Beauty and the Beast Wannabe!

Beastly is supposed to be an updated version of Beauty and the Beast.  Apparently, Daniel Barnz, the writer and the director of this film forgot the concept and the story.  I saw it is was showing on cable one day and thought, "why not...it can't be that bad!"  Well...

Alex Pettyfer who portrays Kyle/The Beast plays this character much like he acted in the movie "I Am Number Four" as "John Smith", brooding with an attitude and never really learning his lesson until the end.  At least in that movie you have a good soundtrack!  Kyle is a pretentious and mean young man and he humiliates the wrong person.  A young lady named Kendra that unknown to him is a witch played by Mary-Kate Olsen.  She retaliates and puts a hex on him and will not lift the curse until he learns a lesson.  His father who acts no better than he does, leaves him with his housekeeper and a blind tutor played by Neil Patrick Harris.  Lindy, the "beauty" that Kyle falls for brings a little brightness to the story but only a little.  The story becomes too trivial and you start to lose interest in Kyle and his immediate problem.  I can see why this film was forgettable in the theaters and it didn't last that long on the cable stations either.  That is not a good sign.

Rotten Tomatoes

The Spanish Flu and Murder

Murder by the Book An Unmarked Grave by Charles Todd is the fourth book in the Bess Crawford series.  Here we find Bess in the Spring of 1918 in France in the middle of something deadlier than World War I, the Spanish Influenza Flu.  It is becoming more of an issue  by the minute.  However, Bess Crawford finds hidden among the countless dead waiting for burial the body of a friend and officer who also served in her father's regiment who was not killed by disease or by a German's bullet.  Bess wants to report this heinous crime but falls ill with the Spanish flu.  When she recovers, she finds out that the only other witness to the crime has hung himself.  Bess refuses to let either death go without investigating further putting her life and others close to her in danger.  This is another intriguing look into World War I with its heartache, compassion and dedication of all who have lived through this time period.
Murder by the Book

A Lady, an Engagement and an Adventure.

Our Lady of Pain by M.C. Beaton is a lighthearted and adventurous murder mystery set in the early 1900's.  Lady Rose Summer is engaged to private detective Captain Harry Cathcart in order to thwart off her parents from shipping her off to India to find a proper husband.   In the interim, Captain Cathcart's new client,  Delores Duval, who has a seductive french accent appears everywhere with the detective which annoys Lady Rose. Ms. Duval mysteriously turns up dead the next day and unfortunately is found by a very jealous Lady Rose who had threatened her because of her association with Captain Cathcart.  From England to Paris to Scotland, Captain Cathcart, Superintendent Kerridge of Scotland Yard and some other friends and colleagues race against time to keep Lady Rose out of jail and alive long enough to prove who the killer really is.Murder by the Book