2025

The Working Man – JenEric Movie Review

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2025 film The Working Man.

Story

The story walks the line between horrifying and a little bland. No one gets violated and none of the good people get killed. The movie writers went out of their way to make sure we felt nothing for the villains.

Score: 0

Characters

Statham tends to play three characters: the seemingly emotionless killer, the angry vengeful killer, and the befuddled killer. In this one he’s the second. Unfortunately, giving him a daughter didn’t add much to the story. It was probably the lack of interactions with her.

As usual, the supporting characters were interesting, and the kidnapped girl kicks serious ass.

The villains are bland beyond remembering.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

A few lines were great and I really liked all the interactions between Harbour and Statham; they were excellent.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

The locations were great and the sets looked very grimy. Everything was shot in a way we could see the action. It was well done.

The music is a little loud but does its job well.

Score: 1

Fun

I was less invested in him and more invested in the kid and the kidnapped woman. I found myself getting bored at times. I watched this alone and although the action was great it just wasn’t all that interesting.

Score: 0

Overall

An extremely competent action movie with lots of death, explosions, and Jason Statham kicking ass. However, it wasn’t great at keeping my interest and the villains were so bland I didn’t care.

Final Score: 2 Stars out of 5

Fountain of Youth – JenEric Movie Review

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Hello Cinephiles,

Today we’re talking about the 2025 film Fountain of Youth.

Story

As entertaining as the movie was, there wasn’t so much a story as a bunch of set pieces held together by banter.

Score: 0

Characters

The major problem with saying your characters are super-intelligent is that they then have to act it. These characters missed obvious things and acted smart when the plot demanded it.

Now that being said, the actors took some mediocre scenes and elevated them. Every last one of them oozes with charisma and charm.

Score: 0.5

Dialogue

Intelligent people don’t have to use big words. With intelligence comes the ability to be concise.

The majority of the dialogue was good and the brother-sister banter was fantastic.

Score: 0.5

Visuals and Music

This movie was stunning. The special effects, choreography, and camera work were superb.

The music was clever, incorporating the small theme in both the plot and the music was a genius idea.

Score: 1

Fun

I and the rest of the family really enjoyed this movie. It was pretty, exciting, and had some good banter. I dislike the ending enough to make me annoyed every time I think about it.

Score: 0.5

Overall

Unoriginal with one of the worst endings I’ve ever seen, the movie is fun and fluffy with the actors making it extremely likeable but the supernatural and the plot were poorly thought out.

Final Score: 2.5 Stars out of 5

Nominate for the Aurora Awards 2025

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The Aurora Awards, which are for Canadian science fiction and fantasy writers and artists, are open for nominations for the 2024 works! (Nominations are open March 2 – April 5) This means the LONG lists of eligible works are being narrowed down to 5-6 per category.

Once they have a list of nominated works, every single person who signed up and paid the $10 membership fee gets ALL the nominated works as downloads. That’s all the adult novels, YA novels, novellas, short stories, graphic novels, and related works (usually anthologies), so about 36 works, for just $10 CAD, which is a great deal.

Getting nominated for an Aurora Award is a BIG DEAL in the speculative fiction writing community. You get a nomination pin (only once, so I’m terrified I’ll lose mine!), and you’re part of an elite group of people. This would be Adrien’s first nomination, so my fingers are crossed!

Not only do Éric and I have quite the list of eligible works, but Pegasus (for his work last year in his kindergarten homeschooling, and the short story he wrote and illustrated) and Dragon (for the short story she wrote and illustrated) are eligible as well! By the way, nomination forms are not ranked.

How do you nominate?

  1. Go to this website: https://www.csffa.ca/members-home/
  2. Join, pay membership fee
  3. Nominate up to 5 works per category https://www.csffa.ca/members-home/nomination/

It would mean a lot to all of us if you’re willing to nominate us! (Categories are in alphabetical order by work)

  • Eligibility Category 1 – Best Novel
    • Monsters! Incidental Wedding Guests by Jen and Éric Desmarais
  • Eligibility Category 3 – Best Novelette/Novella
    • Red Day, Ere the Sun Rises: A Sun Speaker Story by Éric Desmarais
  • Eligibility Category 4 – Best Short Story
    • A Concert Tail by Jen Desmarais
    • Costume Magic by Éric Desmarais
    • Escaped by Pegasus Desmarais (age 4)
    • Funky Looking Chickens by Éric Desmarais
    • O Tannen-bomb by Jen and Éric Desmarais
    • The Hole in the Playground by Dragon Desmarais (age 7)
    • What Scares Pre-teen Monsters? by Jen Desmarais
  • Eligibility Category 6 – Best Poem/Song
    • Shadows Live for the Light by Jen Desmarais, found in Monsters! Incidental Wedding Guests by Jen and Éric Desmarais
  • Eligibility Category 8 – Best Cover Art/Interior Illustration
    • Escaped by Pegasus Desmarais (age 4)
    • The Hole in the Playground by Dragon Desmarais (age 7)
  • Eligibility Category 9 – Best Fan Writing/Publication
    • JenEric Movie Reviews by Éric Desmarais
    • Pegasus Flight School: Kindergarten education through genre media (second semester) by Jen and Pegasus (age 4) Desmarais
    • The Travelling TARDIS by Jen Desmarais

In case you’re wondering why Monsters! Incidental Wedding Guests is not included in the best cover art category, it’s because our cover artist is Vietnamese! Only Canadian creators are eligible, unfortunately.

