Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Got it Maid

When I resigned my lease this year, as a thank you for my loyalty, my apartment complex offered me either a free carpet cleaning or a free maid visit. I selected the maid's visit since I feared getting the carpet cleaning would require moving all of my furniture out of the apartment. So today the maid came to visit! Happy Valentine's Day to me! I wasn't entirely sure what the maid was going to do exactly but they definitely dusted, vacuumed, threw out my trash, threw out my recyclables, mopped the floors, cleaned my stove, cleaned the bathtub, sink, and toilet and made my bed. They definitely cleaned more thoroughly than I do; that's for sure. I'm kind of excited at how good it looks and am even thinking I might fork over the money to do it again, depending on the cost. I've seen Groupons, etc... that offer cheap maid service.

Thursday, February 09, 2012

Valentine's Day movie reviews: The Vow and This Means War

I found this article very interesting about how Fox Pictures is delaying the release of its movie This Means War because it doesn't want to go up directly against The Vow. I've seen both movies over the last week or so thanks to advance screenings and I can say that it might be a smart move. The Vow is the much better movie.

The Vow is about a married woman who gets in a car accident and wakes up with amnesia, not remembering her husband or the last five years of her life at all. And in those last five years, so much had changed for her. The movie basically tells the story of the husband trying to get her to remember. It's part sad and part sweet and part funny, too. The film does a good job of getting you invested in the couple. And even though Channing Tatum isn't the world's best actor, I thought he did a fine job.

Meanwhile, This Means War is one of those that tries to attract both guys and girls by mixing action with romance. In this movie, two special agents both end up falling for the same girl (played by Reese Witherspoon) so they spend their time using their special agent skills to try to win the girl. In other words, they place microphones and secret cameras in her apartment; they put a GPS on her car; the one shoots the other with a tranquilizer dart to put him to sleep on a date... you can only imagine what else. While I have to say the film is a little original in seeing the spy gear being used against each other, somehow overall the plot of the film is crazy predictable. You can see every move before it happens. Ugh. And putting Chelsea Handler in the film as the best friend that helps Reese make decisions on what guy to choose was an awful decision. She's so grating. Finally, even when Reese finds out what's going on, she actually chooses to be with one of the guys, which I found utterly ridiculous. While it also has some funny and enjoyable scenes, you couldn't care less about either couple here. Thank God I didn't have to pay money for this one.

So, overall, just like Fox expects, if you're going to spend your movie dollars on just one of these films, I recommend you go see The Vow.