Royale with cheese

The Friday workers didn't leave any food for us at work today so we had to trek down to burger king to get some noms, saw tat as an option and thought, 'i can make a Pulp Fiction reference out of this' and I did. My hand also went a bit dead this afternoon, clearly I did something bad to it and now it can lift anything heavier than a toaster (I know, I tried) it really hurts but should go away by tomorrow if I am lucky.

Citizen Kane, although I knew the ending it was still a very powerful film, took about 20 minutes but as soon as the first flashback started I realized this would be a great movie. I got a real sense of character from Kane and was very impressed with some of the cinematography, very impressed with the end result and glad Wells kept to his original vision for the film.

The Royal Wedding!

Got bored 5 minutes in, bride looked good but that is general consensus; who the hell was watching that thing from 9am to 4pm?

The Graduate was pretty good, I quite like Dustin Hoffman and he was very good here, doesn't quite warrant it as a comedy but the swimsuit was certainly charming. Great soundtrack and I recognized the Simpson parody as the ending sequence. I finally braved my deepest fears and watched the Exorcist as well, It hasn't aged as well as I hoped. The scenes with Regen were amusing and mildly creepy, but there was sooooooooo much padding in between scenes, yes we get it, the mum is upset and the priest lost him own mum; why was there a seemingly irrelevant first 10 minutes? It wasn't as scary as I thought it would be which was very disappointing and the rest was very boring, I just felt a bit miffed by the end.

4 Day Weekend!

Tomorrow we all get the day off because of the Royal Wedding, followed by and additional bank holiday Monday, that means less school which often means more fun!

Miller's Crossing today, it was the kind of film that drops you in at the deep end, you have to pick up all of the plot by listening carefully and learning who all of the characters are which worked surprisingly well. Performances were top notch and I must reiterate what everyone else points out as the highlight of the film by saying, it's really good but I won't spoil it for you. It captured that old fashioned feeling very well and the violence was pleasingly noisy in places.

Guest Star on our server

JKR came to visit our minecraft server this evening and it was a great honour, I was very humbled by this because his cartoons are one of the inspiring factors for Louis' animations, and it was really cool to be in the same plane as him for once; I keep forgetting to go on his forums in other words.

I was told it was school photos day first thing yesterday, fortunately it was not the individual kind but the big group kind, there are about 200 people in the 6th form so I merely look like a dot in the photo and the whole thing took half an hour which ran into our break, ah well, at least everyone gets Friday off!

The hoodies have arrived!

A little bit snug as Mark ordered medium but otherwise they are really cool, maybe Mark could get a picture of them on the website and maybe even the option to place your own orders to be a part of the Cafe Studios team forever. I seriously doubt it though.

Battle Royale today, after reading the first part of the Manga series I was very impressed with the film adaptation, the ending was quite confusing however, a little bit too cryptic for a balls to the walls adventure film, the violence wasn't over the top which left me a little disappointed as it could have been stylized a little more; awesome concept though. Paths of Glory was second and it was excellent. Every performance was spot on and I really liked the characters ad atmosphere. It also had me thinking deeply about the human nature and what men must have felt like in the war, I like it when a movie makes me think; it's the sign of a damn good film!

Back from my Easter holiday

Got plenty of chocolate and saw a bunch of films but I won't go into that now because I am as tired as hell from all the car journeys I have been through. Fortunately I have an inset day tomorrow so I can do some nice things and have a good sleep in.

Guy Ritchie strikes again!

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels was the Film Friday choice, while it was very similar to Snatch I think I prefer Snatch as it just felt like a stronger film, I did like the cliffhanger ending and once again the charaters were amusing and very diffrent despite both films sharing many actors. I also watched Sunset Blvd. which was very impressive, I don't know why, but I didn't have great expectations for it however I was totally engauging with the plot and the characters, the acting was incredible and I really liked the setting and overall mood of the film.

I may be unable to do a blog over the next few days as I will be visiting Grand Parents over Easter Weekend, and Mark is also away... I'll figure something out!

My first Marx Brothers film!

