Month: February 2019

Awards Season Finale: The Oscars

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Folks! It finally came! The end to awards season, The Academy Awards. And they did not disappoint. I’m going to recap my thoughts, favorite and most awkward moments for you all below, as well as my thoughts on those that took home the hardware.

Despite not having a host this year, the show went pretty smooth in my opinion. No listening to jokes that might not land or an over the top opening number/monologue. Just getting straight into presenting awards after an opening performance from Queen with Adam Lambert. That performance fell a little flat for me, but I still enjoyed it.

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Book Review: Me Before You

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It’s been a long time coming for me to read this romance novel by Jojo Moyes, and I can see why I put it off. It’s freaking sad! Like devastatingly sad! And if you haven’t seen the movie that came out based on this novel three years ago, then shame on you and too bad for spoilers.

The book starts with Louisa, “Lou,” losing her job at a cafe. After failing at some oddball jobs she finally lands a job as more of a companion for quadriplegic Will Traynor. Will is as bitter as ever against Lou’s typically sunny outlook on life that she almost quits. But she’s the sole financial provider for her family, so she is determined to stick it out. That’s when she overhears some jarring news: in six months time, Will is heading to Switzerland to end his life with dignity. After learning this, Lou fights tooth and nail to get him to change his mind, but rather unsuccessfully for the most part. Cue the romance part of this novel: they fall in love. Then cue the awful part of this novel: he still chooses to die! Talk about making yourself feel shitty! I will say I was glad I watched the movie when it came out because otherwise there would have been a lot more tears.

Despite its seriously depressing ending, I do feel compelled to read its two sequels: After You and Still You. I’ll be sure to review if I do!

Weekly Movie and TV Round-Up

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Lucky for you all I had a pretty packed week of content, and I intend to share. It will be a brief sharing, because let’s be real, you’re more interested in what I have to say about the Oscars (hopefully).

First up in movies this weekend was At Eternity’s Gate starring Willem Dafoe as Vincent van Gogh during the final few years of his life. Look, Willem Dafoe has such a distinct looking face that I never realized how perfect he was to play van Gogh! The movie itself had a pretty slow pace, but outstanding performances including Oscar Isaac as Gauguin and Rupert Friend as van Gogh’s brother, Theo. It was great glimpse into the mind of a man suffering and longing to dispel his loneliness with friendship. Dafoe’s performance almost had me convinced he was going to take the Oscar away from Rami Malek or Christian Bale.

Next I headed to the theater for a double feature. First up was Fighting with My Family about real-life WWE star Paige and her path to stardom. It was a really earnest film about the close and strange relationship Paige (played by my new favorite Florence Pugh) has with her family. It also touches on being lonely in a new place, judging a book by its cover, and perseverance! Just the right amount of laughs and cameos that it’s a must-see in my opinion.

Following on the heels of Fighting with My Family I switched gears to watch the kid-friendly, third installment of How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World. Good God was this movie adorable! Since the first film came out in 2010 (yes, you read that right), I was transported back to my childhood days and fell in love with Toothless the Night Fury. So many precious cat mannerisms I could’t take it! This final film follows Toothless as he finds a lady friend and the “hidden world” where dragons can live without being hunted by humans. Cue departure tears. But you seriously better go see this film if you even remotely liked the other two.

Last up, literally two hours before the Oscars aired, two hours before Glenn Close did NOT win best actress, I watched The Wife. It was a very solid effort. I loved Christian Slater as the sketchy biographer, Max Irons as the snide son, and Johnathan Pryce as the diabolical husband to Glen Close’s tough as nails wife. This story gives ghostwriting a whole new look, and that look is bitter. I can definitely see why she was the front runner.

