Day 90: Nanny McPhee

A widower is forced to marry again and his children are not at all pleased about it. Nanny McPhee (Emma Thompson) teaches the children valuable lessons and gets them to stop behaving like little demons.

Nanny McPhee seems like the saddest character. She’s hated initially by the children she looks after and when they eventually realise that she’s wonderful, then she has to leave them. So she moves from place to place and never gets to stay with the people who like her. And she is actually excellent and helps everyone realise what is important. I cry every single time she says this line at the end of the film:  “When you need me but do not want me, then I must stay. When you want me but no longer need me, then I have to go.”

Right, so, I love this film. Let’s be honest here.

8/10

Day 89: Cockneys vs Zombies

Two brothers, their cousin, their daft mate and the local psycho team up to rob a bank to save the old folks' home. The police are after them until they realise they’ve got a bit of a bigger problem. Zombies. The robbers and their adorable hostage head to the old folks home to save them but the pensioners are pretty badass by themselves.

We see the start of the zombie outbreak: builders stumble across a tomb and they decide to indulge in a little light grave robbing. Sadly for them and the rest of the East End, this tomb isn’t filled with any normal skeletons. Some of them get up and they bite the builders. One of them gets their lips bitten off! It was quite dramatic. Don’t rob graves, kids. That is definitely the lesson I took from this film.

The gang head off to rob the bank but they’re all pretty much hopeless. Well, except Katy (Michelle Ryan). She can seemingly do anything and is pretty badass while she does it. The robbery itself is easy but there are a load of police officers outside waiting to grab them. They grab two hostages and try and escape, only to discover everything has gone mental outside. Zombies everwhere! If you’re going to rob a bank, wait until there’s a zombie outbreak. That’s another lesson I took from the film. I’ve learned so much.

I am so influenced by other people swearing; there’s so much swearing in this film and all my notes contain swearing. The film wasn’t amazing but if you want an easy film with zombies and badass old folk, this is pretty much the one for you. I probably wouldn’t watch it again but I wasn’t disappointed, it was exactly what I thought it would be.

Terry:  If we’re longer than 10 minutes -

Katy:  - Then fucking wait longer.

6/10 

Day 88: The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

Seven pensioners head to Jaipur, India in the hopes of spending their retirement in a beautiful hotel. When they get there, however, it’s less spectacular than the ad led them to believe but even though it’s not what they expected, it turns out that it was exactly what they needed.

It’s important when you have quite a large cast that you’re given the chance to learn and care about each one, with the focus not just being put on a few of them. Their stories were all interesting and it was good to see how they came to enjoy their time in Jaipur. Well, not all of them did; Jean (Penelope Wilton) couldn’t get into the swing of things but everyone else managed. Even racist Muriel (Maggie Smith).

It must be so difficult to be with someone for 40 years and realise that you are not right for each other. You might’ve been at one point but now you’re in different places and the relationship just doesn’t work anymore. It was quite brave of them to decide to go their separate ways, I thought. It’s so easy to get stuck even when you know it’s not the right thing. Through the whole film you get the sense that you should go for the things that you want and not just let them pass you by. I definitely agree but I think it takes a strong person to really go for it.

For some reason it took me a little while to get into this film but once I did, it was really great. Celia Imrie is perhaps one of my favourite actresses, she always has me laughing. In fact, the lot of them were great in their own ways. It seemed quite realistic, like it wasn’t even really a film but more like how they would have actually been. I think I’d quite like to visit India, despite my fear of large crowds. It definitely doesn’t seem like it’d be boring, anyway.

8/10

Day 87: Rent

A musical story about a group of friends who are fighting against poverty, AIDS, and heartbreak, and trying to survive life in New York City.

The stories are so heartbreaking and I love them so much. But I can’t really talk about it.

10/10

Day 86: We Bought A Zoo

Trying to move on with his life when everything around him reminds him of his dead wife is too difficult, so Benjamin (Matt Damon) buys a broken down zoo in the country and moves his family out to fix it up.

It must just be so hard when the person you love and built a life with dies. And for Benjamin, it wasn’t just his grief he had to cope with, he also had two young children to care for. His son Dylan (Colin Ford) is having a hard time dealing with the loss of his mother and he is acting out at school, eventually getting expelled. Benjamin decides that they need a new start and the zoo, with the huge house next door, is the perfect place to do just that. The zoo is pretty run down though and there’s a lot of work and money that has to go into rebuilding the place but he is confident that it is the right thing and he completely goes for it. I love that he threw himself into it even though he didn’t know the first thing about running a zoo, I think that's the mark of a strong character.

I wasn’t expecting to like this film but it was actually really good. Sappy as anything but I found that kinda nice. And Scarlett Johansson is amazing, so.

“You know, sometimes all you need is 20 seconds of insane courage. Just literally 20 seconds of just embarrassing bravery. And I promise you, something great will come of it.”

7/10

Day 85: The Decoy Bride

Super famous actress Lara (Alice Eve) just wants to marry James (David Tenant) in a quiet, private ceremony but the press aren’t having it and they manage to find her wherever she goes. They head off to a tiny Scottish island in the hope that they won’t be found. Katie (Kelly Macdonald) has come back to the island after leaving her cheating fiancée and she is swearing off men. She gets roped into pretending to be Lara to outfox the press and, well, I’m sure you can see what is going to happen, yes?

I’ve always loved Kelly Macdonald and she doesn’t disappoint here. She’s argumentative and loud when she wants to be, and she’s also awkward and adorable when she wants to be. Katie takes a liking to James but playing the decoy bride causes a problem for her and the pair bicker until he saves her life when she almost drowns. He thinks he’s supposed to marry Lara because all the men love her, she’s nice, talented, and she loves him, so if you’re gonna marry someone, it should be her. But then he realises (shock of shocks) that maybe she isn’t right for him and instead maybe the person who is right for him is the adorable Scottish lass. Good choice, Sir.

This film is actually kind of good, I wasn’t expecting to like it but it’s funny. And sweet. My god, when that old deaf couple were dancing in the cottage I started crying. It was just so wonderful, the way they loved each other and were dancing to music that only they could hear.

“A life spent making mistakes is so much better than a life spent doing nothing.”

7/10

More Than Two And Less Than Four

The People Of Paper by Salvador Plascencia

The citizens of El Monte declare war on the author, who they call Saturn, so that they can live free of his continual, invasive presence. While writing about the characters, the author's girlfriend leaves him because he is absorbed in the book. She says that she doesn't want to be associated with it and he must not write about her within it. His sadness at her leaving permeates every page and a few of the female characters leave their partners, for different reasons but the leaving is the significant point. The book follows many characters and has them all linked incredibly well. The woman made of paper might be my favourite of the characters. Every act of physical intimacy between her and the men she cares for always leaves them scarred (they end up with deep paper cuts) and so she moves from man to man, never content because she knows it can't last.

I absolutely love it when the characters in a book are aware of the author and it was so well done here. It wasn't even just that they were aware of him and all we got was there side of it, we also read about his girlfriend leaving him and his bottomless sadness and how he fights back against the characters. Beautifully written.

10/10

~

The Cat's Table by Michael Ondaatje

The bulk of the book takes place on a boat over a period of 21 days. Three young boys explore the ship and discover the peculiarities of their shipmates. It was easy to read and at parts was quite interesting but overall, I wasn't that taken with it. It didn't really grab me or make me think in any different sort of way.

6/10

~

The God Of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

We experience moments in the lives of various members of a family in India. And we see how a tragedy can pull apart something fragile. The words and all their combinations were excellent. The descriptions are so well written that it's impossible not to form elaborate images in your mind. Actually a delight to read.

9/10