Duck Soup is possibly the oldest film I've seen (1933) and is also one of my favorites, I loved the energetic and rapid comedy the group have to offer, I was laughing all the way through as it hasn't aged a bit in my opinion. In complete contrast I also watched Snatch which was another great film, as a general rule I quite like crime films, and this one was done extremely well with an pleasant method of story-telling through multiple narratives and perspectives; good stuff.

Not again!

Oh i did do a post yesterday, I wrote a lovely little bit about Portal 2 and why it is one of the greatest games ever made but I wont get into that again, I'll see if I can dig up the last entry but it doesn't look hopeful.

Live of Others was a very good film, all I had to do was read the back of the DVD case and instantly I was intrigued as it is set in one of my favorite time periods, I think I prefer Goodbye Lenin! however it is a very close call. I also braved another potential beating by completing the Bourne Trilogy with Ultimatum, for the most part it was a general improvement over the second installment as this time around we got some original action scenes and the plot was a little more engaging; not as good as Identity in my opinion but it was certainly better than Supremacy.

Carrie and Camping

Short and early blog today as I will be leaving shortly to go camping which should be good.

Watched Carrie with the lads, the final bit scared the hell out of Laurie and Mark and it was generally a very interesting and thrilling film.

I pre-orderd Portal 2

And I am very excited about getting it, it's gonna be so good!

Checked my E-mails at about 8 this morning and was rudely made aware of the fact that I was supposed to be celebrating the st George's Sunday with the scouting association, my day had a noticeable dent put into it as a result. Felt like a big waste of time, it always is which is a bit of a shame but an hour long church service is rather tedious, especially when it is geared toward the 8-12 year olds.

I also watched the Bourne Supremacy today and was thoroughly disappointed. What I liked in Identity was the relationship between Bourne and Marie, it felt organic and real, we also got an insight into Jason Bourne's character as we learnt about him at the same time he did, he was an interesting, charming and at time amusing character to watch. Supremacy basically gave the finger to that logic and made Bourne a dull and boring character who seems totally different to the original and any chance of a further developed relationship between him and Marie were quite literally killed off. The action scenes were awful as the editing was way to fast and it was difficult to keep track of who was doing what. Usually a shaky camera doesn't bug me too much in films but here it was just irritating and did not have the desired effect of putting me in the environment. It's a shame too as I really had some good expectations for the sequel because I was interested in where the plot would go from the first film, I actually thought I was watching Ultimatum by accident at first because I thought I missed something out as somehow the characters moved to India. My favorite part of the movie: when Extreme Ways started playing because it's a great track and it indicates the end of a Bourne film; which is exactly what I was looking forward to.

This weekend gets a 2, I did very little that was amusing and the highlight of the 2 days was Britain's got Talent.

Finally I can say I have seen Star Wars

Fortunately I was lucky enough to see a digitally remastered version so the picture quality was really good, but it seems that some people decided to touch up some of the puppets with some CGI which was a serious mistake as it was really poorly done and took me out of the experience. Overall I was impressed with the quality of the films scenery and technologies etc but I was quickly losing interest in the final battle scene at the end as it went on a bit.

A very quiet Friday

There was no group film watching session today so it felt a little bit slower than other Fridays, on the plus side I got some revision done and watched the Sixth Sense which was WAAAAAY better than Unbreakable, I just think it had a little more in it and although it had to take its plot devise seriously, I was comfortable with it, in Unbreakable it felt a little bit too gimmicky, but here it had a good sense of focus with some greater believability.

Clearly... we are not designers

The group and I have just spent 3 hours on a potential crew hoodie design... a bit too long in my opinion but there you go. I think right now, as I write this we are just coming up with the final idea and it is now looking pretty snazzy, we consistently had to battle our ideas against Mark's as his original concept was not great; but now it's perfect!

Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade this afternoon, really enjoyed it and I personally think it was better than Raiders of the Lost Ark as the comedy was a little bit sharper and I loved Sean Connery's character; the action seemed a lot more engaging this time around as well.

