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My lovely sister asked me to take some senior photos of her. We went to a local park and had a fun few hours making some pretty pictures. A great day and a great subject makes my job easy!

Well, Happy Valentine’s Day to everyone. As I pondered what to blog about this week, I felt it fitting to focus on romance in one way or another. After throwing out several ideas, including an in-depth character analysis of Jack & Rose or a follow up blog as to why I watched Frozen a 5th time, I decided to go with something broader. I think it’s always wise to take a step back and see the big picture. It’s fun to analyze stories and characters but I rarely ask myself – Why do I like this stuff? Why do I stay awake for hours playing scenes in my head? Well, I thought I’d share some of that today and tell you about my love affair with cinema. 

It’s time I do another Top 5. This week, I’ll explore my top 5 actors. Before I begin, let me share with you the criteria by which I determined these list toppers. It starts with variety. I took each of these actors and looked at their bodies of work. If I only saw one type of character permeating the titles of their filmology, I crossed them off my list. It’s easy for actors to get type casted and remembered as “Harry Potter” but each of these has broken that mold and tackled a several very different characters. I wanted to see changeability both in the story and from movie to movie. How well do they hit their beats or moments? Can I relate to the characters they portray? But most importantly, I want to forget that they’re acting. 

There’s this restaurant in New York called Serendipity. It houses some decadent desserts though I’ve not been graced with their flavors yet. My friend told me we could go but not until we watched the movie, Serendipity, starring John Cusack. I agreed with her wisdom and we decided to watch the feature that upcoming weekend. I mentioned it to my roommate and he was instantly excited and said he might invite a few friends. Sounds great. Come Saturday and I assumed with the upcoming chick flick that my roommate’s friends would be girls. Wrong. I opened the door to three guys. So in a serendipitous moment, we had five guys and one girl, sitting down to watch John Cusack woo Kate Beckinsale. Everyone loved it. 

Stories are comprised of words. In one way or another, it takes those smaller parts to piece together the full picture. I’m fascinated by words. If I suddenly find myself with loads of time, I want conduct a study of words and their evolution and meaning over time and throughout culture. It’s amazing how much power these foundational blocks of storytelling hold.