The Fall: Season 3

After waiting what felt like 2 years (it might have actually been that long) for Season 3 of The Fall, I never even watched it at the time it was shown on TV. Doh! Talk about double standards. I started watching BBC’s The Fall not long after is started in 2013; it came onto my radar when a bunch of whingers complained about the violence in it. What is it about a show receiving complaints that makes it so irresistible? Maybe it was a ploy all along. Plus, Jamie Dornan was the lead and with the rumours going round that he was playing Mr Grey in Fifty Shades, I wanted to see what he was all about.

If you’ve never heard of The Fall, let me fill you in a little. It’s a British Crime/Drama, a cat and mouse game between the police, led by Stella Gibson (Gillian Anderson) and serial killer Paul Spector (Jamie Dornan). Spector has a career as a grief counselor with a wife and 2 children back at home, but in his spare time he preys on women and murders them in unsettling ways. That’s as far as you need to go if you haven’t seen Season 3 yet, the rest of this post is going to riddled with spoilers.

Season 2 ended with Spector being shot whilst in police custody, and it was questionable whether he would survive the ordeal when the credits rolled. I liked this ending, and although it would have been a shame if Spector died from the attack, I could envisage how the rest of Season 3 would go. It seemed reasonable to assume he would live, but when Jamie Dornan started promoting the new Season a few weeks before it returned, he told everyone that Spector was going to survive, and that took the edge off a little. Why tease us if it was that obvious?

Episode 1 was arguably more difficult to watch than some of the actual murder scenes. There’s a reason I don’t watch shows like ER! The entire episode was dedicated to the hospital staff trying to save Paul Spector. Interesting, but it was unnecessary to drag it out an entire hour. Of course, the big twist here is when Spector wakes up, he has amnesia, and thinks it’s 2006. I’ll admit, I didn’t see this coming, and it was quite exciting to see how this would change the investigation.

From there however, everything blurred into one, long episode. There were plenty of new plot points opened up, how Spector’s babysitter Katie (Aisling Franciosi) was going off the rails, how Spector’s poor wife Sally Ann (Bronagh Waugh) was driven to attempt to kill not only herself but her children, and the case being built by the scumbag lawyers against Gibson. The problem is, as interesting as those points were, they got scrunched up and thrown into the trash with that ending.

I haven’t been so mad about a TV Show's ending since Dexter. It’s not the fact that Spector died, it’s the fact that so much story got abandoned in the process. It made the entirety of Season 3 pointless.In the end, I felt much like Gibson. Tired. I even read today that the writers aren’t sure if that’s the actual ending or not. So there might yet be a Season 4! Well, at least a new Season of Fargo is around the corner to fill this void in my life.

Review: Arrival (2016)

Oh boy. I know this year has been a bit of a stinker for blockbusters, but overall I personally think it’s been a fantastic year, and now a new movie has rocked up threatening to become my favourite of the whole year. November, you are awesome. This also means that I’ve been to the cinema two weeks in a row, which is honestly the first time that’s happened all year. Two Amy Adams movies in a row, too!

Arrival is directed by Denis Villeneuve, the master behind Sicario, Prisoners, Enemy and Incendies. He’s currently working on Blade Runner 2049. This man is fantastic, I can’t emphasise that enough. I haven’t watched a movie of his yet that hasn’t wowed me, and Arrival is no exception. The UK has been marketing the hell out of this flick, in fact last time I was at the cinema, during the trailers we were shown 2 different Arrival trailers in a row. It was starting to get on my nerves a tad, but only because I didn’t want to know so much before going in.

First and foremost, this isn’t a Sci-Fi in the typical sense. It’s an alien invasion, for sure, but if you’re expecting Independence Day then this isn’t the movie for you. The world is most definitely at risk here, but there’s no room-shaking action sequences or alien punching of any kind. Our main character is Louise (Amy Adams), an expert linguist recruited to work with scientist Ian (Jeremy Renner) to learn from the aliens what their purpose on Earth is. Twelve pods have descended in seemingly random locations around the world, and they don’t seem intent to blow us into smithereens. 

I never excelled in science, and I can’t speak a second language, so I was grateful for the fact that I could easily understand what was happening during the movie, and actually found myself completely in awe of the linguistic work that Louise was doing. It’s fascinating stuff! How she went about teaching the aliens (heptapods, if you’ll excuse my most likely bad spelling) simple vocabulary, to lead up to actually asking a question was something that seemed impossible at first, but when broken down into stages, actually made a lot of sense.

