Weekend Cooking- Visiting CineBistro in Sarasota

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On our last trip to Florida, we ran into Tropical Storm Emily so we decided to get out of the rain and go to a movie. We both wanted to see Dunkirk since I reviewed the book (here), and we headed over to the CineBistro in Westfield Siesta Key.

When I was in high school and college, I worked at a mall cinema, and it was the best job a young person could have, but that was many years ago. The CineBistro we visited was a stunning sight to behold, and nothing like where I used to work.

After you buy your ticket (or in our case get our Fandango ticket scanned), you enter a huge full bar area, with plenty of seating for those who are having dinner. You don't even have to go to the movies to hang out at the bar.

The bar area

To the left of the bar is a small private dining room that you can rent to have a birthday party. It really seemed like more of an adult place to have a birthday party, rather than for kids.

Party Room

You then walk down a long hall, and you'll see a cart in front of the theater where the next movie starts. On the cart are bottles of wine from Francis Ford Coppola's vineyard (where else?), and samples of the Chef's Menu for the day. Today's menu featured Mojito Chicken Flatbread, Grouper and Guava Empanadas.

The Food Cart

You can order food to be delivered to your seat up to thirty minutes before showtime. Each seat is a huge recliner, with a food tray that swivels in and out for access. We didn't get there in time to order food, so we got popcorn from the concession stand. The popcorn is served in a white ceramic bowl, and the sodas are served in actual glasses. How very grown-up!

Mmm...popcorn

Ad we ate our popcorn and watched the coming attractions with our feet up, we decided that this is the only way to see a movie. We will do all of our movie-going at the CineBistro, even if we have to fly to Florida to do it.

By the way, Dunkirk is an amazing movie. I'm not big on war movies, but this is really the British counterpart to America's Saving Private Ryan. Writer/Director Christopher Nolan is sure to get an Oscar nomination for this incredible cinematic achievement, and my favorite actor, Mark Rylance, is wonderful in this movie as well. I highly recommend you see Dunkirk at your local cinema. And if you have a CineBistro near you, give it a try. Their website is here.

Dunkirk- The History Behind The Major Motion Picture by Joshua Levine

Dunkirk by Joshua Levine
Published by William Morrow ISBN 9780062740304
Trade paperback, $16.99, 339 pages

Christopher Nolan, the creative genius behind The Dark Knight (Batman), Inception and Memento turns his eye next to Dunkirk, which tells the true story of a major British military evacuation off the coast of Belgium during WWII.

Dunkirk is based on a book of the same name by historian Joshua Levine. Levine's 2011 book has been updated for the upcoming movie release, and it is bookended with an interview between Levine and Nolan at the beginning of the book about why Nolan chose this project, and a chapter at the end of the book discussing the process of making the movie, including comments from members of the production team. Movie buffs will love these extra chapters, giving them a fascinating insight into the process of moviemaking.

History buffs will love the actual story of Operation Dynamo itself. I confess to not being a big military history reader, so the sections of the book I found most intriguing had to do with the historical perspective of the events that led up to Britain's involvement in WWII.

Great Britain was still reeling from the effects of WWI, fought nearly twenty years prior. They lost an entire generation of men in WWI, and the thought of losing another generation to a war with Germany was not one that many people wanted to contemplate.

The worldwide depression severely impacted Great Britain, with unemployment high. With no system of welfare, there was tension between the classes, and extreme political parties were able to gain a foothold exploiting this. One can see echoes of this in today's world events as well.

Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain believed that he could work with Hitler's Nazi government to avoid war. He was accused of appeasement, and this led to the election of Winston Churchill as Prime Minister of Great Britain during the most trying time in history.

Churchill approved the plans for Operation Dynamo, which called for the evacuation of as many as 40,000 British troops from Dunkirk. The Germans were about to surround the British and French troops, and in order to save the troops from a certain slaughter or capture, they must arrange for an evacuation. Failure to save these troops would mean that the Allies would most likely lose the war, and the world today would be a much different place if that had happened.

The book goes into great detail about the actual logistics of the evacuation, a monumental task. Every available military and private ship and boat was recruited to make the trip to Dunkirk to ferry the soldiers back to England. There are many remembrances from people who make that voyage, and they are so interesting.

The troops were sent to the beach, and with tens of thousands of soldiers along the beach, some for many days, it became a little city of its own. Men played cards, built small shelters, and waited and waited until it was their turn to wade out in to the sea to be rescued, all while being attacked from the sky by German airplanes.

