I've been so wrapped, entangled, whatever words out there to describe inability to spare some time for a non-real-life related activities such as Films and Bloggings. There, it's out of the box. Now back to the checked list of "Things to do before the clock hits December 31st, 2008"
Tropic Thunder is one of those films that I personally thought, has more than enough buzz-words and marketing campaigns surrounding its impending release that made the effort of ignoring this film in order to keep any expectations in around a normal level, is virtually impossible. Therefore, it's pretty understandable that I head to this film expecting on perhaps one of the best comedy of the year. In that sense though, the film is satisfying albeit it runs a wee bit too long for a comedy and an obvious tip of the scale regarding its actor performances.
Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller) is a tried-true-and-tired action star has been. He teams up with another tried-and-tired comedy star, Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black) and 5 time Academy Award winners, Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr.) to shoot a film dubbed as "the most expensive war film ever made", Tropic Thunder. But the ego soon collides, and one decision after another put the actors and crew in a real-life situation as they crosses-path with opium smugglers amidst the depth of Vietnam jungle.
The film is more about Ben's take on Hollywood industry. About how Hollywood tends to squeeze the cow until the very last drop of milk (e.g sequels), evil producers, details attentive (useless) managers, drug-addictive actors, et cetera. As far as a commoner concerned, you could find pretty much every thing you need to know on how the industry worked in here. There's also a pretty hilarious take on why Sean Penn didn't even had a nod for I Am Sam. All in all, even if some of the jokes found here dangerously trotting, even breaching the lines of offensive attitudes, they're at least above average and thus made this film indeed, qualify as a serious candidate for one of the best comedy of the year. And some of the cameos are really worth the time on checking them out when the end credit rolls.
I personally couldn't get my head around Ben. Sure, he's been making some popular movies that no doubt most of you would be fond of remembering but, somehow, and I don't know why, I couldn't really spare any small amount of likenesses or gratitudes for him. But apparently, he has many friends in Hollywood that when he make this film as a some sort of mockumentary to this film, he'd get many support in and out of the screens. The most daring decision was of course to put Robert Downey Jr. as a dedicated Aussie actor who went as far as "re-pigmented" his skin in order to "correctly" portrayed the African-American actor in the Tropic Thunder film. And for a comedy that runs more than 90 minutes which is a long way to say "too-damn long", most of the time, the lines from Kirk that kept me going toward the finish line. Robert Downey Jr. is no doubt, an actor on a very different class of either Ben or Jack. Both of Ben / Jack seems like a sad sad foolish toddler who kicking in dirt to win some attentions ... and failed.
My rating: **1/2 / **** - A fun "mockumentary" on Hollywood, that albeit runs a bit too long, filled with uneven jokes that weren't as funny as the filmmakers think they are, able to provide some decent quality entertainment time that most of the moviegoers could enjoy. Robert Downey Jr. out-shined everyone else, and oh, pay attention to the cameos.
The lack of a decent Film Festival in Jakarta is staggering. Jakarta International Film Festival, which has been my most-see events for the last few years has hit another low this year. The festival has been known to struggle to even exist. With no apparent/immediate support from the government, I've had an impression that whomever held the Festival, is doing so not because of a promising return-of-investment but simply because they love films and would love to share some of that love through the festival.
This year however, when everybody's talking about the global crisis, the festival has hit another low. According to some forums I skimmed through, this year's festival which scheduled to begin on December 9th, would last only for five days. Five days for a film festival? Not nearly enough.
Anyway, another film festival is scheduled for this week. INAFF 2008. I might going to check them out if I had an ample over-supply of time which is a rather long way to say, "Not interested"
Quantum of Solace. Even if I've seen most of the James Bond series thus far, I'm not and won't considered myself as an avid fan of the double-oh agent. Thus, I was totally indifferent when the news about Pierce Borsnan being replaced by David Craig starts to surface. Alas, as I've seen Mr.Craig in Layer Cake, I was known as seemingly the supporter of Craig as Bond. Well, it's merely because I hate it when people gave a presumptuous assumption on one's capability BEFORE they even see or experienced the said capability themselves. And guess who had the last laugh?
I dare to say that most viewers, casual or serious would agreed about the undeniable Craig factor when talking/discussing about Quantum of Solace. Again, portraying James Bond in his early career, Daniel Craig launches the suave agent into a more physical stretching tasks that required him to once again leap over buildings, avoid explosions, taming a speed-demon roadster, and not to mention, save the damsel in distress. Quantum of Solace is a direct sequel to Casino Royale, is the shortest James Bond film ever, and although the knowledge of previous film that precedes this film is minimum, it is at least recommended for a skim through to familiarize yourself with names and faces throughout this film.
Written by Paul Haggis, who wrote Crash, it was to be expected that this film is at least consists of couple layers of story as once again our agent is pitted against the very same yet un-named secret organization (before SPECTRE?) from the first film. This film's "official" Bond-girl, Camille (Olga Kurylenko) involved herself with this organization on a personal agenda that doesn't really deal with the organization itself directly. James Bond's employer is also testing their (her) trust on Bond's "unique" methods, some old names returns, and some familiar recurring character re-shapes themselves to a level we're all familiar, the villains are also has kinks and quirks of arrogance that makes me actually wonder why does the "good" guys didn't see that they were up to no good from the first sight. All in all, the violent and angry James Bond is return yet again, and even though it's different than the elegant spy he used to be known for through the decades of the franchise, I have absolutely no doubt whatsoever of Daniel Craig's imminent increasing popularity as James Bond. Especially for the younger generation.
The film opens with beautiful car-chase sequence, and it's rarely stop from here on unless in a few moments required in order to advance the plot. In terms of action, it has everything I could think of. Bare-hand fights, check. Close-quarter combat, check. Boat-chase sequence, check. Plane-chase sequence, check. Increasingly popular but threateningly close to become a staple of boredom rooftop chase parkour-style sequence, check and I haven't mentioned everything, yet. All that, crammed into a film that barely touches the two hour mark, plus a maddening attention to details and the palpable level of dangerousness, would surely please even the least attentive casual viewer.
But, once you get passed the innuendo action sequences, there's Bond. This Bond is angry, and fueled by the need to revenge, that even his Boss threatened to let him go. He kills seemingly without hesitation or hints of regret. But well hidden beneath that calm, passive outward presence, he is troubled, boiled with rage, mourned with loss, torn between duty and revenge. On one single heartbreaking scene, I had a suggestion that Bond is actually shed a tear. And guess what, from this scene, I hereby proclaimed that Daniel Craig is now my favorite James Bond.
My only complaints? Probably Olga Kurylenko. But she doesn't get much of attention anyway, so no biggie. And oh, Alicia Keys should never ever sings in a duet again.
My rating: *** / **** - This film's overall theme is "personal" This is where we see James Bond finally abandon his personal grit and shove aside his feelings that turns him into an effective, flamboyant, and confident spy agent he was so famously known for decades. Either that, or this is simply an above average, um, make that WELL above average action film. Your choice. If you love Casino Royale, you should SEE this film. Period.
Dr.No. Before Q, before gadgetry, before box-office, before "gimmicky" questions such as "Who's going to be the next Bond girl?" there's "Dr. No" a display of early James Bond, a gritty, violent, sometimes a cold-blooded agent, who relies more on his muscle and wit i.e physical assets as an agent than the gadgets. This Bond is susceptible to fear (as he admits to Honey Ryder, this film's Bond girl, so to speak), and panic which actually makes him a little more human than what he would portrays in his next films.
I've read that it was due to a limited budget at the time (this is after all, before an accepted agreement that any 007 films would costs many and expected to earns more) that made this films felt so raw. Granted, the first Daniel Craig's Bond film is also portrayed the raw Bond but money doesn't lie, and it shows.
The film opens in Jamaica (in fact, the film took place almost entirely there), where an agent and his liaison were killed for investigating a nearby island called Carb Key. Our favorite double-oh agent was soon sent to the ground-zero where he met with Felix Leiter (a recurring character), a CIA agent, and with help from locals, including probably the first ever Bond girl, Honey Ryder (whose first scene is quite legendary, or so I heard, and infamously reenacted by Heather Graham in one of the Austin Powers' film - can't remember which) was soon face-to-face with Dr.No, a member of an evil organization, SPECTRE, a recurring nemesis in James Bond films, who controls the illicit and up-to-no-good operations in Carb Key island.
