"Haven't you heard of peace on earth and goodwill toward men?" "NO!"

Jack the Pumpkin is feeling depressed after Halloween, which seems easier and easier year after year. He wanders around and finds himself in Christmastown! He suddenly feels inspired again - and he decides to plan Christmas.

There's that eternal problem with this movie - do you watch it during Halloween or Christmas? Well, we watched it in September.. Which is close enough to Halloween.

I've always liked this movie. Even though I have seen it many times it hasn't lost its magic. It's partly because of the wonderful soundtrack. All the songs are fun, and I know almost every one of them by heart. To be honest, I probably annoyed my sister by singing all the songs. The lyrics are just simply amazing and melodies are simple and catching - and that's all you need in a good musical: lyrics that carry out the story and melody that gets into the audience's head. My favourite songs are probably "This is Halloween", "Jack's lament", "Kidnap The Sandy Claws", "Sally's song" and "Poor Jack". Even though there's this really cool album with all the songs sang again (meaning This is Halloween performed by Marilyn Manson and Sally's Song performed by Amy Lee and what else), the original soundtrack is much better.

But what's more amazing is the animation. Stop motion animation will always be hundred times more impressive than CGI animations. Stop motion looks amazing, it has a lot more 3D feeling than 3D CGI has, which of course only makes sense since the characters and things actually exist, they are actual things rather than inside some computer program. And also... the patience the animators must have. But the animation is one of the reasons for the magic of this movie. I don't think it would have the same eerie feeling in Halloween town if it was simply CGI or the traditional animation. 

All the actors are also well chosen. What I most love is Danny Elfman singing Jack's songs. He has magnificent voice. Though I keep wondering why didn't he do the whole thing - is it because he isn't an actor? I mean voice acting is challenging, so if Elfman hasn't done any acting then I kind of understand. But Chris Sarandon has such a similar voice, which is why it took me a while to even realise there was something different with Jack's singing and speaking. I think accent or something gave it away. Also Catherine O'Hara is marvellous as Sally. I especially love her voice when she sings Sally's song. There's something unique in her singing voice. 

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

9/10

"How dare you be rude to this women who has invited us into her tent, offered us her hedgehog?" "Says the man who throws women from trains."

While the world is in the middle of crisis, bombings and a possible start of war, Sherlock Holmes knows who is behind all terrorist attacks - not nationalists, not anarchists, but professor J. Moriarty. Holmes takes Watson, who was looking forward to his honeymoon, on his hunt for the professor across the Europe.

I remember when everyone was excited about the last Harry Potter movie, and at the same time I was freaking out over the trailer of this. And I think I went to see it two times. I've seen the other movie too, but A Game of Shadows is way better. I mean for one thing it has an actual villain from the stories, and not some cult leader who comes back from dead. Don't get me wrong, the first movie was also brilliant, but seemed a bit far fetched. It seemed like something sir Arthur Conan Doyle would roll his eyes at. Then again that man would roll his eyes at anything Sherlock Holmes related, since he truly hated the stories. He truly wanted to kill the Holmes character but the fans didn't let him. I'm just waiting for film or a TV show that finally gives audience the true ending sir Arthur Conan Doyle wanted.

Even though I liked Moriarty in this film, I don't like him as a character at all. Actually I phrased that wrong. He's a great character, but his character is used wrong. In the stories he appears in two short stories. And in the TV shows and movies he's used again and again and again. This is kinda why I did like the villain in the first movie more, but then again the first movie was ruined by Moriarty doing secretly stuff in the background. And if there's a stand-alone Sherlock Holmes movie, who is the villain? It's almost exclusively Moriarty. It's annoying, I mean he is one villain and there are so many.

If there's one thing I adore in Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes movies it's the special effects. They are extremely well done and effective. And I also love how they made Holmes a good fighter. I mean in the stories he kind of is - at least he's strong and all that. But in the TV shows and other movies I've seen he doesn't fight that much. Of course that's kind of different these days, but I like seeing fighting Holmes. It kind of shows that if he really wants to, he can be an expert in many, many things, and he's not just clever. It more like seems that... Holmes thought martial arts were interesting, and he studied them - probably read about them mostly - and then adapted to them. I don't know, but I really like the idea.

I sort of hope for the third part, but then again I don't know what they could even do. I mean the ending of this movie was perfect on it's own, so it could be amazing just to leave it at that, you know. 

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
8/10

"Nice wig, Janis. What's it made of?" "Your mom's chest hair!"

Cady has been home-schooled most her life, but now it's time for her to join the actual high school world. By accident Cady finds herself befrieding three most popular and most feared girls known as the plastics. With some aid from other friends, she starts to sabotage the plastics from the inside, but by what cost?

That was a really lame summary by me, as usual.

If I like something about this movie, it's the script and the writing. I mean it's amazing. It was really hard to try looking for the best possible quote for the title of the post, because this movie has many of the best quotes, and many of the best known quotes also. I mean when I first saw the movie, I was like "So that's where that's from", over and over again. The one-liners are usually so much fun. But then there's also Cady's inner narration, which has a lot of longer parts, which are also very well written.

And then of course there's the thing that this movie teaches a very important lesson. Ms Norbury says at that one part: "You all have got to stop calling each other sluts and whores. It just makes it ok for guys to call you sluts and whores." That lien is something most girls should take note of. And why not boys too. 

If I can say one other thing - I mean I should say more things, but I only have this one to say - I used to like this movie. It's well written, it's fun and it has a good purpose. But... you get tired of it. And I don't usually go for high school movies, with a few exceptions that all include James Spader. I just don't enjoy watching high school stuff, I mean I'm living through high school right now. Like I'd rather watch something else. Sure, high school in US is probably a bit different, but still, you know. I want to watch something I haven't experienced. Not that I've experienced stuff like Mean Girls, Easy A and Pretty In Pink, but I mean... high school is high school. It's hell, why is there so many movies about it? I feel like they are mostly for the teenagers not yet in high school, I don't know. The only high school thing I like to watch regularly is Sabrina The Teenage Witch, but come on, Sabrina is a witch. Her life is a bit more exciting.

I've seen this movie several times, yes. I only watched it now so I could do a review. I didn't do any last week nor this week (until now) and I feel... weird if I don't do any in several weeks. I feel weirdly guilty. Now anyway, woohoo, mission accomplished, one review done. I have no idea what to watch next week.

☆☆☆☆☆☆

6/10