Category: Movies

Went to watch Munich with Antegra, DNG, Glendia, LilSneezy, PhatFreeza, and Chheang. You can watch the trailer here. IMDB users rate it a 8.0. The movie didn’t have much action, but told a very strong story, though it could’ve been shorter and it felt dragged out every once in awhile.

Spoilers:

The story revolves the incident that occured during the 1972 Olympics held in Munich, Germany. This was when the Israelites’ (Jews) and the Arabians’ conflict was in full fledge. The Arabs had killed off 11 of the Israel Olympic contestants. Israel decided they needed to fight back, but they couldn’t do it openly, so they created a team of 5 which will have no governmental connection and will complete 11 assassinations or as many as they could until the Arabs get the message.

Most of the story talked about the process and what went on their minds at that time. One of the most powerful thoughts was the fact that new people replaced those who got killed and the replacements were usually worse than before. The leader of this team could not see an ending to this and when 3 of his teammates died, he gave up on the rest of the mission.

The story was powerful, but does require somewhat of an understanding between Palestines and Israelites.

I didn’t know the movie was directed by Steven Spielberg until the credits started rolling. The cinematograpy was great. DNG noticed the shot of the twin towers at the final scene which was quite symbolic.

Went to Noodle World afterwards and Sueon joined us. We chatted stuff ranging from intelligent design to Microsoft’s Windows Live Local. It was quite fun.

The long awaited Schwartz production has finally been released:
比武 Beimo

Well, long awaited for me since I’ve been seeing clips every now and then whenever sschwartz puts it up online. I’ve got to say, this piece was beautifully done. All of the conversation is in Cantonese, though I’m not sure if that makes it more authentic or not.

Spoilers:

This film starts off with the scene where Japan invades China during WW2. However, the context seems to show that the Japanese were attacking Beijing and northern China, which I don’t believe speak Cantonese. However, the survivors later moved to Hong Kong, or so the story goes as they held fights on rooftops.

The story follows the life of a boy whose parents got murdered in front of his eyes. As he grows up, he can’t control the rage he has against the Japanese and always gets into trouble for getting into fights. However, he knows the anger inside of him is not good and asks for help trying to get rid of it.

The choreography was done really nicely and the story flowed well. The video editing was superb! The one thing I do miss is that many of johno’s scenes were removed, including my favorite falling to the knee scene. But I guess since you’ve never seen that one, there’s no point in trying to describe it for you. Another thing that would’ve been nice is a higher quality release. It was a bit hard to see everything at a 320×240 resolution. I was surprised of the adults that took part in it since this is the first time I’ve seen adults in it. By adults, I mean people who look like they’re fathers, but I’m guessing one of them is their Wing Chun master and the other could be a father of one of the actors.

Check out a more indepth review at Kung Fu Cinema. They’re actually on the front page as I type.

IdA (Identity and Access) had a morale event on Wednesday. We all got to go see King Kong! You can watch the trailer here. IMDB users rate it an 8.3. The movie was really nice and exciting at the same time, but wow, it was 3 hours long! That also equated 3 hours of not-working, since we went to watch the movie during business hours. It was pretty sweet. I got in that day around 11. Helped out a new teammate on how to use the Infocards UI. Then I went to lunch at 12pm with other Cal Bears. Got back around 2pm and left for the movie at 2:30pm. The movie started at 3, but that was just the previews. I’d say the movie actually started around 3:20 and ended around 6:30pm. Most of the people went straight home after the movie, but I decided to put in a few extra hours since I’ve really only worked for 1.5hrs that day. I put in another hour or so and called it a day.

Well, back to the movie. The movie was so beautiful and the animation and computer graphics were awesome! When compared to the Hulk, this was way better. I only used Hulk as a comparison since it also featured a large oversized gorilla, although that gorilla was green. The story was true to the 1933 depiction of th movie and the novel. There were actually 2 movies before Peter Jackson’s 2005 revision: 1933 and 1976, however the 1976 storyline changed a lot.

