Bria Lou Reviews

It's been hard to narrow down what to write about when capturing the last three months - there's been so many great things that I've loved! Favourite Movie (1): The Odyssey I'll be uploading a full review of this movie, but as it's here, it's not a surprise to read that I loved it. I'm really glad I got to experience it in IMAX, which was my first ever IMAX experience, and such a fantastic one! This is worth watching in whatever format, but it definitely felt incredibly special on such a huge screen. Favourite Movie (2): The Love Hypothesis This was a late addition to the post - I watched this movie the same day I'm writing this post, but I loved it so much that I had to include it. It'll get a full review but it's worth saying here that it was pretty much everything I wanted from an adaptation of this story! Favourite Show (1): Shameless (US) Pretty much the entirety of my July was dedicated to watching this show. I think it's the quickest I...

  I hadn't heard of this film before seeing it on the bucket list, and the premise was quite vague, so it felt like I was going in blind, which is always fun. The movie was okay, but I didn't like it as much as I wanted to. You get into the story right away - not only do you feel sympathy with the family from almost the very beginning, but you're invested in their story even when you don't know what direction the movie is going in. If you go in blind, it takes a long time to really understand what the movie is about or where it's going. After about 15 minutes, the plot seems to slow down, and other than getting to know the characters, not much happens. It's the kind of film that takes you along for the ride. We experience things alongside the characters, we have as much information as they do, and as more unexplainable things happen, we become more and more invested in how everything will end. The characters are great. Even though we don't know much about th...

  After being given the wrong number by a girl on a night out, Owen (Spike Fearn) teams up with a psychology student (Angourie Rice) to find the right Emily. I am here for all of the original rom-coms, so when I first heard about this one, I was really looking forward to seeing it. But I was even more excited when I saw all of the positive reviews. I really really liked this movie. As said, original rom-coms seem to be back in full force and I will always be a fan! The main character, Owen, is really sweet and fun to follow. The story is really grounded. All of the characters feel authentic and the story feels rooted in reality, even when the dialogue feels a bit over-the-top. The main actors, Fearn and Rice, have great chemistry and the relationship that they create with their characters is really sweet, and so much fun to watch. Their development is lovely and it's fun to be able to root for them as their relationship forms. If anything, all I wished was for them to have more tim...

I hadn't heard of this film before seeing it on the bucket list. The premise was an interesting one that could go in a few different directions, so I was interested to see how it would play out. I have mixed feelings about this one. The film moves slowly at first. We spend a lot of time getting to know and understand our main character, Carole, but because it's a psychological horror, with so much of it being centred on Carole's thoughts and emotions, having this time to understand her is beneficial. This is a psychological horror in the truest sense. All of the horror starts from Carole's mind, and for most of the film that's where it stays. And even when this horror becomes real, this happens as a result of Carole's thoughts. It's really interesting watching the character's descent into paranoia and madness. Seeing the way things escalate to mirror her state of mind really allows the audience to see what she's thinking, and it's fascinating to ...

  I hadn't heard of this film before seeing it on the bucket list, but I did like the premise so I was looking forward to seeing it. I liked this film a lot. It's really fun watching older murder mysteries; seeing the way that tropes have grown and changed over the years is fascinating. But it's also equally fascinating to see the way things have stayed the same - the eclectic group of characters is definitely something that has continued to be portrayed in modern murder mysteries. One of the things that this movie explores is violence against women, and in particular, violence against vulnerable women. Looking at this issue through the trope of a murder mystery is very effective at forcing an audience to look at a real issue by packaging it in a fun and somewhat familiar plot. The film is quite slow moving, which always surprises me in films that have such a short runtime. Particularly for a murder mystery. With only 80 minutes to play with you'd expect the action to n...

  When Angela (Olivia Wilde) and Joe (Seth Rogan) invite their upstairs neighbours over for dinner, the night takes an unexpected turn that forces the couple to examine the future of their marriage. I'd heard such great things about this movie when it first came out, including many predictions for Oscar nominations, so of course I had to see it! To be honest, I was a bit disappointed. I liked the movie, but I didn't fully understand all of the exceptional praise it was receiving. The cast is a definite standout though. They're all fantastic and feel authentic in their roles. The dialogue is really fun and quippy, particularly at the beginning when we're getting to know the characters. It gives an interesting insight into who they really are. But with that, the film is very dialogue-heavy, to the point that it definitely feels like it could, or should, be a play. And it stays like this until the end, so if you're not a fan of dialogue-heavy movies, or just don't ...