Standout episodes in television this week for me included Brooklyn Nine-Nine, where Amy tries to help organize the office while Captain Holt is looking for a new assistant. The latter scenes had me cracking up pretty hard. How to Get Away With Murder‘s penultimate season finale episode was slightly less interesting than last week, but there are still so many potential plot twists that I can’t wait until Thursday! Finally, Gotham finally brought back the best villian duo this series has to offer: Penguin and Riddler! It also touted the return of Jeremiah (cough, Joker) and his face-off with Bruce by cruelly teasing him with people who looked like his dead parents. Friendship.

This week I’m looking forward to the return of Shadowhunters and Roswell, New Mexico along with that season finale of HTGAWM, so keep your eyes peeled for reviews!

Weekend Movie Review

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Trying really hard to get all of the Oscar nominees and movies that I genuinely want to see in before this coming Sunday, so here is what the weekend in movies looked like for me.

Happy Death Day 2U – I wasn’t quite sure how a sequel was going to be made of the original, but it was done and I’d say they nailed it. Success came in the form of a parallel universe and more use of two of the original film’s supporting characters. And her roommate wasn’t a psycho killer this time! Ultimately Tree is left with the tough decision of choosing her still alive mom in this alternate universe, or love with Carter in her current universe. No spoilers here, but I did recently learn that the plan for this film is a trilogy and I want to see that happen, so flock to the theaters for this one please!

Isn’t It Romantic – The “anti-romantic comedy, romantic comedy” is a mostly accurate description for this fun film starring Rebel Wilson as the lead Grinch of love/rom-coms. Living an okay life, Natalie is convinced by her co-worker to open herself up to love, a move which results in Natalie getting mugged and knocking herself unconscious. When she wakes, she finds herself in a PG-13 romantic comedy with all the fluff of a perfect apartment, being the star employee and her own gay best friend (played wonderfully by Brandon Scott Jones). She comes to the conclusion that in order to escape someone must fall in love with her, but in the process of getting wooed by Blake (Liam Hemsworth), Natalie realizes she loves her best friend Josh (Adam Devine, the Pitch Perfect reunion none of us realized we wanted) who is about to get married to someone he just met (Priyanka Chopa, unironically?)! It all works out in the end and we get two quality musical numbers in between.

Roma – Holy shit was this movie boring. I went in trying really hard to like it, but in black and white, subtitled, and clocking in at over two hours about the life of a house maid means I definitely fell asleep in the middle of this. Don’t get me wrong, the parts I did see validated my opinions that it will win Best Picture this Sunday at the Oscars. It’s someone’s cup of tea out there…just not mine.

The Favourite – The last of the Oscar nominees I needed to watch and it was definitely worth the wait! Coming off the heels of The Lobster and The Killing of a Sacred Deer, The Favourite was perhaps the least strange film to come from Yorgos Lanthimos. It was still strange, though and that’s why it was fantastic! The cast was stellar with its trio of leading ladies, led by the magnificent Olivia Coleman, but I was most fond of the comical supporting performances of Nicholas Hoult and Joe Alwyn. I would say my “favourite” part of watching this film was the audience reaction. Clearly no one had educated themselves on Yorgos’ previous films or the meat of what this one would be about. More fun for me that way!

Hello Again – What a terrible musical film! But seeing as I’m newly obsessed with Roswell, New Mexico I had to watch it for Tyler Blackburn! I will say the rest of the cast was pretty intriguing, and I know most of them can sing, but not in this film apparently. It was even a good concept, but good grief! Don’t waste your time.

Television Review – Week 2/11-2/15

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Here to recap all the television I watched this week! I’ll keep it brief, too!

I Am the Night – Three episodes into this limited series and I feel like I have more questions than answers. India Eisley’s Fauna is awkward and looks terrified all the time, and Chris Pine’s Jay is a hot mess. It’s all still just vague enough to keep me interested, and the fact that it’s based around the Black Dahlia murder makes it a must-see. Hopefully more exciting news in the weeks to come.

Drunk History – Switching it up this season means that sometimes host Derek Waters isn’t actually interviewing anyone, but some of his friends are. I’m okay with it and so should you because it’s still the same drunk mess that actually makes learning about history (sort of) tolerable. This week’s episode focused on love, since you know, Valentine’s Day, and notable guests included Josh Hartnett and Alison Brie.

