Movie: Monsters Inc

Released in 2001, Monsters Inc was Disney Pixar's fourth feature film, following on from the highly acclaimed Toy Story 1&2 movies and A Bugs Life. It was an instant success, grossing over $500m worldwide!!

The movie is set in the fictional world of Monstropolis, where a variety of monsters work together to gather screams from human children as it is used to power the city. Scream processing factories use closet doors (used as portals) into the human world where they enter the bedrooms of children at night in order to make them scream. The screams are then collected and stored for future use. This is considered to be a dangerous task, as it is widely believed that human children are toxic to the monsters, so contact is not allowed. Monsters, Inc is the largest such processing factory in Monstropolis, and this is where we find our heroes, Mike and Sulley.

James P Sullivan (Sulley) is voiced by John Goodman and is a giant among the other monsters with blue fur, horns and purple spots. He is a kind natured monster, relaxed with an outgoing personality. However, he excels at scaring children and it the company's current top scarer aiming to beat the all-time scare record before his fiercest rival Randal does. He always does what he believes is best for the company.

Michael Wazowski (Mike) is voiced by Billy Crystal and is Sulley's best friend and work colleague at the factory. He is small, round, green and has a single big eye. He also has an outgoing personality, and a rather large ego. He continually pushes Sulley to work harder in order to beat the record.


As the movie plays out, we learn that things are not all rosy in the scaring business, as the children are becoming harder to scare with more and more "portals" being destroyed every week. Power levels are running low, and something has to be done. Mike and Sulley uncover a secret plot to literally suck the screams out from the children and so embark on a roller coaster ride of mishaps, mayhem and adventure, trying to put an end to the plot, while trying to ensure that the city does not lose it's power. And if that was not bad enough...there have been sightings of a human child running around Monstropolis!!!

I'm not sure why this film appeals to me so much, but I have to admit it is one of my favourite all time movies, and certainly in my top 3 favourite Pixar movies. Everything about it makes me happy, from the opening jazzy music, to the colours, to the amazingly funny and talented Billy Crystal with his perfectly timed one liners, e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g about it makes it a fantastic film for all ages. Perhaps what makes it such a success is the fact that Disney Pixar have created a movie that makes us connect to it. Sure it's computer animated movie set in a parallel universe where monster's live, but it is so well constructed, so well interpreted, you could almost believe it was real, and in the end, you find yourself double checking that your bedroom closet is indeed....empty!!

Be sure to watch this movie at some point in your life...I am giving it a very well deserved 9/10, the only reason I am not giving it a 10....is because it ended :D Though I am very happy to hear that they will release a prequel movie called Monsters University in 2013, same characters, same voices. Nice one Pixar :)

Skyrim

Skyrim, part of the Elder Scolls series, was hottly anticipated following the great success of Oblivion. But did it meet expectations? This link will take you to a great review of the game compiled by my good friend Tinny.

http://tinnster.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/an-epic-feel-less-game-skyrim.html

F.E.A.R. (First Encounter Assault Recon)

F.E.A.R. cover

Released in 2005, F.E.A.R. - First Encounter Assault Recon (rated 18), is a pshycological horror video game developed by Monolith Productions and was the first title in the F.E.A.R. series.

It is a first-person perspective shooter style game where the story revovles around a supernatural phenomenon, which F.E.A.R., a special forces team created for the game, is called to investigate and contain. As the player, you assume control of the Point Man on the team, a new recruit, who possesses superhuman reflexes, and it is up to you to find the source of this phenomenon, a little girl called Alma.

The game itself begins with a nice video which, although sets the scene, it does so in such a way that only a few minor elements are revealed in the beginning, leaving the player to learn more as they play. In other words, what starts of as a normal mission to apprehend a known criminal, soon spirals into a world of unknown. Of course, being a shooter game, there are many things to kill along the way.



Supersoldiers

The main enemies of this game are telepathically controlled supersoldiers. F.E.A.R.'s artificial intelligence allows these supersoldiers advance action. You can often find them working in teams to distract you while another makes their way behind you, vaulting over objects or through windows to avoid being shot as well as climbing ladders or even moving objects to create cover.






Reflex time

What sets you apart from them is your superhuman reflexes. When activated, this creates a bullet-time effect, slowing down the game world, allowing you to move at normal speed, taking aim and taking down your enemy. Of course, this time is limited, and although you can extend it by finding reflex stimulants along the way, you will soon learn that with a good plan of attack, combined with the reflex time and good use of the arsenal of weapons at your disposal, you'll have little difficulty surviving any attack.

