Director: Gary Winick
Starring: Amanda Seyfried, Vanessa Redgrave, Christopher Egan, and Gael García Bernal
I’ll admit, I’m a sucker for a good chick flick. But, it has to be a good chick flick. Not one of the countless movies out there that claim to be a feel good movie but just come off as overly sentimental and cliché. So, I was skeptical when it came to see Letters to Juliet. I didn’t know which one it would be, an actually good chick flick, or one of those overly sentimental ones.
In the end, I ended up liking it more than I thought. Most of the plot is something that we’ve seen before, but I loved the idea of Seyfried finding this letter about a lost love in Juliet’s wall in Verona. It was interesting, and in a sea of contrived plots, I thought it was pretty original. And I liked the journey that came next, of Claire, her grandson Charlie, and Sophie trying to find Claire’s lost love Lorenzo. It was cute. It had some great humor, and wonderful moments. By the middle of the movie, everyone knows how it’s going to end, but that’s okay, because it’s still entertaining. The characters are pretty well developed, I loved Redgrave’s character. She was hilarious. And I loved the interaction between Sophie and Charlie in the beginning, and I wish that quick wit between them had stayed constant throughout the whole film. I liked how their relationship developed (though it was sort of cliché) but I do wish they had kept that initial spark in there. Charlie kind of diminished from that cocky, funny character that he was in the beginning, and ended up quite like every other man in a romantic comedy.
I loved the scenery in the film. It made me want to jump on a plane to Italy immediately after the movie. It was beautiful.
So, all in all, it wasn’t a horrible film. It had some great lines, and the message was cute. It’s definitely something one could go see with a group or friends, a family member, or significant other. I’d recommend it to people just looking to have a good time and see a movie where you don’t have to think much, you just have to sit there and enjoy the character interactions and overall theme.
Overall rating: 7.5/10
Synopsis (for just the novella I Am Legend, not any of the other stories):
From out of the night come the living dead with a single purpose: to destroy Robert Neville, the last man on earth.
[from barnesandnoble.com]
I watched the movie I Am Legend a while ago, and was excited to see the similarities and differences between the movie and novella. There were definitely more differences than similiarities. I really liked the novella, I think it had a cooler message in the end, and I liked how the main character wasn't really someone the reader could fully love or fully hate. It was easy to empathsize with him, but he wasn't a very likeable character. He had flaws. And I liked that. He wasn't a kind-hearted survivor like Will Smith was in the movie, he was rough around the edge. So, I think the novella was a stronger story. I liked how the vampires communicated. The creatures in the movie didn't really communicate like the ones in the novella did. And I liked the scientific explanation that was given in the novella. It was definitely an interesting take on vampirism.
So, while I loved the movie, I think I liked the novella a bit more.
The other stories in the collection were interesting. I wasn't fond of "Buried Talents" or "Dance of the Dead".
"Prey" was okay, as was "Witch War", although I would've liked more on "Witch War". I think Matheson could've gone farther with that story. It was interesting. I would've liked to have known more about the seven girls. The end of "Dress of White Silk" was creepy, and I liked how he wrote it in the perspective of a little kid. That was cool. I liked the premise of "Mad House, but hated the main character. I didn't feel bad for what happened at the end of the story at all.
"The Funeral" was cool, but it's another story I would've liked to read more about. "From Shadowed Places" was all right, interesting enough. "Person to person" was probably my favorite in the collection, after the novella. I loved the ending, it was pretty awesome.
All in all, the stories were entertaining, but it's not a collection that I'll be going back to anytime soon. For some, I would recommend checking it out from the library first.
Overall rating: 6/10
Synopsis:When the dashing Max de Winter finds a new wife while vacationing in Italy, he feels happy for the first time since Rebecca, his first wife, died. However, de Winter's grim housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers, is obsessively devoted to the first Mrs. de Winter and won't let the newlyweds forget Rebecca. As the tension escalates, Mrs. Danvers grows more desperate — and more deadly.
[from barnesandnoble.com]
I loved this novel. I should just get that out of the way. It was really good. It had a very Victorian feel to it, even though it was written in the late 30's.
