Cinematic Concerns

Every year I do a top 10 list. 2010 being the kind of year it is, I was not able to muster ten. It's not that there weren't other films that I enjoyed watching; for example I thought Kick-Ass, Scott Pilgrim vs The World, Little Big Soldier, Reign Of Assassins, She's Out Of My League, Shutter Island and Salt were entertaining movies, some that I enjoyed immensely, maybe even stellar examples of filmmaking and acting. But it would also not be much of a loss to me if I don't recall them in the future - that's why they don't make it here.

So here goes this year's top five:


1A
INCEPTION
Review


1B
HOW TO TRAIN 
YOUR DRAGON
Review


3
THE SOCIAL 
NETWORK


4
DESPICABLE ME
Review


5
AGORA
Review

SHAOLIN | 新少林寺

I read reviews criticising the film for being too preachy and melodramatic, plus I glanced through some reviews in Mandarin, which (as I've seen before) slices and dices petty aspects of the movie in order to criticise it to death, mistaking priggish nitpicking for film criticism.

Turns out they were wrong. It's an excellent film, with good acting from Andy Lau as usual but also, dare I say it, from Nicholas Tse, whom I haven't really cared much for previously. In fact he's just slightly over the top here, but it's what he does in the end that I was impressed with – and a crucial scene too, as it informs the film's main theme of redemption.

Which is a rather yucky theme to go for, when you think about it for even a second. Films about redemption (you almost have to say it reverently) tend to be melodramatic; which Shaolin definitely is, and definitely went eye-rollingly overboard on a few occasions (a dead kid has to have a small daisy on his chubby little hand ... puh-leeeze). And this being a very Buddhist sort of movie, there's lots of idiomatic expressions doled out by the chief monk, and sometimes by the other monks, which no one in the audience can understand unless they read the subtitles (both the English and the Chinese) and sounds so hopelessly pretentious that it doesn't quite befit the tone of the scenes. But it's unavoidable. It's Shaolin, it has to be a movie about Buddhism and martial arts. No choice.

The monks are played by, among others, Shi Xing Yu, who seemed awfully familiar to me, and then I checked and realised he was the Shaolin-trained actor Stephen Chow discovered for Kung Fu Hustle and recently appeared in such films as Bodyguards And Assassins and Ip Man; and Wu Jing, who exudes noble charisma in his scenes here, was previously in Sha Po Lang and City Under Siege.

The fight scenes were alright, the explosion scenes were spectacular, Jackie Chan's appearance in the film isn't just a cameo, there is genuine suspense to some of the scenes due to deft arrangement of plot and circumstance that increases the stakes and makes the audience feel it, a few heroic deaths were had. I was wrong to prejudge it – worth watching for its entertainment value.




THE GREEN HORNET

Jay. Chou. Is. Awesome.

Sure, you may not understand every word he said. Sure, you may be prejudiced with him either because of his mumbling singing or his lesser acting performances in previous movies. Sure, you might think he just looks too 'chuen'. But he's a good actor. I contend that we've seen glimpses of it under Zhang Yimou with Curse Of The Golden Flower (he was almost the best thing in it). And this is a very different type of movie of course, but he's definitely the best thing in it. The fellow kicks-ass (aided by stylish visuals that accentuate the action scenes from director Michel Gondry), and thanks to the cool production design he gets to play with cool guns and cool cars and squint his squinty eyes while at it.

Maybe Gong Li knows what she's saying after all when she said in an interview that Jay Chou is so talented that she's jealous.

The film was written by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, which is probably why it is so Seth Rogen, to the point that when people mentioned that they found the main character obnoxious and annoying ... Yeah, he is. I can only hope that what Rogen was going for was for the character to be truly annoying, muddling about in complete obliviousness to his rich-ass but incompetent arrogance, and then later realising his error and repenting ... well, the 'later ...' part barely happens, unfortunately. The thing is Rogen and Goldberg tipped the scales too far – I mean, come on, with Kato kicking ass like that, how can Britt Reid still think he was actually the hero of any of the action scenes they involved themselves in? (Unless he is a ...)

Still, the writing is good for one thing at least: dialogue. The scene introducing Christoph Waltz as the villain in his encounter with [surprise cameo that made me laugh simply because he appeared] was lol-funny ... and surprisingly, the writers still manage to make it relate to the plot. Other scenes with Britt verbally bullying Kato (and in the rarely effective vice versa) contain some chuckling zingers as well. (Bit mean-spirited, though.)

There are subtle jokes about homoeroticism sprinkled throughout the movie, probably the most subtle thing about the movie (certainly I doubt the mostly unsophisticated Malaysian viewers around me detected it). It's not funny because it is suggesting that Britt and Kato are gay, it's funny because their interactions can, in a different movie, be interpreted as budding romantic scenes. Come to think of it, most of that stuff comes from what Britt says ... must be a Seth Rogen thing.

