I have to admit, I strongly dislike the Paranormal Activity series. I don't find them scary at all and I don't like that everything looks like it's been filmed on a family camcorder. I would probably have to say that this is the best out of all three Paranormal Activity movies, because at least this one gave me a couple of jumps, whereas I fell completely asleep in the other films. I don't know if I missed something, but I don't seem to recall 'Bloody Mary' appearing in this film as she did in the trailer. I found this thoroughly disappointing as that was really the only reason I watched this film. The Paranormal Activity movies also greatly confuse me because they are all linked to each other and yet the events that take place don't really seem to follow on from one another and I got the impression that the characters had forgotten the past horrors, which makes absolutely no sense to me.


The third movie takes us back to 1988 again as a sort of prequel to the prequel and we see Kristi and Katie as little girls. Kristi mysteriously starts interacting with somebody that noone else can see, who she calls 'Toby'. After Toby's appearance, many strange things start happening in the house, so Kristi's mother's boyfriend, Dennis, sets up several cameras all around the house in order to see if anything weird is going on. Everyday, Dennis collects the tapes that have been recording all night and watches the back. At first he cannot see anything, but then strange things start happening, mysterious moving objects, empty spaces that dust won't fall on, floating sheets and slamming doors. Dennis tries to convince Julie, Kristi and Katie's mother, that there's something weird going on in the house, but she refuses to believe him and this could have consequences for her and her family.

The style of acting in these movies is obviously quite different to any other movie. In addition to the fact that you're being recorded on a home camcorder, the characters are usually seen doing normal everyday things, so there's never really any need to display much acting talent as it's all pretty realistic. I did believe that all the scenes were real and had I not known that this was a film, I probably could've believed that they were real home made tapes. I suppose this means that they all were very good at acting, though it would be interesting to see how these actors fare in normal films where they would be forced to adhere to a script that is probably something they have never actually experienced in real life.


These movies always get better as time goes on. The beginnings are usually very, very slow, in fact, I'm pretty sure nothing interesting happened until the last 15 minutes of the second movie, and this one was much the same. However, by the middle of the movie, much had happened, or at least, enough to tickle your curiosity buds and make you pay attention. I felt like there was much more a story line to this one than the previous movies and it wasn't just everyday life with a bit of a twist there was actually a character, 'Toby', involved in the horror. The ending of this movie is definitely the most frightening bit and I think it was done very well in terms of filming; however, I was slightly frustrated at the end as I wasn't entirely sure what had just happened, but that was probably my own fault. This movie actually has a build up and reaches a climax, unlike its predecessor and I'd say this is probably a case of 'third time lucky' for the producers.


Whilst this film was the scariest out of the three for me, it still no way near as scary as your typical 'horror' movies. If you're a fan of the Paranormal Activity movies, then I'd recommend you watch this as it is miles better than the second movie. If you're a horror movie fanatic, but have never watched any of these movies, then personally, I wouldn't recommend that you do when there are plenty of other horror movies out there; however, that's just me. If you're the sort of person who is easily frightened by the mysterious slamming of a door or 'real' horror, then I suppose this is the sort of movie for you.

Shark Night 3D.

I didn't need to read reviews of Shark Night 3D to know that it was going to be a bad movie but I decided to watch it anyway. I'm a fan of these shark-attack films such as Jaws and Pirhanna so I thought I'd give Shark Night a shot purely because there are not that many films of this genre available. To make matters worse, I didn't even watch this in 3D, though I suppose you could say that's a good thing because I doubt the effects would've been that good anyway and it would've cost me twice the amount.

Shark Night 3D is about a group of friends who visit the family lakehouse of Sara for the weekend. Expecting it to be a weekend filled with relaxation and fun, their weekend quickly turns into a nightmare as their friend Malik stumbles out of the lake with his arm torn off. Assuming this is a freak accident caused by water-boarding the friends rush to their boat in order to sail across the lake to dry land where they can get Malik help. However, they soon realise that the lake is in fact filled with flesh-eating sharks. What's even worse is that they were put there on purpose. The friends try desperately to make it to dry land without being eaten alive but not all of them will survive and some will meet a grisly fate in the dark waters of the lake.


