Omohide Poro-Poro / Only Yesterday (1991)

Review: Just the other day, i lent my gf a Japanese animation film, Omohide Poro Poro (literally, Memories Like Falling Rain Drops) or best known by its English title, Only Yesterday. I was shocked beyond beliefs that my gf fell asleep watching it. I was shocked because i loved the film so much, which why i had lent it to my gf in the first place.

True, that the film was a real slow, true, that the film doesn't offer anything in terms of "dramatic" scenes, but, somehow it had earned a special place in my heart for its complete take on daily life of a typical working woman who found her love while she remembers fragments from her childhood memories. Complete in a sense that it could captured the whole emotional aspects of human being. It's funny, it's sad, it's uplifting, and heck, it has one of the best ending ever, that it was almost put me to tears - the song helped greatly - (i'm not trying to spoil the fun, but there's a YouTube video for it, just search for "Only Yesterday ending theme", though i won't give it directly to you).

In this film, we follow the story of Taeko, 27, unmarried, and had spent most of her life in Tokyo. On one summer, she decides to take another trip to visit her elder sister's in-laws in the rural countryside, where she finds herslef nostalgic and wistful for her childhood self. The scenery was amazing and breathtaking and it was based on the real rural Japan. It is said that the train station still looks exactly the same, and it shows that there's infinitely more than Tokyo, Shibuya, or Shinkanshen in Japan. The animations were created after the voices were recorded which had procuded a life-like facial expressions, even being animated. And, even though that i'm a male, i could really easily connect myself to Taeko as the film's length and characterization allows me to do so.

I still have no idea why my gf fell asleep during the film.

In my opinion, it is one of the best full-length anime i've ever seen, and there are many memorable scenes that really put me through a full appreciation (determined by my absolute silence, eyes glued intently to the screen, and breathing were few and far between). One that responsible the most in putting me through such state is the scene where Taeko remembers the only time she was slapped by her father. A simple, everyday scene, and contains only a single slap, but my, the emotional impact that i felt at the moment was as if i was the one being slapped.

Really, if you liked Japan, and been craved to go there someday, or if you really enjoyed a real-life drama, give this film a chance, a two hours plus is nothing. You may find it loving it as much as i do.

My Rating: ***1/2 / ****

PS: According to Wikipedia, this film was charted at #2 as the most requested film to be released to the DVD in the US.

Screamfestindo 2007

Not for the faint hearted. Ah, finally, another film festival option in Jakarta. The Jakarta International Film Festival, December was already a certain film festival i'm going to attend to, now this, designed to please the horror and disturbing film fans, will be held somewhere in November (28 Nov - 2 Des) 2007. Screamfestindo.

Several movies that definitely on my list, The Orphanage, produced by Guillermo del Toro, it had been said that the film had all the gothic-ness and creepiness no stranger to him, Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door which had been protested since it features a vivid child abuse, and probably Vexille, a Japan anime which said had a thought-provoking story (just like Akira, perhaps). Aside from that, since i planned to bought a 10-film pass ticket, i would probably gone to foreign films (Norwegian and Thailand), and classic horror screenings (The Dentist - if i really have a guts to actually seen it on a big screen. Oh, i would probably skip it anyway -, and Re-Animator - i've never seen it, so it would probably a treat, although of course, like The Dentist, the film was more inline with the word 'disturbing' rather than 'terrifying'. Ah, we'll see about that).

Again, not for the faint hearted.

1408 (2007)

Review: Genre is overrated. When you see a film stamped with certain genre, it is best to ignore it completely and enjoy the film as is, and only later judge the film's quality entirely separate from the genre it had stamped with. One example case, if at one certain evening you wish to look for a good scare and went to a local theater to see a film (which conveniently genred horror by media or advertisements) and not feeling scared at all, you'd certainly condemned the film for what it's worth. I say, that was injustice to the film. After all, what is 'scary' anyway? My kind of 'scary' won't be the same with your kind of 'scary'. And vice versa, that's for certain.

If your definition of horror film fall inline with Saw series, then you'd be disappointed with 1408. But, if you're like me, and think Saw is an interesting piece of exploitation in which we dwelt into the human minds behind the film and amused by the fact of how these people were devious enough to invent such instrument of torture, you might find a little more love to 1408. Though, of course, that doesn't mean necessarily that you'd liked 1408 for a certain.