Cameron Diaz didn't appear all that much but was charming whenever she's in it, Christoph Waltz hams it up but didn't go so OTT as to screw it up the way Jason Patric did in The Losers; the character actor David Harbour appears in yet another major Hollywood movie undetected; and you couldn't have guessed which character Edward Furlong played. (You dunno who ...? John Connor, dude.)

And the action-heavy score by James Newton Howard is awesome, man! I was half-thinking it might be a John Powell score at first ... except that it wasn't Powell enough, but it sounded intense and awesome and JNH's the only other composer I can think of who does cool action music in this manner. I want the soundtrack! (Oh, stay for the end credits. The song, heh.)

The movie's without its flaws – primary one being that its titular hero is an ass for at least half the movie; and also that sometimes the plot doesn't make sense – but its entertainment factor is so high that at some point you just don't care.

And who would've thought the director of Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind could direct a major Hollywood action movie? Gondry does these visually interesting stuff which produces an effect to the viewer reminiscent to optical illusions; what I mean is that you see it but sometimes you're not quite sure you saw it. He did it to poignant effect in Eternal Sunshine, and then there's the whimsical La Science Des Rêves. Here he does a few of those stylish, playing with time and space kind of things, zooming into the action without going to a close-up ... och, I'm not describing it well, just go see it.

One effect that is deceptively simple is a kind of montage sequence where a mobster spreads a message and we see that message travel as it passes to two, then four, then more people via split screens. I say 'deceptively' because the screen splits and suddenly there's two separate cameras following two people ... then those cameras split ... Well, how do you shoot that? Think about it. I'm not suggesting it's impossible, but I don't think I've seen it before and it's definitely one of those Gondry tricks that works under your skin.


One more thing I should say – I regret watching this on 3D. Definitely a 2D movie. Also, you know what else doesn't work on 3D? They screened the trailer to the James Cameron-stamped Sanctum, and immediately it was obvious the film won't work. As it is the dialogue is on-the-nose and the predictability of the plot seeps right off the screen, so its only saving grace would've been the stereoscopy; but the fatal mistake is that most of the movie is in dark spaces, which is bound to be made darker in most 3D halls that will screen the movie, so there is now no reason to go watch the film. So there.

PS - I just found out that The Green Hornet is actually critically panned, and Ebert gave it only one star ... oops. Still, there's Maryann Johansson, whose reviews I agree with more often than not, particularly with the more unconventional ones (like when we both decided that Toy Story 3 is inferior to Despicable Me). Well, I agree with her review on The Green Hornet completely, and she says it better than I do.

Considering the Academy has collectively decided to make really odd choices, ones that to be honest kowtows too much to the speculations of the bloggers and tabloid media of the past few weeks (in other words, forgetting that they are the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and are not supposed to be led on by the deceptively valid viewpoints of nominal media), this is what I would've vote for if I was in a position to do so:

Best Motion Picture of the Year
Inception (2010): Christopher Nolan, Emma Thomas

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
Colin Firth for The King's Speech (2010)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role
Natalie Portman for Black Swan (2010)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role
Geoffrey Rush for The King's Speech (2010)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role
Hailee Steinfeld for True Grit (2010)

Best Achievement in Directing
Darren Aronofsky for Black Swan (2010)

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen
Inception (2010): Christopher Nolan

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published
The Social Network (2010): Aaron Sorkin

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year
How to Train Your Dragon (2010): Dean DeBlois, Chris Sanders

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year
None from this list.

Best Achievement in Cinematography
Black Swan (2010): Matthew Libatique

Best Achievement in Editing
The Social Network (2010): Kirk Baxter, Angus Wall

Best Achievement in Art Direction
Inception (2010): Guy Hendrix Dyas, Larry Dias, Douglas A. Mowat

Best Achievement in Costume Design
The King's Speech (2010): Jenny Beavan

Best Achievement in Makeup
The Way Back (2010): Edouard F. Henriques, Greg Funk, Yolanda Toussieng

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score
How to Train Your Dragon (2010): John Powell

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song
127 Hours (2010): A.R. Rahman, Rollo Armstrong, Dido("If I Rise")

Best Achievement in Sound Mixing
Inception (2010): Lora Hirschberg, Gary Rizzo, Ed Novick

Best Achievement in Sound Editing
TRON: Legacy (2010): Gwendolyn Yates Whittle, Addison Teague

Best Achievement in Visual Effects
Inception (2010): Chris Corbould, Andrew Lockley, Pete Bebb, Paul J. Franklin

