Review: Tomorrow Never Dies

We're on the second week and last week of Bond, and we're gonna talk about the 90s, Pierce Brosnan and Dame Judi Dench and little spoiler I really liked this film. 

It's a weird start to a film if I'm honest with you all, you don't see Bond for about 20 minutes and that's not a bad thing just abit weird and I did find it funny that the first time we see him is in bed with a woman, typical Bond. It starts with M played by Dame Judi Dench, who sends Agent 007 to deal with a terrorist attack, which is planned by Elliot Carver played by Jonathon Pryce. The film is set in China and the UK and Bond has two girls in this film, Mai Lin played by Michelle Yeoh, and Paris Caver played by Terri Hatcher. 

I love Pierce Brosnan, as James Bond not so crazy on him as an actor I like him but I feel like he's abit of a one trick pony but this could be to my ignorance of not knowing his work. But that will all change because I like films if you didn't know that and plus I like to be proved wrong. The beginning titles of the film were not my favourites, it just looked abit cheap and tacky, that doesn't mean I hate the film. The film itself was just wonderful my favourite out of Mai Lin and Paris was definitely Mai Lin she was just so badass and was just fantastic. Whereas with Paris she was just abit wet and crap, Mai Lin knew karate and was a character in her own right, and why oh why wasn't I made into Mai Lin. Paris was just a wet lettice, very beautiful but a wet lettice. 

The choreography of the fight sequences were just fantastic, that's what James Bond films do the best. They did it more so than a dance and I've said this before fight scenes are so much better when they're treated like a dance rather than a big ball up. Also the film adds a certain character to the scenes aswell, which is something I just loved. This film is kinda like a sequel to Goldeneye, it does reference it a couple of times, but not too much where I don't have a clue. Also its first time we see M as a female and I can't imagine anyone but Judi playing her, and she really showed this role can be anyone and anything. 

A memorable scene I remember was Bond and Mai Lin on the bike riding through China town and I loved it so much, and the colours were just bouncing off the screen plus it was during a really intense fight sequence and the adrenaline was just amazing you could really feel it off the screen. The Villain of the film Elliot Carver, was just brilliant he for some reason and I don't know why but he reminds me of Steve Jobs. I know it sounds crazy, and I've never met Steve Jobs but from pictures and various interviews, speeches and also from Jobs the film. The way he talks and presents himself its not like a crazy villain its kinda like an annoying History teacher you hate. 

                                                                  
This film is wonderful, definitely one of the my favourite Bond films, with its amazing fight scenes, and fantastic cast the only thing I hate well not hate just don't like is Paris. Other than that its a fantastic film and if you can get past that then you'll love this film, its worth just watching for Mai Lin really. You should give this film a go as it really is worth a watch with amazing acting, dialogue, fight sequences and just everything its a fantastic film. 

Review: Trainspotting

We're gonna talk about the first Trainspotting, as I've heard so many good things about it and why not. Plus not to mention this film is like Danny Boyle and Ewan McGregor's first big break, and its just nice to look back at them being very young, before they got all the success that's later to come. 

One thing that I love about this film is that now people see Ewan McGregor as Obi Wan Kenobi and an amazing singer in Beauty and The Beast and Moulin Rouge but its nice that this film is where he really became a star, not too sound like an E! Documentary, but its true. It's also Danny Boyle's second film, and again its nice that he has this huge success of Slumdog and 127 Hours, its so lovely that his first big success was a gritty British mainly Scottish drama about Drugs and young people. 

The story is about a group of friends, and their addiction to Drugs, it starts with Mark Renton known as Renton in the film (played by Ewan McGregor) who wants to quit Heroin, and locks himself in a hotel room to withdrawal from it all. He goes with his friends to a nightclub and they're all getting of with girls so Renton hooks up with Diane (played by Kelly Macdonald) who turns out to be a 15 year old school girl. All of Renton's mates, Simon 'Sick Boy' Williamson (played by Johnny Lee Miller) Daniel 'Spud' Murphy (played by Ewen Bremner), start taking Heroin again. Renton's other friends Thomas 'Tommy' MacKenzie (played Kevin Kidd) and Francis 'Franco' Begdie (played by Robert Carlyle, aren't drug addicts but they are completely problematic. Its just about them quitting and getting into mischief I should say.  

I absolutely love this film, its so gritty and real, it's just brilliantly edited, I love the way they edited this scenes together when they were all hooking with with different girls.  They way they use music in the film is so good aswell, I love it when films understand music and how much of an impact it can have on a viewer, the way I see it is, its used as a highlighter it just makes it 10 times better. Particularly if its a scene filled with emotion, whether it be love and sex or a fight scene with anger it just gives it more character for me anyway. I also love that this isn't set in London not that I hate London its just whenever people talk about England or Britain they immediately think 'Oh London' and its like London's one place and its huge but England and the rest of Britain is litter with different people from different backgrounds. I think people need to remember that, and celebrate that we're not all from London. 

