My Top Five April Fools

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The beautiful Cara over at Silver Screen Serenade is doing a really fun series called “April Fools” in which we all discuss our favorite lovable idiots from films and/or television. Go have a look at all the great entries so far! You can see my list of My Top Five April Fools HERE. Thanks, Cara! πŸ™‚

And speaking of lovable idiots, I never mentioned that I also took part in Eric’s epic post about the, um, *wonderful* television show True Detective over at The IPC. A bunch of great people got together & talked about how much they love that damn show. Read all about it HERE (but maybe skip my bit if you really love the show – I’ve had enough abuse!). πŸ˜‰

And here’s a photo of Garrett Hedlund for no reason whatsoever:

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Oh! And I almost forgot – I did some bitching once again at the blog I call by its shorter title because I’m lazy: Don’t Sit By Me Ahole. Read about annoying couriers HERE and let the lovely Eric above know if you’d like to contribute to this fantastic blog. πŸ™‚

John Hughes Movie Quote Of The Day: Sixteen Candles

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“I can’t believe this. They fucking forgot my birthday.”

Sixteen Candles (1984)

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**I’m loving this John Hughes blogathon! But I AM missing posting random stuff so, speaking of birthdays, Happy 71st birthday to David Cronenberg!

Here are My Top Five Films Directed By David Cronenberg, starting with my favorite:

1. The Fly
2. The Dead Zone
3. The Brood
4. Videodrome
5. Scanners

Honorable Mention:
A History Of Violence

Love these movies! I should really watch the remaining Cronenberg films I’ve not seen. And speaking of movies, I did watch another non-Hughes one last night: People Like Us. Hmm. I’ll give it a 6.5/10. Review to follow in April. Also, I’m excited to have finally reached 1,000 followers on Twitter! What should I do to celebrate that?? #ILoveToTweet

My Top Movies Directed By Quentin Tarantino

**I updated this list March 2017 to add Jackie Brown & The Hateful Eight and September 2019 to add Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood.**

Here we go! Counting down to my favorite (and not including his guest director credit on Sin City, a movie I don’t really like anyway), here are all the films I’ve seen that were directed by Quentin Tarantino:

9. The Hateful Eight (I wasn’t really a fan of this one)

8. Inglourious Basterds

7. Death Proof
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6. Django Unchained
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5. Once Upon A Time… In Hollywood

4. Jackie Brown

3. Pulp Fiction
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2. Reservoir Dogs
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1. Kill Bill (both of them – I count them as one)
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Inglourious Basterds was SO close to being above Death Proof, which few people will agree with. First of all, I should probably give Basterds a re-watch as I was especially wussy about violence that day and didn’t watch it closely enough except for the parts where Christoph Waltz or the lovely Melanie Laurent were on screen. It’s a much better film than Death Proof. But… Death Proof was fun and I really liked it. Zoe Bell was cool. I’m a girl and I like girls who kick ass (which is why Kill Bill is number one). So there you go!

AND I have an embarrassing confession to make: I’m a big film fan yet there’s one Tarantino-directed film that I haven’t seen. So I’ll update this list if I decide that Jackie Brown deserves a place in the Top Five. (Update – I’ve seen it now!) πŸ˜‰

Now off to finally write my review for Django Unchained (Review done now!). I’ll leave you with a shitty haiku summing up how I feel about Tarantino’s crazily violent films:

Tarantino films
Are really brilliant but I
Wish I could watch them

**I need to point out that the hubby and I are having an argument over how many syllables are in the word “brilliant”. I think this is a US/UK difference. The way I say it, it’s two, dammit! Making my haiku correct…

My Top Five Cameron Crowe Movies

Happy Birthday to Cameron Crowe! Born 13th of July 1957. So I figured I’d do my Top Five Cameron Crowe Movies (directed & written by).

In order starting with my favorite:

1. Say Anything

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2. Fast Times At Ridgemont High

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3. Almost Famous

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4. Jerry Maguire

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5. Singles

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To be honest, 4 & 5 aren’t favorites. I’d have put them the other way around but the pictures looked better in the current order. Lol

Also…

Happy Birthday to both Harrison Ford AND Patrick Stewart today! Star Wars and Star Trek COLLIDE! (but Star Wars is still better…) πŸ˜‰

My Top Five Movie Kisses

Apparently, today was International Kissing Day (6th of July). So I’ve quickly put together this list of my Top Five Movie Kisses (okay – actually six. lol.). I’m sure I’ve forgotten some I’ll kick myself for.