In my opinion, you can't be more formulaic with 007 films. Give some plot to the antagonists to disturb the order of peace with one way or another, thrown our vodka-martini-stirred-not-shaken-lover agent into the scene, mix it with some hottie, preferably buxom and exposing as many skin as possible, and pit him against the arch-nemesis in some archetypal pyrotechnics work in the end. So, you asked, what's the appeal then? To be quite honest, I really have no idea. I'm not considering myself as a Bond's fan anyway. Not by a mile.
I thought, that James Bond films, especially the early releases are more valuable in its historical aspect than anything. We're talking about forty years and twenty films of franchise, after all. However, it should be noted that statistically, films that were released in the 60's are on average longer than films released nowadays, Dr.No may seems slow for many casual viewers. I was guilty as well, I played Final Fantasy Tactics A2 on my NDS while watching the film for the whole time, only occasionally rewind the DVD when I felt like I missed something important. Just for a couple of times, if I remembered correctly.
P.S: This is an attempt to see ALL of James Bond films prior and in an anticipation of the release of "Quantum of Solace" later this year (part 1 of 21 - or 22, whichever version suits you, planned)
The Strangers. The positive buzz generated around this film has promised this film to be a sleeper hit. It does, and more. In fact, it is more than likely that this film would ended up as one of the two best thriller/horror film of the year in my list. Although, given the shock value of the film, I would give Funny Games a slight edge. Just a slight, though.
The film opens with a word that surely going to sent some viewer's mind troubled. "The brutal events that took place there are still not entirely known" Peace-loving audiences who doesn't want to get troubled or annoyed with a film should leave the theater immediately. Kristen McKay (Liv Tyler) and James Hoyt (Scott Speedman) is a couple. One night in February, 2005 (ow, yes, this film is based on true events), they went from a wedding-party to Hoyt's summer house. And well, as these summer houses goes as seen in the films, they are always pretty much secluded. No neighbors, no phones, no cars passing by, which made a perfect choice of place for individuals with an appetite for murder as these so called "The Strangers" in this film to stalk their preys. One time in the film, Kristen asks "The Strangers" of why they were doing what they were doing. Their answer is simply, "Because you're home" and THAT is what I called terror.
The first build-up scene of the film (the first thirty minutes or so of the film) is awesome. I felt Kristen's distress of having someone knocking the front door of your house at four a.m, not knowing who they are and what they were up to. Suddenly, those walls around my room, as surely as those walls around Kristen's house, closing upon me, confined me almost to a point where it almost choked me. This feeling persists, and stays, right until the end.
Well, I don't have anything else to say, but it is in my opinion that our horror filmmakers should rely to the purely human's side of the evil instead of re-hashing the idea of "boo" scenes, sudden appearances, and long haired ghosts. These ideas are already old and stale, anyway. After all, if you asked me, the only thing capable of pure evil in this world is more often than not, are human.
My rating: *** / **** - Although most unlikely, I hope that this film (with Funny Games) could made into this years' Jakarta International Film Festival in December or at least into this year's INAFF in November (if Saw V could made it into this festival, I don't see any reasons of why Funny Games or this film couldn't made it into the festival as well but we shall see) for I am eager to re-experience the whole thing in bigger screen. Currently in the top two of my list of this year's best thriller/horror film.
I had planned to go see Max Payne last night as one of the two "new" releases this week. The other one is P2. I know, P2 is originally released sometime last year, and I've seen it months ago albeit that no review had come from yours truly here. This, again, raises the questionable methods of our local theater network to pick their new releases. The same questionable methods to pit Lindsay Lohan's I Know Who Killed Me, almost a year after its original release.
Alas, considering that Max Payne is one of those game-based movie adaptation, and the last time I saw a game-based movie adaptation is Hitman (which from what I understand, had the same breadth with Max Payne) and it wasn't really that pleasant experience to endure, I had opted to stay at home instead of battling the midnight air.
What about P2? As I've told before, I've already seen P2. But, if you think that I should relive the memory and writing a review about it, well, sorry to disappoint, but that's just not the way it (or this) work. I usually had a one-two hour window of opportunity to write a proper review right after I've seen the film or at the very least, listing key points of strengths and weaknesses. Had I missed the window, well, the opportunity is lost. All I could remember about P2 was a nasty death scene and a generous cleavage of its leading actress. But that's just about it.
So, two options, none appealing, thus, I had stayed home and watched The Strangers instead. One thriller film that had positive buzzes all over the festival film worldwide.
Eagle Eye. What do I think about Shia LaBeouf? Love/Hate, at best. I thought that he was quite decent on D.J Caruso's Disturbia (probably his first big role) even if its resemblance to Hitchcock was rather uncanny, and then I don't really care about him on Transformers for all I care about was understandably, its Autobots and Decepticons line and given that a small fraction of the care leftovers I had from the film (if there's even any) goes to Megan Fox, it practically renders him nearly invisible. And of course, we had Indiana Jones. If even Stan thought George Lucas and Steven Spielberg had raped Indy, how would you think I'd fared? A kid who grew with Raiders of the Lost Ark? Not very much. Anyways, Eagle Eye is one of those films with catchy trailer that actually looks good, heck, probably awesome in some standard and the fact that this film again pitted Shia under D.J Caruso's direction, I was willing to give it a try.
Brutally honest? For all its worth, the film would please most casual viewers flocking the theater on a weekend for an escape from a daily routine while having a buttered pop-corn and ogling the screen for a light entertainment albeit a forgettable one. Well, actually, after the film ended, I heard a whisper from a dude who sat in front of me proclaimed that it was and I quote, "a best non-stop action film" I took an interest to this dude because he has spent most of the film texting with his phone (Oh, how I hate this kind of attitude. The glare, folks! The glare!).
Jerry Shaw (Shia LaBeouf) is a rebel, a laid-back dude who has been under the shadow of his twin-brother for most of his life. That's why instead of going to Stanford, he chooses to work in a copy shop, gambling in his spare-time, scraping for change to pay his rent, and cut all ties to his family. One day, he found that his bank account increased by $750,000 overnight, and there's enough equipment in his apartment to start a World War III. Rachel Holloman (Michelle Monahan) is a single-mom, on her way to sent her kid for a musical performance in D.C. Enjoying her rare quality time, she went out with her friends until a phone call arrives telling her to do things in exchange for the safety of her son. Meanwhile, Jerry captured by the F.B.I only to find himself receiving the similar phone calls that helped him escape the containment and put him firmly on the red book of the F.B.I. Jerry and Rachel met, car chases ensues, explosions here and there, Eagle Eye, final confrontation, and a fitful ending. Now, whoever controlled Jerry and Rachel Holloman has access to almost any electronic devices from satellite, phone cells, traffic lights, automatic crane stuffs, even to McDonald's CCTV!. My advice, don't ever think about the reason behind why such a powerful entity or organization that had its fingers on almost anything (Brother Eye style) still required the assistance of two normal people to do its bidding because this film works well if you just sit back, relax, and put your mind at ease. Oh, and digging to that huge and greasy pop-corn of yours certainly helps to kill some stray thinking cells in your brain.
As for me, the film ended after the FIRST car chase. Granted, its probably the only memorable sequence in this film if there's one. The camera however, swivel and shifted like it was in the middle of a hurricane. Occasionally, we get a glimpse or two of our hero/heroine only to be replaced by flying metals, crashes and explosions in a quick cuts but of course, that is how they shoot action sequences these days. Still, D.J Caruso earned a kudos for this sequence. Even so, believe me or not, I have already guessed the entire plot after this scene and I had to stifle a laugh when the final confrontation occurs because it remind me to a film, which has been cross-referenced so many times I've lost count (I've seen it twice for this year's film releases alone) and in an inferior and pathetic way it's almost sad. I'm not telling what film though. That, and the film runs a bit too long for my taste (of course, given that I've already guessed the plot and manages to keep one-two steps further in the plot development) and this is coming from a guy who loves Il Buono, Il Brutto, Il Captivo.
And oh, Shia LaBeouf is still Steven Spielberg's "Golden Boy" I was surprised during the end credit that this film's Executive Producer is Mr.Spielberg himself. Just when I thought that Shia could finally get out of his clutch.
My rating : ** / **** - Not my cup of tea, too easy, too long in dwindling before the plot concludes, but action fans should enjoy this film. I've seen no significant improvement from Shia (he still bore that same "panic" look simply because the film keep telling him to "Run, Jerry! Run!") and the rest of the cast fared in similar manner. With perhaps one exception, Michael Chiklis even if he only appears in two or three short scenes. Love the guy! Imagine a less badass version of Death Race with dialog! That's why the dude who sits in front of me was able to texting the whole time and manages to utter a comment about "best non-stop action film" His word, not mine.
