Tangy Travis

I watched a few movies lately, some of them are really nice, some of them I don’t even know what’s the movie about. I’ll just discuss those which I think is really nice.

I’ll start with Forgetting Sarah Marshall. This is one of the best comedy I’ve watched recently. It’s from the producer Judd Apatow, who also produced other comedies like The 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, and Superbad (I quite like these 3 movies as well, super funny :D). It seems that the comedies he produced have really high quality, and isn’t like those meaningless comedy recently with a really stupid plot. Back to the movie, Forgetting Sarah Marshall is about this guy who’s trying to forget about her ex, Sarah Marshall (performed by the hot lightning girl in Heroes Season 2, Kristen Bell). While going for holiday after their breakup, both of them unexpectedly met up at a Hawaii resort, and thus begins the story. As usual, there are certain scenes which I can’t stop laughing and absolutely love em. The movie kinda advices us not to hold too tight on a relationship when it’s long gone. Highly recommended for anyone especially comedy lovers.

The second movie is a really old one, 12 Angry Men, filmed in 1957, having the same age as our beloved country, yay. Movie lovers should need no introduction to this film. It’s a classic , a real classic, ranking #10 in IMDb top 250 explains it all. The film is notable for its use of almost one set throughout the whole film, 99% of the film takes place in one single jury room. The story is simple, a jury member tries to persuade the other 11 members to acquit the suspect on trial on the basis of reasonable doubt. The story is really nice that I just couldn’t press the STOP button. I love their dialogues especially during the argument scenes. The jury’s method of slowly digging into small little things reveal more and more possible mistakes in the trial is really impressive. It doesn’t have heavy action nor does it have any impressive graphics, but it has an excellent plot, which should be the core element of a movie, instead of some fancy computer generated graphics or some lame action scenes.

The third movie is The Machinist. I watched it because it has a decent 7.8 rating in IMDb and features the super duper thin version of the buffy Christian Bale I saw in Batman Begins. The following is quoted from Wikipedia:

Christian Bale starved himself for over 4 months prior to filming, as his character needed to look drastically thin. Allegedly his eating consisted of one cup of coffee and an apple (or a can of tuna) each day (approximately 275 calories). According to the DVD commentary, he lost 62 pounds (28 kg), reducing his body weight to 120 pounds (54.4 kg). Bale wanted to go down to 100 pounds (45.3 kg) but the filmmakers would not let him due to health concerns. He later regained the weight, plus an additional 40 pounds (18 kg) due to weightlifting, in preparation for his role in Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins.

The plot revolves around a machinist who has insomnia and hasn’t slept for a year. This causes him to be so terribly thin, like a skeleton covered in skins. A series of incidents cause him to question his sanity. I enjoy the movie’s mysterious stoyline, you just can’t stop watching the movie to know how the story ends. The ending, of course was a surprising one and did not disappoint me. I like Christian Bale even more now, willing to starve himself for 4 months just for a movie. He is a really good example of a professional actor, doing anything possible to portray the character as close as needed. Highly recommended!!

The next and last movie I’m gonna mention here is this new movie from Singapore, Money No Enough 2. It’s a sequel to the successful Money No Enough 10 years ago, and I think is still showing in cinema now. The core actors remain the same, adding other new supporting characters as well. I really enjoy the movie, laugh like mad in the cinema. I like the story about inflation, where prices of goods are increasing but our income has never increased, which is happening to Malaysia right now and our government seems to be ignorant about it. Add a bit of comedy, family issues, and some Singapore society problems, that’s roughly all about the movie. Recommended for people who knows Mandarin and Hokkien. I myself don’t know how to speak Hokkien even though I am a Hokkien, so there are quite some parts I have to refer to subtitles.

That’s all. Hope you guys read this!

Films

Yay, I finally get to watch Wall-E. Reviews are extremely positive of the film, 8.7 on IMDB and 97% on Rotten Tomatoes. Plus, its from Pixar, creator of Ratatouille, The Incredibles, Toy Story etc. This 2 reasons are good enough for me to spend some money and enjoy the film in a nice and comfortable cinema. By the way, something unexpected happen in Mid Valley - I saw Ah Fai and the Little Yellow Devil queueing for movie tickets!!! I went up and had a quick chat, but gosh, she keep asking me for strawberries. Oh no!!!! Guess I gotta go to Cameron Highlands again this weekend to pluck some strawberries for her.

