Heartbeats

And so tonight brings the end of July, which of course marks the one month anniversary of my arrival in New Zealand- my oh my how time flies!

Shortly after my arrival to Auckland the International Film Festival rolled into town, which has been keeping me amused over the last two weeks with some wonderful films. Tonight (also closing night of the festival I might add) that film was Heartbeats by Xavier Dolan.

Complete with beautiful people, voguish music, witty dialogue and stylish outfits, Heartbeats was vaguely reminiscent of The Dreamers for me- Although I may contribute that to the surprise cameo of Louis Garrel in the final scene. Either way it was definitely one of my favourite films from the festival this year, if you have not already see it I highly recommend you do.

Lovely Lovely.

Blonde Blonde Blonde

With the change of weather, comes the need for a change of image and so with this is mind (as I previously mentioned) tomorrow I will begin the start of my transformation from red to blonde.

So while I anxiously twiddle my thumbs and hope that my hair does not fall out of my head completely tomorrow- here is some blonde inspiration for us all to pine over.

Happy Weekend Folks!

The Horror! The Horror!

After watching my fair share of horror films as of late, it has got me to thinking about if I were to make my own what it would be about. I think after years and years of watching some of the greatest and worst scary movies out there, that I should be more then capable of coming up with a somewhat wonderful horror movie plot- keeping in mind these factors:

* Minimal easy gore scares, in fact I would not want one drop of blood spilt in my movie.

* Old fashioned eerie, 'ghost train terror' type factor.

* Interesting and likable characters.

* Definitely an aire of mystery intertwined into the story somehow.

But most importantly I would make a film poster that looked something like these classic horror flicks below- so perfectly chilling!

Scissorhands 20th

Happy Sunday Folks, I hope everybody is doing something delightful with the ending of the weekend- I'm in the midst of a lovely day of some serious rest and relaxation, but just wanted to quickly tell you all about this wonderful project I read about recently!

So like a lot of people out there, I am a massive fan of Tim Burton's masterpiece Edward Scissorhands. I grew up with this timeless tale of love and beauty, and it had been one of my favourite films since I was a wee bonny lass- from which also springs my life long crush on the painfully handsome Johnny Depp *drool*.

So you can imagine how happy I was to read about this recent project organised by Seb Mesnard, an illustrator based in France, who in honour of the films 20th anniversary, asked some of his artist friends to contribute their interpretations of the film to a tribute blog called Scissorhands 20th.

Make sure you check it out! It is truly very magnificent!

Cemetery Junction

With the end of the week nearing and the weekend well in sight, I woke up this morning to find myself with a small case of the sniffles- which I find laughable considering I went through the majority of the freezing Toronto winter unscathed and now that the sun is starting to peek its little head out again I finally get the sniffles.

But enough about that, I wanted to talk about a film I watched last night at a friends house- called Cemetery Junction. It is the latest feat from Ricky Gervais & Stephen Merchant, who are obviously best known for their hilarious television shows The Office and Extras. The film is a coming of age type story set in the 70's that follows three best friends, who live in a suburb in Reading called Cemetery Junction, as they try to figure out who they are and what they want to do with their lives.

Although the actual storyline is nothing that hasn't been done before I still thoroughly enjoyed watching the film. Quite funny and heartfelt in parts, it is the kind of film that makes you nolstagic for your youth- even if your only twenty two like me. Being set in the 1970's, the cloths are wonderful! And the soundtrack is pretty awesome also, complete with some Bowie and Zeppelin. Very nice film indeed.

Has anybody else seen the film? What did you think?

“There’s an ancient Arab proverb that says Throw your heart out in front of you and run ahead to catch it” - Julie

Insidious

After spending the better part of Saturday night trying to find a good horror movie to watch and instead spending the better part of Saturday night watching horror movie trailers, it was decided that I would go to the movies on Sunday to check out the new film from the makers of Paranormal Activity and Saw- Insidious.

Now I am a big fan of the horror movie genre, but for the last few years horror films have been particulary bad for the most part, too much gore and not enough actual scares in my opinion. So on that note I would say that Insidious is one of the better scary films I have seen in a long time. Basically put the film is about a family who after believing that their home is haunted, decide to move house in an effort to get away from the dark spirits, but shortly after moving they begin to realize that it was not their house that is haunted.

Watching Insidious is like going on a ghost train ride, with it's beautifully eerie imagary and simple yet effective scare tactics, it's the kind of film that will have you looking around your own room at night to make sure no ghosties are lurking around.

One Day You'll Be Cool

I really do not like when somebody ask me the question "What is your favourite film?"- And it's not because I could not start listing off an abundance of films that I love and would consider favourites, but more because it is just too broad a question and one that I will consider long after it was asked to me and think, Damn I should have said this.

But despite my mild dislike of the question, it is still one that gets asked a lot, maybe because subconsciously people think by knowing people's favourite films it will give them an ever so slight insight into somebody's personality- which may or may not be true.

Aside from all that bibble babble though, a permanent staple on my own list of all time favourite films would definately have to be Cameron Crowe's Almost Famous. It is one of those comfort films that I can recite word for word and leaves me with a good feeling everytime after I watch it. Perfect actors, perfect story, perfect soundtrack, perfect cloths, perfect film really. Very lovely.

"I always tell the girls, never take it seriously, if you never take it seriously, you never get hurt, you never get hurt, you always have fun, and if you ever get lonely, just go to the record store and visit your friends" - Pennylane

RIP Elizabeth Taylor

Technicolour Dreams

Don't you just love the look of films in Technicolour! It makes everything look so vibrant and so much more theatrical, almost bordering on animated even.

I wish everyday looked like this, then everyone would be happy- how could you not be happy with a life in Technicolour?

Bye Bye Birdie

Ahhhh Ann Margaret, you are so adorable!

A Night At The Oscars

So as most of us are aware (except for maybe those folks who couldn't give two hoots about the glitz and glamour of the happenings in Hollywood-gasp!) last night was the 83rd Annual Academy Awards. Deciding that we didn't want to watch the glamorous event live screening from our laptops, Sinead & Myself opted to head out to Zemra Bar Lounge to watch it on the big screen.

There is something about the Oscars that is just so terribly exciting to watch, it feels like being invited into a world that most people can only dream about being part of- The spectacular dresses, the charismatic actors & actresses, the cheesy but delightful presentations. Ahhh...

I was so happy to see Shaun Tan win the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film. It's not that I'm overly patriotic, but last year Heath Ledger and this year Shaun Tan- both from my hometown of Perth, Western Australia. Makes me feel all gooey inside (-:

Zemra had Oscar inspired cocktails... nice touch

How adorabe was James Franco and Anne Hathaway!

Sinead with her voting ballot

Javier Bardem... so lovely

We were given photo's of ourselves with our own Oscar Awards

A furry friend that followed us home