Counting down from number five:

5. Lady And The Tramp

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Really can’t do a list of best kisses without this one. Classic.

4. The Terminator

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Yeah – You read that right. Sorry, but when I watched this as a young teen, I thought “Kyle Reese” was so HOT. I wanted a shy sexy virgin guy to come back in time to save ME! Hell, I still want that. :-p

3. TIE: The Empire Strikes Back & Sixteen Candles

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Han Solo. Enough said. Jake Ryan. Enough said.

2. The Bucket List

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When he kisses “the most beautiful girl in the world”…

1. Cinema Paradiso

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I can’t say a thing about this one, though, as it would spoil things for anyone who hasn’t seen the movie. For those who haven’t, I HIGHLY recommend this film (especially if you’re a lover of “cinema”, which many of my fellow bloggers are). πŸ™‚

Honorable Mentions:

The Princess Bride
Say Anything
Lost In Translation
Brief Encounter
Notorious
It’s A Wonderful Life
Brokeback Mountain
The Notebook

My 6 Month Blogging Anniversary & 10,000 Views

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I figured I should do a post for either my 6 month blogging anniversary or when I hit 10,000 views but they happened close to the same time. I’m up to 10,771 views as of today since starting this blog on the 25th of November 2012. I have no clue if this is a high or low number after six months but I’m happy about it anyway. I seriously didn’t think anyone would ever look at this thing. πŸ™‚

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I’ve always loved movies but have met very few “real life” people who share that passion (other than my hubby!). So I started this (secret) blog thinking maybe I’d find a few other movie lovers to chat with & was shocked to find that there are SO many of you totally awesome movie geeks! Seriously – you people watch way more movies than I do. πŸ™‚

To celebrate my six months of blogging (this is probably the longest I’ve ever kept going with a hobby!), I figured I’d post links to some of my favorite past posts.

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REVIEWS

– My First Movie Review: The Perks Of Being A Wallflower. I didn’t say a lot but I think I need to find a balance between this and my more recent reviews which I think have become way too wordy! Perks was one of my favorite movies of the past few years and I decided to also read the book after seeing the movie. Book review HERE.

– One of my favorites that I’ve seen in the cinema this year: Robot & Frank. One thing I like about writing these reviews (although I really struggle with them sometimes as I’m certainly no “writer”) is that it makes me think more about the film as I write about it. Quite often the movies go down in my estimation but sometimes I end up liking them even more after I write about them. This happened with Robot & Frank – I realized just how brilliant the film really was while I typed out my thoughts. Another film like this was Beginners.

– The review I had the most fun writing: Monkey Shines. Ha! This movie is a bit mental. I try to keep “spoiler free” with all my reviews but with this one I just HAD to go through the whole thing scene by scene. My review makes the movie sound sort of awesome. It’s not. Lol. Also had fun reviewing Project X, which totally ripped off far superior 80s teen movies.

– The movie that was the biggest “pleasant surprise”: Tucker And Dale Vs Evil. Wasn’t expecting to enjoy that one so much! The same goes for Warm Bodies and, oddly, Sleuth. I keep moving Sleuth up higher & higher in my list of All The Movies I’ve Watched In 2013 – it’s one of those that’s really stuck with me for some reason.

– My Most Popular Reviews: Star Trek Into Darkness and three reviews for Star Trek: The Motion Picture & The Wrath Of Khan & Star Trek (2009)

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MY IMDB TOP 250 CHALLENGE

I started my IMDB Top 250 Challenge on the 1st of January. I’m hoping to watch all of the top 250 movies at IMDB (eventually!). I’d already seen 150 as of the 1st of January and I’ve watched 16 more so far this year. Links to all my Top 250 reviews are at the bottom of the page at the above link but I’ll include the links for my favorites here:

The Secret In Their Eyes – Excellent foreign film. I highly recommend this.

Princess Mononoke – Working my way through the Studio Ghibli stuff. This is the first one to make me truly appreciate Studio Ghibli and I now desperately want to watch all the rest that I haven’t seen.

Alfred Hitchcock’s Rope – I’ve now watched all the Hitchcock films in the Top 250 (there are a lot because Hitchcock was a genius). I’m always surprised to see this review still getting views – seems to be a popular slightly underrated Hitchcock classic.

