The circle- the saviour of reality television

The circle- the saviour of reality television

British reality TV is what some might call a dying genre. From the death of big brother to the recent season of love island reality television which at some point absorbed thousands of people every day now is seen as boring and more and more shows which was once adored is dying minute by minute. And the cancelation of the long-lasting beloved show big brother certified this theory and myself a lover of reality television had started to given up hope. Until the circle came along. My first thoughts while watching the trailer which was being advertised everywhere on my twitter feed was “what?” as the concept seemed quite bizarre and would more than likely be another survival of the fittest esc flop. Yet when the first episode came along and I forced myself to watch it as I couldn’t be bothered to turn off the telly after the bake-off I was astounded by the entire premise which once seemed silly now seemed incredible. And by the end of the episode I was addicted. This became a running theme for the rest of the week telling myself that I didn’t actually care about this show and I wasn’t secretly rooting for the ultimate catfish Kate/Alex (no seriously I shouldn’t be rooting for him to the extent I am) and I was only downloading the app for ironic purposes. Yet I found myself running to the sofa every night holding my breath until the very last seconds and then whipping out my phone to complain about Freddie for the 100^th time that day.

 I have heard people call this a mixture of black mirror and big brother and in all honesty I could not think of a better way to describe it. It has captivated me and viewers just like reality shows did for so many years and somehow this show seems to have the spark and the creativity all these shows had. It’s not perfect there are 100% casting issues and production problems with the editing and how much they are showing us yet this is a start and it is making me incredibly excited just thinking about the entertainment which is hopefully to come. But if Kate doesn’t win I take all of this back. I’m kidding I think?

the monster calls review

The monster calls

I didn’t expect much of this movie at all. I thought it would be a bit of fun a bit of trash so I can relax and not desperately cringe like I did the day before when I saw Rouge one. I wasn’t too stressed about it. I hadn’t heard anyone talk about it really. I didn’t even know it was coming out at all until I saw the trailer in the cinema. The trailer is terrible really and it doesn’t give an actual perspective of what the film is. The trailer was probably thrown together the day before by a film student. The film hadn’t done well at all in the box office which isn’t a surprise as I said the trailer was pretty shit. But don’t let the trailer destroy your perspective of the film. The monster calls is a beautiful piece about a child finding himself and accepting the world around him. It’s surprisingly well done and very heart-warming. Unlike of what it sounds this film is probably not for children. The target audience they were heading the film for is confusing as I wouldn’t say it was for teenagers as there isn’t enough action yet adults may not be appealed to it either. This could be another reason why the sales were low. Yet that is one of the very few flaws of the film. The movie tackles with incredibly adult topics in a good way which is surprising. The protagonist is a kid called Connor. Connor can be selfish and frustrating yet he is lovable. He is realistic as you can be in a fucking monster film. The acting for Connor was really poor at the start yet it got better throughout the film. In fact near the end Connors acting was good even great if you pushed it. The plot line is pretty simple yet strong. Connor is bullied his mum is dying and he is forced to live with his grandma as his mother can’t live with him anymore and his dad left him a while back. He is filled with sorrow and grief then the tree from across from him comes to tell him three stories which changes his perspective forever. The fourth story must be his nightmare. The story is surprisingly emotional in parts as this film tackles suicide cancer bullying isolation etc. and it is really wonderful. If you don’t want to see an obnoxious Oscar film then this is great. This film isn’t going to win an Oscar yet it is well in deserving of one. My favourite part of the whole film was the animation. When the tree tells the first two stories they animate it and the animation is fantastic. The script is okay but the character and the depth makes up for the script. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

star wars rogue one review

Rogue one review

If you know me in real life you will know that I love star wars. It’s a good movie series and I have nothing against Disney or anything as I think they did a very good job with Force Awakens. But they did not do a good job with rogue one.

Now before all the angry fanboys attack let me explain. Now this film got a lot of hype from the people in my media class. They were bigging it up for me when I said I was watching it the next day. They spoiled it a little which could be a reason why I didn’t enjoy it I’m not sure but from what they were saying it sounded pretty amazing. One kid told me it was the best star wars movie so far. So when I went into the cinema I was almost sure I would love it. I so wanted to love it. I just couldn’t.

Rogue one is a story about a girl trying to find her dad after she was captured. That’s the whole plot line. It’s not just that the plot line wasn’t very interesting it was faulted and it wasn’t strong enough for it to get through the whole film. The same plot line had been done many times before with a lower budget. So you would think they might’ve done something more interesting. To hide their faulted plotline they replaced it with a load of explosions with little to no context. There was no reason for most of the explosions or fight scenes as nothing in this film seemed to be explained at all. It was all very rushed which eventually made the film messy.

Even when the plot is so horribly simple it’s very difficult to tell what actually went on with the movie. In fact you probably have to rewatch it a few times to understand the film as a whole. I asked my family what they thought the film was about as they all enjoyed it yet they couldn’t as the film was so messy.

Another thing which I disliked was the script. The script wasn’t bad in a sense but it was very amateur like the acting so it didn’t stand out for me at all. Some lines were good but none went better than good. Some people went on about how funny the film was but it really wasn’t. There were some supposedly “funny” lines yet nobody laughed.

I did like some elements of the film; I liked the cinematography and I really liked the first scene even though the little girls acting was poor yet that was it. If those are the only things I enjoyed in a film then it must be pretty bad. Some people who disliked the film said it was boring and I would never say it was boring as I was entertained for the whole time yet it was still a bad movie. I think the thing which annoyed me the most was how much potential the film had. The film had good actors as a whole a good director good screen writers good effects good editors yet it didn’t work. It could have been a great movie yet it wasn’t. I really hope this year’s star wars film will be better. I think I give Rogue one a 3/10 as it’s not the worst film I’ve ever seen yet it’s certainly not the best.