任是无情也动人

First, disclaimer - I'm not actually 100% sure the download I watched was actually the same Disney's Earth that played in theaters. Apparently there was another version made earlier in England but had a different narrator. So, I dunno, even if it was the original film from England, everything except the narration was supposed to be the same as the actual theater one, and I didn't watch it for the narrator anyways, so I guess it still counts...

( The good, the bad, the different )

Overall: If you love shiny and cuteness, go see it. If you care about the science, go watch National Geographic instead to get it out of your system, then turn off your brain and go see it. You'll never be able to see a real documentary reach these levels of eye candy. I take that last part back, since they apparently swiped the scenes from BBC.

WTB DVD rip/BT download of BBC series...

Overall, I was pretty disappointed in this film. It didn't live up to the expectations set by DaVinci Code at all. I think they were trying to much to make it into a(n average blockbuster) "thriller" and forgot to include many of the elements that made DaVinci Code good - the riddles, the problem solving, the complicated plans, the outrageous daring on the parts of the protagonists...

( Specifics )

link to cashew's reviews

Background:
赤壁 (Chi Bi) is supposed to be a remake of the famous battle in the middle of the Three Kingdoms period. I heard from somewhere that it's one of the most expensive movies produced in China to date - although, it's hard to tell where all that money went. The director claims that he was trying to move away from the ROTK standards and stereotypes that was set by the classic novel of the Ming Dynasty and the original TV series, and instead be more faithful to the historical documents on the era. Unfortunately, his attempts seem to have failed.

Overall Impression:
In my opinion, Chi Bi is the Chinese equivalent of Troy. A purposeful maligning of classical stories and history with modern "reinterpretations" and Hollywood flash-over-substance. And worse still, it's apparently only the first movie in a duology or even trilogy (cuz I certainly can't imagine them being able to finish the story in just 1 more movie given the pace the storyline is moving). The characters and characterizations have been modernized and "humanized" to their detriment, and have lost many of the qualities that made these characters into cultural heroes in the first place. In the end, the movie leaves the audience (as long as they are not ignorant of Chinese culture and history) with the impression that the Chinese filmmakers have sacrificed their own cultural heritage in order to make a film through the eyes of the modern western world on one of the most famous times of Chinese history. And that is just sad.

( More wall of text )

Absolutely hilarious. From what I recall, PIXAR has never yet disappointed me.

I mean, how can you go wrong with a huge chubby panda as your main character? Especially one that apparently is a masochist.

Although I think all of the characters are adorable. The sifu... (uh, I still can't tell if he's supposed to be a rat or some other rodent; someone tell meeeee) is also adorable when he's getting the "mystical kungfu" grief from *his* master. The flashback to baby Tigress and baby Tai Lung just makes me go *squee* and want to hug them and kiss them and call them-- ahem. ^^;

Mantis' "skills" at acupuncture is great, especially in the end credits. Poor crane is so put upon; must suck being the only one who can fly and thus get turned into transportation. Though, ok, it's not like Mantis had it any easier being left as the only one holding up a freaking rope bridge while everyone's jumping on it.

Snake is awesome. I think it's incredible how they can get the CGI to do that - animation that looks like kungfu without the benefits of any limbs.

(It makes me think of the trailer for the Star Wars animated movie that was in the previews. In comparison, that movie seems to be made with action figures for all the facial expressions that you can see on the characters. Lucasfilm, I'm afraid that animation is really not your strength. Then again, I don't think that franchise will lack of viewers regardless. *rolleyes*)

As for the story... ok, some parts of it were cliche, sure. But the humor that it was all done in makes up for it. And there were quite a few original things about it. How master turtle started the whole ball rolling with his prediction - so very Greek Tragedy. The messenger goose was the most Chinese of the whole cast - typical court bureaucrat. And the best thing about an original story is, it wouldn't have to endure being compared to much greater classical works (Forbidden Kingdom I'm looking at you).

Anyway, great movie. Must watch. And I need a panda icon.

Okay, first thing I need to tag on is that I'm going to be rambling freely about the movie, so there may well be spoilers in this entry for anyone who doesn't want to be spoiled (mindboggling as the thought might be for as well known of a story as this).

( Read more... )

I was out running errands today and walked past the theater and thought: "why not"?

