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bananaofswifts · 3 years ago

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By Paul Tingen

From sketches to final mixes, engineer Jonathan Low spent 2020 overseeing Taylor Swift’s hit lockdown albums folklore and evermore.

“I think the theme of a lot of my work nowadays, and especially with these two records, is that everything is getting mixed all the time. I always try to get the songs to sound as finalised as they can be. Obviously that’s hard when you’re not sure yet what all the elements will be. Tracks morph all the time, and yet everything is always moving forwards towards completion in some way. Everything should sound fun and inspiring to listen to all the time.”

Speaking is Jonathan Low, and the two records he refers to are, of course, Taylor Swift’s 2020 albums folklore and evermore, both of which reached number one in the UK and the US. Swift’s main producer and co‑writer on the two albums was the National’s Aaron Dessner, also interviewed in this issue. Low is the engineer, mixer and general right‑hand man at Long Pond Studios in upstate New York, where he and Dessner spent most of 2020 working on folklore and evermore, with Swift in Los Angeles for much of the time.

“In the beginning it did not feel real,” recalls Low. “There was this brand‑new collaboration, and it was amazing how quickly Aaron made these instrumental sketches and Taylor wrote lyrics and melodies to them, which she initially sent to us as iPhone voice memos. During our nightly family dinners in lockdown, Aaron would regularly pull up his phone and say, ‘Listen to this!’ and there would be another voice memo from Taylor with this beautiful song that she had written over a sketch of Aaron’s in a matter of hours. The rate at which it was happening was mind‑blowing. There was constant elevation, inspiration and just wanting to continue the momentum.

“We put her voice memos straight into Pro Tools. They had tons of character, because of the weird phone compression and cutting midrange quality you just would not get when you put someone in front of a pristine recording chain. Plus there was all this bleed. It’s interesting how that dictates the attitude of the vocal and of the song. Even though none of the original voice memos ended up on the albums, they often gave us unexpected hints. These voice memos were such on‑a‑whim things, they were really telling. Taylor had certain phrasings and inflections that we often returned to later on. They became our reference points.”

Sketching Sessions

“The instrumental sketches Aaron makes come into being in different ways,” elaborates Low. “Sometimes they are more fleshed‑out ideas, sometimes they are less formed. But normally Aaron will set himself up in the studio, surrounded by instruments and synths, and he’ll construct a track. Once he feels it makes some kind of sense I’ll come in and take a listen and then we together develop what’s there.

“I don’t call his sketches demos, because while many instruments are added and replaced later on, most of the original parts end up in the final version of the song. We try to get the sketches to a place where they are already very engaging as instrumental tracks. Aaron and I are always obsessively listening, because we constantly want to hear things that feel inspiring and musical, not just a bed of music in the background. It takes longer to create, but in this case also gave Taylor more to latch onto, both emotionally and in terms of musical inspiration. Hearing melodies woven in the music triggered new melodies.”

Not long after Dessner and Low sent each sketch to Swift, they would receive her voice memos in return, and they’d load them into the Pro Tools session of the sketch in question. Dessner and Low then continued to develop the songs, in close collaboration with Swift. “Taylor’s voice memos often came with suggestions for how to edit the sketches: maybe throw in a bridge somewhere, shorten a section, change the chords or arrangement somewhere, and so on. Aaron would have similar ideas, and he then developed the arrangements, often with his brother Bryce, adding or replacing instruments. This happened fast, and became very interactive between us and Taylor, even though we were working remotely. When we added instruments, we were reacting to the way my rough mixes felt at the very beginning. Of course, it was also dictated by how Taylor wrote and sang to the tracks.”

Dessner supplied sketches for nine and produced 10 of folklore’s 16 songs, playing many different types of guitars, keyboards and synths as well as percusion and programmed drums. Instruments that were added later include live strings, drums, trombone, accordion, clarinet, harpsichord and more, with his brother Bryce doing many of the orchestrations. Most overdubs by other musicians were done remotely as well. Throughout, Low was keeping an overview of everything that was going on and mixing the material, so it was as presentable and inspiring as possible.

Mixing folklore

Although Dessner has called folklore an “anti‑pop album”, the world’s number‑one pop mixer Serban Ghenea was drafted in to mix seven tracks, while Low did the remainder.

“It was exciting to have Serban involved,” explains Low, “because he did things I’d never do or be able to do. The way the vocal sits always at the forefront, along with the clarity he gets in his mixes, is remarkable. A great example of this is on the song ‘epiphany’. There is so much beautiful space and the vocal feels effortlessly placed. It was really interesting to hear where he took things, because we were so close to the entire process in every way. Hearing a totally new perspective was eye‑opening and refreshing.

“Throughout the entire process we were trying to maintain the original feel. Sometimes this was hard, because that initial rawness would get lost in large arrangements and additional layering. With revisions of folklore in particular we sometimes were losing the emotional weight from earlier more casual mixes. Because I was always mixing, there was also always the danger of over‑mixing.

“We were trying to get the best of each mix version, and sometimes that meant stepping backwards, and grabbing a piano chain from an earlier mix, or going three versions back to before we added orchestration. There were definitely moments of thinking, ‘Is this going to compete sonically? Is this loud enough?’ We knew we loved the way the songs sounded as we were building them, so we stuck with what we knew. There were times where I tried to keep pushing a mix forward but it didn’t improve the song — ‘cardigan’ is an example of a song where we ended up choosing a very early mix.”

Onward & Upward

folklore was finished and released in July 2020. In a normal world everyone might have gone on to do other things, but without the option of touring, they simply continued writing songs, with Low holding the fort. In September, many of the musicians who played on the album gathered at Long Pond for the shooting of a making‑of documentary, folklore: the long pond studio sessions, which is streamed on Disney+.

The temporary presence of Swift at Long Pond changed the working methods somewhat, as she could work with Dessner in the room, and Low was able record her vocals. After Swift left again, sessions continued until December, when evermore was released, with Dessner producing or co‑producing all tracks, apart from ‘gold rush’ which was co‑written and co‑produced by Swift and Antonoff. Low recorded many of Swift’s vocals for evermore, and mixed the entire album. The lead single ‘willow’ became the biggest hit from the album, reaching number one in the US and number three in the UK.

“Before Taylor came to Long Pond,” remembers Low, “she had always recorded her vocals for folklore remotely in Los Angeles or Nashville. When I recorded, I used a modern Telefunken U47, which is our go‑to vocal mic — we record all the National stuff with that — going straight into the Siemens desk, and then into a Lisson Grove AR‑1 tube compressor, and via a Burl A‑D converter into Pro Tools. Taylor creates and lays down her vocal arrangements very quickly, and it sounds like a finished record in very few takes.”

