Movies: This Is It

I wasn't sure what to expect, but what I saw ... I loved. I really enjoy seeing the making of what would have been Michael Jackson's final tour. You see this brilliant perform who is only singing at a small percentage of what he is capable to conserve his voice, but still sound better than most people. Then you see a man who was 50 year old aided by LCD monitor with song lyrics because he was unable to remember all the words. I think the movie showed more of a complete depiction of the real Michael Jackson.

The only thing I would change about the movie is that it was too short. The two hours just flew by and I could have easily watched another two of the 80+ hours of recorded footage. I hope when the movie is released on DVD/Blu-ray that more footage would be included.

I think I will see it again on the big screen just experience it like I were a concert goer. I really recommend seeing this.

RIP, Michael

Movies: Angels & Demons

This past Memorial Day, I decided to head to the local theater to watch Angels & Demons. Out of all of the Dan Brown's books, I like Angels & Demons the best and I didn't want to see it ruined because I absolutely HATED The Da Vinci Code.

The beauty of the book was that it allowed the readers to figure out the clues as the story advanced. The movie, I felt, treated the viewers as not intelligent enough to figure the clues out, so they were illuminated on the screen for all to see. It was not a wise choice, and I think Ron Howard realized this and Angels & Demons had none of that ... thank Jeebus.

Even though I read the book, I still found myself engrossed in the movie. I think I like this movies more because they brought David Keopp to help write the screenplay with Akiva Goldsman (the bastard who ruining the Batman franchise, along with Joel Schumacker, by writing Batman Forever and Batman & Robin). I am still not sold on Tom Hanks being Robert Langdon and would have preferred someone like Dennis Quaid or Jon Hamm ... but they had to put butts in the seats so they went and bankable International star.

I recommend the movie, but you don't have to have seen The Da Vinci Code to follow the movie because Angels & Demons chronologically happened first, so there aren't any plot points or references to the first movie.

Movies: Sycendoche, New Yorl; Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom; Slumdog Millionaire

I saw a couple of movies over the past week, so I start off with the best and work my way down the worst.

Slumdog Millionaire


The movies about a young man's life and how he ends on the India version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." The questions from the show are answered from the flashbacks from his life as a boy. There some twists, but I will refrain from mentioning them. I highly recommend this movie.

Synecdoche, New York


I don't even know how to describe this movie because I only saw it once. To truly understand what was going on it has to be seen at least two times. Read Roger Ebert's review.

Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom


I watched this badly acted show on Logo, and was wondering how they were going to take that and make a movie. To their credit, they took badly acted TV show and made an equally bad movie that borders on being camp. The plot is so unbelievably contrived that there is so much drama happening at one time, but it's able to be resolved by the end of the movie. It's one of those movies that you have to force yourself to divorce yourself from reality to enjoy. The best thing about the movie for me was sitting the plush couches. YMMV.

Movies: Vicky Cristina Barcelona

I really enjoyed this movie. To me, the movie is about "love" and how the character's perception of "love" are different, yet they are all looking for the same thing ... a connection with someone. The connection can be physical, mental or emotional -- it has the same effect. Just when you think you found what you are looking for, you realize that you may have made mistake ... but making that mistake helps you realize what you are actually looking for.

Movies: Boy A

Boy A is a UK film about a young man trying to rebuild his life after some terrible events in his youth. In secrecy, he had relocated and is now living under an assumed name in order to be given a second chance at life. This is pretty much all I can say about the film without giving too much away. It is limited release and you should see it if it is playing in your area. It's kind of a downer movie, but it well made and very interesting.

The Last Mistress (Une Vieille Maîtresse)

I saw the trailer for The Last Mistress when I was at the Angelika to see Tell No One. The film was interesting, although a little bizarre. The film is about the love affair of two characters Ryno and Vellini over the course of ten years. Ryno is set to be married to Hermangarde, who is a virginal member of the French aristocracy, who is the complete opposite of Vellini. Ryno marries Hermangarde, but he continues his liaisons with Vellini. The end of film makes you ponder the question: who exactly is the last mistress?

Movies: Brideshead Revisted & Tell No One

Brideshead Revisted:


What's better than a British period costume drama? A British period costume drama with gay subplot, that's what. I enjoyed the film even thought I have never read the book or seen the 1981 TV series of the same name. The full extent of relationship between Sebastian Flyte and Charles Ryder wasn't clear from the film -- well, at least to me. Emma Thompson is all over this poster, but her role in the film rather limited. I guess once you win an Oscar, you can demand that type of thing. The film gets kind of slow near the end, but overall, it was good.

