I had a good filmwatching week this week. I hadn't been to the cinema in a while partly out of laziness, partly because of the lack of appealing film choices. I made up for it this week though by going to see four films; The Collector, Heartbreaker, Whatever Works and Predators. Perhaps I should explain how someone who works part-time can afford to see four films in one week. I have what's called an Unlimited card from my local cinema Cineworld. This means that you pay €19.99 by direct debit per month and you can see as many films as you want. The only drawbacks are that you still have to pay an extra €1.50 for 3D films and you can't book ahead by credit card, unless you want to pay. But having said that I think it's a great deal for someone like me who would watch almost anything. It's €10.50 for an adult ticket during peak times which is after 5pm and all weekend. So if you went even twice a month you'd be saving money.
The four films I saw this week were all very very different. The Collector was a horror/thriller with a questionable plot and excessive gratuitous violence. For the mostpart I watched it through my fingers, not because of the violence which unfortunately doesn't really phase me anymore, but for the suspense which really gets me. It wasn't great and I don't think I'd be bothered seeing it again. On that note, I saw a great horror/thriller recently called The House of the Devil which was made last year but never got a theatrical release over here. It's an eighties style thriller (without being cheesy) about a college girl who answers an ad for a babysitter and that's all I'll say apart from it's the first film I've seen in a long time that scared me that much and yet was very original for it's genre. It's amazing what suspense and the use of music can do in a film.
The House of the Devil
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Greta Gerwig is in it too! Check out her awesome 80s hair and ringer tee!
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The second film I saw this week was Heartbreaker, a french romantic comedy starring Romain Duris and Vanessa Paradis (aka Miss Johnny Depp and the face of Chanel). I really liked this predictable as it was. I am a bit of a sucker for romantic comedies, well good ones anyway. Maybe it was that it was French or maybe it was just that bit better than today's Hollywood rom-coms. I went to see this mostly out of curiousity of what Vanessa Paradis was like as an actress and I actually really liked her. It probably helped that she wore beautiful clothes and the most amazing shade of red lipstick. She reminded me of an older, less cute version of Leighton Meester. She's very interesting to look at (in a good way) and very beautiful. Anyway if you are generally a fan of romantic films I recommend this, if for nothing else then for the beautiful actors, clothes and scenery (it was filmed in Monaco).
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I went to see Whatever Works with someone who is a big fan of Woody Allen and someone who is not while I am in between having not seen any of his earlier films and liking half of his more modern films and greatly disliking the other half. As expected the Woody Allen fan liked this, while the other person did not. I liked it too, but I only just liked it. I was entertained and I liked Larry David even though I don't watch Curb Your Enthusiasm. However I'm not a fan of Evan Rachel Wood and found her character very irritating as I usually do with the characters she plays. Ed Begley Jr and Patricia Clarkson were in it too. I really love them and thankfully they didn't disappoint. I don't really know what else to say apart from if you dislike Woody Allen and Curb Your Enthusiasm then it's safe to say you're not going to like this.
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Finally I went to see the previews of Predators on Thursday. I wouldn't ordinarily have been so quick to see this, but my 13 year old brother is currently obsessed with Predator, Alien, Terminator etc. so he made my mam bring him in to see it as soon as it opened and so my boyfriend and I tagged along. I was curious to see Adrien Brody as an action star, I'd love to see when they pitched the idea of having him follow Arnold Schwarzenegger in the lead role. He did a great job though! He really buffed up and made the role his own. Topher Grace was great too as the comic relief. My mam loves all those kinds of films and she is a big fan of Predator but she spent the entire film screaming and hiding behind my jacket, it was rather hilarious. I think the other audience members must have thought I was a weirdo because I kept laughing, but I was just laughing at her!
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Finally I went to see the previews of Predators on Thursday. I wouldn't ordinarily have been so quick to see this, but my 13 year old brother is currently obsessed with Predator, Alien, Terminator etc. so he made my mam bring him in to see it as soon as it opened and so my boyfriend and I tagged along. I was curious to see Adrien Brody as an action star, I'd love to see when they pitched the idea of having him follow Arnold Schwarzenegger in the lead role. He did a great job though! He really buffed up and made the role his own. Topher Grace was great too as the comic relief. My mam loves all those kinds of films and she is a big fan of Predator but she spent the entire film screaming and hiding behind my jacket, it was rather hilarious. I think the other audience members must have thought I was a weirdo because I kept laughing, but I was just laughing at her!
