#14 Paranormal Activity 3

Wow ok, no picture today. I have looked for about 20 minutes for a picture to include on this post of something that was in the movie, to no avail. On to the post...

Well, first let me say I am proud to admit that I watched significantly more of this one than its predecessor!  We turned out to go to a local theater that I usually do not venture to because an old friend works there and I don't want to seem like I'm using her for free tickets or snacks or something as she usually refuses to let us pay. This time I let her, and it was awesome. This theater does not have the normal stadium seating, it has small couches and side tables. It was so comfortable! It was perfect for a scary movie so I could jump into my husband's lap and no one could really notice. On to the movie.

If you haven't seen it yet, do not base any of your expectations about it on the previews on t.v. There was next to nothing in the movie that was advertised, thus my difficulty finding a picture FROM the film. This one

is everywhere, although this never happened in the film. The Bloody Mary experiment happened yes, but not with both of these characters. It happened with the older girl and a babysitting guy. Something that seemed scary from the previews was when the mother threw water in the air only to land on an invisible visitor in the room, again did not happen. The previews show an aerial view of these girls in the bedroom, nope. They show the mom being pulled away from view flying through the air by some invisible force, nada.

Even though a lot of what I expected was not in the film. It was still good and scary. This trilogy is great for making you jump out of your seat. I like the second one better, but I think that is likely because I kept waiting for things I recognized to happen, and when it didn't I was disappointed on some level. Weird I know, but I don't know if I ever had this happen before. I went in knowing of a few things I expected to scare me that never happened. Strange.

I'm not going to go all into the plot, it seemed obvious to me. It's the sisters when they were kids how this started for them and how thier mom and her boyfriend died. Pretty basic, but in movies like these it's not really about the plot.

Before heading to the theater I read a blog on it that said the last 15 minutes will change your life. I do not agree. The last 15 minutes are exactly like the 15 minutes of the last two movies, it moved very fast, was kind of confusing and some people died.

#13 The Walking Dead Season 2 Ep. 1

The Walking Dead premiered this past Sunday, and it was great. There were a few small issues I had with the episode but overall I liked it. My excitement for this show to return is almost unfathomable. I couldn't sleep Saturday night, and could barely function Sunday during the day because I was so excited. I even made cookies, and wore my favorite underwear and pjs, yes I wore pj's at 9 at night I'm just that cool. Around our lovely city it was shown in bars, movie theaters and on campus as well. I thought best to watch it at home so I could take notes and no one would think it was strange. Well, no one except my husband but, I think he's pretty used to my strangeness by now and didn't mention it.

It started with our hero the sheriff (Rick) played by Andrew Lincoln, who by the way is English, which was a surprise to me when I found out as I think the accent is usually obvious when they hide it, not with Lincoln.          

Anyways, Rick is talking into his walkie talkie to the character (whose name I've forgotten) who helped him recover and helped establish the plot by explaining the setting and giving us a timeline. Also, who is very likely dead by this point. Rick, talking over the radio waves recaps last season to his friend setting the stage for what turns out to be only a few days from when they left us last season. They have escaped what was the CDC headquarters, in smoke and are leaving Atlanta. Some of the group loads into the RV, Rick and his family, Carol (McBride) and her daughter Sophia load into a small car, and Daryl drives quite possibly the most stupid mode of transportation possible in the reality they have created for me.

 Thus issue #1: Let us establish this character. Daryl, played by Norman Reedus, is our hunter and tracker. His redneck ways have proven highly useful as he understands weapons, hunting and foraging. He has chosen a bow and arrow as his weapon instead of a gun as the use of guns only draws more zombies. The zombies in this reality seem to have highly sensitive senses, any loud sound or the smell of the living will draw them. Knowing this, why would Daryl choose to drive a chopper?

These bikes are loud by design. It makes since in a busy society who has attention issues while driving like we do, to make the very small and dangerous thing on the road very loud so we in large vehicles are aware of its presence. Although, if the worry is that the things that like to eat me are attracted by noise, one might reconsider announcing one's presence.

Moving on... our group stumbles upon traffic, for a lack of a better word. Basically, it's a graveyard of abandoned cars where the drivers were likely attacked and killed. As soon as they stop the RV overheats. While a few try to repair it the others scavenge the cars for supplies. Moments into what would be a normal afternoon a herd of zombies find their way into the same area. One could argue they were following the sound of a chopper traveling down the highway....

