Coming Soon: February 2016

Orange mocha frappuccino!

I am fully aware that this post is a million days late, but it's been sat almost-finished for the best part of a month so I thought I might as well post it just before February was up!

February's been a funny film month, with the remaining awards hopefuls opening in cinemas alongside a foul-mouthed fan-favourite superhero movie, numerous documentaries and the world's most popular ridiculously good looking male model.

As the Academy Awards roll into Los Angeles this evening, the season of serious dramas unsubtly vying for a shiny gold statue comes to an end. February opened with the successfully nominated Trumbo - Best Actor nomination: Byan Cranston - telling the tale of blacklisted Hollywood scriptwriter Dalton Trumbo who spent the large majority of his career ostracised due to his political beliefs, writing scripts in secret and even managing to win an Oscar for Roman Holiday despite no-one knowing it was him that really wrote the script. The rest of the month saw the unsuccessful, from the snubbed - Best Actor, Will Smith - in Concussion, to a film that failed to live up to its' excellent premise, Freehold. Expect both to be on severely limited release last month, so I wouldn't be surprised if you missed them (I did!).

The rest of the month featured no end of unrelated films. There were the half-term family friendly films of Goosebumps and Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip, and the more teenage-appropriate Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (totally bonkers but enormous fun if you're a fan of both the Jane Austen classic and zombies) and remake of Point Break. Ralph Fiennes and Tilda Swinton are on top form in the astonishingly good A Bigger Splash, Chris Pine embarks on a seemingly impossible true Coast Guard rescue mission in The Finest Hours (for someone scared of the ocean, seeing this in IMAX was a huge mistake), Sacha Baron Cohen's back on controversial form in Grimsby, and there are corrupt cops galore in mild thriller Triple 9. That's not forgetting the remake of Dad's Army and hilarious comedy preaching the virtues of singledom days after Valentine's Day in How to be Single.

The two most anticipated of February had to be Deadpool and Zoolander 2. Both made their way to screens mostly in part thanks to the fans: the reaction to leaked Deadpool test footage led to the studios finally giving the go ahead for the feature film; and the cult status of the first Zoolander prompted the sequel. They're both utterly ridiculous, but while Deadpool triumphs in its individuality, destruction of the fourth wall, fight scenes and vulgar humour, Zoolander 2 is just 100 minutes of insanity. I love blue steel as much as the next person, but it's a bad film...

Follow the link below for the round up of what you might have missed in February... Hopefully they'll all still be in cinemas!

Transformation Tuesday: Week 87

As far as weeks go, it's been pretty boring. However, I am extremely inspired having spent the week reading anything and everything I could get my hands on.

Transformation Tuesday: Week 86

I am no longer ill! Yayyyyy.

Transformation Tuesday: Week 85

This week I have felt infinitely better: my head confuses me greatly!

Transformation Tuesday: Week 84

I feel so much better this week.

Transformation Tuesday: Week 83

I think I've turned a corner, but I know it won't please everyone.

Best Dressed 2015

It feels a little ridiculous to be posting a Best Dressed of 2015 this far into January, but this annual post is always a time-consuming one, and it's genuinely taken me this long to finally make a decision, sift through a year's worth of Best Dressed lists, a ridiculously enormous spread sheet, and get it all together.

So, behold: my Best Dressed 2015. While last year's post showed that I'd moved away from monochrome and started to actually like a wide variety of fashion pieces, 2015 highlighted that I'm a fan sleek, sparkly gowns and colourful suits. I'm so predictable it hurts.

Transformation Tuesday: Week 82

It's been an odd week.

Transformation Tuesday: Week 81

I'm not writing much today: my head's not in a good place at all.

Transformation Tuesday: Week 80

Hello, 2016!

Coming Soon: January 2016

Welcome to the first Coming Soon post of 2016!

January is jam-packed with astonishingly good films as awards season steps up a gear. Nominations have already been released for the Golden Globes, and as the BAFTAs and Academy Awards follow suit in the next few weeks cinemas are filled with award-worthy films. It's my favourite time of the movie calendar, so I fully expect to be spending the next four weeks practically camped out in my local cinema!

Kicking off the year is Tom Hooper's beautiful - if not a little bland - tale of transgender Danish artist Lili Elbe (Eddie Redmayne), The Danish Girl. While Redmayne may be the protagonist it's clearly Alicia Vikander's film as Lili's wife, Gerda Wegener: she effortlessly steals every scene she's in, which is no mean feat when competing with Redmayne's measured and delicate performance. Also opening this weekend is the latest collaboration between director David O'Russell and Jennifer Lawrence: Joy, the true story of the woman who invented the Miracle Mop. Reviews have been mixed so far, but it definitely looks well worth a watch.

Other must-watch films released this month are The Hateful Eight, Tarantino's Western; Creed, the sequel to the Rocky films that has Sylvester Stallone circling Supporting Actor nominations; and The Revenant, celebrated director Alejandro G. Iñárritu's extraordinary 1820s quest that will undoubtedly secure Leonardo Di Caprio an elusive Oscar, and wonderful cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki a third consecutive Oscar for a film that solely uses natural light - a genius and undoubtedly stunning effect. Then there's financial crisis comedy The Big Short; Cannes darling The Assassin; and the film that finally won Michael Caine a European Film Award, Youth.

Finally, January sees Room hitting cinemas. I saw it at an Odeon preview screening before Christmas and would have made it my film of 2015 had it not officially been released the following year. It is outstanding. It affected me much more than I anticipated it would, and genuinely had to pull my car over on the way home as I couldn't stop crying. As someone who struggles to show emotion in films, my heaving sobs really took me by surprise! Furthermore, hotly tipped to win all Best Picture awards is Spotlight. The trailer gives me goosebumps so I have high hopes for this film adaptation of the Boston Globe's true investigation into sexual abuse within the Catholic Church in Boston.

Film Round-Up 2015

It's been a pretty good year for film, yet again.

As I seem to have spent the majority of 2015 in the cinema, it seemed only appropriate to pull together a list of the good, the bad, and the ugly released in the U.K. in 2015.

I think I've covered everything, from my top 10 films of the year to mini-awards for 'The Film That Made the Best Over-Dramatic Use of a Waterfall'; 'The Film That I Wish I Could Experience For The First Time All Over Again' and 'The Film That Blew My Mind (and not at all in a good way)'.

I hope that these lists will provide you with inspiration for a cinema trip over the next few days, or give you some ideas for hidden gems to look for on Netflix and Sky Movies when they arrive next year. Make yourself a cup of tea: it's a long post!

Transformation Tuesday: Week 79

Well, Christmas was fun!

Gingerbread Biscoff Cake

As it's probably clear from all of my baking posts: I'm really scared of taking risks in the kitchen. I know what I'm good at - and what I'm comfortable making - and generally stick to it. Yes, I'll branch out on the odd occasion (Technical Thursdays are definitely the exception and not the rule!), but on the whole I have a very narrow repertoire.

I don't quite know why I did it, but when my turn came to provide a cake for Cake Club at work, I decided to take a chance on a recipe I'd stumbled across on the BBC Good Food website instead of sticking to something I was confident with. It ended up being one of the best cakes I've ever made, sparked a bizarre debate on the score (Cake Club is very serious, and there was a lot of discussion as to whether it was a 9.8 or a 10, but I'd have been delighted with either!) and I knew I had to make it again the following week so my family would have the opportunity to try it.

Behold, the Gingerbread Biscoff Cake: a three layered monster of light gingerbread sponge and decadent caramel biscuit cream cheese icing. It. Is. Amazing.

Transformation Tuesday: Week 78

I love Christmas.