The Bourne Legacy review

On the contrary to most reviews available online now, my feeling is that the first half is actually more content-compacted than the second half. Literally, there's no subtitle on the screen for the last 20 min -- they don't need it cuz there's no talking, only fighting, motorbike chasing, parkouring, etc. So what's next after the pair get rid of a hunter and find some temporary peace? Oh yes, we are expecting sequel...

I like the first half because it's full of drama, wisdom (on both the "good" and the "bad" sides), and emotions gradually grow, as well as audience' awareness of what is happening. Forget about Jason Bourne, there are much more going on there, compared to which, an amnesic agent who is fighting to regain his identity looks just trivial.

Aaron Cross actually got "profit" from the Outcome program -- his less-than-average intelligence got improved. And he doesn't want to lose it, which makes him not look so "moral" -- he stays in the program just to stay away from a even worse life, while his recruiter, Byer, and even Dr. Shearing, believe(d) that they are serving their country, at least.

I feel that Cross started some casually romantic feeling towards Doc during the repeated visits for examinations. I mean, you don't really count the times you meet a certain doctor in a few years, unless you have some special feeling for him/her. And that near "harassing" lines inside the examination room...

While Doc started to look at No.5 in a different way when he was focusing on preparing a fake passport for her. Maybe that was the first time that she saw one of her "participants" really working in the field. There's the saying that "Man who is seriously working is the sexiest" (or some line like that), absolutely true.

The script is really "wide-open", in the sense that now anyone can add in another new program at any time. So there can be endless hunting, endless new agents/opponents, therefore endless sequels, if fans buy it. James Bond must get envious, cuz he cannot even kill a bad guy too fast sometimes but has to keep that for a future sequel. My only concerns are, first, now they've used up the idea of high-speed chasing and chaotic parkour in a crowded city, what other fresh things they can come up with next time? And second, since Aaron Cross has got permanently "infected", he needs the pills NO MORE, so the story actually needs the Doc NO MORE? hmmm that's a dangerous sign for a hero's lady in such a franchise...

P.S. An interesting finding: Outcome had 6 remaining agents when it started to be burned down to ground. We've known that 4 were killed (1 in Pakistan, 1 in Seoul which I believe is the one undercovered into N-Korea intelligence network, the lonely ranger who got "demoted" for falling love, and No.6 who is the black guy), No.5 a.k.a Aaron Cross managed to escape, so who and where is the last one? A thread for sequel? Hope they didn't miscount...

Roles in "Sai Lo Hid"

Sornram Theappitak as Khun Krai Peeriya (later Luang Krai)


Sattawat Doolayawijit as Muen Thip


Usanee Rakkasikorn as Mae Yuean (younger sister of Khun Krai, wife of Muen Thip)

Sorapong Chatree as Khun Pra Suwanracha ,Father of Daorueng

Banjertsare Yamapai as Khun Ya Nim (grandmother of Daorueng )

Metta Roongrat as Chod (cook in Daorueng's family)

Left: Kluay Choenyim as Tub (servant in Daorueng's family)
Right: Bee Matika Atthakornsiripo as young Daoreuang

Left: Yuwadee Ruengchai as Yuean (nanny of Daorueng)

Right: Worached Nimsuwan as Ming (servant of Muen Thip)

Kochakorn Nimakorn as Lamduan (elder sister of Daorueng)

Ekapan Banleurit as Luang Thep (husband of Lamduan, elder brother of Khun Krai)

Left: Nisakorn Yaowarat as Im (nanny of Mae Yuean)

Right: Chaiwarong Changkoed as Ma (servant of Muen Thip)

Prompong Nopparit as Chao Khun / Praya Peeriya (father of Khun Krai & Luang Thep)

Tanyarat Lohanan as Khunying Sri (mother of Khun Krai)


Panadda Komalatat as Mae Prig (mother of Muen Thip)


Roongrat Duangkwan as Puang (a mistress of Muen Thip's)


มาฬิศร์ เชยโสภณ (Neung Marit Choeysophon) as Duean (Luang Sena) (elder brother of Daorueng & Lamduan)

The Next Harry Potter? – “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief”

This is one of so-called “blockbuster” movies – Don’t expect too much in the storyline, acting or more complicated things, just enjoy the show. Most ppl will draw the wallet once they read the line of “from the creators of ‘Harry Potter’” on the poster.

