Epic Fail = Me

Hi friend.
So. My movie watching has been horrendous.
I apologize.
This past week I only managed to watch The Family Stone and Fred Claus.
Oh, and 20 minutes of The Holiday, but that doesn't count.
SO.
I promise that next week I will watch a bundle of Christmas movies so that I can actually meet my goal.
:P
Okay, so The Family Stone:
One of my favourite movies of ALL time. I totally enjoy this movie each time I watch it. I LOVE that the entire movie is pretty much shot in one single location. I also LOVE the cast. I just LOVE this movie.
Enough said.

Fred Claus:
This movie gets me every time. You think you're watching a funny Christmas movie, but no. It's a tear jerker in disguise! Either way though, I really enjoy this movie. The set designers did an amazing job with Santa's village. I think that is my favourite part! :)

Okay ya'll.
I shall be better this upcoming week.
Much love.

Hi friend.

This weekend I started my Christmas Movie watching with 'Home Alone'. This was the only movie I ended up watching from my list this weekend. Silly me, I know. Ah well.
So, what did I think of Home Alone?
Well since I have watched this movie since I was a tot I would have to say that I reacted to it the same way I always do by crying my eyes out.
Despite the fact that the majority of the movie is quite funny, I always find myself crying at the end. A good cry though. You know, when Kevin's mom comes home to find the tree decorated and the stockings hung, and then they rush to each other and there is this adorable reunion?
What can I say? I'm a sucker for happy endings.
Well guys, I promise to do better with my movie watching this week considering I have 24 more films to watch.
Woah baby.

Christmas Movies!

Hi friend!
The time for Christmas movies has arrived! :)
I have compiled a list of my 25 favourite Christmas movies.
From November 27th to December 24th I will watch them all. :)
I will be tweeting and blogging along the way.

So. You ready?
Here's the list!

1. Love Actually
2. The Grinch
3. White Christmas
4. It’s a Wonderful Life
5. All I Want for Christmas
6. Rudolph
7. A Christmas Story
8. The Nightmare Before Christmas
   
9. The Santa Clause 1
10. The Santa Claus 2
11. The Santa Claus 3
12. Miracle on 34th Street
13. Polar Express
14. Scrooged
15. 4 Christmases
16. I’ll Be Home for Christmas
17. Jingle all the Way
18. Elf
19. Fred Claus
20. Santa Baby
21. How The Grinch Stole Christmas
22. Frosty the Snowman
23. Home Alone
24. Family Stone
25. The Holiday

It all starts tomorrow!

New Moon Rocked My Life (spoiler alert!)

Hi friend!!!!!

Last night I ventured out with friends to see New Moon at 10pm!
We spent 3 hours out in the cold and rain waiting in line, but it was SO worth it! :)
New Moon was absolutely and completely incredible.
While the book was not my favourite in the series, I was captivated by the movie.
Chris Weitz did an incredible job with the film! He incorporated the most relevant parts of the book and the effects were fantastic! :)

I'm going to break this blog down into the few things I was unsure of, and the 10 things I LOVED about the movie!

Things I was unsure of:

3. The birthday kiss. The moaning was a bit too much.

2. The break up. It wasn't as intense as I would have liked.

1. Alice's vision. Alice's vision of Bella as a vampire frolicking with Edward was well, odd. It didn't look right. The clothes and all.

Okay. Now that that is out.

10 Things I loved:

10. The script! Melissa Rosenberg did a great job creating a script that was similar to the book, but she also made it humorous! Because New Moon was such a sad book, I think it's great that Melissa added a little humour.

9. The birthday scene. This scene was done so well! As soon as I saw Jasper's eyes my friend and I started to freak out. The scene was just as intense as I found it to be in the book and I enjoyed it thoroughly!

8. The passing of time. When Bella is in her room, Chris Weitz showed the passage of time from October to January outside of her window. This part was really creative and heart wrenching. I loved it.

7. Bella's visions of Edward. I won't lie, it was a little difficult to watch the movie when Edward was MIA 90% of the time. One thing that helped this was Bella's visions of Edward. They didn't occur too often to the point of annoyancy, but just enough so that you got your Edward fix. :)


6. Bella and Jacob's friendship. I thought that the relationship between Bella and Jacob was portrayed incredibly. Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner seem really comfortable together. It was easy to believe that they cared about each other and that they enjoyed the company of one another.


5. The Wolfpack. Great job with the wolfpack. The guys all looked like I thought they would, and acted as I thought they would as well. I was really pleased with the way the pack turned out. :)

4. Third wheel. I LOVED the movie scene with Bella, Jacob and Mike. It was excactly how I pictured it and it was pretty freakin' funny too.

3. Alice is back! I know this is #3 on the list, but only because I am trying to go in order of how they appear. But although this is #3 on the list, it's #1 in my heart. I thought that Alice's return was not only emotional, but utterly hilarious! The way she acted with Jacob was too funny! Also, the part with the phone call was AMAZING.


2. The Volturi Scene. I mostly enjoyed this scene because of Michael Sheen. He creeped me out entirely. I loved the way he spoke, and the laugh that he had. He really pulled the scene together.


and last, but certainly not least:


1. The Ending. WOW. From the voting scene, to Edward and Jacob talking, to the QUESTION. It was all amazing.


All in all guys, New Moon exceeded my expectations. I expected amazing, and I got phenomenal.
I'm headed back to see it again on Sunday. :)
<3

oh and p.s. I had to keep reminding myself through the entire movie that Taylor Lautner is 17, cause he looked about 22. I swear he only wore a shirt 3 times in the whole damn movie.