Devils In The Detail

In his mixes, Low wanted listeners to share his own initial response to these vocal performances. “The element that draws me in is always Taylor’s vocals. The first time I received files with her properly recorded but premixed vocals I was just floored. They sounded great, even with minimal EQ and compression. They were not the way I’m used to hearing her voice in her pop songs, with the vocal soaring and sitting at the very front edge of the soundscape. In these raw performances, I heard so much more intimacy and interaction with the music. It was wonderful to hear her voice with tons of detail and nuances in place: her phrasing, her tonality, her pitch, all very deliberate. We wanted to maintain that. It’s more emotional, and it sounds so much more personal to me. Then there was the music...”

The arrangements on evermore are even more ‘chamber pop’ than on folklore, with instruments like glockenspiel, crotales, flute, French horn, celeste and harmonium in evidence. “As listeners of the National may know, Aaron’s and Bryce’s arrangements can be quite dense. They love lush orchestration, all sorts of percusion, synths and other electronic sounds. The challenge was trying to get them to speak, without getting in the way of the vocals. I want a casual listener to be drawn in by the vocal, but sense that something special is happening in the music as well. At the same time, someone who really is digging in can fully immerse themselves and take in all the beauty deeper in the details of the sound and arrangement. Finding the balance between presenting all the musical elements that were happening in the arrangement and this really beautiful, upfront, real‑sounding vocal was the ticket.

“A particular challenge is that a lot of the detail that Aaron gravitates towards happens in the low mids, which is a very warm part of our hearing spectrum that can quickly become too muddy or too woolly. A lot of the tonal and musical information lives in the low mids, and then the vocal sits more in the midrange and high mids. There’s not too much in the higher frequency range, except the top of the guitars, and some elements like a shaker and the higher buzzy parts of the synths. Maintaining clarity and separation in those often complex arrangements was a major challenge.”

#taylor swift #folklore

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writefasttalkevenfaster · 5 years ago

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Tony Stark / Been There, Done That (Part Two)

Summary: Tony wants to forget about you, but you keep haunting his dreams

Word Count: 1,908

Fuck.

Tony was tired. So tired. He swore, he must have been losing brain cells left and right today, yesterday, and the day before, to be this drunk, again. He was falling into a category that Tony Stark should never inhabit, and that was predictable. But he couldn’t help it. He had been here, he had done this. He had crawled into bottles before, into the beds of strangers, but never had it felt so wrong.

Until now.

Even numb, Tony felt a strange sense of deja vu wash over him, feeling the cool edge of the bar dig into his cheek, staring at the remnants of his drink slid down the edges of the clear glass. His vision was blurry, fighting to keep his eyes open, even as they begged him to shut, to succumb.

But he was so tired.

So tired. Tired of losing people. Tired of having to make the tough choices. Tired of the world taking, and taking, and leaving him with nothing.

“Sir, sir? It’s closing time. You need to go,” but he couldn’t leave.

There was a time that he tried. Was it after his parents died? It was after the funeral, weeks after, when the world had moved on from the absence of Howard and Maria Stark. But he hadn’t. And that’s how he had found himself standing before an edge of a building in Europe, albeit, one he had been drinking on. Teetering on the edge, he made the mistake of looking over the edge. Wow. He wondered how long they would be scraping him off the sidewalks? But then the wind blew, and he misstepped, sending him sprawling backwards onto the roof flat on his ass. But he swore, the wind carried more than the scent of the city. It carried the scent of his mother’s perfume.

“Tony,” he heard your voice whisper in your ear, insistent.

A small smile curled on his lips, before his brow furrowed in frustration. How had he let himself fall apart like this? He was so tired. He had already lost Pepper, and when he did, he couldn’t remember why he had broken his boundaries, why he had torn down his walls, why he let her bypass his sarcasm and snark all the way to his heart, only to rip it to shreds. But you...

“Tony, wake up. It’s time to go home,”

“Can’t you leave me alone?” It was the third night in a row that he had dreamed of you, and he was tired of being taunted. Each time, you would appear to him, taunt him of what could be, what he wanted, and then you would disappear.

Just like everyone else.

“I can’t leave you here. The bar’s closed. I’m pretty sure the owner will throw you out on your ass,” you said, slinging his arm around your shoulder, and pulling him to his feet.

“Now, wouldn’t that be something that everyone would like to see?” he muttered, as you helped him make his way out, “The great Iron Man bested by a bar owner!” you shushed him, the jingle of the bell on the door seemed so real, and yet so did you.

“I wouldn’t like to see that,” And he wrinkled his brow, scratching at his face.

“Well, you’re imaginary, so you wouldn’t see much of anything, now would you?” he replied, “plus, you don’t care about me. You like him, Point Break,” he spat his nickname for him, as if it were poison he had sucked from a fresh wound, “You two were dancing, looking at each other like you were only two people on planet Earth, and otherwise.” He scoffed, and it felt like his blood was gasoline and his jealousy was a lit match.

“I don’t like Thor, not like that,” he snorted, shaking his head, “I’m not looking for the princely type.”

“Not a Disney person? Not into flowing blond locks, magic hammer, that whole deal?”

“No, I’m more into the reformed playboy bachelor, with a little bit of a drinking problem, which he can and will fix, and who is a complete hero and idiot,” he rubbed at his temple, as you leaned him against the car, and he blinked at you, finally taking you into focus.

You were biting your lip, eyes averted, yet peeking at his expression, “That’s an oddly specific type.”

“Well, I’m an oddly specific girl,” you dared closer to him, arm reached around, his back, and he steadied himself against you, dizzy, unsure if it was from the drinks or from your scent. You popped the door open, shoving him inside, “and also I prefer my men sober, and un-stupid, so, let’s go home.”

He didn’t remember much of what happened next. A drive. Stumbling to his door, and finally, you helped him into bed, “Are you going to undress me next?”

He saw you roll your eyes, yet a small smirk on your lips, and he wondered if you considered it, “Don’t tempt me, but feel free to bill me for your drycleaning for your wrinkled clothes.”

“I’ll hold you to that,” he muttered, as he sunk into his bed, and you stood by his bedside for a moment, before turning. He caught your wrist, stopping you, “I swore to myself I wouldn’t tell you, but I don’t think I can keep it a secret anymore. And this is completely wrong time to admit it to you, but I don’t care. I am past caring. Y/N, I think I’m in love with you-”

His eyes snapped open, and his ceiling spun.

He groaned, burying himself in the sheets. It was a dream. Again. He heard the curtains pull apart, sunlight streaming in and he cursed, “Dammit, close the curtains, FRIDAY.”

“It isn’t FRIDAY, and you’ll have to be a lot nicer to me to get me to close these curtains,” He moaned again at the sound of Rhodey’s voice, “Rise and shine, Tony, it’s time for you to get the hell up.”

