August 2016: Watched, Read, Loved

Watched:

At home:

Bring it on Again. I was in a mood where I felt I could handle cheerleaders, and decided to go down the dark dark road and watch some Bring it On. It really wasn’t bad at all, and I thought this second one was actually way better than the one with Kristen Dunst in.

Bring it on: All or Nothing

Hayden Panateirre and Solange Knowles do the whole face off then friends routine in this Bring it On sequel. This one is the best of the lot, and there is a lot of sneaky humor in if you know where to look.

Zodiac

I am still so impressed with this movie. It is a great cast and an excellent story, and I wish I’d thought to put it on my Blindspot list this year! (if only because I already had it available!)

Blindspot: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. This is my Blindspot for JULY, mind you. I have decided that I can’t commit to this exercise next year – it is truly a great concept but I am rather undisciplined and it takes some time and effort sourcing these movies. My plan is to Blindspot you all for a couple of weeks to catch up and end this project properly at the end for the year. Zoe gave me a great idea to do, which I will develop, and tell you all about it when the time comes J As for the movie, I really really loved this film.

In cinemas:

I haven’t been able to get to the movies as much as I’ve wanted to the past few months. I managed to watch Suicide Squad. I liked it, and it seems that a lot of people really hated it. There are some flaws, but it wasn’t as bad as everyone is making. I actually think I will get the DVD when this is released, just to give you an idea of how much I enjoyed it.

Series:

I finished the highly entertaining Vampire Diaries season 4. I’m not sure whether I can start with Season 5 before my exams, which is probably not the best idea for anyone’s marks at this point. You can read my reviews of Season 1 and Season 2 in the links. Season 4 felt a very slight dip in quality. I felt however that it actioned a lot of items on its’ plate, and that it followed a natural progression for all the characters. And OMFG the males in this show is so ridiculously attractive ❤

Jessica Jones. WTF? This show went from okay at the beginning and just went downhill as the season went on. So many things went wrong, so many bad writing choices. I am really the Marvel fan, but this was a bad job and no one is convincing me otherwise.

Read:

I’m actually reading a lot of books again, and playing around with reviewing them again as I haven’t done them in ages and they were reviewed at the beginning of this blog. I reread Twilight (don’t ask) with the intention of reviewing all four books, but I am struggling with New Moon – it is definitely the most tiresome of the series. I ordered Marian Keys’ latest novel (The Woman Who Stole My Life). I am really excited about that. As usual I have about ten million reads to get through. I made a list here and haven’t really touched that list yet, so I should likely also focus on that. I think when I have my degree it won’t even be the success of completion that will satisfy me the most, it will be the freedom I have to do what the hell I want.

Favorite links:

Zoe sent me this Thor clip to watch. It is so funny! Mjolnir even has his own bed!

What’s been happening in your life?

September 7, 2016September 2, 2016 by Natasha Categories: 2016, Life, Life Lately, UncategorizedTags: August, Bring It On, Bring it On again, Bring It On In it to win it, cheerleaders, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Jake Gyllenhall, Jessica Jones, Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Katy Perry, Kristen Dunst, Kristen Ritter, Life Lately, Marian Keyes, Mark Ruffalo, monthly rundowns, Movies, New Moon, Olympic Games, Reviews, Robert Downey Jnr, Stephanie Meyer, Suicide Squad, The Woman who stole my life, Thor, Twilight, Vampire Diaries, Zodiac 5 Comments

Blindspot 2016: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)

Plot: When their relationship turns sour, a couple undergoes a procedure to have each other erased from their memories. But it is only through the process of loss that they discover what they had to begin with.

Rating: 8.5/10

Phew! I am so glad I finally got to watching one of the movies on my list. I have been terrible so far with Blindspots this year. I don’t know why – maybe I’m just way too busy and a lot of the movies aren’t looking that appealing for me. I’ve had some which really disappointed me – especially Love Actually and Home Alone. But I really want to finish this list even if I’m not doing this run next year. I mean, I really love the theory behind Blindspot, but I am personally way too rushed and disorganized to pull off watching older movies in specific time frames.

Anyway, back to the actual review here. I avoided reading anything about this movie before I watched it. I had heard that it was particularly good, but I had no idea what to expect. It turned out to be an excellent decision, because it has been a while since I found anything to be so refreshing or unique.

The first thing that really impressed me is with how well this movie flowed. It was an effortless move shot to shot. I also really enjoyed that while there were parts of this film that could have been confusing it really wasn’t, and that the mystery didn’t cause confusion because it was so well laid out.

Another thing I really loved was that each actor/actress was in such a different roles they would usually get cast in. Jim Carrey is the star here with an unparalleled performance as the main character. He was painfully sweet and adorable, and just wanted to hug him and make him feel secure. It is standout work here in my opinion, some of the best of his career. Kate Winslet was also enormously surprising. I’ve always admired her work, but I am forever more linking her to Rose in Titanic, and Clementine can’t be more different to the classy Rose. I was always unsure whether I liked Clementine or not. She was dramatic and insecure and mistreated Joel terribly in my opinion. But she was also unique as a character and an entity in Hollywood scripts. It is rare to see such a perplexing oddball female character depicted. Elijah Wood was such a little creep as Patrick. I mean really, what he did was gross. Young Mark Ruffalo is also in here. I’m just loving the guy at this point. He is such a great actor, and I’ve caught a couple of films where he is in lately and every single time I thought him well layered and talented. Stan is really just every young guy around – a little goofy, enjoys his job but still not immune to the temptations life has to offer. He was worth a few chuckles because I just know so many guys like him at this point, though sadly not quite as attractive.As for the last female star, I can never really decide whether I like or dislike Kristen Dunst. I really liked her as Mary Stevo because she refrained from coming across as whining. She was so sweet and light at times, only to have her shocker revealed to her when she least expected it.

There are a ton of other things I really enjoyed – the story especially, but I won’t go into too much here because you want to watch this without spoilers. I also appreciated the length, it was just right. There is also something really feel good about this entire film, an underlying optimism that is absent from so many other films. It is totally worth the watch if you have the time!

September 5, 2016September 2, 2016 by Natasha Categories: Blindspot, Movies, movies, Review, Reviews, UncategorizedTags: Blindspot 2016, Elijah Wood, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Jim Carrey, Kate Winslet, Kirsten Dunst, Mark Ruffalo, Movies, Reviews, Tom Wilkinson 7 Comments