my personal opinions

I have absolutely no credibility or any reason why you should read my reviews. I just think I have good opinions and I enjoy writing them down sometimes.

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Taylor Swift and Tom Hiddleston have been spotted kissing and...are we gonna care?

Taylor Swift has spent the last few years rebuilding her bad reputation. Known for “serial dating” too many famous men, the singer was able to prove she’s okay being single after a year off of boys, which she spent partying with friends. She even toured with Ed Sheeran to prove that she only dates the hot guys in her life...er, that she can have guy friends? The release of her 1989 album “proved” that she is happy being independent, and she was able to keep it up for a good five months before being spotted with DJ Calvin Harris.

Her relationship with Harris didn’t spoil her new spotless rep as it helped her prove she can date someone for more than a month. They were together for over a year, which we all know because they rubbed it in through romantic sunset pictures on Instagram. 

Their break up was actually a little bit sad, because we actually had time to get used to them together unlike her past relationships. But alas, only two weeks after the break up Swift has already ruined it by moving in on another superstar. 

Photos leaked earlier this afternoon of Swift kissing Tom Hiddleston on the beach. I can’t help but be reminded of her last summer romance, which was with US royalty Conor Kennedy. At the time she dated Kennedy, she was 22 years old and about to released her 4th studio album, and he was 18, going into his second senior year of high school. 

I hate to go immediately back to calling her a serial-dater, but really Taylor? Is this not too soon? Do you want us to care, when we’re still mourning the loss of Tayvin?

Unfortunately, it does feel like a publicity stunt. 

People talk about Swift enough. Her new hair color for Coachella made headlines, even though every other celebrity did something for Coachella, too. Hiddleston is not coming out with a movie anytime soon. His TV show, which I didn’t know existed, just finished last month.  He is rumored to be the next Bond, so maybe he needs people to know he is capable of being appealing to younger women (Swift is 26, Hiddleston is 35.)

But maybe...Is Taylor going to drop an album on us? Does she have love songs to release?

If she wrote love songs about Harris they should be post-production by now, but maybe she doesn’t want everyone to be sad thinking that her songs are about a failed relationship, so she will appeal to us by making us think her words are about her new love.

We all know people are horrible at guessing who her songs are about, because “I Knew You Were Trouble” was highly rumored to be about One Direction member Harry Styles even though it was released months before they were ever seen together.

It’s possible that she really loves Hiddleston and the relationship is completely real. She has had intense flings with older guys before, like when she dated John Mayer who was 32 when she was 19, or actor Jake Gyllenhaal at age 22 while he was 31. Her relationship with Gyllenhaal along with her short-lived relationships with Taylor Lautner and (maybe) Cory Monteith or that other guy from Glee show that she sometimes does go for actors over musicians (it’s a 4:3 ratio now.)

Who knows. And honestly, who cares?

It doesn’t affect anyone who she dates or why or how long. The only thing this means is that she will probably write more songs, and she will be able to write about her personal life, which are always better songs.

Can we stop giving Swift attention for who she dates? And also, can we stop giving Hiddleston attention at all? 

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Jem and the Holograms

Went into this movie with absolutely no prior knowledge of what this is about or anything. thoughts: (I started taking notes about halfway through the film because I was annoyed and bored) great, another film full of interesting, motivated characters and even POC where the boring white lead gets famous and “doesn’t even want it”.

Many things are unbelievable, for instance, how on earth did that 1 video make her so famous? Is this supposed to be in real life, where everyone is posting their talent on YouTube, and people like her above them all? Nah. That ain’t happening. It got a little more interesting with the added robot but I’m still confused about him. This would be so much cooler if the lead was a WOC, at least. Also if she had as much character and individuality as her sisters. Oh no…rude white boy is rude for a reason…he has a back story…“I was raised rich and now I have to work”…sob sob…and now he wants attention…ugh just kiss Jem I don’t want to watch the build up How did she get so many fans from that 1 video? Why do people care? Why do they care about the band they’ve never seen before? Are they disappointed that she’s playing a completely different type of music live? Will there be any good songs in this whole movie? Thanks Chris Pratt, The Rock, and Jimmy Fallon for making appearances. I don’t think I could have made it through without you. Don’t sign the solo contract, Jem. Didn’t you see Straight Outta Compton? It will fall apart in the end. This is a horrible decision. Told you. Oh my gosh, she’s literally dressed like 2009 Lady Gaga. There is nothing original about her. Cool. White boy saved the day in the end with a cheesey standing-up-to-parent cliché. So it’s not even an empowering feminist film.

