row 1:  old buildings in london & british flag
row 2:  autumn leaves in our back garden & an old  funny shaped tree in the park
row 3:  halloween decorations at the spur restaurant & wayne with his popcorn goodie bag at the movies
row 4:  the only cars we can afford
row 5:  jacaranda tree in south africa (from my sister, heleen) & autumn tree near our house
row 6:  my sister heleen and christiaan (my cousins little boy) & katinka
row 7:  my sister karlien sent me these awesome photos of katinka & her feet slippers
{source:  click on image}
we went to see the adventures of tintin over the weekend & the CGI is just AMAZING but i didn’t like it, it was a bit boring for me & also felt like it took FOREVER to finish.  wayne actually enjoyed it more than me, but i think it’s got to do with the fact that he actually read the comic books when he was younger and i didn’t.

Storyline:

A gritty, white-knuckle, action ride set in the near-future where the sport of boxing has gone high-tech, Real Steel stars Hugh Jackman as Charlie Kenton, a washed-up fighter who lost his chance at a title when 2000-pound, 8-foot-tall steel robots took over the ring. Now nothing but a small-time promoter, Charlie earns just enough money piecing together low-end bots from scrap metal to get from one underground boxing venue to the next. When Charlie hits rock bottom, he reluctantly teams up with his estranged son Max (Dakota Goyo) to build and train a championship contender. As the stakes in the brutal, no-holds-barred arena are raised, Charlie and Max, against all odds, get one last shot at a comeback.

My Review:

we LOVED this movie!  in all honesty the main reason i wanted to go and see this was because of Hugh Jackman.  and i wasn’t disappointed, it was better than i thought it was going to be.

the movie is set in the near future, 2020, when human boxing is obsolete.  the premise isn't really that intriguing. it's boxing replaced by robots. movies with giant CGI robots aren’t anything new since transformers came out. but the heart and soul of this movie lies to the relationship of Charlie and Max and their robot, Atom. it's fun to watch them and even the fighting scenes are pretty exciting.

this movie had a great cast, great story & great action.  it almost made me feel that i am watching a disney film.  you will cheer, cry and laugh through this entertaining film. such a great movie!!  go and watch it!

Story line:  For as long as he can remember, Nathan Harper (Taylor Lautner) has had the uneasy feeling that he's living someone else's life. When he stumbles upon an image of himself as a little boy on a missing persons website, all of Nathan's darkest fears come true: he realizes his parents are not his own and his life is a lie, carefully fabricated to hide something more mysterious and dangerous than he could have ever imagined. Just as he begins to piece together his true identity, Nathan is targeted by a team of trained killers, forcing him on the run with the only person he can trust, his neighbor, Karen (Lily Collins). Every second counts as Nathan and Karen race to evade an army of assassins and federal operatives. But as his opponents close in, Nathan realizes that the only way he'll survive and solve the mystery of his elusive biological father is to stop running and take matters into his own hands.
My Review:  oh my word!!! i don’t know where to start without being horrible.  even if you are a fan of Taylor Lautner & his abs (he took his shirt of in about 5 min into the movie), that couldn’t even safe this film.  this is unless you like half-baked pointless spy thrillers, very bad & lame acting and a dumb script. 
the story/plot is just stupid, the romantic scenes are pointless (& only there to lure the screaming young girls in) and even with a veteran actor like Sigorney Weaver the film still stays dumb.
if ‘Abduction’ goes to prove anything, it’s that Lautner can’t carry an action film alone.  this film was actually just terrible, especially given how talented the support cast members are.  they got almost no screen time and the writing and action scenes was just horrible & the plot didn’t even make sense. 
i saw this review on rotten tomatoes:  ‘you look at the screen mainly because it beats staring at the auditorium walls.’  by Matt Brunson.  this sums up this film perfectly and unless you want to watch Lautner being chased around for 100 minutes, you have no reason to waste your time by going to see ‘Abduction’.

because the weather was so fantastically hot this weekend (see yesterday’s post), we didn’t go to the movies this weekend.  so i decided to show a few up and coming movies (here in UK) for october.