  I'd only seen the 2019 remake of this movie, so this was a new watch. I had no idea how close or far apart the movies would be, or if they'd have the same twists, but I liked the direction the newer one went in, so I was looking forward to seeing this version. I also always look forward to psychological horrors in particular, which made me even more intrigued about this one. I really liked this movie. The beginning of the film does a good job of establishing the character of Jacob. You really feel like you know him and he's a great character to follow. We get the psychological horror aspects from almost the very beginning; we have a character who very obviously cannot trust his own mind, and that's a really interesting dynamic from an audience point of view. This is the character we're following, so if he can't trust his mind, we can't trust anything we see either. And the more the film leans into this, the better it is. It's great that the film can do...

  When a bioterrorist attack causes a zombie-like reaction from its victims, the survivors must work together to stay alive. I hadn't heard of this film until it came out, but after seeing that it was directed by Yeon Sang-ho, who also directed 'Train to Busan', the best zombie movie I've ever seen, I was really hopeful about it. I loved this movie. It had a great start. There was a build-up that gave us enough necessary character information to make us care, while also being short enough that we could get into the main plot quickly. We got to know the characters as much as we needed to, and once we get into the story we really get the chance to build connections with them. You care about them really quickly, which makes you all the more invested. The zombies are designed really well, in a way that's genuinely scary while also feeling fresh and different from the designs used in previous movies. The film is so engaging and fast-paced that you don't want to look ...

I'd never heard of this film before seeing it on the bucket list, and seeing that it was another vampire film didn't really fill me with confidence. But the fact that it's directed by Kathryn Bigelow really intrigued me, as this isn't the kind of film I'd associate with her.  I didn't love this one unfortunately.  From the start it feels a lot more grounded than a typical vampire movie. It's very rooted in reality.  It gets into things right from the start. It takes less than 15 minutes for our main character to be bitten, which is great. We know what we're here for, we know what vampires are, we don't need a long explanation. The characters aren't the most interesting. We only ever get to know them in this situation, so while the vampire aspect is interesting, it gets old, and eventually we have to be able to either connect with, or somewhat like, the characters to stay interested in the story.  The issue is that some of them are two-dimensional...

  When a newcomer joins their cult, Apple (Lili Reinhart), Fig (Alexandra Shipp) and Cherry (Victoria Pedretti) soon find their inner darkness exposed. I didn't know much about this film before it came out, but it starred a group of great, recognisable actresses so I was excited to see what they would do with it. I liked this more than I thought I would! I've already mentioned the cast, and they're absolutely the best thing about the movie. All of the actresses do such a great job with their characters and really elevate the material. The film knows what it is and really leans into being campy, which is so much fun. The characters are absurd, and because of that, a lot of the dialogue hits the ear wrong and generally the whole thing feels somewhat badly written. But this is probably just down to the story itself and the character creation rather than the actual writing. It was really hard to tell where the story was going, but it's interesting and engaging enough that i...

  I'd never heard of this film before, and went in fairly blind, so I knew almost nothing about it when I pressed play. This film was fine, but I didn't enjoy it as much as I wanted to. It grabs you almost from the very beginning with the shock of the opening scene. Having no idea what was about to happen, it really takes you by surprise. This is a ghost story, and one of the most interesting things about it is the images of the ghosts. If we weren't on the main character's side before, seeing what she sees endears us to her. Even though there aren't a lot of special effects, the make-up alone makes the ghosts look scary. I liked the horror scenes a lot more than the world-building ones. I didn't care much about the background characters so it would have been nice if a bit less time was spent on them. Despite being a shorter movie, it feels longer than it is, in both a good and bad way. Good because it feels like we get a full story with real characters. Bad bec...