Will & Grace – Grace and Jack try a crash diet for Jack’s upcoming nuptials and so they won’t split any more of their pants. Will is trying to be a more exciting professor after getting some negative reviews, so he ends up doing a mock case Judge Judy style between Karen and one of her former step children who actually liked her. Hilarity ensues!

Brooklyn Nine-Nine – Rosa sports a plethora of hairdos (ridiculous) and Jake makes a promise to a victim’s mom that he’ll solve her son’s murder case. he can’t and goes crazy trying to solve it, talking to “olive Rosa” and walls. Eventually they do manage to find the culprit, after some hilarious dialogue and a fantastic turn by CSI agent Daryl (“very uncool name, Daryl!”).

How to Get Away With Murder – Five seasons in and this show is ridiculous but still so darn compelling! Only two episodes left and I’m still not sure what’s going to happen. This week saw a Christmas gathering with Annalise’s mother, played by Cicely Tyson, and some of her firm friends. her boss is awkward, but not as awkward as dinner with the Keating Five (now that Oliver is a part of it) and Conner’s mom. Bonnie thinks she might be pregnant, but she’s not. The feds are onto Annalise and all she’s been up to these past five years, but Tegan’s potential lady-crush on Annalise ends up saving her some time and gets her case reassigned. Side note: I am all on board for Frank and Bonnie to be a thing already!

And as if watching twelve shows simultaneously wasn’t enough I decided to add two more to the mix this week!

Miracle Workers – This limited series where Daniel Radcliffe and Geraldine Viswanathan play angels answering prayers and Steve Buscemi is God has some serious potential. Daniel Radcliffe’s character has been answering prayers for centuries and is really good at finding keys and gloves, but anything other than that gets sent up to God. Meanwhile, God has the news on 24/7 and is sick and tired of seeing how awful it is that he plans to destroy earth. In walks the newest angel, played by Viswanathan, hellbent on saving earth by answering one of the “impossible” prayers: helping two people fall in love. Very interested to see where this half hour comedy goes!

Roswell, New Mexico – I discovered this show at five episodes in, so naturally I binged them all Monday in order to be caught up for Tuesday’s new episode! Yes, this was a series in the late 90s, but besides the name and book as source material, these are distinctly different imaginings. This series takes place ten years in the future with a more cultured cast. Primary focus is on Liz trying to figure out what actually happened to her sister Rosa’s mysterious death a decade ago. Pretty quickly she realizes three siblings are aliens, but being a scientist now, they mainly just fascinate her. The aliens, Max, Isobel, and Michael, couldn’t be any more different but they all love each other fiercely and would like to keep their identities a secret, especially from the government who just moved into town for some secret project. My favorite characters so far in the series are Liz & Rosa’s best friend, Maria, and Michael and his former lover Alex (favorite ship, as the kids would call it). I recommend!

Weekend Movie Review: Creepy Sh** (and some funny sh**)

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This past Friday my sister and I decided we needed some laughs in our lives, so we went to go see What Men Want starring Taraji P Henson. This movie definitely had laughs, albeit cheesy ones, but they were laughs nonetheless. Henson plays successful sports agent Ali, but can’t break through the boys club to become partner. She then encounters a strange taro card reader at a bachelorette party and is suddenly able to hear men’s thoughts. All men’s thoughts. Which I imagine were pretty accurate. And honestly, some were hilarious! Especially those between her assistant, Brandon (Josh Brener of Silicon Valley) and co-worker Danny (SNL’s Pete Davidson). That was comedy gold! Ultimately, there were too many players in this film and not enough focus on a core group of characters. They tried to squeeze in girlfriends, a romance, a relationship with her father, and workplace drama all in two hours. Just pick a lane and stick with it. That’s where it could have benefited, but all in all I enjoyed it.

