Call me a nutcase but I stayed up until midnight on November 1 (and began writing at least a half-hour in advance), and I've already reached 5,000 words. That's not to say the words are necessarily good, of course, but as the NaNo people say, "Quantity, not quality." And this is a good exercise because it forces me to get the story out of my system; I worry too much about the decorations on the cake before the cake is actually made, but this makes me focus on the structure of the cake and then I can decorate the entire thing to my heart's content.
Anyway, I decided to do another movie review. Those reviews were a lot of fun, and since Hotel Transylvania is still fresh on my mind (watched it with my family just the other day, before Halloween), I decided to go ahead and review that one.
But Hotel Transylvania is one of those movies that (as you can deduce from the blog's title) surprised me. A lot. I didn't see it in theaters, but when I learned more about the premise (I like to steal spoilers from Wikipedia), I became intrigued enough to buy the DVD. And when I watched the DVD, I was all, "Whoa!"
Another funny little quirk of mine is that I do not like horror stuff. I avoid horror movies like the plague, and I try to stay as far away from Stephen King as possible, though I will confess to peeking at a few of his works out of sheer curiosity. But I flat-out refuse to watch a movie based on a Stephen King book all the way through; I won't watch Carrie or IT, and I wouldn't watch anything featuring Jason or Freddy or Mike if you paid me in diamonds.
Needless to say, I'm not a fan of vampires, either. Never had a strong stomach for that bloody, blatant stuff, and don't even get me started on those so-called "sparkly vampires," courtesy of Miss Meyer.
He is...a daddy!
It's crystal-clear from the start that Dracula has nothing if not good intentions. Sure, his intentions are often misplaced, and most of his actions are not really justifiable, but they're 100% understandable.
Considering everything he goes through in this story, why wouldn't he act the way he does? Who wouldn't go to enormous, if not drastic, measures to protect their loved one...especially if that loved one is all they have left in the world? As Dracula himself puts it, "As a father, you do everything to keep your family safe."
There's nothing really original about Dracula losing his wife to paranoid, prejudiced humans. But it sure as heck never fails to rip your heart out by the seams.
"They are the real monsters." Ouch.
Another aspect of HT that I really appreciate is how Dracula learns to get over his own prejudice toward humans. His budding relationship with the human Jonathan is both hilarious (I seriously hurt myself from laughing more than once) and heartwarming.
I also appreciate the way Mavis and Jonathan interact with each other. In a nutshell, their love story is everything the (in)famous Twilight is NOT. And coming from someone who's also a sucker for love stories, that's saying a lot.
Aww, how cute!
Speaking of Twilight, probably the gag that got me the most was that ingenious jab towards the end, from none other than You-Know-Who!
"This is how we're represented. Unbelievable."
So, to make a long review short, everybody ends up happy, and I was feeling amazingly happy myself. All I could say was, "Awww!"
Even the final song, "You're My Zing," came as a wonderful surprise.
It's not that I don't like closing with a song, but most "grand finale" songs don't perk me up all that much. But this one was a major, major exception. The lyrics were kind of corny but catchy all the same (I thought I found a love but she was just a fling/And then I met a girl and felt a diff'rent thing/It's like you're hit in the ring/Like you're pulled by a string/Can't breathe like you're chokin' on a chicken wing!), and may I say, Drac can really get down!
I've yet to see Hotel Transylvania 2 but it's got my interest snared. Just the pure, simple notion that Dracula is now "Grandpa" warms the cockles of my heart. The only relationship more beautiful than a parent with a child is a grandparent with a grandchild, and it's easy to see from the screencaps that Dracula loves his little half-human grandson something fierce.
(from Disney Screencaps)
So yeah, that's pretty much my whole HT review. It may not be Academy Award material, but it's a definite winner in my book. (The Academy Awards are kind of overrated anyhow.)
Sorry for the slew of screencaps, but can I help it if the scenes are just so dag-nabbed adorable? I'm telling you, this kind of cuteness should almost be a crime. Almost.
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