Frozen Film Review

Frozen, a Walt Disney Production, was released recently in the cinema box office.  It is created by the makers of Tangled and Wreck-It-Ralph and I knew for sure that I could never miss out this opportunity to watch it in the cinemas. I was fortunate enough to go see it and, in all honesty, it was the best Disney film I had ever seen.

I was deeply stricken by the plot of this film. It was nowhere near to what I had expected would happen. The plot was fairly simple and unexpected. Queen Elsa of Arendelle is cursed with magical powers that no one knows about. She faces great consequences to try and hide it. Anna, Queen Elsa’s sister, a very cheerful girl, longs to reconnect with her sister after she shut everyone out but causes tragedy as Elsa’s powers are revealed. She decides to escape Arendelle hoping everyone will be safe without her, but doesn’t realise she’s made a big mistake.

Anna sets out on a dangerous journey to find her sister, unravels mysteries and re unites with a snowman she built with her sister when they were young. His name is Olaf, and he likes warm hugs! He is simply my favourite character in the film. Olaf is dumb, but very kind-hearted and made me laugh throughout the whole film! They set out determined and never gave up on the quest to search for Elsa and save their kingdom.  

Idina Menzel, who plays the voice of Elsa, recently received an Oscar for ‘Best Original Song’. She sang ‘Let It Go’ in the film and I, myself, fell in love with the song. Originally sung by Demi Lovato, it has already sparked nearly 45 million views on YouTube.

Idina told Entertainment Weekly that “This is definitely a dream come true for me. I’m happy for the movie, I’m happy to be a part of the whole thing, and to have a song that really resonates with people is just beyond.”

Here are the main actors, who played the voices of the characters in the film:
-Idina Menzel Queen Elsa
-Kristen Bell Princess Anna
- Josh Gad Olaf the Snowman
-Jonathan Groff Kristoff
-Santino Fantana Prince Hans

Frozen is something completely new for the Disney productions. It’s a film about sisterhood, and the first Disney film ever to teach girls that they don’t need a man to save them. I was touched by the ending, nothing that I had expected, but was one of the most heart-warming endings of a Disney film.

I hope you enjoy the film as much as I did! I highly recommend it for anyone out there; it’s a great family movie with an incredible Plot Twist.

Zakia Nissar, 
year 9

You can watch the movie trailer for Frozen here:

The 40th People's Choice Awards

The 40^th People's Choice Awards took place on 8 January 2014 in Los Angeles. The hosts were Kat Dennings and Beth Behrs from the hit television show ‘2 Broke Girls’. The guest that attended included Sandra Bullock, Ellen DeGeneres, Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears, Nina Dobrev and Ian Somerhalder.

This year, actress Sandra Bullock swept up four awards including favourite movie actress, favourite comedic actress, dramatic actress and shared the favourite movie duo award with Gravity co-star George Clooney. Also Bullock earned another award for favourite comedic movie, The Heat, alongside Melissa McCarthy.

Another winner of the night was Ellen DeGeneres who was deemed by fans as their favourite daytime TV host, making her the woman who has gained the most People's Choice Awards with a total of fourteen trophies.

Iron Man 3 scored three awards including favourite movie, favourite action movie and the film's star, Robert Downey Jr., received the favourite action movie star honour.

Justin Timberlake also grabbed three awards including favourite album accolade for The 20/20 Experience. In his speech Timberlake thanked his "beautiful wife", Jessica Biel, "for teaching me patience and the little things, like just putting the dishes in the dishwasher. It goes a long way. Fellas, you're welcome."

Katy Perry, who was not at the show, scored the win for favourite video for the third year in a row, following up last year's award for Part of Me and 2012's honour for Last Friday Night with her hit Roar this year.

A highlight of the night was when Ian Somerhalder and Nina Dobrev, the stars of The Vampire Diaries, earned the award for best on-screen chemistry. The duo told the audience about their breakups on and off screen. “The good thing is chemistry," said Dobrev, with her arm around Somerhalder, who are no longer in a relationship. Somerhalder also received awards for favourite Sci-Fi/fantasy actor.

Check out the other winners here: http://www.peopleschoice.com/pca/awards/nominees/

Virginia Mitreva

year 8

What Impacts do ICT Games have on our Society?

Since computer games have been developed over the years it has certainly affected our society. There are many advantages and disadvantages to ICT games which I am going to discuss in this article.

Positive

There are many positive aspects of ICT games: 

Hand to Eye Coordination

Many games now involve hand to eye coordination ranging from virtual tennis to training real pilots to fly a plane but not risking lives.  Hand –eye coordination is a useful key in life and by playing games, some reports say that surgeons that play ICT games regally have become more skilled in their practice. Also sports players can simulate a real game through ICT games. An example of this is the Wii baseball game in which uses actual motion of the remote to hit the ball. Games are now also being used to train pilots and drivers in a simulation game as though it is real which reduces the risk of endangering the life of the learner or instructor.

Brain Training

There are now a range of games which include brain training but in a fun game format, making it much more fun than normal classroom learning. The brain training ranges from strategy, maths, logic, spellings and many more, improving the brain all round.  Because games have scores and a continuous tracking of your progress it can get the player to want to improve their score so improving their overall learning. Brain training does not just help children at school but also adults in general life.

Decision Making and Thinking Skills

Games such as war games are very helpful for thinking skills as you cannot just move the character, but it takes thinking time and making quick decisions to decide where to go next. This can link into real life as often you have to make quick hard decisions. Also games such as football games in which you have to be a manager require good thinking skills as it takes serious planning and thinking to make sure that you win matches, all the team is injury free, you have the right players on the pitch and so on. Again, these skills can come into real life as you may have to have team management at school or work.

Negative

Not only are there positive points for ICT games, but there are also lots of negative points that have bad impacts on society:

Addiction

Some games can become very addictive because the player begins to get obsessed with the game and wants to improve their score constantly. This could be a good point in small doses however it can become something that people do constantly.  This could lead to people missing important things such as school, work and meetings as they are playing ICT games.  Also it can make people tired as they have lost vital sleep through playing on them.

Social Isolation

Following from gamers playing ICT games for too long, this can lead to social isolation as if gamers play for hours and hours without communication with others humans they can become isolated from the outside world. Gamers could suffer from bad communication skills and social skills this could be bad on their life and people may not want to talk to the gamer as they can’t hold a very good conversation. However, game makers say that there are online friends but this cannot overrun real life humans as they can begin to believe that their life is actually in the virtual life. Also online friends could not be who they say they are, leading to trust issues.

Cost

As there is such a high demand in ICT games the costs are constantly going up and not everyone can afford to purchase the ‘latest’ games. There are new releases all of the time and gamers could like all of the new games and game consoles to keep up with other people so they don’t get bullied as they don’t have the latest edition. It can put great pressure on the parents to buy all of the games to keep their child happy.

ICT games have many different effects on society, both good and bad, but overall ICT games have positive impacts on society as long as they are not played excessively.  There is a great potential for ICT games to have even more positive in the future and technology is improving all of the time such as the Xbox having a remote control free game which makes the games even more realistic.

Nesta Baxter,

year 9