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Thursday, October 8
An Education
Cold Schooled
Trailers & Mo | Official Website
We've warned you over and over about how udderly franztastic actress cutie pie McGee Carey Mulligan is be (our love started with her minor work in Pride & Prejudice, then blossomed fully in the Dickens mini-series Bleak House, and has never stopped since), but you were probably too busy looking for the NSFWs all over this site to even notice (sure, her boobs aren't gigantic, but it's OK, juss ask yer moms, who doesn't have gynormo ones either). Well, sometimes it takes more than a nation of Thighlanders to get a very valid point across
Spankfully An Education eggsists, and certifies and further promotes this and our finding of Ms Mulligan's skill and bestness. She is An Education. Without her in this breakout and first lead role this knowledge might have remained buried for years to come, and the flick itself would have not been as palatable. But she is in the movie, and others have certainly taken note of her performance, earning much much much Oscar buzz, comparisons linking her to Audrey Hepburn, and plenty o' praise heaped about, even from someone who rarely doles it out like Anna Wintour. Will things ever be the same for this up and comer? It won't, and even if you take a pass on the course work of An Education and miss her indelible/incredible work, her name and face will be hard to escape in the decades to come, so why not hop on now before the bandwagon aint got no mo seats left?
So what is all this Education stuffs, eh? Mulligan plays Jenny, an impressionable school girl (a screenplay by good ole Nick Hornby based on Lynn Barber's memoirs), who's skipping right along on a rosy pathway to Oxford in the post-war 50s world of England. Her proud semi-stern folks (Alfred Molina and olderish-Mulligan look-a-like Cara Seymour) keep a watchful eye on their beloved only child, so when the charming, older, more refined David (Peter Sarsgaard) steps into her life from outta nowhere, will hers or theirs ever be the same? For better, and for worse, no
Through David, she gets to learn lessons that can only be found outside the walls of her all girls school (with a supportive teach played by hey, where the fork have you been Olivia Williams + Emma Thompson, doing her usual steady Emma Thompson thing as the headmistress). Her bright eyes and keen ears are wide open, taking in all sorts of culture and delicacies her working class family never had the privilege to have shown her. She's wined and dined, and has her lid flipped all over London town, the British countryside, and eventually a bon Paris trip, with her new beau, his thick as thieves buddy Danny (Dominic Cooper, slowly growing on us as a solid actor) and his dense sweet-tart (Rosamund Pike). Sounds purty peachy, eh? Well David isn't all that he seems and when not-so-perfect things come to light about her Mr Perfect, everything will come apart at the seems. Will it be too late to stitch thangs back up????
Director Lone Scherfig's colorful period piece thrives with Mulligan in the driver's seat, but the road we head down feels all to well traveled. We've encountered numerous coming of age, girls II women, stories before, and this one isn't that discernible from the rest. But for this particular film, it doesn't have to be, especially when we get the rare chance to see a star being born
Bearded Wonder Boy: poor Matthew Beard. this is the second movie, after When Did You Last See Your Father?, where his crush and hard-on for Ms Mulligan have been crushed and turned into blue balls
Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers
St. Trinian's
Holy Crap!
Trailers & Mo | Official Website
English cartoonist Ronald Searle's St Trinian's series spawned several books and big screen adaptations, the first being The Belles of St Trinian's in 1954. Sequels followed, the last being in 1980, and apparently the time was right to do it all over again, splashed up wit respected actors (Colin Firth, Toby Jones, Lena Headey, Stephen Fry, and the namesake of our annual movie names award, Fenella Woolgar), youngish hotties (Gemma Arterton, Lily Cole, Mischa Barton, Russell Brand?), youngish ones who are on their way to respectability (Talulah Riley, Jodie Whittaker, Juno Temple) + a lil help from the loud girls of Girls Aloud. This film came out in the Old World circa 2007. It was such a island-wide smash that it's own sequel, St Trinian's 2: The Legend of Fritton's Gold, is hitting up their shores this winter. Besides peering at them wickedly adorable beauties and seeing Rupert Everett deliciously switch hit as a student's father and then don a ladies get-up as the school's wacky headmistress (a word so grand, it had to be used in both of our reviews!), this slapdash exercise in controlled insanity is nuttin more than a British version of the hiss-fire Bratz, cept w/o the 'Bratitude' [d]. What, that comparison means nuttin to you? Well, think Monty Python's Flying Circus, w/o the Monty Python, the flying, and a circus with only a 1/4 ring
Saint Sinner: remember Caterina Murino? she was one of the Bond gals in Fapino Royale w/cheese, and if you look at these pictures, you probably won't forget her again
Verdictgo: Slit Yer Eyes Out Repoopulous
An Education schools in NY & LA this Friday, while St. Trinian's fails in the North East only on the same day
and until next thyme the balcony is clothed...
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