Body of Lies. When the world swept away with an avalanche, and people went to the theater by the millions to see Titanic, I, acting like a true introvert, frown at its success and particularly to its leading roles, Mr.Leonardo DiCaprio and Ms.Kate Winslet as my teenager peers at the time mooning and swooning over both. Mr.DiCaprio's previous role in Romeo & Juliet and his subsequent role in The Man in the Iron Mask did nothing to improve his image in my eye and I had thought that Mr.DiCaprio will always be like those boyish actors (example, Freddie Prince Jr.) forever trapped in their young boy persona. Not until Gangs of New York did I finally had some perspective to Mr.DiCaprio's true capacity as an actor. Ironically, both Mr.DiCaprio and Ms.Kate Winslet who started as someone I took for less has both become my personal favorite actor as implicitly evident in my blog for the last couple of years and I greatly anticipated their next re-team feature, Revolutionary Road sometime this year. But that's another matter.
From William Monahan's script who quickly become one of the screenwriter who had the knack of writing a multifaceted and complex script (The Departed), Body of Lies promises a rewarding film experience. That is if a story-driven multi-layered and a thought-required film is really your cup of tea. This film won't surprise or tried to conceal the hidden fact up its sleeve in order to provide some "ahh" moments at its climax. Even so, the nature of the script doesn't too often in putting us ahead of the character which made the two hours plus of duration, as I've said before, a rewarding experience.
Mr.Roger Ferris (DiCaprio) is CIA's field-agent working in Middle East. He knows the culture, he aware with the daily situation, he speaks Arabic up to a point where he could distinguishes the accent, and as it's easily seen, he was in a constant danger. His handler, his attachŽ is Edward Hoffman (Russell Crowe), an ambitious desk-officer with his own agendas some of which he concealed even to his field-agent. An event (best I leave it for you to observe by yourselves) put the guys hopping the airlines across the Middle East, U.S. and briefly in Europe but most of the time, they find themselves in Amman, Jordania where they had to work together with Jordanian Intelligence Agency identified by the magnificent Hani (Mark Strong). Hani is willing to co-operate with the CIA with one simple rule, "Do not lie to me" And of course, given the title of the film, you could easily guessed that the truth would found itself rather hard to breach the surface.
One small advice, go take your leak before entering the theater. This is a tight film with many locations, many names (more importantly, many faces) and many story-angle although the film generally focus on Ferris' point-of-view. This is a kind of film where the rare moment of silence would be filled with murmurs from the audience and this is a kind of film where most people (in Indonesia) would describe as "too many talking" film. On a simple glance, one could very much put this film in the same breath with Jason Bourne films although in my opinion, given the nature and overall tone, The Kingdom would be a fairer, albeit much lesser in quality, contender.
Naturally, Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe drives this movie. Although, after The Departed and Blood Diamond, I had to say that this is his most "standard" performance and Russell Crowe is much more awesome in American Gangster. However, after a month or so, this film gives me a reason to open 21Cineplex.com again.
My Rating: *** / **** - If you liked The Kingdom, I dare to say that you're going to like this film as well, better even. However, Leonardo DiCaprio's performance has a tendency to decline (believe me, I've seen all his films in earnest since Gangs of New York) and Russell Crowe's portrayal as Edward is sort of a mix between his role in The Insider and American Gangster which if you've seen both, you'll know that it screams inconsistency. That, and the "meh" ending. Well, at least Mark Strong steals the scene.
In my plurk page, I've been mulling about the possibility to stay connected through mobile devices, through my MacBook for 24/7. The image above is the partial reason of why. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King. If you had no idea what World of Warcraft is, then congratulations, you're not yet cursed by the imminent addiction of gaming. It is after all, THE most popular MMORPG. Now, the system requirement of the game has been revealed
Operating System: Mac OS X 10.4.11 or newer
Processor: Minimum: PowerPC G5 1.6 GHz or Intel Core Duo processor
Recommended: Intel 1.8GHz processor or betterProcessor:
RAM: Minimum: 1 GB RAM
Recommended: 2 GB RAM
Video: Minimum: 3D graphics processor with Hardware Transform and Lighting with 64 MB VRAM (such as an ATI Radeon 9600 or NVIDIA GeForce Ti 4600 class card or better)
Recommended: 3D graphics processor with Vertex and Pixel Shader capability with 128 MB VRAM (such as an ATI Radeon X1600 or NVIDIA 7600 class card or better)
Hm, given the requirement, I might need to buy an iMac or better yet, a MacBookPro. It just a matter of convincing my wife that spending US$ 2000+ on a machine I already own is actually a good, beneficial thing, :D
When Blu-Ray wins the format war against HD-DVD, I was seriously considering of buying a Blu-Ray DVD player. But of course, with stellar price of Blu-Ray DVDs and the lack of HDTV had so far prevented me of doing so. However, I've already made a plan to give the honor of my first ever Blu-Ray DVD to "The Dark Knight", scheduled to be released on the 9th of December. I've got my eyes trained on the 2-disc set, which includes extras such as Gotham Uncovered documentary, featurettes, and many more.
Pictured above, however, is not the 2-disc set, but the limited edition one, which includes a steel DVD case and a Batpod replica. Heh, I won't even bother to ask for the price of that one. I mean, come on, any thing with limited edition brandished in it could easily surpassed the US$ 1,000 mark. Worse, some eBay speculators might, euh, most likely would tried to get their hands on it. After all, if you could find a buyer who willing to flush US$ 100 for the ticket on eBay, you could easily find a buyer who willing to flush more and more for a freakin' limited edition AND a Batpod replica.
Well, today is the last office day before an obligatory a week-off holiday beginning next Monday. I thought about writing something witty, smart, or downright philosophical. But, nothing came to mind even if I rather found myself more often than not, living in an illusion of being a better than average composer of words (for a non-English speaker, anyway).
Anyhoo, if you're living in a country where Islam is majority AND a Moslem (I am both, by the way) this time of day would surely saw influx of incoming mails electronic or stamp-and-envelope wishing you a merry Idul Fitri, ask for forgiveness, or just some sweet words around that theme. It is, after all, probably the most celebrated holiday in the Islamic calendar.
So, I wish you a happy holiday if you happened to celebrate Idul Fitri, may the wrong doers and talks in the past turns into myth that soon be long forgotten. The scheduled next entry to this blog would be on October 6th.
There's a new TV show at CBS, The Mentalist. It was a story about a crime-unit centered around a ... um, for lack of better word, a mentalist. Clearly inspired by Sherlock Holmes (or so I thought), our dude here, the mentalist, paid extra attention to little details around that turns him into a terrific yet understandably socially inept detective. He solved a murder case by pointing a finger to the most unlikely suspect when his team and the public has allegedly held the primer suspect for the case within the opening minutes of the film. He then surprises his mates again when during an autopsy he gave a comment that the victim was gay (he proved correct later, and no, he doesn't tell us how he correctly guessed one's sexual orientation from his cadaver). And just as Sherlock Holmes has Professor Moriarty, so does our detective. He has his own nemesis to answer to. A serial killer brandished by media with "Red Jack" who has been eluded him for five years and one that he has made into "his own" All in all, even if I'm not swept off of my feet, I'm planning to see what this series has to offer in the next episodes.
General review: Mostly acceptable, helped a lot by impressive performances (TV-wise) from Simon Baker and Robin Tunney.
I see the image first before I read the content. Immediately, I thought, "Why do I need another iPod charger-slash-syncer?" However, as it turns out after I read the article, this little 5-in-1 USB Charger (US$ 14) could charge/sync 5 different gadgets (iPod, Nintendo DS (!), Sony PSP (!), GBA, and a mini-USB device, whatever that device is), three of which I had in my possession. Now, add a Samsung hand-phone charger, and I would order one of these online like, right now.
"You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun"
- Time, Pink Floyd -
The dude in this video below, Dmitri Gaskin, is talking and introducing jQuery in front of developers in Google Tech at April 2008. I've been furiously and excitedly learning about jQuery for a couple of days now, and while the knowledge of John Resig, the original creator of jQuery is only 24 has put me in some kind of jealousy and excitement to match his achievement in a near future, with a product of my own (*yeah, yeah, some dream, eh?*), Dmitri Gaskin made me look ancient as he is only 12, and already a core Drupal developer.
