Fiona's week in film #1

My first term of 6th form is now over (finally!) and I've watched lots of films this week to celebrate that fact. The great thing about the last week of term is that normally we watch films and eat biscuits instead of actually doing work, so as well as a brilliant staff pantomime this year we watched some pretty good films, too!

Monday

...wasn't particularly interesting, as we were still "doing work", but when I got home and grabbed my Dad's iPad and starting watching "Cambridge Spies" (2003). "Cambridge Spies" is a four part BBC drama about 4 of the Cambridge Spies who, like, became spies and stuff... You get the gist. I only had time to watch Episode 1, but it was quite enjoyable, and had all the good elements of a BBC drama: humour, some sort of heart breaking romance, seriousness and SUSPENSE. I'll make an effort to watch the other episodes some time soon, it's worth watching just for the cast and the pretty Cambridge scenery (although, there will probably be less of that as the series goes on... *sad face*).

Tuesday

...In French we watched "10 Things I Hate About You" (1999), because, obviously, it's very relevant to French AS. It's one of those films that you can't not love; Heath Ledger and Joseph Gordon-Levitt are adorable and most teenage girls cannot resist a romcom with good looking actors in it (I speak with experience). The only possible bone I have to pick with it is that it's based on "The Taming of the Shrew" and some things just don't seem right to me. I mean, obviously it's been modernised but Kat Stratford was not tamed much at all, was she? It was too romantic to be true to the original story. I don't know if that's the point but it bugged me a bit. Oh, but I did blub a bit at the poem. THE POEM.

Wednesday

...I watched "Wisdom of Crocodiles" (1998) at home. Nothing particularly special, it was a bit hard to follow at first - which may be because I was half asleep whilst watching it - but I'm into those kinds of psychological thriller films that can creep you out and make you think without the horror element in it too. Jude Law, who plays the main character, wasn't too bad, but overall the film can only be described as OK and little more.

Thursday

...In French we watched an actual French film, "L'arnacoeur" (Heartbreaker). I'd already seen it before by the recommendation of my film maestro and fabulous French partner, Sophie, so I already knew that I was going to enjoy it. We ate the film with cloudy apple juice, lemonade, cakes, biscuits and cherry loaf and laughed at the utter cheesiness which oozed out of every pore possible throughout. The soundtrack is particularly uplifting, and (as a big fan of Dirty Dancing) I approved of shirtless dancing and fluffy romance, as well as witty humour throughout. Je l'aime.

On top of that, in General Studies the majority of our year - bar the unfortunate people who take Critical Thinking - got to watch The History Boys "because of the famous quote about general studies". Having not watched the whole film the whole way through before, I was very excited to finally see it. Despite it being hard to watch due to a bunch of unenthusiastic chatterboxes sitting behind us, I thoroughly enjoyed the 40 minutes we got to watch. As soon as I got home I watched it 'till the end, and honestly cried because the ending lacked Dakin/Irwin sexy time. Dominic Cooper is great at the whole charming sleazeball thing, so I'm glad that I share the name of his girlfriend/friend with benefits. And Stephen Campbell Moore is wow. I just loved his character so much.

Friday

...We watched the second half of L'arnacoeur and swooned over Romain Duris' dancing. A great way to spend the last lesson of the term.

I also managed to watch the first 10 minutes of "The Holiday" (2006), which is one of my favourite Christmas films - I still consider it to be a Christmas film despite it's lack of Christmassy content. It's got Jude Law in it, who can complain? It's sad to think that I have had an Iris crisis (yes, I just made up that term) in my life so far, and possibly still am. When Kate Winslet cries over a guy, you want to cry with her, although not necessarily for her guy this time. I'm a big fan of Rufus Sewell but he's a lot more charming without the curly mop thing. If you haven't seen it, see it. You'll want a Mr Napkinhead in your life, too.