Louise herself is a captivating character. We are drawn to her instantly and warm to her within the first few scenes when we’re shown a tragic moment in her life. She feels so real, and relatable. I’m pretty sure if we were sent up into a pod to talk with an alien we would freak out as much as she did, rather than staying cool and calm, with our hair and make-up perfectly in tact. But I’m getting off topic now.

I’m almost trying not to talk about the movie to be honest, because I want to be really careful about what I say. The less you know, the better, because the final 20 minutes of Arrival was one of my favourite movie experiences ever. That feeling in your mind of everything clicking into place is just amazing. 

Safe to say, my husband fully forgave me for scaring the crap out of him last week when we saw Nocturnal Animals, and he’s even gone so far as to say this might be his favourite movie of all time! It’s definitely threatening to become my favourite of the year.

Review: Nocturnal Animals (2016)

I don’t remember ever going into the cinema as blind as I did last week for Nocturnal Animals. I’d heard a lot of buzz surrounding the name, I’d watched the trailer (once) which didn’t give much away at all, and I knew Jake Gyllenhaal was in it. That was enough for me, and I somehow convinced my husband to come along too. I don’t know how I did it, but I have a feeling it may have been something to do with the ever beautiful Amy Adams.

Before I go into an actual review, I have to share a funny moment with you. Tuesday and Wednesday showings have a silly amount of adverts before the movie, because of the wildly popular ‘Meerkat Movies’ 2-4-1 deal. This poor couple in front of us were already there when we arrived, sat through the whole slog of ads, the 5 trailers (although we were shown the Arrival trailer twice in a row, odd) and when the BBFC ratings screen came on with ‘Nocturnal Animals’ emblazoned on the left hand side, they realised they were in the wrong screen. I hope they didn’t miss too much of Doctor Strange, because that opening scene was awesome.

Anyway! Nocturnal Animals is a dark movie split into two narratives. First we have Susan (Amy Adams), an art gallery owner living a seemingly-perfect life in her mansion of a house adorned with staff, and a husband who sadly, is hardly ever at home. One morning she receives a parcel from her ex-husband Edward (Jake Gyllenhaal), a manuscript for a book he’s written that he wants her thoughts on. The book turns out to be dedicated to Susan, but is a dark and twisted story, which haunts her.

Whenever Susan starts reading the book, we get to see it played out, by Jake Gyllenhaal himself and his book-wife (Isla Fisher). Their story isn’t for the feint-hearted, it’s a cruel and violent tale. Some scenes are particularly difficult to watch, and I get the feeling they were deliberately made as long as possible to make the audience uncomfortable. If that is the case, it definitely worked on me. I kept thinking to myself ‘Oh that won’t actually happen though, they wouldn’t show us that’ and then they did! I’m getting the shivers just thinking about it.

So, whilst we see Edward’s story played out in snippets, we also go back to Susan often to learn more about her, and more importantly, what happened all those years ago between her and Edward. There’s a theme of revenge here for sure, and we know that Susan left him, but not why, or under what circumstances. It’s really well edited in these sections, the way something happens in the book that then takes us back to real life, and editing isn’t something that I normally take notice of.

Of course, I won’t give anything away, but I love an ambiguous ending. One that’s satisfying enough when taken at face value, but when you start to analyse every little detail, you begin to come up with different theories about certain elements. 

I really loved this movie, but I will NOT forgive that jump scare. You can witness it for yourself, I’m not going to warn you, but it scared the crap out of the entire screen. Then I had to watch the next ten minutes from the corner of my eye in case something else happens. My poor nervous wreck of a husband now labels Nocturnal Animals as ‘that piece of sh*t movie that scared me’. He liked it of course, but he’s a bigger scaredy cat than me!

So yes, big seal of approval from me. Just...skip the opening credits if you can...trust me.

I Sat Through Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Gather round ladies and gentleman, it’s story time. I come from a movie-loving family, as you well know by now. I grew up watching National Lampoon’s Vacation every Bank Holiday. Nowadays, every Sunday the talk over the dinner table is usually themed around what movies we’ve seen that week, and once every couple of months we all get together on a Friday night for a family movie night which involves take out, and far too many pause breaks.