Actually I have more knowledge in Greek mythology than “Harry Potter” – cuz I never read the original novels of the latter… So when I saw the three teens entered the “sculpture garden”, I knew that was the dungeon of Medusa. Here the writers are quite loyal to the myths – Percy killed Medusa by cutting off her head, just like his namesake Perseus did in “real myth”. Even the idea of “mirror” remained the same – Perseus used a shielf (given by Athena), while Percy used a more “modern” weapon. 

The “bad boy” Luke by Jake Abel looks more shining than the leading actor sometimes… He ended up in the Hudson River just because he didn’t have a “Big Three” father… Fortunately we will have him back in the sequel, “The Sea of Monsters”.

Another surprise in this movie is to see some actors/actresses of my flavor – Pierce Brosnan proved that he can be a good supporting role too; Kevin McKidd from “Grey’s Anatomy” is one of my recent favorites, and happy to see him as a powerful yet gentle Poseidon here; and Melina Kanakaredes from “CSI:NY” finally got a chance to portrait a real Greek beauty (named “Athena”) after her not-so-successful trial in the hot TV series several months ago (btw I heard that she wrote the story of that ep by herself… no wonder all of a sudden Mike was so attracted by her…), pity she didn’t get a chance to show off her language ability.

It is said that this series will be the next “Harry Potter”. Well, let’s see…

An Overwhelming “Buffet” – “2012”

There are only two questions that you need to ask for any doom-day movie: When it comes, where will you be and who will you be with? Anything else, like the special effects, humanity issues, religions, etc., are either pure technical things or things that could be covered by these two billion-dollar questions.

The profile of Roland Emmerich (a.k.a the director) actually decreased my desire to watch this movie: From “Independence Day” (1996), “Godzilla” (1998) all the way down to “The Day After Tomorrow” (2004) and “10,000 B.C.” (2008), it seems that the only thing increases is the ratio and tech level of those special effect shots in his movies. It was actually this poster and the name “John Cusack” (a.k.a the leading actor) that dragged me into the cinema.

The whole thing looks like a mixture of all disaster movies within the recent decade – You don’t need to be an expert to pinpoint the names like “Japan Sinks” (OK, if you haven’t watched this Japanese movie yet, go for it. I recommend the 2006 version.), “Titanic”, “War of Worlds” and Emmerich’s own “The Day After Tomorrow”. And of course, the Ark... It seems that Emmerich believed that if he could “extract” the classic scenes from all these movies and put them into one new movie, he could be able to create a more successful one. But what we see here is just an overwhelming “buffet” – we have everything, but we simply cannot digest.

Again a wrong role in a wrong movie for John Cusack. He could not even surpass Tom Cruise in “War of Worlds”. He should pick some more sophiscated roles to engrave his name onto some trophies.

And the writers of this movie simply “follow the rules”: Bad guys must be Caucasians; those supporting roles can find their peace in heaven so that the leading guy will reunite with his family and live happily ever after; and don’t forget these “popular” issues now:
1. BRIC: The fallen Christ in Brazil, Russian president and giant plane, the secret discovered by Indian scientist (and in India also), and China that makes the Arks.
2. Black U.S. president.
3. Brave U.S. firemen / firewomen
4. Tibet
etc.

Although, you should watch such a doom-day movie once every several yrs, just to think about those two billion-dollar questions, it’s good for your own sake.

P.S. Do you know the meaning of “Himalaya”?

Legend on the Stage – “This Is It”

Although I knew it is just a final milking from the cash cow by the production company, after watching this “Final tribute to MJ”, I still felt sad and sorry for his departure.

He belongs to the stage: Whatever he did off it, he just shines on it. Even without actually singing those songs (to protect his voice before the real show, as he said), his confident movements proved that he is really the “King of Pop”. Those 80’s costumes and movements might look “out” on anybody else, but just so “in” on him. And he is one of the only two ppl that can make the “black-shoe-white-socks” a fashion instead of a disaster – the other one is the late Bruce Lee. Now they can finally meet in the heaven.

And the stage belongs to him: As one of the two stage directors, he requests for perfection for every detail – echo, lighting, movements of the dancers, etc. The keyboard guy complains that “MJ knows every tone of every single one of his songs”. God knows that most singers have to recite the lyrics and stage positions before every single one of their shows… And I particularly like what he said to that young guitar girl when they were rehearsing for the duo – “It’s your time to shine!”.

