Review: The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Halloween is approaching (and Christmas preparations won't be far behind), so what better time for this review?

Most people have probably heard of The Nightmare Before Christmas. It's a stop-motion film based on a poem by Tim Burton (but it wasn't directed by him, despite what many people think). You know all those "monsters steal Christmas" films? This is one of them, from the perspective of the monsters.

The story starts in Halloween Town. Jack Skellington has grown tired of scaring people, and wants something different. Then he stumbles into Christmas Town.

Jack in Christmas Town.
(Side note: it took me an embarrassingly long time to realise his surname is a pun on "skeleton". In my defence, "skeleton" and "skellington" sound nothing alike in my accent.)

He decides that the citizens of Halloween Town should take over Christmas for a year. So he kidnaps Santa (who's then kidnapped again by Oogie Boogie the boogeyman), and the monsters try to make their own version of Christmas. Sally, Jack's love interest, tries to convince them that this is a terrible idea, and ends up captured by Oogie Boogie too.

The monsters making Christmas

Oogie Boogie. Easily the scariest monster in the film.

Sally

Jack takes Santa's place and delivers the monstrous toys to children. It goes exactly as well as you'd think. It ends with the military shooting Jack and his "sleigh" out of the sky. Jack finally realises what an idiot he's been, and sets out to find Santa and put things right.

He rescues Santa and Sally, kills Oogie Boogie (yay!), and apologises for the mess he's made. Santa undoes the chaos Jack caused. The people of Halloween Town celebrate. Everything's back to normal... and Jack finally realises he loves Sally. Took you long enough, Jack!

My overall opinion? I loved the film when I first saw it years ago, and I still love it. It's hilarious and scary and heartwarming, and Jack and Sally are surprisingly adorable for a skeleton and a ragdoll. Oogie Boogie is exactly as creepy as the Boogeyman should be. The residents of Halloween Town are so funny with their well-meaning trouble-making, and the ending always makes me go "aww!".

Is it available online?: Not as far as I know.

Rating: 8/10.

Review: Beauty and the Beast (1991)

There are some films that I simply adore. Beauty and the Beast is one of them. From the hauntingly beautiful opening to the adorable ending, it's one of the best films Disney has ever made. So what better movie to choose for my first review of an animated film?

Almost everyone knows the story of BATB. Girl falls in love with Beast, Beast is a prince under a spell, Beast turns back into prince and marries girl, they live happily ever after. It may surprise many people, then, to hear that the best-known version of the fairy-tale is not very close to the original. Beauty and the Beast (or La Belle et la Bête, in the original French) was written in 1740 by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, though there were earlier stories with similar plots -- Cupid and Psyche, anyone?

In the original version, Beauty and the Beast were cousins, Beauty was the daughter of a king and a good fairy, another fairy tried to murder Beauty, and the Beast's mother left him in the care of an evil fairy. Why yes, the original version is weird, why do you ask? With that in mind, it's really not surprising that the Disney version follows the better-known plot.

Anyway, on to the story. It's so well-known that I'll just skim over it.

The story begins with a truly beautiful prologue, accompanied by some of the best music ever heard in a Disney film. The narrator tells us how a selfish prince was turned into a beast, and will only change back if he can learn to love, and be loved in return.

Then we meet Belle.

From her first appearance Belle became my favourite Disney princess. I think it's because she reminds me most of myself. She's a bookworm, she longs for adventure, she doesn't fit in with the people around her...

Anyway, Gaston wants to marry Belle, and she wants nothing to do with him. ("I just... don't deserve you!" 😆) Then her father Maurice gets lost in the woods and finds the Beast's castle. Belle goes in search of him and meets the Beast. She agrees to become his prisoner in exchange for her father's freedom.

Maurice goes back to the village and tries to get help. No one believes him when he tells them about the Beast, but Gaston makes an evil plan. If Belle doesn't marry him, he'll use Maurice's apparent madness to have him locked up in the asylum.