However, for me what makes this game a success is it's horror theme atmosphere, which seems to be heavily inspired by Japanese Horror. In fact, Alma bears an uncanny resemblance to Samara (from the ring). But more than that, the game gets under your skin and makes your hairs stand up on end. It's not just a zombie fest of blood and guts and lots of killing, it's the little added noises, scenes and visuals that make it one of the scariest games I have ever played. In all honesty, I do not think I have used the quick save button half as many times in any other game.

Alma

Of course, as the game was released in 2005, the graphics are not up to standards of todays games but they are still very nice. I still remember having to lower my settings in order to increase the performance on my old pc!! So although it might not be pretty to look at, it's not the worst either, and even 7 years on (after I lost my original copy) I downloaded it again as I wanted to relive such moments as you can see in the videos below.

I would rate this game as a nice 8/10, great story, immense intensity, but the end game is a tiny wee bit...disappointing. But nothing that would totally spoil your enjoyment of the game as a whole. It is one I would reccomend you try, but maybe with the lights on eh?

  Scary moments from Fear

Thought & Ramblings - A new era

Decided I would try this blog thing again, only this time, stick to it and add to my portfolio of post topics. Also decided to link this to my facebook page for anyone there who is interested in following it. New things that will appear here are reviews of movies, songs, tv shows and games etc as well as the normal thoughts and ramblings in similar style as before.

I have decided to remove all the posts relating to my diet and start a whole new blog dedicated to that instead. Anyone interested can follow it using this link - http://dietdiary-blog.blogspot.co.uk/

I am also working on another blog which will appear very shortly :)

Cheers

Kudos

Happy Fathers Day :))

Today we celebrate fathers. I am a father to 2 lovely daughters, one is 7.5 and the other 2.5. I watched them today as their little eyes lit up with excitment as they gave me presents and a card wishing me a happy fathers day. Such love I could feel from them :)) And to think, I could have missed this. The thing is, I never wanted to be a father, heck, I never wanted to get married.

When we first got married, we agreed to wait at least 5 years until we have our first child. Nobody thought we would, but we did :)) But even at that time, I was still unsure about it. Needless to say, along came our first daughter "J" and I have to admit, I was not disappointed by it being a girl, I had no aspirations at all. So up she grew, and had her daddy wrapped around her finger, she was a real princess, so fragile and easily broken. My life, already turned upside-down by getting married, was further sent into twists and turns.

After about 5 years, along came number 2, and another girl, "K". Even from birth, K was different than J, and as she grew we found that she took after me more, was more adventurous, more devilish and playful, not at all fragile. She is more like me whereas her big sister is more like her mom.

I love both my girls, and I know we are not supposed to have any favourites, but if we could...it would be K :P she is just sooooo me :))) Anyways, one thing I learned as a father and I would encourage other fathers to follow suit...always make your children feel special. No matter how silly their words sound, no matter how stupid their artwork looks, no matter what mischief they get up to when your back is turned...to them they are communicating, to them they are making masterpieces of art, to them they are helping to re-paint the walls, remove old wall paper, feed the family pets, take the rubbish out (all over the floor!!), to them...they are trying to be just like you and me. And I say well done to them, you did it my girl/my boy, and I am so very proud of you.

And never beat them in games, make them feel like winners, that they are the champions of the world...c'mon man, you are maybe 3 times as big, at least a decade older, of course you could beat them, but the feeling you get seeing their face as they beat you for the 10th time in snakes and ladders, they score the winning goal against you in football, they find the final matching pair of cards in snap...let me tell you, nothing comes close...you know life will knock them back enough when they are older, why add to that now huh?

So remember dads, love your kids, make them feel special and like champions. After all, one day, it could be them looking after you....

It's a funny old game...

Hey bloggers and true believers :) Today starts the mighty football campaign known as the Euros. To all my European comrades with teams in the running, I wish you happy times ahead and the best of luck. There are a few teams considered favourites to win, but as we saw 8 years ago with Greece, anything is possible :))

So good luck to all and I hope you enjoy it :))

I gotta feeling....

Do you ever get a song stuck in your head??? I mean, not even one that you have heard on the radio and keep playing over and over in your head, but just one that is there?? I have had such a song, and I felt it was rude of me not to share it....sooooo, enjoy, and see if you can listen to it all without moving to the beat...