Everyone hides underneath and around the cars and besides one issue with Andrea and her inability to reassemble her gun after a cleaning by Shane, which forced her to stab a zombie with a screw driver, things went ok. Until we see our lone black character T-I won't go into my issues with his name-Dog.

Issue #2: He makes a sudden movement to hide from a zombie and somehow manages to inflict a mortal wound upon himself, by seemingly severing a cordial artery. Blood gushes out of his arms and he stumbles all over the place trying to get help. Daryl sees him and T-dog passes out. To save him from the zombies closing in, Daryl covers himself and T-whatever with a dead body, to cover their lively smells. When he removes the body we see my issue. No blood. There should have been a pool of it from his arm unless, the time span was somewhat weird and he had bleed to death by this point thereby leaving none to pool. All of this is ignored and once the herd clears they bandage him up and he's fine.

Once the herd seems to clear, Carol's daughter jumps the gun and comes out of her hiding spot, attracting the two remaining zombies in the area. She runs in the woods and they chase her, Rick of course runs to help. He puts her into a hiding spot so he can deal with the zombies he says, "I can't deal with them at once... they don't get winded I do... I need to split them up..."

Issue #3: He runs off leaving Sophia hidden only to find a large rock to hit both of the zombies in the head. He didn't split them up at all. Not a huge issue I just felt like he made a huge deal about that, only to not go through with it.

Sophia for some reason gives Rick a 1 Mississippi count and runs off. Only to get lost, eaten or attacked, we don't know what happened to her yet. Rick returns to find her gone. They group searches for her for the remainder of the day and the following day. Yadda yadda yadda. Everyone else heads back after the end of day two except Rick, Shane and Rick's son Carl.

Issue #4: If we have already lost one child why not let the only other child in the group roam around the woods with two people instead of the large group that could protect him?

Proving my point, they encounter a deer which they all seem to marvel at instead of shooting a dragging back to the group for food, who knows maybe they enjoy only eating squirrels and rabbits instead of a deer they could survive off of for at least a couple of days. Anyways someone else takes advantage of this giant FOOD in front of them and shoots it, shooting Carl by accident as well, ending the episode.

Overall it was really great and fun. If you're not watching this series you should. It's great and the makeup is amazing. Don't worry if you don't have AMC if you live anywhere near civilization it will be available to you at several venues.

The Return of the Blogger

I owe all of you an apology! I have been away for way too long, due to a ton of things, mostly procrastination. With that said we have some catching up to do!

Since we last met I have watched next to a hundred movies, started following a few new (to me) podcasts, and purged my life of a lot of things that have made my life shitty.

Let us start with the new absence of shit in my life. I would like to announce that I have been off of Facebook and twitter for five and a half weeks. I know I know, I give Facebook a harder time than it deserves, as a few of you have pointed out. I think my current mental status with it out of my life, proves that fb is a lot more than I originally gave it credit for. Now that I am fbless, I find more time in the day. I find that if I see someone on the street I take more time to talk to them, because I don't already know what's going on with them as I did when I was fbactive. I am now lacking an insecurity that I find I had when I was on fb, I often wondered who was reading my status updates, who's looking at my pictures, does anyone care about me or what I'm doing? What I now find, and am ok with, is yes a few people did notice my absence and now call me to see how I'm doing. Which is WAY more pleasurable then when my status is "liked." What do you mean by that like anyway? Some people seem to like everything, one minute they "like" someones pregnancy status and then quickly move on to "liking" a video of a dog pooping on a baby.

I have now re-discovered what having a relationship with other people is. No, telling me to tell your niece (on fb) "happy birthday" is not the same a giving them a hug in real life. No, dropping a line on my wall is not the same as dropping by my house to say "hi." "Poking" me is not the same as making eye contact across a room, and inviting me to your "event" is not the same a calling and talking about it. Sending me a "message" is not as personal as a letter, and "chatting" is not as personal as sitting in a dimly lit bar chatting over beers. It is sad how much fb has replaced our real lives, and I for one will no longer be a part of it. This decision has severed bonds between me and others but, if they were worth it or interested I'm not phantom, I can be reached in other ways, one would be surprised to consider all of the ways people can be reached. Most know where I dwell, work, shop, eat, study, and learn. Believe it or not I have two phone numbers where I may be reached, and approximately 6 email accounts, just to name a few venues for this girl.

