Movie Review: One Day

I have been wanting to watch One Day for quite awhile now, since seeing it advertised on DSTV's Box-Office. I love Anne Hathaway and enjoy most of the movies that I have seen her in, and this one was no exception.

Based on a book by David Nicholls (which I am now going to have to find) One Day is the story of two people, Emma (Anne Hathaway) and Dexter (Jim Sturgess). The two meet at university and the movie shows how each of their lives progress, dropping in on them both each year after their initial meeting. Some years they are together, some they are apart, but they are always thinking of each other in some way or another on the day. We watch them grow up, grow together, grow apart and grow wiser. We witness joys, pains and everything in between.

I thought that the storyline of the movie was very good. It was an intriguing concept to pop in each year and see how one night can change two people's leaves for the better and for the worse. I thought that the acting was brilliant on both parts and I thought that it was a wonderful movie overall. It had funny moments, mostly at the hands of Sturgess whose character was a bit of a wild child when compared to Hathaway's straight-arrow. Not that Hathaway's character doesn't face struggles of her own, but she tends to deal with them more serenely than Sturgess deals with his difficulties, which on reflection are a lot more life-altering.

I wouldn't call One Day a comedy though, despite some comedic relief on occasion. It is a romance and it is a drama, but the issues that come up throughout the movie can certainly not be called comedy. If you are looking or a good romance to watch, I would highly recommend this one, and would certainly recommend it above some of the others making the rounds at the moment including The Vow and Like Crazy (I never did review that one... perhaps a task for another time). Overall, I would give it a 5/5 because I honestly can't think of anything that I would criticise.

Debauchery in Durban

Considering how much traveling I have done in my lifetime (Zimbabwe, US, UK, Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, South Korea, Thailand, etc), it is surprising how little traveling I have done around my own country. Sure, I went on holiday to Plettenburg Bay every year, but that was as far as my South African travels went until I came to Rhodes for University. Suddenly my horizons opened to include Grahamstown, and from there one or two trips to Johannesburg. So, when given a reason to make a trip to Durban, there was little hesitation on my part. Grant needed a little convincing, but before long the plans were set in stone and there was no turning back.

When deciding how to get to Durban, we took the cost of travel into consideration. Flying would cost us around R1500 each both ways, while driving would cost about that overall. Once it had been decided that both of us would definitely be going, it also made financial sense to drive rather than fly. Since our original plan also included spending a week diving in Aliwal Shoal, this also made the most sense in terms of the time that we had. Once those plans crashed and burned (I still have to complete my diving course), the travel arrangements stuck and we were still going to be driving rather than flying down. A mistake, I can confidently say in hindsight, considering how long it took to drive there. I have driven from Grahamstown to Cape Town and back numerous times, a trip which usually takes me 10 hours including a quick stop for lunch. That is 899km in distance, while Durban is 799km away. So, in my mind, the trip should be at least an hour shorter. But apparently not. Roadworks, traffic and general stupidity on the part of other drivers on the road meant that instead of the 9 hours that we had been expecting, it took us 12 hours to get to Durban and just as long to return. Needless to say, I think I will be flying on my next trip.

Of course, once we actually arrived in Durban (well after the sun had set), it all seemed worth it as we found our way to Robyn's house and were greeted by the wonderful Robyn herself. Robyn makes everything worth it. If I had just taken the trip to visit Robyn, it would have been worth it. But, as it was, we had little time with Robyn and decided to make the most of it by taking her out for a nice dinner and catch-up. We went to a Mexican restaurant on Florida Rd, and continued to eat the most enormous pizza I have ever seen in my entire life. Yes... we ate pizza... at a Mexican restaurant. Grant was perplexed too, especially since we don't get Mexican in Grahamstown and he had been expecting to get something, well, Mexican. But we were all well-fed and thrilled nonetheless and the company was awesome. We then made our way down Florida Rd to an amazing frozen yoghurt place (I cannot for the life of me remember the name of it) where we treated ourselves to some condensed milk yoghurt with the works on top. It was.... divine. And makes me hungry as I am writing this. Damn Grahamstown and its lack of frozen yoghurt!! We decided to walk and eat and made our way back to Robyn's place for an early night.

