Tina Fey: Leading Laughing Lady

Whilst it might not be true for everybody, in my mind Tina Fey is the funniest woman alive. Period. I have loved every movie she's ever been in, her role on Saturday Night Live, and the fact that she is an executive producer of 30 Rock just makes her even cooler. I love her sense of badassery that only a fellow glasses wearing 'geek girl' could ever hope to understand. She is an inspiration and now that I think about it, Ms. Fey might even make it on to my role model list. (I've never really given much consideration to the notion of role models let alone making a list but if I did create such a document I can assure you that Ms. Fey would make the cut).

So, after that long and rather gushing introduction, let's get down to the nitty gritty. Bossypants, the autobiography of Ms. Fey, is one of those books where, as you start to really get into it, notice that while telling you bits and pieces of information, isn't actually revealing that much about that person's life and its intimate details. In most cases (which this is one of) that shows rationality and practicality that the bigger, shall we say, 'less than average celebrities' have clearly forgotten. Believe it or not Paris Hilton/Lindsay Lohan/Britney Spears, there is such a thing as too much information. Shocking, I know.

The book is not a word for word, moment for moment retelling of Tina's life and how she got where she is today. Instead the main sections (which in nearly ever instance are of hilarity or pure, comical brilliance) focus on highlighting the pivotal moments of her life, the instances that have some actual meaning rather than just being page fillers.

My favourite part of the book is when Tina dedicates an entire chapter to responding to some of her "fan mail". In actuality the chapter consists of Tina writing witty and sarcastic responses to comments that have been posted on American entertainment blogs/websites. My especial favourite is her response to a post made by Perez Hilton, a man who I can only describe in single word definitions (gay, pink suit, flamboyant, highly-inappropriate-but-gets-away-with-it-because-he-is-a-supposed-gay-entertainment-god. And yes I did stick to single words). Let me just share a small section of her reply with you:

"I'm not one to toot my own horn, but I feel safe with you jerkstore, so I'll say it. Everything you ever hated on SNL was by me, and anything you ever liked was by someone who did it against my will.

Sincerely, Tina Fey

P.S You know who does have a funny bone her body? Your mom every night for a dollar. "

I 100% more than anything suggest that you go out and read this book! Let me just say that again in case you didn't quite grasp it the first time. READ THIS HILARIOUS BOOK!!!!!

If you don't then I am sorry to say, but I don't think we can be friends anymore.
Bossypants = Brilliance. And if you can't see that then please, go and hang out with Perez Hilton.

You big idiot you.



Image available: http://www.criticsatlarge.ca/2011/04/always-with-little-humour-tiny-feys.html 

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

Watching a movie that transports you back to your childhood is always hard to criticise. The Wizard of Oz, in all its technicolor majesty, is no exception.

As a time-old classic I'm expecting that everyone has heard of it, let alone seen it a million times when they were a child (no? Just me? Alrighty then, moving on!) For those of you who were clearly raised in the wilderness by either solitary religious monks and/or a family of slightly confused beavers, The Wizard of Oz follows Dorothy Gale (played by the magnificent Judy Garland), a young farm girl from Kansas as she, her little dog Toto and the family house get swept up by a tornado and deposited in the wonderful land of Oz, where witches exist, both good and bad, villages are dominated by tiny, singing, rosy cheeked "children" and nearly every inanimate object can talk. Yes, the author of the book that the movie is based on, Mr. Frank L. Baum, must have been smoking some seriously serious stuff when he sat down to write this.

And I'm glad that he did because without a doubt The Wizard of Oz is one of those movies that no matter how many times I watch it, I will still love it. Even after seeing, for the first time, the trapdoor that the wicked witch of the west climbs into when she's supposed to be transported away by her magic cloud of red, sulphur-smelling smoke, I'm still having trouble finding any faults. I guess that at times Dorothy's naivety and innocence that she portrays through countless exclamations of shock, awe and/or surprise does become a little annoying, but that just falls back to being a part of the acting of the time period.