I will admit my only remaining link to the social network, G+. I don't post but Will Weaton does and he makes me smile. If you haven't checked him out, you should he is worth while. He is all over the interwebs these days so he's pretty hard to miss.



Well this rant is a lot longer than I had originally planned, so my other recent adventures will wait until a future date. Enjoy.

Good Dick (2008)

Staring John Ritter's son- Jason, and a new face Marianna Palka. It was suggested to me after rating Timer (2009)  which is what I was planning on writing this blog about today, but I seemed to like Good Dick better. Also I don't want to hear a goddamn word about this being a chick flick, it's cute and kinda creepy in a way that I like, so don't knock it.
    Side note: Quick apology for my leave of absence lately, finals, physical     exhaustion, responsibilities, and an annoyance with Blogspot.com's loss of all of my reader's stats, caused me to be unable to have anything to say. I have had time to watch more movies than ever, so I have plenty of material at this point. Yet as always keep suggesting new or old movies and I will add them to my list.

So this movie is about a girl, (Palka) who is very obviously going through some sort of crisis, and a dorky yet adorable video store clerk (Ritter).
The girl goes to the video store daily to rent porn videos. The guy looks up her address through the stores computer system and peeks into her window only to see her masturbating on her couch to one of her videos.
After a while we follow Ritter back to his car and find that he is living in it.
The next few days Ritter knocks at her door and makes up a story about an ill aunt in the same apartment building, so his often and unexpected appearances in her apartment building can be explained.
After a while he works her into letting him into her apartment. She is very standoffish and keeps a butcher's knife close to protect herself. Time in this movie seems to go by quickly very slowly...
The two grow closer, well, he grows closer to her. She is so mean to him it's hard to understand their relationship. They don't kiss, or touch and she seems to hate him and at some point we learn that he is living on her couch.
Then he convinces her to let him watch a porno with him, which is uncomfortable but it works out ok. And that's how their relationship seems to work, he brings home porn from work and cooks them dinner and they sit on the couch silently watching it. Kinda kinky I guess but it doesn't go any further than that.

One night he makes a bet with her that if his penis is bigger than the star of that evening's film then she has to let him sleep in her bed. This seems to change everything in the movie, we don't see it but the next scene is the two of them in bed, and him screaming that he will not rape her. She rants about how much she hates him and they sleep back to back.

I don't know why I choose this movie, maybe it's because I understand abusing the one's we love to test their love, and I understand the self-hate she seems to have. I hate the female character in this film but my heart bleeds for her. I hate the male character for taking this punishment yet I understand the pain he is in and the mentality it takes to be with someone that is living like that. Ugh, I don't know. It's hard to explain.
I hate movies that are supposed to be light and fun but keep me questioning myself for days after.

On a lighter note I have been watching Game of Thrones and plan on blogging on it once I understand it a little better. Spoiler Alert: This is my new favorite show, if you're not watching it you should be ashamed of yourself because it is fucking awesome- I think- as I said not sure if I completely understand it yet. Oh well, it remains to be seen.

Sorry about the shittyness of this addition, my mind is in a different location.

An Epidemic of Assholes #10

  Recently I have noticed that people are becoming increasingly narcissistic. On Thursday we went to dinner to one of our favorite Thai restaurants. The restaurant is located in a fairly trendy and touristy area so we only go on weekdays or really early on the weekends. No matter when we go parking is almost always a nightmare but, we don't mind walking as the area is pretty neat. If the parking lot and main street are congested we usually expect about an extra 10-20 minutes to find a spot on one of the side streets.
  This time it took closer to 30. First we had to tail behind two teenage girls walking down the center of the street. They looked back and saw us and did nothing to move out of the way. Finally we got very very close to hitting them and they moved just enough so we could get by. Then, we came across a double parked car with all of the doors sitting open. This area doesn't have unreasonably narrow streets so someone could normally drive around a double parker, but not like this. Like this we were stuck we couldn't back up as people were piling up behind us, and we couldn't go around without knocking off their door. So we honked, and honked, finally some man casually walks out of a building and gives us a dirty look and a middle finger.
 
I ask you, what is wrong with people today? This blogger believes everyone has lost their fucking minds. I also think this all has a lot to do with the devastation that is reality television. You aren't convinced you say? People aren't that bad, that was just a coincidence you say?