Our Whatsapp group will ping like crazy before these nights, with suggestions thrown in for which movie we should see. Our audience ranges from very young (under 10) to very old (sorry Grampy) with all ages in between, so finding the perfect choice is difficult. But you can guarantee every time, my Dad will suggest Lawrence of Arabia. Why? It’s his favourite movie, apparently! For years we’ve put up with this, and in turn he’s had to put up with us laughing at him. It was his birthday on 1st November though, and I suggested that we all give in and watch it together for his birthday. So we did!

Suddenly, one part of the family were ‘busy’ so our numbers were diminished. This might have had something to do with the fact my Dad announced he had a remastered version on DVD which included an interlude, bringing the runtime to just under 4 hours. Good Lord! Nonetheless, pizza was ordered, and we started the movie. Well, we started Disc 1 of the movie, because the thing is so big it won’t fit onto one disc.

Oh, were you expecting an actual movie review here? No, sorry, that’s literally impossible for me. I don't know how to review this I’m afraid. I will announce a spoiler alert from here on out however, because I truly don’t know what can be considered a spoiler in the tale of Lawrence of Arabia.

We start out with a message from the composer, who said something about his music being so bloody fantastic that any visuals would distract us, so we were greeted with a black screen and almost 10 minutes of music before we even started. Following that, confusion as we see Lawrence get his motorcycle gear on and go out for a ride. We were fairly sure a desert was involved in this movie. After that? Um. Well. He died! I mean, spoiler alert movie, GAWD.

To begin with, we all got quite invested in the story. Lawrence was a bit of a full of himself guy, but we liked his spirit and we look a liking to the guide that was with him in the desert. I think we were gearing ourselves up for a road-trip-buddy kind of movie, but then the guide got killed and we all felt a bit sad for him for a while. Who knew wells were so important in the desert? We mourned the guide collectively until we came across the two young lads that eventually worked for Lawrence. Our favourite moment was when one pompous guy shooed the pair away, and they retaliated by shoving their stick up his camel’s butt. That moment killed me!

So, some more things happened, lots of talking, some war, and the oldest of my two little brothers announced we were well over half way though the movie. Great, we thought! This hasn’t seemed so long after all. Then approximately thirty minutes later, the screen went black and asked us to insert Disc 2 to commence the interlude and the second half. WHAT. At this point our enthusiasm was shattered, my youngest brother fell asleep, and we sat quietly through the rest of the story. Even the dog had enough at that point. Let me tell you, much rejoicing was done when the credits finally rolled.

On a more serious note, the story of Lawrence of Arabia is quite fascinating, as we learnt that the whole time he was just being used by both sides, his passion taken full advantage of. The music was beautiful, and fit the moods perfectly. The visuals were a sight to behold (my youngest brother shouted out ‘hashtag silhouette goals’ so you know these visuals are on point). It was just at least 2 hours too long for me, for any of us, other than my Dad of course.

Our next family movie night is in 2 weeks time, and my Dad has stayed unusually quiet in the Whatsapp group. We’re all on the edge of our seats waiting to find out what his next suggestion might be.

So, to finally finish, I do recommend Lawrence of Arabia, but watch it over a couple of days.

Review: Swiss Army Man (2016)

Oh boy, I’ve been looking forward to Swiss Army Man for so long now, it feels like forever since the trailer was released. I’m surprised I managed to find myself a cinema buddy for this one. When I first saw the trailer I felt a mixture of shock and disgust, but a second viewing really opened my mind to the possibilities.

The easiest way to describe Swiss Army Man is: Paul Dano is lost on an island, ready to end his life out of desperation and loneliness, until he spots Daniel Radcliffe’s flatulent corpse washed up on the beach, and uses him to try and find his way back home. No exaggerations, there. You thought The Lobster was the weirdest movie you’ve ever seen? Think again!

Paul Dano and Daniel Radcliffe are an absolute delight. I’m not sure just how much acting Radcliffe had to do here, but nonetheless, he really pulled off the dead-guy demeanor. I don’t know enough about movie awards to know Swiss Army Man’s Oscar chances, but Paul Dano would be in my nominations list for sure. This can’t have been an easy role to take on.

If you’ve seen the trailer, you’ll know what to expect, but a few things did shock me whilst I was watching. First and foremost is just how gross this movie was. Flatulence is one thing, we all have it, let’s be honest. I’ve never had it quite so badly that I could propel myself and another person across the ocean, but still, that’s not the worst part. Hank (Dano) uses Manny (Radcliffe) as a water source by quite literally squeezing the liquid out of him. Hurck. The most useful thing Manny can be used for is a compass. How? His boner leads the way. Yep. That’s about it for grossness, but Manny can also shoot things from his mouth and chop wood. Swiss Army Man for sure!

