So there’s the 12 days of Christmas movies. Hope you all enjoyed it. If you have any Christmas titles that I missed, or you are offended weren’t on the list, please feel free to keep it to yourself.

The faster life’s pace, the harder the holidays are. We roll our eyes at Charlie Brown’s Christmas Special. We want to punch through a wall when we hear Christmas songs on the radio (shuttup chipmunks! Why are your voices so high??). We don’t hate the holidays, but the songs and the specials and the decorations have slowly transformed from heralds of joy to harbingers of doom. We hate the lines, the traffic, the cold, the commercialism, the recession, the fact that everyone around us is being an asshole, even while they’re wearing those damn puffy hats.

The spirit of Christmas is important, and not just between October and January. That spirit is hope, encouragement, wonder, optimism, love, sharing, humanity. It’s a spirit that should be with us all year round. It’s that kind of spirit that drives creativity, art, passion, life. We don’t like painful songs because we enjoy pain. We like them because they express things we can’t, and let us know we’re not alone. We don’t watch sad movies or read sad books because we like to feel bad. We do it because we like to feel. To believe that things can get better. That we as humans can build on any experience and turn it into a lesson, a work of art, a meaningful piece of society and life. sexy gypsy is about a generation. This generation is a victim of cynicism. Not a purveyor of it. We have to push past it, even if it’s only for a couple months a year, so the generation before us sees we’re stronger than them. So the generation after us has something to believe in, something to learn from. Even if it’s just candy canes and the 30 Rock Christmas special.

Merry Christmas, movie house.

-sexy gypsy

I know, I know, it’s been a long time. I apologize for leaving you without a dope beat to step to. Unfortunately, the almighty dollar still trumps fulfilling passion. At least for the time being.

I think the older I get, the sneakier the holidays become. I used to start anticipating Christmas morning in July. Lately, though, I’m lucky if I know what day it is, let alone the month. All of a sudden, Zombie Santas are knocking on my door, asking for candy and granting New Years wishes to pilgrim turkeys, and I realize I haven’t heard the words “Christmas” and “cheer” in the same sentence in years.

And why would I? From Black Friday to Christmas Eve, we’re generally embroiled in the gladiatorial deathmatch that is consumerism. But when 10% of the country is unemployed and welfare is in trouble, who can muster the Christmas spirit? When the atheist minority in this country continues to bitch and moan that the holiday celebrating Jesus’ birth involves too much Jesus, how the hell am I supposed to enjoy my all-too-rare silent nights?

With Christmas movies, of course.

Christmas movies are, in my humble opinion, the last bastion of holiday hope in an increasingly jaded and disconnected society. Nowadays, you can’t expect your five-year-old to believe in Santa when he can get on Wikipedia using his Android phone and read about the myth of Jolly Old St. Nick. But you can bombard him with visions of sugar plumbs and charming indoctrinations. Like bells have something to do with angels, and no jury in the world will convict an old guy in a puffy hat.

I’ve seen more Christmas specials advertised on TV this year than in many years before, and it has inspired me to create a little Christmas cheer myself. Starting tomorrow, we will spend twelve days reminiscing about our favorite Christmas movies. I guess you can reminisce about your favorites too. As long as you do it quietly.

NOTE: If you are expecting films like It’s a Wonderful LIfe or Miracle on 34th St, try looking at every other site on the internet. That’s not how we roll.

-GWG

Last night some of our good friends released their independent documentary, Supermarket Boys, on Vimeo. Directed by Jackson Boren and edited by Brian Bazemore, the films speaks of friendship and fashion in 2006 San Francisco. In their words:

“Its the summer of 2006… In the heart of San Francisco three friends find themselves immersed in a fashion subculture known as street wear and inspired to create a line of t-shirts that defines their lives within it. Abdul, Ezra and Will each face immense personal struggles that will test their will to overcome and ultimately decide the fate of the silkscreen dream they call ‘Supermarket.’ In this coming of age documentary, the three young men strive to search beyond the fast paced, big city life they live and find something real in each other: true friendship.”

You can expect a more thoughtful exposition of Supermarket Boys in the coming weeks. But until then, I highly suggest you take the time to watch this film. Get on the Boren/Bazemore bandwagon before they blow up. You can say you knew them back when. I did.

Supermarket Boys

-GWG

I know. Posts have been scarce in the past month or so. My apologies. Life has been crazy—full of moves, trips to Ireland, trips to Napa and other general life stuff.

But we’re making up for it. Tomorrow marks the beginning of Old School Week. In the spirit of last year’s Superhero Week, we’re going to set aside five days to focus on a particular theme. This time it’s the old school.

We’ll share our favorite musicians and filmmakers from generations past. And hopefully, you’ll discover something you’d never experienced in the process. Join us next week as we celebrate those that came before us.

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Your Fearless Leader

As you can see, we’re making some changes to the site. We’ve made the long awaited move from WordPress.com to a self-hosted WordPress installation. So please bear with us as we get everything set up. Hopefully everything will be back up and running by sometime this week. If any of you have some dope WordPress theme suggestions, please leave a comment with a link. It would be greatly appreciated.

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Your Fearless Leader.

Just wanted to let you guys know, our friend and one time contributor, Tyson, is doing big things these days. In addition making everyone’s day a bit more hilarious, he’s refreshed his blog, Lazy Sportswriting. His latest article, When The Man Comes Around: Johnny Cash and Professional Athletes is a great take on how different the lives of athletes could be, had they just listened to Johnny Cash.

You can follow him on Twitter, email him at tysonqsports@gmail.com or become his fan on Facebook. Check out his work, you won’t be disappointed.

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Your Fearless Leader

I know the Day 2 video isn’t working properly. We’re working on it and will get it up and fixed as soon as possible. I apologize. Please stay tuned for more Ashland Independent Film Festival videos and updates including our bonus video on Reversion and an exclusive interview with one of the filmmakers.

Again, I’m sorry about the technical difficulties, we’ll get it up and running as soon as possible.

Until Next Time,

Your Fearless Leader

Lately, it’s been pretty crazy over here at sexy gypsy. First it was Superhero Week and now we’re in the middle of covering the Ashland Independent Film Festival. But I want to take the time to introduce a new category—Current Events.

This is something we’ve been wanting to add since we started sexy gypsy. But, unfortunately we haven’t found the right person or the time and motivation to write it ourselves. Thankfully, our good friend, Nils Jordan has agreed to help us out and contribute from time to time.

So please welcome him to the sexy gypsy family. I’ll let him introduce himself now:

I’m Nils. I’m livin’ in the Napa Valley with my wife trying to eek out a living while paying back the Man. I’m young, educated and will be using sexy-gypsy as an outlet for (hopefully) successful rants about what is wrong with our society.

You can follow Nils on Twitter here.