Archive for June 2011

Home Archive for June 2011

Never Let Me Go was nothing like what I was expecting. I had heard that it was a great, emotional film and it's obvious that it's a romance; however, I knew nothing about the deep and haunting plotline. Some say that they were disappointed with the movie as it did not live up to the expectations set by the book, but if that's the case, the book must be bloody brilliant.

The film revolves around the lives of Cathy, Ruth and Tommy, three children who meet each other at Hailsham, a boarding school for children. The film is quite clever in that it is split into three main parts at different points in the characters lives which means that a lot of the irrelevant waffle that you find between parts of films is gone. At the beginning we see Cathy, the narrator, looking back on her life to when the three children were at Hailsham, then it moves on to when the three are moved to 'The Cottages' and live there after they're 18, the third and final part is when the three characters are nearing their thirties but they've all gone their separate ways. This is great because we get to see how the characters have progressed throughout their lives and it makes the film a lot more interesting.

The lives of all the children are changed when they discover that they are in fact 'donors', children who were bred for the sole purpose of providing organs for people with illnesses such as cancer and prolonging the human life span to well over 100 years. I was truly shocked and disgusted when I found this out. This film explores the possibility of 'harvesting' humans to save other humans. Now thinking about it, this could actually happen, perhaps that is what makes it so gruesome. When I say grusome, the film itself isn't grusome, it's not gory, but in the back of your mind you are constantly thinking about people harvesting organs and the likes and it's really not a very nice thought. It is quite shocking to think that a society would go to these lengths to prolong human life and it's truly disturbing.

Whilst the knowledge that all three are destined to be donors plays around in the back of your mind, in the forefront the plot moves on as Ruth and Tommy start dating even though it's plain for the audience to see that Cathy and Tommy should be together. This is a story of true love as Cathy never stops loving Tommy all throughout her years, even though he is in a relationship with her best friend. After leaving Hailsham School they move to 'The Cottages' where they wait to be called up to start donating. Cathy took the opportunity to apply to be a 'carer' of the donors, which means that she would be called to donate much later and in the meantime she has to care for the donors whose conditions get steadily worse the more donations they do. This is when the three friends part, Cathy becomes a carer and Tommy and Ruth become donors. Of course, later on they are reunited and then it gets really emotional as all three are fighting against time to rectify their past mistakes and to try and make the most of the time they have left before they 'complete'.

This story is so moving and it sort of has two plot lines that are closely intertwined. The story of love between the three friends and the story of their donations. It is truly saddening and really makes you think about the moral implications of sacrificing humans to save other humans. This film is incredible and I highly recommend it but prepared to shed a tear or two. The acting is superb from the three main characters: Keira Knightly, Andy Garfield and Carey Mulligan and it is tied together with the carefully constructed plot line making this movie unmissable. I'm definitely going to add 'Never Let Me Go' to my summer reading list as well.

Out on DVD now.

Green Lantern.

In 2010, at the Los Angeles Scream Awards, Green Lantern won the 'Most Anticipated Movie' award; however, I'm sorry to report that it did not live up to it's high expectations. I have to admit I'd never actually heard of the superhero 'Green Lantern' prior to watching the film but let's be honest, 'Green Lantern' is a bit of a pathetic name for a superhero. In fact it just reminded me of the 'Dragonfly' in the spoof movie 'The Superhero movie'. In addition it was awfully confusing given that 'The Green Hornet' had recently been released as well as the titles are far to similar and the plot lines are essentially the same (as they are in every superhero movie).

I don't think it was the acting in this movie that brought it down, in fact the acting is quite good with Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively (Gossip Girl), Peter Sarsgaard, Mark Strong, and many other familiar faces. Personally, I think that there were far too many visual effects that did not enhance the action at all but made it all rather ridiculous and reminded me of 'Son of the Mask' which is basically about a ridiculous green dude doing stupid things. Ryan Reynolds plays Hal Jordan, the 'Green Lantern', and he has 'will-power' which he can use to create anything he wants in order to block his opponent and the producers could've made this very exciting. Instead, all Hal does is create a race track, a giant fist, and some brick walls, nothing too exciting about those. It's funny because when I look back on this movie all I can think about is the colour green. I just rememeber seeing flashes of green on the screen all the time and I didn't find the fight scenes particularly exciting.