Editing based on limited original video clips is never an easy job. (I did some trivial editing jobs recently, and that’s why I understand that.) This documentary really deserves an Oscar nomination for that. Come on, you cannot get MJ to come back and shoot for some additional cuts when you find out that you are missing them… Yup, I heard that some of the scenes were not by the “real MJ”, but, whatever…

There are so many songs that are important to me here: The anti-war “They Don’t Care About Us”, the save-the-planet “Earth Song” and “Heal the World”, the anti-discrimination “Black or White”, and a very special one for me – “Beat It” (cuz I performed this song in an aerobics way with some classmates back to the college yrs…). And so many classic movements: moonwalk, robot dance, “Billie Jean” (you know what I mean…), etc. Just like a “compilation”… After watching all these, you will have the same feeling as I do – why we have to lose him?!

Golden Ages Once More -- "Inglourious Basterds"

Again, I was attracted to cinema by Brad Pitt. Not Quentine Tarantino, cuz so many movies related to his name really disappointed me... Lucky for him, this time he made it right.


There are 5 chapters in this movie (literally), so I would take it more like a "compilation" of 5 short films which are somewhate related.

Chapter 1: The conversation between a French diary farmer and a SS officer (Col. Landa) almost single-handed consists of the whole 20 min, and even within a humble farm house setting! From now on we should pay attention to this name Christoph Waltz, who also brought us several other excellent scenes in the following chapters.

Chapter 2: This is like a brief for the team of "Basterds", in a close-to-Kill-Bill style. And I guess it's this chapter that made this movie got the "M18" classification in Singapore.

Chapter 3: The real story began here -- One leading female role Shosanna (Mélanie Laurent) made her official debut. And with the handsome German Ace sniper Fredrick (Daniel Brühl, who gained worldwide fame by "Goodbye, Lenin!"), I almost thought that this gonna be a "love in war" movie... Luckily, I was wrong. Another conversation (or interrogation?) from Col. Landa, with Shosanna this time, equally breath-taking.

Chapter 4: This chapter reminds me the "Where Eagles Dare"(1968). If you don't know what I'm saying, go find that movie and watch it. I'm pretty sure that Tarantino has already done that. BTW, although I cannot distinguish Munich and Frankfurt accents, I was strangely whispering "shit" when I saw the English Lieutenant gestured his three middle fingers as "3"... And I saw John Woo in the gun-fighting again...

Chapter 5: Shosanna's make-up scene with the 80's Disco music was a little bit "over", esp. when she walked out in a red-yellow-black outfit... The ending of Shosanna and Fredrick was a bit surprising, but surprisingly good. The distorted face and horrible laugh of Shosanna in the fire brought me the feeling of "The Phantom of the Opera"... And the final scene was actually within my expectation, I even wish Pitt could do sth "further"...

Like I said, you can find many elements of those classic spy movies in this one, and Tarantino's biggest accomplishment might be to make you walk out of the cinema laughing after seen so much blood and bloody things. He should thank Brad Pitt in particular.

The Magic of Sandra Bullock

She is not a “pretty girl” any more, but she still got the magic. After “Speed”, she got bad shots like “Speed 2” and “Miss Congeniality 2”, but she got more good ones like “Miss Congeniality”, “Two-week Notice” and the successful re-union with Keenu Reeves in “The Lake House”. This latest “The Proposal” could be considered as a “reversed” version of her “Two-week Notice” with Hugh Grant several yrs ago – you just need to change the boss from a guy to a gal, and of course, change the super assistant from a girl to a dude.

Sandra did quite a good job in playing “tough girls”, like the “wild cat” in “Speed”, and of course, the Tom-boy cop in “Miss Congeniality”. This time, she is once again, playing an icon for all OLs – the all-mighty editor in chief, a.k.a., “the witch”. While Ryan Reynolds is arguably the most handsome assistant ever, you could be daydreaming about having such a considerate assistant that can do everything from OT, bodyguard, party partner all the way to rush out to buy lady’s pads for you at midnight… The funniest thing is, he even drinks the same flavor of take-away coffee with his boss, cuz he’s afraid that he might spilt her share on the way to office…

The whole story is actually quite predictable – the female boss was forced to fake a marriage with her own male assistant, and they had to pretend to be a couple in love in front of the family members and friends of the dude. Jokes are everywhere, and I particularly like those ones that are quite close to our daily office work. Obviously most audience in the cinema shared the same opinion as mine.

BTW Sandra Bullock keeps fit quite well (although not quite sexy…), and when paired with the latest “Sexiest Man Alive”, the nude scene is pretty nice… Feel like that Ryan shares with Andrew (his role in this movie) in one common thing – they both married a powerful woman…

For the ending, everyone knows lah… Plus, the scenes in Alaska are gorgeous.

