Movies I saw in September: Coyote v. Acme, Dog, Heart of the Beast

All three of the movies I saw last month starred dogs, or at least their close cousins, as the first featured perhaps the most doggedly determined predator ever: Wil E. Coyote:

Coyote v. Acme (In theater, 8/11/2026) Grade: B.

This movie has a great concept and stars the very funny Will Forte, so I found myself quite disappointed when I didn’t enjoy it more. 

Because unlike the marvelous Looney Tunes cartoons the story was based on, which thoroughly entertained both kids and adults, I couldn’t tell which audience this movie had in mind.

If it was made for kids, why did we spend so much time in courtrooms and lawyers’ offices? And if it was made for the adults who loved Looney Tunes as kids, why did I only chuckle once? (OK, maybe it was twice. Either way, not nearly enough).

I did smile a lot, but not really at the movie. I was mostly smiling at the memory of those perfectly layered cartoons: Tons of fun visuals and kooky characters on the surface for kids, with plenty of subversive flair underneath to satisfy adults. Take Bugs as Sweeney Todd: Before I understood how murderously accurate the rabbit’s actions were, I just laughed with all the other kids at how funny his fingers looked massaging Elmer Fudd’s scalp in perfect time to the music.

Because overall, watching this movie was like watching an AI-approximation of a loved one: Something that looks and acts 75-percent authentic, and mostly just leaves you aching for the real thing.

Dog (On DVD from library, 9/19/2026) Grade: B-/C+.

Like Coyote v. Acme, this movie had great ingredients, and unfortunately cooked them even less well. It felt like watching someone take a perfect ribeye and russet into the kitchen, then serve you a steak that was chewy and a potato that was still raw inside and you wonder, “How could this happen?”

Really, I want to know: How did people walk into a studio with the always charming Channing Tatum, add a misunderstood dog and drive them both down the beautiful West Coast — then somehow turn those perfect ingredients into a barely satisfying meal?

Maybe there were too many cooks? Because they definitely did too much. Rather than coating your steak with forced slapstick, just let Tatum and the dog hang out more: Less fancy hotel in Frisco, a lot less scary muzzle, a bit more time with the weed-growing hippies, and a lot more just man and beast. Like, say, in the third movie I watched in September:

Heart of the Beast: (In the theater, 9/25/2026.) Grade: B+.

This movie was much better than the Channing Tatum “man and dog” movie, mostly because the cooks here knew just what to do with their perfect steak, Brad Pitt: Just maybe sprinkle on some salt and pepper before cooking it over an open fire.  

And then put that open fire in the Alaskan wilderness, add plenty of dog time (without the Bane muzzle, thank gosh!) and a pinch of J. K. Simmons to help your exposition go down.

But by far my favorite part of watching this movie was seeing it with my friend. First because she is a fellow dog lover, so we both had our eyes filled with tears as we waled out.

And second because when that 74-year-old treated me to a frozen yogurt afterward, she made me laugh harder than anything in Coyote v. Acme when she declared as we sat eating that Pitt had looked “extra delicious.”

That was cool.

Movies I saw in August: End of Oak Street, Tony, The Dog Stars.

"Two women on a plane drinking coffee." My rejected short stories

I didn’t want to talk. I wanted to swim in last night until his scent washed off. 

But food was coming, so I put down my tray table and put up my forcefield. Which only lasted until that damn spork.

She laughed as I took its cellophane jail to my teeth, and a small smile escaped.

“Cold Chinese noodles, perfect for lunch,” she gushed, so happy to finally be talking that I regretted making her wait.

“Yes,” I said, but thinking that my perfect lunch, the empanadas I bought with him across the street from the office, would laugh at a spork.

We ate them while standing just outside the store. He because the crusts were best while they were still warm from the oven, me because everything tasted better while watching him smoke.

So why was sitting on a plane, eating with plastic instead of my fingers? It was time to go back
to my own kitchen, where I wouldn’t find an Australian waiting for kisses.

Kisses I had dragged like a sleeping bag onto three planes; kisses I wanted to crawl back to as
soon as I forced down my noodles. Instead I heard myself asking where she was going. 

To see her son for Mother’s Day. She was very nervous, having never flown without her husband. But he died on Nov. 28. Not seven months ago, not last year. “Nov. 28th.”

She was married to him for 47 years. 

