A week of books and movies

Hello all! I thought you might like a bit of time to read all the Turkey posts, but I'm back now! I've been having an entertainment-filled week, so I will report on that.

First, Rock of Ages. I went in with low expectations due to reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, but it was amazing. I felt like dancing out of my seat but thought it might annoy the people behind me, and also considered hands-above-the-head clapping, but dismissed it for the same reason. My flatmates also liked it, and we shared our guilt over the fact that none of us have been to the stage show, which is probably better and has been showing in the West End for a while (this is a common conversation, also undertaken after seeing War Horse and Mamma Mia). The story of Rock of Ages was perhaps a little well-worn, but it's a feel-good musical, people, and the songs were pretty awesome. And the dancing. Especially loved the Alec Baldwin/Russell Brand duet.

Next up was Snow White and the Huntsman, which I enjoyed though found myself distracted by outside thoughts every so often and had to remind myself to focus-on-movie. It's a very pretty movie, though I thought the Snow-White-as-chosen-one thing was a bit random. Was this because she's not so much a chosen one in the original story, or some other reason? Do I just have a thing against chosen ones? I like Harry Potter and Luke Skywalker. Is it a boy/girl thing? I hope not. I get the feeling the chosen-one stuff was weighted more towards the end and not introduced properly, though that might just be because I didn't notice it towards the beginning. Anyway, I didn't mind too much, and enjoyed the motion-master effects of the seats in front of me, especially the explosions (they have motion-master seats in my local theatre!).

Final movie of the weekend was Men in Black 3, which I loved. They have so many little by-the-by jokes in their world building so you're laughing much of the way through, and then there's a twist at the end that I thought was really well-done but won't say anything about. Definitely recommended.

And in books! I finished Garth Nix's A Confusion of Princes, which was hilarious and addictive. I loved the voice of the main character, and the fact that the MC is already guaranteed (and feels entitled to) an extraordinary destiny rather than the normal-character-finding-extraordinary-destiny trope that you see a lot.

I think I am using too-many-dashes.

Moving on to the next book (yes I have seen/read this many things this week. I am catching up on my entertainment): Maureen Johnson's The Name of the Star. This is a Jack the Ripper ghost story set in modern London, and seriously freaked me out, especially as the next door neighbour has recently started making loud banging noises in his back garden at 11 o'clock at night which may or may not be the sound of bodies being dismembered. I really enjoy reading books set in London while in London, because sometimes you know the places you're being shown and get a little thrill of recognition (this happened with the last Cassandra Clare Infernal Devices book too - she describes an alley that I walk down almost weekly!). Anyway, The Name of the Star has lots of awesome things to recommend it: ghosts, London, murder investigations, evaluation/criticism of the media, boarding school, brave heroine, secret lives, disguise, the Tube... So, yes, it's good. Go read it :-)

Have a good week!