Based on the short story of the same title from prolific and renowned horror writer, Stephen King, i'd say that the film was more of re-imagining the story rather than an adaptation. I can't correctly vouch the difference between the film and the book, but one thing certain that i was more, much more entertained, and scared by the book rather than by the film.

I believed in notion of 'less is more' (see The Shining for a definite example of how a horror film where 'less is more' worked really well). And the book is far less than the film. Thus, i considered and valued the book more than i could spare for the film.

As with the book, the film depicted one night of the life of Mike Enslin (John Cussack), a writer that went across the states, compiling the exciting horror stories about various sites and recorded his one-night adventures in a book aptly titled, '10 Most Haunted Mansions', '10 Most Haunted Graveyard', and so forth. His research soon brought him to New York, where in Dolphin Hotel, there's a room, a room 1408 that was believed to be haunted and caused more than 50 deaths by suicides, or by natural causes believed to be caused by the room over the decades. 1408 was never allowed to be rented by the management. Mike, being a non-beliver forced himself to stay in the room even after insistence of the hotel manager (Samuel L. Jackson) to do otherwise. From here on, the book and the film went to a rather different directions and ultimately came to a very different conclusion which i had been said, i liked the book version much more than the film version.

This is John Cusack's sole vehicle. And he's uneven throughout the film. His best performance as Mike was at the end of the film, while in the middle, as the film took on a different course than the one i remembered (and loved) from the book, he was rather forcing himself to fit in Mike's shoes. Well, this is exactly the problem with a film based on something you've read (or seen) before, you tend to compare it with the original. I would sincerely thought that you, who hadn't read the book might loved the film more than i did. It was a lukewarm experience for me.

My rating: ** / ****

Megadeth Live @ Jakarta, 2007

"Dave Mustaine can't sing!"
"Yeah?! Well, NOBODY could sing like Dave Mustaine"

When i heard Megadeth was visiting Jakarta for their United Abominations Tour, i hadn't put a second thought of purchasing one ticket for the concert albeit that I never really been a fan of Megadeth (i heard more of Metallica than Megadeth back in my youth, and those who knew metal would surely know about the bitter bickerings between Metallica and Megadeth) and heard only a handful of their songs, but the historical dispute between Metallica and Megadeth's sole front-man, Dave Mustaine, was no strange tale for me.

The concert was scheduled to begin at 8 pm, so i went to the venue at my leisure time, since the venue was a mere minutes from where i lived. Anyway, i arrived just in time when Megadeth was doing a shound-check (only their sound-technicians were visible on stage, of course), and twenty minutes past 8 pm, the solemn intro from Sleepwalker raced with the hysteria thunder of the crowd. I was soo glad there was no opening band. The show went steadily, almost non-stop. Dave rarely addressed the crowd, he say several short words about how he liked being in Jakarta, all those bull, and right before the encore, almost two hours later, he introduces his band-mates and said that he never talked much during the show since he thought that people were paying for the concert to see them perform not to made an idle talk. I was screaming on top of my lung, "Yeah! You fucking right!". One thing i hate from concerts was that the performing artists often wasted a good time to tried to break the ice, or gave the entire verse for the crowd to sing. I mean, i came to the concert to see them singing, not to hear myself and thousands of other strangers singing. Dave only let this happen once, during A Tout Le Monde which he gave in to us to sing one of the verse WHICH he repeats himself immediately afterwards.

I was piciking a festival ticket (of course, who wouldn't?), at the moshing pit. I had an idea that the crowd will be nasty, so i had prepared myself both physically and mentally. During the first songs of the show i had been able to control myself by staying a good distance from the moshing pit, where these huge people, all muscle and shoes, kicking and flailing their arms about (sometimes with knuckled fist). But, when Hangar 18 played (one of the song that featured a killer guitar solo duet), i began to lose control, and when Tornado of Souls played, i went heedless into the moshing pit, and felt like a teenager all over again. I got my first injury, a step on my feet (my left pinky was bleeding afterward), and a nudge at my rib (bruised this morning), during the hell off of Symphony of Destruction, and almost lose my sandal when the superbly-amazing-way-to-close-the-show encore, Holy Wars, played.

All in all, it was pretty fun, and the moshers, though at first seems dangerous were great company that whenever a guy fell during the rush, several others closest to him would cover him and help him to get up. Of course, the 'victim' was all grins, because really, who would felt any pain whenever he was overflowing with energies from the euphoria? I didn't felt any pain on my feet and rib at that moment.

