Prolonged Film Friday

I didn't get as much Zelda in as I wanted to as Mark came over with Ben Gomm at about 12 and they quickly decided that they wanted to make some fake money as a film prop. 2 hours later they still weren't done and there's bits of dyed paper all over the dinning room. We then had to wait ages for the others to roll around at 6 until we could finally watch Super 8, a film that I wasn't too excited to watch but I was surprised by it in a small way. It did feel like a Spielberg film at times, heavily borrowing from Close Encounters and Jurassic Park and some other older Sci-Fi movies. I liked the children characters and I thought that some of their lines were genuinely funny and there was a good deal of atmosphere in the little town. However there were many other parts that did not work so well, it tried to be scary but all its 'jump' moments, although unpredictable, constantly occurred during a conversation, it worked the first time but after the next 3 it just wasn't really working. The character's of the Fathers could have been done so much better but their scenes are short and undeveloped, I was really interested in the Dad of the blonde girl but he turned out to be very boring. Finally the ending was a huge disappointment, providing little logical or satisfaction/closure and just felt a bit rushed. If you want to see a better film about extra terrestrial beings in a small town vs the military watch the Iron Giant.

Babysitting

The Prime family bi-annual get together was hosted at our house this year and me and Louis were put in charge of looking after the 3-5 year olds. Mario Kart kept them occupied for long enough, although the youngest one could not quite grasp the concept of being player 2 and continued to focus his attention on player 1's actions without registering the fact he had to actually play the game. Oh well...at least he looked like he was having fun. The Steam Holidays giveaway has finally paid off for me as I managed to miraculously net the whole of the Back to the Future game set for free! That's 5 point and click adventures that me and Louis really enjoy so thanks Steam!

Zelda is finally mine

Jamie and his brother agreed to lend me their Wii so I took the lengthy route into Cold Ash and back via bicycle in what could have been the worst cycling experience of my life. It felt like everything was coming between me and my beloved Zelda, uphill climbs, slow moving horses and finally rain with headwinds and the whole journey took about 90 minutes. Theo worst pert is, the game hasn't made the strongest first impression so far, after a strong tutorial section with the to be princess, I have felt a serious lack of motivation to continue playing. Apparently it does pick up in the second half however and many do feel it is amazing and I wanna know what all the fuss is about.

Zelda is laughing at me

There it sits, Skyward Sword in all it's limited edition glory, taunting me with is shiney box and chunky instruction manual. I can do nothing but lament my poor, broken down Wii that cannot play the game on account of my clumsiness. As I hold my golden Wii remote, an idea blossoms in my mind. 'Can I not ask a chum to supply me with a temporary Wii?' I sit in wait, desperately anticipating a reply from Mark on Steam...

The near poetry will end here, Mark replied and said no and I can't get hold of Jamie. So, yeah...

Nice little video...

A calm Boxing Day

If there is one thing I would hate to do on boxing day after a wonderful Christmas, it would be going to go and see the opening ceremony for a Fox hunt. Not only do I object to it morally, I just seriously doubt the entertainment value of watching a bunch of men on horses drinking cherry with a broke shotgun in one hand and a dog lead in the other, in fact, a quick look on Google images just gave me that exact image and I had the advantage of not standing out in the cold. Instead we avoided the hunt and headed towards some friends of the family for coffee and biscuits which was very pleasant. After that we came straight back to the grandparents house for some very nice dinner of turkey and potatoes. I was also gifted a very fine bottle of beer and some jelly beans.

I am currently enjoying a nice sit down while watching some curious programme with Bear Grills and a comedienne, while it is just about providing an entertainment factor an degree higher than a fox hunt, me and Louis are just making pee drinking remarks about Grills; and all is right in the world.

Merry Christmas '11

Hello again faithful readers, once again I write this after spending all day doing festive things like eating turkey and opening presents. This year I got a pair of individual toe socks, Zelda Skyward Sword, coffee, and a bright red waistcoat which is pretty cool. Most of Christmas was spent at our uncles house so we didn't have to fret about preparing the meal or the party games although Mum was quite verbal about her fears of being robbed while we were away; this was quietly unsettling because she said it with such casual conviction.

This year's festivities were not as good as last years in my opinion but I am sure I will look back on this one with fond memory's, I think it's because we didn't see any films or television specials, we watched Michael Mcintyre's comedy roadshow but that was about it.

Hope everyone else had a very lovely Christmas and that you didn't drink or eat too much, indigestion hurts and boxing day still has a bit of magic in it, despite the left-over turkey you eat for lunch being a bit dry.

Twas the night before Christmas...

Really excited about Christmas tomorrow, not sure why though, I know a few things I will hopefully be receiving but there are many surprises in store I'm sure. What I really want to see is the look on someones face when I give them a gift, especially Louis, although he has already successfully guessed what his present is this year, how? I have no idea... Another Christmas Eve party was hosted this year, many people came ate our fine foods and left ready for the big day tomorrow, which is exactly what you fine readers should be doing right now!

Merry Christmas again, from Cafe Studios and myself personally, I really do hope everyone has a damn good Christmas despite the lack of snow. I have griped about the general lack of Christmas cheer all month, but I am certainly feeling it now... and I hope you all are too!

Have a very Merry Christmas!

It's a wonderful movie

Vey little was accoplished today, mostly Batman, which is really good and I completed LIMBO as well. What has felt like a small achievement is the fact I finally got around to watching It's a Wonderful life, trust me when I say you pretty much need to see this film at some point in your life, it will just enrich you spiritually and morally. James Stewart performance is, without a doubt, one of the best in movie history, we totally empathise with his every action and when he returns to his home after losing the money you can see in his face how much of a broken man he is.

Louis has put up the new Edmund and Darrel short, based on a slightly true story as I do tend to get him rubish gifts, or so he claims...

View it here: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/586498

Christmas Shopping? Sorted!

I spent so much money today. First of all I got Louis and myself Payday: The Heist, then I saw Batman on sale, and while I was browsing in town I found Deus Ex for really cheap! Dead chuffed with what I got everyone, lots of nice things for some very nice people, I even got Louis his very late Birthday present so that's a huge plus. While I was away worrying about what to get my Mum and my Girlfriend (easily the two hardest people to buy for) Mark, Dan and some others headed off to London to see the theatre production of The Woman in Black, I didn't go because it sounded scary and I am somewhat of a wuss. They bought back someone called Derek who was constructed in the Build-A-Bear Workshop, Mark and the others crowned his as the Cafe Studios mascot as he also wears a little blue hoodie... With little ear holes which are so cute.

As you may be aware, the new Christmas video is up, just a short little seasonal one that we are sure you'll appreciate, if not, then you are a scrooge who needs to eat more chocolate orange.

Merry Christmas!

Old vs New

Sonic generations is a game I have been saving up for a long time, and with the Steam sales on for Christmas I picked it up at a good price. The game has, very nicely, bundled into my nostalgia nerve as, in my life, Sonic came before Mario. All the old levels are amazing in every way, the music, the speed the set moments are just great.

Hugo was a very, very impressive film. It started off quite slowly and you weren't too sure where it was going, but eventually each mystery is replaced with another and you can't take your eyes off it. The secondary characters were great and a lot of fun, especially Sacha Baron Cohen for providing some pleasant comic relief within a misunderstood villain. Frankly it is hard to do the film justice when it's still showing in cinema's just go see it, its for all ages and appeals to the old and young.

Christmas break

School Autumn term is finally over and everyone can now get ready for Christmas. After warfing down the past 5 days worth of advent chocolates I put on an ugly tie by request of my friends and headed into my last day of school in 2011 which went by very quickly. Not much else is new, watched Bad Santa again to get Louis in the holiday mood, great little film that, much better than you would expect. Not many plans for the rest of the week either, I'm watching Hugo tomorrow which should be good, so until then...

Til next year Misfits...

Today, I watched the season finale of Misfits, I think I can honestly say that it was possibly the best episode made to date, it was so good I just wanted to watch more and more but sadly, I will have to wait until next year. Even an hour later I feel like it has been 'the end of an era' thing and I must reconcile thoughts with a fellow Mistfit-er, but alas, I must wait until tomorrow for that but with my sore throat it will certainly be a bit tricky.

The team went back to Mark's house today to film our Christmas special sketch, it is very much in the style of Card-ception so I apologise if you don't think it's amazing, but I can say that it is definitely a little bit funnier than the Birthday video; certainly made us feel a bit festive making it thanks to Mark's lovely living room decorations.

Oh Christmas tree, Oh Christmas tree...

Today was pretty standard, got my 3DS ambassador titles which is amazing, been trying a few of the GBA games out while I have had the time. In the evening Louis and I decorated the tree while listening to Christmas hits, as the tradition goes. We knew the Christmas spirit hit us though as we glanced at one ghastly penguin tree ornament and just couldn't stop laughing.


