Robert Redford and Barbra Streisand as Hubbell and Katie in "The Way We Were"

Okay, so, see, I was not supposed to be working all summer long and did not anticipate having my reading time reduced to my commute time, so my TBR list (or the Great Reading Challenge of Coach Taylor '14) has not been shrinking half as fast as I'd initially thought it would. In the spirit of these frustrating times, I have divided a plan: add a TBW (to-be-watched? Doesn't sound as catchy, I know, but —) on top of the book piles! Yay!

There's another reason why I want to do this, and that is, because the masochist that I am rewatched "The Way We Were" yesterday, and man is this a gem of a movie. Perhaps even a perfect movie? Barbra Streisand is luminous, as is her wont. I don't know how but she just radiates 'natural' whenever she's on screen. I remember being shocked by this as a kid when I saw "Funny Girl" for the first time. I really didn't expect to be able to relate to a singing and dancing broad in a 1968 musical movie, and yet — she was the most natural, real woman I'd ever seen.

So, yes, "The Way We Were" is sometimes convenient, often caricatural. But the characters are never silly. To me, anyway. You can mock their conviction, you can roll your eyes at the plot's inertia, at the campiness of Katie's Jewish left activism and Soviet paraphernalia, you can cry out "Suspension of disbelief!" at Robert Redford's late-thirties face passing as an all-American college jock face. But all this is decor. It's the varnish coating around the real movie. The real story. It's Hubbell getting Katie to cross the street, it's Katie giving Hubbell a typewriter for Rosh Hashanah, it's Katie calling Hubbell after he's just broken up with her because she can't sleep and she needs to talk to her best friend and it's Hubbell coming over and talking to his best friend and staying until she falls asleep. It's also about people trying to change and people trying to live up to their potential; it's about trying to make things work, about believing in something or someone so much you're willing to deny the expected outcome, to delay the disappointments, hoping for a deus ex machina to soften the blow when the realization of this was never going to work hits. But, honestly...who cares. All I'm saying is: Katie and Hubbell! Katie and Hubbell. The original ship ("with the boat and the... putting the books away?" Yes, this is a Gilmore Girls reference. Deal with it. Well, a Gilmore Girls reference about a "The Way We Were" reference that I am now including in a post about "The Way We Were." Boom! Mind blown. Not). I just love all the small moments in this movie. These small, precious little gifts scattered all over this movie. When Katie asks Hubbell, "Do you smile all the time?," and he says, fighting a smile, "No. No! No." The hand-held closeup of them dancing. When (see picture above) Hubbell takes Katie's hand after her magic trick in the restaurant and kisses them — you know, in the falling-in-love montage that is the best falling-in-love montage you've ever seen, don't lie. "Isn't that dumb? It's so dumb! You're the best friend I've ever had." That moment he cracks during the fight because he's so frustrated with her he can't help but laugh. And then she does, too.

"You'll never find anyone as good for you as I am, to believe in you as much as I do, or love you as much!" "I know that.” "Well then, why?"

And if you're still not convinced, just listen to the goddamn soundtrack alone. Then you can join me as I celebrate the cult of Marvin "God" Hamlisch.

It wasn't my intention to diverge into writing about this movie specifically, but what can you do. Now I'm emotional. Stupid. Anyway, I wanted to write up a list of movies to watch this summer, so here goes nothing.

Documentaries.
Taxi to the Dark Side,
The Bridge,
Man On Wire,
How to Die in Oregon,
Paperback Dreams,
Indies Under Fire

Movies.
Synecdoche, New York
Being There
That Girl
California Split
Harold and Maude
His Girl Friday
Waiting for Guffman
This Is Spinal Tap
Anchorman
Working Girl
Broadcast News
Terms of Endearment
Play It Again, Sam
Bullets Over Broadway
Purple Rose of Cairo
Love and Death
Zelig
Sleeper
Radio Days
Fried Green Tomatoes
Steel Magnolias
Beaches
An Unmarried Woman
Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice
Ordinary People
Carnal Knowledge
Shampoo
The Graduate
Chinatown
Bonnie and Clyde
Days of Heaven
Badlands
Three Women
Mulholland Drive
Thelma and Louise
Sabrina
Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
The Verdict
Twelve Angry Men
Prince of the City
All the President's Men
Wall Street
A Few Good Men
The American President
The Manchurian Candidate
The Towering Inferno
On the Waterfront
Splendor in the Grass
America, America
A Streetcar Named Desire
The Philadelphia Story
The Women
Stage Door
My Dinner With Andre
Sleuth
Howl
Shattered Glass
Adaptation
The Truman Show
Russian Ark
Promised Land
Swingers
Clerks
Slacker
Goodfellas
Mean Streets
Reservoir Dogs
Dazed and Confused
The Pope of Greenwich Village
American Graffiti
Opening Night
A Woman Under the Influence
Kramer vs. Kramer
Oslo 31. August
Nouvelle Donne
West Side Story
Gypsy
Fame
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
The Producers
Pretty in Pink
The Big Lebowski
Boogie Nights
Pulp Fiction
Dr. Strangelove
Rear Window
All About Eve

Television.
The Twilight Zone 1 2 3 4 5
I Love Lucy 1 2 3 4 5 6
The Mary Tyler Moore Show 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Happy Days 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
Fame 1 2 3 4 5 6
Cheers 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
thirtysomething 1 2 3 4
My So-Called Life 1
The Sopranos 1 2 3 4 5 6
Deadwood 1 2 3
Six Feet Under 1 2 3 4 5
Rubicon 1
Enlightened 1 2
30 Rock 1 2 3 4 5 6