Movie Opinion | Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation

Hello friends!

I saw this movie the day it came out (I’ll be honest I didn’t even know it was coming out, I’m not a big Mission Impossible fan!) with my parents and my aunt and uncle in North Carolina at a Carmike Cinema. I unfortunately don’t have a ticket stub picture to attach because I don’t think they use ticket stubs there–there wasn’t an attendant to rip ticket stubs like at my usual Regal Cinemas. But you probably don’t want to know about these details and just want to know what I thought of the movie haha.

Rogue Nation was obviously very exciting and action packed and very easy for me to follow despite never having seen a Mission Impossible movie, so props to them! I have a note in my phone that says “wow Tom Cruise looks good”, and…yeah…he did. I was surprised because I grew up thinking the Mission Impossible movies were for “old people” because it’s “what my parents watched” blahblahblahblah so I assumed that Tom Cruise was old also, and even though he kind of is, it doesn’t show. Okay never mind about my brief fangirling about Tom Cruise–moving on!

Poor Jeremy Renner! Every movie he does, he has such a lack of action, it’s as if Hollywood recognizes his talent and sees him as a great actor but they don’t have him do anything! He isn’t bad, his movies don’t do bad, in fact, they’re good! They just don’t become great if it’s in regards to him. I feel so bad, he’s in such high-class movies all the time, but he doesn’t…do anything.

There were a few unnecessary car/motorcycle chase shots where they showed the chase from a first-person perspective and although in retrospect it’s kind of cool and interesting to know what that looks like firsthand, it isn’t central to the plot or the movie and was just an embellishment. An unnecessary embellishment unfortunately.

Also why do all the nerdy and lame guys have to wear glasses in these movies or any movie whatsoever, it’s not fair man. As a proud glasses wearer, that is a lame stereotype that needs to be abolished because most people look great if not better with glasses (so long as it’s the right frame for their face y’know). That wasn’t really important regarding this movie but just a minor ranting point from my end, sorry sorry.

All in all, it was a really exciting movie and I might just take a look at the other Mission Impossible movies.

Hannah
August 17 2015

Movie Opinion | Paper Towns

[Spoilers ahead, press the back button if you don’t want to read spoilers]

HI FRIENDS!

I JUST GOT BACK FROM SEEING THIS MOVIE WITH ARTHUR AND WOW. Wait okay, can we first and foremost talk about the amazing inclusion of the Pokemon Theme Song? Arthur and I were literally so pleased by that and I’m pretty sure we were ready to sing it too. Most of the theatre was laughing too because I think we were all around the same age group so I would like to hope in my heart that everyone knew all the words. Actually, the strangest thing was that there were probably about 20 people in that big theatre. I get that it was a strange-ish time, it was the in-between time of the matinee-goers and the nighttime movie-goers but I am not a nighttime movie-goer and I don’t think Arthur is really a matinee person so we decided on 5:20. I don’t know, I’m talking about pointless things, sorry–moving on!

The movie was great to me. It tied up a lot of loose ends that the book had left me with and I found it more comforting and more admirable somehow. I felt better about Margo and about Q going home after their encounter knowing that they were both okay. Sure there were some obvious differences, like the lack of SeaWorld (but that was for obvious reasons) or leaving before prom and then having to be back from prom rather than missing graduation, but I think somehow I liked that better? But that may just be the high schooler in me thinking about how I find those things so important and so vital an experience to have. Assuming I were book-Ben (or whomever, basically anyone who went on the road trip that wasn’t Q or Margo), I would have been so upset with Q and especially Margo for skipping out on my graduation day. Like, that’s a big day! But I was so glad that movie-Q got to have his prom and his graduation and that he got to look at them with such fond memories rather than seeing them as these minor events to having to find and say goodbye to Margo Roth Spiegelman.

I enjoyed Paper Towns a lot. I think it rested better in my head too because the book had such dark themes sometimes that just scared the hell out of me but the movie was definitely more light-hearted. Should Green have included the heavier stuff? It definitely would have been a more “informing” for lack of a better word, but would that have been worth it? I don’t know, but I don’t mind too much that it wasn’t there. The movie was just fine the way it was written and shot.

I also really loved Margo’s character in the movie, she was more. She was more than the book, just how I wanted her. I wasn’t angry with her, I was just fine. Cara Delevingne was amazing by the way, she was cute. I liked how her accent shed through a few times in the beginning of the film, because in real life, you see her as well, a “paper girl”. You see her, you know her from all those modeling shoots she does, you see all the pictures–she’s perfect, she’s beautiful and daring and amazing. She can model, she can act, she can sing, she can beatbox, what can’t she do?? But I found a strange comfort in her imperfect American accent. She’s still amazing though.