I had high hopes for A Scanner Darkly, its a sci-fi written by the same guy who did Blade Runner (Philip K. Dick) so I knew it would be pretty good and it certainly delivered. However, like Blade Runner, the plot was a times difficult to follow, something that will undoubtedly be remedied with repeated viewings. The actual film was very impressive, delivered in an animated style that is rarely seen it is a bit of a visual treat. Robert Downey Jr was very good in his small role and provided some neat comic relief from time to time and was clearly gave the best performance. If you like Science Fiction I would definitely recommend this, it is quite underrated.

A bit of telly

After watching Film 2011 and A History of Film: an Odyssey I now realise why I tend not to watch very much TV: It's so time consuming! God help those poor people who watch soap operas on a near daily basis. One cool thing that happened today was I got to play Mario Kart 7 for a bit today in multiplayer, very enjoyable and I hope to pick it up soon.

A bit of a fuzzy feeling

Film Friday consisted mainly of me, Mark and Nick sitting on our laptops drinking shots of apple and orange juice while listening to Christmas music, can't think of a finer way to spend my Friday afternoons to be honest. Afterwards we got around to watching Love Actually which I am happy to admit was a lot of fun and full of Christmas cheer and the like. It pretty much is the Pulp Fiction of British romantic comedies as it deals with the entangling storyline of several characters, some more successfully than others. The Hugh Grant Prime Minister scenes and the Alan Rickman ones are probably the highlight of the bunch, there were about 2 or three sidelines I really didn't care much for, like the Kiera Knightley love triangle and the Laura Linney relationship thing never really got as much screen time as it should. Overall however there were some laughs to be had and plenty of the Christmas fuzziness to go around, recommended viewing during the holiday season.

Shoot-out time!

I recall tell you fine readers that this video would be coming out 'sometime next Wednesday' about 2 months ago, but with deadlines and whatnot it has been a tad awkward editing videos in our not so spare time. But now we are finally proud to present to you our new video featuring a large ensemble of our school chums as extras. Basically we figured that we wanted to make a shooting film, but on a super low budget, solution: use finger guns! Although a tad immature, there are several references to many action films and even a western in there so keep your eyes peeled!

Beating Exam Boredom: All Guns Blazing

Running XP like a boss

Today I managed to get a free laptop from Mum's computer graveyard at work, I found a really decent looking one with a working battery this time, got it home and begun installing all the old 90's PC games we own; I'm playing Zoombeenies at school tomorrow! The explorers Xmas party was on today, of which I was completely unaware so I was not in a party mood whatsoever, at least they had crisps and cola which was nice despite me fretting about all of my history homework due in for tomorrow which is all done now but it was a lot of work.

Feeling a little more festive

The one thing I have noticed about Christmas this year is that I simply have not noticed it enough. I haven't heard many xmas songs on the radio, haven't seen any xmas adverts and we have run out of mince pies so we certainly don't have much xmas food. To remedy this I watched Charlie Brown's Christmas Special since I love Snoopy Come Home. The short had some very lack-luster animation and voice acting, and some puns I am sad to admit were not very funny, but in the last 5 minutes you feel a sudden wave of empathy with Charlie Brown that really makes it worth a watch; I don't even know how it happens but it just gets amazing suddenly. Additionally I attended the first of my Christmas parties, this time with my volunteer job, the meal reminded me just how crap crackers are and how much I love turkey and gravy. All in all, today was very important in making me feel just a wee bit more 'christmassy,' I hope this feeling lasts longer and I really do want to hear more Christmas songs!

A greater sense of motivation?

Today was pretty standard at school, the noteworthy aspect being playing a game of chess with Josh that I openly compared to the Vietnam War, perhaps crudely but I truly did feel like President Johnson as he ignored the advise of the wise men and struggled against the guerrilla tactics of the Vietcong.

The other interesting thing that happened, at least in my eyes, was The Breakfast Club. Easily one of the best high school movies ever and a great insight into the lives of teenagers that was fun and thought provoking. It didn't feel too dated either, with the exception of the famous theme song that is so 80's its too awesome to feel old. The film inspired me to do something good and out of the ordinary, I don't know what yet though, just waiting for that single idea to come to mind except it never comes. 

The Bastion is complete

My one claim to fame today is that I finished Bastion. It was quite good for a downloadable game, had some very nice visuals and a neat progression rate with a surprisingly satisfying ending. I was a bit confused at the 'moral choices' section of the game because I didn't really know how much actions would affect what, the whole final decision felt like a bit of a shot in the dark to me but it was still good. I even had a little go at tiding my room today, it just feels a little emptier and a whole lot colder, spent most of the day wrapped up in my duvet and I was still a bit nippy.

'The Mini Band' Music Video

Mark and Chris recently created a video for The Mini Band - if you've got a moment then take a look by clicking here. You can also watch the behind the scenes video on our channel below:

Stuck between a landing and a hard place

Sorry about no blog again last night, another party. This time is was a relatively tame house party, I say tame but there were a couple of people who were shamefully very drunk before I even arrived, by the end there were 3 people being violently ill in various items that link to the sewers while we all enjoyed Finding Nemo and Mean Girls. I was offered a space on the landing under the impression that it was spacious and had very comfy carpeting, 50% of this turned out to be true so I didn't need a roll mat but my head was poking through a door as the surface area of the landing was the size of half a dinning table.

Waking up was also very fun, walking home in 2 oC temperatures was a good way to jolt my brain, defrosting my bike and cycling in however was one of the coldest experiences of my life, I had to hug the radiator afterwards to regain circulation. Film of the evening was The Ox Bow Incident which was really amazing, kinda like 12 Angry Men... with COWBOYS! The film was very ahead of its time, dealing with issues of justice and morality very maturelyproviding a thrilling third act and a great conclusion. It was a little slow to sstart off with, but after 15 minutes in you will not be let go. It even has Henry Fonda in it so that seals the deal.

Reviewing footage of nasty things

Me and Mark went through all of our zombie film footage and marvelled at some of our special effects, we have not 1, but 2 head explosions and they both look fantastic. Other than that there is really nothing else to report, I got Bastion and it's pretty good, awesome narration style in it but I hope it goes on for a bit longer than I expect it might. Friday tomorrow and I can't wait for the weekend!

My first pub pint

After a pretty meh day of school (highlight was the questionnaire I did on chocolate fingers) I went down to a pub with Jamie and shared our first legal, mid afternoon pint. It was quite weird sitting outside by the canal, everyday I would walk on the other side of the water back home, but then I sat on the alternate side, where I previously have never been but always saw it walking home; it feels like some sort of metaphor for a rights of passage.

I watched a Fish Called Wanda this evening, it was a pretty fun movie with some inspired moments but as a whole film it felt a little lacking in places; the ending feels very rushed. John Cleese was the best character by far, having some of the best lines and moments, but Otto certainly had some very forced lines that rarely hit their mark unfortunately. Not as good as I thought it would be but it has its moments.

Game show filming?

I slept horrendously badly last night, I first got to bed at 10:30, but I do distinctly remember after a lot of tossing and turning seeing my clock stating it was 12:14. I handed in my coursework today and had an alright day, in the evening Mark rounded up me, Dan and Laurie to star in his media game show coursework. The rest of the day was just some me time, dawdling on the Internets and playing games, it's good to be free again.

The Sword of Damocles has been lifted!

Sorry about no blog again yesterday, the weekend and today was just one big rush to get coursework finished. Mark has very graciously posted the amazing zombie stuff from yesterday. You may be asking, 'Hey Cafe Studios, how did you get the head explosion to look so real?' Basically, you take one 3 week old watermelon, hollow it out jack-o-lantern style, fill it with coloured apple pulp and break it with a golf club. Pro tip though, if your going to do this effect, tell your actor to swing the club lightly, the carnage of the melon landed on 3 walls and a ceiling which meant 20 minutes of some serious sponging and moping because someone doesn't know their own strength.

All the shooting for the zombie film is finally complete however, let the peasants rejoice! Editing should be somewhat speedier than our other projects because now we got it in the can we need to get it done very soon for the coursework deadline. Speaking of deadlines, after coming home at midnight on a school night from filming, I had to request additional time (one day) to finish my English coursework which was a tad embarrassing but now at least it is all full sorted... this means... DAY OF PROCRASTINATION TOMORROW!

By the way, the language may be quite eccentric today because I am very tired, and have a nasty throat sore. I will endure, and defiantly unwind with a coffee and a film tomorrow.

Hope you like the pictures!

Zombie Preview

Moon Face!

I still feel like I havn't really had a nice weekend to myself in a long time. I don't mind my volenter work, it's fun and I get awesome food. Working on my English Coursework took much longer than I thought it would and it still isn't great, I just don't feel comfertable with handing in courswork that I don't feel is any good. In addition I know I have to do it all of tomorrow morning, and then jump straight back into filming mode for the afternoon/evening so it may be hard to get up in the morning... unless I really get into the mood to change my life sround tomorrow and just really enjoy everything I do, now I just have to get into that mentallity...

