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    Fake-A-Call ™

    Fake-A-Call ™

    Entertainment and Utilities

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    ☆ Now you can fake outgoing phone calls too! Complete with 'fake answerer' recordings! ☆ This...

The Haunting of Hill House
The Haunting of Hill House
2018 | Horror
Beautifully and cleverly written (3 more)
Amazing cast
Amazing acting
Some good twists
A beautiful well-crafted story
This was a fantastic season. Before watching I was hearing insane hype about this show and it did get me worried. There have been many shows and movies in the past that to me were well overhyped before I watched and did not deliver. Finally the hype is real. This is by far my favourite show of the year.

It is creepy throughout the entire season while having so much emotion and believability with this family that have been through many traumatic experiences and you can see the damage and scarring within each character thanks to their incredible performance. The beautiful writing, the believable acting and eery score all add to a compelling and gripping story all the way to the end.

There are so many twists throughout the entire thing which I did not see coming. By the end, the whole thing felt like a puzzle. Everything connected in a way I never expected. What you thought were completely different things would be connected like puzzle pieces and it made the whole thing work and leave you admiring this beautiful piece of art.

I think it's obvious I can't recommend this enough. I'd love to see more from this. Maybe even make this an anthology series with a new cast and era.
  
It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
1946 | Comedy, Drama, Fantasy

"It’s just awesome. What is there not to love about this movie? Donna Reed was amazing! My brother wants to marry Donna Reed. I’m like, “Dude, she’s a little old for you now.” I love the way he (George Bailey) was a happy guy but then can get cantankerous sometimes. Jimmy Stewart was just fantastic in that. I love the magic feel of it and I love the whole idea at the end of this person who did so much for everybody else and really stood on his own and sacrificed so much, that when he finally gave up and needed (help), everyone was there for him and I just cry every single time. I cry every single time. My brother actually says that I am that character in real life. I AM George Bailey. He’s like, “That’s you. You are that guy,” and every time I get ticked off when finally the pressure gets to me — because I do take care of a lot of people — he just yells at me, “Why do we have to have so many kids,” which is of course a Jimmy Stewart line. I even did It’s a Wonderful Life on a thing called “Fake Radio” where we did the entire radio version, on radio. It was great! So, I love that movie!"

Source
  
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Midnight Exposure (Midnight, #1)
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Don't you just love it when you read a book and it is so much more than what you expected? This is what happened to me when I read Midnight Exposure. I thought it would the usual story of hero meets heroine, they don't get on, big calamity, insta-love, everything's fine. That is so NOT what you get with this. You get a well thought out, full of plot, suspenseful story. Yes, there are overtures of romance to the book but they are brilliantly done.

Our main female and male leads both come with baggage and flaws. Jayne is no weeping wallflower mind you. One of my favourite parts of the book was when she used her black belt karate on someone. She is not just going to sit there and be a victim. The supporting characters are all well rounded and develop really well throughout the book.

As for the 'occult' side of things - I thought this was remarkably well written and that's coming from a pagan. Too often in books, knowledge is mis-used or only given in part and the result can be something that makes me cringe as it dumps every earth and nature based religion in with satanism. The parts of this book that were revealing more about the villain and his motives etc, never painted the actual symbolism as black, instead just showing how it was being used for his purposes. I know I haven't explained it very well but trust me, Melinda Leigh did a great job. As for the reviewer who said "we get no clue what kind of religion this is", I suggest you take a re-read as it is written plain as day.

Loved this book and have started on book 2, Midnight Sacrifice. Recommended!
  
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Emma @ The Movies (1786 KP) rated Johnny English Strikes Again (2018) in Movies

Jul 3, 2019 (Updated Sep 25, 2019)  
Johnny English Strikes Again (2018)
Johnny English Strikes Again (2018)
2018 | Action, Adventure, Comedy
Our favourite budget Bond is back in the third installment of Johnny English, and it basically "does what it says on the tin." It's amusing and it's exactly what you expect it to be. Nothing groundbreaking.

They've thankfully updated some of the aspects where needed. We've got a tech genius, cyber threats, VR, and we've got health and safety regulations like you wouldn't believe!

Boff is back too and he's the brains behind the outfit managing to make English's buffonary work, as always. To be fair, English does have some pretty good ideas but they seem to either be accidental or poorly executed!

All of the characters are entertaining and their reactions to Johnny's behaviour are entirely inkeeping with what you'd expect. Ophelia getting exacerbated by his evading/dance technique is quite amusing.

My general feeling about this type of humour though is that you can have too much, or to be more accurate, it can go on too long. Some of the skits feel like they tip just slightly over the line between "that's funny" to "is this still going on?"