The Wizard of Oz is a great film for portraying hidden symbolism. Hidden in the sense that children, the targeted audience of the film, are very unlikely to pick up on them. And that comes down to the overall tone of the movie being one of innocence. Occasions where a more adult theme shines through to be understood by adults are greatly ignored by a child audience. I'm talking about a scene like the one in the poppy field. Some might say that this was a reference to the use of opium or other drugs, but to a child it's merely the work of the wicked witch and her evil spell. It's really the basic themes that are the strong and most obvious ones. Good vs evil, dark vs light and of course, the main moral, "there's no place like home".

With the release next year of a prequel to The Wizard of Oz, titled Oz: The Great and Powerful starring James Franco as Oz, now is a good time to go out and grab a copy of the original film that started it all, to catch up or refresh your memory about the storyline and its characters.

A good film for children and those who are still a child at heart, The Wizard of Oz guarantees plenty of learning and fun times. Not to mention singing midgets, a cowardly lion who makes all sorts of bad 'dad' jokes, the most elaborate cotton-candy costumes, and I can't quite guarantee this, but there might even be some sexual innuendoes thrown in for all you really perverse people. Although, if you are going to see this solely because of that last reason, might I suggest you go watch a film called "Please see a therapist, I think you need some help".
Probably more your style.

Image available: http://vigilantcitizen.com/moviesandtv/the-occult-roots-of-the-wizard-of-oz/

There's Something About Nothing That's Not The Same As Everything Else

I don't like Ben Stiller. I don't really know what it is that makes me dislike him as an actor, although there are some movies of his that I can stand to watch. One's where his performance isn't as cringeworthy as others, where his character isn't based on a stereotypical understanding of a certain American cliche character, like the geek or the jock or some messed up Spanish guy. Movies of his like Night at the Museum. I liked that movie. It had a nice storyline behind it and was just a cute little family movie with dinosaurs. What's not to love?

So I can stand Stiller. I just draw the line at seeing him in There's Something About Mary.

It's an old release (1998) so the humour to nowadays is quite different, which I thought would be a fun change to experience. Something different. And the movie started off with a lot of potential. Cameron Diaz was her usual 'golden gal' self, cute and innocent, loved by all but immune to the charms of so many. Ben Stiller was bearable, his character not being too off-putting but not too "fall in love instantly with". And the story line was okay, if a little bit of a cliche in itself. But then about halfway through, when I suppose the real story started, it just changed. Not for the best.

I found everything uber predictable. I could tell really easily what was going to happen, when it was going to happen, who was going to be involved. And it just kind of became an uncomfortable movie to watch after that because the "big laughs" weren't that big if you knew they were coming. All of the character's were cliche and stereotypical and I would have found this slightly amusing had there not been so many of them. If maybe one or two characters had been written based on stereotypes that would have been bearable but not all them!!

And the ending! Just so unrealistic and predictable. Seriously, I'm looking at it now, looking back at why I chose to watch that and I'm realising that none of my expectations were met. I expected a release from the everyday comedies that are in existence. Missed the mark. Whilst I expected Ben Stiller's character to be the same as all the others that he has played, I didn't think that feeling would dominate my movie experience. Missed the mark.

I guess that I just expected too much. I watched that and I didn't need to feel anything or think at all. I basically veged out, almost fell asleep and then was so comfortable where I was sitting that i didn't move for a good 20 minutes, even after the DVD machine had turned its self off. I mean, I guess I would watch it again if I needed noise in the background, but it was just so blah that it wouldn't even work as a distraction.

So, it really was nothing special.



Image available: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There's_Something_About_Mary 

Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend

Okay, with heading like that it makes me seem a little obsessed perhaps about this musician. However,  I just appreciate diverse and good music. And Welsh singer Marina and the Diamonds ticks both of those boxes.

I first heard/saw Marina Lambrini Diamandis perform on a British chat show and at first, I didn't really think she was anything that special. The song that she was performing was "Primadonna", promoting it as a single off of her second album Electra Heart (which was released in April 2012). And it was when she was just standing there, well sitting actually, not doing anything, just looking posed and perfected by what I can only assume is a mass of hair and make-up experts, that I didn't think much of her. Actually, I thought she was just another American artist set to dominate our ears with auto-tune and screeching lyrics subtly disguised as prayers to God/our ex-boyfriend/President Obama.