Meanwhile, Belle meets the Beast's servants, wanders into the forbidden West Wing, runs away and is attacked by wolves, and is saved by the Beast. This is the beginning of a friendship between them, which slowly becomes love.

Most girls want Belle's dress or happy ending. I want that library!

The servants are delighted with this turn of events, especially because it'll mean they become human again. (Some versions of the film add a song called "Human Again" that's all about this. Some people like it. I'm just "meh" about it. It's not terrible, but it doesn't add much to the film that isn't already in "Something There".)

And this is a perfect moment to mention my favourite song in the entire film, and therefore my favourite Disney song ever:

Beauty and the Beast

Belle and the Beast dance together, while Mrs. Potts sings this awesome song. It's beautiful, it's memorable, and it perfectly sums up the entire story. Every time I watch the film I replay this song again and again until my parents tell me to stop.

The Beast shows Belle a magic mirror that lets her see the outside world. She sees that Maurice has gone looking for her and is now ill. The Beast lets her go, in a scene that's simultaneously heartwarming and tragic. He has no chance of becoming human again if Belle leaves, but he loves her so he lets her go anyway. Aww... and ouch.

Belle finds Maurice, and Gaston finds them. He tries to put his plan in action. But he's foiled when Belle uses the magic mirror to show everyone the Beast, proving her father's sane. Gaston then convinces everyone that the Beast is a monster and will kill their children, and leads a mob to attack the castle. The servants deal with the mob, while Gaston tries to kill the Beast.

This is the part that always makes me cry. Gaston dies, but he stabs the Beast. And Belle has to watch him apparently die in front of her.

😭😭

But wait! Belle says she loves him just in time, and the spell's broken! The Beast comes back to life and turns into the prince!

And they all live happily ever after 😍

My overall opinion of the film can be summed up in one word: amazing. From beginning to end there isn't a single thing I dislike. Well, I loathe Gaston, but that's the reaction he's supposed to get. The gradual change in Belle and the Beast from hostility to love is portrayed so well that it's completely believable.

Is it available online?: I don't think so, but maybe it is somewhere.

Rating: 10/10.

Review: Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)

I've never been much of a Star Wars fan. I enjoy watching the original trilogy (and occasionally watch the prequel trilogy to laugh at it), but I've never been as utterly obsessed with it as some of my friends are.

This film changed that.

(The way the Star Wars films open makes it really hard to get screencaps of just the title and not the expository text. I never realised how annoying this is until now.)

The plot is pretty similar to A New Hope. Character from a sandy planet gets caught up in saving the galaxy, villains have a weapon that destroys planets, main villain is related to the heroes... But there are enough differences that it doesn't feel like a complete rehash.

I'm pretty sure everyone recognises the actors, so let's go straight to the plot.

Years have passed since the end of the original trilogy, and the First Order is the latest villainous group to try to take over the world -- er, galaxy. I was rather dubious about this when I first watched the film. "Seriously? Of all the possible plots out there, you had to go with another "villains take over the galaxy" one?" But moving on, Princess Leia (now General Leia) has sent her best pilot, Poe Dameron (and his droid BB-8), to find a piece of a map that'll lead the Resistance to Luke Skywalker.

Poe

BB-8, probably the most adorable droid ever to appear in Star Wars.

BB-8 escapes with the map, but Poe is captured by First Order stormtroopers and Kylo Ren.

Kylo Ren, Darth Vader-wannabe. (On a completely unrelated note, I really wish I knew how to refer to him. Is "Ren" his title and "Kylo" his name, or the other way round? Is "Kylo Ren" even a name at all?)

BB-8 finds Rey, a scavenger, who somewhat reluctantly lets him stay with her. Poe, meanwhile, escapes the First Order with the help of Finn, a defecting stormtrooper.

Rey and BB-8

Finn

Finn and Poe crash on Jakku, the planet where Rey and BB-8 are. Poe is apparently killed in the crash. Finn makes his way to the nearest town, where he meets Rey and BB-8. Then the First Order arrives, and the three of them have to escape in a ship Rey describes as "garbage": the Millenium Falcon.

