Movies 2013, Crime, pt3

Crime

            These are the more mysterious and intriguing movies I saw, so not a lot of plot details, more just me giving the premise and whether or not I liked it.

Side Effects, or "Jude Law doesn't get enough work."

Overall: 6/10

These are the actors you will be watching.  You may experience sleeplessness and diarrhea.

            You will start off thinking this is a movie that is trying to decry the pharmaceutical industry.  And who wouldn't want to decry those people?  Slight incremental changes to patents, lobbying doctors to keep patients on more expensive medicine, lobbying the government on very murky topics.  They are not the bad guys, they are being exploited.

            This is a mystery film so I can't go into detail with it concerning the plot but all of the actors turn in good performances, especially Jude Law as the one trying to figure things out.  He is put upon, and scared, angry, and ultimately confident.  I wonder if any other actor would have been right for the role, but he did well enough that I feel no need to mentally recast him.

            It has its slow bits, and is visually rather dull and dark, but that fits the mood, and theme of being medicated into a haze.

Trance, or "Somebody watched 'Inception' and 'Girl with the Dragon Tattoo' back to back and then made a decision"

Overall: 6/10

MORE COLOR!  I suppose you could add "Only God Forgives" to the mix of films this takes some influence from.

            This was done by Danny Boyle, a director with a lot of clout in regards to making very pretty movies, with a lot of flashbacks to explain intricate plot developments.

            This is also a mystery film involving the medical industry, ironically it has an American woman Doctor treating an Englishman without pills in complete juxtaposition of "Side Effects" setup.  This movie is about hypnotherapy, art theft, and trippy plot structure.  It has a very engaging premise, that a man double crosses his partners during an art heist and sustains a head injury that keeps him from remembering what he did with the painting they stole, or why he stole it from them, and they try to use hypnotherapy to pull the memories out of his head.

            Big memorable thing about watching this movie, there is a lot of nearly-nude sequences for many of the actors, a lot of James McAvoy's butt.  I saw this with 4 other people and one of them left the room to take a call, during his exit we got full frontal female nudity from Rosario Dawson, holy moly pretty.  This is when he came back from the call and asked, "did I just miss a lot more near nudity?"  And hardly believing us when we told him full frontal.

            The movie is gorgeous to look at because of the lighting and color they use, very much like you are in a dream.  If I have one issue that kind of killed it for me was the false ending that happened which would have been a better ending for a lot of it, instead there is an attempt at an "Inception" like ending that had the film going too long... it just didn't work after a certain point.

            Also, very odd music choices, with a lot of very light pop music at very dark moments.  Very strange.

Welcome to the Punch, or "James McAvoy and Mark Strong should be bigger stars."

Overall: 7/10

Conversely, this film is shot almost entirely in silver, blue, and a light aqua green.
With the notable exception of one scene at the very end of the film.

            Unfortunately I have not gotten to see, "Filth" which is also a James McAvoy film that was well received by critics and look like something I would like to watch.  McAvoy is one of the best actors doing stuff right now and has not gotten the level of success he deserves.  Mark Strong serving as the criminal side of this movie is another actor who does not get enough credit in spite of being an excellent performer who has hit the mark on every bad guy I have seen him play.

            This is yet another mystery film set in England.  When a young police officer nearly catches the most notorious thief in all of the UK and gets shot in the leg for his trouble the cop becomes an embittered and hotheaded asshole, and the thief becomes a wealthy recluse.  Then the massive spike in gun violence in London kills the thief's son and draws him back to London, in turn causing the cop to gear up and try to catch him.  This movie is very well paced with corruption, cat and mouse, detective work, conspiracy, political intrigue.  And the violence in it is a lot more real than in most movies.  People get shot and you say, "well, they're dead as shit."  Which is a nice bit of realism.

            I can't say the movie touched me deep inside or was truly classic, but it was really good and one of the easier to recommend films I saw last year.

Some Pictures from my First Trip to London pt.2

Continuing with this I will show you some of the picks I got from the Tower of London. Sadly no pictures were allowed to be taken of the Crown Jewels, finest of all the things the UK ever took from elsewhere in the world to show who's navy was the biggest.

This is the front gate to the Tower of London. In case you don't know what it is for, you walk thru it to get into the Tower's walls. It is just that easy.

This is the Beefeater Barney a Marine who was full of personality and obviously skilled at giving vivid descriptions of the Tower. If you ever get the chance do get a tour with one of these guys, they have all served in the military, live in the Tower, and know a huge amount about the place, and their guide services are free.

This is the space between the outer and first wall. This alley used to be the mint if London where coins would be struck renaissance fair style, Issac Newton, while minister of the Treasury had an apartment in the Tower of London afforded by his office to over see this function.

