Things I should be doing:
-Writing journals for my college-level English class (2 or 3)
-Writing a research paper for the same class
-Finishing math homework
-Writing my college essay
-Figuring out the rest of my college applications
-Practicing my flute for tomorrow's lesson
-Sleeping
Things I did instead:
-Plan my birthday party for an hour with a friend.
-Discuss the swimming drama going on with another friend
-Type this blog
Yes, I am a productive child! Yes I am a successful child! Bleh.
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Sunday, September 4, 2011
The Help
I didn't mention before, but I finished the book about half a week ago; I really enjoyed it. I won't discuss the whole thing with the premise being that the black side hadn't been told and yet it was in fact written by a white woman, because I'm still not sure how I feel about that fact. I will, however, say that it is a good book, and if I had to wager, I would guess it's at least decently accurate.Anyway, that's not what I was going to write about. I was going ot write about how I saw the movie with my mother and my sister tonight.
As always, we must first discuss the previews: I won't lie, I wanted to see most of the movies that had previews, including One Day, which I've heard got panned, but I don't even care, I still want to see it. I also really want to see whatever the movie involving Anton Yelchin was, becuase Anton Yelchin is awesome, and I totally managed to correctly identify the girl in the movie as the one girl from Northanger Abbey, which makes me feel proud (god my life is maybe a little pathetic).
On to the movie: for me, the start was rocky. I think there were times when things were edited a bit oddly, and maybe it's just my recent reading of the book that's making me think this, but parts just seemed like they weren't flowing/weren't connecting in a way that made sense. Like, Treelore's story seemed like it didn't quite...fit. And Skeeter's random demand to know what happened to Constantine during dinner was just odd (also, I'm sorry, they should've done something else for that flashback. Emma Stone just looked like she was wearing weird clothes, not like she was truly younger). In addition, I have to say: there were some inconsistencies in characters that really bothered me. Minnie was a big one; she sometimes seemed like the badass/funny woman she was supposed to be, and sometimes she just...wasn't. Mrs. Phelan was another one; the whole, "suddenly not racist" thing was weird. I don't know, it just felt wrong.
To be honest, the Minnie issue, and some of the other ones, sprung from the fact that the movie was weird in how it played the funny-serious line. It didn't feel quite right; the funny parts were funny, and the touching parts were truly touching (definitely cried a couple times), but they were awkwardly put together. Like, I feel like Up did this great job of leading off with the terribly sad and moving, and then getting to funny really successfully, and going back and forth beautifully, and I felt like this movie managed to kind of do this most of the time, but then other times just...lost it. I also think that maybe the other part was that the movie lacked the fear: I didn't ever feel like these characters were truly risking things, not even when Medgar Evans was shot. And that lack of fear really makes the entire thing just a little bit flatter; it lacks that extra oomph.
Anyway, enough complaining: now for things that were done really well: Aibileen. She was amazing, especially in her scenes with Mae Mobley. Elizabeth, who had just enough of that subtle, passive-aggressive racism. The Stuart-Skeeter relationship: it actually felt real, and wrong, and it was kind of wonderful that you could just tell they were wrong, without it being necessary to show all these different moments when there was a disconnect. Celia Foote, and the Benefit were also great, and pretty funny. Um...the soundtrack?? Thomas Newman is AWESOME, and his scores always have this hopeful-yet-sad sound, and their so subtle you don't even realize they're there (I'm a little in love with his Series of Unfortunate Events soundtrack. I can just listen to it and start crying; it's that good.)
So yeah. I would probably recommend reading the book after seeing the movie on this one; I tried to avoid comparing them in this post, because that seldom really goes well, but the book has such a strong voice to it, it's a little like a movie playing in your head - and so seeing the movie afterwards is just really disconcerting. But do see the movie; just make sure you read the book too.
As always, we must first discuss the previews: I won't lie, I wanted to see most of the movies that had previews, including One Day, which I've heard got panned, but I don't even care, I still want to see it. I also really want to see whatever the movie involving Anton Yelchin was, becuase Anton Yelchin is awesome, and I totally managed to correctly identify the girl in the movie as the one girl from Northanger Abbey, which makes me feel proud (god my life is maybe a little pathetic).