The man I was crying over? I knew him barely 47 days. 

And the time we spent alone together? Not even 47 hours. Only if I included all the minutes I spent watching him reach for yet another beer instead of me could the total even get close.

So what could I say that wasn’t lame? I sipped my coffee, hoping to shake some wisdom loose. But all it offered was his face, laughing at the silly American who packed more things to make coffee with than clothes to wear.

Of course he stopped laughing when that suitcase began to brew what smelled like liquid heaven compared to the caffeinated dust we drank everywhere else.

“You can tell it’s good because of the foam,” he said, finally no sarcasm in that crooked smile as he pulled me out of sight of the others so he could kiss me.

Afterward was all agony and ecstasy: The agony of waiting for everyone else to leave. The
ecstasy of finally being alone. 

Then agony again when I felt one hand take only one second to unhook my bra. These would not be the fumbling fingers I was used to.

Feeling the fear on my skin, his hands stopped. 

“We can... just talk.”

His voice thawed the fear, so I asked for more Aussie to melt it.

“Why do you love surfing?”

“There’s just... nothing else like it. That feeling, when the wave is curling around you, and it’s
just you and the water.”

I tried to imagine not being terrified to have water surrounding me. My mother had been the brave bodysurfer who wore bikinis, but I was too scared to go in the water, too shy to wear a
two-piece.

So I spent all my time at the beach just watching those beautiful surfer boys run out of the
waves and straight to someone else’s towel. Finally now with one standing in front of me, I decided it was time to go into the water.

Because the thing about those fumbling fingers? They seem safe because they can’t dig deep,
but you should know they still get you naked; just naked and bored. I was ready to be naked
and breathless, naked with some naked surfer skin to touch.

So I jumped into the waves, emerging nearly drowned, wearing only a smile. 

And just as I feared, while the water was swallowing my swimsuit, those fingers were opening that hidden room and hanging new pictures on the walls. Pictures I hadn’t stopped staring at since I left: those impossibly blue eyes, the shark tooth lying on that smooth chest, the shark tooth dangling in my mouth.

As she reached for her coffee again, I tried to imagine how many pictures she had collected in 47 years, wondering which were her favorites. I smiled, thinking we were both drinking memories.

But when I lifted my cup, his face was gone. Instead I saw her, drinking one of the 17,155 morning cups of coffee she had with her husband, enjoying just another breakfast in 47 years of laughing and crying, smiling and arguing, with the same face.

And the face I missed? I last saw it floating in her coffee, his smirk disappearing as she emptied her cup.

And my cup? It still had 17,154 more of her mornings for me to drink.

"Two Women on a Plane Drinking coffee," by Justine Frederiksen.

This fiction piece was originally titled "47 Hours" and rejected by The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Sun, and likely others I am forgetting. It is published here because I never, or hardly ever, reject my own stories.

How I finally fell in love with camping: Sleeping in the silence and safety of my car.

Summit lake campground at sunrise.

My mother took us camping in Yosemite National Park every summer when I was a kid.

I realize now that what she did was pretty wonderful. But at the time, I kinda hated it.

Especially the long drive to the park through the hot and boring San Joaquin Valley in my mother’s tiny Honda Civic station wagon, which was so crammed with our equipment and food that my sister and I had to take turns sitting. 

Yep, when the passenger seat was taken, the only other place to shove a small human was in the stifling hot few inches of space on top of the pile of tents and sleeping bags. I can still remember lying there, staring at the roof of the car and praying for the wheels to slow because it meant we were stopping for popsicles again. 

Which was a brilliant tactic by our mother to keep us from completely collapsing into tantrums of despair — since she never let us eat sugar at home, she knew that we would patiently endure nearly anything if it had the promise of frozen sugar water at the end, even hours stuck in a hot car with nothing to do but stare at the fields of crops and play word games. (Since this was the time before you could carry constant distraction everywhere, the only entertainment in our car was what we made ourselves.)

And even when we got to the campground, our time in the car was far from over. Because these were also the days before reservations, my mother’s plan for snagging us a campsite was usually to arrive in the middle of the night, then sleep in in our car while wait for people to leave at first light.

At least the car was cooler and had more room inside when my mother was out prowling for the best site — she always wanted one next to the meadow for the best birding — but I was always too anxious to really sleep, and all I wanted to do at that point was get out of the car.