( The Review. Spoiler warning. )

Well, I'm sure there are other issues I had with the movie, but these are the ones that come to me right now... I'll edit others in if they come to me.

So cashew and I had a girls day/night/day out yesterday and today, our last day(s) of freedom before classes start... tomorrow. *sobs*

Anyhow, we rented three videos from Blockbusters yesterday evening - "Big Fish" and "Once Upon A Time In China" I & II. This afternoon we saw "Hero" in the theaters. So yeah, reviews are as follows:

( Big Fish review )

( Once Upon A Time In China review )

( Hero review )

Making up for old news that I was too lazy to write about previously...

On Saturday I met up with two of my friends from high school. One also goes to Berkeley and I believe is doing a business/math double major. The other is home on break from UC San Diego, where she's also doing an engineering major like me. The latter friend was meeting up with me for a quick lunch and then seeing movie; her little sister and another friend's little sister were tagging along for the movie. The friend from Cal was just meeting us for lunch.

Anyhow, since I don't want to have to put this entry under friends-lock, I won't name any names or go in too deeply about our lunchtime conversation.

The movie we saw was Spider-man 2. And I have to say that my overall impression of that movie has been very similar to my reactions of most previous Marvel movies with the sole exceptions of Xmen and sequel.

( Spider-Man 2 review )

So I went up to Cal yesterday for a fun day out with cashew now that she's back from China. Though, in retrospect, I guess we should've waited until after she got rid of her jetlag. Oh well, I guess sleep just such an overrated commodity. :p ^^;;

We had lunch at Gypsy's. It's been a long time since we ate there. They still haven't lost their touch. Yummy and filling entrees. Cashew got a veggie dish and I got a seafood dish. Mmmm... calamari & mussels. :)

Then we went to B&N for a while. I skimmed a few manga volumes - nothing that good, though I did get halfway through the first volume of Fruits Basket, which seems rather interesting. Maybe I'll follow up on that series later. Cashew was trying to reread Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but she was also in a constant struggle against good 'ol sleep. :p

After that we went to Oaks Theater to see the 3rd Harry Potter movie... only to get there to find that they're not showing it anymore. Grr. Bakas. So why did you still have it listed up on Yahoo!Movies?! So instead of watching the movie, we took a stroll through the nearby Half-price Bookstore (they didn't have any of the textbooks for our Philosophy class) and then grabbed something at Jamba Juice before taking the bus back to the downtown Berkeley. (Oh, and because I don't have a Class Pass anymore, I had to spend $3 roundtrip for bus tickets. Geez.)

So we went back and ended up watching "I, Robot" at the UA Theater instead...

( I Robot review )

( FAKE manga review )

Anyways, after we were done with the manga, we had pizza for dinner at Blondies before I went home. Not a bad day, all-in-all. ^_^

Right, so I was out for the most of yesterday. Woke up late, had lunch, then went to the movies to see Shrek. Then I holed myself up in Barnes & Nobles until their closing time before dragging myself back home again. A good day, all in all. ^_-

( Shrek 2 )

( Hyperion/Fall of Hyperion )

Well, this morning just dragged on and on. I got up early so I can finally get ossian's bday present mailed. Managed to get out of the house at like... 8:30 or so.

Spent ~2 hours just figuring out *how* I was gonna do this. What with packaging and boxing and whatever. I think I spent maybe 1 hour of it in the car just wrapping/packaging. Maybe 15-30 minutes of that time was spent on the road... specifially, spent on getting lost on the road. Driving by memory for me isn't really a good idea, even in my home city, which is a really really sad testament to the state of my memory. ^_^;;

Then spent half an hour or so in line at the post office and then sending the sucker off. I used express mail, since I spent so much time on the thing already that I might as well make it worth my time. This means that it'll get to the destination really fast (hopefully). It *should* get to Edmonton on Monday, or at least that's what the ads claim. But at the very latest it ought to get there by early next week. I think you may have to sign for it though, ossian, so let's hope it gets there when you're home, else you might need to drop by the post office for it. :p But hey, at least it'll get there on time.