Tell No One (Ne le dis à personne):


I went to this French thiller on the suggestion of a friend of mine. This film is a murder-mystery about a man whose wife was murdered and 8 years later his is forced to revisit her death. From there, the film take many twists and turns that may leave you scratching your head. However, everything becomes clear and things make more sense at the end ... like most films do. The movie is two hours long because the story was so entriguing that the time just flew by.

Movies: Mamma Mia! & The Dark Knight

Mamma Mia!:


Mamma Mia! is a movie that didn't really draw my attention when I saw the trailer. When I saw a clip of Pierce Bronson singing (bless his heart) on The Daily Show, I decided that the movie was not for me. Yesterday a group of people decided to go see it, and I tagged along. And I am glad that I did. The first 10 minutes of the movie were really frantic and nothing really made sense. As it progressed it was clear that I had to stop trying to make sense of the movie and just enjoy the camp-y ride. Acting was okay, the direction was a bit off, but the ABBA songs made up for what the movie was lacking. I would recommend this movie but you can't go in with any expectation (even if you saw the play). Just go to have fun.

The Dark Knight:


The Dark Knight was really good -- but to me the movie isn't about Batman or Bruce Wayne. The movie was squarely on the shoulders of the late Heath Ledger. His portrayal of The Joker was riveting and Aaron Eckhart did a great job as Harvey Dent/Two-Face. My only issue with the movie is Batman. Christian Bale is a great actor, but he is stuck in a suit for most of the movie. He is also doing this weird raspy voice which is a bit distracting. When Christian Bale is Bruce Wayne he has very little to do, almost as if he is a supporting character. With that said, I still enjoyed the movie.

Why So Serious?

I just bought my ticket for a tomorrow morning showing of The Dark Knight. I found this iPhone App where you can Joker-ize your photos. Just thought I would share.

Movies: Hancock, Wall-E, Wanted, The Incredible Hulk

I decided to use the long weekend to see movies that are on my viewing list. With my buddy Paul visiting from Toronto, Onatrio, Canada, in tow we headed the local multiplexes to take in what Hollywood had to offer.

Hancock


I was really excited about this movie because I am a fan of Will Smith, and I was in downtown LA when they were filming some of the action sequences in July 2007. Unfortunately, the movie did not live up to my expectations. The basic premise of the movie was interesting, but the executed was really poor. The acting was sub par, the direction and special fx weren't the greatest, and the storyline wasn't focused. Hancock becomes a very different movie during the second half and the real story should have been PR makeover by Ray Embery (Jason Bateman) and how Hancock handles being the toast of LA. Instead we get a weird, complicated relationship between John Hancock and Mary Embery (Charlize Theron) that doesn't really pay off in the end.

This is not a typical Will Smith considering isn't the stereotypical "good guy" and he uses expletives throughout the movie. Sure, it made a lot of money over the long holiday weekend -- but the movie lacks quality. If you want to see this, I say wait until it comes on DVD.

Wall-E


Wall-E is another movie I was excited to see. I never seen a Pixar movie in the theaters because I didn't want to be the oldest person there without a child. The premise of a movie that stars a robot that doesn't talk was interesting. There is very little dialogue for the first 40 minutes of the film but the robot Wall-E was anthropomorphic character with it is actions and expressions, that you forget that it isn't talking. The movie was odd due to the anti-corporate tone, considering it is being distributed by Walt Disney Company. The movie was really enjoyable with a great message. It is another Pixar classic, even though it is very unconventional. The visuals were amazing and it should been seen on a IMAX or DLP screen, provided that you have either in your area.


Wanted


I didn't plan on seeing this movie, but I heard good things from people I know so I decided to check it out. At the beginning of the movie, I thought I would hate the movie but after 10 minutes I really get into the story. The best parts of the movie is hearing Academy Award winner Morgan Freeman drop the f-bomb multiple times. I see Morgan Freeman as a elegant guy with this regal presence, but hearing him curse made me like him even more. The movie lacked some back story on the assassins known as "The Fraternity," but it succeeds at being extremely entertaining.

The Incredible Hulk


I am not sure whether or not that this movie is a continuation of the first Hulk movie, directed by Ang Lee with Eric Bana as Bruce Banner, or a total re-imagination of the possible franchise. Ed Norton is new David Banner but this new version is nothing like the first.