Nat Wolff was great. Love him always. Had a crush on him since the Naked Brothers Band days. Can’t say anything else, just love him. Yep.

I deeply encourage everyone to watch Paper Towns! I loved it so much. It was a short movie, I’ll be honest but it didn’t feel all that short. There have been a share of movies that I’ve seen that just felt too short or didn’t have proper ending-endings or didn’t take advantage of all the time they had, but Paper Towns is not one of those movies. They used every single second to tell the story and it was wonderful. Kudos to you, John Green!

Hannah
July 24 2015

Movie Opinion | Inside Out

Hi from me!

I was looking at my bulletin board where I had pinned my ticket from Pixar’s Inside Out and thought to myself, “Why didn’t I review this?!” So this is my “review”!

I loved this movie. I really, really, loved this movie and I’m not exaggerating that or anything–I’m probably understating it! I don’t know if I could tell you about the amount of love and respect I have for this movie! I felt the stinging of my eyes twice and successfully held it in until the third time where I let the tears fall. This movie was incredibly cute, incredibly well thought out and incredibly well animated, but did you expect anything less from a Pixar film?

Apart from all the cuteness and great animation though, this movie had a story to tell. It explained all the workings behind 11-year-old Riley’s mind and the effects that little actions can have on a person. It gave an accurate representation of depression and the journey that is growing up. It made you sad about growing up but it showed you that it was completely okay to do that. It showed you that it is okay to be sad sometimes, that you don’t always have to be happy, and that sometimes letting other emotions take over is all okay and all a part of growing up.

There isn’t really much left to say about this movie other than that it was soooo amazing and everyone should definitely watch it. Also Amy Poehler and Phyllis Smith are life. I started off loving Joy (because who doesn’t love a bit of Joy in their life?!) but grew to fall in love with Sadness by the end. Woo Inside Out!

Hannah

Movie Opinion | Pitch Perfect 2 & Avengers: Age of Ultron 3D

First of all, happy Memorial Day weekend! Gladly celebrating and remembering our fallen soldiers who gave their lives to keep our country going. As you can see, I had the pleasure of seeing Pitch Perfect 2 and Avengers: Age of Ultron over the weekend. Avengers was GREAT, but no one expected any less there. Let me talk about Pitch Perfect 2 first.

Now, you all know that I am a huge choir junkie, I love choir, I love a cappella, I love singing, I love all things music and a movie about all that stuff is so up my alley! Not to mention Rutger’s all-male a cappella group, Casual Harmony came to my high school the same day and performed four amazing songs for my choir class (big shout out to Anthony for being the future version of one of my best friends and his adorable dance moves, Lee for his amazing arrangements that I could never match up to, Eric for the epic-ness that is the world of BASS NOTES, and Cyril for his trumpet playing mouth that made for great beatboxing skills) so of course I was pumped for a movie about a cappella! I was disappointed. I loved the first Pitch Perfect movie, it was great, the music was great, the story line–GREAT! Pitch Perfect 2 started out great, I was so excited for the world of a cappella–and then it ended. But did it really? The ending felt so discontinuous and just plain wrong, I actually half-yelled “THAT’S IT????” because that was apparently the end of the movie. They work really hard to get back to the top by going to this one little retreat and suddenly they win the entire competition? But they win it by just singing one song and doing the same thing they always do just minus the props and we don’t hear any of the other groups or competition? They just magically win? I DON’T THINK SO. And there wasn’t nearly enough of just the Bellas singing! Too much of a production! The hype was too much. Sorry, I’ve converted to ranting but that’s all it felt to me! It did not match up to my expectations. 😦

Age of Ultron on the other hand was amazing. Amaaaaaazing. The beginning starts thrown into mid-battle, you don’t even have a moment to recuperate and check your surroundings because it’s just shot after shot after shot. Movie visuals have improved so much over the years and are continuing to better themselves in so many ways! The effects in this movie makes everything look so fluid and real, I bet you the 3D would have been 1000x better if I wasn’t a glasses-wearer and could wear the 3D glasses comfortably. That’s probably my only complaint about this movie, it isn’t even about the movie, it’s just the design of 3D glasses. They need something more inventive for the semi-blind people like me. My one sadness about this film is Quicksilver’s death but you can’t just go through war without any casualties. I wish I could be a better reviewer of this movie but that’s why I call it movie opinion because I can’t make advanced enough reviews 🙂

Thanks for those who are keeping up with my lack of posts!

Hannah