Speaking of which... Robyn has the most amazing place that I could imagine. I wish that I'd had the forethought to take photos, but instead you will have to bear with me as I describe a gorgeous two bedroomed, two bathroomed house. Ridiculously high steps lead up to a veranda with a small pool on one side and sliding glass as the entrance to the house. You step inside and are escorted into a modern dream of dark wood floors, white walls and black furnishings. Leather couches decorate the lounge along with a massive TV, and further on is a small open dining area before you get to the uber-modern, uber-jealousy-inducing kitchen of amazingness. I swear that if that oven would have fit in Grant's car, Robyn would never have seen it again. And then there are the rooms - Robyn's pristine white haven with the open-plan bathroom, and her housemate's room which (I shouldn't know this, but Robyn snuck me in when he wasn't looking) includes a walk-in closet and three deep steps that lead into a sunken bath/shower combo that I would kill for.

Anyway, enough of that. Back to the weekend. After a few more hours of catch up, during which Grant was half passing out from exhaustion, we decided to call it a night and head to bed. Grant and I had an early morning after all. We woke up around 9 and I started getting ready immediately. We needed to be at the Blue Waters Hotel at 11:00, in time for Andrew and Nikita's wedding. This was the main purpose for our trip, and I was excited as anything. I had met Andrew before many, many years ago, but had never met Nikita despite our almost daily chats. We got along like a house on fire, and when Grant and I were invited to the wedding, it was hard to say no. So we didn't. And there we were on Saturday morning, arriving at the hotel and going up to a reception venue where we knew hardly anyone. Actually, I knew one person and Grant knew me. But, no matter, we sat ourselves down at our table and slowly started becoming acquainted with the others. And it turned out that Grant did in fact know more people than me after all! He quickly recognised the photographer as someone he knew in University days and, after telling Andrew how funny it was that the only person he knew was someone from Rhodes, he was approached from a woman who had been sitting at our table all along and informed that he did in fact know her too, from way back in the day at Rhodes! So, our lack of acquaintances was soon made up for as we chatted and danced and had a good time.

The wedding itself was a wonderful one. Not knowing the couple particularly well, Grant was worried that the service might have been religious (think of it as his worst nightmare), despite my assurances that it was unlikely to be. As it turned out, I was right. The ceremony was far from religious, and was actually rather amusing at parts (you wouldn't think that made for a good ceremony, but it certainly made for an entertaining one). The reception venue was beautiful with a view of the Durban coastline from 18 floors up, and the food was delicious. The guests were incredibly friendly and welcoming, as were the couple, and overall we had a fantastic day that made the Durban trip feel like it was completely worth it. A dinner at Bangkok Wok finished off the day, and was the perfect end to it. We made our way back to Robyn's and had another early night, which wasn't surprising considering that we were both feeling exhausted after the long day.

Sunday saw another early start as we woke up and started arranging breakfast at Robyn's boyfriend's place. Having only met James briefly on Friday evening, I was looking forward to spending some time with him and making sure that he was the right man for my little Robyn. Deciding to do something that we couldn't do in Grahamstown, the four of us made our way to Gateway to play some bowling. Little did we know that Gateway would also be Grant's dream come true, as he discovered the Ferrari simulator in the food court. R150.00 and ten minutes later, he had taken the car around the track and was satisfied, though still uber-excited, and it was time for us to play some bowling. Being the terrible bowler that I am, Robyn and I decided to challenge each other with the sides up, while Grant and James took each other on with the sides down. With an amazing finale, I swept the floor with Robyn (winning by a whole like 5 points), and completely lost track of how the others were doing while I was performing my victory lap around the bowling arena. Not really. But I would have been. Instead, Robyn performed a very interesting celebratory dance in her bowling shoes that slid along the carpets. For my entertainment, of course. It was lovely. Once the bowling was over, it was time for some air hockey, some lunch, some shopping, a piercing (not for me) and then it was back to the house so that Robyn could get ready for church (which I skipped). Once she returned, there was more preparation as we prepared for the night that I had been waiting for (without knowing that I was waiting for it) for weeks. That's right folks! I was in Durban! And what else was in Durban?? THE HUNGER GAMES! You should have seen my excitement when I realised it. Robyn was less excited, but totally willing, James was happy to be dragged along, and Grant... well Grant stayed behind and fell asleep early. LAME! Instead, I got to see THE HUNGER GAMES! Which I loved and will tell you more about in another blog.

