小门神 - 2016

AKA The Guardian Brothers, or Little Door Gods.

Not bad, it’s interesting, not boring, it’s nice and the little girl is nice, but it’s a movie more for kids than adults I’d say. Nothing I’d watch more than once.

Details:

There were once two spirits who protected anyone who would put their images on their doors (or something like that) but the world changed and people forgot about the spirits, and now the spirit world is in chaos. Only Rain’s grandma still believes in them, and keeps the images on the doors of her old diner place. But Grandma died, and Rain and her mother Luli kept the place going. 

The new mayor in the spirit world wants a radical change, wants to totally cut any dealings with the humans, and he bans old Beckett because he helped an old human lady who had fallen down.

He remembers when many many years ago there was an evil enemy called Nian, and spirits and humans had to fight together to seal it away. Now one of the brothers thinks that if they freed the Nian, humans and spirits would work together again.

Nobody wants to eat in that old place and even the kids are mean to Rain, and she is very unhappy now. 

The slim brother is tired of these new rules and upset when he’s ordered to destroy the images that are portals to the humans world, so he crosses over. YuLei saves Rain against angry dogs, then he leaves. YuLei breaks the first seal to free the Nian, and the dragon takes his powers and his youth. That was easy, Colossus was a friend and didn’t fight him, but the second is guarded by Bloom and she stops him, but then she sits to talk to him and he sneakily breaks it, and she’s sucked away, and YuLei ages a bit more. There’s still a third seal. Despite all the troubles he’s causing to humans too (no water, no rivers) he goes on. His brother ShenTu tries to stop him. 

When they got no more water, Luli got some from their neighbour, who put something in it and they got in trouble. Then they accidentally put petals in it and their soups were now magical, but now there are no more petals. Rain and Luli decided to try on new ingredients and got more popular, and Rain finally found some friends to play with.

Still, YuLei is going on, and losing a bit of his spirit each time, and he almost breaks the third seal but ShenTu stops him in time (well, he had sort of stopped himself already, he had destroyed the statues/images of himself, but couldn’t bring himself to cut his brother’s) but then ShenTu accidentally finishes what he started, and breaks the third seal. Now both worlds are in trouble but Rain finds out that fireworks keep it at bay. 

In the spirit world, the brothers and the flying kids defeat the evil tree Nian (nooo, I love trees, couldn’t it have been an evil insect? :p)

Now YuLei is young again and the brothers open a restaurant for the spirits in their world, and the humans now believe again in the spirits and feel safe knowing that they are watching over them.

P.s. What happened to Bloom though? Is she alright?

Beautiful creatures - 2013

It’s… honestly a bit boring. The story is not bad, but it’s a very slow building, and only becomes intriguing half-way through, but still the ending is rather unsatisfying, so not a movie to watch and rewatch, no. It was enough the first time, actually, I was tempted to give up more than once.

Details:

In a small town in the south lives Ethan, who has lost his mother in a car accident and lives with a father who never lives his room. He dreams of leaving, and he literally dreams of loving a girl he has never met. 

Lena is the new girl in town, and her uncle is the infamous Ravenwood. Everyone talks badly of him, as if he and his family are satanists or something. The popular girl in class are all ‘my mum says’, all prayers and bad-mouth. 

Ethan is intrigued by this girl. He finds a locket and wants to give it to her so he goes to her house. Ravenwood sort of freaks him out, when Ethan tries to say how he wishes to study far away from here and instead he starts saying how he will live here for the rest of his life, marrying a girl and having an affair with another, divorcing and becoming an alcoholic until he commits suicide, or something like that.

When he and Lena both touch the locket they have a vision (of a couple in love that died during a war?) and wakes up at his house with no recollection of how he got there. He goes back and a spell prevents him from reaching the house until Lena arrives to save him. She tells him her family is different, they have powers, and she’s tired of hiding. In two or three months she will be sixteen, and then her powers will be judged, and only her true nature will decide if she’ll belong to the light or the darkness. 

Macon’s sister Saraphine arrives to bring trouble. She’s of the dark. Ridley is Lena’s cousin, and Larkin’s brother. Nobody seems happy to see Ridley, she was not invited. She was claimed by the dark. She speaks of a curse Lena knows nothing about. Lena says Ridley wasn’t so bad before she turned sixteen, they were like sisters, then she was claimed by the dark and became what she is, she’s like a siren, and we see she caused a guy’s death.

Lena and Ethan touch the locket again, and they see a Genevieve in love with an Ethan, but he was shot and she was desperate so she used magic to revive him, then she turned dark and killed him, and went on killing, and Saraphine, her mother, says that they are all dark because they are Genevieve’s descendants. It was a forbidden spell. There’s no love in the darkness.

