Tag: review

This is the best pen I’ve tried in a long time. Click over to my review.

The Help was great.

The movie certainly was not perfect. White ladies were all made out to be demons, except for Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan and the hurting character, Celia Foote. The African American ladies were painted as almost angels.

True, the situation was appalling. People like Skeeter, Aibileen Clark, Minny Jackson – and Martin Luther King – put their lives on the line to stand up for what was right, and helped culture and society change. Highlighting that courage and strength of character was worth the price of admission alone.

The visual texture was excellent. Pacing was fine. I thought not reading the book was an advantage; the experience of enjoying the story stood on its own. My wife had read the book and still fully enjoyed the film. But she had comparisons of how the film was different than the book, such as how the film was softer in its treatment of characters.

The film challenged my way of thinking about injustice in the world today. Similar conditions of virtual (and real) slavery still abound. What am I doing to change things?

ET mixed with Aliens mixed with Jurassic Park. Add in a lot of intelligence. Then you have Super 8.

My 15-year-old son and I saw Super 8 last night. We thoroughly enjoyed it. J.J. Abrams, the director of the TV series Lost, added that same level of suspense to the film – except you don’t have to wait five years to solve the mystery.

Visually, it’s stunning. The crashes and attacks are totally in your face. The slow-moving scenes are treated with care and respect.

There is way more character development than most action movies provide… a teenage romance is almost the film’s centerpiece.

The PG-13 rating is appropriate. My 10-year-old daughter would have been too scared. And some of the kids swear like sailors.

Verdict? Go, if my description makes the film sound appealing to you. It may be the best film of the summer.

Finally, here’s another worthy review from my brother: on Amazon. (Scroll down on that page.)

Still photo courtesy of collider.com.

I was amused by this “Little Buddy” device that Best Buy sells. It’s a GPS unit that your child is supposed to carry around so that you will always know where they are.

I can see this being a good thing for children of high profile people, where kidnapping might be a possibility. But normal people? My advice is to communicate with your child. Ideally you have a trusting relationship with them – they tell you where they are and when they expect to return. A pay-as-you-go mobile phone would allow them to communicate with you in a situation where they need to make a new plan. And that would cost less than the $15 a month that the Insignia plan requires (if your agreement with your kid is that you will pay for those kinds of calls or texts only).

Finally, I admit that we are of course not perfect parents. And also, some kids just make bad choices. I don’t think those kind of kids would readily carry around a “Little Buddy” in their pocket or backpack. Chances are, they’d leave it at their friends house before they went off wherever it was they wanted to go.