The characters are so brilliant and well written I love it, and I need to see the second one because it was ended on a bit of a cliffhanger and that's annoying, plus it seemed to centre around Renton not that that's bad, its just I'd like to get to know the other characters in the group. Like Franco, I love that he is a stereotype of an angry scott, but I wanna know more about him, and obviously I understand in over an hour story you kinda have to fit everything in once, that means characters and all that. I also love the poster I know that's a weird thing to like, but I love that its so different and out there, and that fact that if you looked at it you wouldn't think its a film.

The way I feel about this film is how I felt about Sid and Nancy, it being a young actor and with the knowledge of them being so amazing in the future, and at the time of the film being made it's just them not knowing a thing but still being so captivating and wonderful to watch. Its definitely one of my favourite 90's films and I guess Coming Of Age film if you can call it that, I wouldn't recommend a 10 year old to watch this, but my 10 year old self wouldn't listen to me at all. You should definitely watch this film, not because of a young Ewan McGregor, but the fact that its an amazingly written film and wonderfully casted and edited.

Peppermint Friday Review #22: Misery

I have been watching quite alot of TV shows this week, hence the absence from Wednesday, but we're gonna talk about a story that has stuck with me for years and is so so good. The character is also one of the few characters that really made my blood boil. 

The story is about a writer called Paul Sheldon who writes a very successful crime series of books around a character called Misery Chastain. He is at the end of the series and goes for a drive and gets into a car crash because of the snowstorm. Annie Wilkes who lives nearby helps him to her home, it turns out she is his number one fan. The series of the books is at an end, this makes Annie Wilkes very unhappy, and she then keeps him there until he fixes it in her eyes.

I love how the plot goes from one extreme to the next, Misery was one of the first Stephen King books I ever read, and Annie Wilkes is one of the few villains who I truly hate, as with Villains you hate them like you're ideally supposed to but at the end you still love them, brilliant example the Joker you hate him, but love the excitement he brings to the story. I love that its a story that has the potential to happen in real life, with TV shows, Films, Books, Video Games, and even the internet, making a bigger impact on us all it can really nail you with the idea of Obsession. 

I've read the book, and they are pretty much identical which is very rare considering that doesn't happen very often. The language of Annie thats used is brilliant, both book and film she is a total sociopath but has that childish mentality that's so common in serial killers in fiction and in real life. Paul Sheldon is brilliant, as you're on his side in the whole story from start to finish and I actually jumped out of my seat in the end. 

Kathy Bates stars as Annie Wilkes and she does a brilliant job with portraying a domineering female, as she played a similar character in American Horror Story: Coven. James Caan is fantastic aswell being the writer Paul Sheldon, I liked that he fought back throughout the film, and in the end and its a great feeling watching a film and finally the villain gets what they deserved.

Its great that this story has been adapted to be a play, as there aren't many female villains that I've seen and have made me really angry or terrified or both even. So to have a character that other actresses can play and interpret is amazing, as its always nice to watch a domineering evil woman for a change. I've seen Shawshank Redemption as a stage play and it was brilliant, so it can work. Its an insight for Obsession and what it can do to you, for Paul Sheldon he didn't really have a clue for his audience in terms of his books, but it just shows you have no idea of people and who they are.

                                                           
You should definitely watch this film, if you are of age to watch of course. If you love Stephen King's writing, and need to see an evil, domineering villain. Then this is the film you need to watch, or read the book as they are identical. I'll see you all next week, with a lighter film hopefully and have a lovely weekend!

Peppermint Friday Review #13: Gummo

This is a weird one, as I had to watch this again because and I know this is gonna sound abit stupid to say but I didn't get it the first time, as if I didn't watch it properly but it was so weird I didn't know what it was about. The film is about....I'm not sure the outline plot on IMDB is 'Lonely residents of a tornado stricken Ohio town wander the deserted landscape trying to fulfill their boring, nihilistic lives.' But this story has a hundred different plots and it doesn't necessarily consist if that makes sense. 

Its like short films, improv scenes and home movies collided into one, there were bits of the film I thought 'thats interesting' not that I liked them but found interesting, but also there were bits that I hated and they were the constant images and scenes of dead cats or cats being shot and chase. That kinda stuff makes me abit uncomfortable because I love cats and animals, and I cannot stand to see animals particularly. I can kinda understand and see how the Director/Writer wanted it to be portrayed as the boys were just bored and wanted something wild to do, or because they were very poor and had bad families, could be anything for the reason, I don't know but that creeped me out. 