Back to da film, Wall-E is actually the name of a robot, alone in the deserted earth cleaning up garbages for the past 700 years!! I don’t want to reveal too much spoilers here, just that the film is related to global warming, a really good theme for times like this. The plot revolves around the “robotic romance” between Wall-E and another much more advanced robot, Eve, which really looks like an iPoD. (After doing some digging, I realize Eve and iPoD are from the same designer. Credits of the film has a special thanks to Steve Jobs.) We are all familiar with humans romantic stuff but what if its between robots? You will be more impressed with Pixar studios if you think the idea of rats cooking impresses you enough.

Humans in the film have become way too fat to even walk on their own because they have robots to do everything for them. All they have to do is sit on the electronic chair and ask for help. I keep on laughing cause they need robots to do every small little thing for them. The end result is the decrease of bones in their body. I got a feeling that humans might turn into such state if technology keeps on improving. Technology should be something that assists humans but not something humans should rely on. A deserted earth might also become reality if earth keeps getting warmer and warmer.

One of my favourite scene where Wall-E is holding Eve's hand

Another element that impresses me is the sound of the film. The first 40 minutes of the film has no dialogues at all because the robots can’t speak properly. They use some “beep beep” sound or simple words to communicate. Because of this, it is important to make sure the sound these robots use are good enough to replace ordinary dialogues, with the core meaning still there and is easily understood by the audience. To achieve that, Pixar hires Ben Burtt to do the character’s sound design. Below is quoted from Wikipedia:

Benjamin Burtt, Jr. is a four time Academy Award-winning sound designer and sound editor for many famous and noteworthy films, as well as directing an Oscar-nominated documentary. Burtt’s most memorable work includes creating the “voice” of robot R2-D2 in the Star Wars films, as well as various sound effects like the lightsaber, the heavy breathing sound of Darth Vader and the speederbike chase sounds from Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi.

He is one of the person that made Star Wars so successful back in the 80s. Needless to say, the sound he designed for Wall-E is excellent. Those sounds are really really cute and with the wonderful eye expression of Wall-E, this film is simply one of the best movie I watched this year. It is an absolute must watch film for everyone especially for its global warming issue.

Films

I’ve always mentioned The Dark Knight as my most anticipated film of the year. I expect a lot from this film, mainly because of the director, Christopher Nolan. I love most of his films, such as Batman Begins, The Prestige, and one of my all time favourite, Memento. He doesn’t disappoint me in TDK, in fact it exceeds all my expectation for the film. He just created a masterpiece of films!! He shows the whole world a new way to make a superhero film. He shows everyone that a superhero film doesn’t need fancy CG visual effects or any lame jokes. All you need is a really solid plot, and some crazy super-villains, and I mean really crazy.

I watched the film at Berjaya Times Square’s IMAX theatre, due to the recommendations of certain movie websites that watching TDK at IMAX is the best choice. TDK has certain scenes using IMAX camera, which features better graphics as it uses the bigger 70mm film compared to the standard 35mm film. More explaination about IMAX can be found HERE. The result was a disappointing one, at least for KL’s IMAX theatres. The film was kinda blur and pixelated on the big screen. My eyes were really tired after the film as I concentrate to watch clearly. It’s kinda exhausting. I wonder if it’s the problem of Malaysian IMAX or it’s the same for IMAX all around the world. If this is what I’m gonna see at all IMAX theatres, I can’t believe anyone would say watching TDK in IMAX theatres feels awesome and even better than ordinary theatres. My guess was that the projector here had some problems, thus showing some really poor and dark images (Ends up I was watching The Very Dark Knight). Plus, I don’t know what they’ve done for the seats. The back of the seat is very straight, and I mean really straight, making me extremely uncomfortable throughout the film. I wonder wat da hell IMAX is doing and which genius designer designs these seats. No wonder they always have such poor business. Ends up my first ever experience in IMAX theatre is also my last one. SIGH… I feel like giving them a feedback. To watch such a great film, only to be spoilt by the poor experience provided by IMAX is just unacceptable.