On the complete opposite end of the spectrum, some friends and I went to see horror-thriller, The Prodigy, starring Orange is the New Black’s Taylor Schilling, mom to an exceptionally creepy kid! The beginning of this film had me a little confused. A girl running through the woods finally flags down a car and screams “he took my hand!” Then we switch to the guy who took her hand about to be raided by the FBI. He then comes out of his house butt-ass naked (why???) and is shot down holding that girls hand in his hand! Those scenes are inter-spliced with Sarah (Taylor Schilling) giving birth to a son, Miles. Again, at the time this made literally no sense to me. Flash forward eight years, with only some creepy Russian-sounding whispering coming from Miles in between, then he starts to turn sinister. Sarah takes his mumblings to a therapist, and the stuff this kid was saying in Hungarian was vulgar! Ultimately, the therapist says that murderer from the beginning was reincarnated into her son’s body! And if he doesn’t settle his unfinished business (murdering the runaway from the first scene), that he could push her real son out forever. And no kidding – that’s what happens! If you watch this movie and still want kids afterwards, good luck to you. This is just further reinforcement for me.

Lastly, I rented the remake of Suspiria. It was much too long and mildly confusing. But in a nutshell, it’s about a girl from Ohio getting accepted into a dance academy in Berlin. That is inter-spliced with scenes of a cult of witches referring to some as “mother.” Then some freaky stuff starts going down! The most disturbing scene hands down is when lead, Susie (Dakota Johnson), is dancing and in another room a different girl’s body is being ripped apart. Then those witches carry her out with a bunch of hooks! It was nasty!!! Ultimately, it turns out that Dakota Johnson fooled all of those witches because she’s the head honcho and annihilates all of the other witches. That was also an extremely weird scene to watch. Major ups to Tilda Swinton playing three different characters, one being completely unrecognizable as an old man!

Awards Season Continued: 2019 Grammy Awards

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Full disclosure, I have not watched all of the Grammys yet, so you may see some updates here.

All in all, I didn’t think there were too many surprises with who took home trophies last night, but Top 40 isn’t totally my jam, so I can’t say for sure. I was a little disappointed that Underoath didn’t take home the Metal Performance award, and I was also a little bummed that Chris Cornell posthumously took home the Rock Performance (obviously he would, just like Bowie in 2016), only because the other nominees were great, too! In all my pre-Grammy research, the consensus was that Kacey Musgraves would take home the top honors because she was essentially the only country artist nominated; everyone else would be splitting hairs, and she did. Despite me not being a country fan, I have seen her perform live and she’s quite impressive, so kudos to her. Even though others deserved what they won, I was surprised that Post Malone got no love.

Speaking of Post Malone, let’s talk live performances of the night. I watched Post Malone “collaborate” with the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Let’s be real. Those were two separate performances, except Post played guitar when the Chili Peppers were on. Eh. And as much as I love RHCP, why weren’t any of the other rock nominees out there performing with him?? Like Greta Van Fleet! That would be something to see! Lady Gaga was fine. A bit much for a soppy ballad. I read and accurate Twitter comment this morning: “If I muted Lady Gaga’s performance, I would have thought she was singing a metal song.” I also managed to catch Cardi B’s performance was very cabaret, but I enjoyed it!

In other controversial news, was Drake’s acceptance speech getting muted and then cut to commercial! Scandal! It seems to me like he got his point across, and I feel like the Grammys only aided him in his message. But to recap, he basically said that the awards don’t matter, that if you have people paying money to see you live or know the words to your songs than you are already succeeding. And I totally agree with that! I feel like the Grammys are just a Top 40 popularity contest/showcase, but it’s also not bad to get one either. Good for you, Drake!

Of all the major awards shows out there, this is one of my least favorite, so take this review with a grain of salt. For all award winners, check the link: https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/10/entertainment/grammy-winners-2019-list/index.html

A Brief Movie Review

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Yesterday I managed to squeeze in three movies after work before my eyes gave up on me. Rather than giving any major plot points away, I decided I am going to give the briefest gut instinct review I had after watching them. You’re welcome.