This is the Tower of London proper, the original structure for which the rest of the walled in area is named. It has been home to many a treason plotter, and unfortunate potential heir. There are a lot of bones buried around this place. Especially under the chapel. See after you were beheaded, they would bury you under the floor of the church so you could feel the weight of the house of god on you forever, rather poetic.

This is one of the administrative buildings of the Tower. honestly every damn thing along the Thames looks nice and I could have spent a lot of time taking any number of pictures, this is just one that happened to be inside the walls of the Tower and so it got priority.

I believe this was the gift shop. See what I said about everything looking important?

Underneath the clock is the entrance to where they keep the crown jewels. Since I only had an hour left before closing I chose to look at them rather than tour the Tower proper, so I got to see the spoils, but not the atrocity of Divine Right Monarchy. Next Trip entry will be in Istanbul.

Some Pictures from my First Trip to London pt.1

Okay, so for the first time I will start posting some of the pictures I took while studying abroad. These will mostly just be scene shots, those with people in them will be on Facebook for people to tag and enjoy. Since I was by myself for the first leg of my trip more will be over here than over there initially though.

This first picture is of the Tower of London Exterior, I have two shots that if edited together would give me the whole thing, but I don't have the patience for that sort of thing. This is the Roman who built the London Wall. People forget that London was part of Rome and has a history that really stretches back through the civilized world.

A close up of his breast plate.

The Wall itself.

And the information about the wall. Goody, education!

Above is all that remains of a centuries old Gate House to London from the East.

These are representations of some of the animals that used to be kept in the tower of London. Yes, it apparently had a zoo portion. Who knew? Or am I maybe just making things up? Did you go to London?

This is a memorial for the Navy, as you can read in the next picture.

Tomorrow I will put up some pics from inside the Tower of London and maybe some other stuff.

Most of my Day ın London and my Stressful Escape

When I reached Gatwick Aırport ın London I had been up for a bıt of tıme.  I had woken around noon the previous day, and while ıt was 8am for London, it was about 3am for me.  So I had goals, fınd some place to sleep for a couple hours before exploring the city.

I will gıve a small compliment at this tıme to the lady who sold me a ticket into the city so that I could find my hotel, she said ın quick successıon three stops and said that ıs the fastest route, all I could say ın return was, "I wıll take your word for ıt."  She then gave me a map with my changes circled and sent me on my way.

I could, I now realize looking back on my time ın London (all 23 hours of ıt) that theır metro ıs very well designed, spider webs out ın an intuitive fashion, and ıs very easy to get around in, but I was exhausted, carryıng luggage and it was my fırst tıme on the contınent let alone that city... Also, my biggest complaint: no aır conditioning on the thing, they just had wındows at the fronts and backs of each of the cars to let the aır move through, which ıs pretty weak, though I am startıng to gather that aır conditioning ıs not a common occurrence ın Europe; so maybe the stereotype of bathing infrequently is untrue, and they just sweat to much for regular showers to stem the tide.

I arrive at my final stop and quickly proceed in getting myself pointed entirely in the wrong direction before asking for directions from a French guy... Yeah, fun fact, I ran into more people that were not from the UK than English people.  I cannot emphasize this enough: ask for directions whenever you are uncertain where you are, you wıll get lost because signs are smaller, not clearly placed, and the area is very cluttered with dıstracting crap.

So I make it to the.  Palace.  That ıs my hotel.  Bleh.  Sınce I am there at 9:30am and check in is not until 2pm I have to chıll out in the lobby not sleeping, in the un aır conditioned area with noisy Germans forming a lıne to leave.  Central Park Hotel London near Fınsbury Park.  Just so you all know ıts name.  Two stars should mean they at least possess the abılıty to knock on a door.

Once 2pm mercifully rolls around I am back out on the town.  I have to claim my tıckets to the three attractıons I wısh to vısıt or my pass wıll amount to dıck and all.  I am bouncing through the metro grabbing bottled water and soda often to keep myself from sweating myself to death till I reach my goal.  The Tower of London.

The Tower is awesome.  Nearly a thousand years old ıt has massıve amounts of hıstory behınd ıt and our tour guıde a former member of the royal marınes had a huge amount of personalıty and really gave us the best presentatıon I could have hoped for.  I highly recommend thıs sıght ıf you are vısıtıng London ın the future.  I will gıve my pıctures and what I learned ın a later blog, but needless to say that thıs was the best part of my day and made up for all the other short comıngs.

(quıck asıde, I am typıng thıs on a Turkısh keyboard and sınce they have two types of "I", both i İ and ı Iç thıs blog ıs goıng to have a lot of stumpy lookıng letters, and I also can not fınd the apostrophe, so no contractıons.  Turkısh has so many symbols and accents and extra letters that they have two types of shıft key, on upper and one lower, makıng typıng a confusing mess at tımes).