The best part of the movie is the mystery of it all. I started to wonder whether Manny was even real, especially when Hank seemed to talk through his issues with him. Was Hank ever even lost, or had he just ran away? Hank has a fascination with a girl he saw on the bus, and re-enacts scenes with Manny by dressing up and even recreating the bus out of whatever he can find in the woods. It’s really quite incredible. I also thought Manny got more and more lifelike the more Hank started to find the root of his issues. He’s clearly a very troubled man.

Of course, there are also several laugh out loud moments. The boner scene was pretty funny until it got a little too much, and the first moment Manny spoke just to be punched in the face had me crying. Hands down, the best line in the movie is spoken by Hank: “If you don’t know Jurassic Park, you don’t know sh*t.” That line, coupled with the use of the Jurassic Park soundtrack, is nothing but pure genius, and is the real stand out moment of the entire movie.

I just don’t know how to feel about the ending. I mean, I don’t know how I wanted it to end myself, I guess I just couldn’t picture it. The movie itself is like nothing I’ve ever seen before, but the ending reminded me of Safety Not Guaranteed, and I never fully knew how to feel about that ending, either.

Swiss Army Man will be ‘too weird’ for many, but in a world full of superhero movies, sequels and remakes, this is a breath of fresh air for me.

Review: Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016)

I’ll give any movie a try, within reason. I don’t listen to critic reviews, but I place a lot of faith into bloggers’ opinions. Bloggers review movies for fun in their spare time, you know you’re going to get nothing but their own opinions from their reviews. Hunt for the Wilderpeople only came into my radar a few weeks ago, and every blog review I read had nothing but praise for it. That was enough to convince me to add it to my watch list, but once I realised that it’s directed by Taika Waititi, the genius behind What We Do in the Shadows, I made it my mission to watch it as soon as possible.

Hunt for the Wilderpeople is based off a book by Barry Crump called Wild Pork and Watercress. It has that book-adaptation feel to it (don’t ask me to explain that feeling - I can’t) anyway, and it’s broken up into Chapters which sum up the ongoings well. In fact, I’d really love to give the book a go, I hope it’s as funny as the movie.

Ricky (Julian Dennison) is a troubled young boy, moving around different foster homes. He’s dropped out at the farm belonging to Bella (Rima Te Wiata) and Hec (Sam Neill) as a last chance. If he screws this up, he’s going to end up in Juvy. Ricky struggles to settle in his new home, despite the love and attention given to him by Bella, and so he runs away into the bush. Hec goes out to find him, and the result is a national manhunt for the pair as it appears that Hec has kidnapped Ricky.

It’s a funny coincidence that I watched this in the same week as Swiss Army Man, because they both have a lot of similarities!

Waititi’s style is clear in this movie. It’s got that same sense of humour as What We Do in the Shadows, and it’s quirky from start to finish. Julian Dennison absolutely shines as the child star of the movie, and his delivery of the witty lines is perfect. He’s just like a lot of other 13 year olds, thinking he’s a gangster because he’s shoplifted a chocolate bar, played GTA and listens to rap music. Yet he’s such a likeable character!

Every time I watch a movie set in New Zealand, I’m taken back by the beauty of the country. I’m sure a lot of work went into the cinematography, but honestly, the setting does half the work itself, it’s gorgeous to look at.

The movie walks that line of Comedy and Drama perfectly without throwing the tone all over the place. It has some horrendously sad moments that had me sobbing quite openly, although I won’t discuss why because of spoilers, but it’s also one of the funniest movies I’ve seen all year. The dialogue is brilliant, thanks in part to the chemistry Julian Dennison and Sam Neill share. 

I’ve been trying to balance this review out with a few negatives to warrant the 9/10 score I wanted to give it, but I’m really struggling. Originally I thought the roles of the Child Protection Officer and her Policeman companion were too campy, but actually, they fit the overall feel of the movie perfectly, especially when I try to compare it to What We Do in the Shadows. I very rarely give perfect marks to any movie, I think there’s always room for improvement, but I can’t find it here!

