Hey!
This past week I saw two very different movies, Trainwreck and 12 Years a Slave. I’ve been wanting to see Trainwreck since I first saw the trailer and 12 Years a Slave has been on my movie list for a while. Amy Schumer does not disappoint and I found myself laughing so hard that I almost missed the next lines! As for 12 Years a Slave, I now understand why Lupita Nyongo’o won an Oscar for her first feature film performance. If you are in the mood to see a more serious film then check out 12 Years a Slave, but if you want a comedy then Trainwreck it is. They are both must-sees!
As you may or may not have read in one of my previous blog posts, I managed to watch all of the Oscar nominated movies this year. I tried in 2014 but failed and 12 Years a Slave was one of the movies that I missed. It won Best Picture so I’ve been wanting to see it!! It is a true story based off the memoir written by Solomon Northup himself. It follows his story of being a free man who is sold into slavery for twelve years. It takes place in 1841 in Louisiana.
Spoilers:
Firstly, Lupita definitely deserved her Oscar for Best Supporting Actress by portraying fellow slave Patsey. She comes part way through the movie but her presence is unforgettable. Her slave owner, Edwin Epps, becomes obsessed with her which in turn makes his wife Mistress Epps treat her badly too. The scene where she gets whipped for going to the Shaw’s plantation is horrifying and difficult to watch. As is the scene where Edwin rapes her.
Chiwetel Ejiofor, who plays Solomon, also has a great performance. He was nominated for an Oscar but fell short to Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club) though. The agony of being snatched from his family to be sold into slavery is shown in Ejiofor’s portrayal. His IMDB page shows that he has a bunch of movies coming up so that’s exciting! It’s the ripple effect from being an Oscar nominated actor now 🙂 Michael Fassbender, as Edwin Epps, plays a brutal slave owner very well. He was pretty disturbing. He was also nominated for an Oscar, this time Best Supporting, but lost to Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club) You all should see that movie btw, also intense but really good! So overall this is definitely a drama that contains many talented actors. The story skips around some time wise but flows really well. I haven’t read the book so I am not sure how true it is but I still thought it was really good!
Now on a lighter note, Trainwreck was hilarious! AND it has 85% on Rotten Tomatoes! I’ve noticed that it is harder for comedies to get high scores. Or maybe there haven’t been great comedies lately? Either way I was planning on seeing this movie even if it got bad reviews. Amy Schumer rocks! She is like the next generation female power house. She is more raunchy than her predecessors AKA Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, etc. but that makes her stand out. I love how honest she is with her comedy which makes her even more funny!
Anyway, this is about Amy (same name), who is known for dating around and not having her life together, falling for a good guy and what that entails. Amy Schumer wrote the script and this is actually the first movie Judd Apatow directs that he didn’t write. The movie has a great cast and is littered with SNL past and present members.
Spoilers:
I read that Amy’s Dad in real-life suffers from MS and her younger sister’s name is Kimberley too. She has an older brother but he wasn’t written into the movie. So she obviously took what she knew and went with it. Now I loved the movie but could have done with less Lebron haha like his first scene was really funny but then he was in it a bunch, and he can’t really act sooooo. One of my pet peeves is when people play themselves in movies but can’t act. This was the case haha there was a scene with Matthew Broderick who can act and played himself. I don’t have a problem with that. But I loved everything else!!! There were so many good one liners. I’m mad I don’t remember them haha Also I am still laughing about the Daniel Radcliffe scenes hahaha I remember when he was photographed walking a ton of dogs. It’s so funny that it was for a fictional movie in this movie lol Everyone was so confused when they saw those pictures.
I thought Bill Hader and Amy were funny together. Sometimes with rom coms there is no chemistry and it makes everything horrible. Just because the two leads are famous doesn’t mean they should be in a movie together! Hader seems goofy in real-life so it wasn’t a stretch for him to play a goofy doctor haha I loved the scene from the trailer where he yells check and writes in the air. Amy says you do one or the other and you should just mouth check hahahah And I didn’t know Amy could dance lol the cheerleading dance at the end was hilarious!
So both movies this week were winners in my book. Also I started reading Go Set a Watchman. Not super far into it yet but don’t love it. Random but I read a story about how these parents changed their 14 MONTH OLD’S NAME from Atticus to Lucas after this book came out. Atticus is portrayed as a racist old man but you gotta understand that Harper Lee wrote this first and probably didn’t think it would get published….I bet that baby is super confused. Well have a great week!
“I like you, Amy. You’re clever but you’re not too brainy. You’re prettyish but you’re not too gorgeous. You’re approachable.”~ Dianna from Trainwreck
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