What I've Been Watching: July Edition

Hey lovelies! If you've been a reader of my blog from the beginning, you may remember that I did a couple of posts titled 'What I've Been Watching' and it was my idea to make these a monthly thing. If not, you can check them out here & here. I didn't keep up the posts because I let my worries get the better of me. I didn't think the posts were interesting enough and felt nervous that I was just gonna bore everyone. Eek! Although, my anxiety can still cause me to freak out before I share a post, especially if it's a new regular 'series' idea, I am a lot more confident in my writing than I was back when I originally shared the posts in question. 

Watching movies (and TV shows) used to be one of my favourite hobbies, I mean it never wasn't but depression likes to get in the way of you doing the things you love. It likes to creep in and drain all of your motivation to do fun things & it sucks! :( Recently though, I've been really trying my damned hardest to not let depression dampen my passions, and so I've been determined to get back to watching movies and TV shows. I even included 'watch 20 new movies' in my summer goals this year as a motivator. So far, I've been doing pretty well. This got me thinking that it would be nice to document this and what better way than to pick up my 'What I've Been watching' monthly posts. I won't include every single thing I watch, only the ones that I liked the most. Here's my 'first' post of many, and I hope you all enjoy them!  

I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum, but my post will include a overview about what the movies & tv shows are about and I'll probably discuss some characters and maybe some of my favourite parts, so sorry if I end up saying too much! 

 Silent Hill (2006)

I am ashamed that as a horror fan, it took me so bloody long (no pun intended, haha) to finally watch the Silent Hill movie, oops! The movie is an adaptation of the well-known Japanese video game of the same name. If you're unfamiliar with the plot, it's about a mother called Rose who's little girl is having nightmares about a place called Silent Hill. She's adopted and Silent Hill is the name of the town where she was born, so in an attempt to help her daughter she decides to take her back there to see it. She soon discovers that there was a massive coal mill fire disaster in Silent Hill which left the whole town adandoned. It is now inhabited by strange ghostly creatures (which are awesome by the way!) and she has to endue them when her little girl goes missing in the town. We are introduced to several characters and learn about the eerie goings-on in Silent Hill as the main character Rose tries to find her daughter, as well as a horrible tradegy that took place there, but I won't say anymore. You'll have to watch it to find out for yourself :) I was happy to discover that the little girl was played by Jodelle Ferland who is the perfect actress to play the part, as she makes the best horror movie child! I remember watching her in Stephen King's adaptation of Kingdom Hospital when I was around 12. If you're a fan of horror movies, you should definitely check out this movie. 

The Handmaid's Tale (2017)

This new TV series is absolutely brillant! I really wasn't sure what to expect after watching the short trailer on an advert. Due to the way the characters were dressed, I assumed it was a period drama/history-based drama, which I'm a big fan of so I added to my 'to watch' list. However, I soon discovered that it was actually a dystopian drama, and I was super happy about this because I have been really into this genre for a few years now. The drama is set in a future were the fertility rates across the world are severly low. The show takes place in what was formerly North America, that has now been taken over by a Christian totalitarian government who have created a society that is made to conform to a strict, Biblical-like regime. All of the woman who are fertile and/or have had children before have been forced into servitude as 'handmaids' who are brutually forced to work and bear children for the upper class families, who are the official leaders of the government and their wives. The story is told through the eyes of a handmaid called June, and it's so so good! It has such an intricate story with lots of strong female characters. I can't recommend it enough and I have a mighty need to read the book by Margaret Atwood that it's based on now. It's a 10 out of 10 from me!

Voice From The Stone (2017) 

If you don't know this already, I am massive nerd when it comes to Game of Thrones. As a result, I have become a huge fan of the actors who portray my favourite characters from the Song of Ice and Fire novels by George R.R. Martin so well, and will often follow which other movies they are in. Emilia Clarke who plays Daenerys Targaryen on GoT was the main character in the newly released movie, Voice From The Stone which is categorised as a psychological and supernatural thriller. It tells the story of a British nurse who specialises in the care of children with mental health problems from weathy families, and she travels from home to home helping to nurse the children back to health before moving on to the next. After the death of his mother, a young boy has refused to talk for many months and so Verena (the nurse) is hired by his father to help him. We find out that there are some ghostly occurrences happening in the house and that the young boy is convinced that his mother's ghost is trapped in the stone around the families estate. There's a reason why the stone is significant but I don't want to reveal too much. I chose to watch this movie mostly because I like to see my favourite Game of Thrones actors and actresses in different roles, but also because I like history-based movies as well as thrillers. It was a pretty good movie, even though it took a while to develop the storyline. Emilia Clarke did a great job though! 