Megadeth played consistently with their energies for almost two hours and with only a few minute breaks (i counted three) in between. Most of the crowd were guys (of course) at their mid-thirties, which made me among the younger group of the audiences, and knew almost every older Megadeth's song. I was laughing when i heard some guys beside me, halfway at the concert puffing and huffing an said, "You can't lie to your age, you can't".

Thank you, Megadeth, for a memorable evening.

HijackThis

"Dude, the user at the finance dept. had a problem with his computer"
"Wait, aren't you guys the IT department? Why don't you and go?"
"Dude, are you kidding? It's PC and Linux! We're Mac users, we're IT artists"

However, given the circumstances, this 'IT artist' had to dwell into a Windows-based environment, and had to deal with problems originated from the 'non-IT commoners' about their IT. This, includes can't connect to printer, my Internet Explorer was slow as snail, can't connect to the Wireless, et cetera, et cetera. Most of the time, these problems emerges because simply the 'non-IT commoners' were too darn stupid ignorant to Googling for the solutions and instead ring the bell of a known IT department oblivious to the fact that this 'IT artist' had his hands already full with a) deploying the reporting tools of the Billing application because the vendor's billing application is stupid and can't do more than simply print, we don't want to do that, b) waiting and installing the new hubs and make sure that the network connection remains 'seemingly' online to the end user while doing so, c) migrating the portal application to a new server, while monitoring the progress of the new portal being built, d) creating presentation (with Keynote. Flashy, elegant, and creative-mind-poking-fun alternative rather than that stiff, boring, no-fun-at-all, creative-mind-killer Microsoft PowerPoint) for the next internal IT staff and the Content Management vendor minute-meeting, and e) figuring out what the hell the user with IP of 90 doing with the internet that he's got the whole bandwidth assigned to him flashing red at my monitor.

Anyway, with time, i became more able and fluent in dealing with the user. Lately, when they had problems with the internet connection, the first one i checked on his/her terminal would be the malwares, worked almost every-time.

I encountered the first problem with malware about three weeks ago. A user came to me that she can't open the treasury application which of course, web-based. I was mulling for almost an hour with her terminal (her IE in particular), while propping my MacBook accessing Google everytime. After several tries, i found this tool, HijackThis, and small instructions somewhere in the internet relevant to the problem. With one click, here and there, and her IE works as well as new. I accused her because the problem was clearly caused by the stupid IE toolbar that she's been installing WITHOUT permission, and the stupid IE toolbar won't uninstalled easily, thus, keeping the IE crashed down. I force-remove it the hard way using said HijackThis.

The next problems were easier from there, when a user asked me about his/her IE slowing down, i would immediately look at his/her IE toolbar, and almost everytime pointed it accussingly to him/her and asked him/her unkindly 'Who installed this stupid toolbar?', the look on their faces were priceless. I would ran HijackThis, and voila, for three weeks, several similar cases, i haven't experienced the situation where HijackThis doesn't solved the problem.

Halloween (2007)

I considered myself lucky for having no previous experience to the Halloween series. Oh, yes, curse me what you will, but really, it was either i was late went into the path of movie-afficionado or the legend of Michael Myers was overshadowed by the likes of Freddy Krugger or Jason Vorhees or most likely in my case, that the original Halloween had spawned many ridiculous sequels in its wake. I've read the synopsis of the previous Halloween series' incarnations and a mere mortal, seemingly impervious to physical damage or the curse of aging, hacking and slashing his victims, 'killed' at the end of each movies only to be resurrected at the sequel doesn't interest me that much. Therefore, i considered myself lucky for having no previous experience to the Halloween series.

Remember, i'm a virgin to the Halloween series.

My best bet on what had prompted Rob Zombie to revive the series would be that he felt the origin of Michael Myers and most importantly, the real motive behind his suicidal actions were mostly left on the editing floor. Therefore, he decided to revisit the Michael Myers saga by going back as far as his childhood time until when he grows into Michael Myers everyone loved. Huge, indestructible, donning a leather mask, and pursue any surviving member of the Myers family, and anyone who stands in between for that matter.

The movie clearly divided into two segments. Segment one is a pain to watch, dragging, aand i had opted to eat my dinner and watch a soccer game in between watching the first segment. And god, the kid was ugly. Further, i felt no love nor hate to the kid that would be Michael Myers. Sure, he's got bullied at school and at home, sure, he's got a tendency to kill, but, that just was it. And when he talked, ah, it's got to a level where i want to kill the boy instead and let the world suffers one less annoyance. Hadn't it for the dinner i ate (a crisp chicken wing, a cup of coffee) or the soccer game at my TV, i would turned off the film right away.