The plot was badly developed as I didn't think that it was actually going anywhere and one hour into the movie Hal Jordan still hadn't done anything significant as the 'Green Lantern'. Everything started to happen at once near the ending and it was all rather rushed and not very well thought through. The 'bad guy' didn't have a prominent role in the film and therefore I didn't feel like the Green Lantern was protecting anyone since the baddie didn't seem to be much of a threat anyway. In my mind this is what happens in the movie: Hal fancies Carol (Blake Lively), Hal gets whisked away and becomes Green Lantern, Hal doesn't want to be Green Lantern, Hal becomes Green Lantern, Hal 'saves' the planet, Hal gets the girl, Hal runs off to save the Universe. I really don't think that there was a lot more to it than that.

In conclusion, I don't recommend this movie because the special effects are over-used and this lessens the quality of the movie, the plot is badly developed, the movie is very slow paced up until the end when everything happens at once. It is a shame because Reynolds and Lively make a good couple.

Green Lantern in cinemas NOW.

The Vampire Diaries: The Return - Nightfall.

The reviews for this book are extremely mixed, there was even a controversy on Amazon over it. Unfortunately, I'm going to have to say that I was extremely disappointed with this book. Having read the previous four books in 'The Vampire Diaries' series I assumed that this book was going to be excellent, sadly I was wrong. It appears to me that over the seventeen year break between 'Dark Reunion' and 'Nightfall', LJ Smith lost her touch, which is understandable giving that seventeen years is a heck of a long time. Nightfall did not live up to the expectations and is way below the bar that the previous four books have set.

By 'Nightfall', I believe that the plot had just become rather ridiculous. Elena had undergone so many changes (human to vampire to dead to spirit to human) that the plot had become even more unrealistic. No one character can possibly go through that many life changes in such a short space of time.

'Nightfall' got off to a very slow start and I found it difficult to get back into the series. For a lot of the first part of the book Elena is just trying to get back to human self and has to essentially relearn everything from how to walk to talk to act and it's all rather boring and sappy as Stefan mollycoddles Elena and Elena overstretches herself. The plot doesn't kick off until around half way through and even then it's all very repetitive. I didn't think that the characters were very well developed in this book and there wasn't a lot of substance. This book was considerably longer than any of it's predecessors, it's probably about twice the length, and consequently, twice the rambling and irrelevant information. Stefan, a main character, was AWOL, inexplicably for the majority of this book and even by the end of it the reader is left confused as to what has happened to him. Stefan is not the only mystery. If I'm perfectly honest, I haven't got a clue what was going on at the end of this book despite the fact that I finished reading it only a couple of short hours ago. The story did not finish, but it was not the sort of cliffhanger that the reader likes, it was just loose ends that needed to be tied up.

The imagery in the story reminds me a lot of 'The Exorcist' or 'Splice' as many of the town's people become possessed by 'malachs'. They then proceed to do weird and disgusting things, but again there is little explanation. There are two new characters, the two troublemakers, but I didn't understand their motives at all. It is quite a long book and it's taken me quite a long time to read it because frankly I just kept getting bored and drifting away from it. Thinking back, I really don't remember all that much happening throughout. The climax is very near to the end but the problem with this is that a. most people are so bored by then, they really don't care and b. it wasn't worth the wait. I know that a lot of people will disagree with me as many think that this is an excellent book, but I am sorely disappointed and I don't feel like I want to read the two subsequent novels.

All in all, this book does not live up to the expectations that were set by the previous four books and I wouldn't recommend you read it. Don't let this book spoil your memories of the first four (excellent) books.

Bridesmaids.