“I’m awake,” he replied, clearing his throat, as he rose from his bed, now keenly aware he had fallen asleep in his clothes, “mission accomplished. You can go now.”

“And leave you to throw up alone in dignity? Nah,” Rhodes shook his head, “I told you not to make this a habit.”

“And I told you to leave it be,” Tony snapped, “turns out both of us have a listening problem.”

“Tony, just tell her how you feel. It’s that simple,” Rhodes said, as Tony swung his legs over the bed, and brushed past him, “I’m surprised you didn’t tell her last night.”

Tony froze, “What are you talking about?”

“You don’t remember?” Rhodes shoved his hands in his pockets, “I should get going. You were trying to get me out of here two seconds ago, right?”

Tony grabbed Rhodes by the shoulders, groaning, as he hung his head, “How much of last night wasn’t a dream?”

“Well, Y/N was the one who called me last night, left a message, and told me she had found you in a bar, nearly passed out and the bar owner had called her number since you had her number pulled up on your cell phone,” he shook his head. He wanted to call her and tell her, but he stared at that same number all of last night, in various states of drunkenness, and got no closer to calling you, “She picked you up, and took you home. Slept on the couch, and left after I showed up. Said you had been muttering in your sleep all night.”

The color drained from his face, “What did I say to her?”

“She just left,” he removed Tony’s hands from his shoulders, “Go see if you can drag your jaw off the ground and tell her how you feel man.”

~~~

You walked down the street, nearly in a daze. Several people bumped into you, shouting, but you hardly noticed, muttering an apology here and there, but Tony’s words echoed in your mind. “I think I’m in love with you-”

And then he fell asleep. And he would never remember.

Shit.

You really had the worst luck, didn’t you?

Your feelings would always go unrequited, wouldn’t they? Because you were always too afraid to take a chance. Always too scared to own up to your feelings. Always too late when you realize your mistake.

Should have you have stayed instead of running? Would that have let him remember? Would he be happy to see you?

You like him. Point Break.

You nearly laughed. Tony Stark, genius inventor billionaire, had bought your little charade. Thor would be pleased to know. You shook your head, biting your lip.

Even so...you wondered if he meant it. Or if in a drunken haze, he had thought you were someone else...that you were Pepper. It must be what that was, wasn’t it? It had always been Pepper. It had never been you, right?

You felt a hand clap on your shoulder, and you whirled around, sunglasses hidden eyes meeting your own, and Tony offered you a small smile, hands slipping into his pockets, “We need to talk.”

~~~

Or so he said. But Tony couldn’t seem to find the words. Two of you had walked in silence for several minutes. Hands a moment apart, but neither of you dared to touch the other.

“I think this is the longest either of us have went without saying a word,” You mumbled, still unable to face him.

“I have to tell Rhodes I’ve set a new record. He’ll be so proud,” Tony said lamely, before he raked a hand through his hair, taking your hand, and pulling you into the park. He sat you down on a bench, as he paced before you, “What did I say to you last night?”

“How much do you remember?”

Tony stopped, “That didn’t answer my question.”

“Did I say I’d give you an answer?” Tony sighed in frustration, and you bit back a smile, before saying the words you didn’t want to say, “Tony, we can forget about last night. We can pretend it never happened. You were really drunk. It doesn’t have to be a whole thing.”

“No, Y/N,” he shook his head, finally facing you, “Maybe I want it to be a ‘whole thing.’ Maybe...I want it to be everything.”

You rose, daring closer to him, only a breath away, “Don’t say things you may regret,”

Tony looked down, shifting from foot to foot, before meeting your gaze again, “I regret a lot of things in my life, but I would never regret you.”

You swallowed his exhale, your fingers brushing his cheek, tracing down his jaw, before resting it on the nape of his neck, “Never?” His scent was dizzying, his gaze intoxicating, drawing you in, before he breathed you out. He leaned closer, giving you a chance to leave, to break away, but he didn’t know that you, you would never leave him.

You pressed your lips to his chastely, breaking away for a moment, “You told me you loved me.”

He covered your lips with his own, this time more insistent, his arms wrapping around your middle before trailing downwards, “And?”

“It’s a coincidence, because I’ve always loved you,”

“Deep breath now,” he murmured, before pressing another kiss to your lips, “because I’m never letting you go.”

Been there, done that.

#tony stark #tony stark x reader #tony stark imagines #tony stark fanfiction #tony stark x you #iron man #iron man imagines #iron man fanfiction #avengers imagines #avengers #avengers fanfiction #tony stark imagine

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jobrosupdates · 6 years ago

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‘Sucker’ Punch: The Behind-the-Scenes Players to Launch Jonas Brothers’ First No. 1 | Variety

The trio's manager, A&R and label chief explain how an authentic thaw in sibling relations led to a strategy of silence, then shock and awe.

March 11, 2019 by Chris Willman

America is collectively a sucker for the Jonas Brothers again — or at least that’s the strong indication from first-week results for their comeback, a full decade after the trio last had a top 30 single. “Sucker” just became their first song ever to top the Billboard Hot 100, and the first by any band to debut at the top of the chart in more than 20 years. According to Buzz Angle Music, the first seven days for “Sucker” racked up a combination of 30 million audio streams, 16 million video streams and 88,000 digital sales, on top of a fast radio start that found nearly every pop station adding the tune.

How’s it possible one of the biggest phenomena of the late 2000s never had a No. 1? Back in their original heyday, radio and older fans were both mutually suspicious of any act coming out of the Disney camp, no matter how massive the ticket sellouts or record sales (they had four straight platinum or double-platinum albums, if you count the “Camp Rock” soundtrack). Ten years later, pent-up fan energy is meeting no such gatekeeper resistance.

“As big as they were previously, they’ve never seen this kind of chart action, which is pretty wild at this point of their career,” Monte Lipman, the chairman/CEO of Republic Records, tells Variety. “They were an arena act, but in terms of the traditional record flying up and down the charts, they never had that. From the outside looking in, I was always intrigued by their success and thinking about what would happen if they had a record that stormed the charts on top of all of that, like they do now. So we’ve been having a blast.”

Crucial parts of the campaign: “Having Nick’s and Kevin’s wives and Joe’s fiancée be a part of the video was really powerful, and that visual provided a lot of fuel at launch that was beneficial to the whole campaign,” says Phil McIntyre, founder/CEO of Philymack, their management company. “And the platform of James (Corden, whose show featured the Jonas Brothers for an entire week) was phenomenal and made for great, fun content that travels.” The “Carpool Karaoke” was even revealing enough about the brothers’ personal story to make up for a lot of interviews they could have done and didn’t. But prior to the video and Corden, the perhaps even more critical component in the plan was… silence. “It was definitely part of our strategy, to try to keep it under the radar, and it was helpful that it stayed there,” says McIntyre, “because we were totally expecting that it wouldn’t.”