Highlight of the day was easily watching a very pessimistic and ill Louis playing the first section of Majora's Mask. He was verbally expressing his anxiety and illness at the same time as the moon slowly decended apon Clock Town and it was hilarious.  

Bye bye beard

I wasn't really doing a 'No-shave-Novermber' this year but I was growing a beard of sorts, you can see it quite clearly in out Card-ception video. Today was the day where I would have to finally shave it all off and let me tell you, the facial fuzz was about 4 times as nasty this year so it would only take 4 times as long to shave with a dull, manual razor. 30 minutes later I felt like my old (and ironically younger looking) self but I do miss it already, my face is going to be pretty cold in the mornings now...

The Conversation was the film of the evening and my God was it good. It felt like everything Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy should have been like, it had a much slower pace that let us absorb the character of Gene Hackman which was fantastically performed, the best Hackman film I have seen so far easily. The soundtrack was also brilliant with some classy jazz numbers and lovely piano pieces, kind made me feel like I was playing a Hotel Dusk game. The plot is also very good, I shan't go into any spoilers but it does have a really good ending; I would highly recommend this to anyone who wants to see a impressive spy drama/thriller or just a damn good movie.

STRIKE

Seeing as I normally only have a single lesson on Wednesdays I was delighted to hear that my teacher for that lesson would sadly not be coming into school today. Best excuse for a lie-in I've had in a long time.

Immediately after breakfast I watched Dog Day Afternoon which was pretty excellent. Pacino was incredible as Sonny, it was a knock-out performance throughout, and when I went online to find that most of the dialogue was improvised I was very impressed. The plot was also very tense and interesting, the tone of the film switched from comedy to drama effortlessly and I found myself dying to know how it would end.

Quickly after that I watched High Noon, a Western that got me hooked by its very 'real-time' premise of a sheriff attempting to round up some deputies in the space of an hour to defend his town. It is heart-breaking to see that no-one wants to help him out, we slowly begin to understand the mindset of the towns folk but we still admire the courage of Gary Cooper, determined to see the afternoon until the end. The eventual train approach was genuenly very tense and it is one of the mosre 'human' westerns out there.

For the rest of the day I finished off Psychonauts, it once again provided a feel good ending that left me fufilled and happy, but also more desperate than ever for a sequel. If I ever have a very large disposable income, funding a sequel is where it shall go. 

Rainy afternoon

It was nice coming back home in Mark's car, it felt like a small bubble against the horrors of the torrential rain that lasted for about 10 minutes. All I could think about in the car was how much I wanted to watch Dracula, arriving home I did not find my LOVEfilm wallet and was left unfulfilled; I just played Skyrim instead. So yeah, bit of a meh day, can't wait for my day off tomorrow though, going to the pub with Jaime and maybe watch a good old fashioned film. 

Boris Karloff is the man

I had a relatively crumby and dull day at school, I lost a game of chess to Herbie after I played embarrassingly badly and it was really cold waiting for my lift in the morning. I came home to a heated house and my lovely computer, taking full advantage of LOVEfilm's watch online feature and tucked in with coffee in hand to watch Frankenstein. Although not as good as Bride of, this film did focus a lot more on Dr Frankenstein and his desire to be a God. His laboratory scenes were very cool, leading up to the most quoted line 'It's Alive!' However it is Karloff who steals the show completely, his monster is perfect showing just the right amount of humanity while remaining terrifying. Best scene? The little girl by the lake, everybody loves it, brilliant and disturbing moment. 

Blackcurrent jam makes decent blood

Did a lot more filming today, 2 til 10:30 again but we got a lot done. Aside from directing I was also on zombie make-up which I did quite well I think, they turned out looking way better than I anticipated but we absolutely trashed the floor in the girls toilets. There was this thick, golden syrup bloody mess everywhere and I ended up moping the floor twice. Another weekend gone, I wish I had some more free time over them so I could do something really relaxing, with me being very busy all the time, this weekend probably gets a 6/10; frantic but fun.

Cheap milkshakes!

Came back from Jack's house today, the first thing I noticed was how much I felt like I needed to brush my teeth. I forgot my toothbrush and we were living on a diet of Pepsi and 6 for 2 milkshakes which left my molars furrier than Chewbacca. I also had a rough night on account of Jack's dogs which were walking all over me as I was the only one sleeping on the floor. Now that I have won a battle with a particularly persistent wasp I can enjoy a canine-free slumber.

Down in Mamsbury

Chris, Dan and I have decided to pay a visit to our childhood friend Jack who lives about an hour down the road. After a hearty meal of fish and chips and 90 minutes worth of Smash Bros we are just about to start playing some Tatsonoko vs Capcom and then consider calling it a night. My English coursework came back today, I secured 27/30 which is a solid A, quite proud of myself there, means good things should be on their way for the other bit I'm doing.

Happy (very late) Birthday Website

Today, is not the sites Birthday, but it was around this time so we thought we would make a brief video to celebrate, the joke is a bit old fashioned but I think we can all agree that Daniels finishing expression is priceless. My face has also been plastered on the blog twice, each time I am pulling a similar looks so thats good. On a crazily, somehow related note, I have just re-started playing Psyconauts since Steam added achievements, I found this on Youtube a while back, if you watched the Birthday video you will get why its slightly related, but just watch this and tell me you don't wanna play this game!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWa1eiHPhKw

I watched Deliverance today, a film which has dated slightly but it's impact can still be felt quite strongly. Some good scenes and some lovely bits of nature but it did get a bit repetitive as the characters just go down more and more rapids, and the climbing scene looks so obviously green-screened now. Also Burt Reynolds should have been the freaking MAN in this film but his character is wasted completely by the second half which is a shame. The film does pack that good old fashioned 'paranoia of Hilbillies' theme going for it which makes it very creepy and real at times so watch it if you like feeling paranoid I guess...

It's everywhere!

Zombie Coursework

So we're in the middle of filming at the moment for our zombie film studies coursework. It's gonna be awesome. If you're around Newbury, free this Sunday and fancy being a zombie extra then email us or check our Facebook feed for regular updates. BOOM.

Such an easy day

School was just so simple, got in, had my 2 free periods and then watched Fight Club, no effort Wednesday is going to be even better next week though as the school may well be closed on account of the teacher's strike scheduled for that day. Jamie came round again today to finish off The 40 Year Old Virgin and a cup of tea, after he left I finally got a chance to watch Misfits, it wasn't as good as I thought it would be as the whole scenario was doomed to be a throw-away due to the non-cannon nature of it, but it was still a fun ride.

I watched Sherlock Jr. today and it really got me excited to see The General. I really enjoyed One Week and Sherlock Jr. was a small step above it, at least in terms of scope and budget. Keaton's stunts were extremely impressive, performing stunts more dangerous than anyone in Hollywood would even dare doing themselves nowadays. The highlights for me was the game of snooker (or pool, I can never tell the difference) in which Keaton dodges an explosive '13' ball blissfully unaware of its nature and the motorcycle chase at the end was also very exciting, prior to this Keaton does 2 amazing leaps through things, I still have no idea how he did them but they are mind bogglingly hilarious. Short and Sweet and you can find it on Google Video, no excuse!

Darn alarm!

I said I was going to watch Misfits today and I am ashamed to say that I did not, somehow in my desperate attempt to hit the 'snooze' button on my phone I switched the thing off instead, next thing I know, I'm late for school. I also showed my girlfriend The Silence of the Lambs because she said she wanted to be a police officer when she was older, not so sure about her views on that career path are now but at least she enjoyed the film.

Part 1 of English Coursework finished

Today I celebrate the end of an very very busy weekend and piece of work, I have no got some free time on my hands once again to do anything I like, really tempted to re-play Wind Waker or just watch a bunch of films that have been stacking up on my watchlist. Gettin' up early to watch Misfits tomorrow, my informant tells me that it is a good one so I can't really miss it, until then find a nice 5 minutes to yourself to just mull over all the good things in life.

Weekend... Y U NO LAST LONGER!?

Sorry about the lack of a blog yesterday, that was because I have been extremely busy this weekend, full of work and engagements. The first of which was of course the Furniture Project early Saturday morning, we had about 3 new volunteers then, all of which were very eager to impress the manager so they frequently asked me for help on a variety of jobs. That evening I went to someones 18th party which was really great, most of my friends were invited and it was quite a wild night, one or two people had one too many drinks than they should have but the music, the crowd and some of the banter was spot on.

Today the team reserved 7 hours in our filming location, sadly it got off to a very slow start, waiting for it to get dark and making the fake blood etc, so we only really got half of what we wanted done. That said the stuff we did get is pretty sweet, the obvious highlight being our first real special effect where we covered our lead actresses face in a spray of fake blood! I just got back at 10:30 and had a very late roast dinner, now I am full and ready for sleep; weekend rating: 8

Shopping trip

After school the Cafe Studios team all pilled into Chris' little car and drove on down to B&Q to pick up some supplies for filming, a visit to Tesco was also required for a watermelon we are intending on smashing for a headshot effect. Screwfix was a bit of a godsend though as they had just what we needed for about half the price, we got some piping for a blood splatter effect.

