Month: July 2007

Categories
Snippet of My Life

Snippet Of My Life Episode 3 – $0.50

A genuine smile dissolves the deepest frown. Try it wherever you can. Think of something happy when you smile. To whoever you meet.

Time to buy my favorite gaming magazine from my favorite news-stand near Cynthia’s office. The news-stand assistance and I smiled at each other from afar. Like long lost friend. I pulled out the magazine from the box. Price tag said $7. He said $7. I jerked backward so sudden that he jerked backward too and laughed.

“$7?! You always give me a discount!” I said with a big smile not sure why I said these words in the first place. Oscar winning performance on my part.

$6.50 he charged me. Simple as that. My ERP going home was somewhat covered.

Met my good old friend SW for two games of pool (0-2, I lost). Haven’t seen him for half a year. Over the pool table, a thought came into my mind. Then a vision followed. Job search is like playing pool. Except when start, besides the white ball, there are no colored balls visible on the pool table. And the table is exceptionally large. But you know there are plenty of balls on the table. Jobs are everywhere. You just cannot see them.

Then you spend a lot of time shooting the white ball in different directions. You spend a lot of time not shooting and ponder why no colored balls are visible instead. And you spend a lot of time doing nothing because you are bored of shooting air.

Just when you want to shoot darts instead, your supposed last shot hit an invisible ball and it turns visible. The visible ball hits some other neighboring invisible balls and they too become visible. Suddenly you have more targets on the pool table. Some take forever to roll towards a pocket. And some disappear on the way to the pocket.

Pretty much like in real life, SW shot multiple balls into the pockets one after another and so did I (out of the extraordinary), in this pool of visible and invisible job opportunities, there are days when you can hardly breath just preparing for interviews.

The search continues. And I have less than 50 km to find my job (more will be revealed later).

Stay tuned.

Categories
Drama Foreign Movie Reviews

My Wife Is A Gangster 3 – I Nearly Cried & I Laughed Till My Stomach Cramped

Once in a while, a man has to go solo putting behind the power of 3 (of our Movie Review Squad). Here is my story.

After 7 years of living with Cynthia, I surrender. I just am not a good shopping partner when it comes to office-wear. Most of the time, I am not excited. And when I am, we both gasp at the price tag. I love fashion but fashion comes with a price. One evening I looked at a sea of shoes for ladies, I had an idea. I suggested to Cynthia to go out shopping with her lady colleagues (in order to liberate me of that role) and she did just that. Cynthia and MW (a very pleasant young lady from Malaysia) went shopping together today (Sunday) and she has spent a rather astonishing amount of money. On the same night, Cynthia lined up a parade of trophies that were enough to cover the entire bed and beyond. What a way to celebrate commemorate the 1st day of the 2% GST hike.

Knowing that I would probably have nothing much to do from the moment I dropped Cynthia off at Orchard to meeting Cynthia and her friend MW for dinner, I thought catching a movie would be a great idea. As I have not met my buddy KF since his return from Mount K, what better way to catch up with him and then four of us have dinner together?

Unfortunately I could not contact KF in time (he did join us for the dinner in the end), I have to pick a movie to watch alone. I chose the sneak preview of “My Wife Is A Gangster 3” that was shown in the odd timing of 3pm. I have no issue watching movies alone as I often do that whenever I cannot find a movie partner at the spur of a moment.

I walked into the theater with no expectation especially after watching “Death Proof” recently (a great movie by the way and what else can possibly thrill me after that?). I think I may have watched the 1st episode of “My Wife Is A Gangster” and from what I read, this 3rd episode does not quite gel with the previous two episode. In “My Wife Is A Gangster 3”, the beautiful Shu Qi is the main actress of this Korean movie franchise that has nothing to do with the previous installments. Those who love the franchise may not like this discontinuity.