Hi friend.

I'm horribly excited and I thought you should know.
I'm making something to bring to New Moon with me.
I'll upload a pic before Thursday. :)

Dear Subconscious...

Inked Magazine May 2009

Credit to whoever took the photo



Hi friend.

Wow. It has been way too long since my last post. I am an epic blogging fail, and I apologize.
Well, now that I am back, I thought that I would share that last night I had a dream about Jackson Rathbone. :)
It is a rare occasion when I dream about celebrities, but it has been known to happen.
I believe the last celebrity that I had a dream about was Mr. Robert Pattinson himself.
I know what you're thinking, but no, it wasn't like that at all.
In my dream we were BFF and he came to see me perform in a play.
Yes, a play.
There are three things wrong with this scenario:
1. I can't act.
2. Why would Robert Pattinson care if I did?
and 3. Friends? Seriously? It's MY dream.
Okay, enough with that. As I have explained, dreaming about celebrities is a rarity for me.
(This could be because when I do dream about them my subconscious comes up with something super lame.)
ANYWAYS.
Last night, Jackson Rathbone made an appearance.
I was at this party just kickin' it and I look around at everyone sitting at this huge dining table, and there he was.
Smiling.
Laughing.
And more smiling.
That's it.
That's all he did.

It was WONDERFUL.

Jackson Rathbone has this light about him.
It shines all the time and seems to touch everyone around him.
It is so bright that my subconscious thought it was the perfect additive to a pretty much boring dream.
So, I suppose what I am trying to say is:
Thank you Jackson Rathbone for being so darling.
AND.
Thank you subconscious for making up for the lack of a proper Robert Pattinson dream.
You're forgiven.
<3

The Chicago Effect

Hi Friend.

I would like to start off by saying that I am terribly horrible at this whole blogging thing.
You all must have missed me. My last post was over two weeks ago! While I would like to say that I have been too terribly busy to bother, it would be a lie. Currently I am an unemployed (soon to be student again), gal who has way too much time on her hands. Ah well, I'm here now.
:)
Okay, so even though I haven't been totally busy, I am happy to say that I just got back Monday night from a 4 day trip to Chicago! As you are well aware, the URL for this blog is "The Chicago Effect". What this describes is a certain feeling that comes over me whenever I think about, dream about, or travel to the Windy City.
Chicago is no doubt my favourite city in the world. Well, in North America, (my lack of funds has not allowed for overseas travel; boo to that). Anyways, back to Chi town. The beautiful city of Chicago has so many great traits in my opinion. Amazing restaurants, parks, museums. You name it. What I like the best however is that Chicago is a city that feels balanced.
The combination of old and new architecture, of parks and busy streets, of beauty and rawness is incredible. Chicago boasts the most beautiful views and I think that is because of that balance within the city.
Anyways, all I can say is that again I enjoyed my time in Chicago. That place just has a way of drawing me in and making me feel at...home. The Chicago Effect is just that. The feeling of home. The feeling of being in a place where you should be living, but for whatever reason are unable. I'm sure that if I were to move there I would find some reason to dislike the city even just a little, but until then I will continue to adore the Windy City.

<3

ATMpire.

Hi friend.

How appropriate. My first blog post just happens to be about Twilight.

I know what you're thinking. Twi-hard...or Twi-tard (whichever works for you), but no, it's really not like that. Sure, I have read the Twilight saga, I am Team Edward, and yes I went and saw Twilight 8 times in theaters, but I'm not Twi-obsessed.

I'm just a fan.

A fan who is concerned about the commercialization of a wonderful book series.

I understand why it has happened though.

It started with a book...

Twilight.

And in this book there was a girl...

Bella.

And a handsome, troubled vampire.

Edward.

And now there are dolls...

Wait. What? Hold the phone. Dolls?

Yes. Twilight dolls.

Why?

Good question.

Well. You see, when a book like Twilight gains popularity there are people who are ready to take advantage of this.

I call these people ATMpires.

Instead of being bloodthirsty, they are money hungry.

These creatures are ready to strike and turn anything into a franchise.

Twilight got sucked into this trap, (no pun intended).

Making Twilight into a movie was an instance of cross-promotionalism.

Twilight already had a fan base as a book, so making the book into a movie was less of a risk for a film company.

A film company like Summit.

A small company ill-prepared for the Twilight craze that was growing.

Before the Twilight movie even came out there was an increase in readership of the series.

Twi-fans emerged overnight.

The book series had become a global phenomenon and the movie hadn't even hit the big screen yet. Oh, but when it did hit that big screen it was an instant hit with all the twi-girls and twi-moms. And so it began.

The success of the book and the movie were enough to bring out the ATMpires.

And now we have Twilight t-shirts, posters, bookmarks, bags, calendars, buttons, necklaces, perfume, candy...

You name it, they have it.

Oh and the dolls.

I suppose what I am getting at here is that I am sad.

I am sad that a series about love and vampires has been commercialized to this extent.

That it is no longer about the love of reading.

No longer about caring for fictional characters and about living as Bella Swan.

It's all about the money, honey.

How should I conclude this? I should start by saying that there are MANY Twilight fans out there who have not forgotten about why they fell in love with the saga. As for myself you ask. Well, I guess what I can say is that if a Twilight theme park opens up (which it will), you won't see me riding on the Forks Ferris Wheel.

p.s. although it saddens me to see the Twilight saga reduced to this extent of commercialization, it's not all bad news. Twilight saga film stars like Peter Facinelli make up for the dolls. Peter uses his Twilight status to better our world by promoting awareness and raising money for different causes. :)