Also for research purposes we re-watched The Evil Dead, and it still scared the hell out of us. Watching it again with all the new knowledge I had from studying Sam Raimi made it a fresh experience, it was great seeing how he builds tension and atmospeare. Just have to re-create that kind of feeling for our film, after we spent so much money on the production it should turn out quite well!

A bit of cake

Mum has now had the last of her 'changing jobs' parties that have been ongoing since the last 2 weeks or so which means that she got to bring home all the left over cake. Regrettably this one was simply too fluffy and didn't have any butter icing in it so I think I will avoid that one until I have an esspresso or something bitter to wash it down with. We have almost fully prepared for the filming session on Sunday, just got to buy some more bits and bobs at tesco and the like for the remaining props.

I watched an older Hitchcock today, Notorious was in my opinopn, not his strongest work. The first half was rather dull with the exception of the kissing scene, but when the second half came to light I started paying more attention. I just really didn't understand what was happening towards the end though, I didn't absorb who the villian was nor why Cary Grant's team was out to get them. Something about film noirs that makes my brain turn off in the first 30 minutes, then when the action picks up I have no idea whats going on, it happens to me far too often I find.

Drip fed Skyrim

Louis was doing some after school stuff today so I had Skyrim all to myself for 2 hours! I did all kinds of things, I leveled up, killed a tiger and fell off a bridge; it's a pretty good game I think, not that far into it though but I like what I played! The walk into school was a very bitter one, its certainly gotten a lot colder in England but that's the way I like it. Still no chance to watch a film so far, will defiantly try to make time for something tomorrow though, starting to feel very unfulfilled in my day to day life.

Just really tired

All day today I simply craved going back to sleep, it wasn't just my eyes that were tired, the whole front of my face was knackered and wanted to melt off into some other alternate dimension where school didn't exsist. I need to prepare myself for walking into school tomorrow, first excuse to wear my jacket all year so at least I look forward to that part. I also really want to watch some more films, I gotta attach some more requests onto LOVEfilm, I did get a chance to watch Misfits though and it was awesome, until I saw the preview for next weeks episode and then I just cried tears of rainbow testostrone, it looked amazing!

No matter how much you scrub, You'll never be clean!

Cafe Studios headed off Within the Woods for one final time, once again I was covered in fake blood and I felt like Lady Macbeth scrubbing off the black (in this case red) dot off her hands. We had to re-do everything on account of it looking a bit naff the first time around but we are defiantly more happy with the stuff we got today. After 3 hours out in the dark and cold I just really want to go to bed and be hugged by the duvet; bliss.

Bone Hike 2011

Me and my old scout leader organized the annual Bone Hike again this year but this time with a small twist that got us several more people involved, 4 times as many to be exact so it was a big faff at times, especially when they got lost during the night period. Most trouble came after a rumour about gypsies started scaring the younger ones, some of them decided to man up and just do the course because we got Adam's little car caked in mud in attempt to get to one of the bases.

The Seventh Seal was a film that captivated me from the IMDB description of a man who plays chess with the Grim Reaper during the black plague, that sounds awesome, but if I could have one criticism it would be there wasn't enough chess. Actually 2 criticisms, it was a little slow going, however it was a very interesting film about a man looking for answers about the almighty, it was only difficult to understand I realize because I was also looking for answers for the knights questions so you may be left confuzzeled, dissapointed or amazed by the film, I was in the first catagory and that is where most will lie until they give the film a hard think; something I have yet to do.

11/11/11

Today we had a Remembrance Assembly in school seeing as they are very big supporters of the military and all that, the ceremony lasted about 20 minutes but we had year 7's dropping like flies throughout for standing up for too long; couldn't make a fuss though as it happened during the 2 minutes silence!

Everyone had various appointments today so there was no Film Friday, I instead watched The Magnificent Ambersons which I found to be quite good. After a charming introductory narration the film seemed to slow down a little bit, I never quite listened during the first half but I got the general gist of things, by the end though I was feeling all sorts of emotions for the characters after a very satisfying ending!

Louis got Skyrim today, about this time next week I may get a chance to play it for myself, if you have got it then good for you and enjoy your well spent weekend!

Stone in a shoe

While the team was editing the new film I noticed that Mark had a stone lodged into the grips of his shoe. Now I am the type of guy who wants no imperfections on the underside of his shoe so I naturally love removing the stones from them, but Mark had other plans. He wanted to keep it lodged in there so he could make tapping noises with it which I could not allow! I managed to yank his shoe off but he begun the chase, after 6 laps of the classroom I still couldn't get the stone out so I settled for an unconditional surrender. Still haven't got around to watching any films yet as my LOVEfilms haven't arrived yet, better luck for me tomorrow I hope!

Thats it?!

Modern Warfare 3... the series has been really great, so many incredible set pieces, interesting twists and surprisingly involving characters... But really Infinity Ward. Is that the best you can do?! Such an anticlimax to an otherwise stellar series.

Filming today was a bit of a fiasco,I asked the scout leader if we could film during the meeting tonight as it was going to be an informal film night. When we rolled up with our cameras I found half the district in there, eagerly awaiting a pair of guest speakers on health and drugs which was mandatory. Under serious pressure from my scout leader we rushed the filming, applying fake blood and temporary tattoos a-plenty to our scout extras and getting some good footage of zombie scouts! Stay tuned!

Dissapointment into victory

Woke up at 5:20 today hoping to play MW3 but steam hadn't unlocked the game files and wouldn't do so until I got back from school, I used the time well though and watched Misfits which was pretty good. School was a shlog and pretty dull I will admit, but when I got home, oh HO was I in for a treat. Although I haven't quite completed the single player (2/3 of the way through) it has been outstandingly cinematic and enjoyable and I have high hopes for the conclusion, act 2 ended very unexpectedly I will say. The Multiplayer is really sweet as well, I think the PC version will get a patch to improve stability when in game as I frequently get booted for no reason but it has been a ton of fun from what I have played and I can't wait to play more.

Good Lord...

Got home at 11pm, knackered, shirtless and covered in fake blood; just another normal evening for Cafe Studios. Although my shower did look like the infamous Psyho scene as the blood poured down the drain. We were filming more of our zombie film today and again, it looks pretty good. Louis released his new Edmund and Darrel episode today, featuring Me, Louis, Mark and Dan's voices and I must say it is absoultly cracking, check it out at www.fredthemonkey.com.

I am very excited for the new Call of Duty which comes out tomorrow, I shall be waking up very early so I can get my hands on it before school, until then: Happy Monday!

Drivin' on the highway...

Me and a friend drove around Ogbourne St. George to walk our planned route for an evening scouting activity. I haven't hiked for many months and I really felt it on the uphill drag, my legs aching, blisters developing (I need to check my feet now actually... we're clear!) and ankles giving in, I was desperately out of practise but I somehow felt amazing doing the walk because I really enjoy the views when hiking and the Ridgeway has some great ones. In the evening we got in Chris' car and drove down to our filming location to test out some shots for the Zombie film. shots so far look pretty good but they need to be much better lit so we can see but at the same time we don't want it to look artificial, we'll sort something out though, probably involving gaffa tape.

Brief Encounter was tonight's film and it was lovely and British. For some reason I don't really like any characters that commit unnecessary adultery in films but here I will make an exception because the characters felt extremely bad for their actions making them more likable. The narration was whimsical and the accents and mannerisms of the characters were so dreadfully charming, it's even starting to rub off on me now. This is a must watch for any British film enthusiasts, it really is one of the greats.

Wish it was half term again

Work today consisted of the usual game of Pass the Pigs, over-eating at lunch and causing self injury out of clumsiness, nothing has changed except now the nights are drawing in. The sensation of walking through my town at night fills me with a weird happiness and nostalgia, the sense that Christmas is on it's way makes me all fuzzy on the inside. It was obviously fireworks night tonight having a massive display at the racecourse means that I will have great difficulty sleeping tonight, good thing I like fireworks. Que Katy Perry song!

Burger with my Friday

Did quite well in our quiz night today, 5th place overall but they weren't offering a prize for best 6th form teams and I didn't win the raffle... this time... I currently have Jamie Creed sleeping over, he wants to watch a film, I want to go to bed so this will be amusing at least for one of us as we are going to see the 40 Year Old Virgin.

Money goes out...

Mark and I were looking at the props we needed for our film coursework, Mark has agreed to pay £20 after I also put in the money in for our new camera (which looks awesome) so tomorrow we are going to the bank so I can take out a fat wad of cash (£83) for the benefit of Cafe Studios, this seems a lot to me considering I am not employed anywhere at the moment, and my contribution actually sounds miserly after Mark is paying over £500 for our new camera, damn my general lack of money when I need it.