So many decades later while camping at another national park this year, I was shocked to find myself not only choosing to crawl back into my car to sleep, but actually kinda loving it.

It was on my first night camping at Lassen Volcanic National Park this summer, when I was unable to fall asleep in my tent because my body was aching and the campers next-door would not stop talking, and in desperation I finally I dragged all my sleeping gear into my car.

That was cool.

Watching the sunset from inside my car.

Because my bedding became more comfortable, it was quiet, and I felt more safe in there. Best of all,  I could see the stars, including one streaking across the sky.

Sleeping with a view of the night sky reminded me of the best moments on family road trips, my parents at the wheel, me falling asleep with the trees flying by. 

And one of the things I dislike the most about sleeping in a tent, other than feeling like a human burrito just lying there for animals of all sizes to nibble on, is that you can’t see the stars.

But in the car I had a wonderful view, and though the moon did get too bright — I remember waking up to a bright light shining in my face and being thoroughly confused — so I will definitely need to get window shades for the next time.

Because yes, I think there will be a next time. I liked having all my stuff around me, already packed and ready to drive away with me at any moment. And it felt like sleeping in my own bed almost, because it had years of my own breath and smells and memories all around me. Not like an unfamiliar hotel room, where I never get good sleep the first night, no matter how tired I am.

And I really needed the good sleep in got in my car, because I would not only be climbing Lassen Peak, but fixing my broken sunglasses at the top!

Movies I saw in August: The End of Oak Street, Tony, The Dog Stars

All of the movies I saw in the theater in August were about endings: The first an end to life on Earth as we know it; the second an end of teen-age freedom as the wave of adulthood threatens to drown all hope; and the third an end of wishing for something that might be just beyond reach instead of embracing what you can touch right now.

The End of Oak Street (In the theater, 8/15/2026) Grade: B.

This movie felt like Jurassic Park blended with Stranger Things, a mix that turned two great originals into one pretty OK smoothie.

Because it was a dinosaur movie with too little time spent with the prehistoric creatures and too much on the all-too-typical dysfunctions of a typical suburban family on a typical street in America, though I did enjoy watching Ewan MacGregor playing a middle-aged dad forced to deliver pizzas to pay the bills.

And while I also appreciated watching his teen daughter slipping away to listen to Steve Winwood on a cassette tape in the family car, I couldn’t help feeling that the scene’s purpose was only to have that “analog” technology used so effectively and naturally in Stranger Things. (Cue the kids on bikes!)

Plus, who the heck turns to Steve Winwood when they need to release angst? I sure didn't when I was that teenage girl, because no one in my house ever purchased any Steve Winwood music.

Tony (In theater 8/23/2026) Grade: A.

I loved Anthony Bourdain, and I loved this movie. The perfect portrait of an icon in the making, and a perfect portrayal of teen-age arrogance being sliced and diced by the knives of adulthood that eventually cut us all.

Dominic Sessa was wonderful as the loutish-but-lovable Bourdain, and Antonio Banderas was surprisingly sublime as the boss we all need when we’re young — the one we don’t even realize is squeezing out the best of us while stamping out the worst.

And while its claustrophobic kitchen scenes did not make me miss my time in food service, which also gave me arms full of burn scars from slinging pizzas, they did bring back fond memories of my restaurant mentor, a small but mighty woman named Betty. 

I never had to sleep on her hammock, but I was an orphan she took under her wing, giving me extra bonuses at Christmas so I could pay my phone bill when she demanded I keep my landline.

And while I had to convince her that a girl could run the ovens — and not just on a sleepy Wednesday afternoon, but on the super busy Friday and Saturday nights — the respect and trust I eventually earned from her still means the world to me.

This movie reminds us that often the best lessons in life are learned by being thrown into deep water and told to swim, and that the best people we meet are the ones willing to throw a bucket of cold water on us, both on our face and our fantasies, when we need it the most. 

The Dog Stars (In theater 8/29/2026) Grade: B-/C+.

There was a lot to like about this movie. As Joey from “Friends” declares when eating Rachel's mistake trifle, I declare: Josh Brolin? Good. Guy Pearce and Margaret Qualley? Good. Quiet moments of people surviving the collapse of civilization under expansive skies? Very good.

