Bria Lou Reviews

Hey Guys x I remember wanting to see this when it first came out, but for whatever reason I never got around to it. So I was really glad when I saw that it had been added to Netflix, as I don't know if I would have watched it otherwise. Edward (Billy Howle) and Florence (Saoirse Ronan) are newlyweds who are trying to consummate their marriage. However, many things in the past and present get in their way. But can their relationship survive the things that are holding them back? I really really liked this movie. From the first scene, it is easy to tell who these people are. You can feel the awkwardness between them radiating off the screen. This gives a great initial impression of who they are as a couple. I really enjoyed the way the story was told. Some of the most important parts of the story are told in flashbacks that slowly lead up to the way that the movie begins, and it's done really intelligently. The conversation that the couple have near the end of the m...

Hey Guys x This is a Netflix film (or a film on Netflix) that I immediately added to my list because of the familiarity of it. I feel like I've seen a lot of horror movies set in similar locations (Carnivals, theme parks, etc.), and I've always liked the idea of horror movies taking place in a completely public space, so I was really interested in this one. On Halloween, six teenagers go to Hell Fest, a fun fair/carnival with a variety of horror based, games, mazes, rides and performances. However, soon the group are confronted by a masked man who is using Hell Fest to conduct his own version of a real-life hellish nightmare. This movie wasn't unwatchable by any means, and while there were some things about it that I enjoyed, overall I'm not a huge fan. The beginning of the movie, particularly the style of credits that are used, makes the movie feel like a classic '80s horror, which to me shows that the director knew exactly what style of film they were tr...

Hey Guys x This is a monumentally late review, but better late than never! I remember wanting to see this as soon as it came out, because not only do I love horror, but I love Octavia Spencer, and you never really see her in 'antagonist' roles, so I was really looking forward to it! A group of high school friends befriend an older woman, who calls herself 'Ma' (Octavia Spencer). Ma buys them alcohol and lets them party in her basement. But when Ma's kindness becomes dangerous, the kids discover that Ma isn't as innocent as she seems... I really wanted to like this film, but unfortunately there were so many things about it that I couldn't get past. And a lot of the things that I didn't like had to do with the group of friends: Maggie (Diana Silvers), Andy (Corey Fogelmanis), Haley (McKaley Miller), Chaz (Gianni Paolo) and Darrell (Dante Brown). For a start, their friendship (particularly with Maggie) is weird and forced from the beginning. The...

Hey Guys x I wasn't in a rush to see this movie, to be honest. I knew that it was connected to the Conjuring Universe, but also heard that the connection was so flimsy that it didn't really make a difference. Nevertheless, it was still on my list of films to watch, just because of how much I love horror. Social Worker Anna Tate-Garcia (Linda Cardellini) has seen many things during her time as a social worker. But one case, involving a woman whose two children end up dead, stays with her. Especially when it seems like whatever targeted that woman has now set its sights on her own family. I liked this movie, but for so many reasons I didn't love it. However, that's not to say that it's a really good movie or anything. The reason I like it is because it's just a run-of-the-mill horror. It's not doing anything different from films like Paranormal Activity, for example. It's also not showcasing anything new in the telling of the story. The only or...

Hey Guys x I'm a really huge fan of the first IT movie (and the small part of the book that I've read, which I'm going back to now I've seen this one!), so while I was sceptical about this one being able to match the first one, I was still excited to see it. In 1989, 7 kids took on evil clown Pennywise and won, making a promise to come back to their hometown of Derry, Maine, if he did. 27 years later, the friends aren't in contact and have mostly moved out of Derry, going their separate ways and forgetting about what happened in their childhoods. Except one. When Mike Hanlon (Isaiah Mustafa) sees the signs of a clown in Derry once again, he rounds up the Losers to defeat Pennywise once and for all. While walking out of the cinema, I felt a bit indifferent about this movie. After letting it digest for a day, while there were things that I didn't like about it, I do think it was a good sequel to the first movie. For a start, the castings were amazing. H...

Hey Guys x Here's another book review, this time in the form of 'A Good Girl's Guide To Murder'. This is a book that I hadn't heard much about until I actually bought it. I remember going into a WHSmiths and it was in their 'recommended' section (along with 'One of Us Is Lying'), and I thought it looked kind of interesting, so I bought them both. Then I went online and saw that the online support for both of them was massive! Five years before, Andie Bell was murdered by Sal Singh. There's no doubt in anyone's mind that Sal was guilty... that is, apart from Pip, who has never quite believed the police's version of events. So when she has to do a class project, she knows exactly what case she's going to investigate. But when the evidence becomes too obvious to ignore, and Pip gets deeper and deeper into the lives of two people that she never really knew, can she push her personal connections aside to discover the truth? And if ...