Spoilers

One of the 1st question people asked after seeing the movie was: “Did the original have dinosaurs?” That’s what I said when I first saw the trailer. Yes, there were indeed dinosaurs in the original 1933 movie. If you click on the 1933 link, you can clearly see King Kong battling a pterosaur. I’ve also uploaded a clip from the original: Spider Pit Sequence which clearly shows the triceratops on the other end of the log bridge.

Just a warning for those who are afraid of bugs and insects, you’re going to hate the Spider Pit Sequence in Peter Jackson’s redition. I actually saw people cover their face. And for those who have seen it, weren’t the worms awesome!?!?!

The battle scene with King Kong vs the 3 T-Rexs were also really great. However, I felt many of the scenes were dragged out a bit too long. The animation was great. The storyline was great. The movie overall was just a bit too long. It felt like the 1st Lort of the Rings in someway, but that had a reason for being long, it was trying to build up character development.

You probably know the rest of the King Kong story, so you don’t need me to explain it to you. I’ve also taken a liking to Naomi Watts. She’s really pretty.

Wathced Lord of War today. You can watch the trailer here. At first, I didn’t really know what to expect of this movie. I saw the trailer and knew the premise of it was about an illegal arms dealer. But what exactly was the story going to be about. It turned out pretty good, but I wouldn’t rate it as highly as the IMDB users, who gave it a 7.5. But I do have to give it to them for making a pretty neat poster.

Spoilers:

Nicholas Cage stars as Yuri in this movie as a Ukraine refugee who fled to America during the 1st World War or was it the 2nd. It doesn’t really matter. His family even converted from Catholics to Jewish to avoid being caught (from who, it wasn’t really ever clear). They own a little restaurnt and Nicholas Cage was always trying to think of easier ways to make money. Turns out weapons had the best margins. Not regular sellings to local gangs. Those were chump change and too much competition already. The margins were too low. The money was to be made from selling it to countries at war.

At first, his brother was in on it, but he got sick of seeing people get killed with the guns he sold. He decided to do cocaine to hide from his conscience, MAJOR SPOILERS [ but Yuri never figured it out until his brother gets shot to death trying to destroy the weapons some time later in the movie. ]

Actually, one thing I never got was why Yuri continued to do what he did? Was it because that gave him purpose? Did he not have compassion for the people that were getting killed? Right before his eyes? He had so much money at one point in time, I couldn’t believe he wouldn’t quit. Let’s backtrack a bit. He was in love with this girl since the age of 10. How he managed to get his dream girl to marry him and even have a kid is somewhat beyond me. I guess with money, it makes things a lot easer. Eva (his wife) isn’t really that demanding of an expensive life-style either. Eva never did question once what Yuri did. She told him she didn’t want to know. I guess ignorance is bliss. However, as an immigrant, Eva’s parents were also killed by civil war by weapons sold by arms dealer like Yuri.

All this time, there has been a detective after Yuri. Some interpol team led bye someone named Valentine. Also, sometime in the middle of this movie, the Cold War ended and the Soviet Union countries had so much arms in their arsenal, Yuri gave them a proposal they couldn’t reject.

Back to the quitting. Valentine had approach Yuri’s wife because after many years of tagging Yuri, he wasn’t able to get much dirt on him. Eva declined to help them and confronted Yuri about this. Yuri said he’d give up the arms deals and try living normally, but life was just not as exciting anymore. He was good with arms dealing and was invincible. The only thing that can hurt him or make him weak was his wife. After 4 months of quitting, Yuri once again returns to the arms business, which ultimately led to his brother’s death.

When he came back, he was under arrest because his wife had apparently gave him up after he went back in. However, the coolest part of the movie came in the next few minutes.