After that I decided that since it's close to noon, I might as well grab some fast food and go see a movie. Since I figured there'll be eateries next to the theater, I went there first...after some more confused directions and driving (*sweatdrop*). Got a ticket for the 12 o'clock Harry Potter 3 showing, which left me with like 30 minutes to run down a block or so to Burger King and grab something to go. I finished a small chocolate milkshake on my way back (it's really hot out today) and managed to sneak in a to-go bag with a 8-pc box of chicken tenders to the theater. I'm so bad. :p

( spoilers ahoy for the movie )

Well, that's enough yakking for now. I'm pretty much out of stuff to say. Hope that review was informative. Maybe I'll go see Shrek 2 some other time.

Heh. The Slayers movie was very amusing. ^_^

Interestingly, I think they did an excellent job with the voice cast. The DVD I got has both the Japanese and English voice version, with options for subtitles and stuff. I actually think that the English dub made more sense (ie. is more understandable) from a viewer's/plot point of view than the English subtitles. The main characters sounded pretty alike in both the English and Japanese version too. Well, they kept Nagha's laugh the same (ie. annoying) anyhow.

The movie isn't an animation/music masterwork with depth of content like "Ghost in the Shell" or "Princess Mononoke", but it is highly amusing and a great popcorn movie to giggle over with some friends.

And speaking of "Princess Mononke", I loved it too! ^_^ Wonderful, wonderful characters who are very well developed. None of that 2D cardboard cutouts anywhere, not even for the minor supporting characters.

The plot and theme were pretty obvious, but well explained and developed. I didn't get the sense of *too* much sermonizing and they did a pretty good job of "show, not tell". The myth/cosmology system didn't make much sense, but I guess that's probably just my ignorance of Japanese folklore/superstitions showing. By itself, no further explanations was neccessary to explain the truly important parts of the story.

And the characters... did I mention I loved the characters? Ashitaka and Mononoke reminded me somewhat of Chihiro and Haku from "Spirited Away", though a lot of their interactions and dynamics are different. The romance/love story wasn't too hammy, and was kinda cute, actually. Pitied the boar spirits. Love the wolf spirits - kawaii!! Moro was awesome and I recognized the voice through the synthesizer effect. ^_~

Great action, great drama... "Princess Mononoke" definitely lived up to its reputation!



...though I still say that Legolas has a 6/10 to 9/10 chance of beating Ashitaka in a Khazan match. :p

Well, cashew did a great job of summarizing our day out yesterday. Lots of fun watching movies and discussing all sorts of things over food. ^_^ Anyways, I thought I'd give my thoughts on the movies we watched. Maybe later I'll go over the manga.

( Ghost in the Shell )

( Ice Age )

( Monty Python's The Life of Brian )

The Review

A couple of things:

1. The reviewer obviously does not know his classical literature from a banana slug, so I think many of his comments, which might seem offensive to the more erudite, should be taken with a large grain of salt... like a whole bucketful.

2. Agamemmnon seems to be barbarian-ized. Though the motive "has always wanted Troy to fall under his power" is a possible hypothesis for the historical fall of Troy, I don't think it works in the context of a mythical/Homeric epic, which is what everyone else is going to be thinking of. That is, unless this movie is a documentary, they should probably stick to fiction.

3. "Don't let the advertising fool you, this is his [Eric Bana's] movie." Well, if they're going to positively portray the Trojan side through Hector instead of Paris, I suppose they might be able to make it work. Unfortunately, I've heard mixed reviews of The Hulk, Bana's last major movie.

4. It seems that Achilles isn't going to be developed as much as the Iliad did... which might account for the even lesser development of Patroclus. His part in the movie is mostly the fighting parts, and probably something with Briseis (who's also on the cast list).

5. Something cashew might be happy about: "Ignore the third billing. Aside from setting the story in motion in the beginning, Bloom is hardly in the movie." Paris, it seems, doesn't get a lot of important scenes to play. I guess his name is high up there only because of the actor's fame. It makes sense, I suppose. In the Iliad, Paris didn't play a big part either except as the instigator of the war and the shooter of Achilles.

6. Patroclus: "...the whiny little brat who plays Achilles' cousin..." Guh? I'm really hoping the guy didn't pay too much attention to Patroclus and therefore got his information wrong. Cousin? Dude.

7. Helen: The guy was too busy admiring her assets to notice anything else. Le sigh. I guess there goes another (possibly) epic movie without any strong feminine roles. But I guess taking the Gods, especially Aphrodite, out of the scenario makes Helen a much less sympathetic character.