However, the second segment, the fifteen years later segment, was an enjoyable part, mostly. Michael back to the Haddonfield, his hometown where he wanted to pay a visit to his little sister, the only known surviving member of the Myers family. It felt like a Grindhouse film, where there's loads of bare breasts, naked girl getting laid and then got butchered, lots of screaming and running, and of course generous amount of blood (i wouldn't say a lot, just generous). And, then, shut. The film ended in what probably one of the ole standard ending that has been produced and re-produced for about 1,345,890 times already. All in all, this film is somehow bland and offers nothing different than any slasher flicks out there.

My rating: ** / ****

Ptolemy's Gate (2005)

The final trilogy of the self-loving djinni Bartimaeus told in parallel the similar relationship development - albeit in different extremes of each other's perspective - between the djinni and its master at different times. Ptolemy in the age of ancient Egypt and Nathaniel in the age of 'modern' London. In the end, the fate of this relationship ended in a resembling similarity almost at the same time as the book reaches its finale.

The book follows yet another rather uncommon relationship between a djinni named Bartimaeus and its master, a young, ambitious, and always in constant risk of losing his allies, and life, Nathaniel. Following the events in the previous books, London was again in a danger. The civic unrest when young males - magicians and civilians alike - were sent to America waging the Empire's fruitless war. Meanwhile from within the Empire itself, the Resistance - albeit loses many of its fiercest warriors over the course of two books - keep whispering and occassionally causes minor unrest throughout the streets of London. Kitty Jones, one of the (former) prominent figures of the Resistance, worked from behind the shadow of her past this time. Yet another figure, a figure who on previous books hid behind the shadow was consumed by greed and plotted an altogether different schemes to toppled the Empire from within. Nathaniel, Kitty, and Bartimaeus must settled their differences and worked together to restore the Order of the Empire.

I've heard a lot of people shows their expression in a rather emotional way - in a very good way, i must add - about the ending. That would only means that Mr.Stroub had been doing his job really well, by pulling his reader to a whirl of emotional wailing, "oh, why it must've ended that way?". I say, if the book ended in another way, i would be very disappointed. This is the end of a trilogy, and this is how the trilogy should've ended. Brilliant.

My rating: ***1/2 / ****

See also:
Book Review: The Amulet of Samarkand
Book Review: The Golem's Eye

Resident Evil - Extinction (2007)

A slow motion heroine in actions, several head shots, way too many red herring "surprise!" scenes, and yet another oh-there-would-be-more ending, Resident Evil Extinction arrives at the new low of the series.

I've been playing all Resident Evil games available at PlayStation and PlayStation 2 machine, at every different modes offered, thus, i considered myself as a fan of the series, though of course, that doesn't mean that i'm an expert in the series, nor i claimed to be one. Well, you got the point.

The third of the series, even though i still liked - loved - Milla Jovovich to reprise her role as Alice, felt so empty compared to the previous two. Yes, even to the number two. The events goes like this, Alice and the gang stroll through the desert, investigating the area (featuring a lot of "surprise" scenes) found some Undeads, black ravens, disgruntled survivors, or Umbrella's employees, then action scenes (featuring a lot of slow motion and head shots and rehashed action scenes. Perfect example, the dog scenes which nothing new nor different in significant with the first film's dog scene), and afterwards, it's time to bury the deads, repeat. Heck, not even the ending scene surprises me nor it's piqued my curiosity. I've seen it coming, way before the camera strolls out.

But, when i remembered the series so far, i was actually gleed. The first of the series, featuring Michelle Rodriguez as Alice's female team-mate slash sidekick. It worked for me. I welcomed the distraction made by Ms.Rodriguez. Now, the second film of the series, the producer said, "let's put more white shiny skins and less guttural macho feminine sidekick", thus Siena Guillory admittance bow. Oh, i was distracted alright, but more with what's under Ms.Guillory's mini skirt than with her roles, or if that matters, her fates. And then, the third film of the series, the producer said, "hey, i heard that the Heroes series was a huge hit, let's put Alice, um Ali Larter in the film". I'd say one thing, if i was one of the survivor, i would looked up more to Carlos' leadership than her. She was simply unconvincing as the survivor leader, and she's a terrible, really terrible shooter, she missed the Undead's head by a mile at point-blank range. Unbelieveable. Now, the next film (if there any, that is), the producer said, "okay, this time, it won't be go wrong, let's put Alice with... Alice, if one is good enough, maybe two, three, four, or an army of Alices would be a bomb!". Interesting idea, but i won't be looking forward to it.