MAJOR SPOILERS:
Let me tell you what’s going to happen.
This way you can prepare yourself.
Soon there’s going to be a knock on that door and you’ll be called outside.
In the hall, there will be a man that outranks you.
First, he’ll complement you on the fine job you’ve done in making the world a safer place,
that you’re to receive a commendation and promotion,
and then he’s going to tell you I’m to be released.
You’re going to protest. You’ll probably threatened to resign.
But in the end, I will be released.
The reason I will be released is the same reason you think I’ll be convicted.
I do rub shoulders with some of the most vile sadistic men calling themselves leaders today.
But some of those men are the enemies of your enemies.
And while the biggest arms dealer is your boss, the President of the United States,
who ships more merchandise in a day than I do in a year.
Sometimes it’s embarrassing to have his fingerprints on the guns.
Sometimes he needs a freelancer like me to supply forces he can’t be seen supplying.
So, you call me evil, but unfortunately for you, I’m a necessary evil.

One thing that wasn’t ever made clear was… did he get AIDs? He did have sex with some random African woman and 1 in 4 of them has AIDs. However, it did mention he was invincible shortly after since some guy with an AK-47 tried to shoot him, twice, but both times the gun got jammed.

Went to watch The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe today with stanman, Richard, and Saran. You can watch the trailer here. The movie was fun, sort of like another Harry Potter for the Christmas season. I only read the 1st 2 of C.S. Lewis’ books and the 1st was actually read by my teacher. I wonder if the remainder of The Chronicles of Narnia will be made into movies. I don’t remember the story much anymore, but the movie did help me bring back some memories. IMDB users give it a 7.7.

Spoilers:

The movie was really beautiful, but the acting could’ve had some more work. Plus I hated Edmund, the little brother. I guess he was suppose to be the character to hate, but I didn’t hate him for betraying his siblings. I hated him because he was so stupid! The props and costumes were supposedly done by the same people who worked on Lord of the Rings, but this one’s more children friendly. The movie follows pretty closely to the story, or at least I think so.

I do have to say that Susan’s participation in the battle was so minimal, her character actually seemed unnecessary in the story, besides the fact they needed 2 sons of Adam and 2 daughters of Eve. The battle was a bit short as stanman stated, though it was a fun an interesting battle. Nothing to get excited over though. I also felt that Peter being able to fight so well was a bit strange and weird. Basically a lot of the movie didn’t make much sense, besides the fact it looked pretty and fun.

One of the biggest mysteries I had was about the handkerchief. Lucy first gave it to Mr. Thomas. Thomas then gave it to Beaver before he was caught. Beaver gave it back to Lucy. But in the end, Thomas gave it back to Lucy. How the heck did that happen? Goof in the storyline?

After the movie, we went to some pizzeria that served deep dish Chicago-style pizza. The pizza was good, but Zachery’s is a lot better.

Just watched Donnie Darko today. It’s quite an intriguing movie. Though it left a lot of questions unanswered, but deadlock says the Director’s Cut explains a lot more, so I guess I’ll be rewatching it. Actually, after discussing with deadlock, most of my questions got answered. In fact, it turns out I watched the Director’s Cut. Haha. You can watch the trailer here. There’s also the Director’s Cut trailer. IMDB users rated this movie an 8.3. You can get the DVD at Amazon.com or the Director’s Cut.

Spoilers:

The movie starts off with a plane crash and a sequence of events where Donnie Darko, the super hero of this movie, meets his imaginary friend Frank, a giant evil looking bunny, who saves his life. They only found the jet engine, but no actual plane crash and the jet engine landed smack into Donnie’s bedroom. However, Donnie is a sick boy with mental problems and he was sleep walking thanks to his imaginary friend. The story continues with an fantastic ending.

MAJOR SPOILERS TO FOLLOW!