And then... two and a half hours after the movie started... it ended, and it was time to make our way back. It was well after 11pm, and I had a 4:45am wake up ahead of me, which I was not looking forward to in the slightest. So I hugged Robyn as tightly as physically possible and promised that I would be back again soon, and made my way inside for a night of relatively restless sleep. And woke up ridiculously early. And we were on our way.

And so concluded the whirlwind that was Durban. It was brief, but it was amazing, fun, exciting, Robyn-filled, wedding-filled and supremely awesome. And hopefully we will be going back soon. Pictures of the trip can be found here:
https://picasaweb.google.com/102893679262962677151/DebaucheryInDurban

Descending into Boredom

I don't know why I ever trust the people who choose Oscar nominations. They are so narrow-minded to begin with, looking for a particular type of movie to fit in with their categories. But it's not just that they close themselves off to the awesomeness of certain types of movies that gets me. It is the movies that end up being picked, even often end up winning the Oscars that truly blow my mind (in a bad way).

Take, for example, The Descendants. You can't really say that it had a great cast. Yes, there was George Clooney, who is a stud and is awesome. I am not denying that fact. But he was expected to carry the show on his name alone, and he actually didn't pull off a great performance. I thought that the girl who played the older daughter was halfway decent, but I found Clooney to be, frankly, flat. His character was supposed to be dull, work obsessed, I get that. But when he finds out that plot to the entire story, it should kind of shake things up a little. Which he tries to do. And fails. His character never seems to move out of first gear and it makes the show painful to watch.

Then there comes the story. The story which does seem to get into second gear with a lot of effort and then still goes absolutely nowhere. For those who do not know what the movie is about, I will tell you no more than what you see in the trailer. It is about a man (Clooney)  whose wife ends up on life support in a hospital when she gets into a boating accident. He is left to look after the two children while he tries to sort out his life, his wife's affairs and sell a large piece of land that he and his family have inherited through the generations. Oh, and he finds out that his wife has been cheating on him. This is all in the trailer, as I said, so I have given absolutely nothing away there. And the sad thing is, there is nothing more to give away. That is the entirety of the movie, squashed into a 3 minute trailer that was far more entertaining than the two and a half hour show. It suggests interesting topics, but the interest never materialises.

Of course, taking  place in Hawaii, you always knew that it was going to be a visual movie, a movie filled with timelapses and beautiful scenery. Which it was, to some extent. But I could appreciate the vastness of the land and the beauty of it more when it was integrated into the story. Like when Clooney and his daughters are  looking over the land that belongs to them, contemplating what selling it would mean, and the camera pans over the land numerous times - you can see why it would be something difficult to let go of, and you can see why the land should be treasured. You can't see that so much when the scene changes randomly to clouds floating over the ocean or over the shoreline. A lot of the most beautiful, most visual scenes are completely separated from the narrative, and it feels like they have just been put there to be pretty. Beauty is one thing, but it should add to the movie rather than be placed there for beauty's sake.

As you can tell, The Descendants did not meet my expectations. And that is the problem with the movies that are chosen for the Oscars. They are chosen for reasons that we are not aware of, and they raise your expectations for the films. Expectations that are often not met. Perhaps they should have a category for dull artsy movies that make you think twice about life. I would certainly put this and Never Let Me Go into that category.