Halloweenie Review: The Babadook (2014)

There are several coping mechanisms that I use when watching a horror movie. My favourite is keeping a cardigan nearby, and watching the tense scenes through it. Cardigans are the perfect thickness for obscuring most of the scariness without blocking the screen entirely. Hoodies are no good, as I sadly learnt whilst watching It Follows, they’re just too thick. They’re perfect for weepy movies though, I just pull up the hood and hide myself away. My latest trick for horrors that I can find on VOD however is watching on my tablet with headphones. Super easy to look away from and tear out a headphone when the creepy music is just too much.

The Babadook (2014) is a wonderfully creepy movie. Amelia (Essie Davis) is still struggling with the tragic death of her husband 7 years ago. Her son Samuel (Noah Wiseman) is having problems of his own. He’s plagued by a monster that not only keeps him awake at night, but has led to him becoming quite a violent and disturbed young boy. Just when things seem like they can’t get worse for this Mother and Son, they read a book called Mister Babadook, turning their lives into a living nightmare.

I got pulled into a false sense of security with this movie’s first half, which does a brilliant job at building the two leading characters and explores their backstories and the reasons why they are who they are. It honestly makes a great movie of it’s own right, without the horror part that follows. It was easy to take an instant disliking to Samuel, he seemed to be the stereotypical ‘weird kid’ you expect from a horror movie, but my heart ached for him and Amelia after a while. It was such a sad situation.

Sadly, the movie moves on from their tragedy and cranks up the scare factor once the ‘Mister Babadook’ book is found. The book itself is written in that rhyming couplet style that many children’s books are written, and starts off fairly innocent. You know, until the part about wishing you were dead. That was a bit off. Amelia does the WRONG thing by tearing the book up that night (personally I would have burnt it, and my entire house down) which I can only assume just angered the Babadook.

I can’t even tell you through words just how terrifying the sound the Babadook makes. Even through headphones rather than quality, cinema speakers, it’s chilling, and I’ve got goosebumps just thinking about it. Move over Godzilla, you ain't got nothing on this hat-wearing monster.

What I liked the most was that we didn’t actually see the Babadook that often. We just didn’t need to, the atmosphere and the music is enough, and it makes those scenes with him in that bit more powerful. Admittedly, I was hiding for a lot of the final chunk of the movie, whispering (spoiler alert) ‘please not the dog’ over and over again, but it was a justified kind of scaredness, I wasn’t just hiding from endless jump scares.

I’m so glad I braved this one, and ooh boy, that ending! I won’t spoil it for anyone, but it was definitely not what I was expecting.

Review: Florence Foster Jenkins (2016)

At this point, I’m pretty sure Meryl Streep could walk on set, say a few lines (whether they’re from an actual script or not), go home and we’d all still be singing her praises. I really like her of course, but I don’t worship her like a lot of movie fans do. Perhaps I just need to see more of her work! My point anyway is that she’s not one of the actresses I would see absolutely anything for. My first impression of the trailer for Florence Foster Jenkins was a cross between a laugh and a sneer, I think.

Florence Foster Jenkins is the story of a wealthy heiress living in New York who dreams of becoming an opera singer and performing in Carnegie Hall. The catch is that she can’t sing to save her life, but her devoted husband (Hugh Grant) can’t bring himself to tell her the truth, and instead hires a singing coach and pianist (Simon Helberg) to not only coach her, but remind her how wonderful she is.

The real stand out part of the movie is the wonderful performances by all 3 leads, Meryl Streep, Hugh Grant and Simon Helberg. Streep is exactly how you would expect her to be, powerful yet effortless. Her awful singing may be difficult to listen to at times, but I can’t imagine how difficult it must be for someone with amazing singing talent to actually sing badly. I’d experiment to see for myself, but you know, I can’t sing anyway. Hugh Grant is possibly at a higher level than I’ve seen him before, mastering that charm like he always has but with a surprising amount of heart.

However, the show stealer is Helberg. Better known as the awkward and often inappropriate Howard in the Big Bang Theory, this is a completely different role for him, and after watching him, I can’t actually picture anyone else doing that character justice. It’s like that saying ‘It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it’, Helberg shines for his mannerisms more than anything else. His body language and facial expressions bring a lot of the humour this movie has.

As for the rest of the movie...I’m still not convinced. It’s just not the kind of story that normally interests me. The tone shifted about quite harshly in places, so whilst I was laughing at a clever one-liner, something quite moving would happen and I wasn’t really sure how to feel. That’s the only real thing I can fault though, so I’m just not sure why I only liked Florence Foster Jenkins, rather than loved it.