Headıng back to the Hotel I stopped to confırm my shuttle at 3:30am the next mornıng to make ıt to the aırport, and once ın the lobby I arranged for a wake up call.  Well, "wake up call".  Thıs hotel has no AC, no mını-frıdges, and no phones.  Why?  Cause fuck me that ıs why.  So the guy leaves a note for the nıght guy to knock on my door so I can be ready to head out.  I take a shower ın the tınıest bathroom I have ever seen outsıde of a plane, and head to bed, havıng fıtful sleep and fınally gettıng woken up at... 4:20am!

Cause fuck me that ıs why!

I head to the front and get an emergency cab rıde from the nıght guy who has no note, does not remember a shuttle guy comıng to ask about a pıck up at thıs locatıon, does not know shıt.  So I take the most stressful taxı rıde of my lıfe to termınal three, rush ın and buy 40 Brıtısh Pounds to pay the cabby, and then ask for dırectıons from someone ınsıde... I am at the wrong termınal.

Cause fuck me that ıs... You get the ıdea.

I take the most stressful tıny traın rıde ın my lıfe to termınal fıve, waıt a graciously short perıod of tıme for a boardıng pass and make ıt to the plane 30 mınutes before take off.  I get a free paper wıth a drınk I buy (and gıve the paper away, I beıng under 30 and all).  I chıll out and prepare myself to head to Turkey.

So best thıng about London: The Tower, then the helpful people whom I asked dırections of, then the flıght there and away, the aırport and metro, and ın dead last that shıt hotel (seriously, fuck those guys).

The Random Notes I Took While on and Right After the Plane

_This is an experiment to see if my blog will post via this Android app, so here is hoping._

I am currently taking a flight in British Airways from Tampa to London. Having mostly just killed time in the terminal by reading 'The Hunger Games' I am finding that only an hour has passed since take off, which is a bit of a drag. I am tired but not sleepy, and I am wondering how much real time I will have tomorrow that I won't be suffering from exhaustion.

When I do finally get off then plane I will be heading to the nearby National Train station to take an hour long ride into the city proper ending at the park near my hotel. I will try to catch a nap before heading out on the town to see the Tower of London which is pretty much my priority destination. Monday morning will be difficult as I will have to be up early to get to Heatherow airport and I haven't been able to confim the means of shuttle from my hotel which is a sort of bus; the reason I could not confirm is that international phone calls are shit.

I am wondering why there is so much tolerance for a crying child. If I had whined his much on a trip I would have gotten slapped. Overall the flight is rather dull, my view is mostly of wing and the only other person in my set of three seats is a vastly older gentleman who has no trouble falling asleep.

A random blonde woman named Barbie just introduced herself to me wondering if I was someone she had met at a previous instance. I can never tell if this is legitimate or if this is a very subtle way of hitting on someone. Either way, I don't see where she goes on the plane and don't think I'll end up seeing her again.

I do not realize how much time I spend on or how much love I have for the internet until I am on this island of metal in the sky far from my usual means of surfing and networking. There is a limit to reading, though I believe my typing on this touch screen is almost as fast as it is on a keyboard; the only real downsides being the lack of arrow keys, and the need to switch the entire keyboard over to symbols in order to use a semi-colon or hyphen which slows things greatly. They are now serving drinks which is good, but I rather feel the need to go to the restroom, so fuel for the fire, and rain for the flood.

I can say with total honesty that was the best meal I have had on an aircraft in my life. They had a chicken and rice microwave thing, but they also had a roll some very well seasoned corn salad, a personalized bottle of white wine, some water of course, but then there was a great bit of cheese cake and a cup of very hot coffee.

I watched the movie 'The King's Speach' which was pretty boring, really whenever Georfry Rush isn't on screen the thing drops a whole star. I know it is difficult to act a stammer, but regardless of how well acted the movie was by everyone involved it was still boring. It was like watching traditional Shakespeare (especially when you consider how many allusions to the bard there were in the movie) yes it is good in its own way, but I don't care to watch it. Sadly the movie selection kicked off before I could watch another movie, though I did get in some 'Big Bang Theory and 'How I Met Your Mother' while eating. Overall I am very pleased with the entertainment on this flight, so much so that I am doubly disappointed that it has now crapped out with another three hours to go.

That damn child cried for another 10 minutes at 4:30am in London, 11:30pm Eastern time, so a win in neither time zone. Sad part being the kid is too old to be crying like that, he seems very spoiled, I can understand a baby getting upset for no reason, but it is night time, the kid should be napping having finished watching one of a dozen movies on the entertainment thing.