Unlike a lot of other rom-coms, a lot of the plot of 'Bridesmaids' is actually pretty believable. The main character is a sad and lonely woman who's reaching 'that age' when you begin to have a minor breakdown because everyone around you seems to be getting their lives sorted whilst you are only moving backwards. Annie (the protagonist), really starts to crack when her best friend gets engaged and makes a new friend all at the same time. Annie crumbles and all seems lost. She's sleeping with her ex-boyfriend even though it's clear he's using her, her business has failed because of the recession, she loses her job, she's sharing an apartment with two siblings from the UK (Matt Lucas is one!) and her best and seemingly only friend is slipping away. Annie takes an immediate disliking to the 'new' friend and they start a silent, but raging, battle between them, competing for the title of 'best friend' of the bride. As you can imagine, things get out of hand.

I don't want to spoil the plot for you, so I won't tell you anymore but this is a genuine story that I'm sure every woman will be able to relate to. This rom-com actually received really positive reviews. Shocking, I know, but it is definitely worth watching. It's even been called 'the best female driven, r-rated comedy of all time'. However, not all of this movie is fun and games, for a large part of the movie the audience will be feeling sadness and sympathy (one would hope) as things really do look bad for Annie. This is what makes it genuine as it isn't a fairy tale, it could be a true story.

Kristen Wigg plays the protagonist and she does an excellent job and is no doubt about to become an even bigger star than she already is. I was suprised to find quite a lot of non-American actors including Matt Lucas and Chris O'Dowd, both of whom are famous comedians in the UK and no doubt have brought their impressive comic skills to this film.

I would say that this movie is aimed at and will most appeal to woman who are in their 30s, but to all other women as well. I wouldn't particularly recommend this movie for men but if you're a single lady looking for a day out with her friends, I definitely advise you to go and watch Bridesmaids, a rare, genuine, funny, heartbreaking rom-com. Enjoy ladies.

The poster's got it right: CHICK FLICKS DON'T HAVE TO SUCK.

Teen Wolf.

So, I'm a little behind on this one; Teen Wolf premiered in the US on the 5th of June and so far it has been very well received. I've just watched the first three episodes in succession and I literally could not stop watching because I needed to know more. Teen Wolf is basically horror meets high school. On reflection, some threads of the story bear a similar resemblance to 'The Vampire Diaries', but on the whole they are not too alike.There is a lot more action in Teen Wolf, and prepare to see a lot of dead bodies and blood, sometimes even parts of bodies.

Right from the onset, there is action, and the plot line is constantly changing. Once you think you've got a character figured out in your head, something happens to make you change your opinion of them completely. You're kept on your toes as the plot moves quickly, which is to be expected from this short 12 episode series. This isn't a silly high school drama, it's a step-up from the usual twilight-esque television programmes and it's for the more hardy teenagers out there looking for some (slightly) gory action. There is of course, a prominent romantic slant to the series which is an interesting development and will no doubt keep the girls entertained, whilst the frequent fight/action scenes will keep the boys watching. This is great as the majority of high school dramas are aimed at female teens, but I think this one will appeal to a wider range, including boys, and even some adults.

The story revolves around Scott McCall as he develops from the high school nobody, to star of the lacrosse team, dating one of the hottest (new) girls in school. Of course, his new found popularity is all down to the fact that one night Scott was alone in the woods and got bitten by a mysterious animal and he then began to develop a heightened sense of smell, sight and touch. Given the title of the series I don't think that I'll be giving too much away by telling you that Scott, of course, becomes a werewolf. Then all hell breaks loose as he struggles to control his changes that take place whenever his heart is racing - because of anger or lust. He must fight to control these urges in order to protect his secret from everyone, but from one special girl in particular: Allison Argent.The plot thickens as one night Scott is hunted down by a group of cross-bow yielding wolf-hunters, the leader of which happens to be Allison's father. There is also the added complication of the other wolf in town: Derek Hale. Scott is aided by his best friend and sidekick, Stiles Stilinski, who finds out all the town goss of the latest killings by eavesdropping on his father's (the town sheriff) conversations.

How will Scott handle threats from inside and outside the boundaries of the classroom as he is being sought after by both Jackson, Captain of the lacrosse team, and Derek, the big bad wolf (or is he?)?

The plot and characters all tie together rather nicely and I believe that every person in this series has a purpose, unlike many others when a lot of events can seem rather random. I am looking forward to watching the remaining episodes of this series and if they are as exciting as the first three I have no doubts that this will soon turn into one of the most-watched television series being aired at this time.

