Jamie Lammers
Stories (150/0)
Star Wars: The Last Jedi Review
This review talks about events that happen throughout the film, but doesn't go into specific detail about how it all goes down. Because of this, this review will be given a minor/borderline major spoiler warning. It comes from my Letterboxd profile.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Futurism
The Diagnosis
I barely remember what happened during the days following my diagnosis with type 1 diabetes. I don’t even think I remember when I truly found out what type 1 diabetes was. In fact, I had to have my mom look over my version of the story to make sure my memory was accurate, and there were so many aspects of her side of the story I don’t remember to this day. For those who don’t know, type 1 diabetes is an auto-immune disease where a person’s antibodies destroy beta cells produced in the pancreas, causing them to stop producing insulin. Insulin transports the sugar from the food they eat from their blood into their cells. The destruction of theses insulin-producing cells prevents the body from getting the energy it needs unless insulin is manually injected. Type 1 diabetics need to monitor the amount of sugar in their blood to make sure it's not too high or too low. This is a disease that the individual must live with for the rest of their lives once they’re diagnosed. Even though progress is being made in developments towards 3D printed pancreases and experimental drugs to delay its onset, there is no cure as of this writing. Even though I've forgotten a lot of what happened after the diagnosis, I’ll never forget the actual diagnosis day. From then on, my life would never be the same.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
Star Wars: The Force Awakens Review
This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I review whatever movies I see. I have seen this film once before. I watched it before going to see The Last Jedi at my local theater. It took me a long time to get sucked in, but at a crucial character moment involving Han Solo and Kylo Ren (if you've seen it, you know what I'm talking about), I realized why these characters were so special and absolutely adored the intense lightsaber climax. However, rewatching it after seeing the original trilogy, I am inclined to believe that as a film on its own merit, Star Wars: The Force Awakens has pretty good acting and characters overall, fantastic production design and top-notch special effects, making it a very entertaining and enjoyable movie. As a Star Wars film, however, its story really doesn't match up to anything supplied in the previous trilogy.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
Anne of Green Gables Review
This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I review whatever movies I end up watching. My mom grew up with the source material of this film and absolutely adored all of the characters, and since I'm curious about the adaptation Anne with an E that's been getting incredible praise for the past couple of years, I figured I should check out what has widely been called the definitive version of the book. Long story short, this movie surprised the heck out of me. I had a feeling I was going to at least enjoy it and I pretty much got the exact movie I wanted to see. This is the exact kind of film to set as an example as a movie that is meant for pure sentimentality and likability. All of the characters are incredibly fun to watch, and the majority of them are likable despite most of them flip-flopping back and forth with their moods when these young children start acting rambunctious. After a while, I realized why these women would so quickly change their attitudes toward the young Anne, however -- this is the late 1800s, a time where women were supposed to be seen as prim and proper and held back and obedient, and meanwhile, Anne is energetic and excited and full of imagination and quick to outburst. She's a girl full of determination, and while this movie doesn't explicitly state that this is what she's doing, she is absolutely fighting against the standard idea of that "prim and proper" woman and sets a role model for girls, and actually anyone, to look up to. Anyone, but especially young girls, can look up to Anne as a figure of passion, as a motivation to keep pursuing what you enjoy, and as a reminder to not let anyone stand in your way with what you think is possible.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
The Aviator Review
This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I review every movie and limited series I watch. Admittedly, even for me subjectively, this is probably a 4.5-star movie. The pacing is definitely not perfect, but part of that might be because I get so excited when the first half-hour or forty-five minutes of a movie just flies by, and then the rest of the movie just doesn't move quite as fast as that. However, despite that, I genuinely can't think of a single moment in this film that I feel deserved to be cut out, anything in this film that felt like it lingered for too long or wasn't quite covered enough. There's really no part of this film where I felt, "Eh, I don't really NEED this." Simply put, this is the fastest-paced three-hour movie I've ever seen. That's an absolutely incredible feat in my opinion.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
Lake Mungo Review
