Review: Les Miserables

It's going to be quite hard to write this review without completely gushing, we're only in January and I think I may have already found my favourite film of the year. Les Miserables based on the stage show by Schonberg & Boublil follows Jean Valjean through decades as he's being hunted by policeman Javert. I saw the show in London a few years ago now and enjoyed it but was never a mega fan and I think that's the best way to see the film because from what I've seen online the mega fans are going to be more nit picky over the film.

Being a self confessed musical nerd, it's an exciting time anytime a show gets a big screen adaption and I think Les Mis is a particularly good one for showing all the people who can't stand them that they're not all cheese and jazz hands. That said if you're expecting to see some perfect belting singing then you will be disappointed, this film is all about the raw emotion of the characters and this was perfectly filmed with extreme close ups by Tom Hooper. I also think the live singing works well with this rather than having the actors mime to pre recorded vocals. 

The cast are all brilliant and I personally enjoyed playing spot the West End actor with all their cameos. In terms of the lead cast, Anne Hathaway is fantastic and she will be robbed if she doesn't win the Oscar for this performance. I also enjoyed performances by Hugh Jackman, Samantha Barks and yes although Russell Crowe cannot sing I think his Javert works well for this adaption. I left the cinema immediately wanting to watch it again and am hopefully going again next Sunday to see it in IMAX.

Award season

Only 10 days into 2013 and we're well into award season already. The BAFTA nominations were announced yesterday and the full list can be seen here, the Oscar nominations were announced today and can be seen here and finally the BRIT awards were announced this evening and can be found here.

Every year when we get the film based awards I realise how behind I am in seeing the latest films, I'm trying to make it up this year though and at the end of the month I'm going to take out a Cineworld card and try and see as much as possible. I'm very much looking forward to seeing Les Miserables tomorrow night and you can expect a review on it as I enjoyed seeing the show on stage a few years ago. I've also just seen the trailer for Lincoln the first time this evening and since that seems to be sweeping the nominations I'll have to get myself to that at some point too.

Looking at the BRIT awards I can't say I'm too enthusiastic about the list of nominees, I have to admit I am biased towards my favourite musical artists so when they aren't featured I'm not too fussed. We still don't have a release date for Lady Gaga's ARTPOP this year and I'm not sure if Florence's Ceremonials qualifies, if it does then it's an outrage they've only received one nomination. Emeli Sande leads the way with the most nominations and I think I'm one of the few who isn't bored of her and I've kept meaning to check out Paloma Faith's new album and seeing it nominated will give me the push to do that.

What does everyone else think of the nominees? Are there any films or music I MUST check out?

Long Time No Blog

Oops I've already slipped into bad habits of not blogging. To be fair it is of course the busiest time of the year, just before Christmas I came down with a nice bout of Laryngitis which meant I had a rotten time at my works Christmas party. I managed to stay for the three course dinner but after that I had to be picked up and went straight home to bed.

Soon after that Christmas was already upon us. My office is open all the days between the bank holidays but I decided to take them off for some lazy time. This turned out to be a great idea because the 90 minute Homeland season finale was on the night before Christmas Eve. The first hour was dull and nothing happened but I feel that lulled the audience into a false sense of security and then BOOM! (Quite literally.) This has raised some questions for the next series but I'm mostly looking forward to Saul becoming head of the CIA and Carrie basically mirroring the first series but this time she needs to prove Brody's innocence.

Christmas is a bit of a weird one in my house because my mum and sister had to work so we didn't have the traditional dinner or presents until Boxing Day. The morning of Boxing Day I headed to the sales, I wasn't really all that impressed, I was in town first thing and then annoyed that Lush & Cath Kidston didn't open until 11am. I did manage to get a nice half price purse & cushion from Ollie & Nic and I went to Primark but only bought a few non sale items. I also got myself a decent TomTom sat nav so I need to go on a road trip somewhere and the day after I picked up a good few bargains at the George (Asda) sale. I'm more of a giver than a receiver when it comes to presents so I enjoyed watching everyone open what I got them, particularly my younger sister when she realised I got her a ticket to see her favourite singer Rihanna. I have to admit I'm really looking forward to seeing her too and now don't have to worry about accidentally mentioning it, phew!

This afternoon I went to see Pitch Perfect at the cinema. I hate the delay in movies we get here, this film is already out on DVD in the US but only just release over here. It's the same with all the Americans who have already got to see Les Mis and we have to wait until the 11th, I really can't wait to see that! Anyway back to Pitch Perfect, the plot centres around a cappella group college competition, yes basically a more grown up Glee. I enjoyed the film and the musicals geek in me loved all the performance numbers. I think Fat Amy is my spirit animal and I spent the whole film thinking "I'm sure that guy (who plays Jesse) is familiar" and then it turned out to be Skylar Astin from OBC Spring Awakening. If you like a good modern musical number and some comedy then I definitely recommend this film.

It's almost time for New Years Eve. I'm not up to anything myself, does anyone else have any plans? How about plans for the new year? I've booked myself some theatre tickets so there'll be posts on those and I also plan to take part in the 365 project so maybe posts on that too.