Charlie Chaplin. Okay – Charlie Chaplin is my favorite “new discovery” this year. I’m so glad that I’ve FINALLY made a start on watching his films. They’re absolutely brilliant. Here’s a link to a post about him on his birthday, which includes links to my reviews of Modern Times, City Lights & The Kid: Happy Birthday To Charlie Chaplin.

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LISTS

Like the character of Rob in High Fidelity, I’m a bit obsessed with making Top Five Lists (or Top Ten, depending on my mood). Here are a few of my lists:

My Top Ten Shower & Bath Scenes In Movies. I decided to make this list after seeing JUST how many views my blog got after I casually mentioned Amber Heard’s shower scene in my review for The Ward. This list worked. People search for various combinations of the word “shower” and end up on my blog EVERY SINGLE DAY. Pervs. πŸ™‚

My Top Ten Movie Endings. Loved making this list. There are WAY too many to choose from and I have lots of honorable mentions. Plus I keep having to go back & add to the list as I watch more films. I should probably add The Wrath Of Khan as an honorable mention as well, come to think of it.

My Top Ten Foreign Language Films

My Top Animated Disney Films

My Top Five Movies About Love

My Top Ten John Hughes Movies

My Top Ten Stephen King Movies

My Top Five Beatles Songs

My Top Ten David Bowie Songs. Because I’m a little obsessed with David Bowie.

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MY TOP POSTS

Ten Things I Like About England. My most liked post ever. And it has NOTHING to do with movies. Maybe I shouldn’t be running a movie blog?! Lol

What Kind Of Film Would YOU Make?. By far the biggest response I’ve ever had to a post. Looks like we all would love to be filmmakers.

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(I felt like there should be a Star Wars picture in here somewhere)

Phew. That took a while. Sorry if that was too long, too wordy, too boring. But it was fun looking back through the past six months of this blog and seeing how much it’s grown. I’m really glad I decided to start it and am really happy to have met such great people here. I love all the discussions we’ve had and I look forward to the next six months. I’ll leave you with an underwear picture as it seems I’ve become known for posting pictures of half-naked people a bit too often lately.

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Were you actually expecting a girl? πŸ™‚

My Top Five Metallica Songs

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In honor of Ryan Gosling’s Metallica – Ride The Lightning t-shirt in The Place Beyond The Pines (Good movie – read my review HERE), I thought I’d post my Top Five Metallica songs. I’d like to point out that I’ve mellowed out now. My metal days are over & I can’t say I’ve listened to Metallica much since about 1992. But I did love them at the time. Okay… I do admit that all of these are on my iPod so I may be fibbing a little.

1. Master Of Puppets
2. One
3. Fade To Black
4. Seek & Destroy
5. Welcome Home (Sanitarium)

Honorable Mentions:

Battery
The Thing That Should Not Be
For Whom The Bell Tolls

And I love these (more than some of those above) but figured they shouldn’t be in the top five as they’re covers:

The Small Hours
The Wait
Am I Evil?
Die, Die My Darling (yes I like the Misfits one)

Sexy Ryan Gosling rocking the metalhead look:

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And in searching for the Ryan Gosling photo, I found this one. Ha! Ties in to my recent post about Disney Princesses, I guess. I’m digging Alice In Wonderland’s new look. I think all the Disney girls need to get themselves some tattoos & piercings.

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My Top Five Movie Scenes Of Self-Pleasure

Time to lower the tone… I’ll count down starting with number five:

5. Pleasantville

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4. American Beauty

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3. American Pie (so many to choose from! let’s go with all three)

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2. Fast Times At Ridgemont High

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1. Pump Up The Volume (it’s just pretend but it’s funny. Take cover, Arizona!)

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Honorable Mentions

There’s Something About Mary
Mulholland Drive
Not Another Teen Movie
American Reunion

**EDIT to add Black Swan – how could I forget that one?

And just seen Stoker so I definitely have to give that one an honorable mention too…

My Top Five Actresses

As it’s International Women’s Day… πŸ™‚

1. Amy Adams

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2. Carey Mulligan

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3. Jennifer Lawrence

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4. Drew Barrymore

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5. Grace Kelly

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Honorable mention to Emily Blunt. And Angela Lansbury & Betty White because Murder She Wrote & The Golden Girls kick ass!