I was really disappointed with Belle De Jour today after seeing it in Ebert's The Great Movies I was very eager to see this, but you know a film isn't keeping your interest when you keep looking at the clock and 95 minutes feels like Gone With the Wind. It was just nonsensical at times, the dream sequences added nothing, I didn't understand the protagonists motivation or eventual aims and I actually didn't like Catherine Deneuve's performance or character. Avoid this one in my opinion.

Russian history stuff

Most of today has been working on my Russian history essay that I still havn't fully completed, I'm going to have to get up early tomorrow to finish it which I hate doing because I have to drag my lazy behind out of bed early and work first thing, coffee will be a nice addition which I will probably include. I watched the ending of the new David Attenborough series about the Artic which looked amazingly pretty, probably will watch more of that if I get the chance. About our film that I said would be up by today... I saw what Mark has done, so far it looks really good but it is nowhere near done at this time so sorry about that. Our deadline is now ASAP so look out for it in the near future, heck, check the site everyday until it comes out, if the films not there a new blog update will be here... I'm always here... Have a good one!

Dia de los muertos!

Happy day of the Dead as I didn't get a chance to blog yesterday, I went off to a Halloween party sleepover thing. I spent most of yesterday preparing my amazing Groucho Marx costume, headed on down to our local fancy dress shop to find a decent pair of glasses I could use, I ended spending £5 on a pair and was very nearly tempted in buying a smoking pipe as well. To get myself into character I watched Horse Feathers, not as good as Duck Soup but it was quite close in some ways, it also helped me drinking a very strong iced coffee and a regular cup of Joe, I was bouncing off the walls for about an hour, by the way there will be pictures of this (the costume, not me being hyperactive.)

Upon arrival at the party I was seriously down-hearted, no-one knew who I was supposed to be! The food and drink made up for this somewhat, actually now that I really think about it, Malibu is disgusting and that was somehow mixed into everything I attempted to drink, I happily settled with water, OJ and coffee; I truly know how to be the soul of the party. After watching Insidious, (crap) Coraline (WOO!) and Limitless (was ok) we unpacked our various sleeping bits and got some kip, this was at about 2 in the morning and I admit I am crap at sleep-overs, I can never get comfortable, often get too hot/dehydrated and end up making more noise than the big bang.

Waking up this morning felt awful, I finally got to sleep around 4 and had to be up for school at 7:30 (I'll let you do the maths.) I was treated to a can of Red Bull and a past its prime banana I bought with me: Breakfast of champions. School was hard as I lost my watch so I felt naked and vulnerable all day. Aside from that today was better than I made it out to be, the dentist appointment was fun and seeing Louis after a 12 hour absence was nice, the link below cheered me up to no end.

http://i.imgur.com/RL4nc.gif

Enjoy that, we are adding the final touches to the new video that should be up tomorrow and we hope you enjoy it! I am going to bed!

Goodbye Trogdor...

Daylight saving grumbles

Although technically we have gained an hour, I'm certainly feeling very tired right now as my brain is telling me it is much later than it is, I shall counter this with the finest of coffees next morning! Our Halloween video is up, I apologize in advance for the long winded nature of it and general lack of entertainment value at times but it gives you a good insight to our personality off camera and will definatly please some die hard fans.

On the car ride home from my Grandparents I watched Enter the Dragon, a martial arts film that was hugely groudbreaking for its time but has since been greatly surpassed by other great Jackie Chan and historical chinese films like Hero. It was all a little bit too serious with a hint of 60's Bond, the fight scenes were decent enough but I would only re-watch one of them on youtube if I wanted to. Like our Halloween film, only the hardcore fans of the genre need apply, otherwise watch Kung Fu Hustle, that film is amazing!

Happy Halloween!

Visits have been due

After a very hearty and continental breakfast of grapefruit and buns we were greeted by half of the other half of the Durrant family, (just one uncle and one cousin,) we then rushed off to friends of the family for cake and coffee. The day has gone by quickly and I am due to visits another grandparent tomorrow, figures when most of your family lives in Kent. I highly recommend the game Rummikub though! It's like rummy and scrabbles love child and is great fun if you like either of those games. 

We have the Internet!

Well, tell a lie, we have BTopenzone's complimentary internet in this area. I have arrived at my Grandparents house and about to settle into bed after the long journey to Kent. I also had Mark and Dan round this morning so we could absolutely ravage the now mouldy pumpkins, we started lightly with the bb guns but they didn't do huge amounts of damage, therefore we jumped straight to a shovel and played baseball with the pumpkins; they didn't last very long.

Immediately after that carnage we sat down to Peter Jackson's Braindead, we agreed that was absolutely, positively the most disgusting and gory film we had ever seen; and we bloody loved it. It certainly had that cult charm also held by Evil Dead, the main actor certainly reminded me of Bruce Campbell due to his health dose of overacting that was hilarious in some scenes (I'm looking at you, baby fight in the park scene!) The final half hour will kick your ass until blood pours out your ears, and hopefully you won't lose your appetites like we did, it was just violence done amazingly over the top and incredibly creative, each kill was just more cringe worthy than the last, and at one point we just couldn't bare to look. Highly recommended to the blood thirsty among you!

Bang bang

Our Halloween video is nearly ready for it's release on Monday, promotional picture can be found below! As I write this, Mark and I are talking about getting a fancy DSLR camera to shoot our videos on in the future for hyper awesome quality looking uploads. Speaking of shooting, Ben Gomm bought over some gas powered bb guns to show as potential props for our zombie film, they were pretty cool, the pistols especially had some actual blow back and power, meaning that they look the part and function like the real thing, we will certainly be calling on him later on. As of tomorrow I will be in Kent visiting grandparents again, I am told that they have internet this time around so I may be able to blog, otherwise I will get the others to do a stand in. Have a good weekend!

Halloween Special Coming Soon

Leauge of Meh...

After a few days of Louis pestering me to play League of Legends I agreed as I have recently been putting down games he likes with little reason, so I got the full experience with some other human players all of which were Louis friends. The game is very boring and time consuming, it even displays the amount of time you have spent in-game just to taunt you and remind you that you could have done so many better things with your life, like bake a pie or ride a boat, but instead you are where you are, watching your champion run into a hoard of minions as he gets massacred by the enemy champion with the stun spell which leaves you buggered and left looking at a very dull re spawn screen where you ponder is it worth it or not. In short, get Swords and Soldiers instead, games last 1/10 the amount of time and it is actually more fun. Other than that I did very little, I re watched Speed this evening because I needed a good action film to get my blood pumping again after being in a 45 minute state of comotosis after enduring LoL.

In the can

Sorry about the lack of a blog yesterday but the team and I were bogged down in filming all evening. First off we bought some more pumpkins, we were a bit lazy so we went down to Lidl, apparently the German's don't celebrate Halloween in the same...scope as us to the pumpkins were much smaller; and cheaper! Armed with 3 brand new pumpkins and after brushing of some immature kids outside Pets at Home calling us gays we triumphantly returned home and got to work on carving the things. Scooping out the insides was easy enough, getting designs was the tricky part, we used up 2 pumpkins for our logo and writing, Nick made a compilation of ghouls and Ben carved a grim reaper manatee. Of course my pumpkin was going to have to have a Homestarrunner design on it so chose to do Trogdor, which Mark originally poo-pooed but quickly changed his tone after I showed him the fan slide show with music video! Setting them alight was also interesting, dropping candles into pumpkins resulted many a scorched finger and spilt wax which ignited within Trogdor, leaving his pumpkin BURNINATED!

This morning we rolled on down to Chris' house to film our Wikipedia sketch, it was great fun filming that. We even managed to think of some new material as we were going that was awesome, expect that one up within the week also. Quickly, Tintin was AMAZING, so many nods to the source material and other Spielberg films, the whole thing felt like a new Indiana Jones adventure and me and friends were actively picking out best scenes that were incredible, one of the highest compliments you can give to a film. I also watched the 1932 horror film Freaks which was very good, it is unlike anything you have ever seen before as it uses genuine 'freaks' so it becomes startiling but also heartwarming as we see them get on so well with the others. I also like how eventually it is some of the 'normal' people become the ones are are looked on with scorn and curiosity, a nice twist.

'Nose Powder'

Once again, I had a very slopey Sunday and accomplished very little. Tomorrow however, we shall be very busy indeed filming an informal and unscripted pumpkin carving event at my house, video up for Halloween. I watched Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times today, I think that city Lights is his better film as it had more emotional moments and a better ending. For comedy purposes however I think this film is a little better, the final singing scene is great and there are some other great gags. I would recommend it to any fan of Chaplin and anyone else who is a fan of silent comedy, but City Lights and Safety Last are a little better.

Hooray for Half Term!