 The Keepers (2017)

I've absolutely loved Netflix Original documentary series ever since I watched 'Making a Murderer (2015)' which was a fantastic crime documentary produced by Netflix discussing secrets and corruption within American law enforcement and the judicial system surrounding several crimes supposedly involving a man named Steven Avery. I just really like how Netflix do their documentaries and so when I learnt about The Keepers I was very much looking forward to watching it. Crime documentaries have been a favourite of mine ever since I become interested in criminal psychology in my early teens. The Keepers is a really good watch! There's seven hour-long episodes investigating the murder of a Catholic nun called Sister Cathy Cesnik in the late 1960's. She was a teacher at a religious high school which has a history of teachers being involved in the abuse of students. There were some conspiracies about the head priest at the school being involved in her murder, because they wanted to cover up the abuse that was going on of which he was the main suspect. Some of the former students of Sister Cathy are working together to help uncover the truth about what happened to their teacher. I don't want to tell you anything else so not to spoil the series for anyone who's interested. I seriously can't wait for the next Netflix crime documentary series!

 Brimstone (2017)

This is another movie that I originally wanted to watch solely because the cast includes Kit Harington who Game of Thrones fans will know plays Jon Snow on the show. My friends will also know that Mr Harington is one of my celebrity crushes (I mean just look at him!). After watching the trailer though, I discovered that this western thriller is right up my street! It's another historically based movie which also happens to be a thriller so I was expecting to really enjoy it. I wasn't disappointed! Carice van Houten also stars in the movie, and she plays the Red Woman/Melisandre on GoT. I was interested to see how actress Dakota Fanning would do in a thriller role, but I think she was great! Okay, that's enough about the cast... here's more about the movie itself. It's set in the old American western days, a time when small towns were being converted to Christianity and people's lives were governed by traditional gender roles and Biblical teachings. The movie is told through the point of view of the main character, Liz (played by Dakota Fanning) who cannot speak and so communicates with sign language. As the movie starts, we see Liz as a midwife with a family and her life is tough, but it gets even worse when a Reverend turns up one day in her hometown. She is terrified and its clear that she knows this man. We discover how and why he makes her so fearful as the movie goes on. The movie is a long one, over two hours and something that I love about it is that it's broken down into four sections, which are titled: Revelation, Exodus, Genesis & Retribution. Each section tells a differnt part of Liz's life. I'll stop here before I end up revealing the whole story! I really liked this movie, and I'd definitely rate it a 7/10. 

The Girl With All The Gifts (2016)

The Girl with all the Gifts is categorised as a post-apocalyptic horror movie because it contains zombies, but I wouldn't personally consider it as one. I'd say more that it has elements of gore and violence but it is mainly post-apocalytic dystopian movie. It is set in a future where society has been plagued with a infection that turns people into zombie-like creatures and the military are experimenting to find a cure for the fungal infection outbreak that as wiped out a massive percentage of the population, and the rest are zombies. The story begins in a military base in the South of England (which I liked because I haven't been a movie set in England for a while), where children are the experimentation subjects. These children are the second generation of zombies, born from people who were infected so they are being used by a scientist at the base to create a vaccination. The children who look like ordinary children and act like them too when they are not exposed to the scent of human flesh are kept like prisoners and are dehumanised by many of the soldiers at the base. There is one particular child (Melanie) who stands out from the rest; she is very intelligent and appears to be more human than the other children. This causes the school teacher at the base to become very attached to her and makes her really question the treatment of the children. One day, the army base perimeters are breached and the zombies attack everyone! A group manage to escape: the teacher, the main research scientist involved in creating a cure, the head soldier at the base and few others, as well as Melanie. The team are now making their way to the next closest army base and the movie follows their journey there. There's so much I love about this movie and it's so tough not to type away about it, but I can't tell you. The movie is based on a book by M.R. Carey which I need to read since there's so many things that I felt could have been explained more in the movie. However, it's still great and you should totally give it a watch!

So, those are my favourite movies and tv shows of July. I also watched a few other horror movies and the last few episodes of the Starz series 'American Gods (2017)' Season 1. I started watching this back in May, after finding out that the gorgeous Ricky Whittle was in it. He stole my heart when I watched him play Lincoln in another series, 'The 100 (2014)'. I'm not sure if I like American Gods as a whole all that much, some parts I really enjoy but then I get bored with others. I'll decide when I've watched the next season :) The highlight of July for me was obviously the start of Season 7 of Game of Thrones, which has been amazing so far! I hope that you all enjoyed this post, and that I've encouraged you to watch some new movies/tv shows. Let me know if you do and what you think :) I'd also love to hear your opinions if you've already seen any of the movies/tv shows I mentioned in today's post. 

Thankyou for reading!

 ♥

What have you been watching lately?

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