Macon says that they can’t love mortals, and that Lena must leave Ethan, but he’s afraid for her (he says that he knows her like he knows himself… kids…)

Seraphine possesses Mrs Lincoln to go after Ethan, and he’s finally had enough. He barges into Lena’s house saying that nobody will keep him away, he’ll stay with her, and thus he breaks the spell her family used to protect her, and he’s now the one who protects her. 

They go to Amma for help on the curse. For weeks they go to the magical library to read an ancient powerful book, and she gets bitter and afraid, she starts changing, but he doesn’t leave and stays with her.

She finds that in order to break the curse, the one she loves must die. She tells Amma she’ll never hurt him, but there are many ways to ‘die’. 

She takes the memories of her away from him, and he wakes up thinking that he barely knows her, that she’s nothing to him.

Seraphine and Ridley are still plotting against them. There’s a war re-enactment and Ridley charmed Ethan’s friend Link so that when they shoot each other, Link shoots him for real.

Only it wasn’t really Ethan, it was Macon with a glamour, his idea to protect them both and break the curse nonetheless, because ‘someone she loves has to die’, so Macon dies.

Lena confronts her mother and cousin. Ridley says it wasn’t her idea and begs for her forgiveness, and thanks her when she tells her to go, and she flees. Seraphine keeps wanting her on the dark side, but she battles her, and forces her out of that body and… turns her into dead wood? Not clear here, is Seraphine dead now or simply gone from here?

Anyway, six months later, Ethan still doesn’t remember anything, and he’s leaving, a tour around colleges, maybe New York University, and he stops to talk to her after saying goodbye to Amma.

He drives away with Link at the wheel, but as soon as they pass the town border, we see the car stopping and he yells Lena’s name. The end.

Oh, and we see that she has one normal eye, and one coloured like her mother, which means she’s half-light, half-dark.

Macon- Jeremy Irons

Lena- Alice Englert

Ethan- Alden Ehrenreich

Amma- Viola Davis

Ridley- Emmy Rossum

Mrs Lincoln/Sarafine- Emma Thompson

Gilmore Girls: A year in the life

Well, very nostalgic, that's the most important thing it has going for it. You watch it and you feel nostalgic, seeing again everything and everyone. That's the other point, really everyone. What I liked the most was the town, of course, the beauty of Stars Hollow, especially at the start of the first episode, it's so beautiful.

About plot... well, of course I know this is supposed to be a year of their lives after so long, so it's not like there's a simple plot for each episode, but still... everything felt a bit forced, and Lorelai seemed very sad, even at the end when they tell her she looks happy, she doesn't really. The first scene is the only one when she looks happy.

What I didn't like is, well, Rory. The character, of course. She's supposed to be this perfect little angel, everyone treats her like she's precious, and she was indeed a sweet little girl once, but now... think about it, how she is with Paul, and Logan, and even Lorelai, the one and only time Lorelai says no to her she's in a fit about how it's so so important for her and mum doesn't understand, and of course the angel wins, only in this series she's no angel at all.

Below I wrote my comments on each episode while I watched them for the first time, but this introduction is written after I've seen it all. I liked it for its nostalgic value, but Rory annoyed me no end. She behaves very badly towards Paul, and she has an affair with Logan who knows for how long, maybe they've had this arrangement to sleep together whenever they are in the same city for the last ten years, since they broke up? Anyway, it seemed like she was destined for a brilliant career when we left her, and now she's nowhere, a lost girl like many others only she's got lots of people behind her to help her.

The point is, I think, that everyone seems less nice, the girls especially. They used to be funny and so so nice, but here they are... not really nice to others, they think of themselves and that's it, the way Rory cheats and helps cheat, the way Lorelai fires people like it's nothing, the way they talk about fat people... they are not nice here, these two girls were lovely, Rory was so sweet and good, and Lorelai was funny and nice and heartbreaking and positive and I loved her, but here they are rude and selfish.

ep1  Winter

The first bit was very nice: the town beautifully covered in snow, people going their own merry way while we move in search of Lorelai. Then we see her and immediately Rory arrives, and it’s nicely nostalgic - maybe just a little forced, but in a way that’s ok because it’s no more their every-day either, Rory just got off a plane, she lived in Brooklyn but is often in London… and for a little while it’s very nice, then it starts getting a bit confusing, sometimes annoying, and sad…

So, basically Rory had a horrible apartment in Brooklyn but she had to leave it and now is without a home at 32 years old (which is an interesting age, the same age Lorelai was when the series started ^_^). So, ten years have passed. She wrote an article for the New York Times (I think, it was the NYT right?) and Luke is very very proud of her, but we don’t know what else she managed to do in ten years. She seemed determined to have a great career last we saw her, and now she only has one article going for her?

