Lemonade Mouth

I didn’t post on Friday or Saturday and I feel bad about it. And I really wasn’t even busy or anything. But anyways, I was feeling very blah yesterday and I couldn’t decide if I should go outside and do something or just remain on the couch. Well, it was in the 50s and gloomy out yesterday so I opted to sit on the couch for pretty much the entire day. So what did I do? I watched the newest DCOM, Lemonade Mouth! Twice actually. Well, 3 times if you count the last time where I just fast forwarded to all the songs.

The funny thing is, I wasn’t even psyched to watch this movie. It looked alright, but not awesome. And two of the stars? Bridgit Mendler and Adam Hicks? I really didn’t like them. Mendler, of course, is on a show called Good Luck Charlie. Pretty much everything I’ve seen of that show annoys me. Although I guess I didn’t hate her in The Clique movie (of course I watched it). Adam Hicks I pretty much only knew as that really annoying next door neighbor in Jonas LA. I could not STAND him and couldn’t understand why they even needed a neighbor. But whatever.The other 3 kids I didn’t really recognize, except for the rebel girl because she was on Wizards of Waverly Place and I adore that show.

So anyways, as I was saying – I fully expected to delete this movie off my DVR maybe halfway through. But that was so not the way it happened. I LOVED this movie! I honestly think Disney wasn’t advertising this movie to it’s full potential.

From the clip above I can determine that the movie is about 1. a band 2. who’s members met in detention 3. and they’re possibly rebelling against something. Which is all true. They did meet in detention, they did form a band, and they’re rebelling against a school that values sports over arts. In the typical underdog story the jocks are always on top and the geeks and artists, etc. are always the ones on the bottom (in this movie they literally are on the bottom since they’ve been forced into the basement).

But if you can get past all the stereotypical crap there’s a really good message underneath it all. And it’s not so much about speaking up and being heard. No, what I thought the most important thing the movie was about was friendship. There was also a nice ‘accept your family/situation’ message (of course none of their situations were abusive or anything terrible), but I thought the friendship message was the strongest of all. You may disagree with me, and that’s fine.

Here is one of the songs that I felt hammered home the friendship part. Unfortunately since the movie is so new, there are limited clips of the songs. This one is from Disney, and they’ve cut the first half of the song. I guess they did it because it looks more like a music video than a movie clip, but by doing so, they’ve left out the sweetest parts of it.

See in the first half of the song, they’re all sitting in Olivia’s (Mendler’s character) backyard. They’re all there because Olivia is sad (I’m not going to tell you why) and the band has come over to see what’s wrong. Then they’re all looking at the clouds and pointing out shapes and the rebel girl reveals that she feels she’s too dumb to be in her family. Then they all say stuff about their families (my brother’s perfect and my parents want me to be him, my mother left us and my dad’s dating someone ridiculously young, my dad wants me to be the perfect Indian daughter), and Olivia tells them the truth about her father and then they sing about how they’ll always be there for Olivia. It really is a super sweet scene and song.

Another thing I feel the Disney channel did wrong was they made it seem to me like Mendler and Hicks were the stars of the movie when in reality Disney did a really good job of dividing the time between all 5 of the characters. I actually wondered until the end why the narrator always seemed to be Olivia. It made sense in the end, and I didn’t have any problems with it. And actually, speaking of Mendler, I thought she did a really good job. I always get pissed off when a pretty girl plays a dorky character, because we all know that that’s not how it works in real life. And that’s another reason I thought I was going to hate this movie. Bridgit Mendler is very pretty in my opinion. I guess, though, that you couldn’t necessarily call Mendler’s character, Olivia, a dork. But she did come off as very shy and awkward and it’s easy to understand why her character might not have wanted people getting close to her. And I actually really like Wen, Adam Hicks’ character, a lot. It seems I am guilty of basing my opinion of these 2 actors on only one Disney show they were in.