1.  The Lion King 3D

this is probably the movie that i’m the MOST excited for!! (even if i’ve seen it millions of times).  this movie bring back SO many good memories:  janine (my little sis) watching it SO many times on dvd that she knew EVERY word; and me, trying to teach a bunch of 2-4 year olds a dance & concert piece from this movie – this was NOT an easy task!

the film came out in 1994 (17 years ago) and Walt Disney decided to celebrate the diamond edition release of this movie on Blu-ray & Blu-ray 3D with screening it in cinemas for a limited time period (will only be released in the UK on 7, 8 & 10 Oct).

if you’ve not seen this (you seriously should make a plan to see this) here is the storyline:  A young lion prince is born in Africa, thus making his uncle Scar the second in line to the throne. Scar plots with the hyenas to kill King Mufasa and Prince Simba, thus making himself King. The King is killed and Simba is led to believe by Scar that it was his fault, and so flees the kingdom in shame. After years of exile he is persuaded to return home to overthrow the usurper and claim the kingdom as his own thus completing the "Circle of Life". {via: imdb}

2.  The Three Musketeers

storyline:  The hot-headed young D'Artagnan along with three former legendary but now down on their luck Musketeers must unite and defeat a beautiful double agent and her villainous employer from seizing the French throne and engulfing Europe in war.

i LOVED the three musketeers movie that came out in 1993. so hopefully this version won’t dissapoint.  apparantly this new version of the three musketeers is closer to the original book, written by Alexandre Dumas.

3.  Real Steel

storyline:  A future-set story where robot boxing is a popular sport and centered on a struggling promoter (Jackman) who thinks he's found a champion in a discarded robot. During his hopeful rise to the top, he also discovers he has an 11-year-old son who wants to know his father.

The film is based on the 1956 short story "Steel" by Richard Matheson.  after looking at the trailer it kind of looks like rocky but with robots.  (they already confirmed that there will be a sequel.)

4.  Paranormal Activity 3

storyline:  In 1988, young sisters Katie and Kristi encounter an invisible entity haunting their home. Although it appears friendly, it turns hostile, tormenting the young girls and their family.  A scene near the start of the film, which is based before the second film, features Katie bringing over a box of video tapes to the home of her sister Kristi and after leaving Kristi starts to sort through some of tapes, being filmed by her husband Daniel.

i really enjoyed the 1st one that came out in 2007, but the 2nd one (in 2010) had it’s good moments but wasn’t as scary as the first one. so hopefully this one will be as good as the first. 

we took the 1hour & 25min train to oxford over the weekend for a little visit & walk around in the lovely town.  we LOVE oxford it’s so green & relaxing (and not london).  we haven’t been there in a while so this was so lovely!  oxford is know for it’s university & a bucket load of bicycles.

here is a few photos from our trip.  i took a massive amount of photos so i will try not to overload you:

harrods bus on the left & wayne doing a ballet move like tinkie, here & here.

at london paddington station for our train to oxford.

on the train

old buildings, walls & book statues in oxford

loads of old doors & doorknobs & even old doorbells.

and some more.

wondering around town, you see a lot of OLD buildings, bicycles (even ones used to advertise a restaurant); a very old (sadly, not working) water pump & boats on very green ‘mossy’ water.

we even saw this peace sign statue & big grinning statue.

and this freaky looking statue with teeth.  check out the small potato statue someone made next to it – even with teeth.

autumn is really here now.

the tree on the left’s leaves have grown against the whole front of the house & look quite spectacular.

there is loads of ducks, swans & birds – waiting to be fed.

we really LOVED this small hidden alley we found – it made us think about, and miss, venice.  all over town these little butterflies was sprayed on doors and walls (not sure why).

we had such an awesome time in oxford – and can’t wait to go back again.

for movie tuesday – we went to see Jurassic Park in the cinema.  they digitally enhanced it for the cinema  - like they did with back to the future earlier in the year.  it was absolutely fabulous to see this on the big screen.  i missed it when it came out the first time around.

hope you all had a fantastic weekend!!  wishing everyone the best for this week!!

plot: A spaceship arrives in Arizona, 1873, to take over the Earth, starting with the Wild West region. A posse of cowboys and natives are all that stand in their way. {via: imdb}

this is such a difficult post to do, because i’m not to sure how i feel about this movie.  when we left the cinema, wayne asked me what i though and i don’t know – i still don’t.  i don’t like daniel craig that much, so i’m wondering if that’s not my issue with this movie.  and that i was looking forward to it, having james bond & indiana jones in one movie, who wouldn’t like that idea!

i think i was just BORED!  the romantic scenes (or trying to be romantic scenes) was just unnecessary.  harrison ford was funny & i really liked him in here but his scenes was way too short.  and i really disliked daniel craig in here, he is definitely NO cowboy.  the story is even weak and doesn’t really make sense because they don’t explain really anything.