Being without a house of her own, she sent all her stuff… to everyone she knows apparently. Two boxes at Lorelai’s, two boxes at Lane’s, two boxes at Emily’s… maybe more, I think she even sent stuff to Paris’ house, not sure, it’s very very confusing and kind of absurd really. Ok, they were always bizarre, but this looks like madness. She wants one special dress and she goes house to house in search of it :-/

She has a boyfriend of two years, Paul, and this whole thing is probably supposed to be funny but I found it extremely annoying because he appears to be sweet and caring but nobody can remember him, not even Rory, and she keeps saying throughout the episode that she has to break up with him but she keeps forgetting about it. It’s rather cruel if you ask me, they’re playing with his feelings without the smallest consideration for him, and we see that Rory has even the occasional ‘meeting’ with her old blond (what was his name? I was never fond of him, but he should be the one she left when she refused to marry him). So she’s a cheater too, technically. She doesn’t care for Paul at all!

She finally has a meeting with a woman in London (River Song, people!) who offers her to write together her life story, but it seems very suspicious to me. She says herself that ‘things taste better when they are stolen’ or something of that meaning, and I think she might want to steal Rory’s work as well, but we’ll see, I haven’t see the next episodes yet.

We see Lane, who has the same life, still married to Zach and still playing in the band, but I think they have two children and he’s upset because he got a promotion and now has to wear a tie at work.

The rest of the episode is sad and upsetting. Four months ago Richard died, Rory came to the funeral then had to go catch a plane, but Lorelai stayed until late - which seemed to please Emily a lot, but then Emily insisted everyone still present shared a memory of Richard, and when it came to her, Lorelai didn’t know what to say. She had a lot to drink and just woke up, and she can’t think of anything nice, so she says the first thing that comes to mind, that when she was a child they were playing but then Richard left, sort of forgetting about her, and another story even more embarrassing of him catching her having sex with a boy while she was supposed to be playing the host part at a party, and it’s a disaster. She tries later to apologise multiple times but Emily is beyond upset. They fight again, and it’s sad because it’s the same old story that Lorelai can do nothing about but Emily can’t accept. Only now Lorelai tells this story to Rory, who says she could have said that Richard loved books… which is sad in itself, if your only good memory of your father is something as impersonal as ‘he loved books’. 

Lorelai then ends up suggesting her mother should go into therapy - really, her house full of her maid’s family is unnerving, she doesn’t understand a word they are saying but she has her house full of Berta’s family and relatives. Anyway, Emily actually finds a therapist and thanks Lorelai for her advice, and Lorelai is so shocked and moved by this that accepts to meet this new therapist, only later realising that she just accepted to have therapy with her mother.

About the rest… Michel got married and is now worried his new partner might want a child. Sookie left work a year ago and Lorelai can’t find a replacement because nobody is good enough. Luke still works at his diner but gives out fake wifi-passwords because he doesn’t want people staying there the whole day (as Taylor angrily explains). Paris is divorcing Doyle and quite bitter about it, no surprise. She now runs a surrogate-business. If someone wants a child she finds a surrogate for them, she has a whole catalogue of women, and it’s all very upsetting. I was quite relieved when Luke stormed out refusing it. A very upsetting thing really.

Taylor wants to improve the town’s health by introducing a sewer system, and he sort of had the best bit of the whole episode, his outburst of him loving this city was quite good.

There was a mysterious man at Richard’s funeral that talked to Lorelai as if they knew each other well but I have no idea who he is.

We see Miss Patty only in passing, and Kirk is his usual bizarre self, only more forced, trying a uber-like service for a little while.

That’s it.

ep 2  Spring

It was full on winter when Emily talked about therapy, and it’s full on spring when they actually go, even their first visit, since Emily says Lorelai is there to meet Claudia. How time flies, right?

We see Mr Kim ( ! ) and Mrs Kim with a few young Korean guys who sing in the most depressing and terrified way. 

Rory keeps seeing Logan whenever she’s around (I looked his name up), even if she has a boyfriend and he has a girlfriend. She also keeps it a secret from her mom, who thinks she stays with female friend Didi when in London. She accepts Logan’s father’s help for Conde Naste. 

Rory keeps going mad about that book with the Naomi crazy woman, while there’s a new internet site that strongly wants her, but she keeps saying no because it’s not big enough :-/

She still has boxes everywhere and has not yet found her lucky dress :-/

Oh, she wrote that article for the New Yorker!

Rory and Paris go to the Chilton school to give embarrassing speeches to the kids. Paris is all angry as usual, she has kids that she leaves to the nanny, and goes frantic when she sees Tristin there. Rory is offered a teacher position, if she ever gets a master. 

The town council was boring and annoying: asking neighbouring towns to lend them some gays for the parade, complaining that only b-level actors are staying at the Dragonfly Inn while the big ones are over in Woodbury… Michel’s rant was depressingly annoying. Lorelai is worried he might want to leave because their Inn is too small and not successful, and Lorelai fires yet another chef.