But like that mistake trifle, which was created from two recipe pages getting stuck together, this movie turned into a Frankenstein’s monster: a bunch of random parts sewn together that never quite meshed. Especially the video-game like scene that melted The Last of the Mohicans, Trainspotting and 28 Days Later, and the even more weird and unsettling David Lynch take on Texas Chain Saw Massacre. 

I’m not sure if director Ridley Scott was encouraged to add all the random chaos to keep the interest of younger viewers, or if all the weirdness was in the novel the film was based upon, but I would have much preferred a much quieter exploration of a man finally being able to leave the guilt of his wife's death behind and accept his current surroundings.

So instead, I recommend watching my favorite Ridley Scott movie, which just happens to be one of my favorite movies of all time, Thelma and Louise.

Movies I saw in July: Obsession, The Odyssey

How I got to the top of Lassen Peak. And fixed my broken sunglasses there!

At the top of Lassen Peak.

I wasn’t sure I could go to the top of Lassen Peak until I met Bob.

“Maybe I’ll just hike to the Grand Vista,” I told myself. “Because I should really get on the road. And I’m tired. And the top looks so far!”

Then I passed another hiker moving very slowly up the mountain.

“Have you hiked this before?” I asked as he stopped to let me pass.

“Yes, every year!” said the 77-year-old, explaining that he had been coming to the park every August, during the sweet spot when it's not too hot and not too cold, for the past few years to summit the 10,457-foot peak. “And I’m going to keep doing it until I’m 80.”

That was cool.

Because he gave me the inspiration to not stop until I reached the top. If Bob can do it, I told myself, I can, too.

Even cooler, though, were the two girls who inspired me to hike even further than Bob.

“That’s where I stop,” he said of the last 200 feet or so of scrambling up rocks, many of them loose, to reach the very tippy top of the peak, located about a quarter of a mile from a nice flat area with amazing views where many of our other fellow hikers were happy to stop, too.

“The most amazing is when you can see Mt. Shasta,” another hiker told me on his way down from the top, explaining that I was not far from what he called “the best sign ever,” since it announced that you were only a half of a mile from the summit.

And after I passed that glorious half-mile sign, then stood at the ridge up top, soaking in the views and gazing at Mt. Shasta, which looked like a big cupcake with vanilla icing that I could reach out and grab, I started to think that I might have gone far enough. 

But then I saw two parents leading their young girls down the rocks from the summit.

“Hey, if those girls can do it, I can, too!” I decided, marching on and meeting the mom along the flat path between the ridge and rocks as she held the hand of her youngest daughter, who appeared to be about six.

“How was it?” I asked, admitting that I wasn't going to try the last section until I saw her daughters coming down. And as she began describing the difficulty of the “scramble” up, my sunglasses broke in half, one lens and ear arm falling to the ground.

“Curses!” she said, which is a good swear word to choose if you’re holding the hand of a first-grader, and I said, “Maybe my sunglasses are trying to tell me I’ve gone far enough!”

But soon I put my glasses back together and secured the broken lens with my hair band — one that I luckily found the day before and picked up because I had forgotten to bring one from home. Yes, the trail provides! — and decided to trudge on after watching the woman’s second daughter scrambling down the rocky peak with her father.

Fixed my broken sunglasses!

And while the little yellow hairband, likely belonging to another young girl, was a bit too small for my hair, it was the perfect size for securing my broken sunglasses, especially since I still needed to see out of them. And Lassen Peak is not a hike you want to do without sunglasses, especially on a bright, clear day with the sun shining off the white rocks.

Once at the top, I chatted with a couple who were enjoying the view and a celebratory beer, which the male half declared “a must!” before tackling the most difficult part of all: heading back down the steep, rocky “trail” on very shaky legs. Thank gosh for my trusty walking stick, which saved me more than once.

And speaking of that stick, it is now adorned with my first summit medallion, a sweet little souvenir sold at the park visitor’s center that luckily my friend told me about, otherwise I might never have bought it.

Because now I can look at it every day, with every next step I take with that stick, and remember not only how I got to the top of Lassen Peak, but all the cool people I met on the way.

That is very cool. 

See more of Lassen Peak in this video:

Walking across the Delaware to New Jersey!

And ss cute and useful as that little yellow hairband was, however, my favorite find on my travels was the ball cap waiting for me on a park bench in Philadelphia, just when I needed it most: while walking around Philly a few years ago without a hat on my first visit there because I didn’t think to bring one. I knew nothing about the city’s weather and planned for days much cooler than the 80-degree heatwave in May! 

