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Alice in Wonderland (3D) - Review (1.3 Preparation and 1.1)

Okay, first things first.

Visually, Disney's recent re-do of Alice in Wonderland, is wonderful.
The live action characters are puppets in a world that is of a large part animated.. which looks really fantastic. Sometimes the backgrounds look a bit distant compared to the up close, especially in 3D, but it still looks wonderful. The costumes and characters look stunning too.

Unfortunately, everything else isn't as good as it first appears.
The trailers are short, giving us an introduction to the wonderful world of Wonderland, mainly featuring Johnny Depp running around with a big hat on looking pretty epic. It suggests a slight twist on the book's story and a pretty good laugh, especially for kids.

However, it's not actually too great.

Firstly - the story is a mess. The film starts with Alice, as a young girl, waking in the night from dreams of a strange world with blue caterpillars and smiling cats... And then skips to her later, where she is proposed to by an arrogant and pompous - well acted - guy...and surprise, surprise - she doesn't want to marry him. Instead, she decides to run after a little rabbit with a clock.
The rabbit with the clock is leading her on, and he's not late for anything. It turns out Alice is returning to Underland, and it's not her first time - this time she must return the throne to the White Queen as the Red Queen has taken over, and slay the Jabberwocky.
The simple and humorous story of the books has been...well, Disneyfied. Badly.
Some of the characters have their own sub-stories - and although some of these are good - the Red Queen with her exceptionally large head is made to believe that all of her henchmen and women also have extremely large body parts, but they are all fake - most of them aren't too great, a main and not very well presented one being the Mad Hatter's, as he tries to grapple with the fact that he may actually be - "Mad."
There's a little sly bit that is only mentioned once in the film, where Alice is taking a walk with someone (forgot who) through the garden, and she says she ordered red flowers but they have white, and Alice says "Why not paint them?" "What a strange thing to say," she replies. I was probably one of the only people in the cinema to smile. It's a case of, read the book and don't watch the film.
Those who have read the book will be disappointed; those who haven't will find themselves looking at an unclear, cloudly story in which the protagonist sees everything just as cloudily as we do. She only realises she isn't dreaming near the end, and for some reason she doesn't recognise that the creatures and characters she is seeing in front of her and being introduced to are actually those that have been in her dreams for the past 15 years or so. To make this worse, quite a lot of the conversation is unrealistic and doesn't flow.

This not-flowing also applies to the characters and the fun suggested in the trailer. It's not as lively and exciting as it looks as to be and some parts are even boring.
The casting of the Mad Hatter, Johnny Depp, didn't seem to suit that well afterwards either.
It has some - I think you could call it - charm to it though. The Red Queen gets little animals to do, like, everything for her. There's a good scene where one of the frogs that work for her has eaten one of her tarts and she is trying to work out which one.
There are some funny characters too - a really mad rabbit at the tea party with the Mad Hatter, and Tweedledum and Tweedledee - Matt Lucas - are one of the best things about the film.

Although it's not quite what I was expecting, it's still good. It has a lot of good moments and it looks very pretty, but it doesn't stand up to a lot of other kid's films these days. I suppose most young people will find the plot fairly average, and everything else probably won't be noticed. It will just look amazing, and that's the best part.
It's good and it's worth a watch for some kids, probably some teens, and adults will love the charm that's often shown in Disney films...but, there's always Harry Potter. And there's plenty more that could definitely stand up to it.

Let's hope the film of the future doesn't just turn to the special graffics and the obvious charms - and stays focused on everything else too.



6/10

Family Day Out: Bronte's House in Haworth Visit (1.1)

Today I and my family (Mum, Dad, & Younger Bro) went to Haworth, about an hour's drive from here, to visit where the Bronte family had lived in the 19th Century, which has now been changed into a museum.




The three Bronte sisters, Emily, Charlotte and Anne, are famous for being one of the most famous literary groups in the world, Emily writing the famous Wuthering Heights (1847), Charlotte writing Jane Eyre (1847) and Anne, though less well known, wrote The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848).

Reverend Patrick Bronte brought his wife Maria to live at Haworth Parsonage in 1820, and they originally had six children: Maria, Elizabeth, Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne, but as Maria and Elizabeth died along with Mrs Bronte within a few years of living here, and Branwell, their only son, was never as succesful as his three other sisters, the children are commonly known as the three Bronte sisters.
Charlotte, Emily, Anne and Branwell lived all their lives in Haworth, but none of them living past 40. Their father outlived all of them, dying in 1861 at 84.

The Bronte sisters were originally reluctant to publish their books under their names as they were female, and instead the books were originally published under Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell.

Charlotte was the only one to be married, and her husband Mr Nicholl moved in in 1854. She was also the only one to become famous in her lifetime.
Branwell was, as a child, considered the greatest genius of the Bronte family and he was the first of the family to see his poems in print, but after his lovelife failed and he was in debt, he later became an unsuccessful alcoholic as his sisters went on to write their famous books.

Charlotte Bronte - 1816 - 1855
Emily Bronte - 1818 - 1848
Anne Bronte - 1820 - 1849
The three sisters would stay up late at night talking and writing. Emily died on the sofa, not admitting she was ill until very late.

All of the Brontes are buried underneath a pillar in the nearby church.