During therapy, Lorelai and Emily keeps either fighting or staying silent, until one Tuesday Emily doesn’t show up, she quits. And now she finally talks.

Emily wants Luke to start a franchising with the money Richard left him for that purpose, so they spend a Tuesday together and Luke learns that Emily quit therapy, while Lorelai keeps telling him they are both still going.

Rory’s book project with Naomi goes off, the woman’s crazy, and she tries to write an article about queues, (they call them lines in New York?), and Lorelai goes with her, and Rory has a one-night stand with a guy and has a life crisis and tells Lorelai about Logan. Yeah, engaged-Logan.

Lorelai tells her to say yes to the website, but she’s very snob about it. She goes there without anything prepared, expecting them to drool over her, instead she doesn’t get the job and fights with the woman there, and goes back to mummy.

ep3  Summer 

Lorelai and Rory spend some time by the pool, bodyshaming people, and for some unknown reason having two little boys hold their umbrellas to shield them from the sun. 

Rory keeps yelling that she’s not ‘back’, is horrified by the suggestion that she should join a group of people in their thirties who sort of came back and started hang out together, and she wants to be with Logan but now Odette, his fiancee, has moved in with him, so she would have to stay at a hotel - they are very light about this, none of them having the littlest guilt about this, since they both have someone else???

The Hollow Gazette would close because the old editor has left, so Rory volunteers for the job. There’s only two other people working there, an old man and a woman. 

Michel officially quits, and Lorelai asks Luke’s help to cook hamburgers at the Dragonfly, leaving his own diner. Rory calls her mum to help her deliver the gazette, and of course now everyone is complaining because the gazette is different with her.

She keeps at it, but she’s not happy, she feels like a loser and completely lost, and once again it’s Jess that comes to her aid. He speaks to her, and tells her to write about what she knows, which is about her life and Lorelai’s. She starts immediately, and is pretty excited, but when she shares her idea with mum, she gets a no and they fight because Rory is all ‘I have to do this!’, but I get Lorelai’s side, it’s her life, and it’s been difficult. 

Lorelai feels lost too. She has a little fight with Luke because he didn’t tell her about the frandchising hunt but she didn’t tell him about the therapy, so at the end of the episode she says she’ll go away for a few weeks, (to go for a long walk in the wild???) simply because it’s now or never.

ep 4  Fall 

Lorelai did go, to take that excursion like in ‘Wild’, the book not the movie because she’s a purist, but she doesn’t enjoy herself much, and she ends up not doing it at all, but she clears her head anyway when she sees a wonderful landscape and remembers a nice episode with her father and she calls Emily immediately to tell her what it was - personally I found it a bit sad that her best birthday was the day her father met her outside school after a boy left her and was cruel to her and she was crying her heart out, and her dad bought her a pretzel and took her to the movies and back home without a word to her mom.

Anyway, after that she goes home, and Luke is sure she’s going to leave him and starts ranting on how they can overcome anything, how he’s not unhappy like she seems to think he is, and how he’ll never let her go, but she wasn’t going to leave him, she actually tells him that they must get married, and it’s all settled already. 

Rory meets Logan and his three friends, and this whole thing was very bizarre, I thought she was dreaming at first, what was that? The office in the dark, the crow calling to her, it was pretty strange. Anyway, they take her away in a crazy trip somewhere, she sleeps with Logan, he says he’s really going to marry Odette as per dynasty duty, or something, and she leaves him. He wanted to give her a house where she could write but she refuses because she goes to her grandpa study to write.

Rory gives the first three chapters to Lorelai to read, but of course nobody can ever deny anything to Rory so she doesn’t even read them, she just tells her to go on writing it. It will be called ‘Gilmore girls’.

Rory tells Jess about her book coming along while Luke is present, and then Luke asks him about it. It does seem like Jess is not completely over Rory, because who could ever be, right? *rollingeyes

And yet it’s a bit annoying, it’s been more than ten years since the two went out together, so Jess shouldn’t have to say it, that he’s over it, true or not. And if he isn't, he could always try again, right? Instead of watching her from afar, she's available after all.

Rory meets Dean while shopping and they talk a bit, just a nostalgic scene, they also show Sookie back at the Inn to present lots of wedding cakes for Lorelai, there’s even a shot with Richard at his desk when Rory goes to his study to write. To close the nostalgic trip showing everyone. Personally, I always liked Dean much more than Jess the rebel or Logan the spoiled brat.

They hadn’t talked about Paul at all, then Rory receives a text and it’s him breaking up with her because they never see each other. Usually it would be a terrible thing to break up with a text, but in this case it was more than she deserved, she already acted like she didn’t have a boyfriend, completely forgetting his existence, but of course the only thing Lorelai tells her perfect daughter is that he wasn’t the right one. As if it was his fault…

Rory even goes to meet Christopher, who now has a job and lots of money, and asks him how he felt, about her growing up with only her mother, and apparently it was how it had to be, and the last image is of Rory telling her mother that she’s pregnant… the end. Will she tell Logan? Or will she say nothing, knowing that he has his life planned without her?Will we ever know? Not sure I care, honestly. 