  When a family are trapped in their home with no way out, they have to work together to protect themselves from the dangerous threat outside. This film was on my radar for a while before it came out because I'm a huge fan of Wagner Moura, so I was excitedly anticipating it! There are some major flaws with this movie, but I did enjoy it. The first point, which is why so many people watched this as soon as it came out and are still watching it - the concept is so inventive and original! The starting point is really simple, but could go in so many different directions that you really want to see what happens. Even just watching you feel trapped, both in the film's house with the family, but also in your own house! It's so claustrophobic that watching it becomes an intense experience. The cast are all great and play their parts really well. The young actors are fantastic and felt really authentic, as did all of the performances. These are characters that we can really root for...

  While on holiday in the Yorkshire Dales, a group of six friends find a backpack containing more money than they've ever seen. But when the group becomes split on deciding whether to hand the money in to the police, long-held secrets are exposed, and the friends discover that they don't know each other as well as they thought they did. T.M. Logan is my favourite author, so his books are always pre-ordered as soon as a new one is announced, and this one was no different. Unfortunately I didn't love this one as much as some of Logan's other novels. I did like that it got right into the story. Everything started really quickly, the money was found before we even knew who most of the characters were, which worked in its favour because the story was a lot more interesting than the characters themselves. From the beginning, I was intrigued to see how it would end, but again that was more about the story than the characters. It moved quite slowly after the initial excitement ...

  Two unrelated people are forced to work together to expose government secrets. I heard really mixed things about this film before seeing it - from it's the best film of the year to it's so bad it's not worth watching, so I was looking forward to seeing it. I too had mixed feelings about it. I actually liked it, but there were definitely huge flaws, so I can understand why a lot of people don't. From the start, it throws you into the situation with no context, in a way that's jarring and makes it difficult to build a connection with the characters. It's not always necessary to connect with the characters but I feel like that connection really would have helped the film. The cast is great, and for the most part the actors do a great job with their characters. That being said, some of the characters had more interesting stories than others. I found I was more interested in the character played by Emily Blunt than anyone else. But when you're interested in the...

  A distant father and daughter (Steve Zahn and Audrey Clair Zahn) are forced to reconnect when he chaperones a dance competition. I watched the trailer for this film and immediately wanted to watch it. It seemed like it would be really sweet but also potentially quite powerful, so I was looking forward to it. And that's kind of what it was; a sweet, powerful story that I enjoyed watching. The filmmakers came up with a really interesting, original way of showing the parallels in the characters' lives, and it allows the audience to build connections with the father and daughter simultaneously. And the whole way through, the film makes such good use out of a split screen and really uses this method to give us much more of an insight into the characters than we would have had otherwise. All the characters have such fun dynamics. It's really nice seeing them interact. The casting is great. The fact that the characters are actually father and daughter adds a beautiful layer to t...

  I'd never heard of this movie, let alone knew that David Bowie starred in a horror movie, so I was intrigued about this one. Though also a bit sceptical, as I don't always love vampire-themed horror movies. I liked this film a lot. The beginning is intriguing. We're kind of thrown in at the deep end without knowing much about the characters, and figure things out as we go. It's not surprising that music was such a large focus, but it ties in with the story so easily. Whether it's actual singing, playing or the score, it all becomes a major feature of telling this story. I love that the film plays with the ideas we've always had about vampires - particularly the difference between eternal life and eternal youth, which in many vampire movies are treated like one and the same. Not only does it explore this, but it actually bases the story on it. The visuals, including the make-up, are done so well. The ageing looks incredibly realistic, the gory scenes are done w...

  When wedding singer Rick (Paul Rudd) meets boy-band star Danny (Nick Jonas) the two bond over their fading careers. But when Rick discovers that Danny has stolen one of his songs, and it becomes a huge hit, he resolves to take back what's rightfully his at all costs. I didn't know much about this film before it got released, and mostly just watched it on a whim because the premise had a lot of potential. So I really didn't expect to love the film as much as I did! For a start, the casting is absolutely perfect. Rudd and Jonas fit these characters so well and play the parts perfectly. The whole cast has great chemistry and their relationships are believable. But in addition to them working well together, they're all giving powerhouse performances. Rudd in particular is absolutely fantastic, and he and Jonas play off of each other so well. If anything, something that I'd change is that I'd give them more time together. Due to the nature of the film and where it...

