White Bird in a Blizzard (2014)

What if you came home one day to the news that one of your parents went missing? Would your reaction depend on how close you are to each other? If you were close would you be scared, anxious, and emotion? If you were not close, would you be indifferent and just accept the fact that your parent just suddenly disappeared and be unaffected by them leaving? When it comes to movies dealing with the subject of a parent abandoning a family the kid(s) are usually left emotionally scared and damaged from abandonment issues. That is the typical road movies take but White Bird in a Blizzard goes a different way. It goes with a girl be unaffected by her mother’s disappearance.

            Kat Connors (Shailene Woodley) was seventeen when her mother Eve (Eva Green) up and disappears one day in 1988. She came home to find her father, Brock (Christopher Meloni), sitting at the kitchen table, staring blindly ahead of him. He tells Kat that her mother has not come home and cannot be found. Kat asks about calling the police but Brock says he does not want the police to come around and have the neighbors in their business. He says that they  go to the police station in the morning.

            Months go by. Kat sees a therapist to discuss her family life and her mother no longer being around. She seems unaffected. She explains that her parents had a lot of issues and were not very loving. Eve used to be a good mother. Kat loved and adored her when she was little. Then all the sudden began to change into someone different like someone going through a midlife crisis or a personality disorder. She just snapped. Kat also tells the therapist that she has these dreams where she is driving through a snow storm or walking in a blizzard and she sees her mother calling for help.

            Years later Kat comes home from college for a week long break. She hears small things about her father from her best friends and her ex-boyfriend. Now Kat really starts to question all the events that lead up to the day Eve left.

            The cast was great. I watched this mostly to see Eva Green. As of this writing I have seen two episode of the show Penny Dreadful in which Green is the star. In just those two episodes I was totally floored by her acting. I cannot get over how fearless she seems with her acting. She was given crazy things to do in Penny Dreadful and you can tell she just went for it she was all in. Green was the same was in this movie. Something went wrong with Eve and Green went all out to show that. What I like about Green is how her face always has a touch of evil and insanity in it. Maybe that is why she was so good in her scenes and so convincing. Shailene Woodley I am not too crazy about but I enjoyed her in this. I like how she played the character’s indifference yet still see some impact of her parents’ loveless marriage and Eve’s disappearance. She is as if Kat wanted to care yet at the same time did not. Woodley played that perfectly.

            My summary of White Bird in a Blizzard is not the best. There are so many details I do not want to give away and if I had tried you would be even more confused. The narrative jumps around through the years to explain how and why Eve disappeared. I thought the story was great. I liked how it was not typical. Kat and her parents were not close. You can see there was really no love between any of them. The whole time I was thinking that Eve defeinitely left because she was just pissed with the way her life was going. Honestly if I was spoken to like she was by daughter and I had a husband like Brock I would have left too. I felt like you could not blame Eve for leaving for the way she was spoken to by Kat and had a husband who did not fight back or charge. But you can see that something was mentally wrong with Eve. As I said she just seemed to snap. She snapped out of boredom her whole life was just too uniform. When the real reason why Eve disappeared is revealed it was something I was not expecting I was actually surprised. The direction really brings out the greatness of the story. There is no bullshit with it much like there is no bullshit with the story. Both are raw and uncomfortable. I like feeling a little uncomfortable or unsettled with a story and the direction, to me that indicates everyone is doing their job perfectly. White Bird in a Blizzard is movie I recommend seeing. It is not a drop what you are doing right now and go watch it movie but it is a movie that is worth taking the time to watch.

            I would just like to give a shout out to my wonderfully incredibly awesome friend Emily for telling me about White Bird in a Blizzard. She is a huge Shailene Woodley fan and watched the movie twice in one week. Emily my dear thank you very much for the suggestion.  

Dark Shadows (2012)

“My name is Barnabas Collins. Two centuries ago, I made Collinwood my home... until a jealous witch cursed me, condemning me to the shadows, for all time.” 

            First let me get myself prepared for all the things that will come flying at me before I begin this post…… Ok I am prepared….

            I am not a huge fan of Johnny Depp….. wait, wait let me finish!!!! *darting all the items being hurled at me*. Geez, people can be so touchy!

            Let me start again… I am not a huge Johnny Depp fan but every once in a while I see a movie of his where I actually like him. I do not mind him as an actor but sometimes he just drives me nuts. I found myself really enjoying him as Barnabas Collins in his new Tim Burton feature Dark Shadows. I actually enjoyed the entire movie.

            Barnabas lived his mortal life in the late 1700s. He left Liverpool, England with his mother and father and moved to Maine where they ran a very successful fishing and boating business. As Barnabas got older he became a playboy messing around with several women. Unfortunately he had messed with the wrong woman. Angelique Bouchard (Eva Green) has worked for the family ever since she was young and has loved Barnabas all her life. He does not love her, he loves a young beautiful woman named Josette. Angelique is a witch and created a spell that made Josette walk to the edge of a cliff and kill herself. Barnabas jumped after her but Angelique turned him into a vampire so he could spend the rest of eternity suffering over his lost love. She then has the whole town of Collinsport turn against him for being a monster and they chain him and bury him.

            Two hundred years later in the 1970s the few remaining descendants of the Collins family still lives in the lavish Collinswood home that Barnabas’s father had built. The family has been hit hard throughout the years owed to Angelique who is still alive and running her own business against the Collins’s. One night a group of construction men stumble upon Barnabas’s coffin. They make the mistake of opening the coffin and they pay with their lives.

            Barnabas returns to his family home. He is greeted by Elizabeth Collins (Michelle Pfeiffer) who is the head of the family. Barnabas lets her know that he is a vampire and also the secret passage where his father’s fortune has been hidden for all the centuries. He helps to rebuild the family business and clean up the mansion. Angelique finds out Barnabas is back and still wants him more than ever.

            Things happen to piss Angelique off and she wreaks havoc on the family and Barnabas.

            The story was actually really good. I found it to be interesting with a lot of back story. the characters were so good and the actors did a fantastic job bringing these crazy people to life. Helena Bonham Carter was the whole reason I even thought of seeing it for and she did not disappoint whatsoever. She was not really in it too much but to me she stole the movie. Johnny Depp was his great. The man does have a gift for delving into his characters and really becoming them. All the praise in the world goes to Eva Green. Really the woman just made the entire movie she was so damn incredible. Green was the perfect villain. There was one scene where she smiled the most sinister smile I have ever seen; you will know exactly what I am talking about when you see the movie. The rest of the cast was alright. Michelle Pfeiffer was good in her role as the matriarch of the family trying to keep things as normal and proper as they could be. Johnny Lee Miller was a slim but it is always good to see him in something. Chloe Grace Mortez was a typical moody teenager made more so by the fact that she listened to moody 1970s music like Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd.

            I liked Dark Shadows so much I cannot wait until it comes out on Blu Ray. I enjoyed the story and the performances so much. I especially liked the theme of family Barnabas says right off the bat that family is everything and he proves it by helping his very distant relations just because they share the same blood. But I must warn you that opinions of this movie vary a lot. While I liked it my two brothers and out parents were not too thrilled with it. Reviews for it were all over the place. I say see Dark Shadows and decide for yourself, it is worth seeing at least once.