At the end of the song, however, I knew that I was going to buy her second album when it came out, maybe her first one as well, if not a couple of her songs. Her voice is in no way stereotypical, no way cliche American. It has this way of being both pop and operatically influenced. There are subtle ways in which the lyrics and notes are pronounced and sung where you can definitely see a upbeat feel behind them. And the same goes for the tracks themselves. Some are definitely meant to be danced to, some to make you think, and then there are just some in between.

Of both the albums, The Family Jewels and Electra Heart, I would have to say that Electra Heart is my favourite. It just feels like in this album, Marina has had more time to refine that line between being pop and being ballad/operatic. A lot of the songs in the first album are more a mix of both, where you can't really determine if you're meant to be hardcore dancing or just sitting there quietly contemplating the meaning of your fruitful existence.

From Electra Heart, my favourite songs (yes, there's more than one) are the two that best represent the combining influences of Marina's music. The first, Bubblegum Bitch, just makes me want to run/dance/throw my hands in the air and scream. It's a fantastic song for going to the gym. It's motivational and the lyrics are very clever, talking about a girl being sexually evocative towards a boy. And as the first track on the album it introduces you (literally) to the concept that is Marina's second album.

My second favourite song is Buy The Stars. As a slower song, it's cute and makes you think, but not too strenuously. It's definitely more operatic and haunting than perhaps any of the other songs on the album. It's the last track on the album and makes for a good send off. It's kind of like, after listening to all the songs on the album, this track makes you reflect on all those songs, your reaction to them and what message you think Marina and her songs are trying to send to you. Just a really nice, resolute way of ending a great album.

Image 1 available: http://www.marinaandthediamonds.com/news,preorder-electra-heart_264.htm 
Image 2 available: http://mavenity.wordpress.com/2010/08/26/must-listen-marina-and-the-diamonds-the-family-jewels/ 

When You're Visited By Alcoholics

 I don't really know if it's my sheltered existence, but when I was first given this book, "A Visit From The Goon Squad" by Jennifer Egan, I immediately thought, "Why would you want to read a book about people being visited by cheap wine drinkers?" Where's the intrigue in that?" Although I understand that a goon is also a bad guy or a thug, my current state of association with various persons of good and bad natures lead me to believe that this would be a book that they should read, not me.




However, Egan does a brilliant job of entrancing me into the pages, despite the lack of indulgent drinkers. The novel follows the lives of a select handful of characters; record producer Bennie Salazar, his assistant Sasha, her friends, his friends, enough people to make you feel as though you're entering a community, entering that other world, which is mainly based in New York. Written in short chapters from the various character's varying perspectives, you don't even necessarily have to read the entire book. You could just read a couple of the story threads and then get sick of it. But if you do want to get a good feel for the lives of these emotionally see-sawing characters, then start at the start and go from there.

And at that point it really is a page turner. You're just starting to see the characters for who they are, you're getting introduced into their lives. However, after a while the common depressing feel that runs through all the character's lives starts to get a bit too similar and I started to lose interest in where these characters were going. In fact the last couple of chapters I just flicked through, trying to get the general feel without having to really read. Despite this very small dislike of mine, the book was overall enticing and entertaining. There was a certain amount of dry wit and humour woven throughout the various threads that did give the novel a fresh edge at times.

The main theme permeated throughout the book is time and what happens when it starts to get away from us. I think maybe one of the reasons why I started to lose interest in this novel was because of this theme. Jumping from the past to the present and back again, all the separate stories revolved around this notion that "life's a goon", that being that your life is just going where it goes and you really have no control over that. Which is a bit depressing really and not something that I particularly want to think about all the time. So, like I said previously, the small amounts of humour should have been made into large amounts of humour, just so I would have been able to laugh a little and not continually think of depressing things like death and growing old.

All in all, the novel wasn't overly horrible. In fact, I would read it again. And maybe it's one of those novels that you do have to read a second time, just to get a proper feel for it. I don't know. I give this book a 3/5.

Happy reviewing everyone!



Image available: http://www.erikzona.com/tag/breteastonellis/