Harry Potter Summer Memory Part 1

 know, I haven’t finished the Director’s  series I did, but I figured I could start another series since I am a DISTRACTED genius.

Summer 2011 was Harry Potter summer for me. The premiere, the coping, the friends I lost and made, it all happened.

But today I want to concentrate on a one of a kind totally awesome most amazing HP-related thing I did: Hogwarts Vacation Bible School.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with  VBS, it’s basically this thing that goes on for a week and it’s got a theme and kids go and learn about God and Jesus and all that cool stuff.

So a local church here in town chose to eschew those lame themes and do a Hogwarts Vacation Bible School, which was a very bold move on their part. 

I don’t actually attend this church (I go to one down the street) but I play music for them at their cool midnight church service and my sister went to pre-k and Kindergarten there.

But they were having this thing. So I went and helped.

It was so adorable.

The main room was decorated like the Great Hall and Hermione taught you songs and Dumbledore told you stories in the basement and Professor Snape gave you challenges to do and it so frakkin’ adorable. The four hoses were re-named after the four gospels. I was very impressed. And as far as the lessons, they were using symbolism from the Harry Potter books to teach Christian values and principals. I also heard John Granger came to speak at the thing, but I missed that bit.

I brought along one of my friends and we did house-elf duties, and I was playing Kreacher and she was playing Dobby.

But what was so cool is that this church had the boldness to do a Hogwarts Bible School. A lot of other churches wouldn’t let their kids go, because they think Harry Potter is a how-to Wiccan Handbook.  But on further inspection, this was a perfectly legitimate church outing. I was so impressed.

-Randi 

Hipster Movies

-So I want to see all these crazy underground movies lately. And a lot of people are, to put in meme terms, "coming at me bro". Just because you went to  see Transformers 3 and I went to go see the King's Speech doesn't mean the world is going to end. I honestly don't see the problem. Do hipster films translate to, like, Black Swan or something? I don't even know. Either way, nothing shall deter me!

The Great Week of Movie Watching! Part 1

Hi everyone! I've been watching a ton of movies lately, new and old. So I'm gonna sum 'em all up in a four part series.



The Help- First of all, I loved the book to the point of suffocation and this movie had high expectations. And it got as good as it could get. I'm not going to go into plot detail, just general over-view.
1. There's one of thing that the movie has that the book didin't: Viola Davis, Octavia Spencer, and Emma Stone with an amazing cast of supporting characters. I forgot the name of the lady who played Celia Foote but lawdy she was funny. The ending made me want to cry more than the book did and I really loved watching it. Like, I never thought WHEN IS IT GONNA BE OVER!?!?!? I loved sitting in the theater with my mum and laughing and crying and listening to other people have the same reaction

NOTE: The following review is writted (that was on purpose) by my fantabulous brother CALEB...

Schindler's List- I spent most of my life hearing about Schindler's List as a really great, really graphic, really emotional kind of movie. but in my whole life, I had never seen it. so Randi got it off Netflix. I watched it, and I must say that it was one of the best I've seen. I love Liam Neeson for his always epic acting, and this movie's probably his best (that I've seen at least. I've yet to see taken, which I was told is great). The black and white is hard to get used in a way, but it's not a negative at all. The picture quality itself is just as good as any movie made today and seeing that kind of quality in black 'n white is definitely a great effect. Color is used only twice in the movie, both times to show significant important things. If you wanna see what the holocaust was like, the closest depiction of it is this movie. No hidden violence here. All shown, all the time. Best movie I've seen in a while.

KEEL BEEL VON AND TWO (otherwise known as the two part film known as Kill Bill)-  Quentin Tarantino has one of the best imaginations. Ever. I know, ranking such abstract things as imagination is super unfair. But Quentin Tarntino must be something of a genius. I think so anyway. But alas, I'd never seen Kill Bill, which is like his second most popular, well-loved, well-reviewed film (first goes to Pulp Fiction obviously). So I invited my best friend, the Diabolical Diabetic overe to watch them with me. And I loved them more than I loved the previous two movies. It had everything I love: Action, drama, weird swords, weirder people, long lost kids, tricked-out trucks, assassins, crazy asians, all done tongue in cheek. I won't give anything away, 'cause youu need to see these for yourself. It's a thrill ride fo' sho'.

That concludes part 1!