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"The Giver" Review

From watching the preview I could tell that The Giver would be different from the books, so I tried not to be too affected by comparing it. The movie was entertaining, but it felt like a cheap adaption-working too hard to have all those movie clichés that people "love."

Highlights:

-The boy who played Jonas was incredibly good looking with very nice teeth.

-There were a lot of babies in the movie, and Jonas took care of one of them, and it was very cute.

-The overall message of the film was inspiring and uplifting--we need emotion, and feelings, and memories, whether they are good or bad, they shape the world we live in and help us to be empathetic and knowledgeable. 

The main things that bothered me:

-Meryl Streep's character was obviously added to bring more drama. Not sure what exactly bugged me about it, but I wish they hadn't made her character such a prominent role.

-Taylor Swift's cameo felt like a cheap sell out. I love Taylor, but the part was not necessary. It could have been a huge important part that made us think, but it took out the part about Rosemary choosing suicide and made her character more of a cheap sell out. 

-The change from when the world was black and white to when Jonas saw color was too drastic. It was obvious that everyone was wearing white in the beginning, to stand out, and nobody wore white anymore after we saw in color. Obviously, once he sees in color it's nice that not everyone was just wearing white, but the human eye can tell when something is just white and when something is colored even in black and white. Also, this is more to the author of the book, but putting the world in black and white doesn't erase racial differences...I can still tell a black person from a white person even without actual color. It's black and white. Sorry, but this utopia is unrealistic. 

-Fiona's character...obviously, they added romance to appeal to the Hollywood movie style, but they didn't do it well. Maybe if she had run away with Jonas in the end it would have been more satisfactory, but it was hard to believe she felt real emotion and chose to live without it. Also, the actress was terrible, constantly making a doe-eyed face up at Jonas, never lifting her head. 

-The sledding scene. I don't know what that thing was that they sled down, but it didn't make sense. It seemed like a cheap visual trick. Why were there trays at the top? Why didn't they get in more trouble? Why did there just happen to be a random patch of grass at the bottom? It upset me.

-the "line of memory" or whatever it was called. When Jonas passed it, everyone had memories again. This did not exist in the book. It made it hard to understand why Jonas didn't just go back. Why did he have to stay out and almost die with the baby if everyone remembered things just like he did now? Also, at the end he finds the Christmas house. How? This was an old memory. It didn't exist anymore. Did he die and go to heaven? That sucks. That's a terrible ending. I was mad. That was a dumb ending whether the house was real or not. It didn't make sense.

Jonas was great. The babies were great. Jeff Bridges was pretty good. The basic plot was great. But they changed too much, and all the changes felt like cheap Hollywood tricks, as if an audience wouldn't enjoy a realistic movie. People love the book, it's a classic. If the movie had followed it closer, it would have been more enjoyable. 

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“Our Time Is Up” Review

            Our Time Is Up is a short film written and directed by Rob Pearlstein. It was nominated for best live action short film in the 2005 Academy Awards. The film tells the story of a therapist, Dr. Leonard Stern, played by Kevin Pollak. The therapist is stuck in his everyday routine, listening to patients but not directly helping them, when he gets a call saying he has six weeks to live. His life becomes much less put together and he tries a different approach with his patients: honesty. Instead of listening to his patients complain about their lives and calmly telling them things will get better “in due time,” he flat out tells them what’s wrong with them or forces them to face their fears. In the end the doctor finds that this strategy is much more effective.