Hulk is more of an origin story on how David Banner became the Hulk; and The Incredible Hulk is how Bruce Banner is looking to get rid of alter ego. Hulk was more emotional and gave more depth to each character, the new version doesn't really care about character development and just blows things up indiscriminately. These are two different movies with the same main character, but I much prefer the first Hulk movie because it felt like a comic book come to life and had a cohesive story. I didn't hate The Incredible Hulk but one thing bothered me -- why was the Hulk only about a foot taller than the character played by Liv Tyler? [edit: Hulk is only 7ft tall, so this makes sense.] If you plan on seeing The Incredible Hulk, I recommend seeing Hulk as well.

Movies: Eastern Promises

I saw this movie this past Saturday, and I must say that I was quite impressed. The only David Cronenberg I saw was "The Fly" with Jeff Goldblum. I've been meaning to see "A History of Violence" for while now, but I have since added it to my Netflix movie queue because of this movie.

Plot Summary via imdb.com:

The film follows the mysterious and ruthless Nikolai (Viggo Mortensen), who is tied to one of London's most notorious organized crime families. His carefully maintained existence is jarred when he crosses paths with Anna (Naomi Watts), an innocent midwife trying to right a wrong, who accidentally uncovers potential evidence against the family. Now Nikolai must put into motion a harrowing chain of murder, deceit, and retribution.

I went with some people who felt that the pace was a bit slow, but I don't feel that way. The film's pace is perfect because it allows the audience to get pulled into the story. The film is, at times, very brutal with its depictions of volience. Oddly, what I like most about Easter Promises is the brutality with the absence of guns. There are a couple of very gruesome scenes, but in the film, it seemed to be necessary in order to give the audience a bit more insight of the characters.

Nikolai's (Viggo Mortensen) fight scene near the end of the film is done completely nude with full frontal nudity. In context, the nudity seems incidental and it barely took me out of the film. The nudity seemed necessary.

The end of the film didn't feel like an ending ... if anything, I felt the movie was too short. I think there was a love triangle between Nikolai, Anna (Naomi Watts) and Kirill (Vincent Cassell). There were a lot of homo-erotic undertones with Nikolai and Kirill. When Anna seemed to get the attention of Nokolai, Kirill got weirdly possessive. I was very intrigued by relationship between all of the characters.

If you aren't terribly squeamish, you should see this movie.

I Will Make A Fool of You .... TOP THAT!

I was singing (well...rapping) "Top That!" in the shower yesterday for some strange reason. I remember watching Teen Witch with my best-friend from elementary school in his basement, and dozens of times on HBO over the years. Even thought I haven't seen the movie in years, I still know 95% of the words. So when I found this online today, I had to post it.

Teen Witch, for me, was like Showgirls at the time I saw it. It was so bad, that it was so good. I still can't believe that this movie got a PG-13 rating considering that there is a sex scene and a scene where 10 variants of the word penis (in rap form)is used. I never heard of the word "schlong" until I saw this movie.

My second favorite song of the movie, "I Like Boys":


I love it when people randomly start dancing and singing in unison for no apparent reason.

13 days later ....

I am alive and well, just have been really busy with a bunch of things. I will give a brief rundown of what I have done since I last posted.

Parties: Pool party, House-warming party, Tennis viewing parties
Going to the Movies: The Bourne Ultimatum, A Death at a Funeral, Hairspray
Watch TV shows on DVD: House, M.D - Season 2, Footballers' Wives - Season 1

I have been also working a tennis tournament website which required me to build a online registration system using PHP and MySQL. It has been a while since I've coded so it took a bit of time but it is finally up and running.

Speaking of tennis, I had a tournament August 10-12 and I ended up placing 2nd. I lost to a guy that beat me once before. His style of play frustrates me which causes me to commit a lot of unforced errors. I have 4 tournaments scheduled between now and December, so I have tighten up my game so I can end my 3.0 career on a high note before I move up to 3.5 in January.

I return to regular posting this week and hopefully finish my Road Trip 2007 posts. In order to finish them, they will be shorter with less detail. I will just get to the good stuff.

So I am fine (for those who were worried) and doing well.

I may have a new crush developing but I am not quite sure if there is any interested on his part. There is something keeping me from exploring it further: he's in the military. This guy invited me and a select few to a pre-Labor Day BBQ. So I will test out the waters.

Movies: SiCKO

Last week I got to see Michael Moore's lastest "documentary" film SiCKO. I didn't hear much about this film until there was a controversy about Roger shooting parts of the film in Cuba, which cause him to be investigated by the US Treasury Department. Also, a master copy of the movie was stolen and place in the Internet a couple weeks before the scheduled release. This prompted conspiracy theorist to believe that this was done deliberately but the Bush administration. I don't know that, but any way you see it, it is a good film.