Levine compared this scene to the one of refugees from war and poverty who are taking any form of floating apparatus to get to the shores of Greece and Italy, an apt comparison.

Dunkirk is a fascinating look at a historical event that many people don't know about. While some people felt that this event was a story of a failed battle, Levine looks at it as an incredible story of survival. The goal was to save 40,000 troops, and the reality was that over 260,000 troops were rescued from the shores of Dunkirk, an astonishing number.

England used Dunkirk as a rallying cry and people in England today still speak of the "Dunkirk Spirit" when talking about bucking up and working together to achieve a goal that seems unattainable.

I highly recommend Dunkirk for movie fans, history and military history buffs.

Joshua Levine's website is here.
The website for the movie Dunkirk is here.

Thanks to TLC Tours for putting me on Joshua Levine's tour. The rest of his stops are here:

Tour Stops

Tuesday, June 27th: Savvy Verse & Wit

Wednesday, June 28th: bookchickdi

Thursday, June 29th: Dwell in Possibility

Friday, June 30th: Mama Vicky Says

Monday, July 3rd: Ace and Hoser Blook

Wednesday, July 5th: My Military Savings

Thursday, July 6th: Books & Tea

Monday, July 10th: Man of La Book

Tuesday, July 11th: A Bookish Way of Life

Wednesday, July 12th: Jathan & Heather

Thursday, July 13th: Tina Says…

At The Movies- Brooklyn

A few years ago I read Colm Toibin's beautiful novel Brooklyn.  He told the story of Eilis, a young Irish woman who leaves her home, her mother and sister in Ireland to come to America for a better opportunity in 1951.

Eilis' sister Rose arranged for Eilis to move to move to Brooklyn where a kindly priest found her a job working in an upscale department store and a place to live in a boardinghouse with other young women.

Eilis was frightened and very lonely, and Toibin made her loneliness feel palpable on the page. I can remember feeling that so many of our own relatives must have felt the very same way, moving away from home and family all alone to a new country.

Toibin's novel was turned into a movie, also called Brooklyn, and I saw it last week. It is such a beautiful work of art, it felt like an old-fashioned MGM movie from the 1950s. The colors are so vibrant, the costumes just so lovely, and Saoirse Ronan is absolute perfection as Eilis.

Her beautiful face just registers all the emotions that Eilis feels- the loneliness, homesickness, fear, and eventually joy and love. Ronan gives a stunning performance, and is in nearly every scene of the movie. Oscar buzz is already building for her, and I would be shocked if she is not nominated.

Director John Crowley creates a work of art here, and Nick Hornsby's script perfectly captures the essence of Tobin's book. All of my favorite book scenes are in the movie.

As Eilis falls in love with Tony, wonderfully played by Emory Cohen, you can feel Eilis coming out of her shell and believing that she can be happy and have a future. Watching them fall in love was so heartwarming.

Tragedy intervenes and Eilis must return home for awhile. When she gets there, she feels torn between her home and her new life, and you will be on pins and needles waiting to get to the end. And even though I knew how it ended, I still felt anxious, that's how well done this movie is.

In the lobby

I give Brooklyn the movie my highest recommendation. Take your mom or your grandma to see it with you.

The City Cinema 1-2-3 on the Upper East Side had a display of one of Eilis' costumes, a black sweater that I coveted from the movie. Maybe there will be a fashion tie-in with the movie?

A closeup of Ellis' sweater and skirt

The link to the homepage for the Fox Searchlight movie is here.

Win A Copy of Gillian Flynn's GONE GIRL Movie Tie-In Book

One of the most highly anticipated movies of the fall season is an adaptation of one of the most popular books of the past few years- Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl. Everyone has been talking about this movie, (which reportedly has a different ending than the book) and with director David Fincher (The Social Network, Zodiac) at the helm and Ben Affleck getting rave reviews for his role as Nick, the husband suspected in the disappearance of his wife, it is sure to be a hit.

Ben Affleck as Nick in Gone Girl

I'm looking forward to this movie, it has a cast- Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Carrie Coon, Kim Dickens and Neil Patrick Harris- that I am intrigued by.

Thanks to 20th Century Fox, I have two copies of the movie tie-in edition of the Gone Girl book to giveaway to my readers. Winners must be in the United States, and to enter just fill in the form below. I will choose two winners on October 3rd, the day of the movie opening.


Fans of Gone Girl can follow Amy Dunne's Pinterest page, where maybe she has left behind some clues as to what happened to her. Click here.

Watch the movie trailer here: