Award Winners

Ok its the moment you've all been waiting for, just so you know i wrote this right after i wrote the other little post just thought i'd made you wait cos i no the tension must of been killing you. I may even forget to propery post this one who knows, well if your reading this you no :P So the winners are:

Best Picture

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2

Best Director

Matthew Vaughn – X-Men: First Class

Best Actor

Colin Firth – The Kings Speech

Best Actress

Rooney Mara – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Best Supporting Actor

Geoffrey Rush – The Kings Speech

Best Supporting Actress

Jennifer Lawrence – X-Men: First Class

Best Special Effects

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Best TV Show

Doctor Who

Best TV Actor

Matt Smith – Doctor Who

Best TV Actress

Mayim Bialik – The Big Bang Theory

 

Time For A Change

Well as anyone who may of been here before will have noticed i have decided that as it was a new year/term it was time for a change in terms of the background in order to keep things looking fresh and new and exciting. Also i get bored easy so expect more changes in the future (if i keep this thing up)

Review: The Descendants

The Descendants (2012)
Director Alexander Payne

This is very much an award season film, and is purely based around the actors involved. George Clooney (Batman and Robin, Up in the Air) is the center of the film and manges to put in the best performance of his carear so far and thoughly deserves an oscar for his role of a middle aged man going through a family crisis. The other stand out star of the film is newbe Shailene Woodley, who on this evidence is going to be one of the stars of the future. Matthew Lillard (Scream, Scooby-Doo) and another newcomer Nick Krause add some much need humor to the occassion. The story may not be great and a bit predictable but makes up for that with stunning visuals of Hawaii, that particually in the second half of the film are some of the most beautful areas on the planet, very similar to how War Horse portrayed some of Englands pretiest areas earlier in the month. Overall, this film is all about Clooney and will go down as one of the finest of his carear.

7 out of 10

Review: Red Riding Hood

Red Riding Hood (2011)
Director Catherine Hardwicke

Ok so alarm bells should of been ringing when i found out that Hardwicke (Twilight) was directing this 'adaptation' of the classic tale. Everything about the film seems to disapoint, from an almost one dimensional performance from lead Amanda Seyfried (Mean Girls, Mamma Mia) to Gary Oldhams (Harry Potter and the Prisonor of Azkaban, The Dark Knight) performance been below his usual standards and the plot of the film ruins the source material. The most annoying of the plot points is the creation of a love triangle - a la Twilight. The one thing the film has to its favor is that it just managed to trick me and suprise with the sort of twist ending. The Wolf itself looks similar to the incrediably unrealistic wolves of New Moon, and fails to produce the threat or dark tone that this sort of retelling needs and could of made the film at least watchable. Not one for the kids ... or anyone!

2 out 10

Review: Cars 2

Cars 2 (2011)
Directors John Lasseter and Brad Lewis

Now of all the films Pxar has released, Cars would of been one of the last on my list of sequels to be made. It is very hard to critical of the company that have constantly brought their A game to every film they have released over the past 15 years but the cars universe is probably the hardest to buy into and lacks the studios habit of creating memorable characters. Despite this i still went into Cars 2 with the excitment of a child and you cannot deny it is a magnificently created world that flicks from city to city with ease. Where the first film focused on Lighting McQueen the sequel chooses instead to focus no his sidekick, Mater, and his interaction with Michael Caine (The Dark Knight, Harry Brown) voiced Finn McMissle who is the closest the film comes to create the next in a line of characters including most of the Toy Story gang, Nemo, Doug the dog and Wall-E himself. It's still an enjoyable watch although i'd rather pixar focused on origonal stories rather then sequels.

6 out of 10

Review: Monsters

Monsters (2010)
Director Gareth Edwards

Following in a line of recent low budget releases Monsters clocks in with an estimated $800,000 to play with. The film fits in with the Sci-Fi elements that have always intrigued me; how would an alien event effect life on earth. Set in Mexico the film follows too people trying to return home to America though the so called infected zone. Both relative unknowns Scoot McNairy (Herbie Fully Loaded) and Whitney Able (All The Boys Love Mandy Lane) are capable and its refreshing that the romance story takes a bit of a back seat rather letting the film focus on how the extra terrestrial event has effected the people of Mexico and on how the aliens need earth. The aliens themselves proove that a big budget is not needed to create beliable and acceptable effects, with them easily been able to stand up to the big budget alien invasion of recent flop Skyfall. The film also manages to keep its independant elements in.

6 out of 10

Review: Marley And Me

Marley and Me (2009)
Director David Frankel

Marley and Me has a reputation as one of the most upsetting films of recent years but thats not saying that there arn't laughs and uplifting moments over the course of the story. The plot features the lives of married couple Owen Wilson (Armegeddon, Meet the Parents) and Jennifer Aniston (Friends, Horrible Bosses) who decide to rise their first dog who proves to be a little more trouble then he's worth. Thankfully for the audience this trouble proves to be good fun as we watch the cute puppy grown and into a rather larger dog. Never staying with the family for long periods of time before moving on to the next milestone the family seems to grow in a blink of the eye as we see Marley grow older and reach the ineviatal end of his life, have tissue ready for the young families goodbye. Despite the tears theres nothing to dislike about the film which makes for a perfect sunday film while not setting the world alight.

6 out of 10

Review: Edward Scissorhands

Edward Scissorhands (1991)
Director Tim Burton

Over the past few years i have become less and less of a fan of Tim Burton's work, ever since his 2005 destructions of Charile and the Choclate Factory. But there is not doubt that his best work was in the 1990's and this is one of his best works. The story takes its time to get started but once it enters its second half the film has your complete attention. You need not question the worlds that Burton creates and theres no doubt in that. A young Johnny Depp (Sleepy Hollow, Pirates of the Carribean) will see better days but its still a confident early performance and Winona Ryder (Alien Resurrection, Black Swan) is at her most likable and on this evidence could maybe have had a more a-lister career, although theres still time yet. How the film will stand further viewings by me remains to be seen but all the evidence is this is Burton at his Sleepy Hollow and Batman best.

6 out of 10

Review: War Horse

War Horse (2012)
Director Steven Spielberg

War Horse is exactly what you'd expect from a film by Mr Speilberg; big, emotional but still manages to lack any connection to the characters. Of course that job is made harder by the way the story is told in episodes following Joey the horse thoughout his journey from England to war and back again. Some cast members manage better then others with the main acting highlight featuring Tom Hiddleston (Thor, The Avengers) and Benedict Cumberbatch  (Sherlock, Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy) which unfortunatly occurs too early in the film and means that you are left wishing for a reapearence during some of the less eventful moments of the film. The problem the film faces is like several other Spielberg films it looses the attention of the audience around the halfway mark before reaching it's emotional climax near the end. The other huge success of the film is the way it captures the beauty of England with its endless wide shots and long opening sequence. Not Spielberg at his best but still a good watch
5 out of 10

Skins Series 6 Bet

Very important – winner receives two sausage rolls of each contestant for each one of their chosen that characters dies

Tim wins if Alo, Nick, Grace or Liv dies during series 6

Matthew wins if Mini, Rich, Matty or Frankie dies during series 6

 
In the event of no character dying during the course of the series we both eat our own sausage rolls J

Yeah I Am a Geek

Ok i'm a film nerd so award season always gets me excited (Yay for you!!) and this year i have nothing better to do as university dosnt start until the very end of January so i decided to do my own little award show and of course you cant give awards until the nominations are released (even though i can already guess what wins what) so here exclusivly for you are the nominations for my film and tv awards 2011, hope for the sake of my social life there wont be any 2012 awards. Also unlike awards people i havn't seen every film this year (they go by UK release date) and there are others i want to see that probably would have the chance to be in this list cos they all want to be its that good!!

Best Picture

Black Swan

The Inbetweeners Movie

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2

The Kings Speech

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Super 8

Thor

X-Men: First Class

Best Director

J.J. Abram’s – Super 8

Darren Aronofsky – Black Swan

David Fincher – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Tom Hooper – The Kings Speech

Matthew Vaughn – X-Men: First Class

Best Actor

Johnny Depp – Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

Robert Downey Jnr - Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Michael Fassbender – X-Men: First Class

Colin Firth – The Kings Speech

Andy Serkis – Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Best Actress

Cameron Diaz – Bad Teacher

Elle Fanning – Super 8

Felicity Jones – Chalet Girl

Rooney Mara – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Natalie Portman – Black Swan

Best Supporting Actor

Jude Law - Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Geoffrey Rush – The Kings Speech

Jason Segal – Bad Teacher

Stellan Skaragard – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Channing Tatum – The Dilemma

