Happy Birthday: One Year On...

One year ago from today I put my first blog post online. I started doing it as a bit of fun, not expecting for my blog to grow as much as it has! 63 posts later and I have an audience that I never thought was possible. The amount of different people in different countries that have read my posts is incredible! I have even had the organisers of the Sundance Film Festival read some of my posts! I would not have a got here without the help of my readers! Thank you guys so much! I also want to thank The Large Association Of Movie Blogs (The LAMB) for letting me into their community and bringing a larger audience of fellow movie bloggers to my site.

I was a bit unsure as to what to write about today for the 1st birthday of my blog, but I have decided to look back at my 10 most popular posts of the last year. So please enjoy!

10. The Avengers Review
I remember this day very well! I was so excited for this film and I am so glad that it met all my expectations. My review is a very happy one indeed and although I am biased as a massive fan boy! There is no doubt in my mind that this will most likely be my favourite film of the year.

9. Chronicle
Many of my popular posts I did not expect to do as well as they did and this post is one of them. I saw it on DVD, really liked it and wrote a review. It sure is a film to check out if your fan of superheroes and found footage films.

8. Ted
Ted is one of those films that I had mixed feelings on. I would definitely watch it again with a group of friends but it definitely wasn't the funniest things I have ever seen. Check out this review to see if you agree with me.

7. God Bless America & 21 Jump Street
Even though I was on holiday when this was posted this still got a great amount of hits. This is mainly due to the fact that this was the first post people saw when I had been allowed as member of The LAMB. Both films I believe are great and I recommend them both as good comedies.

6. Reinventing Romance
This is one of my more recent posts and it actually contains my case study for the end of Media Studies course. I really enjoyed writing about the subject and I am glad you guys took a liking to it too!

5. Shame
Shame is one of those film that I loved but don't really want to watch again. It contains one of my favourite actors, the Fassbender, in one of his best roles. But the subject matter of sex addiction is an uncomfortable one and is most likely why it was denied an Oscar nomination.

4. Would You Like The Good News or The Bad News First?
Another post I am surprised has done well.One of my first posts and it just contains a summary of movie news that had happened that week.

3. Alex's Essential Spider-Man
I am so glad this post did well as I worked very hard on it. I loved the fact that I was able to get fan made pictures from my readers to work on this post and celebrate our love of Spider-Man. Even if the most recent film was a bit of a disappointment.

2. Sundance London 2012
One of the best weekends ever in blog form! With help from organisers of the festival I was able to move this post up to second on the list. Whether I'll be there next year, I do not know. Being a student can be difficult in this day and age! If I can, I will!

1. What Would Travis Bickle Do?
The biggest surprise of them all! My quick angry rant turned into my biggest hit. I don't really know what else to say as i wasn't expecting this to that well. I think when I first put it on it did terribly but as the months have passed, more people have read and enjoyed it. Thank you so much!

Although things have slowed down here recently on the blog I would like to thank everybody who keeps reading it. Here's to another year!

Thank you for reading!

Ted Review

If you like crude humour then Ted  is right up your street. If you don't then it is not, as my girlfriend found out, who hated this film. Me on the other hand, I rather enjoyed it!

Written, directed and starring Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane, Ted's plot goes like this; 'As the result of a childhood wish, John Bennett's teddy bear, Ted, came to life and has been by John's side ever since - a friendship that's tested when Lori, John's girlfriend of four years, wants more from their relationship.' A pretty straightforward plot, a pretty straightforward film, with quite a few laughs in between.

Actually it is the start of this film that gave me high hopes for this to be an excellent comedy film. It is unfortunately after the first act that the film falls short of that. After the first 30 minutes the jokes start to slow down and become less funny. A hilarious party scene in the middle of the film brings back this hope but unfortunately is let down by a lacklustre third act.

The problem with this film was that the talking teddy bear was the most realistic part of it! The relationship between Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis was unbelievable and did not feel real. All of Mila Kunis's lines felt forced, which was such a shame as she is generally a really good actress! Mark Wahlberg is much better in a comedic role as you are actually allowed to laugh at his acting but unfortunately this made most of his more human scenes pretty rubbish, therefore not allowing the audience to become emotionally connected to any of the characters, which pretty much makes the last act fall apart. This is mainly because the third act asks us to worry about these characters when in danger and by this point you couldn't care less.

This film is a comedy film so you shouldn't care about the story too much and just wait for the laughs to come. And there are quite a few really funny ones and there a re quite a few that aren't so much. So you get your fair share but at least it had more laughs then The Sitter did earlier this year!

As I said at the start the jokes are crude and are likely to be about farts or will just offend a few people in the audience. Like Family Guy it can be racist, homophobic and will take the mick out of fat kids but what more do you expect from Seth MacFarlane?

Ted himself looks pretty impressive and thanks to the magic of motion capture I did not once believe I was watching a bear made of CGI, though every now and then thought I was listening to Peter Griffin!

There are some great moments in this film and also some excellent cameos but what it falls short of is emotional connection. But what the hell, it's a comedy! And although its not as good as some this year like 21 Jump Street, it's still on of the better side of the list! If you are a fan of Family Guy then you will probably really enjoy this! Though it wasn't perfect I still enjoyed Ted and had a good laugh. So therefore I am giving Ted a rating of 3/5.


In other news, Joss Whedon has been confirmed to write and direct The Avengers 2!!! This is awesome news! Bring on the next 3 years of anticipation! Joss Whedon is also helping develop a TV show for ABC that will be set in the Marvel cinematic universe. No announcements on what it's about but my guess it will be about the agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. What do you think?

Thanks for reading!