My rating: *1/2 / **** - Just fun, but the investigate-decapitate-burial-repeat scenes grows into boredom rather quickly.

I'm Going Home

This would be my last post for the next ten days or so since i'm going home, and i've got a feeling that this year's holiday is going to be awesome.

Pimp Thy MacBook

I'm not usually had a penchant with jewelry. But really, coating my MacBook with 24-carat gold AND diamonds at the Apple logo? Oh, my mouth watered with the mere view of it. Imagine you fetch your golden MacBook out of your battered back-pack (one thing that my friends often commented, my back-pack was old, rusty, and aged with worn, but who would have thought that i had a MacBook neatly stuffed in it), savor the 'oohs' and 'aahs' from the commoners around you. Dream on, dream on.

The Golem's Eye

The successor tale to the wicked - or rather, resourceful -, self-loving djinni doesn't disappoint. Following the event of the first book, sets two years apart, some characters that had previously side-stepped and mentioned in a sort-of just-passing manners to gave the much more appropriate spotlight to the main plot (the Amulet of Samarkand), returned with more prominent roles in this second installment.

Just like its first book, the second book, again, centered around the struggle for power. Ah you know, those sort of things, when a ruler's power began to wane, and some candidates (those who had the potential to be the ruler, and more dangerously, those who thought had the potential to be the ruler) raced, openly and often - and more interesting to turn into a story - devious and mischievous, to wield the power. And our protagonists - sort of -, trapped within.

Still wielding the same story-telling technique, the book again acquainted with the self-loving djinni, Bartimaeus, his young master, Nathaniel, who after the event in the book one, earns himself a respected position at the ministry, a respected position that was seen by his peers with awe and envy. Ah, you know how it goes, there are some - and even more so in the literature world - who doesn't like you because simply you're smart and your career advanced faster, much faster than his. The same goes with Nat, some people watches his career closely, and quite easily would love to see him fail and humiliated. It's a man eat man world.

And so, the trouble brewing, some commoners (non-magician) under the flagship of Resistance tried to topple the Ministry of Magic, and as Nathaniel was given the responsibility to unfold the Resistance, his neck was soon on a chopping block after the Resistance seems growing bolder and caused more havoc than ever in the London street, and then there's this mysterious, shadow-shrouded power-house monster that seems invulnerable to magic, caused more chaos, and - oh yes, there's always more - someone or some party broke into the top magician's tomb and had unleashed the afrit - a powerful entity even stronger than djinnis - within. Our 'hero', Nathaniel, and his djinni, Bartimaeus soon entangled within. He - our hero - had his own theories, and of course, the ministry won't believe him and he was backed with none save his own djinni who obviously more interested to save his own skin and get out off the world as soon as possible.

I liked the book even more than its predecessor, because, first of all, there are no single prominent protagonist. Nathaniel? Oh, he's corrupted with desire for power already (i had pointed out in my review of the first book that he reeks of seven sins, and even prominently so in this book). Probably the only good guy (not girl, i would come to it later) in this book is our djinni, Bartimaeus. But, as he thought more about himself more than any others, he would save his own life before even thinking to save other's. And then there's Kitty Jones, the member of the Resistance. She had show up in the first book, made a brief acquaintance with Nathaniel and Bartimaeus in different occasions. If Nathaniel's innocence and altruism sometimes shown up subtlety in the first book, in this second book, it was Kitty's who took that part of innocence and altruism. So yeah, you had one good guy, and good girl. For now.

The book ended in an appropriately safe manner. I mean, we know - or rather, we wanted - the figure who was pulling the strings of most events happened in the book, and Mr.Stroud has given us so. Expected ending, but also a promise was made about the final book. I haven't read the third book, but this book really really worked as a cliffhanger episode between the first and the third. And i did mentioned that almost every trilogy's best was at number two. According to my taste and preference, at least.

I really loved the last dialog exchange between Nathaniel and Bartimaeus. It hurts so much, and mounted to a subtle emotional feeling between Bartimaeus and Nathaniel, but not the other way around in which that's why it hurts so much.

My Rating: ***1/2 / **** (Getting better, much better, i recommend this trilogy to any self-proclaimed book-worm. And it has been translated to Bahasa Indonesia anyway).

A Learning Experience

A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.'