Best Supporting Actress

Diana Agron – I Am Number Four

Jennifer Aniston – Horrible Bosses

Jennifer Lawrence – X-Men: First Class

Mila Kunis – Black Swan

Emma Roberts – Scream 4

Best Special Effects

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Super 8

The Adventures of TinTin: The Secret of the Unicorn

Transformers Dark Side of the Moon

Best TV Show

The Big Bang Theory

Doctor Who

Frozen Planet

Glee

How I Met Your Mother

Not Going Out

Best TV Actor

Darren Criss - Glee

Neil Patrick Harris - How I Met Your Mother

Jim Parsons – The Big Bang Theory

Jason Segal - How I Met Your Mother

Matt Smith – Doctor Who

Best TV Actress

Mayim Bialik – The Big Bang Theory

Kaley Cuoco – The Big Bang Theory

Karen Gillian – Doctor Who

Heather Morris - Glee

Naya Riviera - Glee

R.I.P Darlington FC

It's always a sad day when you see a football club go out of buisness never mind one of your local teams. While i was growing up there were only 5 clubs in the football league in the entire of the North East, now of course there are only 4 after Darlingtons relegation to conference in 2010, and therefore the club has always had a great amount of my respect. But today it finally looks as though the end is here after the club sacked all its players and care taker manager Craig Liddle (who has done an incredable job over the last few difficult months) suggesting that this is finally the end for the Quakers. Of course all there problems can come down to George Renaylds and his ridiculas idea that Darlington need a 25,000 seater stadium for a four tier team. It's a sad end for a club that started the year by winning the FA Trophey at Wembley and have always been a credit to the North East and incrediably helpful to my club Middlesbrough often taking youngsters, including a young David Wheater, and giving them first team football. Thoughts must be given to the fans of Darlington who are the biggest losers in all this and now appear to have lost their club forever.



Review: New Year's Eve

New Year's Eve (2011)

Director Garry Marshall

Following in the same vein as Valentine's Day, New Year's Eve is another attempt for America to make a success of the Love Actually formula. Although it is an all star cast, the film seems to have brought toghether some of the most annoying actors in America and forced them into one film. The other problem is there are just too many stories going on at once that you loose interest in each particular volume. There are some good moments with Robert De Niro's (Taxi Driver, The Godfather Part 2) story been the highlight but with others been almost so predictable it's painful to watch, in particular Lea Michele (Glee) and Ashton Kutcher (Valentine's Day, No Strings Attached) been the worst of them all! The one thing i can say about the film is it's not as bad as everyone makes it out to be but that by no means leads to it been a good film, it's just alright with the highlight of the film the bloopers that make up the end credits, which says everything it needs to about this 'rom-com'

3 out of 10

Review: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2011)

Director David Fincher

Now normally i disapprove of remakes of perfectly good foriegn films but i have to admit that in the case of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo due to the nature of the story an American language remake was maybe needed. And if your going to remake a good film you need a great director and thankfully the producers of this tattoo managed to hire one of Americas best David Fincher (Se7en, Fight Club) for whoem the books seem to be written in order for him to adpat and his direction is a superb as ever here. The other major factor in wheter the film would suceed was the titular girl, a role everyone in Hollywood seemed to want but eventually went to Rooney Mara (A Nightmere on Elm Street, The Social Network) who is incredible from start to finish and one of the best performances of the year. The one black spot is Daniel Craig (Layer Cake, Casino Royale) who is the same character we've seen before which isn't too bad but the lack of a Sweedish accent makes him stick out like a saw thumb.

7 out of 10



Review: Sherlock Holmes A Game Of Shadows

Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows (2011)
Director Guy Ritchie

The first Holmes films was one of the unexpted hits of 2009, and appealled to me particaully because of its originality. This was the problem that the sequel was always going to face. The other problem at the moment is that because of the complexity of the story i need a 2nd viewing to fully understand it. The heart of the film is still the same with the fabolous chemestry between Robert Downey Jnr (Iron Man, Tropic Thunder) and Jude Law (The Holiday, The Imagination of Doctor Parnassus) as well as the addition of Jared Harris (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Mad Men) as the evil Morriaty who excels as an unconventional but enjoyable villian make the film enjoyable. Unfortunatly the female cast of the film are extremely underused and undevolped especially Rachel McAdams (Mean Girls, Wedding Crashers) and Noomi Rapace (The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo) who could have made the film to the standard of the first film is the series.

5 out of 10

Happy New Year!!

Well theres not really much more i can add to this other then a few pretty pictures as i've already gone on a bit about what i'm looking forward too a bit on this blog although i may put some nice pics of those on this post!!