I thought the characters were great. The main character (I really don't think we ever learn her name) gets a tad annoying in about the middle of the novel, because she is afraid of standing up for herself, but then she finally does, and it's a great moment. I know I was cheering for her. And Mrs. Danvers is a great creepy housekeeper that everyone would probably be a little scared of. Maxim wasn't really in the novel as much as I would've liked him to be. He was more prominent in the end of the novel. He was there in the scenes, but he was a stoic, kind of off-standish character. I liked seeing more emotion in him at the end of the book.
I loved Manderley. The descriptions were great, there were some great images I could see clearly. What's a suspense novel without a big house, after all?
It should be clear that this is an old novel, so there isn't a lot of action or drama. I mean, it's there, but it's mostly about the characters and setting up for whatever drama there is. Much of Du Maurier's writing reminded me of Agatha Christie's writing.
The one thing that sucked was that there were quite a bit of errors in my copy of the novel, so that broke the flow sometimes. I don't know if it's just my edition, or if it's all of them. An editor should definitely go through the novel and fix them, if that's the case. Hah.
But, I loved the book. It's great for a rainy day.
Overall rating: 8/10
Director: Marc Webb
Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel
Synopsis:
Mark (Gordon-Levitt) is an aspiring architect who currently earns his living as a greeting card writer. Upon encountering his boss' beautiful new secretary, Summer (Deschanel), Mark discovers that the pair have plenty in common despite the fact that she's seemingly out of his league; for starters, they both love the Smiths, and they're both fans of surrealist artist Magritte. Before long Mark is smitten. All he can think about is Summer. Mark believes deeply in the concept of soul mates, and he's finally found his. Unfortunately for Mark, Summer sees true love as the stuff of fairy tales, and isn't looking for romance. Undaunted and undeterred by his breezy lover's casual stance on relationships, Mark summons all of his might and courage to pursue Summer and convince her that their love is real.
[from barnesandnoble.com]
"This isn't a love story. This is a story about love."
I've wanted to see this film for a long time. Basically ever since it came out. I finally got around to renting it from Netflix and watching it last weekend.
Overall, it was a good movie. I liked the strong differences between Mark and Summer, and I liked how they changed throughout the film. At the end of the film, they weren't the same characters as they were in the beginning. Some of their scenes together were really cute and well done, like when they were in the bar, and when they were in the furniture store. I loved those scenes. I think they picked good actors for the lead roles, Joseph and Zooey did a great job in their parts.
I also loved the music in the film. It's definitely a great soundtrack!
I think that the sister should've been in more of the film, but that's just because I thought she was hilarious.
I thought the movie was well-shot, it flowed pretty well, and kept me interested until the end. There were some great lines and moments. I liked how the days were all out of order and you got day 500, then day 5, then day 45. It was cool.
This is definitely a movie I'd recommend to people who are more into character-driven movies and not plot driven movies.
I don't really have anything negative to say about the film. It wasn't absolutely amazing, but it wasn't horrible. It had a good message, good acting, some great moments, and was a great way to pass the time. I would definitely watch it again.
My rating: 7.5/10
Synopsis:
The Picture of Dorian Gray highlights the tension between the polished surface of high society and the life of secret vice. In this updated version of the Faust story, the tempter is Lord Henry Wotton who lives selfishly for amoral pleasure; Dorian's good angel or conscience is the portrait painter Basil Hallward whom Dorian murders. Although sin is punished in the end, the book has a strong flavor of the elegantly perverse. Wilde asserted in his Preface to the expanded edition: "There is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written or badly written. That is all."
[from barnesandnoble.com]
I loved this book. It's been sitting on my shelf for a while, waiting to be read, and I'm glad I finally got the chance to pick it up. Wilde's prose is beautiful, it flows wonderfully, painting clear pictures in the reader's mind. I could see everything vividly, as if I were in the story.
The plot was awesome, I loved the idea. And the dialogue is well written, especially the dialogue between Lord Henry and Dorian. There's a lot of philsophy in this novel, it's definitely a novel to make you think. But it's entertaining, too. There are some very funny moments. It's a novel that reflects Wilde's viewpoints of society at the time, much like most of his writings do.
The characters were great, too. I loved Dorian, he was so flawed it was easy to hate him, but you kind of loved him, too. Lord Henry was interesting, as was the Duchess. The moments between them were hilarious, I kind of wanted to see more between them. And Basil was interesting, too. I liked the way that the three main characters were distinctly the same, yet different at the same time. They played off one another well.