Work was very slow but relaxing today, mainly we sat around and played pass the pigs, legend of a game that is. Louis and I watched Living in Oblivion which was really very good, Buscemi is in one of his best roles here and he really pulls it off. The dark comedy is great, you can't help but laugh when things go a little wrong but by the end you realize that maybe, just maybe, film making is worth all the hastle you put up with.

Feeling oddly spiritual

Yesterday we gave you a lovely picture of Jamie pulling an amusing face, 'this was no ordinary announcement, Cafe Studios is planning something big' you think to yourself. Today we give you an apocalyptic look at our school after we were done with it... on final cut pro! We plan to release our new short by the end of half term, before Halloween, it will not be our formal holiday video as we have something much more basic planned for that, rest assured, by the 31st there will be 2 new videos on the site!

I watched Waking Life today as it is made by one of my favorite directors on one of my favorite topics: dreams. The film was animated very differently to most and it's general feel reminded me very much of the Sandman books as they shared a similar subject matter and done by multiple artists. The film also provided some very interesting insights that puts the phrase 'food for thought' to shame, by the end you feel like you have taken in enough information to last a lifetime, leaving enriched and checking your light switches compulsively.

Film Friday choice was Office Space, the 1999 cult classic comedy. It was pretty good, I didn't personally think that it lived up to it's prestige, it was certainly very funny in places but despite it's brief run time of 89 minutes it still felt a bit too long as some scenes tended to drag a bit. However I would probably recommend it to be seen at least once just so you can understand the legion of film's memorable lines.

Say no more...

Armoury increased

After waiting a month and a bit my Birthday present from Mark and Dan has finally arrived: A BB shotgun! It is very cool, I also ordered another handgun, this one is capable of firing ink filled BB's, after playing around with the red ones we decided that they would make a very good special effects thing if we ever wanted to shoot someone on camera. I went round to Chris' house as well, at first it was just to wash his car, then we were finding out how long we could last on his treadmill at highest setting, then we were preparing a late pasta dinner; I got home much later than I thought I would!

Coming soon...

Missed a shot

Got a text in the wee hours of the morning form Mark telling me to bring the same clothes I had yesterday on set because we needed to film a single reaction shot from Dan. This was both a good and bad thing, it was bad because it was a little bit of a faff, although it was a necessary faff, it was good because without the text I wouldn't have gotten up in time for school. In the evening I went out to see Pink Floyd's 'The Wall' being performed by a semi-local school and for a school production it was bloody good! Certainly much better than Othello but now I just really want to see the film again.

I watched Cape Fear (1962) because I craved a good old thriller and it certainly delivered on many levels. Michum's performance was as good as his role in Night of the Hunter, he played a very similar creepy character here and we can truly see everything he is thinking without saying a word and he really stole the show for me. It was also one hell of a ride, tension was very high in certain scenes, the last scene in particular had me squirming with discomfort. A decent view that I would recommend to thriller lovers!

Some more filming, late home again

Once again, I had little to no free time today as filming went on until 6 and I needed to be ready to go out at 6:30. The shooting went quite well as a whole and I am very excited to see Marks end product, at home I was left with 10 minutes to get ready, with a fork in one hand and chopsticks in the other I warfed down my sweet and sour pork and went our to see an amateur performance of Othello. I was very lost after 5 minutes as the language was needlessly confusing thanks to a loose adaption towards a more Caribbean dialect, I spent 80% of the viewing experience starring into space, daydreaming; fortunatly the company I was with shared similar opinions of the performace.

Hot chocolate weather

It has come around to that time of year where you just want something hot and sweet, you don't want a tea or a coffee and then you think 'ooh yes, a hot coco will do nicely.' I spiced mine up with half a teaspoon of coffee granules to give it a faint bitterness, Louis likes his with a dash of cinnamon or ginger which I think is a bit rank. Filming today went on for a very long time, we finished around 7 and I didn't feel particularly helpful this time around as in reality there was very little I could actually do to help. What we got looked pretty good and we will be filming the rest tomorrow, Mark will have plenty of fun editing the footage and it will defiantly keep him busy for the next week.

Lego patterns are infinate!

My girlfriend got me an unofficial Lego book that teaches you to make pretty much everything from bridges to spaceships with the miracle bricks after they have found an ideal blueprint for everything, it's pretty awesome and I will certainly be giving some of the stuff a go.

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf was a very interesting film, the writing and performances were excellent and there were some scenes of ridiculous amounts of tension despite it being about 4 characters over the course of one evening. The bicker, dance, laugh, cry, drink and bicker and drink some more, my only complaint about the film is that it is just a little bit too long; if you are willing to put up with that then you are in for a real ttreat if you like a character study.

Dustin in drag

Oooh, it was nippy outside today, bit of a shock as we have just had a few warm days before this cold, I actually wore gloves to work today for the first time in 9 months. I do love the cold though, there was little to no one walking outside and the glistening fields of frost put a smile on my face as I cycled past.

Today's highlight was easily Tootsie mainly because of Hoffman's performance as a women, it was just the little things about her character and mannerisms that made it so charming, by the time everything goes wrong during the later section of the film you really do start to cringe with embarrassment because you know his secret. It was very funny too, I was laughing out loud on numerous occasions and was very pleased to see Bill Murray in a small but piviotal role. Mark. If your reading this. You will love this film.

No time for FIlm Friday

Cafe Studios spent our afternoon filming our new sketch, simply we got around 12 people to look like they were sitting an exam until they break out and start shooting each other with invisible guns. One person actually (and miraculously) did draw blood but we filed that as an accident on set. After that we came home and thought about watching a film but instead watched an episode of Tintin in preparation for the new film coming out in less than 2 weeks. Collapsing on the sofa we just had some witty banter for about an hour, Louis joined in and we laughed the minutes away. I rustled up an omelet and some bacon for Dan and Mark, then we were off to House Evening (a school talent show.)

The opening acts left something to be desired I will admit, the performers did try, bless them, but some real charisma was lacking within them so it was hard to get into their acts. My 6th form tutor group put on some very tongue and cheek intros to each new show, usually ending in a God awful pun. We got a chance to show our film during the second half however, me and Dan braced ourselves on making a stage performance to introduce the video and that went surprisingly well due to our natural chemistry, even put in a bit of free advertising for the site at the end. The film went down amazingly well and it was really lovely having people come out of the show and openly congratulating us, teachers, tutors, friends, even people we didn't know said that the film was great! Such a pleasant way to end a good day, it's worth making films just to hear an audience enjoy themselves.

Energy Ball

I found my electricity glass ball thing, I forget the actual name for these things so hopefully pictures will speak louder than words:

Google images informed me that these are called plasma balls, my nostalgia informed me that they are awesome.

Me and Mark had a proper go at scripting our zombie film today and it sounds amazing at the moment, I have also been doing a lot of Internet research on gore effects we can use, so far we want to make a head a'splode and to break an arm, there will probably be bullet wounds as well but we'll have to wait and see. Cafe Studios are also going to be filming half of our latest short film/sketch idea, we pray that our extras will turn up, the bribe of 'biscuits and other snacks' is hopefully enough!

I found Dazed and Confused while scouting through our DVD's today, hit it up on IMDB, who's the director? Only Richard Linklater, the man who brought us School of Rock and the lovely Before Sunrise (a favorite.) The film is basically 100 minutes of high school kids chatting, smoking weed and paddeling freshmen, and it's great; if you like that kinda film. Simple day in the life premise, lots of mini narratives and decent characters and somehow it just works as a film. If you love an meaty plot then steer clear, like Clerks this one has a bare bones narrative but human characters doing normal things and chatting about crap; the kind of film I deeply respect.

Akward phone call

Nothing too eventful happened today so I thought I would share this real telephone transcript with you from this afternoon, please bear in mind that the gentleman on the other side sounded awful due to his very shoddy phone.

Theo: Hello
Mr X: Hello, is Mrs Durrant there?
Theo: No I'm afraid that she is out
Mr X: Oh ok, i'm one of her colleges and I was told that she pick up my (inaudiable), I really need it so when she gets back could you get her to call me
Theo: Your what sorry?
Mr X: My (inaudiable)
Theo: (Knowing that he cannot ask again in fear of sounding rude) Oh... ok... I'll, I'll tell her you rang
Mr X: Ok, thank you, goodbye
Theo head: What the hell just happened?!

I got arround to watching Irreversible after that phonecall and in some small way I left mentally scarred. It left an impact on me as a viewer in a similar way to 2001: A Space Odessy as I would personally only watch it once but it was one hell of a ride. It has possibly the most infamous of rape scene in a film amoungst a few other moments in the first half which really leaves you feeling sodimized yourself. The second half is an almost polar opposite and I actually found myself laughing with the characters despite the violence I saw in the first half that nearly left me thinking 'They went too far.' Watch it if you like extreamist or hyper-realistic cinema but do view with caution, I read on IMDB that the first 20 minutes has a very low frequency in the mix that is inaudiable to the naked ear but is the same noise you hear during earthquakes that creates feelings of sickness and nausea and I was certainly felt a little disorientated during the exposition.

