Slideshows of my experience!!!

Bend It Like Beckham Review

In this 2002 film directed by Gurinder Chadha, an Indian girl(Jess) raised in London, tries to play on a football(soccer) team even though her conservative parents disapprove. The movie's title is named after Brit's star football player David Beckham. Jess is friends with Jules, a member of women's soccer team. Jess plays with Jules team without letting her parents know. Jess lies and tells the parents about having a summer job. Even though the parents tolerated Jess's sports passion when she was young, they now believe she should become serious about her life and prepare for the future. That means giving up children games for cooking lessons, marriage, and university studies. The whole movie shows cultural clashes. Those similar to the movie "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," the parents basically trying to control her life.

Jess falls for her coach Joe, who Jules also has a crush on also. Which leads to a love triangle.

The leads are energetic and likable. Jess and Jules bring a lot of spirit in the movie. Joe whose career is on the upswing, shows charisma and may be on his way to sex-symbol status.

The film is charming with a little something for everyone. Combining sports, strong independent women, romance, family values, and comedy. Overall it wasn't great but worth watching once.

The Full Monty Review

This 1997 film is about six unemployed men who are inspired by a touring group of male strippers. They all agree that they could make a small fortune by putting on they're own striptease show but with one small difference. That small difference would be the fact they would be baring all! The title of the film is meaningless in America but in British slang it means "totally nude." The film is generally upbeat and positive and it portrays unemployment, divorce, and poverty. Paul Barker who is nicknamed Horse has a showstealing audition scene which on its own makes the film worth seeing.

Robert Carlyle who played Begbie in "Trainspotting's" stars in the film as Gaz. The whole idea about stripping was made from Gaz. In the story, Gaz's son who is about 12 or 13 in the movie plays an active role in this get-rich-quick scheme. The son named Nathan actually believes in the Father's idea. The movie makes you question whether or not this is really good for the kid or this will damage his sexual psyche in the future.

Director Peter Cattaneo doesn't use a lot of cinematic tricks to make the film work. He puts the characters together and lets the script and the actors have their way with each other. The ending of the film you are confused with what happens at the end. We are left to assume much of what happens next including what happens to Gaz and his son. Another problem in the script is about the two characters that fell for eachother. You don't know whether the other members are okay with it because they joke about it.

The film is hilarious mostly with the dancing scenes and is filled with great disco and plenty of laughs.

Trainspotting Review

This movie was about a group of people who only cared about drugs. Mark Renton(the main character) realizes that there has to be other things in life, and tries to change. This movie helped launch Ewan McGregor's(Mark) acting career. "Trainspotting" was taken place in Scotland. The dialogue was a little hard to understand during the whole movie. Although the movie had a modern sense of humor and it was a hilarious comedy about heroin addicts. The movie was based on the book by Irvine Welsh. During the movie, while Mark and his friends are trying to treat they're addiction, Mark gets caught in a love affair with an underage school girl.

Mark's two best friends are also junkies: Sick Boy, who is a snappy dresser obsessed with James Bond, and Spud, a nerd. He also hangs out with Begbie, a borderline psychotic who loathes junkies even though he drinks like a fish.

After getting in trouble with the law so many times, Mark tries to stop heroin and moves to London. While in London he finds a job but eventually his druggy friends arrive at his doorstep leading Mark back into drugs and crime.

This movie was entertaining yet depressing. But even in the sad parts it's comedy uplifted the film. The soundtrack was perfect for the film. The actors were amazing and it was overall a good movie.

Monty Python's Life of Brian Review

The 1979 film "Monty Python's Life of Brian," was a rude, crude and hilarious with British comic sensibility. The film was about a baby born in a stable in Bethlehem on the same night as night as Jesus. It was Brian of Nazareth who had no miraculous powers at all. He wasn't all there in the head either. The wise men believed Brian was the messiah and Brian himself thought so too. He is always in the shadow of this other guy from Galilee. Brian is witness to the Sermon of the Mount, but he couldn't hear anything except "Blessed are the cheesemakers?"
He is eventually sentenced to Pontius Pilate to be crucified. Instead of the Last Six Words, Brian breaks out in a Cheer Up musical song" Always Look On the Bright Side of Life."
When the movie was released the Catholic Church wasted no time condemning it as blasphemous. Countries banned it, making it become an underground cult classic. The Pythons always mixed smart, insightful humor with outrageous funny dialogue. Almost like the sense of humor from Mel Brooks "History of the world part 2."
The whole film is a comedy of misunderstandings. This movie I don't think was meant to take serious even though most people did. I thought it was funny because it was all satire. Here are these people thinking Brian is the Messiah and he is just a regular person like them. He tries to protest his crucifixation but noone saves him.
People with a sense of humor I recommend to. Before I saw this film I saw the Monty Python's "The Holy Grail." It was just as funny as this one and that's why I chose to watch this film.