Another point for Disney? Unconventional romantic storyline. Well, I say unconventional only because it felt new for Disney. I expected for two (not the blond ones) of the band members to get together, but it totally didn’t happen! The guy professed his love for the girl and the girl turned him down. And then the one girl’s ex-boyfriend did a really nice of walking the line between jerky jock and nice popular guy. He may have crossed it a few times but he redeemed himself in the end. So that was nice to have a popular guy be a jerk (legitimately) and redeem himself (not like HSM where he was kind of tricked into it but didn’t really mean it since he was only saying those things to pump up his basketball team, but still doesn’t really give him an excuse to say those mean things, but I still fully believe that we are all entitled to privacy in locker rooms and whoever was taping Troy in the locker room should have gotten into BIG trouble…that was Corbin Bleu’s character, right? Could that be thought of as sexting a little bit? But with a video camera? Good thing there’s no nudity in Disney…unless you count the boys in the towels in HSM3). Oh wow, that was a really long parentheses… Now I forget where I was. So let’s just end it here. If you’re looking for a feel good, positive message musical movie that has some pretty catchy tunes, give Lemonade Mouth a try!

Oh, I guess I forgot to mention. I really hated Mo’s wardrobe. She wore all these dresses with really full skirts or lots of ruffles and it just did not flatter her at all! She needed a-lines like my coffee needs it’s milk and sugar. And also, blue was the favorite color of whoever was doing wardrobe for the extras. So. Much. Blue.

I seriously hate her dress.

<3s, Lindsay

I love when the principal says, “What’s he saying?” Oh generation that I’m not super far from.

I want that black and white dress with the flowers. WANT.

Phineas and Ferb Friday #3

One of my favorite things about this show is the theme song.  It is so catchy and I literally find myself singing it all the time.

The song is sung by Bowling For Soup which I mainly remember from their amazing song that I used to listen to over and over again, “Girl All the Bad Guys Want.”

Whoa, I don’t think I’ve ever seen that video before…..why was that guy on the toilet?  And was that the kid from Salute Your Shorts at the end???  Weirdness.

Anyway, one of my favorite Phineas and Ferb moments ever is when the band makes a real appearance on the show.  Here is a scene from one of my fave episodes, “Phineas and Ferb’s Quantum Bugaboo” where Phineas and Ferb go to the future and visit their nephews.

I love to watch that video and pick out the things they actually did, from the stuff that is just made up (for example, they have raced chariots, but have not skiied down a mountain of beans).

Happy Friday everyone!

Jen

 

I Want Phineas and Ferb To Be My Little Brothers!

Phineas and Ferb is my new favorite can’t-miss-it tv show.  It has been on the Disney Channel (which is my the channel I watch more than any other) for a few years now, but I have always ignored it.  I think it was because it was an animated show, so it did not fit in with the other Disney Channel shows.  Also, I felt like it was ALWAYS on tv, so I would be flipping through the channels hoping to find Hannah Montana or an awesome DCOM and I would think, “Man!  Phineas and Ferb is on again!!  Blerg!!”  Now, I curse myself for ever thinking that.

Let me state this for all of you who don’t know it:  “PHINEAS AND FERB IS AMAZING!”  It is hilarious and it gets even funnier with every episode that you see because there are so many in-jokes and references to previous episodes.

The basic premise of every episode (which are each about 11 minutes long) is Phineas and Ferb build some outrageously awesome invention in their backyard.  Their sister Candace spends all her time trying to “bust them.”  In other words, she tries to get their mom to realize what they are up to.  While all this is going on, their pet platypus Perry (who is a secret agent) goes off and tries to stop Dr. Doofenschmirtz from carrying out his evil plans.

Perry the Platypus in secret agent mode

My favorite characters are Ferb (who almost never speaks, but when he does it is Thomas Sangster doing the voice who was the little boy in Love Actually!!), Perry the Platypus (who has the best facial expressions EVER–trust me, he does), the Mom (how she puts up with Candace I will never know!), and Baljeet (I’m a huge groupie of The Baljeatles).

Baljeet and his friend Buford the bully (can you guess which is which?)

If any of that sounds confusing, don’t worry, it is pretty easy to pick up on.  Some of my favorite episodes in case you want to start watching (most of them can be found on YouTube) are “Vanessassary Roughness,” “Oh There You Are Perry,” “Greece Lightning,” “Hail Doofania,” “Swiss Family Phineas,” “Isabella and the Temple of Sap,” “Finding Mary McGuffin,” and “The Chronicles of Meap.”

Most of the episodes have songs and several of them are very catchy.  I adore the Evil Love song from “Chez Platypus.”  If you can get past Dr. Doofenschmirtz’s terrible voice, the song itself is really pretty.  I also love Come Home Perry from “Oh There You Are Perry.”