“As hard as it is to keep a secret in 2019, especially when you’re three of the most followed guys online,” says Republic’s EVP of A&R, Wendy Goldstein, “they did a great job at keeping it quiet. And the Jonas Brothers as a band may have been dormant, but their individual development and success probably contributed to amplifying excitement. They’ve been out there for six years in the public eye, but not as Jonas Brothers,” she says. “It was the perfect tease.”

Adds Lipman, “Because when you think about the marketplace, nearly 150,000 new songs are made available every single week, and the greatest competition we’ve got right now is that sheer volume — the static, the noise. So in this case the best thing to do was almost the opposite, something without any messaging, and literally just drop it out of the sky — and ka-boom, it’s the loudest bang you can create.” But everyone was concerned the secrecy could be blown at any moment. “Any time the guys were ever seen in the same room together, the rumors started flying. So there was a lot of denial, absolutely.”

Plausible deniability, though, because the Jonases really did have another reason to be in one another’s company — a documentary — and the recording was an outgrowth of the unofficial on-camera therapy sessions undertaken for that.

“A year ago, we started making a documentary with just the intention of telling what an incredible story these brothers have of taking this journey together and growing up in the public eye together as a family, and the ups and downs of it,” says McIntyre. “And it was not to necessarily make new music or anything like that. So it unfolded in the most authentic way possible, and I think that’s part of why there was an element of surprise, because for the most part when they were seen together, most people thought it was for the documentary.”

When did a documentary shoot turn into a resumption of the Jonas Brothers as a commercial and artistic enterprise? “I would say it was toward the end of the summer last year,” McIntyre says. “Because we probably did four or five different trips with the brothers: They went to Australia where Joe was shooting ‘The Voice.’ They went to Jersey and to a couple other locations, and probably after the fourth or fifth location, they had sort of processed through so much of the things that tore ‘em apart earlier in their career, and just started to get honest with each other. And there’s a magic to when they’re together, and as much success as anyone’s had on their own solo journey, it doesn’t necessarily compare to what they’ve experienced as brothers. So it was toward the end of summer that they started to have the conversations around it, and it was at that point that I said, ‘I’ve got to get with Monte and talk through this.’ Because in my mind, there was only one place to do this, and that was with Republic. I just knew that they would they would be able to nail it.”

Finding a new label home for the Jonas Brothers, many years after their departure from Disney’s Hollywood Records, wasn’t a stretch. Republic had had Joe’s interim project, the group DNCE, and been jointly involved with Island Records on Nick’s solo career.

Lipman says he didn’t offer any preferences for which stylistic direction the Jonas Brothers should take their new music, once he was brought in. “Monte Lipman? No,” he chuckles, as if the idea that he’d get personally involved in their A&R is a laugh. “I learned a long time ago just let them let them do their thing. The cool thing about working with the Philymack camp in particular and the Jonas Brothers as their partners is that when they come to the table, so much of it is been vetted, and ‘Hey, this is the way we’d like to present the music. This is the aesthetic.’”

But Goldstein did get highly involved as recording continued — and had a strong preference when it came time to pick a single out of the supposed two albums’ worth of material the trio has recorded. “There are some really powerful bangers ready to go,” she says. “But ‘Sucker’ just had a vibe. It felt like a great way to come out. I think everybody agreed on that.” After her persuasiveness, anyway. “There definitely was a debate as far as what the first look would be,” says McIntyre, “and to Wendy’s credit, she was the one who said, ‘I feel strongly that “Sucker” is the right first sound and first song.’”

“Sucker” is much more akin to the dance-oriented material Nick and Joe have done in the interim years than the guitar-based, power-pop sound the brothers played in the 2000s. At recent “secret” shows in New York and L.A., the group sounded like they did in the first part of their career — that is, like a straight-up, heavy-on-the-hooks rock band — and they rearranged the one new song they played, “Sucker,” just enough that it fit in with the guitars-and-live-drums ethos of their old sound. But that may not be an indication of where the eventual album will be headed.

“Creatively, they’ve evolved, as any artists would after a decade,” says Goldstein, not quite willing to commit them to a genre. “I don’t think it’s tied to any era in particular. They were adamant about making an honest, real and somewhat raw comeback. They draw on their history together, but it’s an exciting new chapter.” McIntyre is a little more committal about how fans shouldn’t expect the new material to exactly revive the 2000s: “I would say that you will be able to see and hear the influences of what Joe did in his solo career and what Nick did in his solo career come together in a very natural way.”

It was a good time for the brothers to reunite, personal reasons aside, because although their solo endeavors had kept them somewhat in the limelight — Nick as a solo artist and Joe with DNCE had both made the top 10, and had ongoing success on the dance charts — neither had had such an ongoing run of hits that a resumption of the brother act would seem like a step backward. Nothing was guaranteed: The last time the Jonas Brothers tried coming back after a layoff, in 2012-13, on an indie label, the media and radio weren’t much interested, and their personal disagreements took such a toll that a planned album and tour were canceled as they officially broke up. But clearly a few years of their absence as a collective made the public heart grow fonder.

“They were part of a lot of people’s most influential years, of their childhoods or beyond,” says McIntyre, “and so I think that the timing of them bringing those positive, good times has resonated, and people appreciate them now for being the soundtrack to their lives.” Plus, there’s the small matter of the song being good, “so we do get the opportunity to get a whole new audience that isn’t there for nostalgic reasons. It’s very much a two-pronged strategy.”

As for an album, “We’re working through the timeline now,” McIntyre says. “I think everybody would like to get it out as quick as possible, so I would look to the first half of this year.” As for a live return, the brothers had 35 minutes of material very solidly rehearsed for their secret El Rey show last week, but the nature of a tour is still under discussion. Picking up where they left off at the height of their careers, in arenas, has been part of the conversation, but so have more modest venues. Nick leaves this week to shoot a “Jumanji” sequel, which may put a slight speed bump in those discussions.

Will the documentary, done in partnership with Amazon, come out simultaneously with the album? “As of right now they’re separate things,” McIntyre says, “but we’re looking at it. Because as you tell this story, you realize that so much of the story revealed itself through the process that then led to the music. So we’re playing with just how to kind of roll out the two bodies of work.”

McIntyre says some healing had gone on before work on the documentary started, but the filming process caught any sense of alienation further breaking down. “I think that they are like most families out there — that they had touched on the issues enough to be able to move forward, but they didn’t really get into it,” says the manager. “They didn’t go into the depth of where the hurt was each one of them really felt in those moments, and being able to articulate it and explain it to each other. That was a discovery along the way of making this. It wasn’t something that we knew was there, necessarily; it was once we got into it, we sort of all looked at each other and were like, ‘Wow, there’s a lot of layers to this that need to be discussed.’”