I'm still excited all over though, as most of you probably know, my current stint as a cubicle worker is merely a temporary. I want a job that I love, not just a job because it's a job and paid well and it took me a while, but I knew what I love (as the wisdom often said, you never knew what you love until it taken away from you) and this job I'm holding right now, clearly not one of them.
"Gather ye rose-buds while ye may, Old Time is still a-flying; And this same flower that smiles today, Tomorrow will be dying"
It's been a quite a long while since the last I cried during a film. Dead Poet Society (1985) brings back that moment when the emotional torrent swept me up off my feet as a single drop of tear shed from the corner of my eye. Alas, although it's not the first time that I've seen the film, in so far, the film has never failed to made me at least had my heart expanded within its casket on that particular snow-field scene. "O Captain, My Captain"
Awake (2008). I used to love Jessica Alba. Well, probably I still did. Her bedroom eyes is naturally her first and foremost main attraction to many. On the other hand, I was ever reluctant with Hayden Christensen. And the fact that he keeps having roles that pit him against beautiful actresses doesn't help a bit. Anyway, probably due to my very low expectation, I found that Awake is an okay experience, at least much better than what would I have expected and Jessica Alba and Hayden Christensen actually had their above average performance (which still poor :D) here.
The Love Guru (2008). Another Jessica Alba. Mike Myers probably thought himself as the center of the universe. Even so, this film is probably his funniest film after the first Austin Powers film. Featured many cross-reference to his previous stints (the most obvious one, "Bohemian Rhapsody"), its lightness and disgusting acronyms might appeal to many who seeks for the merest form of entertainment through film.
What Happens in Vegas (2008). There's one single fact that I still found confusing today. Cameron Diaz portrayed as a f-ing hot actress. Big no. But hey, that's just me. Whatever my opinion is, she still is one of the most overpaid working actress in Hollywood today.
My Sassy Girl (2008). I wonder why I even bother to see this excuse of a film. Remaked from the 2002 Korean film of the same title, featuring Elisha Cuthbert among others, this film is far far inferior than the original film. Don't even bother to rent.
Yea, yea, I know, it's been almost a week since the first beam in the LHC launched. Yet, the mounting concern of whether what LHC would uncover is some sort of a Pandora's Box refused to deceased and although it's deemed most unlikely, the possibility that the first collision in 6-8 weeks could made a great rift in a time-space plane, fourth-dimension, and even could spawned a Black Hole threatened to cast our beloved Earth into an oblivion, a sure Doomsday, the final existence of humankind.
I spent almost a day on Friday to read about this LHC and its impact almost obsessively. PHD Comics had a pretty cool five part comics that explained this LHC. Wired.com had an article of FAQs about LHC in Twitter format (less than 140 characters) as well as a thorough long article. Wikipedia is of course, another reliable source on this subject. But, by far the most effective and entertaining explanation of LHC surely has to come from this hilarious rap song apparently sung by CERN's scientific members that worked closely in the environment.
Well, even if I had seen the film four nights ago and the rest of the world had probably seen it like three months prior, I couldn't help but to make a post-Hellboy-experience post. Just like my previous writing stated, Guillermo Del Toro has created himself a niche ever since that 2006's Pan's Labyrinth. Arguably, public are made aware of Del Toro's niche through this film even if he has already made films in the same breadth as Pan's. Pan's Labyrinth still remains as my favorite film in the year 2006 and up until now, I could still whistle the last lullaby of Olivia as she steps into her kingdom and welcomed warmly by her people and her royal family with passion that never failed to gives me goosebumps all over.
In his latest film, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Del Toro's niche is further accentuated as he redefines the Elf-race, the Tooth Fairy, the Troll market, Goblin and their machineries, and on some length, the Beanstalk from whatever-tale-that-beanstalk-coming-from. In 2001, Peter Jackson introduces the Elf-race to the greater masses (those who watch films but not read books and there are still far too many of such people) with his adaptation of J.R.R Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. Up to that point, most likely that when you're talked about Elf, you're going to remember Arwen, or in my case, Galadriel. Peter Jackson's Elfs are slender, full-of-grace, and not to mention, terribly beautiful. Now, when I say that Del Toro redefines the Elf-race, one need only to look at Princess Nuala. She was beautiful, but unique, a definition of beautiful that puts her not-of-this-world and then we had Prince Nuada. Fierce, sharp, and precise is how am I going to define his presence. Both of these Elfs still retains the majestic quality, the slenderness and the grace-ness of the Elf-race but they're certainly different, up the ante so to speak. Now, why am I making this comparison? As most of you probably know, Guillermo Del Toro's next project is two-episodes of "The Hobbit", a prequel to "The Lord of the Rings" saga. "The Hobbit" told a story of how Bilbo Baggins found that troublesome One Ring which his nephew Frodo Baggins has to carry ever east to the Mountains of Doom for the duration of three films, and of how Smeagol is a, um, well, Smeagol. Even if Peter Jackson still involved with the project by being a producer, it is to be expected that Guillermo Del Toro will pours his own vision to create the Middle-Earth. I was utterly excited to see how he's going to re-shapes Rivendell and its citizens, how he's going to told the Battle with Smaug and really, judging by what he has done to New York through Hellboy, I had a pretty good reasons that he could do more with a fantasy world such as Middle Earth.
Meanwhile, an assumption could be safely made that we're going to see the third Hellboy film in the future and the word is, we could have a TV series in between. Well, if I was a producer with millions of dollars to invest, I would want to see a Hellboy-related TV series. Not about Hellboy himself, but perhaps more about Manning and his B.P.R.D for as you can see briefly in the film, there are a lot of "interesting" activity in the Bureau which actually reminds me a lot to "Men in Black" Well, whatever Guillermo Del Toro has in store (the seventh Harry Potter film, perhaps?), my only hope is that he's going to finish "The Hobbit" first before anything else.
I've been known as a furious defender of the first Hellboy film. Even as far as name it the best superhero film ever second only to Batman and that's only because I love Batman. Reasons aside, whenever I heard someone bashed Hellboy, I would revert to my grumpy self and childishly ignored whatever else that come out of that someone's opinion about films. Yes, childish, I know, but as far as I'm concerned, I hadn't yet proved to be wrong on attributing such ignorance. When I know a someone who said that s/he doesn't like Hellboy, even feeling bored and fell asleep on the occasion, I would later found out that s/he is indeed has a pretty crappy taste for films. Thus, my ignorance is justified.
Hellboy is sort of an anti-hero, much like Batman in his best of days (what is Batman's best days, you ask? Well, the death of Jason Todd is one, or when Barbara Gordon got shot). From that alone, you know I loved him already. He swaggers and swaddles, fought with such confident and humor that Spider-Man should had but largely absent in the films, and as many superheroes does, his life is sucks but does he moors and grieves? Peter Parker did, but not our Red-beast from Hell and damn you, if you can't love that. Elizabeth Sherman, as portrayed by Selma Blair remains the best female-sidekick in superhero film ever. She's not the kind of a mere sex-slash-lust object (point-in-case, Kirsten Dunst), nor is she an insignificant figure, largely forgettable and exist just for the sake of an existence (point-in-case, Katie Holmes), she is a character with a full-arc and honestly, the closest female character to her that I could think about was perhaps Margot Kidder in the original Superman film.
And then there's Guillermo Del Toro. He has created a niche for himself as a director with a penchant to create a fantastic fantasy creatures.
Therefore, when the full crew is back four years after the first film for a sequel, you know I wouldn't want to miss it.
Hellboy II: the Golden Army is further established Del Toro's niche in creating fantastic creatures. He redefines the Elfs, brought forth from their origin as a beautiful and slender beings to a still beautiful being but with a certain edge. A sharp and terrible edge. I can't help to think about Dark Elf in Blizzard's cosmology of role playing games when Prince Nuada and his sister appears on screen and my, the Prince sure can move in a beautiful way. He also redefines the Tooth Fairy, and populated the screen with other fantastic creatures from the pages of role playing games and fantasy literature universe. However, be as it may, I loved the first film better. The sequel is great though, still great, and I had a really good time, but this time, if I heard someone bashed it, I would forgive him/her and won't go as far as ignored his/her subsequent comments in film and thus able to appreciate our difference in taste. That's how I feel about the first film and this sequel.