Zombie planning

Our film lesson today helped me and Mark focus our efforts on our coursework on our beloved genre of zombies. We have planned a general synopsis for our 8 minute film, it will be mostly set within our scout hut and a good old siege, we are hoping to spice it up with some typical comedy and plenty of gore!

My new pair of Lovefilms arrived today so I hastily popped in Barefoot Gen, a film I have been greatly anticipating since I saw it on the top 50 animations list, it makes a very good companion piece to Grave of the Fireflies as both are about the late war in Japan. While I would call the latter a slightly better film it isn't by much, considering that Grave is one of my favorite films that is saying a lot. The animation style is a lot more cartoony and the first 20 minutes of the film lull you into a calm state of mind, much like the peaceful civilians of Japan. What comes after is one of the most shocking and brilliant moments I have ever seen in an animated film that truly and horrifically portrays the bombing of Hiroshima. I squirmed, I smiled, I laughed, I cried and all in a brief 80 minutes. I highly recommend this under appreciated film, it was simply wonderful.   

MIB

Had some very interesting conversations in school about religion and the existence of God today because it was Monday and we were feeling a tad philosophical. We are also very excited about our screening of our film 'As Time Goes By' to a large(ish) audience at our house evening, it's basically a talent show and I in particular would really like to see a audience response to our film.

I had intentions of watching Irreversible today but I was somewhat intimidated by its themes that consist mainly of rape and violence so I just thought 'sod it, I'll watch Men in Black,' a complete contrast I am aware. It was pretty decent, the opening sequence had some very good music from Elfman and the film ended quite well. What bugged me is that it had a lot of 90's pop culture references, mainly ones that poke fun of other actors, some of which flew right over my head and will seriously hinder it's lastability. Smith was very good but Jones's character was a bit dull until near the end where he is given a very rushed attempt at character development. I'm sure it will have a place in some 90's kids hearts but for me it was a little bit mediocre, I expected more laughs but I merely sniffed wit amusement infrequently.

Another weekend gone

I didn't really accomplish much today, I worked on my English coursework but that's about it, I did watch 2 films, the first being Ghost in the Shell, after a very awesome 20 minutes of garbage truck shootings and invisible water fighting the film really went downhill as it tried to talk about too many philosophical questions during its last minutes, only a few of which made sense. The animation was both amazing and lazy at times, the fore mentioned water fighting moment was great but there were several dialogue sequences where mouths didn't need to move thanks to the convenience of telepathy. Luckily it was quite short otherwise it would have dragged on for way longer than it needed to. The other was Touch of Evil, the main thought going through my head was 'good God, Orson Welles has gotten fat' It stated and ended with a very tense sequence but I felt that it dragged on for the first act quite a lot but towards the end it certainly got a lot better and a little bit thought provoking thanks to Welles' performance which was, as always, very good, it was quite clear that he saved the bast character for himself, everyone else I didn't really care about but Hank (Welles) was very engaging. 

No vegitables

Lunch today comprised of s whole roast chicken between 3 people along with our typical toastie recipes, but now with 100% more chicken! Dinner was a steak pie and chips and I must say I really have noticed the absence of fruit and veg in my diet today as I am feeling quite ill, I should bounce back though despite me additionally feeling knacked to hell.

Yay, weekend!

Had a good old Friday today with a small gathering for the weekly film which was Police Story, A film I haven't seen in ages but it was way better than I remembered, Jackie Chan is a genius of action and comedy, amazing stuff. Making milkshakes again but I ran out of ice cream to make them in the standard uber thick state, we had to settle for single cream consistency rather than porridge, it was tough times. I have also been replaying Bioshock 2 on my new graphics card, I got to the bit where you get the shotgun, spotted a splicer and unloaded hell onto them, fired my first shot and clearly the card couldn't handle that level of awesome and it crashed instantly.

Comedy Cabaret

This evening I went to go see Frisky and Mannish performing in our area, they are basically a music comedy act which was absolutely hilarious. As with most acts of this type the phrase 'audience participation' came into play a little more then I anticipated as I was selected to perform along 4 other oh-so lucky audience members to perform in a very tongue and cheek boy band. We were told to look emotionally into the distance and mime along to a pop song that none of us knew the words to, when I returned to my table my friends thought it was absolutely hysterical and honestly it was a good time. If you get a chance to see the pair perform do so, they are extremely talented, more so than most modern pop musicians.

Happy Birthday Blog!

My goodness, has it really been a year? A whole year of me writing down my daily crap to anyone and everyone who would listen, to be honest I am surprised I have been able to keep it up for so long. I'd always wanted to keep a diary of some sort when I was younger because I thought it would be really cool to look back on myself and see what I have done/accomplished, after looking back through the blog archives I do feel a little proud. Blogging daily has been no easy task either, many times I have been away and got Mark or Daniel to do it, other times I have stayed out too late to warrant a blog entry, once or twice I forgot all together and lay in bed feeling like I had left some task incomplete, after promptly remembering it was the blog I had to re-boot the computer just for you peeps. I would like to thank everyone who reads the blog, I know there aren't many of you but without the few that do I wouldn't have been motivated to continue.

Me and Mark sat down today to do some of our scripting, so far we have begun some basics for our 'Day in the Life' series, picking out unusual characters and jobs. I also handed in my CV to Gamestation who have been offering jobs for seasonal staff, looking forward to hearing from them as it would be pretty sweet to work there, chatting with people like me and serving the occasional new gamer, dropping in some recommendations and denying adult games to minors; that would be the life. By far the 2 best things to happen to me today were finding £1.52 down the sides of my desk chair and finally getting my hands on the Evil Dead trilogy DVD set, I now have all of the films in easy access, it even came with a bonus disc with some hilariously cheap looking interviews with fans of the series giving a very broad overview of the history of the series, complete with over enthusiastic presenter with mock 'Raimi Rush' shots; ironically I found it quite campy.

Thanks again for reading, if you can put up with my dull life and horrendous spelling I would be honoured if you would keep reading through the next year.

Theo Durrant

Ideas on paper

The group had a small brainstorming session today about our future projects, we know for a fact we will do a genuine zombie film as our coursework practically demands it since Mark has decided to study Zombie in film and I have chosen to study Sam Raimi's horror films. We have also begun planning 'A Day in the Life' mini series that will basically play out as 2-3 minute mockumentaries on unusual characters, we have some good ideas so far and will have a lot of fun making them. We shall spend some time in our frees scripting these shorts and should definitely come out with some good stuff for the future!

I have been very keen to watch Network as I have seen it on numerous Icheckmovies lists. The performances were absoultly stunning, especially between Dunaway and Holden, his final monolouge is one of the highlights. The film did tend to phase in and out of interesting points at it kinda lost me when they hit us with all the TV jargon but I got really interested when people started yelling, I couldn't take my eye's off Peter Finch whenever his character was onscreen as you know he is going to be so unpredictable. It also poses a lot of interesting points about the TV generation and the media as a whole, encouraging you to get mad and scream: 'I'm as mad as Hell and I'm not gonna take this anymore!'

A lot of views

Our 'Ah... Bisto' video has received nearly 600 views, that is more than all our other videos combined! This is probably because we have since posted it on funnyjunk and reddit so we can spread some of our comedy to the unsuspecting Internet!

I got the chance to watch A Bridge Over the River Kwai today after becoming a Guinness fan I could not resist this film. I must say I was very impressed as I can not name another film before 1957 with the same scope or scale as this one, clearly it had a massive budget and was shot on location so it looks great even by today's standards. The final sequence was very impressive but did fee like a massive step backwards in regaurds to the plot, at least it provided a huge specticle that would not dissapoint any viewer.

My milkshake...

...Did not and will not bring all the boys to the yard because it was funky and not all that great. Afterwards I tried to make some pukka iced tea with freshly squeezed orange and lime juice, that went a little better but I didn't add enough sugar at the last minute and it tasted like water as a result, I even frosted the glass with sugar to make it look the part; sadly it was another letdown.

While watching some film noirs I realize that my brain goes numb from all the information I am putting into them as due to the fast talking and twisting plot, worst offender is Brick which I couldn't understand a word of dialogue. The Maltese Falcon was not so bad at this but I did briefly get lot at times but at least it had the decency to recap every now and then and the talking moments were varied with moments of shouting which were pretty cool. The fighting was also quite humorous and Bogart was great as usual. It didn't have the most satisfying of endings but at least it didn't go for a strictly happy ending.

HD gaming!