I nearly died laughing when I realised which ship she meant.

They escape, meet Han and Chewie, have a very narrow escape from some pretty nightmarish monsters, and go to visit Maz, someone Han thinks can get BB-8 to Leia. Unfortunately the First Order turn up again. A battle ensues. In the middle of it Finn learns he can use a lightsaber, Poe reappears alive and well, and Kylo Ren captures Rey. Shortly afterward, Leia turns up (with C-3PO!) and has a long-overdue reunion with Han.

Leia, Han... and Threepio

By this time we've learnt the terrible truth about Kylo Ren. He's Han and Leia's son, Ben Solo, who turned to the Dark Side because of Snoke, Supreme Leader of the First Order.

Rey saw the map, and Kylo tries to get it from her mind. He fails spectacularly, and storms off to sulk. Rey uses her newly-discovered Force powers to escape.

Rey and Kylo (without his helmet)

Rey escaping with the (Force-assisted) help of a stormtrooper.

Meanwhile we've learnt what the First Order is doing. General Hux, who's supposed to be Kylo's co-commander but is more like an exasperated underling, is creating Starkiller Base, a new sort of Death Star that can wipe out multiple planets at once (as they demonstrate, unfortunately for the Hosnian system).

The Resistance sets out to destroy Starkiller. Finn helps Han and Chewie get into the base and lower the shields so Poe and his friends can blow it up. Along the way they meet up with Rey... and Han meets Kylo. This is a moment that always leaves me in tears, because... Kylo kills Han 😭

*sobs uncontrollably*

Finn and Rey fight Kylo while the planet is falling apart around them. And Rey discovers she has the Force, and fights Kylo with Luke's old lightsaber. Yes, it's as awesome as it sounds.

The Resistance destroy Starkiller, Rey and Finn escape, Kylo is presumably rescued and returned to Snoke, the galaxy is (temporarily) safe... There's just one thing left to do. Find Luke. So Rey follows the now-intact map and finds him. And then... the film ends. (I was really annoyed by this cliffhanger at first. It's become slightly less exasperating now that the sequel's out, but still.)

So, my overall opinion of the film? I love it. Is it the best Star Wars film? No. Does it borrow too much from previous films? Probably. (How many times can this series use Death Stars before they find a more original plot?) But is it a good film in spite of that? Yes!

Rey is awesome. At first her ability to fly the Falcon seemed a bit unrealistic, but then it was revealed she has the Force and it made perfect sense. Poe's survival comes out of nowhere, but I can forget about that and focus on his amazing piloting skills. Finn is just as awesome as Rey. In the space of a few hours he goes from being a stormtrooper to being lost in a desert to shooting TIE fighters. And BB-8 is simply adorable.

On the villainous side, there's the surprisingly sympathetic Kylo Ren. If you'd told me before I saw this film that my favourite character would be the crazy Darth Vader fanboy who murders Han, I'd have thought you were as crazy as Kylo. But then I saw the film. And Kylo became not just my favourite character in it, but one of my favourite characters in the whole Star Wars series. Guess I should have realised by now that I just really like tragic villains 🤷 First Loki, then Maeglin, now Kylo.

Is it available online?: Probably, but I don't know where.

Rating: 7/10.

Review: Thor (2011)

I'm taking a short break from period drama reviews to review a film I fell in love with when it was first released. Well, I didn't fall in love with the film. I fell in love with a character in it.

(You probably already know who.)

Thor isn't a straight-up adaptation of Norse mythology; it's an adaptation of Marvel Comic's adaptation of Norse mythology. So obviously it's not very close to the original myths. I'm not a comics fan so I can't say how close it sticks to the comics, but other people's remarks make me think it's a loose adaptation of them too.

