About Murder on the Orient Express, I think Johnny Depp was meant to be extremely unlikeable.  I've read the book but this was the first time I've seen any adaptation and I was surprised at how much the sheer tragedy of the situation was highlighted. I mean, consider that the book begins with the inciting crime (the murder of the child and subsequent death and suicide), it seemed almost clinical in contrast to the movie.

Also while I liked the jaded, world-weary spin on the character of Poirot, I didn't like the insertion of the long-lost love, whose portrait Hercule carries with him.  I just thought it was unnecessary.

But this actually wasn't the last movie I've watched. A couple of days after watching Murder on the Orient Express I went to see a Slovak film called The Teacher, which I truly enjoyed. It's the story of a teacher, natch :D, who basically extorts favours from the children she teaches and their parents using their grades. I didn't know that it was actually based on a true story, not that that made much of a difference to my enjoyment. I've also always loved the poetry of Samo Chalupka (that's a lie I didn't learn to speak Slovak until I was in my late teens) and the recitation of Branko at the end was pretty fantastic. I'd rate it a solid 4 out of 5.

I work at a theme park "restaurant", one day this family walks in and the kids go and find a seat and the mum and dad walk up and order.  As they're just ordering food that's pre-made and bottled  drinks it doesn't take long to plate it all up and by the time the woman has paid the order is sitting on the counter on a couple of trays ready to go.  The woman abruptly turns on her heels and walks away leaving the man to carry the trays one at a time to said table. When he walks off with the first tray I turn to one of my workmates and mutter "Damn that woman was so rude she could have carried one of trays!"

At this point my colleague gives me a disgusted look and says

! "She has no arms"

I have pretty eclectic tastes when it comes to music. My first love is classical, but I also like country, bluegrass, pop, rock, hip-hop, reggae, jazz, folk music… You name it if it's music I'll probably like it.

I recently watched Into the Woods on the recommendation of a friend, and I certainly enjoyed that. I'll look into the films you named, I've seen Rocky Horror when I was 13 it was unforgettable experience.

I recently saw Matilda the musical, and I really loved it. I'm hoping that they make a movie of the musical when they can (I know that the producers agreed not to make a movie for at least another three years in order to have it performed on Broadway).

I just wanted to ask for recommendations for other Musicals that people have enjoyed. Movie musicals are probably going to be more practical in terms of me actually be able to watch them.  I live in Brisbane and there are only three or four big musicals produced here a year.  Although they've released tickets for a production of Aladdin next year. :cheers:

@royalcrown89:

It'll probably change before the year is out, but definitely Get Out. It is a masterpiece and I honestly cannot wait for the award nominations it will receive fingers crossed to be announced. It isn't one of the most critically-acclaimed films of this year for nothing! It still has a 99% rating on Rotten Tomatoes AND it was a relatively major box office success given its budget. Beyond that stuff though, it's a great film and struck a near-perfect balance of comedy and horror.

I agree. This film had so much going for it and I say this even though I watched it already knowing what was going to happen (because I was listening to a CRACKED podcast and didn't pay attention when they said to skip the next few minutes if you didn't want it spoiled.

Also The Hunt for the Wilderpeople, a New Zealand film that was actually released late last year, but is so damned funny that I have to say it is hands down the best comedy film I've seen in the last twelve months.

I enjoyed it.  It made me think.  It made me uncomfortable.  I have random thoughts about it weeks after having seen the film.

On the other hand I never thought it was going to be any kind of horror/thriller and I certainly wasn't expecting any action.  I understood walking in to the cinema that it was a Daren Aronofsky film and I kind of had an idea of what that meant.

@bob85:

Oh, and another one is watching porn as a teenager. I mean… who waits until they are 18 to watch porn for the first time? Teens get curious and they're horny as f***!

This.

And using torrents to download copyrighted content.

Nah, I tend towards quiet sighs and whispered/muttered endearments.

TPBM has had sex of some sort on public transport.

No.  If someone came up with a guaranteed cure like a pill that had no side effects, or a surgery that was comparable to a vasectomy in terms of pain and recovery time, I'd still say no.

I do have to say that, even now (without such a simple, easy cure) I have no objections if other adults decide to subject themselves to whatever quackery is needed for them to tell themselves they're now straight.  I do have objections when it's forced on children and adolescents by their supposedly well meaning parents and elders though.

My biggest fear for the future actually is someone coming up with an in utero test and cure so that no more babies are ever born gay.  Even with the gains in acceptance we've made in the last couple of decades.  My gut feeling is that, if such a breakthrough were to happen, the people who are having the babies (straight people) would implement it without a second thought.  Our protests, though justified, would be useless.

I loved "Last Summer" and "Full Circle" by Michael Thomas Ford. I have them on Audiobook as well and the narrator is the same for both books and he's amazing.