Hellboy II starts pretty much the same as many other adventure films (as well as the first sequel). It starts with a flashback sequence that provides a backdrop to the story. A legend said about the legion of indestructible Golden Army, all seventy times seven of them. The army was made by the goblin (an established fact in almost all fantasy world that the goblin race is very very good with machines) for the King of Elf to fought against human. Know no passion, no loyalty, and no remorse, the King of Elf deemed this army is way too dangerous to fall into anyone's hands. Mortal or Elf. Thus, he ordered for a truce and that the golden crown used to command this army be separated in three. Prince Nuada, the King's son, disagreed with the King went into exile. Time passed, and what once was a history turns into legend that turns into myth and even long forgotten. Until a day when finally Prince Nuada returns from his exile and planned for an all-out attack against us, human that has defiled the Earth and of course, the fate of our beloved civilization lies on the shoulder of individuals behind B.P.R.D front-runnered by Liz, H.B, Abe, and one particular weirdo which for the sake of your viewing pleasure, I won't reveal here.
Once, I had a theory. When you're talking about adventure films, making a sequel it's easy. In the first film, you laid the foundation and the origin of the main players of the adventure while in the second film, as you don't need to introduce the characters you could simply built upon the foundation and have some fun. Hellboy II did everything fun-related right. The action-packed sequences works (if you asked me, Hellboy vs Prince Nuada hand-to-hand combat is almost at the same level of entertainment with Jackie Chan vs Jet Li hand-to-hand combat in The Forbidden Kingdom. Well, at least it was WAY better than Jet Li vs Michelle Yeoh hand-to-hand combat in The Mummy 3. Plus, I noticed no slow-motion during the sequence which is very very nice. Gosh, I HATE slow-mo) , the tension-relief sequences were enjoyable most of the time (with one exception scene which I found awkward and quite unnecessary in my opinion), and you could easily guess and feel that everyone in this film is having fun in reprising their roles. Given the direction, had I stretched far enough, I could understand if some casual viewers said that they enjoyed this film more than its predecessors. But of course, I stand my ground, I praised the first film more. The atmosphere of the first film is just, right. It's tighter, and it flows more smoothly than its sequel. Further, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, in my opinion, suffers from two major plot flaw revealed at the end of the film. Of course, I was too excited to gave it more than a frown and a hum but, the flaws are there.
My rating: *** / **** - In Indonesia, the Summer season ends with a bang. Hellboy II: The Golden Army is sure going to pleased many movie goers here considering the quiet post-summer season. However, entertained and pleased as I was, I couldn't help myself but to compare this film with its predecessor and I had to say that I enjoyed the former film a bit better. Also I found surprising, the film has an unmistakenly cheerful atmosphere but it certainly doesn't shy away from deaths and killing (usually, for this kind of film with this kind of atmosphere, the good guys should NEVER get killed on-screen. Off-screen, maybe, but never on-screen. Example, Indiana Jones' original trilogy). Personally, I felt that it doesn't seem right.
I loved to shuffle my ENTIRE library a lot during the day I'm listening to my iTunes. With iTunes 8, however, I just found out to my dismay that shuffle didn't work the way it used to. Yet, I hope. Floating threads at the Apple Discussion Forum pointed out the very same problem I had with this issue.
From the Grid View, although my shuffle indicator is on, the shuffled playlist stays in the same album. Puzzled, I tried to switch into a list view. Problem? Still there. It bugs me a lot. I hope they fixed it right away.
From this site. I had a good and fit laugh when the image above shown. "PEOPLE KEEP ASKING ME TO FIX THEIR E-MAIL, SO I HAVE NO TIME TO CODE" Ha. Talk about a personal experience. An abundance of it. :D
The Apple event today has its announcement, revamped iPod Nano line, refreshed iPod Touch, capped iPod Classic (no more 160 GB iPod), and public concern on Steve's health that seen the Apple's stock slumped for a bit. As an end user who doesn't even have a Credit Card and a resident in one of a developing country a day away from the nation that begins it all, as excited as I was to the news (I had my eyes trained to 16 GB iPod Touch even though I'm totally satisfied with my fifth-G iPod Video 30 GB - and it still had around 5 GB of free space, anyway) the only thing that I could get my hands early on from the announcement is the release of iTunes 8 and I'm not ashamed at all that the first thing I did after I opened my MacBook at the office today is downloading the 50+ Megs of the update right away :)
I love the interface already. Previously, I've never really liked Cover Flow display but has learned to get used to it as opposed to the old-fashioned simple lists which I have been abandoned a very long time ago. Even so, I still disliked it. The new interface, as shown in the image above, is a pleasant welcome for the time being, whether it's going to last or no, only time will tell.
Quite probably the most celebrated new feature that comes with iTunes 8 is the Genius sidebar. Although given its nature, in an over-simplified terms, that Genius is a "Recommendation"-system that has been around for quite some time, in my opinion, the Genius sidebar manages to put this recommendation thingy in a personal level. First, it compiles my Library, sent the information to the iTunes Store (which required an Apple ID that requires a valid Credit Card - I don't have any, so I'm using my wife's) and after a while, depending on the size of your library and your Internet connection, you can start using the Genius bar.
The Genius sidebar worked as follows, first, choose a song and click a Genius button to create a playlist which the Genius thought could go well together. The early reports from the blogosphere has found some disagreement with the Genius' selection. In my opinion, you couldn't really expected that the Genius would work in a perfect harmony with your preference in music. After all, when it boils down to preference, you're talking about style, about personal sense, about the divergence in human genes, about the origin of life, about.. well, things that goes well beyond the machine's logical computation. But, of course, I had to try it for myself.
The first thing I try was one of Kelly Clarkson's song which in my library that mostly consists of 'hard' bands from the 90's could be considered as a minority. Surprisingly, the Genius did a pretty good job. The playlist, as you could see from the image below, suggested an acceptable harmony. It includes "The Unforgiven" from Metallica, "Don't Cry" from Guns 'N Roses although of course, the inclusion of "In Bloom" by Nirvana or "Brain Stew" from Green Day is actually questionable but all in all, it provides a good balance between the soft and the hard. So, yeah, no complaints here.
Next song that I'd like to try to "Genius"-ed is of course, my favorite song from Megadeth (Tornado of Souls). Now this song has a distinction as the single most played song in my library. In this respect, the Genius sidebar made some obvious choices. Alas, as the choices were made by algorithm it's actually more proper to call it an obvious choice with a "wow" attached to it. I mean, from my point of view, the playlist manages to include my next favorite song from Megadeth (Skin O' My Teeth), "Stream of Consciousness" from Dream Theater, "Locomotive" from Guns 'N Roses, and "The Call of Ktulu" from Metallica. It just "wow".
Based on this review and a couple of tries with Genius sidebar, my first impression on iTunes 8 is therefore, positive. Now if you'd excuse me, I'd like to try a few more.
By the time I wrote this post (4 p.m local time), Google Chrome is already a day old, an old news considering the breakneck speed in which information was exchanged nowadays. It begins with a comic floating in my mailbox yesterday. The comic depicted the technical concept behind Chrome which naturally makes the techies stuff a lot easier to comprehend. I read the comic and actually excited about it. Imagine my surprise when I arrive at the office this morning, to know that the blogosphere is already fumed with the release of Google Chrome beta. Word is, that the arrival of ultra-secret-project that is Google Browser a.k.a Google Chrome has push the ante of web-browser a notch more. The V8 JavaScript VM was reportedly up to 10-times faster than Firefox or Safari and FIFTY SIX-times faster than IE7 (Source: www.wired.com) It is interesting to see how Redmond is going to respond with their IE8 (another "me too"? InPrivate mode? sorry, not interested)
However, as the beta version is only available for Windows (considering that Google aimed to dampen the largest market share first, quite a bold move, if you asked me), I can't get my hands on it just yet and therefore I could only take the news of a blazing fast, clean and minimal design new player in the browser war at the face value. It doesn't make me less excited though.
Doomsday. From what I've already seen, I had a reason to believe that Neil Marshall is at least a supporter of female gender domination equality. Both of his films that I've seen so far shows exactly just that. A heroine or heroines that live up to a task usually reserved for their male counterpart. Not that I'm against it, mind you.