Wow! I actually wasn't planning on writing so much! That's a post in itself right there. I'm going to go on however and tell you about my weekend. On Saturday I woke up to a breakfast of pancakes and maple syrup courtesy of my wonderful boyfriend. That evening we met some friends in a wine bar in the city. It's only been open for about a year or so but we really love it because there's a huge basement room with exposed brick and old tables, chairs and couches and a piano. They do great coffee and brownies too! The basement room is great because you can still hear the people in the restaurant and the music upstairs but it's quite private so you can have the place to yourself sometimes. We got a table and ordered some bottles of red and white wine to share. My personal preference is for white. Their house white is very nice and quite reasonably priced too. Afterwards we went to Thomas Reads, a pub on Dame Street and met my sister and we danced to the Smiths. Then we got some yummy pizza before heading home pretty late!
The guys playing piano once the other people had left
I wanted to show you my fake eyelashes and red lipstick from last night.
I can't believe how well the lipstick stayed on after drinking from a wine glass all night.
Just in case you were wondering it's Benefit Flirt Alert, my new favourite red lipstick
My wonderful sister Kate, hasn't she the most beautiful blue eyes!
My make up turned out unintentionally slightly eighties today
but I kind of liked it because I don't usually wear such strong eye shadow
I found an old dress from work and thought I'd wear it again with my new jacket and boots
as it was a bit chilly today after raining all weekend
Photos by Donnacha and I
I wanted to share with you some music that I am loving a lot right now. I had heard of Warpaint a few years ago because the lead singer Emily was dating John Frusciante (my all time favourite musician) but at that stage they hadn't released any material so I kind of forgot about them until recently when I heard they would be playing in Dublin so I decided to see if they had released an album. I downloaded their EP Exquisite Corpse that they released last year and I totally love it. I don't even know how to describe their music because it's quite unique so I'll post my favourite song from the EP below.
The line up of the band has changed a bit over the 6 years since they formed, Shannyn Sossamon (from The Rules of Attraction) used to be in the band, her sister Jenny still is. Josh Klinghoffer, the new guitarist with the Red Hot Chili Peppers and collaborator of John Frusciante was their drummer for a while. The line up now consists of Emily Kokal, Theresa Wayman, Jenny Lee Lindberg and Stella Mozgawa.
Here's their video for the song Elephants. It's a very simple idea but beautifully shot and the girls look amazing! Hopefully I'll get to see them live in October. Their first LP comes out later this year.
Ok so that was a bit of a monster of a post but I suppose it's better to have too much to write about than too little. I just want to leave you with a really funny screencap from the Hitchcock film Saboteur that I watched on Friday evening. It's a funny part of the film where the main character is asked to keep an eye on a baby so that she doesn't fall into the pool and he makes a funny face at her. I don't know why but I found it so funny so here it is (the film was great by the way). Hope you've had a lovely weekend!
Robert Cummings as Barry Kane in Saboteur
The guys playing piano once the other people had left
I wanted to show you my fake eyelashes and red lipstick from last night.
I can't believe how well the lipstick stayed on after drinking from a wine glass all night.
Just in case you were wondering it's Benefit Flirt Alert, my new favourite red lipstick
My wonderful sister Kate, hasn't she the most beautiful blue eyes!
My make up turned out unintentionally slightly eighties today
but I kind of liked it because I don't usually wear such strong eye shadow
I found an old dress from work and thought I'd wear it again with my new jacket and boots
as it was a bit chilly today after raining all weekend
Photos by Donnacha and I
I wanted to share with you some music that I am loving a lot right now. I had heard of Warpaint a few years ago because the lead singer Emily was dating John Frusciante (my all time favourite musician) but at that stage they hadn't released any material so I kind of forgot about them until recently when I heard they would be playing in Dublin so I decided to see if they had released an album. I downloaded their EP Exquisite Corpse that they released last year and I totally love it. I don't even know how to describe their music because it's quite unique so I'll post my favourite song from the EP below.
The line up of the band has changed a bit over the 6 years since they formed, Shannyn Sossamon (from The Rules of Attraction) used to be in the band, her sister Jenny still is. Josh Klinghoffer, the new guitarist with the Red Hot Chili Peppers and collaborator of John Frusciante was their drummer for a while. The line up now consists of Emily Kokal, Theresa Wayman, Jenny Lee Lindberg and Stella Mozgawa.
Here's their video for the song Elephants. It's a very simple idea but beautifully shot and the girls look amazing! Hopefully I'll get to see them live in October. Their first LP comes out later this year.
Ok so that was a bit of a monster of a post but I suppose it's better to have too much to write about than too little. I just want to leave you with a really funny screencap from the Hitchcock film Saboteur that I watched on Friday evening. It's a funny part of the film where the main character is asked to keep an eye on a baby so that she doesn't fall into the pool and he makes a funny face at her. I don't know why but I found it so funny so here it is (the film was great by the way). Hope you've had a lovely weekend!
Robert Cummings as Barry Kane in Saboteur
Goodnight,
Em xxx
Em xxx
Thanks for sharing the movies. I love learning of new ones! I wish I had a cinema card like that!
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