I had a very tiring day at work, we had to deliver a sofa during our lunchbreak by hand and the door wasn't big enough in the guys house so we had to take it back. I did get a very nice drinks cook book though, it teaches you the basics of cocktails and smoothies and I shall hopefully be making some awesome milkshakes tomorrow. The highlight of the day was fitting my graphics card after yesterdays issue was simply resolved, it makes my games look pretty sweet, I can finally enjoy them to 90% of their fullest and apart from homework and films tomorrow, that is all I will be doing, thank God for Sunday's

Epic bath time part 2

Hope you like our new video, it's just a quick one and we thought it would be a bit funny so we hope you like it. My new power unit arrived today, I ran upstairs to install it, immediately after unpacking it I discovered that it required a 230V ac adapter. EVERY other adapter in the house with the same style plug is 250V, my PSU is just one of those things that is a right arse for the sake of it, so now I will have to go out and buy something else just so I can have decent graphics, so far it hasn't been worth the effort.

Film Friday's choice was Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy as per Empire recommendation. The film was confusing to say the least, we are never truly formally introduced to any of the characters and that makes it a little hard to care when each new plot event occurs if you could keep up with the story. The camera work and acting is very nice though and the all star cast is great, it's just a shame that the plot wasn't conveyed in the most user friendly manner.

Epic Bath Time

FTM forums are up!

I can now have mildly witty banter with the crowd and fans of fredthemonkey.com as their forums are back up, I have been posting under the name of Edmund (from E&D) and having fun the the currently small community of users. Nintendo have also decided to be a bit boss today and release Zelda the Four Swords for free, it is a little bit slow by my lonesome but it is still good old fashioned Zelda fun! Me and Mark have also been working on the gravy video, hopefully it will be up tomorrow along with the making of video which is amazing, wait until it gets 5 minutes in and you may chuckle softly to yourself.

Twitter!

Sorry, I got our Twitter account wrong in the post I made a few days ago, we now have a feed going so you don't have to hunt it down! Speaking of which, you may have already read that Daniel has been a subject of our own torture device but not intentionally so. We have all been wanting to do a Bisto advert for sometime now and we had a odd concept that basically meant that we would sit Dan in a bath of gravy. First off all the  granules didn't dissolve as planned to we had to boil some separately then pour it in. Dan initially complained about it being a little too hot in the tub but I told him 'Imagine you are a big ice cube that will cool down the water' to help his mentality, it later turned out that gravy retains it's heat very well indeed! Although Dan's hair never touched the water it was soaked with the amount of sweating he was doing, I had the task of fanning him in between takes with the clapper board and feeding him ice cold water. I probably didn't help that we bought some very cheap gravy that was full of fat, 99% of which had risen to the surface and clung to Dan's skin like a mollusk on a bit of driftwood. We got him showered down promptly and gave him a lolly, we even think we cured his cold! Result.

Rubber duck

A lot of nerves were shared around our film studies class today as we believed that we hadn't done enough coursework to satisfy our teacher, luckily we got away with what we had and me and Mark begun planning our short adverty film we are doing tomorrow. Without giving to much away I can say it will involve Daniel and a lot of gravy. I went out for a late Birthday meal with my girlfriend, after deciding I was really craving a curry we went down to a local Indian place and had a very nice meal, nothing really insightful to say about that apart from the fact I had a nice time.

Bored!

Just nothing interesting happened today, played a bit of minecraft and did my homework... life is slow at the moment.

I was really in the mood for a decent old fashioned horror film that was more about atmosphere and the feeling impending doom than gore and shocks, The Wickerman fit this bill nicely. It had the great set up of a foreigner looking for a missing person in an unusual area, things seem relatively normal at first but as the minutes pass there will be more than one time you will raise an eyebrow in disbelief or perverted interest. The mise en scene was very impressive and the last scene of the film is very harrowing, really enjoyed it!

New featured videos

Mark has put up some of our new videos today, Jamie's 'How the View' promo tells you why you should download his new single for absolutely free on the 29th and honestly, why wouldn't you? We have also put up our Bournemouth endeavours that shows you what type of shenanigans we got up to while we were down there. Give them both a quick watch and you shan't regret it.

Downloaded an application called comicrack today, it is basically a graphic novel reader, I downloaded the complete Sandman to read when I felt like it, turns out the file is nearly 3GB big but is awesome. It also came with the spin off series of comics which are equally interesting, especially the childrens book version of the characters and plot, tis very different to the themes of the original but it knows it is being a little tounge and cheek.

Watched A History of Violence today as it peaked my interest yesterday because I really liked the sound of the concept. It went by really quickly and the first hour was very good indeed, the final 20 minutes were decent but the story became a little too focused on the main plot point and another one just died out without any real acknowledgement. I can see why some people would really love this film, but for me it was just pretty good, if you want something short and somewhat interesting you should check it out.

James Creed Promo for 'How's the View?'

Saucemouth

We have a Twitter account

Daniel signed us up on Twitter under the name of moviemocha, at least I think so... I will verify this when he comes back from holiday tomorrow. Other than that I went back to my volunteer job for the first time in 2 months as I have been busy all other Saturdays, nothing has changed, the layout, the lunches and the customers have all stayed the same and its good to be back. For a film today I watched the French short Le Ballon Rouge which was generally regarded in the youtube comments as the second coming of Jesus, honestly it wasn't that good, the first 30 minutes were quite dull and repetitive, a young boy walks through the streets of France with a red balloon... that's it really. It was only in the last 5 minutes that I started feeling surprisingly emotional, I have no idea why either, I guess it was just visually interesting? I don't know, you can check it out for yourself on youtube if you like but it is not essential viewing unless you like old French films.

New graphics card...

My new super mega awesome graphics card arrived today, the thing looks insane, me and Dan quickly rushed to install the thing but we realized that had the wrong power adapter box... thing. Basically I am going to have to buy an new one of them so I can get my beast to work fortunately I have nothing better to spend my extras wages on so I'll just hope onto amazon later this week and see what I can do.

Weddings used to be fun...

Mark and Dan were over for the night again as we had to catch an early train to be a part of our extras job, we got up at 4:30 and arrived on time at 7 but left us very tired in the process. We spent about 9 hours sitting on the same pew waiting for instructions, I think about 3 shots were filmed again but one of them lasted around 2 minuets every time a take was done and we had to repeat this one the most times with our reactions. Although a little boring at times, it was still a lot of fun, the team were very friendly and they had an enjoyable time making the film; plus we got paid so that may bias my opinion a little.

Cowboys and samurais

Had a fun 1 lesson today, essentially we just watched Bowling for Columbine and discussed it, I like the film and its fun to talk about it so it was a good lesson. Walking home from school we got into an issue with a few year 9's, their arsenal increased from a few mushy apples to a 9-iron golf club that came within a few inches of my face but did hit my friend in the stomach, after that we left a trail of nose blood after he was punched in the face, all in all it was a very interesting walk home; and all we wanted were some crisps from Tesco.

Watched another film from Asia today, Yijimbo was basically A Fistfull of Dollars before it was released, personally I preferred the latter. It had it's moments though, it should have certainly been rated higher than a PG due to excessive swearing and strong violence, also the translation and subtitles were hilariously awful, 'Do not make him dead!' was by far my favorite line of the film and for all the wrong reasons.

Rooftop bouncing

I finished Ghost World early this morning and really enjoyed it, I should probably check out some of the other graphic novels in the library. I will probably be spending most of tomorrow working on my film coursework draft so that will be fun, at least I am humbled by the fact that I am further than Mark.

After searching for our copy of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon I finally found it under 'C,' I was really in the mood for a good martial arts film but I felt that it only partly delivered. Some of the fight scenes were very impressive and the settings looked nice, but ultimately I really didn't care about any of the characters or their motives, I felt like I hardly knew them. Whenever there wasn't on-screen fighting I found myself rather bored as the plot wasn't very deep but when the martial arts got going it was impressive... then went back downhill. Personally I think Hero is a much better film so I would highly recommend that rather than what I just watched.

Havin' fun isn't hard...

After feeling like utter crap at school today due to a lovely combination of head-aches and tiredness I did something a little bit out of the ordinary and headed into town to see my girlfriend. Taking my bike was apparently the wrong decision as my wheels were very deflated, it was perilous going in straight lines, let alone manoeuvre around dog walkers and other cyclists. After meeting up we decided to go to the library because it was warmer there, what started with me looking for the Sandman volume 1 (Nocturnes and Preludes) ended up with me filling out an application for a library card and taking out Ghost World; I can't remember the last time I was even in that library!

I finished off my Ealing comedy collection today, it turned out we had a seperate copy of the Ladykillers that didn't have the pesistant German subtitles. It started off a little slowly and Alec Guiness was practically unrecognizable save for his voice but the film really picked up at the very end as once again money and betrayal go hand in hand. Not my favorite Ealing comedy admittedly, but it had it's moments, it was good to see a very young Peter Sellers but now I am very curious to see the Coen Brother adaptation of the film, although I have been told by most to steer clear of that one.

A little time for myself

After 2 very hectic days it has been nice to chill at home again, went to Chris' party in the evening where we sat around and chatted until the night drew in. I was also offered some 'insanity' sauce which was basically edible napalm for your curries, I found out I was not as manly as I thought and made a quick dash for a glass of milk. Refreshing.