The film shows how the privatization of health care in the United States compares to (universal) national health care systems of countries like Canada, England, France and Cuba. After see how other industrialize nations treated their citizen in terms of health care, I walked out of the theater feeling disenchanted. Watch the trailer:


The film is humorous and informative, but it also has heartbreaking stories of health insurance battles people suffered through which in some cases lead to the death of a loved one. It's shocking.

I have been lucky enough in my life to have alway have some type of health insurance. I've had surgery twice to remove Chalazions from my eyes: once under general anesthetic and once under a local. My mother's insurance covered nearly all of costs.

The only time I haven't been covered was when I moved from Buffalo, NY to Dallas, TX and I was in the process of looking for work. When I became eligible for health insurance at my currently job, I went to a doctor to an annual check-up and was told that all of the procedures where covered (excluding a $20 co-pay). A couple of months later I received a bill for almost $400. I shocked because my friend had the same check-up that I did (same hospital, same doctor, same blood tests) and he was only charged his co-pay. This was a year and a half ago, but I am scared to go see another doctor because I am not sure how much will cost me.

I always thought that if anything serious happened to me I would be okay because I got health insurance. Now, I am not so sure. I am plotting a move to another country with national health coverage so I could have only less thing to worry about. Since gays can marry in Canada, I might end up there. As I type this, I feel the onset of a severe cold and I am taking Zicam to help lessen the symptoms. I hope I don't lose my sense of smell as a result.

Any (preferably gay) Canadians looking to get married? I need to see a doctor.

edited: because Michael Moore made this film, NOT Roger Moore. What the hell was I thinking about? Thanks for the correction, Anonymous ... if that's your real name.

DVDs: Glitter (Rifftrax version)

I love the movie Glitter for all the wrong reasons. I never thought I could love it more, until it yesterday with Rifftrax.

[source: Rifftrax.com]
Rifftrax is the brainchild of Michael J. Nelson. Michael J. Nelson was the head writer and host of Mystery Science Theater 3000 during seasons 5-10, and a writer of show since it premiere. I have been fan of Mystery Science Theater 3000 for many years and it is good to see some of the actors and writes from MST3K participating. Mary Jo Pehl (seen above giving her best Mariah face), Kevin Murphy (voice of Tom Servo), Bill Corbett (voice of Crow T. Robot) have all provided commentary for Rifftrax.

Click here to view a sample of Rifftrax'd version of Glitter.

Movies: Spider-Man 3

To be quite honest, I didn't know Spider-Man 3 was opening on May 4th, 2007 until about a week prior. I remember seeing all of the promotion for the movie but I never paid attention because I didn't want to have the movie spoiled for me. From my quick glimpses I thought the movie was going to be really dark -- the mood to match Spider-Man's newly acquired black costume ... but it wasn't. The movie turned out to be far worst than I imagined.

I will try not to spoil the movie for those who may be reading, but here are a list of my grievances:

1. There was far too much crying from all of the characters.
2. Sandman was real let down. He only had about 10 lines in the entire movie, which I think was done on purpose to setup a possible spin-off movie.
   
3. Venom is only in the movie for about 20 minutes (another possible spin-off) with hardly in background information.
   
4. The film was a live action cartoon instead of superhero drama/origin story like the first and second films.
5. The action scenes were very boring and some seemed like they were recycled from the previous movies.

Spider-Man 2 > Spider-Man 1 > Spider-Man 3, in my opinion. This movie cost in the neighborhood of $260 million to make, and it has broken many records (highest one-day gross, highest weekend gross, etc...) but I don't think it was money well spent. I will assume that most of the money went to the CGI production which looked a bit fake and wasn't really used effectively.

I don't know what went wrong with this highly anticipated movie. I am thinking that Sam Rami's involvement in the writing of the movie have been its downfall. The was some weird hybrid of Spider-Man and Evil Dead (there was far too much of Bruce Campbell), which perverted the feel of the movie. I don't know. Maybe I was expecting too much after the very well done Spider-Man 2, which set such a high bar for any future superhero movie . I guess I was doomed to be disappointed.

With all that said, I can't recommend this movie to anyone to see in the theater. Wait for the DVD and watch it at you leisure.