But luckily on my first day of walking everywhere in the blazing sun I found a pretty cute, pinkish hat just sitting on a park bench near the Liberty Bell.  So I washed it in the bathroom sink with some soap and water and it became mine. Park benches provide!

Another cool find in Philly was a woman making “hot, fresh donuts!”

Movies I saw in July: Obsession, The Odyssey, Dead Man Down

Both movies I saw in the theater last month featured one-track minds: The first being chosen by a man determined to get home against all odds, Gods and enemies; the second being forced upon a woman against her will and knowledge:

Obsession. Grade: A.

This movie was better than I expected, a feat that was nearly impossible given all the hype it received, and one that was achieved nearly entirely because of the acting by Inde Navarette.

Her perfect casting proves that you can take even the most familiar and predictable story, say someone being granted a wish they soon deeply regret, and make it seem fresh and cool because you have the right people telling it.

Because this movie’s punch could only land if delivered by a woman we believed was possessed, an affliction Navarette embodied by not only melting her face from happy to sad to angry and back again in seconds, but by often swirling all three emotions together in one bubbling cauldron to create one of the most impressive, and truly unsettling, performances I have ever seen. 

As for the movie’s message, I saw it is as a lesson in the dangers of infatuation, particularly the ones we unleash when trying to control it. Because the only thing more impossible than trying to choose who we fall in love with is trying to control who else falls in love with us.

But I certainly don’t blame the young man who tries to have Navarette’s Nikki return his crush, because haven’t we all ached for someone who doesn’t love us back, wishing there was a way to make the person we crave feel the same about us?

I certainly have, and am incredibly grateful no one can buy a One Wish Willow that actually works. Though if you know of a store that carries them, I do need one for the next time I have to watch a smart woman lose all sense over a guy that everyone else can see is a total dirtbag. 

Hey, maybe that can be Navarette’s next movie: Cloak & Dirtbag: A woman suddenly discovers that the man she loves is really a dirtbag hiding all his bad qualities under a magic cloak. So she enlists her friends to find the source of the magic and disarm it, saving the world from Dirtbag Blindness forevermore.

The Odyssey, Grade: A+.

These days I groan if a movie is even over 90 minutes, let alone almost three hours. But I eagerly went to this opus because it was made by Christopher Nolan, since the last film of his I saw, Oppenheimer, was even longer, but I was so happily absorbed I never checked the time once.

And while I will admit the beginning of Odyssey did drag a bit for me, once we get to the Cyclops I was all in, loving my time with Samantha Morton, John Leguzamo and even Robert Pattison, who I sincerely hope loves playing sleazeballs as much as we loving watching him portray them.

But by far the highlight for me was Nolan's realistic version of the Trojan horse, showing how it would really go down with dozens of men crammed into a horse statue for days, pissing and pooping all over each other, then barely able to walk once they finally were freed from it.

The only changes I would make are to swap the characters played by Anne Hathaway and Charlize Theron, because I think Theron would have made a much more compelling queen; and, more importantly, to switch out Tom Holland for someone able to exude a bit more anger and desperation as the son left behind by father he never met. Heck, even Pattison could have done the tortured son almost as well as his delicious dirtbag. Holland might be great as Peter Parker, but he was a bit too bland for that role.

Movies I didn't watch in July:

Dead Man Down: A DVD rented from the library, stopped after only 9 minutes and 40 seconds. Maybe we would have liked it better if we stuck around until Noomi Rapace showed up, but, alas, we didn't.

Movies I saw in June: Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Death of Robin Hood, Disclosure Day.

Movies I saw in June: Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Death of Robin Hood, Disclosure Day

There are three cool things I remember about staying at my grandmother’s apartment in San Jose when I was a kid:

1. Cheeseburgers: While my grandmother was at work, my sister and I were allowed to walk to Marie Callender’s for lunch. I loved everything about that restaurant, especially their cheeseburgers with a magical mix of American cheese, Thousand Island dressing and iceberg lettuce.

2. Television: Grandma allowed us to watch as much TV as we wanted, which was heaven for kids without a television set at home. And other than a couple of hours of Barney Miller and the news after she got home from work, grandma allowed us to watch whatever we wanted, even well after she went to bed. So like a starving person who couldn't leave the buffet table, we would stare at the screen until our eyes could not stay open anymore, usually about the time Benny Hill began chasing women around in circles.