To give you a quick overview of this Chinese-Korean movie and to illustrate how diverse this movie is, from the language perspective:

70% Korean, 20% Mandarin, 10% Cantonese

And from the movie genre perspective:

50% Comedy, 20% Drama, 20% Action, 10% Romance

As the story goes, A-ryong (played by “Shu Qi”), the daughter of one of the gangster bosses in Hong Kong, caught in the middle of a gang conflict and upon the request of her father, she left Hong Kong and into a country of her choice – Korea. There, she was under the protection of a Korean gang that is in a different kind of conflict with other gangs. Gi-chul (played by “Lee Beom-soo”) together with his 2 subordinates were put in charge as a guide to protect A-ryong. And the story pretty much zigzags between Hong Kong and Korea from then on.

There are many things I love about this movie. When filmed in Hong Kong, it has the typical intense gang drama and action and the moment the location is switched to Korea, I just could not stop laughing at the comedy. The contrast of the gangsters from these two locations (fearful and deadly feel versus comical acting) makes this movie one notch above the Asia movies I have watched.

I often get put off by actors and actresses trying to speak a foreign language throughout the movies that require them so (with some exceptions). I was prepared to see Shu Qi speaks in Korean or the Koreans speak in Chinese. But no, each speaks in his or her native language. To bridge the language barrier, the film-maker has thrown in a translator. And because the translator at times does more than translating the original message, that makes the movie such a joy to watch. With my limited exposure to Asian films, I have not seen films that exploit this translator’s role into great comedy materials.

Talking about originality, besides having a translator that takes on his or her personality, there are quite a few scenes that are original. I am not going to post the spoilers here and you will have to watch it to find out yourself. I love the car chasing scene and I bet you one popcorn set (if you buy me the ticket) that you have never seen anything like that before.

Yes, there are moments when I was so touched by the drama that I nearly shed a tear. There are moments when I laughed till my stomach cramped. And the action scene are beautifully filmed. Almost remind me of Uma Thurman in “Kill Bill” when I saw Shu Qi in action. I have always been a big fan of Shu Qi. In this movie, you will see her coldness, her coolness, her sweetness, a bit of her sexiness as well as her vulnerability. She can be so adorable when she smiles. As icing on the cake, the soundtrack does the job well to blend in with some of the action scenes.

I love “My Wife Is A Gangster 3” and I will certainly get the DVD when it is out. Do I recommend this movie to everybody? Only for those who enjoy Chinese action-drama and Korean comedy-romance and are open to the idea of the combination of these two unique cultures.

Categories
Music Reviews Pop Rock & Alternative

Missy Higgins’s “On A Clear Night” – Brilliance Voice Over Mediocre Music

It pains me much to write such a title because I have great respect to those who write the lyrics and music of all the songs in the album. Missy Higgins’s debut album “The Sound Of White” is brilliant and should not be missed. If you have not heard of her music, I strongly recommend “The Sound Of White” instead.

Australian singer songwriter Missy Higgins’s key selling point is her honey like mellow voice with a good texture and she has the right technique to control her voice. She may not have a big voice but she certainly has an unique one. That pretty much matches all the mellow songs of hers perfectly. If you are not familiar with Missy Higgins’s music, I urge you to check out the video clip of The Special Two. I have also found two live clips from her previous album as well – Scar and The Sound Of White.

“The Sound Of White” is very piano-driven while “On A Clear Night” is more band-driven. I often think that if the artist’s voice is unique enough, he or she can almost get away with mediocre music. It may be true in this case because while “On A Clear Night” may not have the same level of sparks as her debut, “On A Clear Night” is now certified nine times platinum and is one of the highest selling Australian albums of all time. It is quite an admirable achievement consider that Missy Higgins is originally an Indie singer from Melbourne (how many indie singers from non-US and non-UK countries are well known worldwide?).

There are some tracks from this album that I do enjoy such as “Sugarcane” and “Where I Stood”. Below is the video of “Where I Stood” and if you want more, try out “Steer” – her first single from “On A Clear Night”. On the record, I am still glad that Missy Higgins has released another good album that has added to my music collection. I just wish that it was as brilliant as her previous one.