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Entertainment Reviews

The Academy Awards Reviews and Predictions for 2024

Ah, it’s my favourite time of the year again, the Oscars season! With my new local cinema membership, I hope to catch up on the films nominated for the prestigious Best Picture award. I will admit, being located in the UK, the British equivalent of the BAFTAs is also on my radar, but my heart will always go to the Dolby Theatre in sunny Hollywood, California. Without further ado, here are my reviews, upcoming screenings and predictions for the 2024 Academy Awards!

American Fiction

I haven’t seen this yet, so expect a review to be coming very soon! I did however catch a trailer before watching Maestro at the cinema, and I was very interested in what the story has to tell in the film. The film focuses on a struggling novelist who is frustrated at the Black entertainment industry that profits from tired and offensive tropes. To prove his point, he writes an equally outlandish book under a penname which soon becomes a breakout hit, pushing him into the madness that he tries to critique. Provoking, yes, with probably an equal amount of comedy in the situation that this educated writer has found himself settled in.

Quick review: fantastic … Read More

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Entertainment Reviews

A Bittersweet Profile with Tasty Notes: “Wonka” Review

When it comes to Willy Wonka, no one was asking for a prequel, especially after the madness that was Tim Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Who could blame them? Considering that Gene Wilder’s original performance of Rohl Dahl’s candyman and Chocolatier Willy Wonka cannot be topped, this film wasn’t too high on anyone’s list. Still, here we are with Warner Bros. new film, Wonka, starring Timothée Chalamet as the starring character in his youth, about to open his first sweets shop. Once you get through the hard shell, you do see the sweet, gooey centre of something really special.

Wonka is simply described as the story of Willy Wonka’s beginnings, wanting to break into the Gallerie Gourmet with nothing but a handful of sovereigns and a hatful of dreams. Wonka prides himself in the appearance of both a magician and a chocolatier, fusing them to create marvellous scenes and spectacles like chocolates that can make you fly or even bring back memories or feelings of happy times in one’s life. With the assistance of a young girl named Noodle and a rag-tag band of misfits that were tricked into servitude like Wonka, relying on the generosity of others, … Read More

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Entertainment Reviews

I Just Saw You In My Dream, Is That Weird?: “Dream Scenario” Review

Dreams are funny little things that our minds play with when the rest of our body is resting or asleep. For some, they might be working over the things that are on their mind during the day. Others, it might be a struggle to face your fears in a place where you aren’t physically in danger. But what if there was someone watching you in your dreams? A24’s Dream Scenario tackles this exact thought with Nicholas Cage being the “man of your dreams” in this dark comedy of limitless possibilities.

Paul Matthews, Cage’s character and the protagonist of this film, is an unremarkable professor who desperately wants his work to be appreciated. For some inexplicable reason, people start seeing Paul’s likeness in their dreams while they are asleep. The news reaches Paul in the waking world and he instantly becomes a viral, Internet-famous celebrity which for Paul is a dream come true to have his own talents recognised in his field of study. Soon, the likeness of Paul in the dreams becomes less of a passive observer and more of a nightmare to his audience of millions, which starts to create obstacles for the real Paul and his family.

Generally, … Read More

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Entertainment

Getting Back In Sync: “Trolls: Band Together” Review

I’ll start by saying that I’ve only seen one Trolls movie before this screening of the third movie in the series. With Trolls, it seemed like a fairly inoffensive, kid-friendly jukebox musical, even if they did butcher Gorillaz’ “Clint Eastwood” for one scene. Of course, who didn’t hear “Can’t Stop the Feeling” on the radio when the movie was first released in cinemas?

With the second movie, Trolls: World Tour, the release around 2020 says all that it needs to about why I couldn’t get to the cinema to see it and with home releases, my time was split away from watching another sequel in a kids’ franchise. So, why Band Together? Well, with this movie being the catalyst of *NYSNC getting back together to record new music this year, I figured I’d see how it is for a fun, family-friendly cinema experience. Boy bands bring back a certain nostalgia from my childhood that isn’t easy to ignore.

Trolls: Band Together takes place after the events of the first two movies with a Bergen wedding between Gristle and Bridget, demonstrating the peace between the Bergens and the Trolls. However, the movie focuses more on Branch, the down-to-earth Troll, and … Read More

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Entertainment

Chip ‘N Dale: Rescue Rangers New Trailer is the Disney Nostalga Trip I Never Knew I Wanted

In all my years of being a Disney fan, one of my favorite Disney TV shows was Chip ‘N Dale’s Rescue Rangers alongside other great Disney TV shows such as Talespin, Darkwing Duck, and of course, Duck Tales. The last thing I ever expected was a return to this classic animated Disney show but I also did not anticipate after watching the trailer (which you can check out below) just how much of a nostalgia trip this new movie would be.

So as it seems, this movie takes place in a land similar to Toon Town from Who Framed Roger Rabbit where toons and humans live together in semi-harmony and the plot shows that some of these toons tend to randomly disappear. That is where you will immediately being to noticed a very large number of these animated characters such as Lemur from Beauty and the Beast. The movie shows Dale as more of a CGI character from the fact that he got surgery to do so, Dale decides to pay Chip a visit who still has his classic animated look. Various scenes in the trailer hint at the possibility of Peter Pan being our main antagonist but that will … Read More

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Entertainment

The Blue Blur is Back: Sonic the Hedgehog 2 Movie Review

Video game movies have always had a tendency of either being downright awful (here’s looking at you Uwe Boll) to being good yet insanely cheesy such as movies like the 1995 movie based on the video game hit, Mortal Kombat. Because of this, many gamers and moviegoers alike have come to brace themselves whenever a movie based on a video game is announced and then released hoping that this movie might be the one that ends up doing the source material some justice with many failing and some just missing the mark.

Until 2020 when Sega decided to bring the blue blur himself, Sonic the Hedgehog, to movie theaters nationwide, and it absolutely dominated as one of if not the best video game movie ever made. Now, Sonic is back and he has brought some very familiar friends along to take on a returning Jim Carey as Dr. Eggman after being isolated on the Mushroom Planet since the end of the first movie. We find Sonic making his home in the lush town of Green Hills just outside of Seattle where Sonic hopes to be the hero that he believes is his destiny.

While trying to maintain a normal life … Read More