The Secret Life of Bees Buzzes Best In Its Laidback Sequences

Lily Owens (Dakota Fanning), the lead character of The Secret Life of Bees, doesn't know who her mother was. Beyond the fact that she's responsible for inadvertently shooting her mom, Lily doesn't know a thing about her mysterious mom. Her father, T. Ray Owens (Paul Bettany), certainly won't tell her anything about her mom. That means Lily has got to find out for herself. Teaming up with her family's house worker Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson), Lily travels to a pink-colored house that she just knows is connected to her mom's past. The house is run by honey farmer August (Queen Latifah) and her sisters, June (Alicia Keys) and May (Sophie Okonedo), who give Lily and Rosaleen a temporary place to stay while Lily tries to discover who her mom was.

13 Days of First-Time Frights: Let the Right One In

13 Days of First-Time Frights is a series of reviews for October 2019 where Douglas Laman, in the spirit of Halloween, watches and writes about thirteen horror movies he's never seen before. These reviews will be posted each Tuesday and Thursday as well as the last three Wednesdays of October 2019.

Entry #13: Let the Right One In

Remember a decade back when vampires were just everywhere in the worldwide pop culture scene? This was during peak-Twilight mania, so some of it was people trying to capitalize with what cool with the kids in that point in time but a good chunk of it was stuff created totally independently of Edward and Bella, leading to an odd confluence of events that led to a lot of vampire media being released over the span of a few years. Let the Right One In, a Swedish horror film from director Tomas Alfredson based on a 2004 novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist (the author also writes the screenplay here), was one example of a vampire movie released in this vampire-centric era that was made totally divorced from any influence of Twilight (it was even released a whole month prior to the first Twilight movie!)

High School Musical 3 See's This Musical Franchise Jogging In Place, But At Least The Music's Still Aces

And now it is time for the High School Musical saga to reach their own Return of The King, their own Toy Story 3, their own Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade, the moment where they close out a trilogy and bid farewell to the world that turned their stories into such massive successes. Granted, like all those three aforementioned franchises, the seemingly dormant High School Musical would eventually return (a 2011 spin-off centered on Sharpay and a forthcoming TV show specifically) but this was the conclusion of the tale of Troy Bolton (Zac Efron), Gabriella Montez (Vanessa Hudgens) and their fellow Wildcats as they navigate High School with accompanying musical numbers and elaborately choreographed dancing.