Look out for Teen Wolf on MTV every week on Monday evening 10/9c and it will premiere in the UK on Sky Living at 9:05p.m. on July the 7th.

The SONY VAIO Series (VPC-EB2Z0E).

I am currently an unemployed student, so when I began my hunt for a laptop of my own, I wanted to be thorough to make sure that I was spending my life time (pocket money) savings on a suitable and reliable product. I was keen to buy an Apple Macbook, but I decided that for my first laptop it would be a lot simpler to have a PC with all the same functions that I would find at school/offices/home etc. I looked in my father's WHICH? magazine and it recommended the SONY VAIO series so I decided to do some reseach. I came to the conclusion that this particular model was the most suitable for me because of the size, portability and features. I went ahead and bought this laptop for around £800 from an official Sony store (All Microsoft Software and Anti-virus Software included).
Unfortunately, it seemed I had picked a faulty model, as the laptop kept crashing. As a result I had to swap it for a new laptop. This was just an unfortunate incident as I seemed to have picked the faulty one. I have had no problems since and everything has run smoothly as all the reviews told me it would.

I highly recommend this product as I believe it has just the right balance. It is light enough to be easily portable, it has a lot of features including a large storage capacity (mine is 500MB) as well as the intel core i3 processor. The screen is 15.5" on the diagonal which is a good size, it is neither too big nor too small. What I particularly looked for whilst searching for this product was the graphics card as I watch a lot of movies on my laptop. I found that this model had a premium graphics card that was better than the rest of the VAIO laptops.
I highly recommend this series. If this laptop isn't the one for you, well then there are many many others to choose from. For me, this is a good laptop for gaming and film watching due to the graphics card. It is also very good at all other functions and features that you would want from a laptop with a very large memory. If you are not so bothered about the graphics then perhaps you should choose another model.

This laptop is very fast. My favourite feature of them all is the 'Quick Web Access'. This allows you to access the internet in seconds. LITERALLY. At just the press of a button your laptop turns itself on to the VAIO browser. You cannot access the rest of your laptop in this mode, it is just a browser for when you need to access the internet fast.
I also really like the layout of the keys. As i mentioned earlier, I originally wanted an Apple Macbook, so when I saw that this laptop had the a very similar keyboard layout I was very drawn to this laptop. Each of the keys is separate with about a 2-3mm gap between them and I believe that this makes it a lot easier to type, and you make less spelling errors from slips of the finger.

This model, of course, comes with the latest software: Windows 7, which is also excellent and if you're not looking for a new laptop, I'd highly recommend you at least upgrade to Windows 7. It really is very good, MILES better than Vista, and I'd even say better than XP.
This laptop is very easy to set up. There is very little that you need to do yourself, you just need to follow the on step screens to set it up. Don't worry if you're not a tech wiz, you'll still be able to use this brilliant laptop. It takes a while to set up as you have to download some features, I believe I waited a couple of hours, just to make sure everything was completely set up and saved before I went ahead changing everything to fit my personal style.

Also, this laptop plays Blu-ray discs as well as DVDs! This is excellent as Blu-ray is sure to become more and more prominent in the future so it's good to get ahead now. There are 3 USB plug holes along the side which mean you can do many things at once and access lots of files. There is a special slot for SD Cards which is very useful, you don't need to fiddle around with adaptors anymore your camera memory card will fit right in!
I'd also have to recommend that if you were to buy this product you buy it from a SONY store and not from anywhere else. They offer the best guarantees and warantys for this product and it means that should anything go wrong you can take it straight back to the people who designed it to get the best help. The prices vary from store to store depending on what promotions are currently happening so I suggest once you have chosen your model you visit several different stores to see what they can offer you. I would say that the price will range from £650-£850, which I believe is a fair price for all that it offers you.

Subscribe to: Posts ( Atom )

FILM REVIEW: Never Let Me Go.

Whats Hot? Movies.

Whats Hot? Books.

Whats Hot? TV.

Whats Hot? Movies.

Whats Hot? TV.

Whats Hot? Technology.

Whats Hot? DVD.

Whats Hot? Websites.


Get this charm for only $1!