Once again, cashew has done a much better (and faster) job than me on the recap of our Saturday together.

I actually had a pretty late breakfast that morning, so I decided to skip lunch and just get a boba drink. I tried the Chrysanthemum Pearl Tea at the Sweetheart Cafe. Mmmmm... it was good. Sweet with the faint taste of flowers. I'm going to have to look for Chrysanthemum tea in the stores now. ^_^

"Starsky and Hutch"? Slashy, verily. Goodness, they had more mushy scenes together than a lot of hetero couples in a non-romance movie. About the only thing they didn't have is a kiss scene and a nudity sce--oh wait, I suppose the dinky towels scene sorta counts... make that "and a sex scene".

Troy looks very nice. I'm really curious about how they're going to end it though. The Iliad ended *before* the Trojan Horse and the fall of Troy. But ending the movie somewhere after Achilles dies doesn't make for a very coherent storyline. Cinematically, I just don't think they can get away with showing a resolution to the war, which would have to involve the Trojan Horse 'cause *everyone* already knows that story. Which begs the question, how are they gonna film the end of the movie when two of their main leads (Hektor and Achilles) are already dead.

Likewise, it's going to be interesting to see if they mention Paris & the Golden Apples story in relation to the kidnapping of Helen. As well, the involvement of Thetis in Achilles' story, such as bringing him his new armor from Hephaestos. Since we haven't seen anyone being cast as a Greek God/dess, it's fair to guess that they're not going to be included in the film, which makes the above two parts interesting to rewrite.

Comic Relief... Read the manga "Dahlia", which cashew recommended. It was kinda freaky and somewhat confusing. The Salome story reminded me of another fanfic which was also based off the "Salome" play. "Hellsing" looked interesting. "Shadow Lady" is obviously mainly fan service. Also read the latest issue of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"; the art was very nice as always, and I notice that the plot line is starting to move toward the direction of the CTHD movie, as opposed to the TV series. Also read the latest issues of some westernized Chinese comics. Not much to write about but the obvious - they had much fun slaughtering Chinese mythology.

Comics-wise, I got my hands on "Lucifer: Inferno". The Morningstar rules, as usual. Stomping demon lords and angelic champions and whatnot all without any of his powers. What's ironic is that while I was reading it, some girl came up to me and started trying to get me to join some Christian organization/charity or whatever. Gee... maybe the fact that I'm currently reading a graphic novel labeled "LUCIFER" is kinda a hint that maybe I'm not a good Christian girl? *snerk*

Also flipped through the latest issue of "Meridian" and "Negation" and the last issue of "Scion". The "Negation War" is looking to be interesting, as long as Crossgen doesn't cut and run halfway through. Didn't see "Mystic" though, darnit.

Dinner was nice, though I think I might have stuffed myself. Also noticed that the BBQ place seems to have more fat in their meats than before. Huh. Maybe the meat prices are going up again.

Well, I mentioned this in the last entry. Needless to say, I looked on ffnet. I found out the movie is based on a book...of a trilogy. I wonder if there's going to be sequels? *is chagrined of ignorance of history & literature*

Oh, and going through the fics in ffnet, an overwhelming number seem to have Jack (the captain) refers to Stephen (the doc) as "joy" or "my dear"... and vice-versa too. There's just no way that all of it is made up by the fan-authors. Which means that such endearments must've been in the canon (most likely the book). *facepalm* Talk about slash-fodder.

Desire - Um... A non-explicit PWP? Just a snapshot scene really...

With All My Heart - More of a friendship fic. The slash is somewhat one-sided, "lets be friends" type deal. But at least there's no wallowing afterwards. The spacing is somewhat annoying... it looks like ffnet butchered whatever format the fic was submitted in.

Ship's Rations - Nonexplicit slash... nothing more than a kiss. Quite a bit of talking things out though.

Weather - Really, really short fic which does not waste any words. Rather well written too, with some nice imagery. Oddest thing is that the title/author info is under the fic. So I read the short fic and looked down and went "wait... that's it?!"


I need help. No, scratch that... I need my parents off my back so I can read fics at home. *grumble*

( Master & Commander )

( Charlie & the Chocolate Factory )