Saturday

...I watched "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" for old times' sake. Unfortunately noticed how ridiculously bad the younger cast members were (except Tom Felton. He wasn't too bad, probably because he'd been in two films prior to Harry Potter). But, of course, my inner Potterhead didn't care. Wingardium leviOsah.

The other film I managed to watch was a film called "Never Let Me Go" which was fascinating. I do adore Carey Mulligan, and Andrew Garfield with his English accent does make me giddy. Then Keira Knightley is there too. It's got a really interesting plot, and the beautiful images throughout the film made it pleasant to watch even though the story is somewhat dark.

Sunday

...I don't know what I was thinking. I just thought "Oh, that Jeremy Irvine is a cutie, I need more of him in my life." and decided to put "Now is Good" on. I'd had a long day, dropping my brother off for a squash course in Coventry, wheeling my Nan around M&S in the panicked Christmas shopping crowd, the busiest shift at McDonalds I've ever had (and apparently the restaurant had ever had, too). I'd already watched the Homeland finale, which was HELL. It just started off so happy and beautiful and ended HORRIBLY (the story, not the episode, Homeland is always flawless, no matter what). I was a mess, mentally. So I whacked on the film thinking that Irvine's face would cheer me up.

I've read the book that the film is based on, and loved it even though some of the content in the book was like WOAH GIRL CALM YO'SELF. The film was much more appropriate, but it completely broke my heart. It wasn't necessarily the best film in the world, but it's one of those films that requires some chocolate and a humongous box of tissues to be handy. The story is about a 17 year old girl who has suffered from leukaemia and decides to stop treatment and live the rest of her short life to the max. I didn't expect much from Dakota Fanning considering she's American *shudders* but she pulled off the accent, so I couldn't really fault her performance. She wasn't quite who I'd pictured playing Tessa, but she didn't do a bad job, so I shan't complain. I absolutely fell in love with Adam (Irvine), and you just have to watch it to understand why. He's just utterly perfect. A girl's dream. My dream...

To me, though, the chap who plays Tessa's daddy, Paddy Considine, deserved the biggest pat on the back. He's really great, he managed to shine brighter than most in the film and I just wanted to hug him by the end of it. If I could see him through my tears.

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New project!

Hello, reader, and Merry Christmas.

Over the past few weeks I've been on a little stressful roller coaster as I've had to balance a lot of things on my flimsy paper plate. Unfortunately, writing reviews fell off said plate, and I don't want this to carry on. I've been involved in a few small internet-y projects over the past few months that have been a bit of a disappointment, so I want to do something in which I don't have to rely on anyone else for a while, although I may need help along the way.

My idea is that once a week, I'll post a list of films that I've watched with mini reviews and pictures etc. alongside any reviews that I post. This will be done on Sundays/Mondays (ideally). I used to try and watch a film a day, but I've had so much work to do that it isn't possible any more, so I'll bung TV episodes and specials in the pot too, just to spice things up a bit. I'll be re-watching many things too, just because I enjoyed them so much.

It would be awfully nice if people would help me out by recommending films and series to watch, too!

That's all for now, I'll be posting my first one later on tonight!

{P.S. It doesn't feel like it's Christmas tomorrow, does it?}

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and... ACTION!

I thought my first review should be about the thing that I watch from the small hours to the small hours every weekend and every week day when I am "doing my homework". Anyone who follows me on twitter will know or can probably guess that it's going to be about Two and a Half Men. It used to be my guilty pleasure, but now it's a part of the daily routine. I don't quite know what about the series is so addictive. It could be how unbelievably relatable Alan can be , or how much Jake resembles my brother, Jake. Maybe it's Ashton Kutcher's existence. Whatever it is, I'm hooked.