Yesterday, leaving a local farmers market parking lot. A silver Nissan almost t-boned me. Why? Besides the fact that she was coming from the wrong way on a one way street and running a stop sign, the pubescent driving the vehicle was on her phone. The she stopped in the middle of the intersection further blocking traffic to give me a face that said, "How dare you be in my way?? Don't you know I'm me? Don't you know that I am on the phone and cannot be distracted by your silly screeching tires and honking horn?GAWD!"

This all has a lot to do with reality television, I am sure of it. Let me first define reality television. Reality television is not a game show such as, Survivor, Amazing Race, The Apprentice, Dancing with the Stars, American Idol, America's got Talent, Hell's Kitchen, Flavor of Love, The Bachelor, The Bachelorette,  so on and so on. These are simply more dramatic versions of the game shows that populated early television. These are nothing but people on a television show for a known prise, they are challenged, and whoever overcomes

 

the most challenges wins the prise. Whether that prise may be a man a woman, cash, or a house. These are all nothing but game shows.

Now reality television, has no prise, the prise is being on television. There still may be challenges but no prise. Some would even include small prises for individual challenges but no overall prise to be attained. This would include, Real World, The Bad Girls Club, The Hills, Teen Mom, The Girls Next Door, Celebrity Rehab (which is interesting because there does seem to be a coveted prise; sobriety, but no one ever wins) Basketball Wives, The Real Wives, and the worst JERSEY SHORE. I have never seen Jersey Shore, but I have seen the repercussions of it. These shows glamorize bad behavior, a lack of common sense, and a overall incapacity for morality. Let me ruin a little bit of this America, surprise surprise reality TV script writing is becoming a very popular career to pursue. No, not everything is written word for word but those dramatic scenes that they highlight on commercials are very possibly a fabrication.

Unfortunately, these fabrications, in bodyand in mind. Have become our nations, role models. We watch the Bad Girls Club run all over LA getting into fights and kicked out of clubs, and develop the same since of entitlement. We do whatever we want because that's how "real" people act. We hold nothing back because that's what Snooki does. If she's fascinating then so are you. Well let me tell  you something America. You are very rapidly becoming a nation of narcissists, and people like me will not put up with it for much longer.

I don't  know how many classes I can stand to sit in as you take over with your lies and personal stories that have nothing to do with anything. I will not stand your facebook status updates that do not include a single word listed in the English dictionary. I will not stop at green lights because you are too busy texting, putting on makeup, talking on your phone, or simply not paying attention to the fact that your light is red. I will not let you get in front of me in lines at the post office, because you were too dumb to pull a number. I will not ignore your ridiculous conversations at mutual places, so full of fallacies it makes me want to vomit. No capers are not fish eggs, and no NPR does not stand for national private radio, run by communists.

I ask those of you absolved by this epidemic to stand with me. Stand for truth, personal space, and morals. Be silent no longer, stand for what is right, show these assholes that they cannot continue to ruin all that is sacred.

# 9 The Human Centipede (2009)

Let me start by saying, WHAT THE HELL IS THIS???!!! This movie was the most crazy thing I have ever seen, and I have recently Googled tentacle erotica.

Let us start from the beginning shall we?

We start by finding our villain sitting next to a highway masturbating to a picture of a dog, oh wait that's three dogs... oh shit that is three dogs taking it ass to mouth. whoa. Ok.

He then gets out of his car and follows another motorist who pulled over to take a poop on the side of the road, apparently there are no rest stops in Germany. We see him take out a dart gun and shoot the pooping driver, end scene.

We meet two of the three protagonists (two very young and attractive American tourists) in a German hostel asking directions to a night club from the concierge. After taking no notes on the directions, they head out into the night in high heels short shorts, and no spare tire. Instead of stopping when they realized they were going the wrong way they continued driving deeper down a dark road in the middle of the woods. Of course the get a flat. The only sign of help was a perverted motorist who undoubtedly would have raped them both, although considering the ultimate outcome that might have been preferable. The girls decide to walk and look for help. Instead of following the road they came from they for some unexplained reason venture into the woods. Because we all know people that would help some stranded tourists live in the middle of the woods like a hermit, instead of people who live on the main road. Duh. As soon as they enter the woods, it starts raining, of course.

After some really bad acting the girls finally manage to find a house.

 Lucky for our villain guess who's house they happen to find? Yep the only psychopath in a 20 mile radius. Of course he lets them in, and offers them a poisoned laced glass of water each.