Love and sonic screwdrivers,
Randi

Florence and the Machine's New Single "What the Water Gave Me"

So I'm a huge Florence and the Machine fan. So natrually this new single already had high expectations. Produced by Paul Epworth (he's worked on Adele's new album as well) and brilliantly done, "What The Water Gave Me" is exactly what I thought it was going to be and more.
The song starts out pretty relaxed. Some of Isa's famous keys and a delicioius bass line and Florence basically setting the format.
Then the chorus has some nice jazzy organ, and the lyrics really kick in. And then the Machine gets the groove on and it blows up by the bridge and it's the same exhillirating feel as other Flo classics like Cosmic Love and Dog Days Are Over. This song reminds me of a cross between My Boy Builds Coffins and Hurricane Drunk from the previous album with some newly discovered groovy bass thrown in and a bit more guitar than Lungs.
If Dog Days was the apocalypse, Cosmic Love was the meteor shower, Hurricane Drunk was the Hurricane, than What The Water Gave Me is the Tidal Wave.
You can hear the song on youtube. Job well done to Flo and the Machine once again!


Much love and sonic screwdrivers,
Randi

Wilfred Confuses Me

Thanks to my brother and a very funny youtube comedian who's even more ADD than I am, it seems I've discovered the whereabouts of Elijah Wood the Hobbit Boy.
He's on FX on this insane show called Wilfred.
And I haven't seen a single episode, but this sound whack, so somebody correct me if I'm getting this wrnog.

So there's this guy, and he's depressed and there's this dog that's actually a guy but nobody else thinks it's a guy in a dog suit and they go off and have silly misadventures to make depressed guys's life better and depressed guy is Elijah Wood.
Am I with it so far?
I'm generally confuzzled at this point. This shouldn't work, but apparently people love it...I need closure.

Much love and Sonic Screwdrivers,
Randi

Casablanca: Lives Up To the Hype

So Casablanca is one of those classic movies that nobody I know seems to have seen, so I decided to finally use my powers of Netflix and check it out.
In short, this is one of if not the best romance I've seen. And the answer is simple.
It's so darn good.
There's no other excuse. It's just good.
The dialouge is beautiful (here's looking at you kid) and there just isn't anything that annoyed me int he movie. It was delicious from start to finish.


You should check it out. I know a lot of people have issues with it because it's old and what not but put black-and-white aside and turn on subtitles and you'll get caught up in it anyway.

Much love and sonic screwdrivers,
Randi

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 Review

Well, considering the first time I tried to do it I ended up crying, here is a full, very biased review of the last Harry Potter adventure.
SPOILERS FOR THE SUPA FANS AHEAD!
We start off where we left off in Part 1 with Voldemort stealing the Elder Wand from Dumbledore (small tear ensues).
Then the trio rob Gringotts, sneak back into Hogwarts, you know the story.
First all the stuff I liked:
-McGonagall (Maggie Smith) dueling Severus Snape (The great Alan Rickman) in the Great Hall and then bringing the light back to the room just made my heart swell.
-The Dragon!!!!!! DRAGONS!
-Helena Bonham Carter did a wonderful job of pretending to be Hermione pretending to be Bellatrix. That's a hard task to accomplish and she does it so well.
-Neville (Matt Lewis) really gets to step up in this part, and Matt really just topped off the whole film. It's been a joy to see him grow from scared little klutz to the hero depicted here.
- The Prince's Tale/ Snape's Death are the only places I let myself sob during. I loved it to pieces. I was so happy.
-The Room of Requirement chase scene with the Fiendfyre and everything. Oh my Lady Gaga, that was awesome.
-The awkward Voldemort/Draco hug of AWESOME! That made me laugh so hard.
-Ron's little one liner as he gets Hermione into the Chamber of Secrets. The whole theater laughed.
-Yes, you knew it was coming. THE RON/HERMIONE KISS! It was tremendous and funny and the theater cheered loudly the two times I've seen it.
-Molly Weasly/ Bellatrix. I'd been waiting for that since the first time I read the sequence in the books.
-VOLDEMORT CONFETTI!
THINGS I DIDN'T LIKE:
I think the Prince's Tale could've been a bit better, but I had such high expectations that would've been impossible to reach them in the first place.
-THEY DIDN'T MEND HARRY'S WAND!!!!!! What was this?!?!??!!??!?!/ It would've taken five seconds to film! I would rather have Harry mend his wand than Neville's motivational speech.
-As much as I like the Bellatrix and Voldemort confetti, I would've prefered the original deaths.
-What happened to the Cloak of Invisibility? Not even mentioned even though it's one of the freakin' Deathly Hallows!

I was happy with the film. It was a fitting send off. I'm gonna miss the premieres and such as the years wear on. But knowing Hollywood, be prepared for re-makes.
I'll write a report on the premiere itself when I get the time.


Much love and Sonic Screwdrivers,
Randi