Every so often you find a film that is just average on its own, but has a character/a plot/a song (if it's a musical)/a scene that you fall in love with. Thor is one of those films. I frankly couldn't care less about Thor's romance with Jane, and his quest to get back to Asgard is interesting but not enough to hold my attention. Every time I watch this film (and I've seen it dozens of times), it's because of Loki.

I'm pretty sure absolutely everyone knows the actors, so I won't even bother listing them. Instead I'll go straight to the plot. Not the entire plot, just the important parts.

The story begins Jane trying to get photos of a storm, only for a man to appear out of nowhere and hit her van. Then it flashes back to the events leading to this situation.

Odin, King of Asgard, tells his young sons, Thor and Loki, about a war between the Æsir and Jötnar/Frost Giants.

Young Loki, young Thor, and Odin

Then we jump forward about a thousand years. Thor and Loki are now adults, and Thor is about to be crowned King of Asgard. The ceremony is interrupted when a group of Frost Giants sneak into Asgard. Thor, egged on by Loki, takes some of his friends and goes to Jötunheim in retaliation. A fight breaks out. And in the middle of it, Loki is grabbed by a Jötunn... and sees his skin inexplicably turn blue.

The moment that set Loki on his path to villainy. Poor Loki 😢

Odin rescues Thor and co., then promptly banishes Thor for nearly starting a war. Thor ends up on Earth, where he crashes into Jane's van.

Loki, back on Asgard, discovers that he is a Jötunn. Not just any Jötunn, but the son of King Laufey. He takes this revelation... pretty badly. Just to make things worse, Odin -- in a display of spectacularly bad parenting -- has raised him to hate and fear Jötnar.

Result: Loki goes off the deep end. He decides the best way to cope with this is to nearly murder Thor, and try to destroy Jötunheim.

It doesn't end well for poor Loki. In fact, it ends in attempted suicide, and him becoming a full-fledged villain 😭

Don't let go, don't let go... NOOOOO! 😭😭

The film ends with Asgard cut off from Earth thanks to Loki's actions. But after the credits there's a scene that reveals Loki is still alive, and on Earth. I'd cheer, but considering what he's on Earth to do...

So, what do I think of it overall?

Thor's plot is pretty average and predictable. And to make things worse, I can't think of a single scene where his romance with Jane feels natural. Every time they interact it's painfully obvious that this subplot is here just because the director/script writer/producer/whoever thought the film needed a romance subplot and didn't care if it was believable.

Loki, on the other hand, is the greatest character in the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe. He's tragic, he's losing his mind, and I feel so sorry for him even when he's trying to blow up a planet. This is one of the reasons why I'm not the biggest fan of Loki's characterisation in later films, incidentally. From The Avengers onward he stops being a tragic villain and becomes just a villain. A fascinating, amusing villain, but a much less sympathetic one.

Is it available online?: Probably, but I'm not sure where. I've heard it's on Netflix, but I don't have Netflix so I don't know if that's still true or not.

Rating: 5/10 for the plot, and 8/10 for Loki.

Review: Cranford (novel)

Cranford the series is perfection. Cranford the book is... not quite so perfect.

First things first. Cranford is a novel by Elizabeth Gaskell, first published in 1853. Unlike Mrs. Gaskell's other novels -- North and South and Wives and Daughters in particular -- Cranford does not have an overarching plot. Instead it describes a few events in the village of Cranford over several years.

The narrator is Mary Smith, who frequently visits Cranford and observes its resident's amusing oddities. Several characters from the series -- Dr. Harrison, Lady Ludlow and the Huttons in particular -- don't appear in the book at all.

Attempting to explain all the incidents the book covers would take ages. Instead I'll just say what I thought of it.

I watched the series before reading the book, and so I kept comparing the book unfavourably to the series. (Yes, this is one of those rare cases where the adaptation is better than the source!) Captain Brown's astonishingly early death was a real shock. So was how little Jessie and Major Gordon appeared in the book. I was amused to discover that Lady Glenmire from Return to Cranford is a relatively important character in the book, complete with the drama about her marriage (though obviously she doesn't marry Captain Brown in the book).