Several of the questions I had included what would happen after Donnie Darko’s death. Would the timeline be the same? Or would it be completely different? I’d imagine that the plane crash would still have to occur since if the plane crash doesn’t occur, no jet engine would travel back in time, and no dead Donnie Darko. However, because of Donnie Darko’s death, he would not have a chance to burn down that Fear guy’s house. That will lead to the gym teacher not asking Donnie’s mom to take the dance team to compete, since the reason why the gym teacher couldn’t go was because that the she was a big fan of the Fear guy and wanted to be at his hearing or trial to support him. With Donnie’s mom not taking the dance team to the competition in LA, neither her daughter or she would be on the earlier flight home which became the plane crash.

One does wonder if the Fear guy operating the underground kiddie porn network would ever be revealed.

Another question I was wondering was what did happen to the mother of Donnie’s girlfriend. If you remember, she came looking for Donnie at the Halloween party saying her mom disappeared and the house was a ruin. One could only assume that the stepfather found them. Yes, the stepfather that stabbed the mom’s chest 4 times.

Another question was regarding Grandma Death. What was she waiting for? Was she really senile? Did she know that Donnie was going to give her a letter? Will she not wait anymore now that Donnie’s dead?

Also, the legend regarding Grandma Death hoarding a lot of money and gems, and the fact that the 2 punks actually tried to rob her on Halloween, leads me to actually think who she really is. They never elaborated much about her past besides that she used to be a nun, wrote a book called the Philosophy of Time Travel and became a teacher at Middlesex school.

“Cellar Door” was noted as the most beautiful phrase/words by the English teacher (played by Drew Barrymore). I actually think that it’s quite beautiful, but I wonder if any linguist ever really said that.

Welp, that being said, if you’ve never seen this movie, go watch it! It’s rated in the top 100 movies of all time!

One special note that the movie mentioned that I never knew was that Smurfette was actually a spy sent by Gargamel to infiltrate the smurf camp. According to Wikipedia: Smurfette, a female Smurf with more delicate features than the male Smurfs, was chemically created by the sorcerer Gargamel as obnoxious and with stiff, black hair. She was transformed through a spell cast by Papa Smurf, wearing a white dress, white high heels and having long wavy blonde hair (surgery in the comics). It’s a fact that I never knew. There’s jokes about how she’s the only female smurf and would mate with all the other smurfs to have babies, but apparently smurfs can’t reproduce. Baby Smurf (male-gendered) joined the village later, brought in by a stork, which increased the number of smurfs to 101. (The number eventually went higher as more Smurfs appeared.)

Went to dinner and movie with CDMCC and Elizabeth tonight. They actually treated me to a really nice fancy restaurant for taking care of Audrey (their dog) while they were away. We then went to watch Walk the Line, the movie about Johnny Cash. You can watch the trailer here. The movie was fun and had really funny parts here and there. It’s interesting because I’ve never heard of Johnny Cash till this movie came out and apparently he’s some hot stuff.

Spoilers:

There’s really not much spoilers. It’s just the life of Johnny Cash. How he started off, how he became a big star, how he got addicted to drugs, how he got off the drugs and the happy ending. That basically sums up the entire movie, but it’s the process of going through those that made it fun.

One of the more interesting aspect of his life is his father and brother. MAJOR SPOILERS! His brother died at a really young age due to some chainsaw accident. However, the older brother (Jack I believe his name was) was the favorite of the 2 boys because he was smarter and was more obedient. When Jack died, the father was so pissed and asked God why did he not take Johnny instead and proclaimed Johnny as useless and nothing. Even later in life, when Johnny got really famous, but started taking drugs, his fater still didn’t really acknowledge him and still calls him nothing, which I find very painful for anyone to take in, especially if your own father called you that.