ITA Una mamma per amica: di nuovo insieme

Murder mystery - 2019

Not bad but not great either. It would be better if you were an Adam Sandler fan, which I am not. And I didn’t like his character at all, which is the main problem since he’s the protagonist.

I like Jennifer Aniston, though.

This is some kind of parody of mystery movies and books. 

Details:

Nick and Audrey are married, been for years, and their anniversary is approaching. She’s a hairdresser and complaints that he’s not romantic at all, that he used to make promises but never kept them, like their trip to Europe, so when they have a discussion at home and she brings it up, he lies and says he had already organised it as a surprise.

Problem is, Nick always lies. She thinks he’s a detective, that he got a promotion, but it’s not true.

On the plane, she wanders around to watch the first class, and meets Charles Cavendish, a very rich and handsome man. They talk for a while and he invites them to go with him on a yacht. Nick refuses at first but then agrees when he sees the bus they were supposed to use.

There are other people on the yacht, reunited there to celebrate billionaire Malcolm Quince marriage to a much younger girl, Suzi. She used to be engaged to Charles. There’s also actress Grace, Malcolm’s son Tobey, a colonel who saved Malcolm’s life years ago and his guard, a maharajah, and car pilot Juan Carlos.

The pilot doesn’t speak English at all, and the maharajah is the “yo” type, which is maybe supposed to be funny, I found it annoying.

Malcolm says that they are all parasite that wait for his money, so he prepares to sign a new will in front of them where he leaves everything to Suzi, but before he can the lights go out long enough for someone to kill Malcolm. Everyone suspects Tobey at first, but he’s found dead shortly after. 

French inspector Delacroix interrogates them all and suspects Nick and Audrey.

Audrey is a fan of mystery books, and up until this moment had fun trying to decipher the clues. Being suspects now, they kind of have to find out who actually did it.

The inspector knows that he lied and it’s a simple sergeant, who failed the detective test three times.

Cavendish provided accommodations for them, so at least they are not stranded on the street. That’s rather on Cavendish’s favour, I’d say.

Audrey suspects Suzi for no reason, just how Nick suspects Cavendish because he’s jealous of him. They get a message to go talk to Sergei, they go and hear a story about the Colonel and why he might have killed the old man. When the colonel saved Malcolm, he had a girlfriend, but when he came out of the coma, she was married to Malcolm. She died, and her child too.

Someone comes and kills Sergei and they escape through the window, see the colonel in his room flossing his teeth and they enter another room where the maharajah and Grace jump on the table while they are under it, but it seems he can’t… perform so they leave.

They can’t suspect the colonel at this point, and they see the tv news where their pictures are shown as murder suspects. Audrey finds out he’s not a detective and is quite upset that he lied to her. 

Cavendish brings her to Lake Como. She finds Japanese medicine and suspects he acted with Suzi. Nick is there because he followed Suzi. Someone shoots at them and they run after them with Juan Carlos. They meet Suzi with a gun, but she gets murdered with a dart. Nick shoots so badly it’s a miracle he doesn’t kill anyone in their own houses.

Suzi can’t speak and tries to mime, which looked a lot like ‘filming a movie’ to me but Audrey doesn’t get it. 

Four are dead now.

They think it was Cavendish and call the inspector saying where they are going, Malcolm’s villa. Malcolm arrives there with the carabinieri :-p

They find Cavendish already dead. They talk about always doing things together, so they plan to get in a room with anyone and figure it out, but for the final showdown they dress up - she found a red dress in a random closet, while he took Cavendish’s tuxedo off him.

Not sure why, but Grace, Juan Carlos, the maharajah and the colonel are there as well.

They do a recap, where they think everyone… did not do it. 

Nick asked help from his friend in New York police, where the Madeleine woman died but there’s no death certificate for the child, and they accuse Grace of being that child, which she admits… just like that. Audrey proves by making her take the hat off, where she got hurt by Nick with a plate. Nick successfully shoots her in the shoulders (why did the inspector give orders in French? I mean, he’s French and is speaking English to the others, but the carabinieri speak Italian :-/ )

They take Grace away, then Juan Carlos betrays himself by answering to Audrey’s thank you.

The maharajah says she couldn’t have killed Sergei because she was with him, so they understand about Juan Carlos and go after him, but he drives away on a carabinieri car (saying Tobey did kill his father, convinced by Grace). Grace killed Suzi and Cavendish, Juan Carlos killed Sergei.

Nick and Audrey get inside a Ferrari - for some reason with the wheel on the right side, so she drives.

The inspector he took is alive, but Juan Carlos is hit by the bus they should have taken.