Still, I’m glad I gave it a watch, and I would definitely recommend it to you all. What did you think, if you’ve seen it?

Review: Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (2016)

UPDATED with Jenna's review: Tina Fey is my spirit animal. I absolutely love her. Currently, I’m binge watching 30 Rock like there’s no tomorrow, knowing the end is in sight and not wanting it all to be over whilst saying to myself ‘just one more episode’. So I knew as soon as Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (2016) came out, I was going to have to see it asap. I’d just come back off honeymoon and knew I needed something funny to pick me up, so this was perfect.  I am not such a Tina Fey fan, I don't dislike her at all (loved her in Sisters) but I don't actively watch things because she is in it, I can find her irritating so I have to limit my intake.

The movie is based on memoir of real-life reporter Kim Barker, titled ‘The Taliban Shuffle’, recounting her experiences with reporting on the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Kim, played by Tina Fey, had no experience in this field what-so-ever, but being unmarried without children was enough.

Maybe I should have worked this out on my own, but from the trailer I was expecting a bit of a parody, something to keep me laughing throughout. Don’t get me wrong, some moments are absolutely hilarious, for example, when Kim first arrived in Afghanistan a lady shouts abuse at her for not having her hair covered, and Kim’s local guide and translator Fahim (Christopher Abbott) tells her she is simply welcoming her to the country. Then there’s a moment where Kim describes the local women as ‘walking Ikea bags’ or something like that, which had me in tears!  Yeah I completely suprised by this, I was expected and full on 'Tina Fey' comedy and got nothing of the sort.  It had funny moments as Allie said but nothing that would make it a comedy, it is much more of a drama.  Luckily, as a drama it was very good so I didn't feel entirely cheated by the trailer.

Mostly though, the movie is a drama that hit me harder than I thought it would. I don’t watch a lot of war movies anyway, but the ones I have seen have focussed on the action, and the soldiers fighting these wars. They’re exciting, and fuelled with adrenaline. This is much different from that. Maybe it’s because I was seeing the war through the eyes of someone inexperienced to it all, someone who reacts the way I imagine I might have done.  It terrified me, I kept imagining what I would have done if I was in Kim's shoes and I just got all sweaty and anxious.  It really does show a whole new side to the war in Afghanistan!

There’s a great cast here. I’ve already mentioned Fahim, whose politeness when translating gets a lot of laughs, but I liked Tanya (Margot Robbie) more than I thought I would too. She’s a reporter too, and has been out there longer than Kim, but shows her the ropes and explains concepts such as ‘being an American 4 makes you a 10 out here’, making Tanya herself a 15. Obviously. General Hollanek’s (Billy Bob Thornton) bluntness caught me off guard several times. And then we have Martin Freeman as Iain, doing a brilliant Scottish accent, although the last time I saw him he was trying an American one in Civil War which was awful, so maybe my radar is off-balance. Honestly, it’s worth watching just to hear Martin Freeman drop the ‘c-bomb’ so frequently!  Not sure I was as impressed with Freeman's Scottish accent but maybe I'm still reeling from Captain America: Civil War. but yes the C-bomb ultimately made his character for me - you know I love a good swear!!

I’m realising now that I actually enjoyed this more than I thought I did. It was definitely mis-marketed, and the tone shifts quite sharply every now and again which throws you off balance, but it’s a war movie that I’m recommending left, right and centre, and I don’t think that’s happened before. Give it a try!

I can't even explain how I felt about this film, one minute I was laughing, the next I was hugging a cushion, thankful that I was in the safety of my little house.  That being said, I was completely hooked!!

Review: Wiener-Dog (2016)

Let me tell you about 2 of my favourite things. Number 1: Dogs. All dogs, to be perfectly honest. I’m the type of person who, whilst walking in the woods will say hello to every dog I meet, and completely ignore the human being on the other side of the lead. Dachshund’s in particular are extremely cute. Number 2: Those movies about multiple stories where they all end up linking together in some way. Okay, what I actually mean is that I love Love Actually, but you get the picture. So when I find out about a movie called Wiener-Dog, a movie about a little dachshund who changes the lives of a whole bunch of people, I’m hyped.

How then, can a movie let me down so badly?! Here, let me find you this movie’s description, straight from IMDB: A dachshund passes from oddball owner to oddball owner, whose radically dysfunctional lives are all impacted by the pooch.