I love the plot of the film. This film is not some ordinary superhero movie where some villains start terrorizing the town and our superhero saves the day. The film doesn’t follow such lame plot (It’s lame in my opinion). Instead, the film starts with a clear line seperating hero and villain, but as the film goes on, the line gets blurer and blurer. The big question in the film is “How can you fight a villain with no rules and sanity on his mind? To what extend the Batman has to go to defeat this enemy?” The reuslt is a really dark and frightening film, something I never expect from a superhero film, even from Christopher Nolan. It just gives you no time to breath throughout the film as waves after waves of terror strike Gotham CIty.

Heath Ledger’s role as Joker is awesome, just superb, I rate him a full 10/10. He exceeds all my expectation for the role, even scarier than Jack Nicholson’s superb role as Joker in 1989’s Batman. He still haunts my mind with his high pitch laugh, and I think the haunting will continue for few more days. His voice undergoes a complete change, from his usual deep and cool voice in Brokeback Mountain to his high pitch laughs in TDK. I start to like him when I watched Brokeback Mountain few months ago. The very last scene when he cries while looking at the jacket was really heartbreaking. Such a big loss to the film industry that he passed away at such a young age of only 28 years old. His career has just begun to climb. Ironically, his last film is also his biggest hit. He surely deserves an Oscar nomination for his role, and I think he deserves the award. That’s not to say other actors deliver a poor job, just that Heath Ledger shines above all.

As usual, Batman film always features a car chasing scene. This time, it just got better!! A new motorcycle called Batpod was used this time instead of the Tumbler. The way Batpod appears and doing its stunts really leave my mouth opened!! This part of the movie is just too exciting to describe in words. You will understand when you watched it. Most of the stunts are done the usual Nolan’s way. He limits CG effects in his Batman films to as low as possible. One obvious example was the scene where a hospital was bombed to pieces. You can clearly see a hospital with the exact size being bomed to pieces!! No CG effects used!! It’s all REAL!!!

Best of all, this is the first time I hear people clapping when the film finishes, something very rare in Malaysia. I don’t think I’ve witnessed this before. I followed and clap as well, YAY!! I just love dis film and can’t wait to watch it again!!

Films

After missing out Wanted last week, I make sure I get to watch Hellboy 2 this week no matter what!! I am really in the mood these days. Why am I so crazy for this movie to the extent of watching it on the first day? Simple! I was really really attracted to the trailers. It has all the crazy creatures design seen in Pan’s Labyrinth, another award winning film also directed by Hellboy 2’s director, Guillermo del Toro.

We manage to grab tickets at 1pm even though the showtime is 1.45pm, best part, on the first day of its showing. Plenty of seats left as well when we look at the screen. Seems Malaysians are not really interested in Hellboy. They prefer the wild 3D adventure of “Journey to the Center of the Earth“, which has quite a long queue compared to other movies (GSC specially reserve a line for them). Good for me. Can still get good seats even its 45 mins before showtime.

The film started off really well, with some cool fights and funny dialogues along the way. We get to see Hellboy back when he is just a kid. He is like any ordinary kid back then, albeit with a really big right hand, called The Right Hand of Doom in comic. It is invulnerable and feels no pain, OWNAGE!!!

The Troll Market scene is awesome. It is like an exhibition of creatures you never dream of. Kinda reminds me of Star Wars back in the 70s, people are suddenly introduced to all kinda weird alien creatures in the universe. Nobody has ever done stuff like that before and everybody love it since then. So far this is what I feel of Pan’s Labyrinth and Hellboy 2.

The 2nd half of the film kinda let me down. The plot starts to get boring as it focuses more on the romantic relationship between the characters and their development in the story. Hellboy gets upset to be scolded by the public when all he really wants is to protect these people. Watching all the trailers of a movie seems to be a bad thing sometimes. The trailers kinda have most of Hellboy 2’s impressive moments. I don’t really have much surprises throughout the film when all the really awesome creatures have already appeared in trailers.

Aside from that, it is a good film. As long as you don’t watch all the trailers and don’t hold much expectation for the story, it is still a really enjoyable film. The final battle of the Golden Army is the most impressive moment for the movie. Well done for the climatic battle.

Films