Some fun facts about where I am now, after taking a bumpy course up the coast of the US for numerous hours we are now over the night covered Atlantic, we are about even with English latitude and it it negative 58° farenheit outside, we are traveling about 40,000ft up, at about 580mph. Strange detail, the plane's reader has Tampa as the destination, so it is telling us we are getting further away from where we are headed but the destination clock is set to London, so it is counting down with what I imagine to be an accurate projection of our landing time.

I cannot seem to take a picture of the night sky or glowing horizon through the window, so... you'll have to take my word for it, that though my view is very much obscured by a gigantic wing (isn't that always the way), the sky is in fact rather nice to look at at this height and speed. Kind of looks like the horizon is on fire and the flames are lighting the sky above it.

Another small hicup I ran across. Turns out that the e-book I bought for the trip was not completely downloaded, nor was the sample book I grabbed. So, while I have enjoyed about a fifth or sixth of 'The Hunger Games', I lack so variety to my literature intake.

Crying again now it is 13:37am for the Eastern seaboard and 5:37am where I'm headed. And the brat just keeps getting louder.

I arrived on time to Gatwick airport and immediately got to a rail to take me to my hotel area, though street signs are hard to find so I got pretty lost for about a half hour before getting pushed in the right direction. If there is any advice I can give to people traveling it is this, 'do not be afraid to ask directions.'

I will continue to talk about my time in London at a later time, and maybe get some of my pictures up though that might end up being all at the end of the trip as a big recap series of the whole trip as the steps to put the pics on my tablet, then to put them on the website is a little time consuming. Right now I am about to go to brunch in a small area near Koc University with the rest of the students

posted from Bloggeroid

Starting My Trip to Europe and Asia

            I am taking a trip.  So far in my life I have cultivated opportunities to go places I have not been to various levels of success.  I went to Atlanta, Chicago, and Toronto with the Model United Nations in Undergrad.  I studied abroad in Beijing and Shanghai just after my graduation.  And now, some 4 years and a couple months after my last big trip, I will be taking my own little (2 month) trip to Europe.

            Tomorrow I will leave from Tampa, Florida on my way to London, England.  I'll only be there for about 22 hours, but in that time I hope to see the Tower of London and a couple other palaces/sights of interest.  Sadly my timing caused me to miss out on the bigger Stonehenge, Oxford, and Jack the Ripper tour I had been hoping for.  But I am quite happy with this.

Going here.

             Leaving London I will head to Istanbul, Turkey.  This area will take up the meatiest portion of my trip, being a 6 week study abroad venture which will hit the numerous hot spots in the city along with a few excursions out into the country.  This was the event around which I planned all the other bits of my trip.  I was committed to going as soon as I saw the Prof's power point for it in a class one day and realized that the length of the trip and the credits I would receive were greater than the trip to China I had taken after undergrad, and they were the same price.  I will also have a few free weekends that I will have to work out some plans for.  Maybe I can visit the Black Sea beach and wear a Speedo un-ironically.

And here.

             When I finally leave Istanbul I will head to Athens, Greece.  Hopefully two months from now the unrest over there will calm down because I want to see the birthplace of democracy, philosophy, and western civilization as we know it.  I will spend 10 days there as part of a tour package which will include various islands around the capital.

And here.

             After Athens I will head back to London but only long enough to drop off some luggage and take a bit of sleep so I can head to the tube and go to Paris, France.  I'll be there for about a day seeing the tourist centric locations of the Arch De Triumph and the Eifel Tower (I keep having this day dream play out in my head that I will get there and both of the French national treasures will be vastly smaller than what I pictured and when I say, "I always pictured it would be a bit bigger" a French guy behind me will call me, "Americans, size queens everyone of them" and being that I don't speak French I will just ignore the insult).

And I guess it does look pretty big.  So yeah, here too.

            From there I will bounce back to London and then to home.  Then I'll have a week of sitting around begging for money from loan agencies and then it will be back to college in Tallahassee to work my butt off trying to earn my duel Masters in International Affairs and Urban and Regional Planning.  This seems like a good course of events.

            Last month and part of this month I tried hard to produce a blog each day, and in doing so train myself to make very regular updates in hopes of chronicling my trip to the internet with my reflections.  So at the end of my trip when they ask for an 8-10 page reflection on the trip for my grades in the class (or however much they decide to request), I can hand them my blog url and say that I bested the request by about 10,000 words, many times 10,000 if you count pictures for the 1,000 words a piece that is common adage.  So my tertiary goal to 'Studying' 'Enjoy Myself', will be to (for the first time) use my blog to professionally benefit myself.  Wish me luck.

            If you liked my rambling, please click the Google "+1" button in the comments section, post the link on your facebook, or send people over from anywhere else you might social network.