DVD: Dreamgirls

My DVD of Dreamgirls arrived from Amazon.com today. Luckily I have dual monitors at work, or else I won't be able to get anything done. I will have to watch the movie this weekend.

Movies: Hot Fuzz

This past Tuesday, I had a free ticket for a preview screening of the movie Hot Fuzz.

I was looking forward to seeing this movie since I really enjoyed Shaun of the Dead. When I went to go see Grindhouse this past Saturday, I saw that they were giving away free passes and I grabbed a bunch to distribute to some of my friends. Sadly, I was the only person who attended the screening because it conflict with my tennis club's play session.

I arrived at the theater 30 minutes early and the it was packed. When I went to look for seats, there was nothing left but seats in the first and second rows from the scene. At first I was not happy, but when I sat in my chair (located in the second row on the left-hand side) I found that my view of screen was actually rather good. The only trouble I had started when I decided to be a nice guy when I moved over a seat to allow a couple to sit together. I regretted my decision 10 seconds later.

THEY WOULDN'T. STOP. TALKING!

She was a purported screen writer, and her companion (husband? boyfriend? friend?) was an alleged actor. I swear, I never wanted to chastise anyone in a theater for talking before more than these two. The movie was so good, that I decided to not make a scene.

Hot Fuzz is a lot of things, and dull isn't one of them. It's a cop drama-action-mystery/whodunit comedy ... if that makes any senses. My favorite thing(s) about the movie is how mundane tasks are give a sense of heightened drama to them. The opening a dooring is done in a fast-zooming camera motion accompanied by a swooping, bass filled sound effect. It's hard to described, because I am horrible writer, but if you have seen Shaun of the Dead then you know what I am getting at. If you haven't seen Shaun of the Dead, rent it immediately.

If the movie is in your city on April 20th I recommend that you see it.

Movies: Blades of Glory & Grindhouse

Blades of Glory

Let me say this ... I am not the biggest fan of Will Ferrell, but the movie looked interesting and I was on the fence about seeing. It wasn't until I saw this picture that I knew I had to see it:


I have a big crush Will Arnett and I have liked Amy Poehler since her Upright Citizen Brigade days, so the picture above compelled me to see this movie. Alas, the movie was not good. There were a few good jokes, but they were few and far between. Anything with Amy and Will was hilarious but everything else fell flat. I wouldn't recommend seeing this movie in the theaters.

Grindhouse


This movie was awesome. I was expecting to leave the theater at some point during the 191 minute movie, but I couldn't leave because I didn't want to miss anything. The faux trailer for "Machete" (which may actually become a real movie), Robert Rodriguez's "Planet Terror" starring my other crush Freddie Rodriguez, the faux movie trailers, and Quentin Tarantino's "Deathproof" were just a spot on throwback to the exploitation movies of the late 60's and 70's. In both films I loved the uses of bad continuity, missing reels, and poor lighting found in most B-movies.

But which movie is better?

The movies complement each together well, but for me, I think I like Tarantino's "Deathproof" a bit more than Rodriguez's "Planet Terror". There is far less action in his film, but there is more character development and great Tarantino dialogue to enjoy which all builds up to a great car chase scene.

These movies are best enjoyed on the big screen. It is a must see.

Movies: Premonition

When I saw the trailer, I had a premonition that the movie would suck ... and I was right.

The Greek and I went this past Friday, and I was actually had high hopes for the movie. Too bad the trailer showed me everything interesting about the film and for most of the film I was commenting how pretty Sandra Bullock looked. Seriously. Her bone structure is amazing. But her looks didn't distract me enough to overlook how contrived and convoluted the plot of the movie was.

My major issue is the lack of continuity with the time-space shifts.

[****SPOILER ALERT****]
How time shifts in the movie:

Thursday(husband dies), Monday(husband alive), Saturday(husband's funeral and older daughter has scars on face), Tuesday(husband alive and daughter goes through glass window requiring stitches)...

By my logic the daughter should have scars on face the day the dad dies but she doesn't for some reason. Possible parallel universe?

Sandra Bullock's character listens to a message on the answer left by her husband apologizing for something but is interrupted by another call. The person on the other line ... Sandra Bullock. So there are two Sandras existing at the same time? How can the husband call between parallel universes? His cellphone bills must be high as hell.

This movie doesn't make any sense logically. I tried to like this movie but my brain still hurts with all the inconsistencies. Rent The Lake House, also starring Sandra Bullock, which uses a time-space shift as the plot device but it does it far better.

It is probably a good rental on DVD, but don't waste your money seeing this in the theater.