Another quiz night

Getting into having a small coffee in the morning, keeps me perky and alert for the rest of the day and gives that unique flavor that makes you say 'well good morning taste buds.' It has also been the first day in about 2 weeks that I have not watched a film, bit of a shame really because I have a few I wasn't to see now which are working up a small catalogue but I was busy at a quiz night this evening, it was a bit easy however particularly the film round, to put it bluntly it had George of the Jungle in it; 'nuff said. But we won and greedily grabbed an Easter Egg that I will be saving until the Sunday. I seem to have developed a small cold again, it's just a blocked nose but it is blooming annoying, especially when I am blissfully trying to drift into a deep slumber and I have to get up to blow my nose every 5 minutes; here's to hoping for a better night's sleep.

Voice recording has happened

Did some voice acting for the new Edmund and Darrel cartoon my bro is working on, really think it's gonna be a cracker, it's funny and written just as we would probably speak to each other, which is a nice bonus. Went on a small run today, originally I used to do a 20 minute jog every two days or so, but recently I have been very lazy and now I have paid the price as I am seriously out of practise but I am willing to climb back to my previous ability level.

I was very impressed with Good Will Hunting, I loved the writing which was very good for the actors Matt Damon and Ben Affleck and I think it struck a chord with me, Robin Williams was very good and I loved his monologues.

Right bed now as it is late, here's to hoping I don't wake up in the middle of the night due to over-heating... again.

Wiggle your big toe

Did a few hours of revision with Mark today then went home to watch Kill Bill volume 1. It was Pulp Fiction but my ass was sufficiently kicked, I liked the stylish action sequences and the hardcore violence, the music was pretty good to! Now we are gonna have to watch volume 2, but that's for another time...

I got my lemonade!

Felt so good, me, Dan and Louis were all sat around having lunch and we all 'chinked' glasses together to celebrate the arrival of the good weather in Britain, we may simply be in an anti-cyclone but that's not the point. I also played the new L4D2 map today, it was made by a fan but was added in a beta form until a further update and I was really impressed, bearing in mind this was just one person, he really made the effort and delivered a great experience to all of my team-mates, except for Bilbo who was bloody awful at the game.

Silence of the Lambs tonight, I was very impressed with the quality of the film making as it really kept me on edge throughout, I loved the feeling of adrenaline it gave me and it had some very interesting characters and moments, I shan't spoil anything so I simply recommend watching the film if you haven't already.

I think a 4/10 is good enough for this weekend, not much happened but it wasn't offencive or taxing in any way. Right, if your at work tomorrow then I wish you the best of luck, if not then you deserve a good rest.

What the hell did I just watch?

Brazil... What a weird film. I really liked the atmosphere that the film created and some of the comedy was genuinely charming and humorous but something didn't quite click with me, it just didn't have any scenes that I thought could be considered memorable, I loved the Grand Central dance scene in The Fisher King and the final slow-motion airport sequence in 12 Monkeys was very impressive, but I couldn't find one of these moments in Brazil; perhaps I just have to wait a while to understand some of the symbolism and undertones so I can really appreciate it.

Work was alright today and it's starting to get hot in the house and the rest of the country for that matter. Here's to a good Sunday, I may get some lemonade so I can enjoy it in the sun.

Yay, Easter break!

Break has officially started and I had a very easy day with 2 lessons of English and finding out how well I did in the Tuesday English test, I was only 2 off full marks! Finally we watched There Will Be Blood during Film Friday, we had to frequently post-pone this film due to it's length and the fact there would be no time as a result of of our primary school thing. I thought the acting was amazing and some scenes were very good, however it didn't leave any kind of impact on me whatsoever, the main character was evil, yet he had no clear or favorable motives who we saw change, but I'm not sure if he developed, we learned more about him rather than see him change and accept something throughout the narrative. I liked it, but it was a little bit too long and some scenes failed to hold my interest.

There goes my favorite pen

It ran out of ink today and I can't see a way of replacing the cartridge. It is a really cool pen because it has a highlighter on one end and a standard pen on the other, the perfect annotating pen but sadly it may have to end up in my bin...

Bride of Frankenstein today, possibly the oldest feature film I have seen but it still impressed me in it's own little way, the monster was performed really well by Boris Karloff and there were some moments of poignancy, rare in a horror film.

