The Impossible

Today I am going to write about a fantastic movie I saw over the weekend.  It is a must see film and I promise you won’t be disappointed.  The film is called “The Impossible”, which stars Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor.  The story follows an English family while they are on their winter vacation in Thailand.  Maria (Watts), Henry (McGregor) and their three sons are enjoying their time playing and relaxing by the pool when they hear an awful roaring sound coming from around them.  The sound they heard was the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami of Boxing Day 2004.  Maria and her family were swept away by a 30ft wall of water that destroyed everything in its path.  She was being thrown around underwater for about three minutes before she resurfaced and grabbed hold of a tree.  She finds her oldest son about 15 meters away and bravely swims over to get him, but the rest of her family is nowhere to be found.

It is an inspiring and heartfelt story about hope, faith, love, family, and the human spirit.  It truly is a moving film, and I challenge you not to shed a couple tears.  What’s even more inspiring is that this film was based off the survival of a real family who suffered from this tragedy.  The tsunami of 2004 was a devastating catastrophe that killed 230,000 people across Thailand, Sri Lanka, Indonesia and 11 other countries.  Eight years have passed since this natural disaster occurred but this film serves as a reminder to those who lost their lives so suddenly.

Take a look at the trailer below.

photo source: philonfilm.net

The Impossible Trailer

Gangster Squad

So last night I went to see “Gangster Squad” with my friends, and aside from being completely smitten with Ryan Gosling, we actually loved the film!  For those who haven’t seen the trailers, “Gangster Squad”, is set just after World War II in 1949, Los Angeles.  The city is being run by Brooklyn-born mob boss, Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn).  A merciless gangster who traffics guns, drugs, and prostitutes, and even has the protection of the police and politicians who are under his control.  He’s basically untouchable—but that isn’t enough to stop Sgt. John O'Mara (Josh Brolin) and Jerry Wooters (Ryan Gosling) from putting together an secret crew of LAPD outsiders to bring Cohen’s empire to the ground.  Emma Stone also stars as Cohen's etiquette coach and girlfriend—Grace Faraday.  She meets Jerry Wooters, and they begin a secret relationship. 

I love films that take place in a different time period.  Director, Ruben Fleischer does a great job of capturing the glitz and glam of 1940’s LA, and the cast is brilliant to say the least.  “Gangster Squad” got some negative reviews from the critics saying that the film, “suffers from lackluster writing, underdeveloped characters and an excessive amount of violence” (Rotten Tomatoes).  I think that the critics are full of baloney, and they take their jobs too seriously; but you should all go see it and decide for yourselves!

You can watch the trailer below and I also posted a clip of Emma Stone talking about the film on The Ellen Show.  You will probably notice that I will post a lot of clips from The Ellen Show because I love Miss DeGeneres.

Gangster Squad Trailer

photo source: plug-in.bestbuy.ca

Emma Stone on Ellen

Django Unchained

Welcome to my first ever blog post! I've never done this before, so bear with me.  I'm very passionate about film and I have a fair bit amount of acting training from Sears Acting Studio.  I'm a Business Marketing student and I hope to work in film marketing one day, and perhaps to continue with my film training as well.  I will be writing some short reviews on recent motion pictures that I have seen, and I’m going to start off with a film I am really avid about.  The other day I went to see Django Unchained, and let me say that it was FANTASTIC.  I love pretty much anything from Quentin Tarantino, but this flick is now my all time favourite.

The film is set in the South of the United States, a few years before the start of the Civil War.  Jamie Foxx (amazing) stars as Django, who is freed from slavery by German bounty hunter, Dr. King Schultz, who is played by Christoph Waltz (also amazing).  He is freed under the terms that he will help Schultz capture the murderous Brittle brothers, because only Django knows what they look like.  The two men continue to work together, long after they capture the Brittle brothers.  They then set their sights on rescuing Django’s wife, Broomhilda who was lost in the slave trade years ago.  They discover that she is slave to the wicked Calvin Candie, who is played by Leonardo DiCaprio (again, amazing).  He is the infamous plantation owner of “Candyland”, where he grooms his slaves to fight against each other for sport.  Django and Schultz enter the plantation, pretending to be interested in this “fight club”, but they need to get out of there fast because ‘someone’ is suspicious of their real intentions.

In an interview that Jamie Foxx has with Ellen DeGeneres, he explains how difficult it was for him to play a black slave who had no rights or freedom.  He also tells her that DiCaprio really had to lose himself in his character in order to really capture his essence.  I will post both the trailer and the interview in this blog.

LOVED this movie.  Everyone should go see it.  So go... now.

5/5 stars people!

Django Unchained Trailer

Jamie Foxx on Ellen