A Series Of (Un)Fortunate Reviews

I don't think I've yet shared with you my love of Hallmark Movies.  I love a good Hallmark Christmas movie.  I can watch a Christmas movie in the winter or the summer; Christmas in December or Christmas in July.  Doesn't matter.  I watched this movie in the Spring and saved the review for closer to Christmas.   Christmas Land stars Luke Macfarlane and Nikki DeLoach.  I previously saw Luke Macfarlane in the Hallmark Movie and Mystery, The Memory Book (the library has it on DVD), and that was a decent movie.  It seems Macfarlane has recently become the darling of Hallmark movies because he's done a Hallmark movie a year since 2014 (and I have thus far seen two of them), and that's fine by me. When Jules, a high powered something something executive in the big city (something to do with social media campaigns or some such), inherits her grandmother's house, land, and the Christmas themed attraction that occupies that land, Jules returns to the small...

Miss Shayne returns with a review of a new movie in theaters now; it will be available to borrow on DVD from the library soon. I absolutely LOVE the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. It is one of the reasons why, as a child, I would often tell people I wanted to be a pirate when I grew up. (And, if I’m being honest, I still tell people this.) The first two movies in this franchise are incredible, and it would be difficult to match the perfection achieved with them. However, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales is still worth a watch. This movie starts out by following Henry, the son of Will Turner and Elizabeth Swann. He is trying to find Poseidon’s trident which will undo the curse that binds Will Turner to the Flying Dutchman, along with every curse on the sea. To find the trident, Henry must first enlist the help of Captain Jack Sparrow, who Henry believes to be some kind of pirate legend. Henry eventually stumbles upon Carina Smyth, an intelligent woman of sci...

The Bridge on the River Kwai was required viewing for a class I'm taking.  I had a choice between reading the book of the same title by Pierre Boulle or viewing the movie adaptation.  I chose to watch the movie which is about 40 minutes too long. Set during World War II in a prison camp in Asia, Col. Nicholson butts heads with Col. Saito, the commandant of the prisoner of war camp that Nicholson and his men have the misfortune of landing in.  When Nicholson refuses to allow himself or his fellow officers to perform hard labor in the camp (the Geneva Conventions forbid it!), Saito throws Nicholson in the oven fully expecting him to capitulate within a few hours.  However, Saito sorely underestimates Nicholson's hardheadedness because the stalemate between the men lasts weeks (possibly months; it's hard to tell, but I know it lasts an hour in the movie) while Nicholson and his men bake in a dark hole. When the two men finally reach an agreement that gets Nichols...