Along with the amazing descriptions, the dialogue was well written, too. There were a lot of great lines that make awesome quotes in this novel.
All in all, it was an amazing novel. Definitely one I would recommend to those who love British literature. Wilde was a great writer, one of my favorites. There were some parts that dragged a bit, but they were few and far between.
Overall rating: 9/10
Synopsis:
Audrey Niffenegger's innovative debut, The Time Traveler's Wife, is the story of Clare, a beautiful art student, and Henry, an adventuresome librarian, who have known each other since Clare was six and Henry was thirty-six, and were married when Clare was twenty-three and Henry thirty-one. Impossible but true, because Henry finds himself periodically displaced in time, pulled to moments of emotional gravity from his life, past and future. His disappearances are spontaneous, his experiences unpredictable, alternately harrowing and amusing.
The Time Traveler’s Wife depicts the effects of time travel on Henry and Clare's marriage and their passionate love for each other, as the story unfolds from both points of view. Clare and Henry attempt to live normal lives, pursuing familiar goals — steady jobs, good friends, children of their own. All of this is threatened by something they can neither prevent nor control, making their story intensely moving and entirely unforgettable.
[from barnesandnoble.com]
I had really high hopes for this book after hearing some of the awesome reviews people had given it. So, maybe it's my fault for placing it on such a high pedestal. I really should learn to stop doing that.
Not to say I was completely disappointed with this book, but it wasn't what I thought it would be. I think the layout of the story was really confusing and disorganized at times, I had to frequently check back for dates and just trying to keep everything straight was sometimes difficult. And I didn't really like that it was in present tense. It read less like a story, and more like a diary at times.
I also didn't like how Niffenegger would introduce a character, and then we wouldn't hear about them for one hundred plus pages. I think some of them were just tools for her to develop the character. Like, there was really no point to Ingrid or Celia in the story (although I thought Ingrid was one of the more interesting characters. I wanted to know more about hers and Henry's relationship). I also think that alternating POVs, while I can understand why Niffenegger did that, I do think it delayed developing the characters big time. I didn't really start caring about the two main characters until more than two hundred pages in. They just seemed like characters I'd seen before. The girl who is always waiting on a guy, and the guy who is crazily fucked up who gets "saved" by this girl.
The plot was also lacking a little. It wasn't strong. This was definitely a character driven story, not a plot driven story. I think after a while it was just a story about how these two people cannot seem to overcome all these horrible things being thrown at them. And, really, a lot of horrible things happened to them. At one point in the story, I wondered if Niffenegger hated her own characters for everything she put them through.
That said, Niffenegger knows how to write. Her prose was really well done. Details were spot on. She had very clear concise pictures. So that was definitely well done. At times, the writing was a little cheesy, like the note Henry wrote to Clare at the end of the novel. That was just unrealistic to me. Here's this guy, librarian or not, who drinks and is quite fond of drugs and punk music, the tone of the note just seemed completely out of character. The note was more unrealistically written than him time traveling.
In all, this isn't a sweeping romantic tale. At least not in my opinion. It was a well written novel, with sort of developed characters that had somewhat shaky motives for the things they did, and an interesting premise. Worth a read, but I'd recommend you borrow it from the library before buying it.
Overall rating: 6/10
Synopsis:
With a series of sketches, the novel lovingly describes the "adventures" of middle-aged ladies in the quiet country village of Cranford in the 1830's. Despite their poverty, residents of the village are kind, decent, and thoroughly proper.
[from barnesandnoble.com]
I had to read Cranford for a class I'm taking. It was a pretty pleasant read. It's slow and hard to get into at first, but about halfway through the novel the overall quaintness of the town and its inhabitants kept me interested. Miss Matty was just a sweetheart, and I liked the main character (though I didn't like how you don't learn her name until the end of the book). The novel is written almost as a series of short stories about the town, instead of a continuing plot. There are continuing themes throughout the novel, but each chapter is, essentially, its own story. I liked that. I think that was partly due to the fact that Cranford was a serial publication.
If you're interested in British literature, I would definitely recommend Cranford. It contrasts with a lot of the ideas in society at the time, but reflects some also. And the atmosphere of the small town works to the novel's advantage.
In all, I didn't hate the novel, but I don't know if I'll ever reread it. It's pleasant enough for one read through.
Overall rating: 7/10