Thank you so much for your time, attention, and support. If any of the above does make it through the nomination round, which ends April 5, I’ll be making another post for the voting round, which will be taking place starting in June 2025.

On the Edge

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Dear Friends, Family, and Fans;

The past decade has been a confusing and scary one for me. I have a very definite sense of justice and I’m often confused when others don’t. The fact that people like Rowling, Trump, or Woody Allen can still have successful careers is baffling to me.

It’s a source of great stress, especially when I see people defending hate. Two years ago when the convoy debacle happened, I got into an argument with a family member. They believed that the convoy was fighting for righteous reasons. I disagreed but could accept that. When I pointed out that two of the organizers had ties to hate groups, they said it didn’t matter because they were fighting for their right to not wear a mask. I still can’t understand that position.

How can you ignore, or forgive, the hateful part of someone just because you agree with something they are doing or saying?

The whole concept has me on edge. Every day in the news, there’s a new, hate-filled event and it’s exhausting and nerve-wracking.

More than ever, I feel like the world is on the edge of something truly terrible happening. I worry that I’ll be looking back at this time and thinking it was the good old days. “Remember when we could afford to drink coffee and we could chat with people around the world?”

I’m trying my best to take joy wherever I can, but it feels selfish and like I’m ignoring the world.

I wish I could do more than just avoiding supporting the cruel and speaking out. I wish I could do something bigger. Unfortunately, that attitude isn’t helpful. If everyone does small acts of kindness, we can start to make a difference. Individual snowflakes are powerless but when they get together they can paralyze a city.

Do what you can, I’ll do what I can, and together we can hopefully start an avalanche of kindness to combat all the hate.

Also… VOTE!

Vote like your life depends on it, because it’s becoming clear that the US is a warning, not an aberration.

There are good people out there and we need to remember that there is still hope.

Take care of each other!

Stay safe and be kind,

Éric

Éric’s 2025 New Year’s Resolutions

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Hello my friends, Family, and Fans;

Typing in 2025 feels like I’m writting some far off date not the actual year. Not sure I’m in love with the future as it is but let’s concentrate on the things that we can control.

This year, I’m going to be extra ambitious with my resolutions. (Quick reminder, my resolutions are goals that are meant to push me.)

A kids slide with a web across the bottom and two spiders on it. The caption reads, "If we pull this off, we'll eat like kings."

1. Write The Hounds of Bakerville

I have a basic outline and I’m going to start re-reading the first four to get back into it. It’s kind of exciting to be working on the penultimate book in the series.

2. Write a serial story

I’m not sure what I’m writing this year, but I will try to get a 1000 word chapter out each month. This is going to be the twelfth year I do it.

3. Master 1 song on the ukulele and record it.

I wrote a song for Elizabeth 4 and set up the chords, but between the colds and the medical issues, I didn’t get really good at it. I’m going to do my best to get good enough to record it.

4. Read at least 12 books

Last year I crushed my reading challenge and I’m hoping I can do the same this year. 12 might not sound ambitious but it is.

5. Build my new book nook and lego

Three years ago for Christmas I got a Magical Cafe book nook. Over the three years I’ve made it to page 17 of 40ish I think. There’s so much painting and gluing and it’s really hard. This year, my sister in-law took pity and got me another one that doesn’t need the paint or the glue. Maybe this will help build my confidence.

I also got an epic Van Gogh’s Starry Night LEGO set. It has a lot of pieces.

6. Feel less guilty

2024 was a busy year and now that I’m feeling better, I have more time that isn’t just for recovering. I’m having trouble taking that time for me and not feeling bad about it. It’s not selfish to read, it’s not selfish to watch a show on my own, it’s not selfish to do things for me. I know that, but I’m having trouble shutting up the little voice in my head.

7. Design and deploy a new coffee flavour for Ottawa Comic Con in September

I have an idea what it’s going to be, so this should be easy.

8. Plan and plot out the first in a cozy mystery series

I have this idea for a series of short cozy mysteries. The hope is to make them around 40 thousand words and just have fun. It would also give me the chance to play around with self-publishing. The idea would be to write this after Elizabeth 5 before I jump right into the final book.

9. Organize a massive birthday party and book release

This one scares me, but I want to do a joint book release* with Jen this summer. (By the way you should totally check out her cover reveal for Winging It!)

*More details in a future post.

10. Keep fighting to learn more about myself and how to make my life easier

I have learned a lot about my body and mind this year, and I know I have a lot of work, both to improve my health and to accept what and who I am. More details in a future post.

I hope that everyone has a productive, healthy, and good 2025.

Éric