Doomsday takes our world into the UK in the future where a virus outbreak prompted the government to resort into a drastic measure of martial law that seen Glasgow and most of the northern part of the UK quarantined-slash-surrounded with a tall impenetrable steel wall. The idea is simple, let no one in or out of the quarantined area. Soon, the quarantined area - and millions that lived within it - became no-man's land, abandoned, and forgotten. Thirty years later, when the general belief is that nobody left alive within the area that was Glasgow and northern UK, a similar case of virus outbreak that once engulfed Glasgow broke in London. It would seems that a similar drastic measure of martial law was soon to be applied in London. However, as it turns out, the government still has something in its sleeve. It was known - only to the selected few, of course - that started from three years prior, some signs of life was recorded within the wall. It was a sign that there's some way to overcome the virus. Soon, a team was dispatched into the wall. Its mission is simple, to bring back survivor or vaccine or anything that proves that the virus is indeed curable. Led by Major Eden Sinclair (Rhona Mitra) who given her history deemed fit to the task, the team wasn't expected to survive. After all, it was thirty years since the wall was closed and thus made whatever law or values from its inhabitants are somewhat different.
I actually liked this film despite facts that the heroine reminds me of Charlize Theron's Aeon Flux (which is bad), thugs that remind me to Mad Max or that video California from Tupac, and a couple of inconsistencies that left a gap in my train of logic thought. This film has an ample supply of gore and violence to make horror fans happy (and me, though I had refused to acknowledge myself as a horror fan, enjoyed the severed limbs, and plenty of blood and gore that this film has to offer), bare hands fights, close quarter combat, trigger happy, and high-speed chase with tremendous amount of body counts to make any bloody action film fans happy. Indeed that this film isn't really made to goes beyond the level of an acceptance of action films that requires small attention from the brain and if you could put it where it belongs, you'd be ended up liking it as much as I do.
Doomsday is what I'd called as an "air-tight" film in which the miniscule details are crammed up in a 90 minutes of time frame. The background narrative that sets-up the film took at least five minutes, for example. Now this could prove as a turn-off to some of the casual viewers who are so used to arrive late at the theater (it bothers me, really, I mean if they can't be punctual to something in which they had to pay for tickets, how could they be punctual in other more important aspect in their life, such as work? Sigh, my fellow countrymen)
My rating: **1/2 / **** - Doomsday sets in a brooding future. However, thirty minutes off the mark and the mood was shifted into an action packed gore-fest. Not that I mind that, but it was certainly not something I had expected in the first place. For better or worse, again, if you could put this film on the level of mere entertainment, you could actually enjoy it. Assuming of course, that seeing a bloody slaughter, explicit mutilation, and various manifestation of violence of men against men doesn't put you in a state of queasiness.
Death Race. I had ascertained many times that I love Jason Statham (a bad-ass bald dude with a cool accent that could hurt you with a mere frown) as an action figure. An unabashed love that even if he has involved in that Uwe Boll's stinker (which I had to admit, the ONLY Jason Statham's filmography that I haven't seen and I'm not boasting as well. Nineteen films of his, and Dungeon Siege is the ONLY one I haven't seen), I could very much forgive him and return to the theater for his newest film if it's involve death, carnage, bad-ass fights, gun powders, and the like. Even if the plot and script promises nothing, as long as the bad-ass bald dude that is Jason Statham is doing what he's doing best which is beat the crap of the other guy, we don't really mind. I don't.
Death Race's plot is as simple as you could imagine. In the abysmal future when economy slumped, unemployment rate hits record high, and crime rate is staggering, the crime institution are runs by profit oriented private company. One of such company, runs by a particularly evil Hennessey (Joan Allen), put a race involving full-armor and full-weapon cars, conspicuous female convicts as navigators with one simple rule, stay alive until the end of the race. To attract the inmates to stake their life for profits, they're promised freedom after they had won five races. A fan favorite, masked Frankenstein had won 4 races. However, he killed during his final race. The company covered the fact by saying that he was injured and thus unable to participate. During his absence, the rating drops and the company need someone as good and as bad to replace him. Enter Jensen Ames (Jason Statham), ex-convict who has tried to live an honest life after he met his wife and had a daughter. He was framed for his wife's murder by the company and soon found himself participating in a Death Race masquerading as the masked Frankenstein. But of course, not after he threatens Hennessey with an 'awesome' line, "You wanted a monster? Well, you've got one"
From Paul W.S. Anderson, you won't and shouldn't expect too much from this film. The characters were simply exists as means to advance the plot and nothing more. And here, when I'm talking about "plot", I was actually referring to exploitation action scenes where we, as an audience, giving in to our most primal and raw instinct without any or minimal interference from the part of our brain that cries for "logic!" In that note, the film delivers and serves its purpose as a high-octane hot-wheeled smoking asphalt action film.
It is enough that this film has a totally like-able tough guy we all rooting for and an identifiable face that we could associated with evil that we want to see down, obliterated, and shredded into the oblivion. I mean, you don't need character actors to shoulder this responsibility. However, I've got a particular liking for Ian McShane. Well, he was already an awesome dude in HBO's Deadwood anyway.
My rating: **1/2 / **** - Well, for an action films it serves its purpose. Don't go looking for a breath-taking actor-wise performances or a brilliant script that made you want to go back to that English literature class and you could enjoy this film. Rated R for violence, so leave your kids at home (I was amazed that there's actually a couple who take their kids to see this film. I was muttered, "It's rated R, stupid" as they passed my aisle)
.jpg)
Of course, with the huge success that is The Dark Knight, questions surely be aroused on who is our favorite cape crusader's villain in the next sequel. A too much time talented fan has created his own rendition on who would be the next villain of the Dark Knight. In this picture, Kristen Bell portrayed as Harley Quinn. While I've always seen Kristen Bell as someone to adore rather than someone to hate, the dude did a pretty good job. Other than that, the dude also imagined Marion Cotillard as Catwoman. Head to his gallery page for more.
I'm not really sure who's who or which is which in this case but apparently, some tug-of-war between Fox and Warner Bros regarding the "rights" for Watchmen has threatened the release of this film which scheduled for early next year. I'm not really into the news, but fans has threatened that should Watchmen really be pulled off of the release date, they would unanimously boycotted any films released from the Fox's vault.
I'm no saint nor angel, but I've always tried to be honest in everything I said and did (at least, for the last couple of years :D). Currently, I'm preparing to make a move from this virtual leased house to a permanent home I shall called "my own"
Mirror was actually up for a screening this week, but seeing that I'm not into its original work from which it has been adapted (Into the Mirror, I had wrote something about it in 2003 - whoa! 5 years ago! - and not really liking it), and I had personally thought that Alexandre Aja is already a Hollywood sell-out after his initial horror flick that had launched his career so I had decided to stay at home and watched Funny Games instead and judging by the initial response to "Mirror", I think I had made a pretty good decision.
It could be said that Funny Games - although that it's actually a US remake from an Austrian film also directed by Michael Haneke - has fallen from the radar of many movie-goers out there. I had to focus on the cover (a picture of beautiful Naomi Watts - she had a nose that could melt my heart, seriously - shredded in what appears to be tears and agony, and another, a picture of a golf club covered in dried blood) before I started to really wanted it. Ironically, the title itself was what probably rendered it into an ignorable candidate of a film. All in all, I had wanted to see this film since earlier this year, but the lackluster in news related to it kept it dropped out of my short term memory. I was pretty much forgot about the film until I saw its DVD in one of the store in Singapore last week. And here goes my real review.
First, a disclaimer. Reviewing Funny Games without spoiling anything is hard (especially, considering what happened in the film at the 100th minute. You might want to circle that because I really think that nobody could've seen that coming. My jaw is like dropping all the way to the floor, ALL THE WAY. I was stunned that for minutes I still tried to contemplate the scene). But I think I did a pretty good job of disclosing the content of the film in this review.
Funny Games remind me a lot to A Clockwork Orange but grimmer, messier and far worse (not in a sense of quality which I think it's rather superior). It's creepy, it's haunting, it's disturbing and it manages to do all those things without any sound effect imposed to add a shocking value. Horror and especially thriller fans should be able to appreciate this film and it didn't do a justice that this film is little known.