(This pic was used to make the cinema posters in Singapore, which I preferred. Wonder why I couldn’t find this version of poster online…)

Splendid Feast – “G.I.Joe: The Rise of Cobra”

“G.I.Joe” was the only “boys’ cartoon” I watched during my childhood. Now I could even hardly remember the names in it, don’t mention the stories. But the theme song still rings the bell – “G.I.Joe, G.I.Joe, …”. So I headed to the cinema as soon as I found this “beginning” movie was on.

Basically there are two “winning tricks” to make a real-life movie out of a classic comic book / cartoon: You can either make a much “deeper” (and most of the time, much darker too) story to attract those ppl that never watched the original ones, or just use tens of millions of dollars to “reproduce” those classic costumes, scenes and monsters so that the loyal fans will finally pay the bill. This “G.I.Joe” movie chose the second one, by piling up incredibly advanced weapons, incredibly CG effects and incredibly hot hulks and chicks. Don’t expect anything “abstract” or “reasonable” here – what you should expect is just a splendid feast for your eyes.

Channing Tatum is not good enough for my Duke, but anyway he is not doing much “solo” here (Marlon Wayans a.k.a. Ripcord definitely stole a lot of scenes from him), so I’ll just let it be. Sienna Miller showed me nothing but her sexy curves, and the most unforgivable thing is that she even could not make any chemistry with the Korean heart-throb Lee Byung Hun! On the contrary, Lee Byung Hun did whatever he could to make the impression, including showing his six-packs without any reason in his last scene (OK, I admit, there is one reason for that, the box office…).

To me, he did his Hollywood debut much better than his fellow Daniel Henney. Other baddies are just normal, no difference from other baddies in other movies. The only one that “popped up” is Arnold Vosloo (as Zartan, whom I believe that will have some bigger shares in the next sequel), because another “un-credited” role in this movie is Brandon Fraser (as a Joe trainer). That reminds me the “Mummies” series… Another name to take note is the young Storm Shadow (the adult role by Lee Byung Hun), Brandon Soo Hoo. This little boy is only 14 yrs old, with black belt in Taekwondo, fluent in English, Mandarin and Cantonese, and practicing Wing Tsun now. Could he become the next Bruce Lee?

Notable scenes of this movie:
1. The car racing in the streets of Paris. Although we all know that was not true, just use your imagination pls…
2. The fall of Eiffel Tower. You guys French must got some issue with Hollywood – There are quite several movies recently took this big guy down.
3. The attack of Joe’s under-water troops against the secret base of MARS. That reminds me the Pacific War era – the legendary Hornet and Yamato…

Scenes that could have been better:
1. The first confront between Baroness and Duke. Maybe they wanted to make Joe’s look more powerful, by portraying a group of useless commandos…
2. Fights between Baroness and Scarlett. Come on, two hot chicks are fighting! Can you show us sth hotter?
3. Fights between Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes. Again, we expect more skillful sword-plays. Even the laser swords in Star Wars 30 yrs ago did a better job.

And I can promise you that there is definitely gonna be a sequel. But I really got worried for the writers and director of this coming sequel – how would you make the story when you got Zartan in the office of xxx…

Era of Passion -- "Public Enemies"

That was an era called "The Great Depression", and now it's the era called "The 2nd Great Depression". That was an era that ppl hated the banks that "robbed" their money so that any bank robber could be a super star, and now its the era that ppl hated the banks that "cheated" their money yet the banks still gave huge bonus to their management staff. That was an era of passion, and now it's an era of re-creating such passion, on the screen.

Nostalgia colors, old-school microphones, 30's costume and settings, all these brought us back to that era. But I don't buy it that a Thompson semi-auto can be fired like a M-16, although the gun fighting scenes are awesome, esp the one in the Little Bohemia Lodge and the woods. We've been flooded by bombs, lasers, missles and other modern weapons, so when I heard the gunshots that resemble the real-life ones, it actually touched me more. The other thing I disagree with the camera-men is that why they couldn't just hold the cameras still? I felt like car-sick after the show...

Johnny Depp doesn't look quite like John Dillinger, neither does Christian Bale look like "Little Mel". Aside from the box-office, they earned their roles, I bet, most likely because they always dared to do some "extreme" things in their previous projects, like "Edward the Scissorhands" and "Mechanics". Depp is definitely the star of the whole movie, via the skillful acting that he used to portrait Dillinger from being smart, being aggressive, and finally being desperated. There is only one scene that I felt that he was "over-acting" -- The scene that Billie got arrested. Dillinger was actually surrounded by dozens of special agents, and he acted like he just wanna shout it out. Hard to believe that no one noticed such a strange guy there and just let him drive away like that... The scene that Dillinger visited Chicago Police Department looks quite weird, but I heard that it was based on reality. I just saw Depp walking around like a ghost, weird, but I kind of like it.