I may be a whole series late in saying anything about it, but let's not dwell over that small fact. The NEW Two and a Half Men [Series 9, onwards] completely surpassed all of my expectations. I didn't think that anything on the planet could be funnier than Charlie's laid back, cynical sense of humour, but Walden is so adorably naive that I couldn't stop watching. My family are glad that I finished the 9th season in no time at all because they had to sit through it with me. They enjoyed it, Jake in particular, but they were too caught up on the current plotline in Eastenders to be patient with my obsessive viewing habits. SOD 'EM!

I have to be honest though, there are some things that ruined the season for me and made me miss Charlie more than I thought I would. The main thing is Walden's girlfriend, whatshername (let me google it... ZOEY). She's so annoyingly British in it. Unfortunately, after wikipedia-ing her (yes that's probably a verb now) I've learned that she is actually English AND a member of the royal family by marriage. I'm scared to say what I was going to now in case it's treason...

#YOLO

(Did I just say that? Oh dear... I'm going to regret that...)

Well, I really rather dislike when actors over exaggerate their accents or mannerisms when they are acting. It happens all the time and it makes you wonder, are they native or just pretending? I'm hardly ever convinced. What's even worse, though, is when they are actually attempting the accent and they fail miserably. I've lost favour with many actors over this, sadly. The most recent being Anne Hathaway in One Day. She's normally fabulous, yet in this film her accent distracted me from the great story that I'd adored in the book. I was tearing my hair out by the end of it because everything was perfect except for the failed Yorkshire accent. There's a load of examples I could use but you're probably sitting there with a couple popping up in your head already so I shan't bother. The fact that you are now probably thinking about it and can think of one is proof that I'm not crazy.

Other than the annoyingness of the love interest in the 9th season not much else bothers me. Walden, after a few episodes, seems really predictable: charming, lucky, rich, perhaps the angel version of Charlie, BUT every episode got more ridiculous and you never can quite know what Alan or Walden will do next. Alan seems to be less human and a million times more pathetic without Charlie around and despite the ridiculous things he does to get money without looking desperate (as if that ship didn't sail a umpteen seasons ago) he's still funny, just in a more cartoon character way. It's nice to see him, Jake and a lot of other characters being more involved than before, though. Even when, admittedly, most of my attention is on Walden's face - especially when shaven - I have begun to see how Alan's mind works. If he hasn't lost it.

I'm very much looking forward to the rest of series 10!

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Pilot

Good evening, all!

I'm at that age when you have to start thinking about what you want to do with your life, and honestly I'm not dealing with it very well. I assume that most people my age are in a similar situation to me and trust me, I sympathise. I really, really do. I'm at 6th Form college and I'm studying Maths and Further Maths, Physics, History and French. It's a varied mix, and when I tell my friends what I study their jaws drop because they either hate science or think that I'm crazy for studying French. I don't quite know what was going through my head when I chose these subjects. Perhaps the idea of being an engineer sounded promising and decided to glue itself to my brain, whilst my favourite subject, History clung insistently to my heart. And French? French is good. C'est chouette! C'est pas mal! I do enjoy it, even though I accent sounds German and I can never remember anything.

But 3 weeks into the first term and I am still hopelessly confused. I adore Physics but can't stand the lessons, Maths seems like effort, History is great and French is hard but the lessons are fabulous. I've started to regret not taking English, even though I know that certain topics within it would kill my brain cells slowly and painfully. And whenever I get home I'd rather get on with my hobby, watching films, than anything else. Which is why I am here!

On a whim I've decided to write a blog post for film reviews, reviews on TV series and episodes and give my opinion on anything that I find interesting. I just thought that it would be appropriate to do a pilot post first, so hopefully I'll be writing posts on a regular basis to keep me sane. I must say that despite the common idea that people who watch films all the time are unhealthy and/or lazy but I firmly disagree. I find it completely educational and I must be the only person on earth who can't snack while I watch films. I still go outside on occasion and I eat regularly and every once in a while I am prised away from the laptop or television to do my homework.

Without further ado, Fiona's Bugle!

((In case you don't understand the title, it's a clever use of The Daily Bugle from Spiderman.))

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