The film begins pretty harmless, as we follow through a bourgeois family of three, Ann (Naomi Watts), George (Tim Roth), and their son on a journey to their vacation home and as all vacation homes do, houses were scarce and far between, remote and no landline phones. On their way, they met with their next-house neighbor. They said 'hi' but comments were made about the neighbor unusual quiet behavior and about a couple strangers in their front yard. They were soon acquainted with these strangers. Peter and Paul or Tom and Jerry or Beavis and Butt-Head as they identified themselves. By mere looks we knew that these couples were up to no good and they lived up to their expectation as later, they held the family hostage and forced the family into some sort of twisted "games"
I cannot really went further than that, else I would ruin your experience. All you need to know is that this film uses minimal setting, minimal sound, even minimal dialog but in this case, the less is actually more. The camera sometimes linger on an extended period of time on a single spot and on particularly one scene it is hard NOT to look away. Naomi Watts is one of my favorite actress (a nose to die for), and during my review on "The Incredible Hulk" I had given a deserved praise for Tim Roth and the two dudes who plays the villains (Michael Pitt, Brady Corbet) is REALLY creepy. Finally, for consideration as well, given the content, this film was rated R but I think it even deserves an NC-17 rating even if the scenes rarely, if ever, happened behind the frame but this kind of given impression and imagine it for yourself kind of scene is actually worked. Really well. Not easy to stomach, and certainly not for a casual viewer who merely wishes to have fun in her viewing experience.
And then there's the 100th minute scene. From what I've read in various board messages, most of the viewers hated this scene. Well, I personally think, that particular scene is a great scene in a way that it slaps you in the face, hard. It's something that you totally didn't expect and goes "bam" Down you goes, all bloody and gory.
My Rating: ***1/2 / **** - This is a kind of film that made you cringe and silently mouthed the 'F' word. To film that could lasted such impression to me deserves at least a three and a half rating. Given enough time, this film could even well wade into one the most memorable film (four rating). Won't be a favorite though, cause to put this film into a favorite means that I would want to revisit this film time and again and by doing so, it would implies that I was a psycho. I had a very troubled sleep after I saw this film.
Forgetting Sarah Marshall. I usually don't take a rom-com genre seriously. But time and again, I found one that really hit the spot. Either if it's because I could very much relate myself to the characters or simply that the film is indeed in an outstanding quality among its peers. Forgetting Sarah Marshall is one of those film.
Sarah Marshall (Kristen Bell) is a TV superstar. She stars in famous TV shows called "Crime Scene: Scene of a Crime" apparently in an alternate universe where terrible one-liner, and shockingly stupid dialog could be passed as a hit TV series. For a five-year-and-a-half, she dated Peter Bretter (Jason Segel) a talented (questionable) musician but hadn't work to fulfilled his passion yet as he only wrote "dark and ominous" soundtrack for TV series. I could relate to Peter in a way that his life is lacking direction. Besides work, which he did most of the time at home, he spent his time lazing around on the couch and watching mind-numbing TV shows. Practically, he has his own little world from which he is ever reluctant to leave, simply going nowhere. Just like yours truly here. However, he hasn't hit the bottom just yet. Sarah is his anchor. But when Sarah suddenly dropped the bomb, and dumped him, that was when he plunge. Devastated and advised by his friends, Peter decided to go vacationing to Hawaii only to met Sarah and the very reason she had broken up with him, Aldous Snow (Russell Brand) a rising rock superstar. Again, in an alternate universe where terrible singer with penchant to sexual lyrics could be passed as a rock superstar.
My initial thought of this film is that the main dude is the main protagonist one. The film want us to sympathize with him, to root for him, to cheer him up and probably get through day with hands held high in a winning salute (not to mention, a buxom babe who happened to be a front desk clerk in the hotel where he was staying dangling to his feet). Obviously, that, put the object from the title of this film (Sarah Marshall) into a no-good bitch. But then again, had that been the case, what made this film different than million other rom-com films that held the same vibe?
I was surprised, genuinely surprised that Sarah Marshall is not at all a heartless bitch who just casually shattered our good-man-slash-protagonist's heart into a million pieces as she portrayed to be. I took a special liking to the way the film told its story. Immediately, as the film begins, Sarah was put into a position where she should be hated with all of your heart's content and only progressed downward as the film progressed, up to a point (at least in my case) where we wanted her to get a payback as mean as possible. However, minutes later, I was shocked that in one scene, and one scene only, I could changed my perspective toward Sarah. She has the same treatment with any other prominent casts in this film, a very humane treatment that pull these characters from the screen and put them in a real life where there's no black or white characters. Just gray. And that what made this rom-com different than the other film from this genre. That, and the fact that I could apply my personal real-life to that of Peter's.
My favorite moment: Dinner scene where the prominent casts discussed (more of mocking I should say) Sarah's latest film about "a spirit manifestation that could kill through the cell-phone" to which Sarah defends that it was actually about "a fear of the rapid advancement of technology" Peter mocked the absurd idea of the film. What makes it funny is that Kristen Bell is actually starred in "Pulse" and the fact that she lets the script mocking Sarah for the film which inadvertently (or not) also mocked her in the real-life for "Pulse" is even funnier.
Judd Apatow produced this film, and now I'm convinced that every subsequent film that bore his name should be given a considerable thought despite of how cliche its premise promised to be. Judd had also promised that every film that got his name attached on either as a writer, producer, or director would have a penis showing. This film didn't falter from the promise. So, purist, beware, this film rated R for sexual scenes. But I promise you, if you're a fan of this genre, you'd gonna love this film. If you don't, then you need to revise your definition of "a fan of a particular genre".
My rating: ***1/2 / **** - Let's see, is this the best film that had Judd Apatow's name attached on it? This, and Superbad, if you asked me although I would give a slight edge to this film since I could relate more to this film.
Universal Pictures has 7 figures paid for rights to bring Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series to the movie screen. I wasn't excited. At all. I had a significant doubt that Universal Pictures could really pull this off. Really, Wheel of Time is a very vast world, with incredible details that had spanned for 11 books, hundreds (HUNDREDS) of prominent characters that even to exclude one of them is going to unbalance the ship, numerous warring factions each with their own motives, and not to mention countless artifacts and magics each with their own origin. I couldn't imagine how a screen writer could put a single volume of the serie into a feature-length film. Even if the film would runs for three hours. It would be really really hard for them to pull it off, if not impossible. Good luck with that.
I think I put it correctly when I say that just like most boys my age, I got acquainted with Fantasy genre through Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. I picked the book quickly after the first film, and it's only a matter of time before I made a transition from the relatively simple Lord of the Rings world to George RR Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire world and Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time world. Frankly, had you asked me, if you think that The Lord of the Rings is already a too heavy and too complicated reading material, then you wouldn't stand a chance to read through 11 books of Wheel of Time. So, therefore, even if I would love and utterly curious to see how Wheel of Time translates into a silver screen, I was pessimist that it would please the fan of the series.
Wall-E. When it comes to animation, Pixar rarely disappointed. Of course, some hit and miss are due to abound (I've never seen "Cars" for instance, and didn't really interested to see it in the near future) but as far as I'm concerned, given the premise (love story between robots and minimal dialog?), Wall-E delivers. The fact that this film arrives a month late to our local theater (as with most animation film out there) puzzled me a lot because this is a kind of holiday-family-film-thingy. I just hope they didn't prolonged "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" as well though of course, I think it is safe to assume so.
Welcome to the future. Earth's current inhabitant: One small cleaning robot, Wall-E. He was chosen by the nature to survive for 700 years and thus had developed some sort of curiosity and intelligence that I'm sure none of its original programmers were able to anticipate. Wall-E is a dedicated robot and lonely until suddenly, a robot, origin yet unknown, arrives from space. Her name is Eve and she quickly captures Wall-E's "heart". Together, they're bound to an adventure that led them to the last human civilization aboard the space fortress, Axiom.
It is easy to treat Wall-E, Eve, and any other robots featured in this film as a fully-equipped with human emotions robot through tiny gestures that once you passed the five minutes mark, you could forget that they're robots. Big kudos to the animators. From Wall-E's initial fear, Eve's exasperation and concerns, it is easy to imagine these robots as flesh-and-blood even if their purpose is still and intentionally remain alien and robotic. As absurd as it may sound, this is the best way to enjoy this film, sit back and relax, and stow away that trying-to-logicized-everything thoughts that you may have.
Finally, as a conclusion, even if the film had both subtle (HAL and Dave from 2001 made an appearance, although their names is not explicitly given, the resemblance is uncanny) and serious (ecological-greeny stuffs) messages, the unlikely courtship between Wall-E and EVE was more than enough to keep the viewers of all age hooked and interested. Of course, this film is not a sci-fi per se, therefore, its considerable lack of the "science" part (mostly involving space EVAs) are largely forgiven.