Compared to Depp, Bale was not that lucky, for his role, special agent Melvin Purvis, was just not the focus. This is not "Catch Me If You Can" after all.

Our "Dillinger Girl" Marion Cotillard could be hardly categorized as "beauty" in Hollywood. The most impressive scene is when Billie was tortured by that fat-boy agent. Besides earned some points to her career, she also earned a romantic scene with Bale here. ^_^

I actually don't quite like the director to put so much love stories upon Dillinger, but I know that's for the box office...

Better in School -- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

The first minute of this movie really lighted the fire: Flying together with the Deatheaters caused me feel like car-sick, and the collaps of the Millennium Bridge also brought some "Armageddon" feelings. But then the director seemed to recall the idea, and put the boys and girls back in the school, making the whole thing more like a high school movie. BTW I really don't like the arrangement of the love relationship among our main roles: Ron is too fat for Hermione, and Ginny is just too normal for Harry. I would rather make a H&H couple, and assign Ron back to his bitchy GF. Guess what? I also wanna add some spicy things here by making Drako and Ginny a "Romeo & Juliet" couple! Seriously, why didn't Rowling never think about that?

The later half of the movie made almost all of my friends sleepy, and no exception for me. If the whole thing is about some evil plot, it's obviously not that evil or complicated that we really need our brain cell to digest.

The new professor Jim Broadbent（as Horace）is average, but the mad woman Helena Bonham Carter (as Bellatrix) really drove me mad. There are some "formulas" to play a bad guy in a movie, but she definitely did not get it.

Finally, may the soul of Dumbledore rest in peace...

Older, and Nicer, Maybe? – “Duplicity”

When I first saw the poster and the trailer, I thought that it was a challenge to “Mr. & Mrs. Smith”, and with Julia Roberts on the board. But actually it looks more like a spin-off of “Ocean’s” series – tricks, traps and traveling.

The story-telling is quite nice though, with several pretty surprising turns. But I don’t like some points that were made so “over” – the “vulnerable” travel arrangement department, the messy “battle room” and those magic photocopy machines. In details like dialogues and body languages, these guys showed us some real stuff, and that is not only about Julia Roberts and Clive Owen, but also a full set of supporting roles. I particularly like the exaggerative speech by the CEO Dick (Paul Giamatti), which reminded me some “big bosses” I’ve seen.

Although not that necessary for the story, the scenes in Dubai, Rome, London and other multiple cities in U.S. are quite entertaining. As the big “coming back” of Julia Roberts, the movie company definitely paid a big bill. But shouldn’t the happy mummy tried harder to keep fit before bargaining about such benefits? And don’t even mention the obviously aged faces of both Roberts and Owen – ppl DO get old… Even with a slimmer figure (compared to “Children of Men” and “Shoot’em Up”), it’s quite hard to believe that these two can “seduce” anyone…

Rose In the Brambles – Sunshine Cleaning

Just saw Emily Blunt as the gorgeous and noble Queen Victoria in “The Young Victoria”, it’s really a bit hard for me to see her in a Gothic outfit playing a troubled-and-not-so-teenager teenager. Plus the silly vase from “Night at the Museum 2”, Amy Adams, this “Sunshine Cleaning” truly brought us quite some surprises.

Struggling single mother, troubled family members (tough-to-handle father, troubled son, even more troubled sister and a mother killed herself) and an affair with the detective in town who has already got wife and kids, every element here could be used to tell a nice story by Hollywood writers, and here they were so generous to pile them up! Some reviews compared this movie to the awards-winner “Miss Little Sunshine”, and I can understand that now. Life is tough, and even tougher for Rose here. Obviously the budget for this movie is quite limited – there is no special effect, no splendid stage setting, no fashionable costume, even no impressive music. With a bunch of no-so-famous actors (although some of them have earned some attention in recent yrs), the director was lucky enough to get a good chemistry among the crew and make the miracle to happen.

The mood is a bit over sometimes, like the scene that the younger sister Norah crazily shouting under a bridge and the one that Rose “spoke out” to Winston (the owner of the cleaning appliance shop) all of a sudden. I would prefer that Rose to be tougher here.
And since the scripts had been finished before early 2008, there were some “out-of-date” info in the movie like a “fantastic job” in real estate… The writers were not as smart as their colleagues working for “Transformers 2” that intentionally left the name of the US president blank and used the post-production to “fill in” the winner’s.