3. Raiders of the Lost Ark: But definitely my favorite memory of San Jose was when grandma took us to see Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark at the Century 21, a dome-shaped theater with a huge, curved screen that was the perfect way to immerse yourself in the amazing adventures of Dr. Jones and his spitfire sidekick. 

So this year when I saw that Raiders was playing in theaters I jumped at the chance to see it on a big screen again, hoping to feel just some of that prior magic. But unfortunately it turned out to be quite the opposite experience, as apparently there were no humans at the theater I went to who could figure out how to properly display the “ancient” media from the 1980s, so the first fifth of the movie was projected in a squished, almost-square ratio that I found incredibly distracting.

Luckily the theater staff finally fixed the problem before the most awesome bar brawl ever, so overall I found it satisfying to see Raiders in a theater again, making it not only the best movie I saw in June, but still in my Top Five favorite movies of all time:

Raiders of the Lost Ark (In the theater in 1981 and 2026!) Grade: A+++

Just like Pretty in Pink, I suppose I really can’t be objective about the grade I give this movie, but tell me I’m wrong thinking its pretty dang perfect?

Not only is it super cool and fun, it is the first movie I remember making me think of the craft and artistry behind the story I was watching, especially details like the plane flying over a map on the screen to tell you where Indy was heading.

And 45 years later, I still think this movie has not only the best bar battle ever, and maybe still the best battle on wheels ever. I will admit that Fury Road’s fantastic chase scenes may finally have topped even Indy’s impressive feat of crawling back from under the truck, but Raiders still did it all first.

By far the most surprising thing about seeing this movie again, other than how crazy young everyone looks now, was realizing how much of it was tailored for a younger audience. With so much of the humor, plot and even love story easily understood and appreciated by children, it's no wonder I fell so completely in love with it.

The Death of Robin Hood (In the theater). Grade: A-.

This movie was brutal, straying about as far from the Disney version of Robin Hood you could get. But I also found it beautiful, especially loving the moody mountain landscapes and the extra moody Hugh Jackman, looking extra dashing in his long, silver locks.

I also enjoy every minute I get to spend with Jodie Comer, though I admit liking those minutes much more when she is asked to behave badly, as in Killing Eve.

As for this movie's story, I found it a nice mix of Dead Man Walking and another one of my Top Five movies, Logan, which features Jackman playing a character I love even more than Indiana Jones: Wolverine. 

And while I love watching Wolverine eviscerate his enemies with the coolest finger swords ever, this movie managed to find the one thing I could not watch Mr. Jackman do: trap and clean a rabbit, which is something I learned all about as a child and need never watch again. So if you don’t want to be reminded that animals are meat, then I suggest you close your eyes whenever you see a rabbit foot, too.

Disclosure Day (In the theater) Grade: B-.

I love that Steven Spielberg is still making great movies more than four decades after Raiders, and I really liked the first two-thirds of this movie, especially enjoying wondering how in the heck Emily Blunt could suddenly read people’s minds, and how Colin Firth could suddenly enter them.

But the last third fell flat for me, as I didn’t understand exactly what either the good guys or the bad guys were trying to accomplish.

Also, I don’t go to movies to see the world I live in, which is just a bunch of people staring at their phones. Not even if they are supposed to be watching old-school media like broadcast TV. I’d rather watch Indy again, squished ratio and all!

Movies I saw in May: In the Grey, Wrath of Man, The Apartment.

Now for the movies my grandmother saw in June of 1999:

6/13 TV: Movie, “Her Alibi.” Sad, but good.

6/19 TV: Morse repeat. Watched “Extreme Measures” again. Good. Hugh Grant, Gene Hackman, who is always believable.

6/21: To show, “Limbo.” Surprised, no ending.

6/23: To show, “Notting Hill.” (2nd)

6/24: To Scotts Valley for show, “The Love Letter.” Good.

6/26: Ran “Desperately Seeking Susan.”

6/27 : To show, “Tarzan.” Good, fantastic digital animation.

6/29: To show, “Red Violin.”

6/30: To show, "Notting Hill." (She went on to see Notting Hill in the theaters nearly a dozen times!)

Read grandma's journal entries from June of 1999 here.