Lipman also says the documentary will further reveal that the reunion “is not a marketing ploy. It’s not anything that was calculated. It wasn’t a money grab.” But if they’re able to mint some out of the finally refreshed brotherly love, that will be a significant Jonas bonus.

Source: Variety

#jonas brothers #phil mcintyre #monte lipman #text #article #2019

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thedaveandkimmershow · 3 years ago

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What's happening so far is that Disney World is playing out as a backdrop for our experience as a family as opposed to being the entirety of our experience.

Which explains why we've done a shocking few rides so far. Twelve year-old me would surely have been disappointed. So, after a coupla-and-a-half hours at the Magic Kingdom yesterday plus an hour-and-a-half at the Be Our Guest meal… we went back to our suite to, depending on which one of us I'm talking about, spend time chilling on the balcony, taking a nap, or hanging out in the pool.

Round about 630 in the evening we're on our way to Epcot where, first thing, it's Spaceship Earth. And it's been so long since we've been on this ride that, since then, Disney's added (at the very least) Steve Jobs in that garage from which he & Steve Wozniak launched the first Apple computer… and then the whole thing about the world wide web.

After that we walked to Shimmering Sips for a flight of Mimosas just as we reached the lake…

... while the girls headed on to the United Kingdom for, you guessed it, fish 'n chips.

We joined them eventually, managing to score Linzy's leftover chips with some super yummy tartar sauce then headed to France for dessert: chocolate brioche for Rachel and for Linzy?

The lightest most heavenly chocolate mousse anyone's ever had.

And yeah. I got a little taste. 😁♥️♥️

After that, Kimmer 'n Rachel raced ahead to find churros whilst Linzy 'n I mosied our way ever farther behind them. By now it's full dark out and it's obvious that Epcot really shines at night. Especially with all those massive flaming torches strategically placed around the lake.

By 'n by we meet up at the pyramid that houses the Mexico pavilion. Sadly, Rachel isn't able to score her churro… but there'll be more opportunities here in the coming days.

So we set off for our last Disney experience of the night: Epcot's Test Track. It's definitely's one of our family's most loved rides ever.

By the time we're off the ride, it's 930 and everyone's streaming out of the park. To the busses. To the shuttles. To their cars and taxis. And to the ride shares.

It's a good twenty minutes hanging out before our Lyft arrives.

Now, our driver's name is Rodrigo… and Rachel catches the accent right off the bat: he's from Brazil. A genuinely charming gentleman, he indulged a bit of Portuguese with Rachel and gave us the rundown of moving from Brazil to Florida as well as commenting on how large is the Brazilian community: maybe a hundred thousand in Orlando, nearly a half million across the state of Florida.

At one point he's talking to Kimmer and she's telling him how we relax at the condo between Disney parks and he says something like "it's not possible to relax at the parks because they're so American".

They're so…

American.

Doing is what he's talking about, by the way. Always doing, always in motion, always with what's next.

I knew exactly what he meant. Just an observation on his part.

By the time we're back at the condo there's a full blown lightning storm going on. Not on the ground. Not with any kind of rain. Or thunder.

Just a dramatic, silent light show up there in the clouds.

Now, our morning itinerary starts with Disney's Animal Kingdom.

At eight.

So...

Up at 530AM.

It wasnt as bad as it sounds. It's basically taking it real slow. Not rushing out our our place first thing… but allowing consciousness to arrive slowly, sitting out on the balcony.

It's a peaceful morning as the girls wake up for breakfast and their own waking up routines as the property's groundskeepers begin their day as well. And, by the time we're standing out front waiting on our ride, it's eight in the morning.

Now our itinerary this morning calls for Disney's Animal Kingdom park and Linzy… is set on creating a bookmark I'm time, a second father/daughter experience on Expedition Everest after ten years ago I convinced an 11 year-old Linzy to ride this with me.

And after riding it this time, more than a decade later, I don't know what I was thinking. Because this.

Is an insane ride. From that moment you seemingly rum out of track. To careening wildly and backward through the mountain. To that drop that immediately turns into sharp left bank going up. It's all fast, even when it's just getting started. And it's all quite unexpected. Surprising.

I'm crazy lucky Linzy wasn't traumatized by that first experience. Instead, it continues to be one of our best memories together.

And.

As testimony to how intense this ride is, we actually walked onto it first thing with the absolute intention of getting right back on when we were done.

But after that first ride of the morning we were both yeah… we'll give it another few hours. ;-)

Disney Animal Kingdom holds a lot of good memories for us. We brought Linzy here when she was in single digits and there are places here where I remember pulling over with Linzy's stroller to take a moment to ourselves outside the flow of people streaming on the paths.

After the coaster, our experiences this morning were still family experiences. A lazy walk along the Maharajah Jungle Trek with it's Komodo Dragon, Makaks, Exotic Pigeons, and Tigers (among all manner of other animals).

About those tigers… though?

Linzy 'n I both noticed how right outside their enclosed area was a grassy field of Buffalo looking animals. Prompting Linzy to say

"That's like having you in a room next to a million apple fritters. Except the apple fritters can move…"

"And poop" I added.

We went crazy off the top, by the way. Taking pictures. All of us. Just shooting away with abandon because this place above all others is such a complete photo op. You have no idea.

After the jungle trek we all hopped aboard the Kilimanjaro Safari, like the jungle trek but in a big truck and with rhinos and elephants and giraffe.

Oh my.

After that, the girls jumped on a train for Raffiki's Planet Watch, an experience they hoped to be something of a petting zoo that turned out to be strictly show 'n tell. While they were doing that, we hit the Harambe market for a lunch that basically turned out to be a Greek salad complete with olives. Plus a watermelon lemonade that was super yummy.

When we all got.back together, we picked another family memory: the Kali River Rapids. This memory is from our very first trip here as a family with Linzy in her single digits and a stroller in tow.

She actually quite loved the lazy part of the ride…

But the calamitous drop into white water rapids made her--how shall we say?--quite cross.

Yeah.

She wasn't happy.

This time, though, we had a fun time together all the way through with me taking the full force of water rushing over the side and Kimmer taking whatever was left.

Linzy absolutely loved that.

Around 12:30 we bring our Animal Kingdom to a close and hop a bus for Blizzard Beach. By the way, the bus stops with the brown metal railings always remind me of one of our earlier times with Linzy… and this one time she was balancing on two of those brown railings when I snapped a picture.

As for Blizzard Beach, we took a couple looooong turns around the entire park on its lazy river winding mostly under the shade of trees and one massive mountain that randomly delivers icy drops of water as you wind through its tunnel.

