fenchurch | International Movie Rec Day?

Sounds like something someone made up because they were bored and out of ideas for what to watch. :-)

I'm having a bit of a brain-freeze, and I know there are plenty of other movies I should be recommending, but this is the one that always comes to mind first when the subject comes up, so you get only one.

American Dreamer -- Everyone needs to see this movie. It's got humor, romance, action, and some great chemistry between the two leads (JoBeth Williams and Tom Conti). It's also the sort of movie that almost no one knows about, but nearly everyone loves once they see it (when I worked in a video store in high school, it was the movie I recommended most to people, and everyone raved about it when they brought it back). Sadly, just about the only way to see it nowadays is if you own a copy, happen to have a video store nearby that has an ancient copy, or if you can catch it when it plays on cable.

Basic plot: Kathy Palmer, house-wife, loves the Rebecca Ryan books (they're sort of quasi-romance/mystery/spy novels), and enters a contest to write in the style of the author... she wins, getting a free trip to Paris for two. Her jerk of a husband doesn't like the idea (presumably because he likes having more control over her life), so she winds up going without him. While sight-seeing before a dinner in her honor, she's in an accident and suffers a blow to the head... when she wakes up, she believes she's Rebecca Ryan and hijinks ensue.

Something kinda funny... when I was watching my aging copy of it a few years back, I noticed a familiar name on the screen: David Greenwalt. So, for those BtVS and AtS fans out there, yet another reason to see this movie... he co-wrote it with another occasional AtS writer, Jim Kouf.

If you manage to track down a copy, be sure to watch until you see the credits... you would not believe the number of people who rented it and shut it off too early, believing the movie was over (there's a scene where it looks like the movie is done, with the camera pulling up and away and the background music rising).