all in all i was disappointed, this could have been a lot of fun, with a lot of laughs and action.  instead, we got a boring western/sci-fi action/adventure film that is trying to be too serious.

the latest movie we went to see:

{via: here}

by now everyone should know what this is about but here is a short summery of the storyline:  Survivors of a suspension-bridge collapse learn there's no way you can cheat Death.

this movie was predictable (of course) and just OK.  not as bad as the 2nd one and not as good as the 3rd & 4th one.  this was darker and had a lot of elements from the first movie, which i liked.  i don’t want to give away to much, but the last scene of the movie will leave you speechless.  in my opinion this was brutal, gruesome and cleverly done.  it has many well-thought out death scenes, and one death scene in the movie made me cringe and look away but in all honesty:  i think enough is enough now.  let’s hope this is the last one in this franchise. 

i got spoiled with

a bubble bath & flowers.

wayne played with his remote control tank.

saw this lovely pink flower on our walk around wimbledon.

[left] saw these old cars on the street.  (i only noticed a few houses down the road that these cars are going to be used on a film set.  i’m not sure what they were filming though.)

[right] were on the new metropolitan line trains.  i actually like them, they look more spacious and there’s no doors between the individual compartments anymore.  now you can see straight through the train.

we also went to see rise of the planet of the apes.  we thought it was excellent! 

{via here}

i loved the fact that this wasn’t a remake of the original movies but kind of like a prequel of the first movie.  andy serkis as caesar was brilliant.  he made caesar by far the best animated character in the history of cinema. his facial expressions tell it all! you feel his rage, his fear, and his child like innocence through his wonderfully animated eyes. not only is the C.G.I. good, but the character is written very well in general.  you will go through all of those emotions yourself as you witness his journey. all I can say is that (if i had a dog or even a pet) i’ll try to walk it without a leash as much as possible. through the film, you will understand what caesar is feeling and why. the invisible character of the film is humanity itself, and at times, feels like a study of human nature.  it is how cruel humans can be on the one side and on the other how kind they can also be.  this movie will have you in tears at one stage and then angry on the other end.  the CGI in this was so good that i had to remind myself that these apes aren’t real.  so go and see the movie – it was fantastic!

hope you all are having a great week so far!!

we went to see this over the weekend

a short summary of the storyline:  In the summer of 1979, a group of friends in a small Ohio town witness a catastrophic train crash while making a super 8 movie and soon suspect that it was not an accident. Shortly after, unusual disappearances and inexplicable events begin to take place in town, and the local Deputy tries to uncover the truth - something more terrifying than any of them could have imagined.

this movie makes me think of movies i loved when i was still a kid (ET comes to mind).  it’s not bombarded with CGI & all kinds of special effects BUT filled with friendship and even heart. there is special effects in the movie but it doesn’t take away from the story line it just enhances it.  it also makes you miss the days when you were an adventure-seeking & truth-seeking kid & just loved hanging out with your friends.  the young actors was just spectacular in here.  claudia puig said the following:  “Though there is nostalgia involved — the movie is set in 1979 — the story bears the stamp of contemporary wonderment and the specter of 9/11 paranoia”; i think this captures the idea i got from this movie perfectly.  all in all i would say that i enjoyed this movie a lot & for JJ Abrams first movie – i think he did a wonderful job.

an interesting fact:  when JJ Abrams came up with the idea of the movie it was initially a prequel or sequel to Cloverfield (i thought this movie was not very good) but luckily Stephen Spielberg (who is the producer on super 8) liked Abrams original idea more than the cloverfield idea. 

when we left the movie the first thing we both wanted to know was where the title came from and we google it on the bus and… the name is from the film & camera that the kids use to shoot their own movie.

i hope everyone is having a fantastic friday, so far.  i created a guest post over at my sister’s blog, Black Sheep about my favourite blog reads this week, go and have a look.

we went to watch Captain America last night, it was better than i expected, after reading all the bad reviews it got.  i liked Chris Evans as Captain America, he played the role really well.  i liked the fact that there was quite a few funny one liners in the movie (got everyone to giggle/chuckle).  i didn’t find the villain convincing but more cheesy than anything else.  and the ending was stupid, i know that the next movie, The Avengers, is out next year & they tried to probably bring that into the ending.  but it was just dumb with what Captain America said in the end (not going to say what he said, don’t want to spoil it for everybody).  i probably didn’t like the director, i think that was the problem.  with The Avengers, Josh Whedon will be directing this one – so i can’t wait to see it!

but anywoooo, here is my instagram photos for the week:

Have a fabulous friday & weekend!!