Where’s Kaeden?

One of my fellow classmates commented on one of my blog posts and said to me “the meaning of a movie is whatever the viewer gets out of it” and this really struck home with me, because it is true. Two different people can watch the same movie and each person will take away something completely different. I found this to be extremely true as I was watching The Devil Wears Prada last night.

We All Love Charts

Today in class a fellow student named Maggie, who has a wonderful blog about treats and delicacies (you can find it here), presented on the Tumblog, I Love Charts. So I thought it would be fun to scour the archive for a film related chart to add to my blog. The charts related to movies were copious, but because I have a poll asking favorite genres, I thought this one would be fitting.

The chart itself shows all the percentages of films made in each genre. I realize it is extremely small, but if you simply click on it you can get a bigger view. I was disappointed to see how low the horror genre was…

How did your favorite genre do? 

A Walk to Christianity

After having a rough night on friday, I thought it would be best to take it easy on Saturday night. As soon as i got off work, I went straight home, got into my favorite pajamas and slippers and took off to a friends place. She had texted me earlier asking if I wanted to watch a scary movie. As you may well know from reading my blog, a scary movie is my ultimate weakness. So I had to say yes! After watching The Possession, a disappointing “horror” film about a demonic box, we decided to lighten the mood and watch A Walk to Remember. I use the term “lighten” very generously because it was pretty much a complete 360 turn around of the mood.. Anyways, I could basically feel my tears forming before the movie even started.

Self Diagnosed Insomnia

Last night I suffered from a bad case of insomnia. After tossing and turning in bed for an hour and a half, I finally decided to get up and try again later. So I decided to order some pizza, sit on the couch and do some channel surfing. About fifteen channels in, I noticed a movie about to begin. The intense 20th Century Fox logo pulled me in and made me curious and kept me on the channel. Having just gotten my pizza, I nibbled on a piece while I patiently waited for the the credits to stop playing and tell me the title of the movie. Finally, in big red letters over a nice view of Boston, Fever Pitch was displayed.

Movie Magic

Middle school; a time of cracking voices, hormonal acne and the segregation into cliques. At this time where so little actually matters, we would attach importance to the most meaningless things. Of these things we attached importance to, nothing beat fitting in with the “cool kids.”

In my small hometown of Yelm, Washington, the best way to be one of the “cool kids” at Yelm Middle School was to go to the movies. With the recent addition of a movie theater in our small hick town, it was all the rage. During conference weeks when our days were cut in half, nothing was cooler than walking to the movie theaters after class.

Aca-Amazing!

Following the release of Disney’s High School Musical in 2006, a fondness for warm-hearted, romantic, teenage musicals was born inside me. After the second High School Musical was released a few years late, the fondness turned quickly into obsession. There’s just something about the parallelism that lights up my heart and mind with the idea of “hey I am also a teenager, i can relate to their pains and struggles.”

Anyways, the obsession turned more quickly into full on stalk-celebrities-who-play-in-the-movies-and-follow-their-instagrams-and-twitters-because-im-obsessed after the release of Pitch Perfect. After watching it for the first time I was immediately hooked. I watched it four more times after that in a course of three weeks.

The story follows a young adult, Anna Kendrick, as she takes the leap into college life. Armed with a secretive singing voice and a talent for mashing up popular hit songs she finds herself joining an all girls acapella singing group called the Barden Bella’s. The Bella’s are one of the four acapella groups on the college campus that results in in-school competition as well as national competitions. The whole movie is focused on Becca (Anna Kendrick) and her journey with the Barden Bella’s through the many tiers of acapella competition, as well as the many tiers of building friendships and even relationships.

Overall, I really enjoyed the movie. It was full of drama, heart, love, happiness, and all the while it remained completely hilarious. However, I do want to touch on a few key aspects:

• I have watched the movie multiple times now and each time I do I end up hating the main character Becca (Anna Kendrick) more and more. She has issues with her father, yet they never address the issue so you’re left guessing what happened. She basically seems like a spoiled brat the whole time and takes the fact that her dad is paying for all of her college for granted. As a college student, this was really annoying for me, because I wish I had a dad that could give me a free ride to college. Who doesn’t?! The other thing that I found really annoying about her is that in the movie her character apparently doesn’t enjoy movies. This was odd to me, because I don’t think there is a single person alive who honest to god does not enjoy movies. What’s better than watching a fictitious story with attractive actors?! NOTHING. So it was a little unrealistic for me to believe that any person could legitimately not enjoy movies.

• This movie would not be what it was had Fat Amy, played by Rebel Wilson, not joined the Barden Bella’s. Fat Amy is the heart and soul of this film and probably the reason why most people decided to see it. Okay, okay Fat Amy. If I am being honest you are part of the reason I did see the film. Not only did she provide the Bella’s with some much needed comedic relief, she also contributed a powerful singing voice that added flare to all of the Bella’s performances.