The audience in Bristol did appreciate one of the particular cyber attacks... "all the trains are trying to stop at Bristol Temple Meads"... yep, that seems about right to us!

What should you do?

You could probably hold out and watch this when it streams, it's quite a short film so it's probably not going to feel like you're getting your monies worth from a cinema ticket.

Movie thing you wish you could take home

Oh so many options, but I think I'll pass on the spy gadgets and go straight for some of Johnny English's dumb luck!
  
    Cladwell Daily Outfits

    Cladwell Daily Outfits

    Lifestyle and Productivity

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    Expertly styled outfits, sent to your phone every morning, using the clothes you already own. Get...

Made You Up
Made You Up
Francesca Zappia | 2015 | Contemporary, Young Adult (YA)
9
6.4 (5 Ratings)
Book Rating
I'm big into books that deal with mental illnesses. When I heard about Made You Up by Francesca Zappia, I knew it was a book that was right up my alley. I was not left feeling disappointed.

The plot and world building felt very realistic although I'm not Schizophrenic nor do I know anyone who is. I could not tell what was real and what was a delusion by Alex. Kudos to Zappia for giving us a brief glimpse into how a Schizophrenic would feel. I kept second guessing myself throughout Made You Up. Sometimes it would be obvious that Alex was hallucinating, but there were many times everything felt too real to be a hallucination. I would be wrong, and something realistic would be a hallucination. As you can imagine, there were many plot twists throughout this book. There was one major plot twist which I had predicted towards the beginning which turned out to be true thanks to subtle hints the author would throw in, so be sure to be attention to every word on the page to try to grasp what is Alex's reality and what is not. I did feel like the main storyline of Made You Up was whether or not Miles, the boy Alex met briefly when she was a young child, was actually real or not since she meets him again her senior year of high school. It was fun trying to guess if Miles was real or not and if he was the same boy Alex met as a child.

All of the characters in Made You Up had a lot of depth to them. They were all easy for me to imagine as real people instead of characters in a book. I enjoyed reading about Alex and her thought process and what all she had to go through all the time due to her Schizophrenia. Alex, like all the characters in this book, was a very likable character. Miles was interesting. I didn't really know what to make of him throughout the book (mainly because I was trying to figure out if he was real or imaginary). I did enjoy him, and I was definitely intrigued by his back story. It was great learning about him. I loved little Charlie and how much she seemed to love her big sister, Alex. Alex loved Charlie so much as well, and I loved reading about the tight sisterly bond between them.

Trigger warnings for Made You Up include some profanity, some violence, death, minor gore, some child abuse, mental illness, a minor sexual situation, bullying, references to Nazis, attempted murder, and death.

All in all, Made You Up is a very interesting read with a fantastic plot and well developed characters. It's obvious the author did her homework before writing this novel. I would definitely recommend Made You Up by Francesca Zappia to those aged 16+ who are seeking a book full of twists and turns. Just be warned that this book will have you second guessing almost everything (which isn't a bad thing).
  
The Lodge (2008)
The Lodge (2008)
2008 | Horror, Thriller
3
6.3 (4 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Good acting (2 more)
Creepy moments
The sadistic daughter
Shooting felt amateur (3 more)
85% of it was slow and boring
No shocks or twists
Didn't feel R rated
A cliche "horror" that lacks so much
First off I just want to say you can't spoil this movie. Whatever you think is going to happen, it will happen. There are no shocks or twists to the story.

They waste no time showing how creepy the caretaker is. Because of this you hoped that it was all a misdirection but sadly not. You even hoped it would possibly go into a ghost story instead but it just turned around and went right back into predictability.

The shooting of the movie felt very amateur. Every scene was out of focus and it's sad it's something you get used to.

The first half was extremely slow with drawn out scenes and about halfway through it did start to pick up some pace but sadly this ended up dragging on too long and felt too anticlimatic. It did feel like a homage to Texas chainsaw massacre which was nice but did nothing.

It was clear that this was very low budget with only 4 members of cast so there was no place to hide with the acting and I have to say it was good. They did a decent job with what was written and the characters often showed good logic which is rare in movies. For example they had reasons for alarms clocks going off randomly in the night, weird noises etc they were likable too which is a big thing for me.

The sadistic daughter was a great addition. She felt sinister but it is never explained why she is so dirty or why she is the way she is.

Sadly there is nothing new here. It felts like plenty of other movies you have already seen. For a R rated movie, it felt very tame. Like every movie they get caught but nothing terrible happens to them. You expect more violence or gore but this barely had anything and I found myself bored and excited for it to end.

I did go into this expected the worst movie ever so I was surprised that there were parts I liked but ultimately I wasn't impressed. It could have been so much more but lack too many things.