Shark Night 3D is a teen horror movie where all the main characters are college students so of course, the acting standard is pretty poor. The cast comprises of actors who have been in many other teen-related movies or television serials, but apparently they all dropped what little talent they had just as quickly as the characters they played ditched clothes for swimsuits. Granted, it is quite difficult to pull off a convincing act when the story line is ridiculous (at least, I sincerely hope it is), but I was hoping for something a little better. Sara Paxton plays the protagonist Sara Palski alongside Dustin Milligan, Chris Carmack and Joel David Moore. For most of the movie, I found the characters incredibly irritating as they clearly lacked sense and reason when it came to dealing with emergency situations. There's a lot of screaming and squealing from the girls (and guys) and not a lot of thinking - so really, it's no wonder most of them die.

The plot line isn't actually that predictable as there is a certain plot twist that will shock the viewers - at least I wasn't expecting it, but I could've fallen asleep by that point. There isn't a lot of depth to the story, it's very one dimensional and there clearly wasn't a lot of thought put into it. The CGI effects weren't particularly great at convincing me that there were in fact real sharks in the lake. In addition, I thought there was quite poor use of lighting and camera as the screen was dark for a lot of the time, made worse by the fact that a lot of the story took place at night). It was a little gory at times, but in a silly way, as it was not realistic enough for it to be frightening.

I wouldn't recommend Shark Night 3D, even if, like me, you're a fan of these hungry fish tales. It lacks plot, direction and good acting and doesn't have much going for it really.

I think that In Time is so good because it's what I imagine could potentially happen in our world. The rich are already paying extortionate amounts for plastic surgery to make them look younger, I wouldn't be all that surprised if in the (very distant) future they could buy time so they could live longer too. It explores an interesting idea where only the rich live long and the poor suffer and die because they didn't 'earn' enough time in their lives. It really makes you think about the morality of some members of the upper classes and the value of money. Imagine if time was your only currency - what would you do with your life? This may be science-fiction but it seems to have drawn in some philosophical and mind-boggling elements to really get your brain ticking.

One Day.

Around the time that One Day came out in cinemas, I felt like everyone was talking about it, though, considering I go to an all girl's high school, that's not entirely surprising. Many of my friends had read the book and told me that it was absolutely incredible and I had to read it. Unfortunately, I didn't have enough time to read it before watching the film so I can't tell you how close to the novel the film is; however, the general consesus among my friends -and most women - is that the film does not do the book justice. The first time I watched One Day I thought it was absolutely brilliant. I was blown away by the intensely moving story and found myself leaving the cinema in floods of tears. I thought to myself, if the film doesn't do the book justice then that must be one hell of a book. However, I think I may have been swept up in the moment because when I got home and really analysed the film, I realised that it wasn't that great.

One Day is a romantic love story about two people, who meet after their graduation and become friends for life. She is a working-class girl with morals and high ambitions and he is a wealthy boy determined to live life to the fullest - and by that I mean, have the most fun possible without a care in the world. Over the next twenty years we see the key July 15ths of their lives - sometimes they're together, sometimes they're not, but they're always thinking about one another. They have a long and ardous relationship but they eventually realise that what they've been looking for has been standing right in front of them all along and they learn the meaning of life and love. But is it too late?


Anne Hathaway plays the protagonist, Emma Morley, and whilst she did seem to suit the role, her acting wasn't what it could've been. I've always held Anne Hathaway in high esteem, but unfortunately, she did not deliver in One Day. For starters, her accent was absolutely atrocious. To be fair, I didn't notice this the first time I watched it, but after rewatching several scenes I realised that her accent was different in each and every one and so I finally clocked that Anne Hathaway is incapable of doing a British accent. I found this quite surprising as she seems like the sort of actress who'd be really good at any role of any nationality, but apparently I was wrong.