The inspector gives them back their passports and sends them away on their anniversary trip, which apparently they arranged for them. They board the Orient-Express…

Nick Spitz- Adam Sandler

Audrey - Jennifer Aniston

Charles Cavendish - Luke Evans

Tobey - David Walliams

We can be heroes - 2020

A movie for children, but a nice one. Recommended. I think kids will like it. For adults it’s obviously rather silly, so you must watch it with kids’ eyes, in which case I found it nice enough and funny. The speeches were boring for me, heard them in a thousand movies already, but if you’re a kid you haven’t, so it’s okay. You can take it like a parody and smile ^_^

Basically, there are lots of superheroes, called the Heroics, and they are sent anytime there’s a problem. Missy’s father promised her not to do it anymore, but when lots and lots of aliens show up in the sky, he’s ordered to join the others. All the superheroes are defeated and trapped inside a space ship. Missy’s father is the leader, then there’s MiracleGuy, father of Wheels, LavaGirl and SharkBoy, parents of Guppy, Tech-No, father of Wild Card, BlindingFast, father of SlowMo, Ms Vox, mother of A Cappella, CrushingLow father of Facemaker, Invisi-girl mother of Noodles, and a couple always bickering, parents of Rewind and FastForward. I don’t think they are named during the movie, but the ending credits read a CrimsonLegend and a RedLightningFury and that’s probably them, since she wore red and he wore black and red, and also they sound like superheroes name and they’re the only ones without a name.

The children are kept locked in a room by Ms Granada for their protection, but when they see on tv that their parents have been captured, Missy plans to escape because she saw on Ojo’s drawings that the aliens will enter their room. Ojo never speaks but she can draw future things.

WildCard is not happy to leave her in charge because he was supposed to be their leader, but she  has a plan and it works, with help from everyone. They get out. Adults try to stop them, but they use their combined powers and escape. They go to Missy’s grandma, who trained all their parents, and now trains them, although not for long because they are found and must escape.

They enter an alien ship and go aboard the big one with their parents.

The president is an alien and Ms Granada too. The children are once again locked in a cell, but Missy gets them out. Once out, Missy and WildCard have a row, she wants to stop the rocket to be launched to Earth, while he wants to free their parents, so he leaves with Facemaker.

Missy and the remaining kids reach the piramid-shaped rocket, and it is revealed that Ojo is an alien and can speak, and is upset because they didn’t work together, but Missy proves that she’s wrong. She knew, looking at one of her drawing that she was an alien, because Ojo only draws the truth and drew herself with tentacles behind her back, so she plotted something with WildCard. Facemaker changed his face to look like him, so that he was free to reach the control room. Now he can finally control his powers, and can stop whoever tries to stop him.

Missy and the other kids work together to fight the aliens and stop the launch, and when they make it, the piramid opens and their parents come out. 

It wasn’t an alien invasion, it was a way for the concerned alien to be sure that the next generation will be able to defend the planet, it wasn’t the takeover of Earth, but of their powers, from the parents to their kids.

All parents now can hug their children, although BlindingFast has to wait a while for SlowMo to reach him (next time, dad, go closer ok?)

The last scene shows the young superheroes with their costumes, not flashy like their parents, but serious and practical, quite cool.

I listened to a bit of audiodescription to see if they named the twins parents, which they don’t because their name really aren’t told. The female voice was really nice and the description well done, only one tiny detail, during a fight she calls Invisi-girl the twins mother, which she isn’t.

It was nice, they mocked in a light way the superhero genre, like their costumes and masks and attitude. They kids were all good.

I only knew two actors in this movie, that I was sure of. Two more that I think I know but don’t know why.

I know Christian Slater of course, and also Sung Kang because I like him. Then there’s Christoper McDonald that I must have seen somewhere for sure but have no idea where, the name isn’t familiar, and same thing for Priyanka Chopra Jonas, I think I saw her somewhere but am not sure.

Conclusion, nice thing. Netflix production huh? They did some pretty cool stuff, really.

Missy - Yaya Gosselin

A Cappella - Lotus Blossom

Facemaker - Andrew Diaz

Ms Granada - Priyanka Chopra Jonas

Tech-no - Christian Slater

Blinding Fast - Sung Kang

President Neil Anami - Christopher McDonald

The prom - 2020

 Well, the story was a good enough one, the two girls were good, played their role well and were really good at singing, most of the songs were good, and the happy ending was welcome and nice. 

I read that this has been a musical for many years but I’ve never seen it, never heard of it before, so I’m not making comparison of any kind. Although I say that that kind of excessive extravaganza works much better in the theatre than in the movies.

Problems? Just a few: 

 - third place, the characters of the actors were too much, I mean they are designed that way, it’s not a matter of acting, but they were really over the top. Too much, really, sometimes it took something away from the story. 