  This was one of the ones I was most looking forward to based on the premise alone. I thought it sounded so great and, if done well, had the potential to be genuinely scary. That being said, other than the written description, I knew nothing of the history of the movie. I had mixed feelings about this film. I liked it for the most part, but it wasn't what I thought, or really wanted, it to be. The collection of characters is so interesting, particularly because most (if not all) of the actors portraying people with conditions actually had these conditions in real life. Most of them appear to be professional sideshow and/or circus performers, which just adds to the authenticity of the characters, and the story itself. The writing is great. As with the characters, everything feels completely authentic. The pace of the story is odd - it takes a long time to set everything up, but because it's such a short movie, once the horrors begin, there's not a lot of time to really expl...

  A group of shoplifters get more than they bargain for when they set their sights on a fashion mogul. I didn't go into this one with high expectations, mostly based on the director's first movie. I gave it a positive review but I didn't love it, and as time has gone on I've liked it less and less. Based on the way this one was spoken about it seemed similar, so I thought I'd probably feel the same way. And that's what happened. It just wasn't for me. That being said, one of the main reasons I wanted to watch it was because of the cast, and it's worth watching for them alone because all of the actors are fantastic. I personally have a hard time with absurdity and absurdist comedy, so that was always going to factor into how much I liked the film. That being said, visually it's really pleasant to watch. It's so vibrant and colourful, and you can tell that so much thought went into creating each detail. And while this was great, it did get to a poi...

  I'd never heard of this film before the bucket list, and I felt slightly wary that it was billed as an action/thriller movie rather than horror. I'd definitely say it has elements of both, and I completely loved it! The opening scene was definitely horrific, and horrifying, so I immediately saw why it was classed as a horror. Especially when you go in blind, it just takes you completely by surprise. It does a good job of really drawing the viewer in. And after this, you're really intrigued to find out where the story is actually going. The murder scenes are so brutal and shocking - despite how graphic the first one is, each additional one is still a shock to the system. These scenes, and the way they're shot, are what make the film a horror. They're really well done. The story is so engaging. It's not just a serial killer movie, and it's not just a revenge thriller; it's never too much of one thing. The scenes last the right length of time, and you...

  The life and legacy of pop superstar Michael Jackson (Jaafar Jackson). I have to preface this review by saying that I wouldn't consider myself a fan of Michael Jackson's life or music, and I probably wouldn't have seen this if I hadn't watched it with actual fans, so my thoughts on it will be different than if I was a big fan. As it stands, I thought the film was fine. I didn't love it, but I wouldn't say it was bad either. Though some of that is definitely tied to not being a fan. If you're not interested in Michael's history then the story itself isn't that interesting. That being said, it does a good job of giving you an insight into the struggles he went through, and definitely draws sympathy. The story became somewhat incoherent when it moved from childhood to adulthood, but individually both periods of the character's life had merit and made for interesting individual stories. The thing that lets the story down is the writing. This would ...

  I'd never heard of this film, but it had a really interesting (if vague) premise, so I was looking forward to seeing it. I liked this film. It gets into the action right away - we're meeting characters, we're seeing murders, at 12 minutes in we're already invested. I really liked the development of the relationship between the main character and the journalist. It's always interesting in horror movies when we get relationship development, whether romantic or platonic, in the midst of some horrific event. Sometimes these relationships are the most compelling when they're not the main focus of the story. It has a really interesting score and soundtrack. It almost feels out of place with the tone of the film, but for some reason, it works. Not only is it memorable, but it underscores the scenes in a way that really makes you pay attention. While looking up some of the background of the film, I saw that there was a significant difference between the original Itali...

  When Jill's (Zoey Deutch) voicemails to her late sister are redirected to a stranger (Nick Robinson), he begins to fall in love with her by listening to her stories. I really loved the premise of this film, so I was looking forward to seeing it. Thankfully, I loved the movie! Considering we only got to see the sisters together for the first 10 minutes of the film, it does a really good job of building a believable friendship and connection that carries through the entire movie. If anything, it would have been nice to see more of them together. In terms of being a rom-com, it's more romantic than comedic, but it definitely has fun rom-com vibes throughout. Deutch and Robinson have great chemistry and you want to root for them. That being said, it's really hard to tell this story without having the male character come across as slightly creepy for the decisions he makes. It's a shame because he's a really likeable character, but even if you can rationalise some of h...