• Finally, nothing could beat the heart-warming ending. By the end Becca has had a change of heart and no longer acts like such a spoiled brat. Even better than that, however, she wins over her love interest Jesse (Skylar Astin) by using a song from his favorite movie The Breakfast Club. In the final mashup of the Bella’s, they mix classic hits with current hits for an award winning performance. The mixture of Give Me Everything by Pitbull, Price Tag by Jessie J and Don’t You (Forget About Me) by Simple Minds provided me with copious amounts of goosebumps. Even better than that is when Jesse’s nerdy roommate who wants nothing more than to join the Treblemakers (the boy acapella group at Barden University) gets his shining moment. Benji (Ben Platt) gets to sing a solo in the Treble’s final mash up. It is heart melting when his face lights up the moment he hits the stage. If I remember one thing from this movie it will be how happy Benji looks as he starts his solo. 

Aca-overall, this was a fantastic movie. It was so good to me, in fact, that I have purchased the DVD as well as the soundtrack. Nothing helps me start my day like listening to the Barden Bella’s do covers of popular songs. This movie is fantastic all the way up until the end and I would honestly recommend it to anyone and everyone.

What Does 3-D REALLY Stand For?

In terms of the newly released Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3-D, the “D” in “3-D” must stand for “Do not go see this movie,” or maybe even “Do not waste your time and money.”

This movie was just released nearly two weeks ago on the 3rd of January and according to Masslive it hit number 1 at the box office with a total of $23 Million dollars in the first weekend. With the average price of the 3D ticket being anywhere from $9.00-$13.00, that is nearly 1,769,230 people who walked out of the theater thinking either: a) “wow that was really scary, i hope i can sleep tonight!” or b) “i cannot believe i wasted time and money on this ‘horror’ film.” My own thoughts being the latter option.

Now, not everything about this movie was completely terrible. There were moments where I found myself covering my eyes, because I could not bring myself to witness a chainsaw slicing it’s way through a human body. However, there were other times where I could not help but laugh.

Throughout the whole 90 minute film there were a few things that really stood out to me.

The first and foremost is the fact that the movie set itself up for limitations right from the beginning. The protagonist, played by Alexandra Daddario, was accompanied by three friends on her journey to reconnect with her blood relatives. They are later joined by a hitch-hiker bringing the grand total to five main characters. With only five main characters, the storyline is limited and the blood, guts and gore are limited, as well. This really ground my gears because it made for a short film and hardly any notable death scenes.

The second thing that I could not help but notice throughout the film in it’s entirety was the sex appeal. If the Texas Chainsaw Massacre Franchise wanted to go into the porno business, it would be a spin-off of this new installment. Nearly all of the characters wore little to no clothing throughout the whole movie.

As you can see above, next to no clothes. The girls all wore skimpy clothes and the boys went shirtless more often than not. I was surprised to see Leatherface fully clothed, because this movie did not hesitate in creating sexual appeal for the audience and hey why not make the killer sexy, too?!

Prior to what Apple or anyone with an iPhone may believe, it isn’t always time for FaceTime. Which brings me to the third thing I could not help but laugh at, FaceTime at the wrong time. At one point in the movie, a lone sheriff believes he is strong enough to take on Leatherface one-on-one. He enters the house with a gun in one hand, but what is in his other hand? A flashlight? A knife? Maybe some mace? The answer is not any of these things. The answer is his iPhone. Whether this was simply ingenious product placement by Apple or an accurate representation of how our society is literally attached to their iPhones, I could not help but chuckle. Not only is he using his iPhone as a flashlight, but the sheriff is also FaceTiming the other officers back at the office, because the deputy requested “a visual” of the scene. The whole scene itself was extremely ridiculous.

The final thing I noticed about this movie was the cliffhanger set-up in the end. Granted, for some movies having a cliff-hanger means another movie which is exciting! In terms of the Texas Chainsaw Franchise, however, the cliffhanger that basically screamed “we are going to make a sequel,” made me roll my eyes and cringe at the thought of yet another installment.

Overall, if you are faint of heart and easily scared, this movie will provide you with some gore and thrills to get your heart racing. On the other hand, however, if you share the same love for horror films as I do, this movie will be nothing less than a good laugh.

And don’t you look so worried mister leatherface, you’ll do better next time!

Welcome

Hello all and welcome to my blog! I have an immense passion for horror films and am on the never-ending search for that one special scary movie that brings tears to my eyes and is followed by sleepless nights. It’s taking a lot longer than I had hoped though.

My passion for horror films is what inspired me to write a blog on movies. I will not solely focus on the horror genre, however, I will broaden my horizons and discuss different genres as well. With this page I plan to share my thoughts and feelings on new movies as well as old movies. I am by no means a movie critic, however I do enjoy watching different films and I generally have strong opinions about them.

I will be updating weekly. I hope to watch a movie each week and critique it to the best of my ability. I will be critiquing new movies that are in theaters, as well as anything I find intriguing on Netflix and/or Hulu Plus.

So whip out your popcorn and soda and let’s watch a movie!