Month: March 2008

Categories
Drama Foreign Movie Reviews

Sky Of Love (Koizora) – Starring Yui Aragaki (新垣結衣)

Sky of Love (Koizora)

I can’t help but to draw similarities between my favourite Japanese star YUI and the 19 years old model turned actress turned singer Yui Aragaki that go slightly deeper than just a name resemblance and a birthday that is only 3 months apart. Both starred in a rather sad movie (“Midnight Sun” for YUI), both look so pure and cute and innocent, sound so pure and cute and innocent, and both released a studio album after the show (I will review Yui Aragaki’s new album in my next post and YUI’s albums are “From Me to You” and “Can’t Buy Me Love”) with very similar vocal texture as well.  But as a true fan of YUI, what do I make of Yui Aragaki?

Music talent to be addressed in a separate post, Yui Aragaki does have acting talent for the romance drama genre.  It is hard not to fall in love with her on the screen (though I must say, Cynthia was more delighted by the main actor Haruma Miura instead … those sexy lips she said).  I had no idea what “Sky Of Love” was about.  I wasn’t even sure if it was a tear jerking movie at all.  All I knew was that the novel that the movie was based upon was once featured on paper late last year.  A cell-phone novel that took the Japanese market by storm.  I read that the cell-phone novel genre tends to have short sentences (hence a rather short and engaging plot development?) and chided by the old school novelists.  Initially, this cell-phone novel was hosted in one of the Japanese websites amongst many others.  I guess if the story is good, it doesn’t matter where it started.

In a few short and vague words, “Sky of Love” is about a young girl falling in love for the first time, vowed not to fall in love again, and found courage to love someone forever.  Cynthia criticize this particular genre as something that comes straight from a template; every Japanese or Korean tear jerking movie tells the same story.  I do agree that they are all there to basically jerk your tears.  But if you look at the typical Hollywood action thriller or romance or any type of mainstream movie, there are always three stages of the plot: the development, the conflict, and the resolution.  I learned that from the PC game “The Movies” (hey, geeks can be quite ‘knowledgeable’ by playing games too you know!).

Sometimes I ask myself, why do I love the Japanese or Korean or Thai horror movies if I don’t really scream that much?  Or why do I love the Japanese or Korean romance drama if I don’t really cry?  Anyway, Cynthia in her own words told me that she cried till she got a headache.  TK used the same amount of tissue paper as Cynthia for a totally different reason (running nose … ha ha ha).  I am not sure what TK’s friend makes out of the movie.  I may be bias.  I personally like this movie very much – both the storyline and the acting.  Predictable storyline most of the time, there are some rare moments that delight and surprise.

Categories
Other People's Lives

Last Lecture Of Randy Pausch – How To Live Your Life

Randy Pausch

Hypothetically, if you knew that you were going to die and you had one last lecture, what would you say to your students?  It is an academic tradition of Professor Randy Pausch’s University to give a “last lecture” to the students except it was not just a tradition in his case; he is actually dying from cancer and only has months to live.  My friend from work, SF, has forwarded a YouTube video to me and in this Oprah episode, Randy Pausch talked about our childhood dreams, how to achieve them, and in essence, how to live our lives.  And he gave the lecture for only three persons in this world (the answer is in the video).  If you have 10 minutes to spare, you may wish to follow the link below and be inspired.  Below are the summarized points.

  • It is an easy time to dream when we are young (and happy) and we should never lose that spirit.
  • Experience is what you get if you don’t get what you wanted.
  • When people drive you hard, they care about you.  They want you to be better.  When you are doing a bad job and no one points it out to you, that is when they have given up on you.
  • Brick walls are there for a reason: they let us prove how badly we want things.
  • Good parents are instrumental for us to achieve our childhood dreams.
  • The importance of people versus things (people come first, always!).
  • Never ever underestimate the importance of having fun.  Choose to have fun today, tomorrow, and every day thereafter.
  • Work and play well with others: (1) tell the truth, (2) apologize (properly), (3) wait, and people will show their good sides.
  • Tell the truth – integrity.
  • A good apology has three parts.  (a) I am sorry, (b) it was my fault, (c) how do I make it right.  Most people neglect the third part and fail to demonstrate sincerity.
  • Be patience.  No one is pure evil.
  • Show gratitude.
  • Don’t complain, just work harder.
  • If you lead your life the right way, if you live properly, the dreams will come to you.

The YouTube video can be viewed by clicking here.

My book review: The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch – A Lecture from the Heart to Whom He Loves

Categories
Snippet of My Life

Snippet Of My Life Episode 11 – Of Coffee Bean Muffins, Singapore Budget Terminal, Sudoku, 1-800-CALL-NEA, and IPO

Oil Painting Morphed

I swear things are getting more expensive in Singapore.  Just couldn’t pinpoint the exact figure as I am lousy in numbers until one morning, I was devastated to see my beloved muffin at Coffee Bean is now selling at S$3.50, up from S$2.70.  That is a 30% hike over the weekend.  That’s it, no more muffin breakfast for the poor me.  The staff looked at me in sympathy and sighed, “Only salary doesn’t go up”.  I agreed.
 