Another “surprise” is the little boy acting as Oscar, the cute son of Rose. The young actor, Jason Spevack, made his debut in 2003, while he barely started to walk by himself…

The Real “Ever After” – The Young Victoria

There is a rather unknown movie by the legendary Romy Schneider (in case you don’t know her, she is the Princess Sissi forever) about the same topic of this one. But that version is a pure prince-and-princess-style fairy tale: the prince married the princess, and they were happy ever after. And today, this movie is gonna show you some not-so-happy things behind the fairy couple and ppl surrounding them.

Basically almost everyone in the movie got a dark side somewhere: the mother that wanted to be Regent of her own daughter, the prime minister that wanted to use the young queen to defeat his political enemies, the uncles that wanted to use marriage to control the queen and even the whole empire, etc. But the only role that was doomed is Sir John Conroy, a.k.a the lover of the mother. The scenes that Conroy shouted at the young princess (later on the queen), grabbed her in the arms, and even tried to force her to sign the “Regent Order” seemed rather unbelievable to me – Can you imagine that kind of things happened in any sovereign country where the bad guy actually had no power (officially he was just the treasurer and housekeeper of the mother)? Several simple words from the queen could easily send him to jail or even the guillotine. And when you saw the scene that the queen happened to meet Conroy alone in the corridor shortly after the unsuccessful assassination, you knew what would happen next…

As the core of the whole story, the B-cast Emily Blunt showed the potential of another “Her Majesty actress” – not so good-looking, but always behaves like a noble, and just like what Victoria said about herself in the move, “stronger than looks to be”. We are so glad that we find a successor to Cate Blanchett. And standing by her is the rather C-cast Rupert Friend (although he looks quite like Orlando Bloom, this is the first mainstream leading role he ever got in a full-length movie). Actually he did a pretty good job, but for commercial reasons, we would prefer a better created face…

And as a historical topic (and even more, a royal topic), this movie showed us some interesting points of the royal life. Some of them had been well-known via other Victorian movies (like the Romy Schneider version), but others are rather novel, like the funny rule that Victoria must hold the hand of a maid whenever she stepped up or down the stairs, and when she was having a date with Albert (given it a walk in the garden or a chess play by the stove) there would always be a group of “companions”. Maybe we shall thank the consultant of this movie, the former wife of Duke of York, Sarah Ferguson.

Embarrassing Hybrid – Blood: The Last Vampire

Another movie adapted from popular comic books, this Blood: The Last Vampire (titled as Last Blood in Japan) combined the production team (including director) from Hollywood, beauties from Korea and Japan, and the stunt team from Hong Kong. But sometimes, a hybrid just could not be the perfect combination of advantages from all ancestors, but those shortcomings instead.
When you saw the “blood” syrup splashed everywhere in a 300 style, you knew that the director wanted to take the advantage of that classic movie. Unfortunately, he could not add any value to the once-successful style, but only acted like a copy-cat. And to make things worse, we saw those stupid Caucasians screaming and running around and doing stupid things, just like those victims you saw in every SAW or I Know What You Did Last Summer or Jason movies. Another scene that made me feel disgusted is at the beginning, when I saw a U.S. military camp with the Mt. Fuji in the background, in which there were so many “happy” marines, American chicks, etc. Come on, just think about what U.S. brought to the whole world these days, you could not feel anything “happy” here.

The stunt designed by Corey Yuen is not quite exciting either. Although he was a “classmate” of Jackie Chan, obviously he did not have the equal creativity as his junior. Fighting in the rainy streets and the forest could be more attractive. And since the two main roles, Saya (Gianna Jun) and Onigen (Koyuki Kato) were so slim, they seemed to not be able to control their own motions while being lifted up to the sky by wires. (The fact is, if you do not have enough strength in your waist muscles, you will most likely be “dancing” instead of “fighting” on those magic wires.) And there are several shots to satisfy the guys’ desire – I could see the black brief of Gianna…

Things I couldn’t understand:
1. Since the zombies could even change into the form of US marines, why didn’t they just use guns to kill Saya (she was killable by guns) or at least that silly blonde?
2. Saya kept talking to the old Kato in Japanese (although Gianna herself is Korean…), but always used English when talking to Onigen. I mean, Koyuki Kato (I hate to call her “Koyuki” only, cuz that’s also my Japanese name…) was good at English at all. The horrible Japanese pronunciation of English…

As Subtle As a Japanese Dish – Departures

When you heard the rough story of this Departures (or Okuribito in Japanese), and when you knew that this is a Japanese film, you just knew what you gonna see. Subtle emotions, subtle story-telling skills, and even subtler acting, are the trademarks of this kind of movies. Actually this movie kept reminding me of a lunch I enjoyed in a traditional Japanese restaurant in Kyoto: A whole set, including dozens of small bowls and plates was spread in front of me, and each one of them only contained a small amount of food, so that I could just tasted with a bite, not be stuck up (like a Subway sandwich normally does).