Hey Guys x This used to be on Netflix, and I remember watching at least 20 minutes of it before getting bored and deciding on something better. But recently it came on TV and I thought that I might as well give it a chance. It definitely wasn't as boring as I remembered! Travis (Benjamin Walker) and Gabby (Teresa Palmer) are next-door neighbours who don't like each other. At all. He's too easygoing for her, and she's too uptight for him. But when Gabby's boyfriend (Tom Welling) leaves town, the two find themselves getting closer, and their attraction is undeniable. But can these two people who bother each other so much, really be together? I enjoyed this movie, but I have to say that it's based on a Nicholas Sparks novel, and you can totally tell. It has the cliche trope of 'two people who hate each other' that everyone pretends to hate but secretly loves. While I find it a bit overdone, I guess it does make things more interesting than if two ...

Hey Guys x This film is called 'Drunk on Love' in the UK, so initially when it came on the Sky Premiere channels I didn't recognise it until I read the description. Nevertheless, I had heard of it before, and the inital premise was enough to interest me. Taylor Ogburn (Nick Robinson) has lived a sheltered life because of this heart condition. So when he meets Krystal (Rosario Dawson), he falls head-over-heels and wants to experience all of life with her - even if she is an alcoholic ex-stripper with a sixteen-year-old wheelchair-bound son (Jacob Latimore). To get closer to her, he joins AA, even though he's never had a drink in his life, hoping to find out more about this mysterious woman. The reviews for this film aren't great at all, so I had really low expectations, but upon watching it I was pleasantly surprised. For a start, this film is Rosario Dawson in a role that I'd never seen her in before. It was great and refreshing to see her as a charact...

Hey Guys x This is Netflix's latest rom-com offering, and I had been waiting to see it for ages just because I love a good fluffy rom-com, and this promised to be exactly that. Gabriela Dias (Christina Milan) loses her job and her boyfriend in the space of a week, so when she enters a competition to win an inn in New Zealand, and wins, she jumps at the chance for a fresh start. But when her inn needs more work than she expected, she finds that the people around her are more than willing to lend a hand - particularly contractor Jake Taylor (Adam Demos). I liked this movie a lot! For a start, it takes less than a few seconds to fall in love with the character of Gabriela. She's soft enough to be strong without being intimidating to the audience. She's a comfortable, interesting person to watch, almost like watching a movie about a friend. A great thing about the film is that it's effortlessly diverse in all facets - it was nice to see a movie set in New Zealan...

Hey Guys x I've actually been aware of the 'After' story for a while. I'm not a One Direction fan in particular, but I am really into the fanfic community, and have read more fanfics than I can count (and written a fair few myself), so when After was being written I had it saved in my Wattpad library and read a few chapters. I didn't hate it, but it didn't capture my attention enough to read all 100 chapters. Anyway, I always had it on the back burner, saved a few chapters in, so when I heard that it was going to be made into a movie, I was really surprised - especially because of the mixed feelings surrounding it. But of course, when it came out on Netflix recently, I had to watch and review it! When I'm preparing to write a review, I write notes in a notebook and then write those notes out. Well, for After, I have more notes than I've ever written on a movie. It kind of feels like a really strange review because the points that I've written c...

Hey Guys x I have quite a few favourites to talk about today, so let's get on with it! Favourite Movie (1): Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark I reviewed this after I went to see it, and you can read my review HERE . But every time I think about this film I like it more, and I really can't wait to see it again! Favourite Movie (2): The Accountant Ben Affleck is one of my favourite actors in the world, so even though I had already tried to watch this once and turned it off, I wasn't deterred, and tried it again once it was on Netflix. And I was so pleasantly surprised that I had to put it down here, because I did not expect to like it as much as I did and I certainly didn't expect to love it. It's still on Netflix (UK) so give it a watch if you haven't! It's about an autistic man with an amazing gift for numbers who discovers a discrepancy while working as a accountant. However, the cause of the discrepancy is linked to someone who will do anythi...

Hey Guys x I remember seeing the trailer for this on TV and thought that it looked really interesting. It reminded me of 'The Autopsy of Jane Doe', which was a really good horror movie, so I was already feeling positive about this before I saw it. Megan Reed (Shay Mitchell) begins working in a morgue after a personal tragedy, when she is delivered a body that supposedly died months earlier. But when strange things start happening, and Megan starts seeing things that she shouldn't be seeing, she begins to wonder - what the hell happened to Hannah Grace? Horror movies never really get high scores on sites like Rotten Tomatoes, mainly because it's hard to do something that hasn't been done in some shape or form before. However, while I do see the problems that this film has, as a horror movie fan I really enjoyed watching it. Like 'The Autopsy of Jane Doe', I think that a morgue is a great setting for a horror movie. It makes everything instantly scar...