On to the movie: for me, the start was rocky. I think there were times when things were edited a bit oddly, and maybe it's just my recent reading of the book that's making me think this, but parts just seemed like they weren't flowing/weren't connecting in a way that made sense. Like, Treelore's story seemed like it didn't quite...fit. And Skeeter's random demand to know what happened to Constantine during dinner was just odd (also, I'm sorry, they should've done something else for that flashback. Emma Stone just looked like she was wearing weird clothes, not like she was truly younger). In addition, I have to say: there were some inconsistencies in characters that really bothered me. Minnie was a big one; she sometimes seemed like the badass/funny woman she was supposed to be, and sometimes she just...wasn't. Mrs. Phelan was another one; the whole, "suddenly not racist" thing was weird. I don't know, it just felt wrong.
To be honest, the Minnie issue, and some of the other ones, sprung from the fact that the movie was weird in how it played the funny-serious line. It didn't feel quite right; the funny parts were funny, and the touching parts were truly touching (definitely cried a couple times), but they were awkwardly put together. Like, I feel like Up did this great job of leading off with the terribly sad and moving, and then getting to funny really successfully, and going back and forth beautifully, and I felt like this movie managed to kind of do this most of the time, but then other times just...lost it. I also think that maybe the other part was that the movie lacked the fear: I didn't ever feel like these characters were truly risking things, not even when Medgar Evans was shot. And that lack of fear really makes the entire thing just a little bit flatter; it lacks that extra oomph.
Anyway, enough complaining: now for things that were done really well: Aibileen. She was amazing, especially in her scenes with Mae Mobley. Elizabeth, who had just enough of that subtle, passive-aggressive racism. The Stuart-Skeeter relationship: it actually felt real, and wrong, and it was kind of wonderful that you could just tell they were wrong, without it being necessary to show all these different moments when there was a disconnect. Celia Foote, and the Benefit were also great, and pretty funny. Um...the soundtrack?? Thomas Newman is AWESOME, and his scores always have this hopeful-yet-sad sound, and their so subtle you don't even realize they're there (I'm a little in love with his Series of Unfortunate Events soundtrack. I can just listen to it and start crying; it's that good.)
So yeah. I would probably recommend reading the book after seeing the movie on this one; I tried to avoid comparing them in this post, because that seldom really goes well, but the book has such a strong voice to it, it's a little like a movie playing in your head - and so seeing the movie afterwards is just really disconcerting. But do see the movie; just make sure you read the book too.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Cheers to the freakin' weekend
...and while I won't drink to that, because I'm a goody-two shoes who doesn't like the taste of alcohol, I will go on a dinner-picnic with friends in celebration.
(okay, so it wasn't actually a "Yay weekend!" celebration, but whatever, I just wanted to mention it so you all know that yes, I actually do have friends. I know, sometimes I sound amazingly addicted to my computer on this little blog, what with all my talk of shows and books and stuff. I dunno, hearing about someone going out with friends usually isn't all that interesting, so I tend to avoid that subject. You understand right?)
SO. Now that we've got that confirmation of my real life existence out of the way, we can move on to the stuff you know you're really interested in: my opinions on television shows.
Oh Pretty Little Liars. How you try my patience sometimes.
First off, we have the whole kidnapped therapist thing, from the previous episode, which I can't get over: she's an adult. An adult who is apparently not an idiot. So explain to me why, exactly, she would reveal that she knew the name of A in her office, which she KNEW was bugged. YOU KNEW IT WAS BUGGED. WHY. EXPLAIN WHY.
However, my biggest issue this episode was the fact that when one of the liars (Emily) was trapped in a barn with a car that is apparently filling the barn with noxious, deadly fumes, she just sort of gave up and passed out. Girl, that barn is big. You'd have at least an hour. Go try and break open the car or something - if it's not running, the fumes won't kill you. That thing has windows. You have shoes. Seriously.
Beyond PLL, I have an embarassing confession: I started watching Glee again. I know, I know. Santana drew me back in (I think it's possible she's slowly becoming one of my favorite characters). I still hate Will most of the time, and Sue has gotten amazingly old, but to be honest, the rest aren't...horrific. Rachel's pining was annoying, but Kurt and Blaine are cute and Brittany is once again hilarious. So's her cat.