Dexter Mayhew (Jim Sturgess), is one of those characters you'll either fall in love with, or want to strangle. I fell in love with him, whilst my friend sitting next to me was quite close to killing herself every time he opened his mouth. His accent is very posh-boy-British so I suppose it all depends on personal taste as to whether or not you like that sort of thing. Towards the middle of the movie his character was incredibly annoying but you come back round to him nearer the end of the movie. I think Sturgess is actually fairly good with his portrayal of Dexter as he's supposed to be a bit of a douche who can't express his feelings and I'm not sure if he pulls this off because he's really good at acting, or really bad.


Having never read the book before, the ending was actually quite a shocker for me. I literally had no idea what was coming until it happened - tears ensued. I was pretty sure that I had had the story lined sussed from the very beginning and nothing could've prepared me for the true ending. I think those who haven't read the book will like this film a lot more than those who have, not only because you won't realise that Anne Hathaway is indeed supposed to have a Yorkshire accent (I had to google this) and you won't be able to predict the end (or the middle) of this tale.

One Day is probably going to be one of those films you're either going to love or hate. If you've read the book, there's likely to be a much greater chance of you hating it considering the book is supposedly a million times better. If you can put up with Anne Hathaway's atrocious accent and you've got a box of tissues at the ready then  I would recommend One Day, if only to give yourself a kick up the backside and realise that love won't come easy.

Friends With Benefits.

I've been wanting to see this movie from the very first time I watched the trailer. I've been keeping tabs on Mila Kunis since her performance in Black Swan and I was curious to see how she would fare in a rom-com. Justin Timberlake was still teetering on the border for me as to whether or not I thought he was actually a good actor so I was also hoping to see him in action. Friends With Benefits is very similar to the film 'No Strings Attached' starring Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher earlier in 2011, but much, much better. 

As you can imagine, Friends With Benefits is about two friends who've just been dumped and miss sex to decide to spice up their relationship by having meaningless sex with strictly physical emotions. Obviously, things don't turn out as they planned as other factors begin to affect both their working and personal lives together. The question is ... what will their relationship be when all this is over? 

The plot was brilliant and the balance between 'romance' and comedy was absolute perfection. Although it's pretty obvious how this movie ends, it wasn't one of those annoyingly predictable movies where you spend the entire film wondering when the predictable event would happen. I was perfectly content to wait and see exactly how this movie panned out. There are some down right hilarious moments in this film, but there are also points in which I wanted to cry. Romantic comedies usually come with a lot of stick and rarely are they movies that are actually of a very high standard but this one really was. 

2011 seems to have been a good year for Justin Timberlake with the release of three very successful movies: Bad Teacher, Friends With Benefits and In Time. Bad Teacher was a bit of a let down but that was mainly due to a poor plot line so I was a little dubious about how he was going to perform in Friends With Benefits, but he excelled. He was able to display several different emotions and he made the audience laugh, feel sad and take him seriously when necessary - he even got to show off his musical talents with a bit of rapping! I definitely now consider him to be a serious actor and I look forward to all of his future works, be they comedies, romances or action films. Mila Kunis set the bar very high for herself after her role in Black Swan and she too proved that she is not a one trick pony and can also do comedies. She was the same as Justin Timberlake and was able to be sad, happy, funny, serious and sexy all in one movie. She is clearly a very talented actress who will go far, I'm sure. The chemistry between Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis is electric. They work really well together and it's the chemistry between the two that really carried this film forward and made it all the more believable. 

This film explores relationship issues between men and women, be it friendship or something more which I feel is an issue that a lot of people confusing and so it is easy to relate to. I'd definitely recommend that you buy Friends With Benefits on DVD so that you can watch it again and again and again. It's an incredibly funny and yet moving film that you will never tire of - so really.. it's an investment!