Malkovich... Malkovich!

Oh boy, 'Being John Malkovich' is a very odd film indeed, I really enjoyed it however as I was very impresses by the original story which kinda reminded me of psychonauts (especially the trip into John's sub-conscious). I also liked the puppeteering sections as they were amazing to watch, overall it was a weird film but highly enjoyable. Grave of the Fireflies is a different beast and possibly the saddest film I have ever seen because it was simply incredible, there was not a single second I didn't enjoy and I totally connected with the characters and now fully appreciate the efforts of Japanese film making, now one of my favorite films that I won't see again for a little while.

Again, not much happening in my life, Jamie is currently working his way through Grim Fandango which is an all time favorite game of mine, so difficult not to tell him exactly what to do as it's one of those point and click adventure games that is really hard to figure out by yourself. Nearly the Easter Holidays, can hardly wait, have a good few days until then.

IM ON A BOAT!

Mark has fashioned a very impressive boat, you will find the name of it in the caption, I thought it was a very apt name as it's one of Mark's favorite films:

Image is a little blurry, but it is still there in its boaty glory, we are making Davy Jones' boat next and it's coming along nicely.

I saw Goodfellas today, possibly the best soundtrack in a film ever along with some great performances from the cast... what a good movie overall a classic and the epitome of Scorsese films.

Repeated festivities

Now I  have recovered from the mother day Chinese take-away from yesterday I have to say Happy Birthday to Dad who I am sure has had a good day, we celebrated by watching Let Me In which is an American re-make of the original Swedish horror film Let The Right One In, although it looked pretty good and there were a couple of inspiring camera shots it was overall inferior to the original in pretty much every way, it wasn't a bad film mind but if you had to pick one then I recommend braving the subtitles for a better movie. I also watched Raging Bull which I didn't full appreciate until I read into it, particularly Rodger Ebert's short essay on it. I kind watched through it in a trance, much like I did with Taxi Driver but now I think I understand both films as they are mainly about a characters search for redemption, which is a very cool concept in any film. Raging Bull is really interesting as it isn't really a sports movie as this concept puts off many people so you should watch it with an open mind, De Niro again is amazing, even willing to put on a few pounds to convey the older and fatter version of Jake LeMotta; good stuff.

Oh crap... it's Mothers Day

I completely forgot this fact, I never remember these things anyway, fortunately Louis made some truffles for mum and I got away with getting her something by 'indirectly' paying for the sweets, I say this because Louis asked for the money after he took it. Watched two films today, first was The Apartment which essentially invented the modern romantic comedy and it has held up really well thanks to some very tight writing, the humour was at just the right tone and it had a pleasant level of quirk and charm, I'm looking at you: spaghetti tennis ratchett! The second was Mary and Max, the best way to describe it is if you took Wallace and Gromit, Corpse Bride and Bellevile Rendez-vous and threw them into a blender. It had that dark, Burton-esce feeling with totally repulsive looking characters that have more personality than your best mate, absolutely wonderful movie that will totally run the gambit with your emotions; a must see if you love animation.


This weekend gets a... 5, but only because I saw some great films over my short break, the rest of it was pretty average. Anyways, Monday has come round again and I have to revise for a small English test so I had better start on some mind maps, have a good tomorrow.

I want a Dragon...

'How to train your dragon,' went in expecting a pretty average animated kids film, but damn was I wrong. This was a great little film, although quite predictable it as the Totoro charm mixed with some truly inspiring moments, I especially liked the first proper flying scene; overall a really fun movie with an appropriate sense of humour.

Bed now, slow day today so not a lot happend, I am really warm at the moment and hope I don't have much trouble sleeping.

Are you talking to me?

That was the quote of the day according to Icheckmovies so we saw it as a sign to watch Taxi Driver, it hasn't dated as well as I hoped it would but De Niro was still very good in the role of Travis and his gun contraptions where pretty cool.

Man I'm tired, not much else happened today so I will leave you on your Friday evening and ask that you all do something to make your weekend worthwhile.