So I watched the available episodes on Hulu, and yeah. I mean, Glee is all over really: sometimes it really hits the mark with certain quips or storylines, and other times it is SO FUCKING RIDICULOUS. Since the Prom episode was the most recent one I watched, we'll talk about that first: I was almost happy for about two seconds when Jesse returned, because it meant Rachel would stop pining over Finn for an episode. Except she didn't. Stop. Pining. Which made his return both implausible and useless. You flunked out of UCLA? And then came back to Ohio? And now have this idea that you will advise show choirs? I don't remember your character being this stupid; is your character really this stupid? Also, what is going on with your scarf thing? Also also, what high school allows a non-high school student to go to prom? Oh, apparently one where the principal allows write-ins to determine prom queen, and then proceeds to read out that prom queen, despite the fact that apparently it was yet another attempt to bully/tease the gay student (we must address this too: I didn't realize until the whole awkward-lack-of-applause that it was meant as a hurtful thing; I just assumed, you know, support/breaking the crown thing in Mean Girls. You know. Like, maybe people kind of thought he wanted to get the crown because of how he generally acts around school...I dunno. I mean, I understood in the end that it wasn't that, but at first, that's how it seemed.)
Beyond all this stuff: school starts on Tuesday. My last first day ever. Kinda weird, I won't lie.
(okay, so it wasn't actually a "Yay weekend!" celebration, but whatever, I just wanted to mention it so you all know that yes, I actually do have friends. I know, sometimes I sound amazingly addicted to my computer on this little blog, what with all my talk of shows and books and stuff. I dunno, hearing about someone going out with friends usually isn't all that interesting, so I tend to avoid that subject. You understand right?)
SO. Now that we've got that confirmation of my real life existence out of the way, we can move on to the stuff you know you're really interested in: my opinions on television shows.
Oh Pretty Little Liars. How you try my patience sometimes.
First off, we have the whole kidnapped therapist thing, from the previous episode, which I can't get over: she's an adult. An adult who is apparently not an idiot. So explain to me why, exactly, she would reveal that she knew the name of A in her office, which she KNEW was bugged. YOU KNEW IT WAS BUGGED. WHY. EXPLAIN WHY.
However, my biggest issue this episode was the fact that when one of the liars (Emily) was trapped in a barn with a car that is apparently filling the barn with noxious, deadly fumes, she just sort of gave up and passed out. Girl, that barn is big. You'd have at least an hour. Go try and break open the car or something - if it's not running, the fumes won't kill you. That thing has windows. You have shoes. Seriously.
Beyond PLL, I have an embarassing confession: I started watching Glee again. I know, I know. Santana drew me back in (I think it's possible she's slowly becoming one of my favorite characters). I still hate Will most of the time, and Sue has gotten amazingly old, but to be honest, the rest aren't...horrific. Rachel's pining was annoying, but Kurt and Blaine are cute and Brittany is once again hilarious. So's her cat.
So I watched the available episodes on Hulu, and yeah. I mean, Glee is all over really: sometimes it really hits the mark with certain quips or storylines, and other times it is SO FUCKING RIDICULOUS. Since the Prom episode was the most recent one I watched, we'll talk about that first: I was almost happy for about two seconds when Jesse returned, because it meant Rachel would stop pining over Finn for an episode. Except she didn't. Stop. Pining. Which made his return both implausible and useless. You flunked out of UCLA? And then came back to Ohio? And now have this idea that you will advise show choirs? I don't remember your character being this stupid; is your character really this stupid? Also, what is going on with your scarf thing? Also also, what high school allows a non-high school student to go to prom? Oh, apparently one where the principal allows write-ins to determine prom queen, and then proceeds to read out that prom queen, despite the fact that apparently it was yet another attempt to bully/tease the gay student (we must address this too: I didn't realize until the whole awkward-lack-of-applause that it was meant as a hurtful thing; I just assumed, you know, support/breaking the crown thing in Mean Girls. You know. Like, maybe people kind of thought he wanted to get the crown because of how he generally acts around school...I dunno. I mean, I understood in the end that it wasn't that, but at first, that's how it seemed.)
Beyond all this stuff: school starts on Tuesday. My last first day ever. Kinda weird, I won't lie.
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