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    Rush Rally 2

    Rush Rally 2

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    5 / 5 - Touch Arcade - "Easily one of the best racing games on mobile" 9 / 10 - Pocket Gamer - "You...

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Bob Mann (459 KP) rated Emma (2020) in Movies

Feb 21, 2020  
Emma (2020)
Emma (2020)
2020 | Comedy, Drama, Romance
9
6.8 (8 Ratings)
Movie Rating Watch
Anya Taylor-Joy.... mesmerising (2 more)
Gorgeous to look at; stunning locations and costumes
Witty and well-observed debut script
Music is overly intrusive in places (0 more)
Simply Sublime
I loved the look of "Emma" from the trailer. And I was not disappointed. It is a simply sublime piece of comic entertainment.

Emma Woodhouse (Anya Taylor-Joy) is a rich, privileged 21 year-old looking after her elderly and quirky father (Bill Nighy) in the family stately home. She has never loved, despite the persistent presence of 'family friend' George Knightley (Johnny Flynn), but finds it entertaining to engage in matchmaking, particularly in respect to her somewhat lower class friend Harriet Smith (Mia Goth). Emma has high ambitions for Harriet... ideas significantly above what her social station and looks might suggest.

Emma has her sights on a dream.... the mystery man Frank Churchill (Callum Turner), son of wealthy local landowner Mr Weston (Rupert Graves). She has never actually met him, but is obsessed with his myth. #fangirl. As a source of immense annoyance to her, but often a source of valuable information on news of Churchill, is the village 'old maid' Miss Bates (Miranda Hart). "Such fun"!

But Emma's perfect life is about to face sticky times, as her machinations fail to yield the expected results and a stray comment, at a disastrous picnic, threatens to damage both her reputation and her social standing.

If you like your movies full of action and suspense, you are digging in the wrong place. "Emma" is slow... glacially slow... wallowing in beautiful bucolic scenes (with superb cinematography by Christopher Blauvelt); gorgeous costumes by Alexandra Byrne; and hair styling by Marese Langan.

The movie also benefits from a joyfully tight and funny script by debut screenwriter Eleanor Catton (a Man-Booker prize winner). This picks relentlessly at the strata of the class system set up by Jane Austen's novel: "Every body has their level" spits spurned suitor Mr Elton (Josh O'Connor).

I know Anya Taylor-Joy as the spirited Casey from "Split" and "Glass": she was impressive in "Split"; less so for me in the disappointing "Glass". But here, I found her UTTERLY mesmerising. She has such striking features - those eyes! - that she fully inhabits the role of the beautiful heiress who haunts multiple men sequentially. I even muttered the word "Oscar nomination" at the end of the film: though we are too early in the year to seriously go there.

An even bigger surprise was the actor playing George Knightley. Johnny Flynn has been in a number of TV shows I haven't seen, and a few films I haven't seen either (e.g. "Beast"). But I had the nagging feeling I knew him really well. The illustrious Mrs Movie Man clocked him: he's the Cineworld "plaid man"! (For those outside the UK or not patrons of Cineworld cinemas, he was the 'star' of a Cineworld advert that played over and Over AND OVER again for months on end before every film I saw. Arrrgggghhhh!).

Here, Flynn is excellent as the frustrated and brooding Austen-hunk. He even gets away with an ar*e-shot within a U-certificate!

Particularly strong in the supporting cast are Bill Nighy (being delightfully more restrained in his performance); Miranda Hart (being "Miranda", but perfectly cast) and Mia Goth (memorable for that eel-bath in "A Cure for Wellness").

And a big thank-you for a web review in the online Radio Times for naming one of the comical (and bizarrely uncredited) footmen as Angus Imrie - - the truly disturbed stepson of Claire in "Fleabag". It was driving me crazy where I knew him from!

The one criticism I would have is that I found the (perfectly fine and well-fitting) music, by David Schweitzer and Isobel Waller-Bridge (sister of Phoebe) poorly mixed within the soundtrack. There were times when I found it overly intrusive, suddenly ducking under dialogue and then BLASTING out again. Sometimes music should be at the forefront.... but more often it should be barely perceptible.

As you might guess....
...I loved this one. The story is brilliant (obsv!); the film is simply gorgeous to look at; the locations (including the village of Lower Slaughter in the Cotswolds and Wilton House - near me - in Salisbury) are magnificent and a blessing for the English Tourist Board.

All the more impressive then that this is the directorial feature of video/short director Autumn de Wilde.

This comes with a "highly recommended" from both myself and the illustrious Mrs Movie-Man.

(For the full graphical review, please check out https://bob-the-movie-man.com/2020/02/20/one-manns-movies-film-review-emma-2020/ .)
  
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Whatchareadin (174 KP) rated The Identicals in Books

May 10, 2018  
The Identicals
The Identicals
Elin Hilderbrand | 2017 | Fiction & Poetry
6
8.0 (3 Ratings)
Book Rating
Tabitha and Harper Frost are identical twins. Their parents divorced when they were 14 years old, and the twins were split between the parents(like the Parent Trap). Tabitha goes with their mother to Nantucket and Harper goes with their father to Martha's Vineyard. Even though these 2 islands are only a few miles away, they might as well be thousands. After this separation the girls grew farther and farther apart until they stopped speaking all together. When their father, Billy, dies, will it be enough to bring Tabitha and Harper back together as the sisters they once were, or will this drive them even farther apart?

Elin Hilderbrand has put together another enjoyable novel. My travels have never brought me further north than upstate New York, but she paints a picture of the New England coastline as a place I have to visit.

I don't know what it's like to be a twin, but I do have a sister. I think it would be impossible to go years without speaking to or seeing my sister. What happened between Tabitha and Harper that they couldn't work out their differences? Will the death of their father prove to them that whatever it was can be fixed?

For me, I didn't really connect with either of these characters. The person I connected most with was Ainsley, Tabitha's 15 year old daughter. At the beginning of the book, she is struggling through life as all girls at that age do. Trying to find out who you are, who your friends should be, which cliques to be a part of. Ainsley is trying to figure out her place in her world and trying to find her way through that with a parent who is pretty much hands-off.

Harper is also struggling through some things at the start of the book. But unfortunately, this is nothing new for Harper. She always seems to find herself on the wrong side of trouble.

Tabitha as well is going through a tough situation. As the head of her mother's clothing empire, trying to keep the store afloat as well as raise a teenage daughter and have a social life, it's a lot on one person.

Will these three ladies be able to put their differences aside, pull up their big girl panties, and work everything out so that they all will be able to coexist and thrive?