The topic about how an unemployed man got a new start with a new career is nothing new to Hollywood. The job of “Noukanshi” (literally “People put the corpse into the coffin” in Japanese) probably sounds rather OK to western ppl (thanks to those cute and cool guys work in the morgue in CSI series…). But to Japanese and other East Asian cultures, it is often considered as a “humble” job that only certain class of ppl or ppl in extreme needs for money will likely to do. Bare this in your mind and you will enjoy more when you watch the struggling of the leading role Ogoku (Masahiro Motoki).

How subtle can Japanese be? Take a look at the scene that Ogoku tried to wash off the smell from the corpse he just handled before going home. Hair, hands, ear holes, nostrils, and he even drank some water and “sneeze” it out from the nose! Japanese really never mess up…

Another thing that Hollywood should definitely learn from this movie is, no matter how “friend” you are with those cameo stars in your movie, cut them out whenever they are not necessarily needed. Those ppl playing the family members in sorrow or even the “corpse” are not just nobody in Japan, esp Toru Minegishi (the last “corpse”, and the actor himself actually died of lung cancer during the showing period of this movie in Japan).

And as a plus, do enjoy the music by Joe Hisashi.

P.S. The Japanese title of the movie, Okuribito, means “people send others away”. It is somewhat related to the English title “Departures”. As a Buddhist point of view, death is just to leave this world to another (and hopefully better) one. So the funeral is also a ceremony for “departure”. But the original novel that this movie was based on is actually called “Diary of Noukanshi”, and throughout the film they used the word “Noukan” (the action that put the corpse into the coffin) to indicate this particular job, even the name of the company “NK Agency” came from the initials of Nou-Kan.

Unsuccessful Extension of the Classics – Transformer Salvation

Terminator 1 & 2 are two classics: One showed us the infinite possibility of “time travel” in fictional world, while the other one introduced one of the most impressive robots in history. And of course those creative and bold stunts and explosions re-defined some “rules” of Hollywood movies. The third one in the line was a disaster: ruined the box office, and sent Schwarzenegger to the Governor’s office.

Now here comes T4, which used a different naming style, a brand new cast, and most attractively, a new actor in the leading role. But the script writers seemed to be lack of some imagination: The human-robot-hybrid looks not quite much different from RoboCop series, and the “mercury robot” just disappeared (maybe ppl nowadays know that could not possibly come true before 2018?). The non-stop bombing and stunts are quite exciting, esp. with the thundering sound effect, but we shall expect more from a T movie, right?

Some bugs in the story:
1. How John Conner suddenly became the global leader of Resistance? At the beginning he was just a member of the field team (a junior leader at most), but when the Commander gave the order to bomb Skynet, he could simply make ppl around the world to disobey it. Was he some kind of “Robinhood” here? Anyway he gained the leadership in this sequel, so we don’t need to worry about that in the next one, if there is any.
2. How could the Resistance maintain their super hi-tech communication channels when Skynet got the ability to destroy those satellites? Transmission stations above the ground are easily recognized, and mobile ones are too unstable. Don’t take your globally roaming mobile phones for granted…
3. Why Skynet did not just kill Kyle when they found him? If Kyle is dead, John Conner will not be born, so everything will be changed right? Keep Kyle and lure John Conner into the Skynet base looks just for the storytelling’s sake…

As for the actors, most look average. Christian Bale is the star, and Sam Worthington got an equal share too. But not like some reviews saying that Worthington “steals” the show, they actually contributed some pretty good scenes together. God knows how long we have been waiting for those real man-to-man scenes! (OK I know those journalists don’t like Bale, but over-praise Worthington is not good for him…) Anton Yelchin (as Kyle) is quite hot these days, like the most recent appearance in Star Trek as the genius Russian young lad. Moon Bloodgood must have mistaken the famous “sun-burn” makeup originally from Faye Wong (in case you don’t know, one of the most successful and famous pop queens in Chinese-speaking areas, who also always led the fashion trends until retired to family yrs ago). But as an ex-model for MAXIM, her performance as the wildcat-like sexy pilot was actually beyond expectation. And since she got a typical Asian face (got Korean blood), reviewers from Asia gave her a hell lot of praises, which I think is a bit over. Bryce Dallas Howard (as Mrs. John Conner) looks pale, not only because her role is pregnant. Why she took this trivial role when she actually got the talents to write and direct a full-length movie by herself?

