Movie of the
Week:
Unfriended
Found-footage is a genre of film that you either love or hate, but
even when you do enjoy watching those types of films, depending on the film itself,
it can still be difficult to get into a enjoy as much as you would have liked.
The shaky camera can be a bit distracting when instead it supposed to blur the
line between what is real and what is fiction, it is a very unique way of
telling a story. Over recent years, the number of films in the found-footage
genre has grown a lot with the arrival of the Paranormal Activity series. From
what I have learnt from watching a few films of this type, is that horror does
appear to be the better way of really blurring that line. The Paranormal
Activity series did scare and shock us, but then we kind of got used to the
concept and a lot of us has drifted away from the series and the genre once more.
It became too predictable, we knew that it wasn’t real, we knew how the basic
ideas worked and so we expected something different, and so we left the genre altogether.
The only way that can pull us back into our seats is for a film to do something
different with the idea. And that’s when Unfriended came along.
The entire film is told through someone’s laptop via a Skype
conversation. It’s about a group of teenagers who started off causally talking
about everyday life and having a bit of fun, as everyone does when talking with
friends over Skype, but then a mysterious caller appears and that’s when things
start to go downhill for these people. The ghost of a teenage girl who was
bullied into committing suicide has come to haunt the people who made her life
hell, and what an impact she makes. It’s quite clear from the moment this film
starts off that this is a unique way of telling a found-footage story. It kept
me glued to my chair as the characters slowly felt the full force of this
supernatural being. In a way, this film doesn’t do anything that a classic
horror normally does. It basically strips it down to the very basics of what a
story can be before it stops being interesting, and that to me is interesting.
With so little, they managed to do so much.
I will have to address that there are many critics who have
expressed their dislike towards the film, and that’s fair enough, but some of
these critics you can plainly see don’t really like found-footage in general.
If you are aware of the concept and enjoy it, then you will like this film.
If this sounds like your type of film, below is the link to the
IMDB page of the film:
TV Program
of the Week:
Still Open All Hours
The legend that is Ronnie Barker never stopped making us laugh.
One of his greatest roles, in my opinion, is the tight-fisted shop owner,
Arkwright, who will stop at nothing to make sure his profits are high. Each
episode was a classic and still makes the nation laugh even today. The show ran
for 4 series from 1976 – 1985, which is also the year that Ronnie sadly passed
away. It would be impossible to continue on the story with a replacement actor in
the shoes of Arkwright as Ronnie is the only person to nail the characters
quirky personality each and every time. It was simply a genius of a show.
When I heard that they would be continuing the show as a one-off Christmas
Special in 2014, I couldn’t help but get intrigued. The TV magazine said that it
would follow Arkwright’s nephew Granville after inheriting the shop after
Arkwright’s passing. What drew me to watching it was two things. The first being
that David Jason would reprise the role of Granville along with Lynda Baron as
Nurse Gladys. The second thing is that it would be written by the original
writer Roy Clarke, who is a comic genius when it comes to writing TV shows. He is
the only person I know of that would know exactly what to do with the
characters. After knowing that Roy Clarke was behind the pen, I had to give it
a chance, and I was completely blown away by how it captured everything that
the original was as well as paying tribute to the original and Arkwright at the
same time. The laughs are a plenty. I wasn’t the only person to have liked the
show as its popularity grew massively since the one-off special and a new
series was commissioned almost immediately. This year, in 2015, on Boxing Day, series
2 began and is still as good as it was during the first series.
It’s very hard to keep things exactly how they were many years
before, but Still Open All Hours does exactly that without struggling one bit.
If you are interested, here is the link to the IMDB page and the
BBC Iplayer for the first episode of series 2:
IMDB:
BBC iPlayer:
Game of the
Week:
Legoland
Before Rollercoaster Tycoon became hugely popular and took over as
head of the theme park games, Legoland was storming the market. I loved playing
this game as a kid. Even if I didn’t understand everything that was going on, I
enjoyed playing with it because the light-heartedness of the entire game drew
me in and I didn’t stop playing until the computer grew too old and didn’t work
properly anymore. After that, our new computer wouldn’t play the game properly
and so we threw it away. I never really remembered much of it as I grew up until
I found it in a shop in Colchester one day; all my memories of playing it
flooded back. Fortunately, the game has been upgraded to play on Windows 7, which
means that this game is still popular enough to warrant an upgrade instead of
being pushed to one side and forgotten about. I had to get it and start playing
it again. It was just as I remembered it and that just increased the level of nostalgic
value behind the game. As far as I’m concerned, this was the first true great
theme park game, and a truly spectacular game it is.
If this sounds right up your street, then below is the link to
where you can purchase the game:
Amazon:
Video of the Week:
I/O – Input/Output
This video might have come out in the beginning of October, but
this video is very hard to describe. The only thing I can say is how imaginative
the creator is. This video ignores how the rules work and creates its own, and
that makes for one heck of a fantastic video. The first time you watch this,
there will be so many questions, and it’s only when you’ve watched it several times
afterwards that you begin to understand it all. Heck, you have to watch it a
second time anyway because your brain won’t be able to understand it the first
time round.
I have no idea what the meaning behind this is, if there is one at
all, but I believe that because of how so much is going on, you will be able to
make up your own meaning behind it. For me, the meaning of this video is not to
be worrying about things if they are suddenly turned upside down. If something
happens that you weren’t expecting, just roll with it and move on because you
may make yourself worry about something that isn’t necessarily significant
compared to the many other things going on around you. Of course, if a
particular thing is turned upside down and it is significant, then again, don’t
worry about it. The last thing you want to do is panic and make things worse.
The situation will be sorted out in no time at all if you are cool, calm and collective.
But of course, the actual meaning behind this film is probably vastly
different to anything I’ve interpreted that it makes the film make even less
sense. Maybe there really isn’t a meaning behind this film, just a very
imaginative person wanting to see what he can make. Whatever the meaning, it’s
safe to say that this is one very awesome video that never fails to deliver no
matter how many times you watch it.
Below is the link to the video:
Thanks for reading
Antony Hudson
(TonyHadNouns)
My book, Sector 22: Zoey is now available on Amazon and eBay:
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eBay:
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