There are no dramatic plot twists or adorable weddings in this book, unlike in the series. And it won't make readers roar with laughter or burst into tears the way the series does. But if you want to read something that's fairly short and certainly enjoyable, then Cranford is the book for you.

Is it available online? Yes, on Gutenberg.

Rating: 7/10.

Review: Middlemarch (1994)

It's inevitable that I'll have to review some series I dislike at some point. Middlemarch is one of those series. I've decided to post this review after my Lark Rise to Candleford review to get the series I don't like out of the way, so I can pay more attention to series I do like.

Middlemarch (or as I like to call it, "Dear God, What did I Just Watch?" or "Unlikeable Characters: The Series") is based on a book by George Eliot. It doesn't have a plot. Instead it's about the lives of several residents of the village of Middlemarch, especially Dr. Lydgate and Dorothea Casaubon (née Brooke).

I didn't recognise many of the actors. These are the ones I did recognise:
Michael Hordern (Cedric in Ivanhoe 1982, and the King in The Slipper and the Rose) as Mr. Featherstone
Rachel Power (Pleasant Riderhood in Our Mutual Friend 1998) as Mary Garth
Elizabeth Spriggs (Mrs. Jennings in Sense and Sensibility 1995 and Mrs. Gamp in Martin Chuzzlewit) as Mrs. Cadwallader
Robert Hardy (Sir John Middleton in Sense and Sensibility 1995) as Arthur Brooke
Rufus Sewell (Prince Leopold in The Illusionist) as Will Ladislaw
Douglas Hodge (Willy Wonka in the musical of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) as Tertius Lydgate
Pam Ferris (Mrs. General in Little Dorrit 2008) as Mrs. Dollop
Judi Dench (Miss Matty in Cranford) as the voice of George Eliot
Jonathan Coy (Charles Cheeryble in Nicholas Nickleby 2001) as Ladislaw's friend

The story starts with Dr. Lydgate arriving in Middlemarch, certain he'll do great things there. Shortly afterward, Dorothea Brooke accepts the proposal of the much-older Reverend Edward Casaubon. This marriage turns out to be a disaster, thanks in part to the interference of Casaubon's cousin Will Ladislaw, who reminds me a great deal of Wickham. Meanwhile, Dr. Lydgate makes a similarly ill-advised marriage. He marries Rosamund Vincy, an airheaded spendthrift, who does her best to bankrupt him.

There are exactly two somewhat likeable characters in the whole series: Mary Garth, and Mr. Featherstone, who's more comical than likeable. And he dies less than half-way through. Everyone else is either obnoxious, disgusting, irresponsible, or practically a non-entity.

Dorothea sets my teeth on edge. She blunders headlong into a marriage that anyone can clearly see is going to be a bad idea, and then while she's married she becomes infatuated with her husband's cousin, who spends most of his time with other women. And when her husband dies and she marries the cousin, we're supposed to see this as a happy ending.

Dr. Lydgate is, quite frankly, an idiot. He marries a clearly vain, selfish brat. To please her he rents a house he can't afford. She spends practically every penny he has, and throws a fit when he complains about this and suggests they sells their furniture. I couldn't stand him or that imbecile Rosamund. Every time they appeared I fast-forwarded the DVD.

The most interesting thing to happen in the series is when Mr. Bulstrode is revealed to be a hypocrite, and helps cause the death of the man who could expose this to the whole town. And this happens near the end, and is quickly forgotten about in favour of the incredibly boring romantic entanglements of various Middlemarch residents.

I never thought I'd find a series that would rival Lark Rise to Candleford for the dubious honour of "worst period drama I've ever seen". Middlemarch is that series.

Is it available online?: I didn't even check. If for some reason you want to watch it, you'll have to search for it yourself.

Rating: 1/10.

Review: Lark Rise to Candleford (series)

I can sum up this series in one sentence: the Coronation Street of period drama. That's how dull, implausible, and trashy it is.