Hmm, not quite. Let me give it a go: The unluckiest dachshund in the world gets passed on from one bad owner to the next, people who don’t deserve the bundle of happiness that is Wiener-Dog.

Perhaps I’m being harsh. Let me recap on the ‘oddball owners’ that Wiener-Dog gets passed on to.

Oddball Owners #1: A father picks up Wiener-Dog from the local shelter as a gift for his cancer-suffering child. Proceeds to keep her locked in a cage until ‘her will has been broken’. Parents leave said child alone in the house whilst they attend a yoga class, and the kid feeds the hungry little dog far too many granola bars, causing mass diarrhea. Father takes Wiener-Dog to the vets to be put down.

At this point the viewers are treated to a beautiful tracking shot of diarrhea in the street. It goes on for ages, and it’s accompanied by some lovely music, too. 

Oddball Owners #2: The vet’s assistant (Greta Gerwig) takes pity on Wiener-Dog, and steals her away. She names her doodie. As in, well, poo. Great. She then decides to take a road trip with an old school friend who is possibly the world’s biggest douchebag, and leaves Wiener-Dog with her friend’s disabled family.

I’m not sure what happens at this point, because we head straight on to…

Oddball Owners #4: A struggling scriptwriter (Danny DeVito) now owns Wiener-Dog, but instead of giving her a loving home, he has a crazy turn and straps a bomb to her. I’m not even kidding. The bomb squad have to disarm her before she goes boom.

Oddball Owners #?: Wiener-Dog now lives with an old, blind lady, who has named her Cancer. Wonderful. Old lady’s horrible granddaughter comes to visit with her new boyfriend Fantasy (arghhh!) and asks for $10,000 to help him with his artistic dream. She relents, and terrible granddaughter leaves. What happens next is some bizarre epiphany involving multiple versions of old lady’s younger self.

I won’t spoil the ending for you. Even though this post should ensure that you’ll never want to see this movie, I won’t do that to you. It will go down in history as one of the biggest ‘WTF’ endings. 

From what I can gather, Wiener-Dog got a lot of good reviews. Perhaps the story is just too spiritual or artsy for me, but all it did was turn me into a giant ball of rage. At least I wasn’t bored at any point. 

Review: Sing Street (2016)

Sometimes, a movie just sneaks up on me out of nowhere, and takes me by surprise. That’s what happened to me with Begin Again (2013), now one of my favourite movies. Then, a Tumblr blog brought my attention to the song from Once (2007), Falling Slowly, a song I eventually walked down the aisle to on my wedding day. Both movies were written and directed by John Carney, now a legend in my eyes, so how Sing Street got released without my knowing is beyond me!

Connor (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo) is having a rough time. His family life isn’t great, his parents (Aidan Gillen & Maria Doyle Kennedy) are struggling for money and arguing relentlessly, and to save money, Connor is forced to move schools. After a disturbing confrontation with the school’s resident bully, he finally makes a friend in Darren (Ben Carolan). Whilst chatting to Darren outside the school gates, he spots a beautiful girl. Determined to impress her, he tells her he’s in a band and needs a model for their music video. The girl, Raphina (Lucy Boynton) agrees, leaving Connor with the task of putting a band together and actually making some music.

The first third of the movie is spent introducing the rest of the cast as the band is formed, they’re a rag tag bunch, but highly likeable. Sadly we don’t hear much from a lot of them, but Eamon (Mark McKenna) helps Connor write the music  and the two have great chemistry together. This is the first major movie credit for a lot of the cast which is hard to believe at times, they’re all so talented. Mark McKenna stood out the most, but I couldn’t shake it from my head how much he reminded me of Corey Feldman from Stand By Me!

Sing Street is set in the 80’s, and obviously the music choices and inspiration is all gained from popular bands from this era. I was just about born in the 80’s myself, but never really was a fan of the music. It was off putting to begin with, but as the boys put together their own original songs, I got the same warm fuzzy feeling that I had with Once and Begin Again, and I loved it every moment after. The story isn’t new, but it’s done so well that comparing it to others is pointless, because Sing Street is better.

It’s just such a beautiful movie. Watching Conner and the gang’s person styles change as the movie went on, and some of the shots of Ireland were stunning. It made me realise just how beautiful the countryside, and even the villages themselves, can be. There’s a lot in this movie actually that made me feel warm and happy inside, and the ending did, too. In fact, I’m not even sure what happened, but once the credits started and stated that the movie was ‘dedicated to brothers everywhere’ I even shed a few happy tears. Maybe it was just the summer heat getting to me.