 - second, the scenes with the big revelations on how even the actors have troubled past, to show us they have a heart, like how Dee Dee was once really in love and crushed when she realised her ex husband only cared about her money, or Barry’s story of how he left home because his parents couldn’t accept him for who he was (how he didn’t go to his own prom because the boy he liked showed up with a girl, and his parents wanted to send him to get ‘cured’ so he left and never heard from them again), both interesting messages in the story, but they should have been explained throughout the story showing some character development, not throwing it all on one long scene that turned out to be more boring than touching. Honestly I kept thinking ‘yeah yeah where is Emma?’

 - first: Nicole Kidman… I mean, really??? To play a dancer when she couldn’t put two moves together to save her life? She posed several times, and was extremely coquettish, not believable at all, and the worst part of the movie. Sorry, I have nothing against her and I’ve watched her in other movies (although I admit nothing recent), but this was so not a role for her, come on, everyone danced more than her, literally everyone, and her acting was cold and totally without involvement or emotion.

The songs were nice, the ‘I want to dance with you’ and the ‘love thy neighbour’ (which said a lot of things that I think as well, so a kiss in that direction) and the one about life being difficult, I can’t believe I don’t remember the words, they sang it a lot, anyway, very nice. Also Emma’s song.

Details:

On one hand, we have a small town in Indiana where the parents protests and decide there won’t be a prom because one girl is openly gay and they don’t want her to bring another girl as her date. On the other hand, we have a couple of Broadway actors who are destroyed by a terrible review, and with an unemployed actor and a failed dancer decide that they need to do something that will bring them back on top. The review said they were total narcissist so they find a good cause, and Angie finds Emma’s story on twitter.

They barge into town declaring their support and Emma believes them, and so does her principal (who is completely on her side, bless him) and after various songs they get what they wanted, there will be a prom, and Emma is all excited. Alyssa, her girlfriend, will reveal their relationship at the prom, thinking that being in public will prevent her mother from making a scene (her mom is the head of the protesting parents).

Barry helps her find a dress and they are all excited, but when they get to the school gym, there’s only the principal there. Without telling her, the students and the parents organised a second ball, where they all went, and she’s here alone now. She speaks to Alyssa on the phone, but she’s stuck there now and is too afraid to drop anything and run to her. 

Emma is really really hurt, and next time she meets Alyssa they break up because she can’t go on like that.

Dee Dee calls her ex husband and gives him a house to get Emma a spot on television to tell her story. Emma says thanks but I will do it my way, and she makes a youtube video where she says who she is and plays a song, which is very nice, I like it a lot.

She plans another ball, and our four celebrities give money to make it happen.

Two couples of students come to her to say sorry, after having talked to Trent, and Alyssa tells her mother the truth after she tries to stop it from happening.

The ball is beautiful, and Emma finally dances with Alyssa, and a lot of people who saw her video come to dance too, and even Alyssa’s mother. (And Barry’s mother too, come to say sorry after Dee Dee called her, after decades of not speaking to her son - apologies appreciated, but couldn’t she reach out to him sooner instead of waiting for someone to tell her to? :-/ )

Set it up - 2018

 It was nice, cheerful enough, but the two protagonists’ love story was boring and full of cliches. The ending was pale, but there were funny moments, that were more or less all in the trailer, and there was Lucy Liu which is always a good point.

It starts with showing us the life of many personal assistants, and how they are treated like slaves by irrational men and women that have absolute power over their lives.

Then we are introduced to Harper and Charlie, who supposedly have it worse than anyone. They have a boss who works all the time and demands very much of them, so they have no time for a personal life.

They meet each other while desperately trying to get some food for their boss. Harper ordered it, but she has no cash to pay for it. Charlie didn’t order it (because Rick first said he didn’t want it) but he has cash, so he pays and takes it, but Harper manages to convince him of taking one thing each. She had ordered one thing for Kirsten and one for herself, so they take one each.

Kirsten is a journalist, she writes about sport and Harper thinks she’s a goddess.

Rick is… someone somehow important, apparently, whatever he does, and Charlie hopes that sooner or later he’ll get promoted because a promotion by Rick goes a long way.

Charlie and Harper meet again because she has to pay him back for the food. It’s quite late so they start talking about why they’re both still at work, and then about who has the worst boss, then Charlie takes out some alcohol (discarded by Rick because not enough expensive) and after a few glasses Harper starts saying that maybe their bosses work so much because they don’t have a sex life, so she starts saying that they should get the two together so they’d hook up together and be less mean. Charlie resists at first but then agrees after Rick keeps being a jerk.

Harper has a point, they know everything about Kirsten and Rick, so they can be their Cyrano.

They start by getting them stuck in an elevator, but that doesn’t go too well since a delivery man, a huge one, enters and freaks out when it stops and starts taking his clothes off and even pissing in some glasses (that was a bit too far, come on).