I watched a few episodes of it when it was being aired, and remember it as being incredibly boring and unrealistic. Recently I decided to rewatch it. Lots of other people were talking about how good it was, so obviously I thought there was something wrong with my memory. Maybe I'd just seen the bad episodes of an otherwise good series.

No, the whole series is like that.

The music is the only good thing about this series.

Lark Rise to Candleford is a loose adaptation of three semi-autobiographical novels by Flora Thompson. If it was any looser, it would fall off completely.

I only recognised a handful of the actors:
Julia Sawalha (Jessie in Cranford, and Mercy Pecksniff in Martin Chuzzlewit) as Dorcas Lane
Brendan Coyle (Nicholas Higgins in North and South) as Robert Timmins
Claudie Blakley (Martha in Cranford) as Emma Timmins
Karl Johnson (Tungay in David Copperfield 1999) as Twister
Linda Bassett (Abby Potterson in Our Mutual Friend 1998) as Queenie
Peter Vaughan (Mr. Boffin in Our Mutual Friend 1998) as Rev. Ellison
Phil Davis (Smallweed in Bleak House) as Arthur Ashlow
Victoria Hamilton (Mrs. Forster in Pride and Prejudice 1995) as Ruby Pratt
Liz Smith (Peg Sliderskew in Nicholas Nickleby 2001) as Zillah

I watched series one torn between laughter and disbelief. The Christmas special left me speechless. Slogging through series two was a battle of Greek proportions. I spent most of the last few episodes in tears of laughter. That was the only way I could cope with this mess. And I can safely say I will never watch the third and fourth series.

LRC doesn't have a plot. It has a collection of plots, one or two to each episode. Its main characters are Dorcas Lane, a postmistress, and Laura Timmins, her assistant. It all blurs together so much in my mind that I can hardly remember any specific plots from it, except for one or two especially outrageous things.

In the first few episodes the problems with this series become apparent. Problem one: the very modern characters. The mark of a good period drama is that the characters act as if they're really in Victorian England/Tsarist Russia/Tang Dynasty China/whatever place and era it is. Lark Rise to Candleford has a collection of 21st century characters who for some reason have decided to dress up in 19th century clothes. That's it. They're only wearing the costumes, and making no attempt to fit in with the 1890s beyond that.

Problem two: the lack of a coherent plot. Some series have a new plot in every episode but manage to be very good series in spite of that. Jeeves and Wooster springs to mind. LRC doesn't. Its episodes follow a predictable pattern. A never-before-seen character appears, and is often treated as if they'd always been there somewhere, the plot revolves around this character, the episode ends, and both character and plot are completely forgotten in the next one, which continues the cycle. It's exactly as frustrating as it sounds.

Problem three: the caricatures. There are virtually no likeable characters, or even ones with a personality. And almost every character is a caricature. Laura, despite being the narrator, is as interesting as watching paint dry. Robert is an arrogant jerk who'd rather see his family go without food or clothes rather than accept charity. Thomas is always babbling about religion, and comes over as decidedly unhinged as a result. Dorcas is always right, always knows best, blah blah blah.

Problem four: the morals or lack thereof. It was an absolute scandal in Victorian England for a couple to live together without being married. Queenie and Twister would have been shunned by the whole village as soon as it became known they weren't married. Think of the mayhem Lydia and Wickham caused in Pride and Prejudice by running off and living together without being married. In this respect, things were no different in the 1890s than approximately eighty/ninety years before.

Problem five: that bizarre Christmas special. I still can't believe that someone looked at this sub-par series and thought, "What it needs is a ghost story." So we take a sudden and unexplained detour into the supernatural which is never mentioned again. Especially weird is that this ghost has supposedly been lurking around for eighty years, but no one has ever seen or heard of her before.

This is only scraping the surface of "what's wrong with LRC". I've never found a more disappointing, overrated period drama.

Is it available online?: Some episodes are. I don't know if the whole series is, but why would anyone want to watch the whole sorry mess?

Rating: 1/10.