            Overall, I thought the film was mostly good. Though the plot was not anything particularly original or profound, the cinematography and soundtrack made it feel like an important movie and the comedy written into the screenplay made it enjoyable to watch. It was well casted, well acted, and well directed. It was pleasant, but not revolutionary.

            The weakest point of the film was the plot. The “man has six weeks to live” story is a little overdone and the way this man chose to spend his last six weeks was a little unbelievable. It would not be unusual to think that someone with six weeks to live would quit his job and go do something he actually enjoys for once. Instead, after taking about one day to process the news, Dr. Stern chooses to continue working with his patients, though he clearly does not get joy out of it. Though the plot was weak, the screenplay saved it. The screenplay added funny moments and great lines, such as “soap removes the bacteria from other things, but what removes the bacteria from soap?” said by Dr. Stern’s germ-phobic patient. Each of the patients had their own problems, and they were all somewhat comedic. With just the story of a man having six weeks to live and deciding to be honest for once, it probably would have been a boring film, but the screenplay brought in comedy that made it enjoyable.

            Along with the screenplay making it funny, the actors helped to nail the comedy. It would have been easy for the actors to take the jokes too far or overact their characters. For instance, the germ-phobic woman could easily have played her character more violently, yelling and screaming about her fears, but she had her character sitting uncomfortably, seemingly jittery with anxiety about germs. Had she played it differently, it could have bordered seeming fake or more forced, but she acted it just right for it to be believable, and hilarious.

            Short films tend to be very artsy, and Our Time Is Up was not an exception. The cinematography style was interesting, but not unexpected for a short film. I do not know how to describe the repetitiveness and slow camera shots besides “artsy,” but it’s the kind of art that only works for a short film—for a full length film, it would get irritating. This is not to say that full length films cannot be considered art the way that short films are; it’s just that short films are condensed versions, so the art feels more compacted and noticeable. For example: Our Time Is Now opens by showing that Dr. Stern has everything placed in a specific spot. It shows his shoes set out ready for the week, perfectly polished. It shows his shirts hanging in the closet, perfectly ironed, with their hangers at exactly the same distance apart from each other. It shows that he goes out to get the newspaper every morning right as it’s being thrown. These are all things that subliminally tell the audience this doctor is living in a set routine with everything in order. The shots repeat to show days going by, which is an effective cinematography technique. After Dr. Stern discovers that he is sick, the shots continue, and as time to goes on things are less in order. His shoes are not placed exactly right, shirts are missing or wrinkled, he misses the newspaper several days in a row. This shows viewers that he is distressed, even though he continues to work.

            The costumes also help to tell the story. Dr. Stern’s clothing is all perfectly ironed at the beginning of the movie. The straightness of it all helps to show that he is a man who cares about his looks. As time passes and he gets closer to death, he does not even put his clothes on anymore, but stays in his bathrobe. His hair also shows that he is losing grip, because he starts out with it always perfectly gelled down, but at the end it is a mess. There is also a slight change for some of the characters’ costumes. For example: in her first two scenes, the germ-phobic woman is wearing very covering clothing; a turtle neck, a shirt buttoned to the top. The third time she is shown, when she is starting to conquer her phobia, her neck is no longer covered. These small clothing differences are not necessary but they help with the overall feeling of the film. Little changes provide subliminal clues and show the art of costuming.

            The soundtrack also adds a lot to the feel of the movie. It begins with eerie music that leaves the audience wondering what type of film it is. As the comedy comes in, so does comedic music. It ends again with the eerie music, which makes the realness of the concept of Dr. Stern dying stand out. But when the credits roll, it plays the comedic music again, to help make the audience feel like it was a joyful film. The alternation of eerie and comedic music keeps the theme strong and the feeling fun.

            There were many technical devices used in the film, which showed that it was definitely a work of art. Though the plot may have been somewhat unoriginal, the small details brought in through the screenplay, cinematography, costuming, acting, and soundtrack helped to make it unique and enjoyable.