So, the two Cyranos keep trying. Harper tells Kirsten the guy in the elevator asked for her number, while Charlie tells Rick that Kirsten’s site is very sought after.

They send them both to a baseball game with a business meeting pretence, and have them appear on the kiss cam (three times until they eventually kiss).

Kirsten and Rick sleep together, and that day they both leave work during the day, to the assistant’s delight.

Charlie spends his time with Suze, and even his roommate can’t stand her. Harper meets a guy for minigolf and she likes him (although HER sense of humour is odd and embarrassing).

Kirsten is upset because Rick hasn’t called her yet, so they make him call her.

They have Kirsten have a bikini shave (which I didn’t understand, didn’t they already sleep together or did I misunderstand that?)

Only now we see that Charlie had no idea who Cyrano was… oh God.

They send Kirsten flowers and expensive alcohol to Rick, and they plan their dates and the clothes they wear and they write the cards inside the flowers… and it is working, they go out often so they have free time for their personal lives.

Harper wants them to go out for a weekend so she’ll have time for her best-friend’s engagement party, but then Charlie forgot to plan the last date and it went horribly wrong (Kirsten chose Korean barbecue and Rick agreed even though he didn’t know what it was, then he didn’t let her explain and then he threw up and blamed her).

Rick thinks she wanted him to look stupid so he destroys Charlie’s laptop, and then he destroys the science project Charlie made for Rick’s son so now he has to made another one and Harper helps him.

Rick comes to the office all drunk, (and he’s much nicer when drunk, much much nicer), and Charlie tells him what to say to Kirsten and Rick goes to her while still drunk and they make up.

So they go to their weekend away, all planned by the assistants.

Charlie and Harper go together to Suze pool party, have some more odd conversations, then Charlie goes with her to the engagement party, have some embarrassing but maybe fun dancing,  then they leave because the pizzas haven’t arrived yet… which seemed a bit cold to me, honestly, but apparently Harper was too hungry to wait with the others and so they went out and bought a pizza for themselves and went to eat it at Charlie’s place (through the emergency staircase because his roommate is with someone and he doesn’t want to interrupt).

They eat pizza together and start liking each other so she goes away.

Rick is in Kirsten’s office, and they get Charlie there to tell them both that they are getting married.

Rick offers Charlie a promotion once they get back from the marriage next week, and Harper is offered that article she talked about (but never actually wrote).

Charlie is shocked to hear that Rick still plans to sleep with his ex-wife Kiki right before telling him to go buy a ring for Kirsten.

Harper is happy because she thinks they made two people fall in love, and Charlie doesn’t tell her.

Harper hears Rick talking to a woman on the phone, but she knows Kirsten is on a meeting, so she confronts Charlie and learns the truth.

Charlie says that Kirsten doesn’t ever has to know about it, but Harper doesn’t want to help Rick cheat on her. Especially after Kirsten told her how she found a man that understands her and supports her, which isn’t true, because they told Rick everything, they wrote the messages and chose everything.

She goes all out on him, a big speech on how he cares only about himself and his promotion, then she goes to Kirsten and tells her the truth, that she and Rick were set up.

She tells her that she doesn’t really love Rick, that it wasn’t real. That they were tricked into thinking they loved each other while actually they don’t even know each other.

Harper tries to write her article but is having a hard time at it, but finally she manages after some encouragement from her best friend (and some free chips from a place that is way too accommodating, I don’t know of a place that would let her crash there eating all their free chips without ever paying anything, not even one drink, nothing…)

Charlie takes Suze to an expensive restaurant and she’s excited (just because it’s expensive I guess) and suddenly he’s missing the pizza he ate with Harper and breaks up with Suze and walks away just like that. :-/

Harper is writing her article so she doesn’t answer him when he calls, and he goes to the airport to stop Rick and Kirsten from getting married.

He shouts at Rick that he’s a bastard and he quits his job, then he tells Kirsten not to marry him,  that she deserves better, then there’s a very lame moment when Kirsten asks him questions like her favourite food and such (things that Charlie knows but Rick doesn’t) then Rick even calls her Kiki and Kirsten leaves him.

Rick goes to Charlie’s place to ask for information on Kiki because he wants to win her back (yep, Kiki, not Kirsten).

Harper finishes her article. Kirsten offers her old job back but she refuses, saying she used it as an excuse to not write, so Kirsten helps her with that after Harper promises to help her find a new assistant.

It ends with Charlie meeting her outside her office building, after Kirsten set them up to meet, and they get together… but they’re boring so I wasn’t much thrilled about it.

Anyway, they use the term Cyrano as a verb, kind of like setting people up, which is not exactly what Cyrano was…

ITA: Come far perdere la testa al capo

Harper - Zoey Deutch

Charlie - Glen Powell

Kirsten - Lucy Liu

Rick - Taye Diggs