Here is one episode to get you addicted to the show.  It doesn’t really follow the regular premise, but I LOVE it!!!  I think my favorite part is when Candace says “Am I sweating milk?”  heeheeheeeeee

So if you’ve never given this show a chance, you should at least check out a few episodes.  Right now it seems to be on from 8-10 in the morning central time so you could watch it while you get ready for work.  I know I’m not the only adult who loves this show (I have an inkling that over half the fan base is parents who watch it with their kids), so don’t be embarrassed.

Jen

P.S.  One of my favorite things about this show is that Ferb has a crush on Dr. Doofenschmirtz’z daughter Vanessa who is played by Olivia Olson who was Joanna in Love Actually.  That means the two little kids who were in love in that movie are crushing on each other again in this show!!!!

Harriet the Spy: Blog Wars

Over the past few days I have been forcing myself to watch the Disney Channel Original Movie (or D-COM if you will) Harriet the Spy: Blog Wars, starring Wizards of Waverly Place’s Jennifer Stone.  I finally finished last night.

Pictured: Excruciating pain for me

 

Lindsay’s Grade: F-

The problem with this movie was that it sucked.  The acting was terrible, the story was stupid, and I never once believed in any of it.

I had high hopes for this movie, because I really love Jennifer Stone.  Or at least I love Harper on WoWP.  Also, I adore Harriet the Spy – the book and the movie starring Michelle Trachtenberg from the 90s.  Who didn’t adore that movie?  It was awesome.  I should go buy it.  Actually I think I like the 90s movie even more than the book.

Pictured: Awesome Sauce

 

Back to Blog Wars.  The acting.  Every character grated on my nerves.  The only character I actually liked was Beth Ellen.  The girl who played her did so in a manner that worked really well with who Beth Ellen is.  As for Jennifer, who played Harriet, …. I hated Harriet.  Harriet had no redeeming qualities.  I know that Harriet does some crappy stuff, but you always forgive her because she has an air of innocence and doesn’t really understand that her observations may sting.  But this Harriet just acted like poor me poor me, and there was no part of her that was likeable.  Like I said, I was super surprised that Jennifer Stone couldn’t bring her own loveable tweak to the part.  A shame really.  Golly, the nanny, and Harriet’s parents were pretty bad too.  Although I do have to say that Disney Channel has a hard time portraying adults as anything other than ridiculous.  Can anybody think of an example of a DCOM movie where this is not the case?

(Spoilers, although I doubt anybody would actually like to watch this movie) 

And the plot.  In the 90s movie, Harriet loses her notebook, which her classmates find and then hate her for.  It’s not Harriet’s fault because it was in her own private notebook, not meant for anybody else’s eyes.  In Blog Wars, Harriet’s observations were written on her class’s blog, which is on the freakin’ internet.  So we’re supposed to believe that the evil girl is the one who took that information from the blog and posted it on the internet that can be accessed by everyone and not just the class.  This is just so stupid on so many levels.  The observations spread on the internet were that of a famous teen actor.  So of course everyone’s going to freak out about that.  Disney’s acting like it was a horrid reaction.  It’s so not!  That’s what would happen in the real world!  And it would be the original poster’s fault!  Not the one who spread it!  It’s like friggin’ facebook – if you don’t want it to be known, don’t put it there for anybody to see.

Oh well.  Maybe someday Nickelodeon will do a remake of the 90s movie.  I’m trying to think of someone that’d be good as Harriet.  Hmm.  I’m not up on the 10-12 year old actresses.  Maybe Dakota Fanning’s little sister?  She was really good in Phoebe in Wonderland.

Pictured: The only young actress that I can think of at this moment.

 

That’s all for BEDA Day 1 for me folks!

<3, Lindsay Folkmann

P.S.  A picture of my new kitchen!  I’m moving right now!  Hooray!

There is at least one dinosaur in every room of my new apartment. That's what makes it so awesome.

P.P.S.  Another thing that irked me about Harriet the Spy.  The only two colors they put her in were red and blue.  Mostly red.  Blue for school, red for everything else.  It was ridiculous.  She was spying on an actor wearing bright bright gouge your eyes out red.  Come on!