10 Things I Learnt from Maleficent (2014) *spoilers*

#10 General Life Advice (Part I)

What do you do when your baby girl is cursed to fall into a coma on her sixteenth birthday? Send her off to a cottage that’s so far in the middle of nowhere that you’ll never spend a day with her until the very day she’s supposed to fall into a lifeless coma.

#9 Breathtaking visuals

The Director, Robert Stromberg previously specialised in Visual Effects with quite an impressive C.V. including Avatar, The Hunger Games, Life of Pi, Alice in Wonderland, Pan’s Labyrinth and even a few episodes of Game of Thrones. With a couple of Oscars under his belt for Art Direction, Stromberg is certainly no stranger to the art of creating a magical alternate universe in which  the viewer can fully immerse their senses, which in this case is a world full of mud-slinging trolls, talking and walking trees, fairies and other winged creatures.

#8 All faults with the script may be forgiven as long as you have Angelina Jolie to carry the film along

Edge of Tomorrow *Spoilers* (and explaining the ending)

Some really funny moments but the story just wasn’t substantial enough to carry it through to the end.

The first half of the movie was actually extremely entertaining as the director plays around with the notion of a time loop which resets to the exact same moment, every time Cage (Tom Cruise) dies.

*TBT* Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)

Ok so this isn’t a huge throwback but I thought I’d it’d be a fitting post with the Sydney Film Festival happening at the moment since I saw it during the festival 2 years ago and fell in love with the main character,

“Once there was a Hushpuppy and she lived with her daddy in the Bathtub”

The Fault in Our Stars *Spoiler Alert*

So we’ve all heard the synopsis and have become well aware of  The Fault in Our Stars’ tear-jerking potential and some of us may even be aware of it’s 8.6 rating on IMDb so it’s pretty clear that The Fault in Our Stars is a deep and meaningful film liked by a wide range of demographics, right? Wrong. *Warning* Stop here if you really liked the movie and/or book.

*TBT* The Imposter (2012)

One of the most intriguing documentaries I’ve seen to date. The film follows quite an unusual form for a doco as it takes you on a roller coaster of twists and turns as you would expect from a thriller but the best and most chilling part is that it’s all true – not based on a true story where they hire Brad Pitt to play someone who looks nothing like Brad Pitt – but an actual snapshot of an extraordinary event in these people’s lives.

Nicholas Barclay, a 13 year old from San Antonio in Texas had been pronounced missing for three years when an anonymous phone call alerts the authorities that he has been found in Spain with claims that he had been kidnapped and tortured. While we as the audience are aware of Frenchman Frederic Bourdin’s deception, the film digs deeper as more and more questions are raised about the incredibly bizarre situation.

June reels: Upcoming movies in cinemas this week

Edge of Tomorrow 

When: 5th June

Who: Doug Liman (Director), Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt

What: Set in the future during an alien invasion of Earth, Tom Cruise finds himself stuck in a time loop where he must relive Invasion Day over and over again by dying over and over again.

Why: Watching Tom Cruise relive Invasion Day over and over again by dying over and over again.. But seriously I have actually heard some pretty good things said about the clever storyline and refreshing characters.

Rated 95% on Rotten Tomatoes (surprising but impressive…) and 8.1/10 on IMDb.

The Fault in Our Stars

When: 5th June

Who: Josh Boone (Director), Shailene Woodley, Ansel Elgort

What: Based on the novel by John Greene, The Fault in Our Stars explores the love story between Hazel and Gus that began in a cancer support group.

Why: What I enjoyed most about the book was how refreshingly honest it was – it wasn’t just a really sad story about a brave dying person but it was a story of something devastating that happened to normal people with their own imperfections. The novel did such a great job at drawing the reader into their world but at the same time reminding us that this world is not so different from our own. BYO bucket.

Rated 8.6/10 on IMDb.