So I shall go budget.  Cynthia went budget for a totally different reason (last minute flight booking).  I enjoy sending Cynthia off to the airport in the morning.  A break from the routine travel on the CTE and a chance to see the Singapore Flyer up close and personal, I love the Daytona highway ride in around that area too.  We have not been to the Budget Terminal before and joked that we may be able to drive up to where the plane parked.  Nothing like that of course.  The Budget Terminal, to me, looks pretty much like the Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal from the outside.
 
Today was the first time I visited the Budget Terminal.  Today was also the first time I played Sudoku!  I have always been tempted to try it out.  The rules are actually a lot simpler than I thought.  Sudoku is pretty much like my favorite Minesweeper game – either a direct solve for a cell or a solution by elimination.  It is therapeutic and while I was playing it on Today (the free newspaper), I was more fascinated in how I can create a Sudoku puzzle and how I can write a program to solve a Sudoku puzzle using artificial intelligence.  Who knows?  Granted that many may have done that, I may actually do that myself.
 
Besides Sudoku, in today’s Today forum, there was an official government response on a complaint made against motorists who leave the engines on while idling on the roadside: call 1-800-CALL-NEA.  All we need to do is to provide NEA with the date, time, location, vehicle registration number, and the brief description and NEA will take action from there.  I have no qualm over that because many times while I was jogging on the street, I see motorists taking naps inside their air-conditioned vehicles with their engines on.  Singapore is an unique country whereby citizens and residents are mobilized from catching irresponsible motorists to the participation of the manhunt activity.  Imagine one day we could call 1-800-CALL-CWO (corrective work order) for the spotting of litterbugs.  Or another 1-800 number to call CASE for a muffin hike not unlike the one at Coffee Bean.

In the middle of Raffle Place, where my office is, I often see up to three IPO counters ‘competing’ for attention.  9 out of 10 counters will have a pair of attractive young girls … distributing booklets.  Part of the advertising strategy perhaps?  One of my friends agreed, “Ain’t no pretty girls, ain’t no IPO”.

Talking about IPO, Benny emailed me this morning and said, “I feel for you bro”.  You feel for me how what who where?!  He was referring to my HWT share that continues to head south.  The price was so stagnant that I gave up staring at the same figure day after day.  Is there such a thing as: too late to sell?  Oh well …

So I lost S$600 on paper.  And I needed a retail therapy.  I bought tons of rare CDs from HMV with one that costs as much as S$52.95. 

Things are getting more expensive in Singapore, I swear.

Categories
Drama Movie Reviews

There Will Be Blood – Daniel Day-Lewis

There Will Be Blood

There will be a bunch of viewers leaving the theater feeling enchanted by the Oscar winning performance of the lead actor and mesmerized by the cinematography of the late 1800’s and early 1900’s America.  There will also be a bunch of viewers who find the film too long (160 minutes), the storyline too inconclusive, and the acting too intense.  For all that is worth, “There Will Be Blood” is not meant to be released as a blockbuster though it has made it to the top 10 best films of 2007 by the critics.

You know what it is like to read a book from the good old days.  The plot of this film has an old literature feel, which is not surprising as it is inspired by Upton Sinclair’s novel, “Oil!” written in 1927.  ”˜Inspired’ is the keyword because the film only adapts the first half of the book.  Imagine how long the film would be had it covered the entire book (320 minutes?!).  In the defense of this rather inconclusive storyline, Paul Thomas Anderson did write the screenplay with Daniel Day-Lewis in mind as the lead actor.  That probably explains why the entire film centers mostly on one single character, the silver miner turned oil man Daniel Plainview played by Day-Lewis.

I am a huge fan of Daniel Day-Lewis and love his roles in “The Last of the Mohicans”, “In the Name of the Father”, and “Gangs of New York”.  His acting-in-character approach works well in “There Will Be Blood”.  You can clearly see that he was not acting in the film but has rather become the character.  It can be scary to watch because the main character Daniel Plainview is not necessarily the most likeable character in the film.  The main character itself is complex.  Daniel Plainview is the down-to-earth-get-your-hands-dirty kind of person who devotes his entire life in the pursuit of success.  He takes in an orphan as his son and as a ”˜business partner’ to enhance his image when dealing with the communities.  He accumulates enough hatred along the way and does not hesitate to kill.  He has no faith in religion but yet is forced to join a Christian community as part of a business deal.