On the trip we looked around the little town, looked in the museum and did a short walk around part of the moors that were inspiration for the books.
The Bronte house contains many retrievable original items owned by the family layed out to look at in the rooms and contains all the original furniture. In the museum/house, you can learn about each of the 10 rooms, (they were quite a rich family) and look at all the exact original clothing, furniture and items that the family used.
The rooms were: The entrance, Mr Brontes study, the dining room, the kitchen, Mr Nicholls study, the servants room, Charlotte's room, The nursery, later Emily's room, Mr Bronte's bedroom and Branwells art studio.
There was also a newly built room, added in 1878, which contains a special exhibiton, "The Brontes: a family history" which was where most of the information we found out came from. There was also an exhibiton, "Sex, Drugs and Literature - The Infernal World of Branwell Bronte" there, that we visited.
It was an interesting and educational trip :)

Up Review (1.3 Preparation and 1.1)

Up / Up- 3D (2009) - Pete Docter, Disney Pixar

Here's the scene. Young "adventurer", Carl Fredrickson, runs along the street playing games at his young age, when he stumbles across a dark abandoned house. He ventures inside, slowly, only to meet another adventurer of his age, a really funny, wacky girl named Ellie, who immedietely becomes attatched to him. They grow up, get married, move into the house and grow old together. Then Ellie dies.

The man lives on in the house, alone, depressed and fed up, the town changing around him, turning into a city, and he eventually has to vacate the house and go and live in an care home.

Or does he?

This is where, in the night, he attatches thousands of balloons to his house, and in the morning, flies away to a lost land in South America, where he and Ellie had dreamed of going when they were small. Only to find he's got a little accidental stowaway with him, an 8 year old boy called Russel.

What follows is their struggle to get to Carl's destination, the uncovering of a shocking secret, and then - their struggle for something else. Involved in this are a group of talking dogs, really - better than they sound - and a rare bird named Kevin.

This is a fun family adventure, lots of funny moments, some action, and though it dies down before the climax and has a bit too much of a friend/love/message moment, people could find it quite a touching film.

The humour and jolliness of the film in general though, made me sometimes even laugh completely unprovoked, at just the whole idea. I wonder if the adults enjoy these films more than the kids nowadays..

This film once again offers the guaranteed charm and laughs of Disney Pixar films even though it's not too special, so it's not one that's going to go down in history, but as far as kids films go, it's pretty good.

What adds to it is the wonderful new 3D it can be seen in. If you haven't seen a 3D film before, this is probably a good one to start with, and if you have, it's a good one to continue with!

Enjoy!

8/10

The Birds Review (1.3 Preparation)

The Birds (1963) - Alfred Hitchcock

Another one of Hitchcock's classic thriller films, this fim offers more of a horror twist as nature turns its back on humanity and attacks.

The film begins slowly as a young woman, Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren), meets a man, Mitch Brenner, (Rod Taylor), in a bird shop. He appears as mysterious to her, and it is this and her attraction to him that draw her to eventually be staying at his mothers house with him at Bodega Bay.

Whilst she is there, there are a number of attacks on innocent people by a variety of different birds, which as they go, increase in severity. As the attacks become harder, there is more suspense between scenes and more of a darker sense to the film, so it becomes more gripping, exciting and scary in the second half.

Infact, until past half way through, the birds seem to be more of a distraction to what appears as the main story. The characters all have their own stories to tell, their own pasts and even side characters met through the film are very distinct. Even though this spaces out the horror in the first half, the detail behind the characters is partly what this makes this film so good. But it is the scenes that you know are coming, as more birds gather, and the build up to these scenes which makes this film what it is.

Another distinct thing about this film that makes it itself is that, while Psycho, Hitchcock's other classic film from the 1960's, was told and well known by it's story-telling and intense soundtrack, The Birds has absoloutely no soundtrack whatsoever. Throughout the film the peace and quiet of Bodega Bay is crushed by the dark background noises of the birds which substitute the music, constrasting the quiet with the films dark trademark. This is very effective, as are the spooky camera shots and the sometimes quite disturbing horror scenes.

Critisicm for this film are that the characters, despite how interesting they are, seem to do stupid and illogical things that put their lives in danger throughout, for the purpose of adding scenes of horror, and there is a disappointing end.

This is a deep, interesting and moderately scary classic by Alfred Hitchcock. Though it may not quite top other classic mass destruction films, it is quite thouroughly enjoyable.

8/10

Bring Me The Horizon concert (1.1)

Band: Bring Me The Horizon

Support: August Burns Red, A Day To Remember

Venue: Manchester Academy

I'm not gonna write a review because I won't know what to put, but what I am gonna write is: THIS CONCERT WAS AWESOME!!

I loved it all, and I am so happy I went because I nearly couldn't (Luke and Paddy, shush!)

I went with some year 11s and people none of you really knowww lol but i saw our ex-diploma-person Georgia there ><

twas actually amazing and worth £22 :) which was £8 more than the original ticket but oh well

The lead vocalist Oli Sykes said it was one of the best concerts he'd ever played :)

Dead By Sunrise's new album out today!

Dead By Sunrise is the side project of the lead singer of Linkin Park, Chester Bennington, a whole new band which features all the members from the band Julien-K and another additional member.

This has been long awaited, as Chester released a demo of his song: 'Let Down' many years ago, and the whole album was originally scheduled for a 2006 release!

Dead By Sunrise fuse elements of grunge and post grunge with alternative rock, and an electronic sound over the top. Fans of Linkin Park should expect a different sound from Linkin Park, but it should still contain some of the feel of Linkin Park's most recent album, Minutes to Midnight.
The album is more personal to Chester than Linkin Park's, as many of the songs are about his past struggle with drugs.

If you're more interested in rap, Mike Shinoda (the rapper from Linkin Park)'s side project, Fort Minor, might be more for you, but as Linkin Park are my favourite band and I'm sure a few of you will like them, I am looking forward to getting/listening to this album and I thought I'd share it with you! Yes, you!