A Clockwork Orange Review

A Clockwork Orange was written by Anthony Burgress. The film had a lot of obscenity in it such as sex, violence, and rape. Stanley Kubrick released the film and 1971 and depicted the main character Alex as this stealing, singing, tap-dancing criminal. Alex would sing "singing in the rain" right before he'd rape a girl. He was just mentally messed up in the head. In the story he was jailed and during his time he is brainwashed so that they could release him back into the world. His malicious acts against society were his idea of an exciting night. Him and his gang would beat up people who spoke a lack of order in society.

He was brainwashed for 2 weeks, from drugs which made him so sick if he watched horrific crime scenes. Scientists in the film believed that through special training or a program that his evil ways could be fixed. Alex was forced to watch the films with his eyelids clamped open. His face was then wrapped in electrical straps and wires. His violent impulses were then inhibited by his own physical response. Music played a big part in this film as well. Whenever Alex heard the fourth movement of Beethoven's Ninth Sympohony he became violently ill.

Once Alex was released home he realized his room has been given to a lodger, so he couldn't stay. Outside, the homeless man Alex once beaten up recognized him. The homeless man and his homeless friends then attacked Alex. When the police arrived they drove him out to the country and beaten him too. Every person he kept bumping into was someone he had assaulted in the past. So, basically all these victims of Alex take there revenge on him because he is powerless because of the drugs he took in order to so call, help him.

He tried to commit suicide by jumping out of window. It did not work and he found himself awokened from a long coma in the hospital. While he was in a coma the doctors reconditioned him back to his old self. At the very end of the film Beethoven was playing in the room with the minister and Alex did not grow ill. Alex imagined himself having wild sex while proper English men and women stood around and applauded.
This movie was absolutely crazy and I heard it was banned in the U.S. at one point. I am not surprised because this was a very shocking movie with lots of violence and nudity. If it were released now people would probably think "yeah,that was really crazy," but get over it. I wouldn't recommend this movie to everyone but it is worth watching for people who are planning on becoming directors or are interested in classic movies.

Last Day =(

Day 7...



I woke up and felt rested from getting enough sleep from the night before. It was a free day to do whatever we wanted. Some of us decided that we wanted to see the London eye...especially since we heard they were taking it down sometime soon. It was pretty cool because I got to see the whole city of London. It took about 20-25 min for the ride to end. It wasn't your typical ferris wheel. I mean this ride was huge!! It looked like a big bubble and was able to fit I'd say 20-30 people each cart? I'm glad I did it even though it costed 15 pounds! After that I headed down to where all the main shops were. The clothes are so cool over there...it sucks that we have to wait a year to get what they already have now. I didn't buy anything because I was saving my money for the night out to celebrate Tamika's Birthday.
After everyone was done..some of us had tea time! We figured were in London so how could we not. The Tea was amazing and I felt relaxed after drinking it. Our waitress was very helpful and gave us some information about some cool places to go out. After we left we only had to walk across the street to meet up with everyone for dinner. The dinner was at a mexican restraunt and it was really good. It was sad because it was our last dinner together but at the same time we all knew we were going to have a fun night clubbing. We left dinner, went back to hotel to chill out for a little, and got ready to go out. We went to a club called Zoo..It was a very cool club with lots of different music rooms...but some of the music they play was very outdated..which doesn't make scence to me because I thought a lot of music get released there first. We all had a great time and then came home somewhat late and passed out.

Last Day...
The next morning it was madness in the Lobby. So many travel groups were leaving the same time as us. I was exhausted from the night before but excited to come home and see my family and friends. When we got to the airport we had a few hours until we could actually board the plane. Virgin Airlines is the coolest airline ever!!! I always wanted to fly on the jumbo planes that they show in movies. I couldn't believe there was a bar right when you walked on! Unfortunately I couldn't sit at the bar but my seat was good enough. We had a enough enterntainment in front of us to keep us busy. In front of every seat was a lcd screen and I was able to watch a library of good movies and listen to just about any type of music..plus play games...with a remote attatched to the seat! I fell asleep for a few hours and when I woke up only had an hour left. I was surprised at how fast the time went by. When we landed we had to go through immigration and customs and then waited for a shuttle bus to take us back to Kean. When we got back my Mom and Step-Dad were waiting in the parking lot to pick me up. I was excited to see them and finally be back home. This trip was totally one of the best experiences of my life. I am so happy that I went on the trip and I plan to some day in the future take another trip back to Europe!!