I’ve decided now that I’ll follow John Carney anywhere and everywhere, in the movie sense at least. That’s another soundtrack I need asap.

Review: Tallulah (2016)

Oh boy, I hope I don’t make a habit of watching movies about terrible parents. A couple of weeks ago I watched Hungry Hearts (2014), a movie about a terrible mother who refused to feed her baby anything other than oils and vegetables, and it was awful. The movie itself was okay, but it was heartbreaking watching something like that, even knowing it was fiction. So of course, when I heard about Tallulah (2016) and read a few reviews, all positive, and then discovered it was available on Netflix, I had to give it a try. Plus I love Ellen Page!  Gosh that Hungry Hearts sounds awful, I don't think I could watch it to be fair!  There was some confusion with this as Allie thought I had recommended it to her so when she asked me about it, I was completely confused until she realised it wasn't me at all.  However, it did peak my interest so I parked myself with a glass of wine and Netflix!

The movie tells the story of 3 struggling women. Tallulah (Ellen Page) is a drifter, living out of her van with her boyfriend Nico (Evan Jonigkeit) and has dreams of travelling to India. One night, the living situation becomes too much for Nico and he leaves to go back home to New York to see his mother. With no money or food, Tallulah drives to New York to find Nico, scavenging food from left-out room services in hotels. This is where she meets Carolyn (Tammy Blanchard), AKA runner up for the Worst Mother in the World award.

Carolyn is out of her mind, clearly. Her husband isn’t aware that she’s galavanting out and about and she’s determined to have a good time, and to do so, she has no problems at all hiring a complete stranger to babysit her 1 year old daughter while she goes out to party. This scene was the only one I really didn’t like. Watching Carolyn rant and constantly ask Tallulah if she looks pretty just got far too uncomfortable for me. Eventually, Carolyn returns home horrendously drunk, and that’s when Tallulah takes the baby to sleep in the van with her to keep her safe.

The next morning, Tallulah goes to return the baby, but nopes the hell out of there when she spots no less than 5 police officers in the hotel lobby. And so begins the game of her just making the situation worse with every given minute. I honestly didn’t know how to feel at this point, I mean, is it still kidnap when she’s just doing what’s best for the baby?  I found it so hard to watch, I was just willing her to admit to what she had done so she could take her back, I was on the edge of my seat the whole.  The problem was I wanted Tallulah to tell the truth so badly just so that Margo wasn't let down again.  I felt like she was one of those characters that just keeps getting knocked down just as she is getting back up and it broke my heart.

Our 3rd leading lady is Nico’s mother, Margo (Allison Janney). I love this woman. Poor Margo is lost in life. Her husband came out as gay, cheated on her and now has a happy life elsewhere, her son left home on bad terms, her turtle just died, and a very unexpected visitor has arrived on her doorstep. I’ll let you watch the movie for yourself to find out who, and why.  

I wanted so badly to be mad at Tallulah for what she was doing, but I just felt such a strong connection to her, it was impossible. She had such a horrible upbringing herself that she couldn’t just walk away and let that happen to someone else. What would you do in that situation? I honestly don’t know what I would do. The story had me gripped from start to finish, and I had no idea what direction it would head in, or how it would end. My husband was giving me funny looks across the sofa as I was wailing ‘this isn’t going to have a happy ending’ over and over again.  I was totally on the edge of my seat, wailing at the TV, it all just got  too much and I had to pause for a cuppa (totally British, nothing in the world that can't be solved with a cup of tea!).  I wanted everyone to have a happy ending.

The performances all round were absolutely amazing, and as much as I love Ellen Page Allison Janney was the MVP for me here. It was the little qwirks in her character that gave me the much needed comical relief every now and again. Plus it was lovely to see some of my favourite faces (Zachary Quinto, Uzo Aduba & David Zayas) pop up for their small roles. Highly recommended! In fact, I made Jenna watch it the very next day after I did!

Ellen Page just wins everything for me, she is such an amazing actress and in this when you knew what the character was wrong in what she was doing you still wanted to reach out and help her.  It takes serious skills to pull of a character that no matter how bad their behavior, you are always on their side.  Alison Janney is one of my favourite female actors and these two together was just awesome, they need to do more work together....like now!