This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I review whatever movies I end up seeing. I've been curious about this film ever since I saw Chris Stuckmann's review for his Halloween special a couple of years ago. (Wow, the second review in a row where I've talked about him... can you tell I maybe like Chris Stuckmann and that he maybe inspired my interest in films? Just a little bit?) For whatever reason, I never sat down and actually watched it despite the fact that it's available on Amazon Prime. Recently, however, Chris tweeted that almost a year and a half after making his video, where he stated how terrible the home release of Lake Mungo actually was, an official version of the film was finally released on Blu-ray by Second Scene Films. I pre-ordered the Blu-ray as soon as I saw it, eager to support a distribution company that could bring more attention to lesser-known films like this, along with the idea of owning another collector's Blu-ray case. Funnily enough, despite the fact that I didn't think she would, my mom showed interest in watching this movie tonight, so I watched it with my parents. I genuinely didn't expect that to happen because I thought the premise would turn them away and I probably wouldn't watch it for another week or so, but nope, they wanted to see it, so we watched it together. My goodness, I'm so glad I did.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
Rolling Thunder Revue Review
This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I review all of the movies I see. In a lot of ways, this is a conservative rating for me because, for a while, I couldn't quite jump on board with whatever this movie was going for, but after finishing it, I'm pretty sure I love it. I think I may need a bit more time with this movie before I decide whether or not I fully loved it or not, so I should explain my experience with this film.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
Staged Season 2 Review
This is from my Letterboxd profile, where I review every movie and limited series I see. This is actually my review for the entirety of Staged Season Two, or as it's formatted this time around, Staged2. To my horror, I've only just realized that Stages Season One was completely taken off Letterboxd, and thus the review that I wrote for that first season might be completely lost to the sands of time. I'm very sorry for that inconvenience and I'm really sad that the review is now completely gone.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
Transcribing The Past
I look at the pages of a historical text online. It could be any kind of text. A pamphlet from a bygone era, a book forgotten to time, or a newspaper that no one knows about. I scan the text, focusing on how the words are formatted on the page. I edit pre-typed text that is supposed to mirror this formatting, or sometimes type it myself. I press save on the page, happy that a small piece of history has been converted to a form suitable for online consumption. I repeat this step until I get bored and then resume it again at another point when I'm looking for something to do.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
The Graduate Review
This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I review every movie I see. The only thing I knew about this movie was the incredibly famous line, "Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to seduce me." That was it. I thought that the line and the seduction was only a short scene in the film. I didn't know the entire film was going to revolve around that. As such, I had no idea what to expect with this movie. I didn't know whether I would think it was overrated or whether I would like it. I didn't know that this film would hook me as much as it did, I didn't know it would resonate with me as much as it did, and I didn't know that this film would be so amazing to me that it might actually make my top 10 personal favorite films of all time. This movie is beyond fantastic. Again, I really want to give this film five stars. However, there are some aspects of the plot that are incredibly dated, there are some cuts between shots that are really obvious (cuts in time are really obvious because the center of the shot moves a bit during the cut, so you can tell there was a cut), some of the music editing is repetitive, and there are continuity errors in some of the lighting in this film (admittedly, my parents noticed those, not me). There are so many minor glaring flaws like that that don't affect the story that I can't give this film five stars. However, that doesn't mean I didn't adore this film.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Humans
A Quiet Place Review
This review comes from my Letterboxd profile, where I write movie reviews like this for every movie I see. A Quiet Place is a concept film, through and through. If the concept is executed inadequately, the film is going to fail. The idea behind this film is genius -- a family needing to stay quiet in order to prevent themselves from being attacked by merciless creatures in the woods. The kicker is whether or not the screenplay delivers on the potential of that premise. In my opinion, it absolutely does. This film is an hour and a half thrill ride from start to finish, recognizing that while there isn't necessarily a lot of character depth to be built from this story, there is just enough to make you care about the characters while being entertained. The best part of this film is the sound editing, simply because it draws your attention to whatever sound is present in the moment. A good 85% or so of this film is completely silent, making whatever sound is heard narratively important. Whether it's the background noise of the environment this family lives in or Marco Beltrami's intense score or actual noises made by the family, intentionally or not intentionally, every single sound in this film has a narrative purpose, and that requires meticulous attention to detail.
By Jamie Lammers3 years ago in Horror