I was looking for a Winston Churchill quote when I happened to see some Johnny Cash quotes because he happened to mention Winston Churchill in one of his quotes: I grew up in the ’40s and I heard all these great speeches, like Winston Churchill. His most famous, or infamous commencement exercise speech was one that consisted of seven words. He stood before this graduating class and said: “Never, never, never, never give up.”. The quote I found interesting was: My father was a man of love. He always loved me to death. He worked hard in the fields, but my father never hit me. Never. I don’t ever remember a really cross, unkind word from my father. Though the movie never mentioned his father beating him, I found it odd that it contradicts with the kindness of his father. Words like useless and being nothing are very harsh words, very very far from kind. I wonder if this was the author or director’s interpretation or if Johnny really took that as kindness.

Watched Dragon Squad (猛龍) today. You can watch the trailer here. The movie overall was quite fun, though I thought the side stories were a bit too much. In short, it’s about a team of 5 elite police officers from different countries forming a team, but… well, read the spoilers to find out more. After reading the credits, it turns out this movie was actually co-produced by Steven Seagal. *shivers*

While watching the movie, I had several thoughts. I’ve seen kidnappers chop off fingers and ears of their kidnappee and send them to the people they are ransoming as a warning. One question that popped into my head was, people can still hear without their ears right? So I messaged several friends: If your ear was cut off, you can still hear right? Just not as loud since you dont have that satellite dish thingy to direct waves into your ear hole. Most of them believed that was the case. Human ears are shaped almost like a parabola to get the most sounds. If you’ve done any geometry, you’ll know that a parabola directs all incoming lines into a focal point which is our ear hole or ear drum in this case. Our ears aren’t exactly the shape of a parabola, so I wouldn’t say it’s the most efficient, but it does a pretty good job.

One scene I thought was hilarious was that the chief was running with a cigar in his mouth. At first I couldn’t figure out what the thing in his mouth was since he was jogging and the camera couldn’t really focus, but as he came closer and closer to the camera, I was like OH! I just couldn’t really imagine someone running with a cigarette or cigar in your mouth. It’s like eating while exercising where it’s complete opposites.

Spoilers:

Movie starts out introducing 5 elite officers from different countries bringing in evidence to pin a international crime lord. However, during delivery of the crime lord to court, the police were ambushed by a team of elite veterans, also from different countries. However, they weren’t rescuing the crime lord, but this crime lord had a brother (another crime lord dealing in drugs and arms) that had something that belonged to them. As a gift to the brother, they sent him his ear (hence what sparked the discussion above).

The remainder of the story is about these 5 elite officers trying to catch this team of 5 elite veterans. Somehow their chauffeur comes into play and turns out to be the chief back in the days and after his entire team dying (sorta like in New Police Story), he went into a slump and was lost for many years. He finally came back, but would only do the little stuff like being a chauffeur.

Though neither of the teams seem that elite when they were facing each other. With over hundreds of gunshuts, no one would get hit nor wounded. And it was pretty much only a few feet apart. The ending was a bit weak too on how the elite team got tricked so easily and splitted apart. I’d have to say the ending was a bit rushed.

The choreography was nicely done and it was pretty fun watching it. It had a mixture of Cantonese, Mandarin, and English which was nice. For some reason, it really felt like New Police Story, but not as pretty nor as good.

Also watched Bad News Bears today. You can watch the trailer here. Movie wasn’t much, had it’s funny moments and somewhat touching moments. Sometimes you just hate Billy Bob Thorton, then other times you commend him for what he did.

Spoilers:

Trailer pretty much says it all. The coach is a drunk. The team sucks and hates each other. So how does a drunk turn this team around? Not much of a storyline. Ending was rather expected. But these movies are usually made to bring out a few chuckles here and there and that’s what it did. I still have no idea why the guy in the wheelchair joined the little league. Also there was a a guy on the team just so that he has something extra to put on his college application and told the coach that he could put him on the bench most of the time and that’s what he’d prefer. Their way to victory did feel a bit cheesy since as the other team said, it was really only Amanda (the coach’s daughter) and Kelley (some guy who has a grudge against another coach) that made the team good. The rest of the team was just so-so.