The girls caught up with us just after our second time through the mountains and, after we all got out, they headed off to the wave pool whilst we indulged some cold refreshments at the base of Summit Plummet.

Anyway...

That's all for now. We're having an unexpected family experience even in the midst of all things Disney.

We may come out if this exhausted... no avoiding that But we will come out of this with lovely new memories together.

🙂♥️♥️♥️

#vacation #vacation stories #disneyworld #animal kingdom #blizzard beach

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weekendwarriorblog · 4 years ago

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The Weekend Warrior 9/4/20 – TENET! MULAN! I’M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS (but now that I’ve seen Tenet and Mulan, I’m better)… and More!

It’s Labor Day weekend… it is, isn’t it? I can’t even remember what day of the week it is anymore, and it looks like movie theaters across the country are generally all reopened except for a few specific areas. While theaters seem to be playing a variety of old and new movies – and Chadwick Boseman’s breakout 42, in which he plays Jackie Robinson, will be shown in 300 AMC theaters starting Thursday -- it still feels like we’re not quite where we should be. That said, only three states remain fully closed as far as movie theaters go: New York (eff you, Cuomo!), North Carolina and New Mexico. California is slowly rolling out movie theaters reopening in certain sections but not in L.A. or San Francisco just yet. Honestly, I’m having a rough week, and I’ll be surprised if I even get through half the movies that I have seen and planned to review, let alone everything else I have to do.

Finally! The movie that’s looking to be one of the most controversial movies of the summer, if not the year, comes to the United States. Of course, I’m talking about Christopher Nolan’s TENET (Warner Bros.), his tribute to James Bond movies with John David Washington (BlacKkKlansman) playing a super-spy (of sorts) who teams with Robert Pattinson to perform intricate heists on a mission to find out who has discovered bullets that travel backwards through time and brought them back into our time. Also starring Elizabeth Debicki and Kenneth Branagh, the movie has received mixed to positive reviews with about 76% on Rotten Tomatoes. You can read my full review right here and a second technical review here.

Right now, it looks like Tenet is going to be playing in roughly 3,000 theaters over Labor Day weekend with only a few states fully closed including my own (New York), as well as North Carolina and New Mexico. A few other states like New Jersey and Maryland are reopening but it may be too late to get Tenet in there. California has a few areas open but not Los Angeles or San Francisco.

Although I’m hesitant at making any predictions right now or doing a full-blown analysis – there so many unknowns in a pandemic -- I think a four-day opening of somewhere between $25 and 28 million should be possible even with limited seating in most theaters that have reopened. I think people are ready to go back to theaters despite the negative narrative created by certain irresponsible film critics who seem to care more about their own personal health than that of the industry that has allowed them to pay rent and live large for years.

Another movie that I’ve been looking forward to and actually my most anticipated movie of the year is Disney’s live action remake of their animated classic, MULAN, this one directed by one of my favorite filmmakers, Niki Caro of Whale Rider fame. I cannot tell you how excited I was to finally see this movie after being invited to a press screen back in March, and then have it systematically cancelled as everything else started shutting down. Fortunately, I got a screener and while not my favorite way to watch a movie, I absolutely LOVED IT!

It stars Yifei Liu as the title character, made famous in the 1998 Disney animated movie, and it follows a similar story of a teen girl who steals her father’s sword and armor and pretends to be a man to join the Imperial Army under secrecy. There are definitely major changes in Caro’s version, most notably the lack of songs and no sign of Mushu, the adorable dragon voiced by Eddie Murphy. This is also not meant for small children, because it’s PG-13 not because it has anything terrible like someone waving genitals or swearing but because some of the action does get intense without much blood or anything terrible. I mean, this is definitely a SOFT PG-13, if that’s even a thing.

The movie is gorgeous and in the vein of movies I love like Zhang Yimou’s Hero and Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and it’s even exec. produced by Bill Kong, who produced many of those films. The point is that I love these kinds of movies, plus I’ve long been a fan of Caro’s, and everything just comes together beautifully from the performance by Yifei Liu to the fantastic characters around her, including ones played by Jet Li and Donnie Yen (reuniting from Hero!), as well as an amazing witch played by the indelible Ms. Gong Li, who is also terrific. Sure, there’s a few issues with the dialogue, but this is not a kiddie movie, as much as it’s something on par with the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie, and I just love all of the decision Caro and her all-Asian cast make in telling this story in a new way. I particularly liked how the film followed Chinese traditions and dealt with things like “chi,” but as with the animated film, the stuff in the army

On top of the amazing martial arts fights, there are also some terrific battle scene that would do Braveheart proud, and it’s all pulled together by Harry Gregson-Williams’ score, which may be one of my favorite pieces of music this year. Definitely a score I’ll be buying since it brings so much excitement and emotion to every scene, but that’s just as much a credit to Ms. Caro and her fantastic cast, who in a couple scenes, particularly between Liu and Li, had me tearing up almost as much as every single time I’ve watched Caro’s debut, Whale Rider.

I’m sure that fans of the animated movie (which I only saw for the first time earlier this year) will have different expectations, but you can’t fault Disney for being a little bit concerned and undeservedly dumping it to the Disney+ streaming service (which you can watch it at a premium of $29.95) rather than giving it the theatrical release it truly deserved. Honestly, if for some strange reason, Disney decides to play it in a bunch of theaters once they’re fully open, I would not hesitate to watch this again in what I consider a much-better environment for a movie which is likely to end up in my top 10 for year. It’s probably my favorite straight-up Disney movie (not including Pixar or Marvel) since maybe Kenneth Branagh’s Cinderella, although I kind of enjoyed Mary Poppins Returns, too.

I also have a crafts review of Mulan over at Below the Line, so check that out!

While I’ve generally been mixed on Charlie Kaufman’s movies that he directed himself, I couldn’t NOT watch I’M THINKING OF ENDING THINGS, his new movie on Netflix, starring Jessie Buckley and Jesse Plemons as a young couple going to visit his parents, played by Toni Collette and David Thewlis. At first, it looks like they’ll get stuck in a snowstorm, but then they get there and then they leave and once again get stuck in a snowtorm. No, this isn’t Centigrade 2, but actually something far FAR worse, to the point where I’m not even sure where to begin.

It starts with Buckley’s “Young woman” – yes, Kaufman doesn’t even bother giving her a name – being picked up by her boyfriend Jake (Plemons) before the long ride through the snow to his parent’s house. The whole time, we hear her inner thoughts about wanting to break up with Jake for one or reason or another, her thoughts always been interrupted by Jake making a statement that seems out of the blue. When they get to his parents’ farm in the middle of nowhere, things start to get weird, and I don’t want to go into too many details because if you read my review and decide to sit through it anyway, then it’s your own fault.