A quote from Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001), the guy (a satirist - does that kind of job really existed?) who wrote (his most famous work), The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

So, you make a mistake, don't gloom over it, dummy! Pick up the pieces, and strike back.

Birthday Gift Wish

I had said somewhere here (look for the posts under October 2006) about how October is my favorite month. Of course, it's my birthday, that's for a start. And the TV series (in the US of course) sparks some new and refreshed seasons (i'm currently watching Dexter Season 2, The Simpsons Season 19, Heroes Season 2, Survivor Season 15, Bionic Woman Season 1, and Chuck Season 1). And Hollywood had replaced their Summer-blow-things-up line-ups with Fall-frowns-and-movies-that-either-smart-brilliant-confusing-or-simply-pretentious-line-ups (i was waiting for two films from
my favorite actress, I'm Not There where she played Bob Dylan, and word is, she's magnificent in that role, and Elizabeth: The Golden Age a sort of sequel to her 1998's Elizabeth, one film that introduces me to her). But most of all, it's my birthday. And right now, i want this gadget as a gift. A Sony's PSR-500 E-Book reader. For US$ 279, with this gadget, i could read my e-books (which of course, there are tons) anywhere (well, duh, it goes with the name E-Book reader). Sounds geek enough for me, tee hee hee.

PS: This is actually a non-too-subtle message for my gf. So, honey, don't get mad if i spent yet another US$ 300 for some gadget that you think had no immediate usage, okay?

Ayumi Hamasaki Forget Lyrics

Niken asked me about my favorite Japanese singer. She's the one. In this video, she forgets the lyric of her song, and caught in a momentary panic. But after the first verse she screams, "Gomennnn..." (Sorry), which exactly shows one thing or two about her. One, she didn't lipsynced her songs as often done by 'world-class artists' such as Britney Spears. And two, she asks for audience's apologies afterwards which means that she was dedicated to gave her best performance to her fans (unlike that, again, Britney Spears 2007 VMA performance which not only embarassing herself but also her peers and fans alike. I don't like her at all, but i too, felt ashamed when i saw her said performance). Be as it may, my favorite album from her is her first album that even though her voice hasn't fully developed yet, her songs felt true and sincere. Sadly, none of her subsequent albums had the same impact as her first. Oh, there were one or two more than decent songs in her albums, but none like the first, which i really loved in its entirety.

Stardust

Neil Gaiman is a man whose works, shorts or longs, written or in motion were somethings i saw with grudgingly envious manners. Imagine it this way, you were top of your class for several years in a row, when suddenly this new kid, younger, more handsome, toppled you from the top that easily. And since, in any given game, there'd be only two positions, Winner or Loser, after comfortably in a Winning position, being a sudden Loser is not something that would reined in happily. That's what i felt when i read Neil Gaiman's. His works demonstrates a skillful story-telling (grudge number one), dealt with fantasy and magnificent imagination (grudge number two), and finally crosses many boundaries that his works is sometime frightening (grudge number three), and sometime humorous (grudge number four). Granted, making people laugh or scared by means of written words were not an easy feats. But yet, on more than one occassions, Neil Gaiman's works inspired fear and ignited chuckles in me.

"Stardust" (now a motion picture) is a lighthearted fantasy written works in the form of graphic novel, accompanied here and there by beautiful illustrations by Charles Vess, and suggested for mature readers. Sets in rural English village and a fantasy Faerie land, chiefly dealt with Love and a man's quest to attain such Love. It was peacefully started, and also peacefully ended. The story itself was no stranger, almost akin to many bedtime stories that always seems to begin with "Once upon a time..." and always seems to end with "Happily ever after." True enough that "Stardust" begins with sort of "once upon a time..." and ends with a sort that quite passable as "happily ever after". But, the various reference (and rather graphic visualization) of sex and murder made "Stardust" none too wise a choice as a story to read to your kids. You might would have guessed how the story would end halfway through the story. But nonetheless, the execution of how the story was ended at the Epilogue suggested a remorse and a pang of sadness, that actually, in a way, rather marred the "happily ever after" part. But, well, you see, it was still a "happily ever after" - if you hadn't read the Epilogue part, that is - only the kind of "happy" that has been reached its "ever after" part, and thus had exhausted itself.

I haven't seen the film, as it had generated significantly less buzz even though there were prominent names in the film (Robert DeNiro, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Claire Danes). I haven't seen it in local theaters, and no words of when the film would actually arrived, though it has been released for quite a while.

My rating: *** / **** - Simple and plain read.