Small vs. Big -- Night At the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian

There are some movies that did a pretty good job in small details, but failed in the big picture. The long-waited sequel of the big hit in box office, Night In the Museum 2, unfortunately joined the club here.

Ben Stiller's influance in Hollywood is obvious -- just look at the whole group of ppl he summoned for this carnival-like movie! It seems that he wants to make it another Ocean's series. But my suggestion is, next time, write the scripts yourself, Ben.

Similar to the original one, this sequel movie tells the "battle" in the biggest museum of the world -- National Archives of USA, located right in the heart of Washington D.C. We know that the story is predictable, but the effort of trying to improve that by adding a whole bucket of patriosim, a classic Hollywood version of "the man saved the day and got the girl", several pieces of funny talkshows (OK, they are NOT that funny, actually) and the most IN items such like the Jonas Brothers (but they really look cute... pardon me...), is not effective here at all. 99% of the audience are here for Ben Stiller, not a freak lady pilot crazy for whatever man she saw. I'd rather to see some more scenes about the little boy playing Ben's son.

Some jokes are too abstract for foreigners and even some Americans. The last scene about Motorola mobile phones is so ironic -- I'm pretty much sure that we will see this end of this once-holy brand quite soon.

Should-Not-Delete Deleted Scenes – Angels & Demons

I’m a huge fan of Dan Brown, esp Angels & Demons. So you can imagine that how excited I was when I saw its trailer in the cinema for the first time. But when I finally bought the ticket and sat back to enjoy the show, I grew disappointed only after 5 min – yes, with the scene that Tom Hanks on a “Vatican helicopter”, instead of the CERN’s super jet.

With limited length of the film (actually not quite “limited”, 2 hrs 15 min according to my watch), it is understandable that the director needs to cut off sth from the original book. But should that be those most important things such like the father-and-son relationship between Camerlengo and the Pope? If you’ve ever read the original book, you will definitely agree with me that this is the key to the whole story – why this young man killed his be-loved Holy Father and planned for the series of cold-blood murders. Without the key, you are just looking at a normal plot-of-murders movie (OK, a luxurious version maybe). Was it because of the pressure from the real-life Vatican Court? Otherwise I just couldn’t understand why the director chose to keep so many details about religion, history and arts while deleted the key. BTW sometimes I felt like that Ron Howard shared some common things with Dr. Langdon – they showed off a bit too much.

Tom Hanks finally got a decent hair-do, for God’s sake (literally here…). But Ewan McGreger still stole the show, even with so many scenes deleted – the Father’s gown is gonna be the Next Bit Thing in fashion industry for sure.
The only thing that the movie did better than the book – they really found a stature of “Angels-And-Demons”!

Pieces of Memory – “Star Trek”

I’m not a real Star Trek fan. When this classic TV series was being broadcasted in China, I only caught up with several episodes, here and there. My only remaining impressions about it are the skinny uniforms and the “flash away” of the Enterprise. But when the movie hit cinemas in town, I still decided to go watch it.
By telling how the main crew of Enterprise was assembled, it appears that we are expecting sequels… Guess the main cast signed some contract (like Harry Potter and Pirates of Caribbean series) to act in sequels… They look toooo old for the roles of fresh-grads! Captain Pike (by Bruce Greenwood) looks more like the captain of Enterprise in my memory. And see if you can recognize Winona Ryder…
The story is quite predictable: tragedy, grow-up, conflicts, reconciliation, revenge, etc. But I really don’t like the way that Hollywood writers handle the topic of “Alternative Reality”. Since the time of Back to the Future and Lost in Space, they’ve been continuously talking about “go back, change, and happy ending” stories. Well, I feel like that even people did travel back to the past, they should not be able to interfere with anyone or anything that existed in that reality, but rather be a pure “watcher”. Occasionally people in that reality could see some trace of those time travelers, and most likely they would treat such things as “oracle” or “miracle” and develop a whole bunch of religious stuff.
The music is not as good as the Star Wars classic, but the visual effects are quite nice, especially the scene that a whole planet collapsed into a black whole within seconds.