Apparently, this was loosely based on a book of the same name by Iain Reid, but it was adapted by the guy who wrote Adaptation, so Kaufman pretty much just went off and did his own thing based on Reid’s general premise. What I find particularly weird is that some of the early reviews talked about this movie as if it was a horror movie, but I just don’t see that at all. It’s just a really dry and weird comedy that doesn’t really take off. While parts of it remind me of the comics work of Daniel Clowes (Ghost World), who I genuinely love, other parts just get so weird, and at times, it reminded me of David Lynch’s Eraserhead or M. Night Shyamalan’s The Visit, but only because there are so many WTF moments that you wonder what the actors must have thought while they were doing what Kaufman told them to do. Again, I’m not going to ruin the experience of being thoroughly confounded by some of the weirder moments but after Buckley and Plemons leave the farmhouse, they’re back driving through the snow and having far more intelligent conversations about such mundane topics. At one point, I thought, “This movie must be over soon, right?” and I checked, and there were 43 more minutes to go. That’s when I went from angry to outright ballistic, because I knew that there were so many other things I could be doing than listening to all the talking, talking, talking… They eventually arrive at an abandoned school and go there for shelter, and I was like, “Oh, good, now we get to the horror stuff.” Nope.

I’m Thinking of Ending Things is the perfect movie for the scant few that raved about Darren Aronofsky’s mother!, or those who consider Holy Rollers a masterpiece of the highest order. Awful, aggravating and almost unwatchable at times, I’d only recommend Kaufman’s movie to people as a practical joke. Nah, I’m not that mean. It’ll be on Netflix tomorrow. Good luck with it.

Filmmaker and Rooney* frontman Robert Schwartzman directs his third feature, the comedy THE “ARGUMENT” (Gravitas Ventures), which takes the simple idea of a cocktail party and turns it into a riotous and sometimes strange comedy of errors, of sorts.

Dan Fogler and Emma Bell play couple Jack and Lisa, he a writer, her an actress, who have been together for some time, and Jack is ready to pop the question. After the final of a stageplay Lisa is co-starring in, Jack throws a cocktail party at which he’s gonna propose. He invites over his agent Danny Pudi from Community) and his wife Sarah (Maggie Q) but Lisa has invited her amorous co-star Paul (Tyler James Williams from Everybody Hates Chris all grown up!), who brought his own bubbly girlfriend Trina (Cleopatra Coleman). As Trina starts drinking, thing just get worse and worse, and it inevitably turns into a full- on fight between Jack and Lisa aka the “argument” of the title. Jack is convinced that if they have a do-over on the night, they can prove who is right.

Oh, yeah. That couldn’t possibly work, right? Well, I’m not going to spoil it, but the one do-over turns into several, which turns into Jack trying to script the perfect cocktail party with the six of them … or rather five after Maggie Q’s character quits in a hilarious huff where she does impressions of the other five. (I’ve always found Maggie to be hilarious from talking to her years ago, and it’s great that her comic skills are finally being used, along with her beauty.) Eventually, Jack brings in actors to play each of them and perform the script he’s written so they can all sit back and figure out where things went wrong. Honestly, The “Argument” is more like the Charlie Kaufman movies I liked (such as Adaptation), and the movie has a vibe a lot like the play God of Carnage, which Roman Polanski adapted into a movie that nobody saw and few gave a fair shake. Also reminded me of Ike Barinholtz’s The Oath, which I quite enjoyed. The main leads are great, but I gotta give additional kudos to Maggie and Cleopatra Coleman, who gives a surprisingly layered performance as possibly the first ditzy African-American not-blonde “blonde” in movie history?

Although Schwartzman didn’t write this movie – it’s written by Zac Sanford who made The Chumscrubber -- he does a great job using his talented cast to throw many surprises at the viewer, and I was laughing quite hardily as the movie went on, because I really enjoyed the characters portrayed not just by the main six but also the actors playing the actors. Yeah, I know it might get confusing but at least this doesn’t have time travel, so if you want a fun and unexpectedly clever dark comedy, do check out The “Argument” which will be in theaters and On Demand, and apparently, you can even order it bundled with WINE?!?!? (*And you can also check out Rooney on Spotify!)

Another really nice surprise this week was Jeff Barnaby’s apocalyptic horror film BLOOD QUANTUM (Shudder/RLJEFilms), which was released on VOD, Digital HD, DVD and Blu-Ray earlier this week but is also on the awesome horror streamer, Shudder, I guess right now? It involves a community of indigenous people in the reserve Red Crow who face the undead when an infection hits the village through a bunch of animals who come back to life and then infect the humans. The movie starts on the first night of this plague and then cuts forward six months when the people of Red Crow have shut themselves off from the rest of the world with the hopes of keeping those still alive uninfected from the hordes of “Zeds” outside their gates.

I’m a little bummed I didn’t have press notes for this movie because there are so many great characters and performances, but it was hard to keep track of them without a scorecard. It does star Michael Greyeyes from Fear the Walking Dead, as well as Forrest Godluck (The Revenant), Kiowa Gordon and Elle-Máijá Tailfeatures, but other than Greeneyes, who plays the sherriff trying to keep his family safe, I could barely keep track of the characters or figure out who played them, and that’s a shame.

I generally liked the recent Train to Busan: Peninsula but Blood Quantum works just as little bit better, mainly from the interaction of the characters in a world full of sex and drugs and gore galore where you never who is gonna get killed but for the most part, they’re likely to go in a way that involves blood that pours like a waterfall. You add to the quick pace of Barnaby’s direction the amazing score that almost sounds like Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, and you have a movie that makes you realize that Barnaby has made a film that perfectly captures the spirit and feel of John Carpenter’s best work.

I actually watched John Leguizamo’s feature film directorial debut CRITICAL THINKING (Vertical Entertainment), way back in March, literally my very last press screening before movie theaters shut down, little realizing that it would be the last press screening for six months! It’s written by Dito Montiel, who I’ve generally been mixed on, and it’s based on a true story from 1998 where a Miami teacher, played by Leguizamo, tries to save a group of Latino and Black teenagers from the inevitable drugs and crime that kids from the underserved ghetto usually get into by teaching them chess and getting them all the way to the National Chess Championship. I didn’t get to rewatch it to write any sort of intelligent review, but as you can imagine, it has a Mr. Holland’s Opus or Dead Poet’s Society feel, but mixed with the little-seen Disney movie, Queen of Katwe, which I generally enjoyed much more. I do think Leguizamo did a pretty decent job with his first feature as a director and maybe if the crazy early days of COVID weren’t distracting me so much, maybe I would have enjoyed it more. This is a movie that I need to rewatch with a better head on my shoulders.