In “There Will Be Blood”, you will see Daniel Day-Lewis drenched in oil, covered in mud and dirt, slapped on his face till his cheek turned red, and shouting with such an animalistic emotion till you see saliva dripping from his mouth.  Gosh, there are only a handful of actors who are in his league.  Plenty of memorable scenes in this film, I can certainly see why Daniel Day-Lewis has beaten George Clooney (“Michael Clayton”), Johnny Depp (“Sweeney Todd”), and Viggo Mortensen (“Eastern Promises”) for the Oscar title by a large margin (note: I have yet to watch Tommy Lee Jones’s “In the Valley of Elah”).

I can imagine one day in the distant future, I will watch this classic production again reciting some of the lines together with Day-Lewis (“I drink your milkshake!” or “I’m finished!”).  Is “There Will Be Blood” suited for mass consumption?  Probably not as I think it is a film to admire rather than a film to entertain.

Categories
Book Reviews Fiction

The Cleft By Doris Lessing – Drop All That You Know And Start Over

The Cleft

In the beginning, there were only women.  Then one day, a deformed baby with a tube hanging in front was born.  These deformed babies grew up with breasts that have no milk inside and nipples that were dysfunctional …

The above is how the plot begins in “The Cleft”.  I don’t know how you all make decision in picking up a book to read.  Here was what went through my mind chronically when I picked up “The Cleft”.

  1. Cool title with a nice cover – 5% of importance
  2. Nobel Price winner in literature sticker – 30%
  3. Unusual plot of in the beginning, there were only female species – 40%
  4. Under 300 pages – 10%
  5. Writing style that is easy to read – 15%

In fact, “The Cleft” has all the right ingredients that I was so tempted to buy the book at first sight, at second sight.  But these days, I want to see return from my own tax money.  I borrow from the library instead.
 
To fully appreciate “The Cleft”, you really have to drop all that you know about the two sexes and start over.  Presumptions will only frustrate you and you may probably miss what “The Cleft” is about: an evolution of human society from single sex sea creatures (in human form) that have no conception of the collective “we” and the individual “I” to the interdependency of the two sexes that realize “how few we are, how easily we die” (a direct quote).  The journey from the primordial life form to the realization of moral righteousness, the importance of the continuation of the species, the never ending yearning of exploration, and the discovery of love is not an easy journey to cover in fewer than 300 pages.
 
And that is only half of what “The Cleft” is about.  The main story – that only account for a tiny portion of the book – centers around an old Roman senator who was tasked to write a history on the first recorded human society.  Seeing how history was written in “The Cleft” makes me reflect upon how our own history is written.  Legends are passed onto generations orally in forms of memories, and stories.  Somehow, the first half of the book – the early era of the clefts (female species are being referred as “the clefts” while the male species are referred as “the monsters” by the clefts and as “the squirts” amongst the men) – reminds me of the biblical story of Adam and Eve, equally mythical and ancient.
 
One day, a boy was born amongst the clefts and the clefts had decided to feed the “deformed” baby to the Great Eagles at the Killing Rock.  Soon, more and more boys – or “monsters” in their jargon – were born and instead of killing the boys, the Great Eagles took them away from the caves of the clefts and into the valley.  There, the monsters or rather the squirts – a preferred term amongst the male species – established themselves as a society relying on the Great Eagles to deliver them the babies.  The early era of the clefts is definitely a great read on its own.
 
Superimpose onto this fable is the old Roman senator taking in a beautiful young wife who was sexually active amongst her own social circle.  Back in the days of the Roman Empire, or even to the days of the Cleft when clefts and squirts participated in mass procreation exercise, what social norms were there to judge the orgies and gladiators?  There was probably none.  That is the hat you may wish to wear when you read “The Cleft”.  And that is probably why Doris Lessing is a genius – shifting a rather simple fable from our modern day mindset into a perspective of an ancient Roman making the idea so original.
 
Over time, songs were written (like my favorite title: “how few we are, how easily we die”) and onto the second era, the clefts and the squirts further interacted, procreated, disagreed, and fought.  The fundamental differences between the two sexes began to emerge.  The harsh external environment made them realized how fragile life was, how precious babies were.  The notion of love and leadership began to emerge too.  This later era of the clefts may not be as magical as the one before making it a less interesting read.  But I guess the rather beautiful and abrupt ending makes up for it.  Till today, I am still trying to decipher what to make out of the ending.  I was like so close to the Cleft civilization one moment in time and all of a sudden, I was thrown back to my own reality.  The visualization of the Cleft civilization literally faded away in front of my own eyes.
 
On a side note, it is coincidental that the author of this book (88 years of age) and the author and director of “Persepolis” from my previous blog are both born in the same place – Persia or Iran, depending which year you are referring to.  Doris Lessing’s parents were both British and she has won every single European literature award.  I wish I could recommend a more renowned literature from her collection of 50 books but this rather controversial piece of artwork is all that I have read from her.

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