(Yes, only I could have Drew Barrymore above Grace Kelly. Well, I grew up with her! And it’s my list so I can do what I want.) πŸ˜‰

My Top Five Severed Limbs In Movies

I normally start with my favorite with these lists but I’ll go backwards for this one, starting with number five:

5. Planet Terror

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Because, really, what’s cooler than a machine gun for a leg?

4. Monty Python And The Holy Grail

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It’s just a flesh wound!

3. Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope

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So many to choose from. Could do an entire list with just Star Wars limbs, hands, etc. But I like the Ponda Baba arm-severing in the Cantina. And Robot Chicken made this one REALLY funny. If I was a Star Wars geek I could go on about the arm on the floor not being the correct one to match what Ponda Baba’s arms actually look like or whatever. But I can’t say I ever noticed. Because I’m a girl and not that geeky. :-p

2. Kill Bill

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Again – so many to choose from in just this one movie. But I’ve gone with poor Sofie Fatale.

1. Teeth

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Okay – I may be stretching it a bit on what’s considered a limb? I won’t go into any detail – not necessary for anyone who’s seen the movie. And I choose the final “severing” in this movie as there’s more than one.

(OMG she didn’t include Evil Dead II! What about Reservoir Dogs? Do ears count? Toes? Big Lebowski? Decapitations? Am I going to get these sort of replies?) πŸ™‚

My Top Five Movies About Love

What the heck – since Valentine’s Day is coming up.

1. Up

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I posted about this recently – I’ve never found any love story in a movie as believable as this one.

2. WALL-E

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What can I say? Pixar is perfect. Not only do I find animated romance more believable than live-action romance, I also find animated ROBOT romance more believable. πŸ˜‰ Has anyone ever loved anyone as much as WALL-E loves Eve? I don’t think so.

3. Before Sunrise & Before Sunset

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Look! Humans! What can I say? These two were so perfect together & had such great chemistry. I found this romance very real. It’s a very “me” kind of romance.

4. (500) Days Of Summer

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“What?”, you say. Well, it’s real. Very real. Who can’t relate to this movie? Joseph Gordon-Levitt is so fantastic in this. You truly believe he loves her and you can actually feel his pain. Who doesn’t love a bit of unrequited love in movies?!

5. Cinema Paradiso

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Is this cheating? πŸ˜‰ Sorry but I can totally relate to “love of cinema”.

Honorable mentions to these dudes:

Lloyd Dobler

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Perfect boyfriend or what?! The movie isn’t in my list, however, as that bitch SO didn’t appreciate him & his awesome “boom box over the head playing Peter Gabriel” thing. He shouldn’t have gotten on that plane with her. She’s not in love with you, Lloyd! Bring your boom box and cool Clash t-shirts over to MY house. πŸ™‚

Ryan Gosling

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Hey girl. Gotta mention Ryan Gosling. You know, just in general. For being so freaking sexy cool all the time. I absolutely refuse to be all girly & put that totally contrived Notebook movie in my list. However, being in love with The Gosling, I can’t exactly pretend I don’t secretly love the whole kissing in the rain scene… πŸ˜‰ Okay okay – I kind of like the movie! I admit it! But I only think it really works while it’s showing them as a young couple – I didn’t buy into the old couple at all. Damn you, Ryan Gosling, for making me go all girly!

Jake Ryan

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Last but certainly not least. I’ll always remember my first (movie) love. πŸ˜‰

My Top Ten Beatles Songs

List updated to make this a Top Ten (well, 15) instead of Top Five. I’d left out far too many good songs…

Honorable Mentions:

15. Hey Jude
14. Girl
13. Blackbird
12. Happiness Is A Warm Gun
11. Nowhere Man

Top Ten:

10. Tomorrow Never Knows
9. Hey Bulldog
8. I Am The Walrus
7. Helter Skelter
6. A Day In The Life
5. In My Life
4. Dear Prudence
3. Eleanor Rigby
2. Across The Universe
1. Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)

Here are a couple of photos from one of my trips to Liverpool to do a Beatles tour πŸ™‚

My Top Five Christmas Movies

1. Scrooged
2. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
3. It’s A Wonderful Life
4. A Christmas Story
5. A Christmas Carol (with Alastair Sim – Scrooge as it’s called in the UK)

This was hard – I have six favorites. Also love the original Miracle on 34th Street. And of course love all the TV specials like Charlie Brown Christmas & The Grinch & Rudolph. Should have put the classics like It’s A Wonderful Life at the top of the list but had to be honest with myself – I never go without watching the first two every December. πŸ™‚

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