Tyler Norwood’s doc ROBIN’S WISH (Vertical) takes a look at the last years of comedian and actor Robin Williams, who died from suicide in August 2014 at the age of 63. To everyone who knew him, from close acquaintances to fans, it was a mystery why Williams would take his own life with things going so well in his marriage to Susan Schneider. After his death, the autopsy showed that he was afflicted by undiagnosed diffuse Lewy body dementia, and apparently, that was enough to do his head in to the point where suicide seemed like the only solution.

This is a very different than the equally good Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind, because it does focus so much on Williams’ last years and his relationship with Schneider, who plays a much bigger role in this movie with in-depth and intimate moments. It also does a good job talking to Williams’ neighbors in Marin County, who laud the comedian’s commitment to entertaining those in the community. It also interviews Shawn Levy from the Night at the Museum movies, who talks about how Williams wouldn’t let anyone around him know what was going on, maybe because he didn’t really know himself.

Williams’ death was tragic but even moreso when you realize what he must have been going through, and the only thing else I will say is that the notably teary documentary Dear Zachary may finally have some competition as the most tear-inducing real-life film you ever watch. Even so, it’s wonderful and does as great job shining a light on how hard something like dementia hits people when they least expect it. (Also, the score and cinematography for the film are fabulous at provoking those sorrowful emotions even more.)

Arthur Jones’ doc FEELS GOOD MAN is available right now On Demand via the Fantasia Film Festival and will be available via other film festivals, like Oxford Film Festival, starting Friday. (It will also be in theaters, including Oxford’s drive-in!) The movie follows the journey of comics artist Matt Furie, who drew a comic called “Boys Club” that featured a strange frog character named Pepe, who I never heard of, but apparently, the odd underground comic character went from being a popular meme to becoming a symbol of the alt-right. It sounds pretty crazy, but it is an absolutely crazy story as Furie sees his lovable and peaceful slacker character get out from under his control as right wing kooks like Alex Jones from InfoWars gloms onto him.

At first, I wasn’t sure if I’d find this as interesting as the HBO doc, Beware the Slenderman (which I also happened to see at Fantasia a few years ago), but the way that Jones tells Furie and Pepe’s story is really quite compelling, especially as he (and we) watch the craziness surrounding his character unfold, and Pepe becomes less and less like something he wanted to be associated with. (Furie and his wife spent thousands of their own money-making Pepe T-shirts and merch only to have to destroy it all once Furie gets pegged as the creator of a hate image. I mean, holy shit, this thing gets ugly!)

Apparently, Feels Good Man won an “Emerging Filmmaker” Jury Award at Sundance, and it’s well-deserved. I’d recommend the movie to anyone who likes comics or politics and doesn’t mind when the two things collide.

There are a few other movies that I want to write about that I didn’t have time to watch despite having screeners and who knows, maybe I can watch them over this longer weekend if things aren’t too crazy screener-wise. (I lost quite a bit of time with my trip to Connecticut to see Tenet, unfortunately.)

First, there’s Julius Berg’s THE OWNERS (RLJEFilms), which stars Maisie Williams from Game of Thrones and Sylvester McCoy aka Doctor Who #6 (I think?). It’s about a group of friends who want to break into an empty house in which there’s a safe full of money, but when the elderly couple (including McCoy) return home early, they turn the tables in a deadly game of cat and mouse. Yeah, it does sound like it could be fun, and it’ll be in select theaters, On Demand and digital this Friday.

Also out on Digital, as well as DVD, Blu-Ray this week is the anime CHILDREN OF THE SEA (Shout! Factory/GKids) from director Ayumu Watanabe and STUDIO4ºC who made Mind Game and Tekkonkinkreet. It’s about a young girl named Ruka whose father works at an aquarium where she comes across two mysterious boys who were raised by dugongs (a type of sea cow) so they’re very familiar and acclimated to water, to the point where they have to be in or near it at all times, kind of like Aquaman. I did watch a little bit of this, and I do have to say that it looks gorgeous, definitely more photo-realistic than the work of Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. I’m sure I’ll get around to watch the rest of it because I do enjoy well-made anime -- Weathering With You and Ride Your Wave are likely to be in my year-end Top 25, for instance – so hopefully, fans of anime and fantsy will check it out.

On Amazon Prime this Friday is Eric Merola’s doc THE ANDORRA HUSTLE, which look at the country of Andorra, located between France and Spain in the Pyrenees mountains, holding a population of 80,000 people who find themselves at the center of one of the most convoluted robberies in history in 2015 when a the private bank Banca Privada d’Andorra was shut down by the government to destroy the Catalonian Independence Movement, leaving dozens of innocent civilians facing jail time for laundering money after losing their life savings.

A couple prominent science fiction series premiere this weekend, including the Ridley Scott-produced Raised by Wolves on HBO Max and Away, starring Hillary Swank on Netflix. Someday, I hope to have

There’s a lot of other stuff that I didn’t have to watch or even think about it, so yeah, this is a little bit of a “lite edition” of the Weekend Warrior, so I apologize. Hopefully, I’ll be able to do better next week.

By the way, if you read this week’s column and have bothered to read this far down, feel free to drop me some thoughts at Edward dot Douglas at Gmail dot Com or drop me a note or tweet on Twitter. I love hearing from readers … honest!

#TheWeekendWarrior #Tenet #ChristopherNolan #Mulan #TheArgument #BloodQuantum #Movies #Reviews #DriveIns #VOD #Streaming

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appmarketingplus · 7 years ago

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Ratings: 3.9 out of 5

Best Sellers Rank: 297 in Video Games, 58 in Video Games

Platform: PlayStation 4

Xbox One Deals

Nyko Power Kit Plus – Xbox One

Includes 2 high quality NiMH rechargeable battery for excellent performance and long lasting life.

It has longer charge and play cable for easy battery recharge from the consoles USB ports.

Fully compatible with Microsoft’s wireless controller for Xbox One.

Does not require expensive batteries.

Original Price: $19.99

Discounted Price: $14.88 (Using Amazon promo code)

Savings: $5.11 (26%)

Far Cry 5 – Xbox One Standard Edition

Fan the flames of resistance and fight to free Hope County from the grip of a deadly cult in the newest instalment of the Far Cry series.

Customer Reviews:4.1 out of 5

Best Sellers Rank:48 in video games and 1 in Video Games > Xbox One > Games.

Original Price: $59.99

Discounted Price: $38.38

Savings: $21

Best Selling video games

Amazon has made the video games reachable to each and every of its customers. Gone are the days when you have to thoroughly search for the latest video games in the market; earlier the option of buying it online was not there in the minds of the customers. But now you can get the extensive collection of video games at Amazon; almost all gaming products are available on Amazon for your consideration. Following are the bestselling video games and products that you can purchase at reasonable prices. Some games are yet to be released but have gained popularity before.