As we all know, Pixar is closely related to Apple, Eve's design should easily remind us to the white iPods and MacBooks but ultimately, the "bong" sound that greets every Mac OS X's user upon booting is quite palpable on at least two occasions. It doesn't really important, anyway just so you know. And there's a nod to the perhaps the only sound I would ever associated with space sci-fi films, "Also Sprach Zarathustra"
My rating: *** / **** - If I may, I would divide this film into two parts. Before and after Axiom. I luuvvvee the Before Axiom part, and frankly, the After Axiom part isn't really giving me other than the usual animation blather. But it's still good, though.
Our journey is far from over. It was almost 1 am in Singapore, and we've got practically nowhere to go. We were left wandering in Chinatown by cab ($ 8.20) from Queens Terminal and spent almost an hour in local 24 hrs restaurant that actually still filled with many patrons. Finally, exhaustion took its toll (at least for me) and walking with that huge backpack isn't much fun anymore. This is our first (of second) mistake in Singapore soil. Checking in to the nearest hotel in Chinatown (Hotel 81) that cost us dearly ($ 179 for a night). But, all in all, it has been a pretty adventurous trip, and me and my wife were actually excited to re-enact our journey next time despite this wrongful decision (my decision, if I may add) that cost us a lot.
We spent almost nine hours in that hotel. At 11 am, we checked out, heads to one of the apartment in Chinatown, and got ourselves a small place to stay for a night for a measly $ 40 and the fun of the day had just begin.
Little do we know that on that particular day, Singapore is celebrating its National Day. Therefore, it was especially crowded that day, and we saw red shirts everywhere. We begin our day by going to the nearest MRT station, Chinatown. The very first thing I noticed in Singapore is how everybody using some sort of card as their payment. Thus, the very first thing I wanted to have is that card. Luckily, there's a Ticket Office in Chinatown MRT station (not all station had this office, and in Chinatown it only opens from 12 pm) so we asks the very helpful lady behind the counter for a card. She offers us a Daily Tourist Pass ($ 8 / day each with $ 10 deposit refundable upon returning the card within 5 days. Total: $ 18). We were so lucky to have this card for given the standard tariff, and the amount of time we were using the transportation either by MRT or bus, had we didn't have the card, we would spent $ 30 - $ 35 minimum on tickets alone.
Commuting in Singapore is a no-brainer if you're good with maps and I'm considered myself very very good with maps. It took very little for me to memorized the MRT map and means to go to various "recommended" location to visit in Singapore. The first location we're visiting is obviously Orchard Rd. We travels there with MRT which involving switching trains halfway through, took a lunch there (I personally, didn't really liked Orchard Rd. perhaps because other than Starbucks or Movie theater, I generally hated Shopping-Malls and I don't really see why I should treat Malls that littered Orchard Rd. differently) and quickly went away albeit not quick enough to my liking.
Another obvious site is Melion Park. We really have no idea where to go, even my friend who has been to Singapore for an n-th time doesn't really have the clue either (I told you before, he was a spoiled-and-freakishly-rich boy). He said it was in Sommerset, and so we go there by MRT, but we saw another Malls and I hate it already. One of the local citizen pointed us to City Hall and this is where we, for the first time, actually seen the ridiculous crowd who celebrated the National Day. People flocking the street in front of the Esplanade theater, all the way to the bridge that led to Melion Park. My wife, who wanted to visit the lion statue in Melion Park, put a second thought and decided against it after we saw the ridiculous crowd which make it near impossible to go near the statue.
After few photo shoots, we go to Bugis Village for souvenirs (they're cheap! This is where you need to go to bought souvenirs, if you asked me) and a light dinner. Afterward, we went to Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal almost all the way to the eastern side of the island to bought our home ticket to Batam. Of course, the Terminal is almost closed. But, we learnt a valuable lesson that there's actually another Ferry Terminal just two MRT stations from Chinatown (Harbour Front). Our feet is already sore from walking all the time, but as the nice lady in Tanah Merah said that the last ferry from Harbour Front departed at 10 pm, we decided to go to Harbour Front. Only to find out that they don't sell tickets in advance. Exhausted, but happy, we decided to go back to Chinatown and immediately fell asleep.
For fear of no tickets available, we head to Harbour Front early in the morning to bought three tickets to Batam at 1250 pm. This is where I made my second mistake. The nice lady asked me, "Pulang balik?" (Going back?) which I had wrongfully assumed that she asked wether I was going back to my home country to which of course I said, yes. An hour later, my wife revealed to me that she actually asked wether I want a two-way ticket to which I had given a "Yes" for an answer. That set us back $ 41 each, and three unused one-way ticket to Singapore from Batam that valid until July 31st, 2009 which we're planned to use for ourselves later this year.
The ferry went exactly on time and you know the very first thing my wife and I did right upon our arrival in Batam? Local food, plenty of rice, plenty of chillies, and a glass of warm tea. That made my day.
All in all, it was a very nice experience. My wife and I brought $ 400 and RM 200 and we are left with $ 40 in small change. But, there's a plenty room for improvement that I dare to say, you could spent two days and two nights in Singapore with only $ 150 and still able to brought back souvenirs. Professional wise, Singapore is a place I would love to work in. Superb transportation system that renders the ole reason of "caught in a traffic jam" largely useless and laughable. But for a mid-range salary man, I still prefers Jakarta than Singapore to raise a family. Much.
By the way, we had already planned our next "unplanned" trip. Instead of going south from Kuala Lumpur, we're going to try to head north from Kuala Lumpur. Penang, Phuket, and perhaps as far as Hanoi if our budget permitted.
Fin.
We don't know who had made the decision, or even if a discussion has been made that led into such action. I remember throwing a question of wether we should stay for a night in Johor Bahru before crossing the border to Singapore early or straight ahead to Singapore that night as well. All i know is that we found ourselves standing in line for a transit bus that led us to Singapore. It was 2230 hrs.
The driver asked us where we're heading. Stupidly, I answered (most of the time, I had assumed the role of leading the party and did all the questioning-and-answering) "Singapore" The driver said, "Singapore is big, where is exactly you're going to?" I said, "Chinatown" The driver frowned a bit and later said that he could take us as far as Queens Terminal and the fare is 5.40 for three. I found out later that the bus was numbered #170 and didn't passed Chinatown at all and the fare he asks was in Singapore dollar which I had paid in Malaysian Ringgit that due to the minimum light and an almost identical color of 5 Malaysian Ringgit and 5 Singapore dollar went unnoticed by the driver. This is a genuine first time mistake in my part. I could assured you that the mistake was not deliberate, and I genuinely felt sorry for it.
Thinking that everything is going to be alright, we rode the bus away to Singapore. Despite the situation that we had no idea whatsoever whence we're going to head in Singapore and the fact that it was a mere hour away from midnight doesn't damped our spirit. In fact, we're so high spirited that we felt like singing. I was, for once, excited about traveling.
Singapore
Initial plan: Arrive at 0400 hrs, look for an apartment to rent in Chinatown, and sight seeing for the whole day.
Miniscule details: A map of Singapore that shown MRT line.
Execution:
Upon crossing the border to Singapore at Johor Bahru, we got hold up at the custom due to our religion (I say, WTF?) which apparently was obvious judged by our goatees. My wife cleared though, but me and my friend had to spent almost half an hour questioned. Of course, we are cleared eventually, but really, just because we had goatees we had to be detained? Even if it's for a short while, I was quite insulted. Anyway, the clock hits 2330 hrs when we finally stepped into Singapore's soil. Imagine, 2230, no means of transportation, no local acquaintances, no nothing. Yet, we were happy and chatted excitedly about the previous event even took some photographs (only minutes before we saw a $500 fine notice for taking pictures. Fortunately, no one spotted us taking photos).
We sat around for a while in the custom discussing of what to do. There were buses coming and going but we have no idea which one to take, and after all, our bus that we took from Johor Bahru bus station has obviously leave us behinds for we took quite a long time in custom.
When the night goes on, we decided to board any bus available. And again, noticing our big backpacks, the driver asked us where we are heading and he pointed us to board bus #170 instead. Moments later (considering that it was almost midnight, it's amazing that there's still buses available), we board the bus. Upon seating, we are wondering wether we should pay or not. Again, I did the asking. I asked the Indian bus driver wether we should pay or no because we've already paid the other #170 driver at Johor Bahru for taking us to the Queens terminal. To my surprise, he urges me to sit back and asking none.
And finally, we've got our first view of Singapore and it has been a long day.
To be continued.. tomorrow.