After a dramatic effort to get one of the girls to drink it, he subdues both of them. They wake up sometime later in small hospital room in his basement on stretchers. Next to them they find the pooping motorist also drugged and gagged. The doctor decides that he doesn't like the male he picked up at first, so he kills him and brings home a feisty Japanese man instead. Now the search is complete we learn that our villain is the top surgeon in the world infamous for separating Siamese twins, well he's retired now and sick of separating and is ready to put some people together.

His monologue to explain his master plan included a slide show of exactly how the operation would go down. Also I think it is worth mentioning that the Japanese man does not speak English at all so all he understands are these photos. So I'm sure all of this is much worse for him, because he doesn't have a clue as to what is happening.  

You can figure this out from the pictures. It's gross, got it. Now, an avid movie watcher like me would expect this to go live, at the very end. Meaning that we would get one quick look at this disgusting thing in action very briefly at the end of the movie, but no that's not how it worked at all. After a quick escape attempt the doctor successfully completes the operation with an hour left in the movie. So we see everything. Oh and the one girl who tried to escape was punished by being placed in the middle position. Yuck.

The day all three wake up they are surprised to say the least that he actually did it. The doctor celebrates by joyfully dancing around them as the girls sob and the man (in the first position) screams.

This is getting more unsettling by the minute. Sorry about all of the pictures but I wouldn't believe this if I were reading this and not seeing it.

 Anyways, we follow this unfortunate trio through longer than I would have expected, it must have been at least a couple of weeks because their faces looked like they were healing. We even got to see how the second two were fed. Yup, it was the poop of the one in front of them.

This movie is really crazy and leaves you hanging at the end. I won't give it all away, you are just going to have to see it for yourself. I don't know if I would recommend this movie to anyone or not. The acting wasn't that bad and the graphics were pretty good, but the content was well... just plain gross. Ok, I've decided, you should watch it. You won't believe it if you don't.

#8 Paranormal Activity 2 (2010)

Let me start by admitting that I watched 45% of this movie with my eyes open. What of it my husband and I heard over my screams and an on going argument over whether I can survive finishing the movie with the light on or not, made the plot slightly confusing. Then there was the three pauses so I could find the dog (I don't like movies that hurt puppies). I am not usually this big of a wuss something about this movie and its predecessor kills me every time.

Excluding all of the distractions, this was an overall good movie. Staring a bunch of nobodies including the two from the original Katie Featherson, and Micah Sloat. What they don't tell you in the previews is that this is actually a prequel to the original. With much better camera work. Instead of the whole film shot Blair Witch style, after the house is ripped to pieces by their first paranormal event, which they rationalize as a break in, the family decides to install a house wide surveillance system instead of an alarm system. Which is sort of impractical and silly but it makes the quality of the movie much better.

In this movie we understand all of the missing pieces from the first movie, why the demon is after Katie's family. It turns out some distant ancestor sold their linage's first born male to the demon for wealth. Unfortunately, it took almost 50 years for a male to be born in that family. Cue in Katie's sister's son Hunter. So long story short with help from Google Hunter's step sister and father figure out what's going on and send the demon, which is now possessing Katie's sister into Katie, because she does not have a child. Sorry Micah it's not gonna work out for you.

I'm guessing they choose to ignore the alternate ending from the original because it wouldn't make this ending make any since. Instead of killing herself Katie comes back to her sister's house to finish everybody else off. Even though in the closing credits of the first movie it said she was never seen again. I guess in films nowadays we pick and choose what we feel is important when making a sequel. GOD that pisses me off. The ending was stupid anyway. They were off to a decent start I was officially completely freaked out and I am sure my husband will have a scar from how tight I was holding on to him. Then they had to bring me back to reality by fucking with logic. DAMN IT!

Anyways, it was a good enough movie, just don't watch the end of it if you have a brain or have seen the first one. I am still a little freaked out from it. Which is sad, you never saw anything really scary in the movie it is all psychological. The BOOM sound in a silent house, the thought that there is something else in the house is terrifying. So much so I have had to listen to my Charlie and The Chocolate Factory soundtrack for most of the morning to get my mind off of it! Screw you scary movie zombie movies are better anyways.

Speaking of zombies, I have decided that the first TV blogisode will be about The Walking Dead, in fact I am adding it to my queue right now. It will be a while it's at the end of a VERY long list.