  1. Replicas – Good grief was this bad. Not even Keanu Reeves could make this better. Like at all.
  2. On the Basis of Sex – Man was this inspiring, and Armie Hammer as supportive husband?! Yes, please.
  3. Velvet Buzzsaw – Besides the badass title, there was death by colors and the creepiest art display ever, called “Hoboman.”

If I had to choose one for an audience to see, my vote is for On the Basis of Sex. Go see it! You won’t regret it!

Book Review: Boy Erased

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After watching Boy Erased this past December, I decided I wanted to read the memoir it was based on. I’ve got to say for the most part it was pretty spot on. There were certainly some more dramatized moments in the film, but it covered everything else accurately. It was a little hard to read with some names removed, and sometimes I wasn’t too certain to what time flashbacks were taking place, but otherwise the flow was nice.

The novel touched more on Garrard’s internal punishments, like not eating a lot and running more so he could “disappear,” which is something maybe the movie was lacking. I also got a strong sense of the relationship with his mother, as well as how religious he actually was. It was also touching to read how his experiences in conversion therapy essentially destroyed any relationship with God he had, but how he is still diligently trying to find it again.

All in all, I felt the memoir was maybe a bit long-winded. I’m not saying there probably wasn’t more to tell, but that he seemed to repeat himself a lot. Maybe the point was to draw this experience out for the reader just like the experience was probably an eternity to him.

TV Recap: Gotham

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I believe I missed reviewing last week’s episode of Gotham, so I’m back! This week’s episode titled “Pena Dura” picked up right where last week left off. We learned that Ed remembered firing off the RPG that destroyed Haven and killed hundreds of Gothamites. Although, with the memory problems he’s been having recently, he decides he did not do it unprovoked, so he heads off to find out why.

While trying to figure out who destroyed Haven, Jim and Harvey run into some trouble but are saved by some military folk sent in by Walker (who Jim spoke with over radio last week), including Jim’s old army buddy, Eduardo. Ed is pursued by the two, but escapes only to be captured by some serious hillbillies hellbent on avenging their pooch who got fried in the bombing (not kidding). It was during this torture that Ed remembers Oswald/Penguin saying he was going to “fix” Ed.

After escaping the hillbillies, he makes his way over to city hall to have a stand-off with Penguin only to learn that Oswald was trying to SAVE Edward after being stabbed. Ed learns that he paid Dr. Strange (all hail BD Wong!) to fix him back up. Through a heated exchange we basically get their version of saying they love each other (Nygmobblepot for life), but then the cops show up as Ed escapes again.

Ed makes his way to Barbara’s club to get answers to where Strange is at, and end up forming a very loose alliance. After confronting Dr. Strange, Ed gets a paralytic sprayed in his face because Dr. Strange needs to fix the chip that was implanted in his brain. We learn that he’s being controlled, although not by Strange. At the end of the procedure, Jim and Eduardo bust in and we learn that EDUARDO is controlling Nygma! He tells Jim he needs to put a bullet in his head in order to prove his loyalty. Jim obviously can’t do that, escapes, so Eduardo orders Ed to go after Jim and kill him.

In the midst of all of that action, we see Bruce still struggling with the fact that Selina murdered Jeremiah and feels no remorse. In confronting her at the club, Selina hits Bruce with a harsh truth: she saw his parents get murdered and did nothing about it because she didn’t care. She’s not a hero like Bruce wants her to be. That’s got to be a tough pill to swallow.

All that celebrating is for not though, since at the end of the episode we see Ecco wake a SLEEPING Jeremiah. He is led out of his “tomb” to see the work of a surgeon who has apparently made Thomas and Martha Wayne replicas. Can’t wait to see Bruce freak out about that. Two weeks from now we should be getting some more answers, but in the meantime we must wait. Boo!