The Director/Writer of the film is Harmony Korine who made the recent film Spring Breakers, but other than that I'm not that familiar with his work. But that doesn't mean anything, one thing that I found fascinating was the bunny boy throughout the film, he provided an air of mystery throughout the film, particularly when the boys are shooting him with pretend guns, bunny boy doesn't say anything and thats one of the reasons why he's a mystery of course and the character sets out to be a mystery.

One thing that made me cringed so badly, and just makes me cringe in general was the girl in the end who shaved off her eyebrows and that makes me cringe, and I don't know what it does but I hate it. Anyway I thought she was quite nice, because it felt that she didn't realise herself if that makes sense. She was just really genuine, throughout the film I mean the majority of the characters for me anyway didn't really feel real, they might for you and thats great. I loved the soundtrack of the film, as it was added like lighting is makes the scene.

Put it this way I will never forget this film, as it dented itself into my memory. Not for good reasons not for bad, I mean it did feel like an Indie film, and in some ways it was and it did feel like allot of improv was in the film, and apparently it was. Its very organic this film, and its different and incredibly unique and that is always a good thing, but I didn't like the amount of dead cats there were in the film, but also they were lacking in the wardrobe department for guys, as most of the men in this film were shirtless. Not that thats, bad or good, merely an observation. The cast in the film didn't go on to other things, and it felt that they were real people not actors, apart from Chloe Sevigny, and she was married to Harmony Korine. Anyway this film is weird one, but I included it as the main character is a teenager. But I can reassure you all that next week, will be lighter.

  

Peppermint Friday Review #12: Clueless

Bit of a leap from Superheroes but I felt like watching this and I wanted to talk about it. As its a Cult Classic and we all know how much I love Cult Classics.

I'm sure everyone knows this film, so I don't need to tell you about the plot too much. Its directed and written by Amy Heckerling who actually wrote Clueless because in High School she was completely opposite to Cher (Alicia Silverstone) and wanted to portray a privileged girl in a private school. The character of Cher is based off the title character in Jane Austen's Emma, and its about Cher and her way of talking through different situations of her life. She has one best friend at the start of the film, Dionne who is like Cher, but not a clone she unlike Cher has a boyfriend. Cher doesn't really like High School boys, and is still a virgin but doesn't feel the rush of wanting to lose it, like many Teen films the main character is a virgin and wants to lose it.                                                                          

Particularly with her grades, and when a new girl Tai comes to school Cher takes full advantage of giving her a makeover and essentially giving her a guide to school, and just being a human being, not that she wasn't a human before, anyway Cher lives with her father who is very rich and a litigator, and like Cher has a way of talking his way out of things, Josh who is her ex-stepbrother during a college break Josh is living with Cher. I love Cher as she goes on a journey with this film, as Josh keeps telling her that she doing does things for herself, and its accurate because like I've said before teenagers are selfish. But she isn't devious for she does things bad, she's just very clever and doesn't exactly make it obvious, she can talk for England (or in this case America😋). 

The costume in this film is amazing everyone is totally unique in how they present themselves of the characters. I want Cher's wardrobe as its so beautiful in every scene, the film is 90s all over and I love it. The film was made in the early-mid 90s and back then the fashion was very Kurt Cobain, it was all grunge and grey and baggy jeans, then this film came out with its colours and beiges, and pastels. So this film in the fashion world was very influential, and ground breaking.

 I also love the minor characters in the film, like the teachers Mr Hall played by Wallace Shawn, and Ms Geist played by Twink Caplan. They are just fantastic mainly because they're played by two brillaint actors, but also what the film did with them was not brush them aside like background characters or just there, but made them really interesting. Another favourite of mine is Travis at the beginning he is just the typical stoner, then as the film goes on he has a real talent for skateboarding, and is shown as a genuine guy and perfect for Tai.

Tai is another person I love as she very genuine at the beginning but again she is a teenager and is selfish, but she comes through and totally flawed. There's not one character in this film that I go 'urgh' or should I appropriately say 'urgh as if!😀' as I feel there all flawed in every way possible. One thing that I loved was when Cher was doing her driving test and she had alot of things on her mind, but she completley failed it, and there was no way of getting out of it, and for it kinda felt like 'oh I talk my way in school and around my father, but not in the real world' as driving is a real world thing, I might be looking into this as too deep. Anyway, the film for me is so amazing and its one of those films you watch if you wanna feel nostalgic but feel new and fresh all at the same time.