Best Documentary, Features
Restrepo (2010): Tim Hetherington, Sebastian Junger

Best Documentary, Short Subjects

Best Short Film, Animated

Best Short Film, Live Action

I mentioned this in an earlier post but to summarise: I almost had a chance to be part of the inception of this movie, if only I had been more daring. I had read the book "The Long Walk" by Slawomir Rawicz back in 2007, had tried to pitch it with the help of one of the executives there to the CEO of the production company in Hollywood where I was interning, but it didn't impress and so that was that ... until I saw the trailer of this movie. Talk about missed opportunities. (Disclaimer: doesn't mean that if I did manage to push the movie through, it would've been produced, or would've been successful, or that I would've gotten some sort of credit on the film ... even if I do think about that last one.)

Suffice to say, obviously I can't be objective about the movie in its current incarnation.

Now I haven't read the book since 3-4 years ago so I can't fully remember all the details (though I do have the book on my work desk now), but I do remember the broad strokes of that story, and in this case the movie stuck to it mostly faithfully – except the very beginning and the very end, which I'll get to later.


The story itself is about a group of prisoners, who each have personal stories of how they were unjustly arrested by the Soviet authorities in a Communist society that is increasingly hungry to chew up and dispose of elements that sway more than a few degrees from the designated way of life, made a daring escape from a Siberian gulag and walked 4,000 miles to India – that is, across wintry steppes, wet forests, harsh deserts and through challenging mountain passes. That is a remarkable story in itself, and the fact that it's populated by interesting characters, and not all of them make it, means the story, the plot is solid, even before the first word is penned for the screenplay.

Peter Weir is, of course, a dependable director – he of Dead Poets Society, The Truman Show and Master And Commander: The Far Side Of The World. The film that resulted under him is a technically excellent one, but unfortunately, not a memorable one.

They had casted excellent actors – from Jim Sturgess to Saoirse Ronan to Colin Farrell to Ed Harris to the other less-known Baltic and Scandinavian actors – and they did exactly what the story needed them to do, that is, look dirty and skinny and demoralised and like they're about to die of starvation and exhaustion half the time.


The pacing, however, didn't fare so well. There is often a slight sensation that the movie dragged, which is odd considering we are constantly looking at beautifully captured, awe-inspiring landscapes – whether it's to the characters' benefit or not – as the ragtag runaways traverse one landscape upon another. It's perhaps due to the rather episodic nature of the story; there are a lot of scenes in the movie, more so than even the average adventure movie, but they don't really affect each other. Something happens here, they move on; then something happens there, they deal with it and move on. Do we get to know the characters better? Sure, but I think not enough, and so we don't sympathise enough. One particular death in the movie was rather underwhelming emotionally, when I had imagined while reading the book that it would've easily wrenched the guts out of the audience. Perhaps my expectations were too high.

Obviously one couldn't transfer everything that was described in the book onto the screen, but one glaring omission was the escape from the gulag itself. When I was reading the book, the few pages describing their stealthy, suspenseful crawl to the edge of the prison, and then having to cut their way out without the dangling icicles from the barb wire making a noise, all that stuff, was the thing that I still remember today. That could easily have been the emotional highlight of the film – I had imagined a 10-minute, terrifyingly tense sequence, which would then provide the rest 70% of the movie with that quality of cathartic denouement that usually lasts the last five minutes of a typical movie, as if the long walk to India, however terrible will be and whatever tragedies struck, is the relief itself. That, to me, was an interesting idea that would make this adventure story different from the others; though, I admit it's definitely not an easy thing to pull off, as it is such a precise thing to aim for.


[Spoilers here.] Then there's the framing device that Weir and his co-writer chose to use: the wife. To begin with they changed the names of some of the characters, including that of the autobiographer of this story who instead goes by Janusz, indicating that they meant to diverge from the story told by Slawomir Rawicz – though again, they did stick closer than the average Hollywood film would've to their original or true stories because this story is already so incredible. Which is fine. But what I thought didn't work enough was having the wife betray Janusz and so make her the reason why he is a political prisoner, but having him be such a kind soul that he is not angry with her and making this journey about him travelling home so that he can forgive her ... well, I didn't buy it. The film didn't really touch upon this theme much, except for one conversation between Janusz and Mister Smith (Ed Harris) – and this is supposedly a major theme, because the ending has Janusz going back to Poland to find his wife four decades later after the fall of Communism. Again, I could be biased, because in fact Rawicz never made it back to Poland, but ended up in England after the war where he married an Englishwoman and raised a family of his own there, though the demons from the torture and the trek never left him until the day he died. The way the film had Janusz returning to his wife in the end just smells to me like it was groping for a false happy ending and felt too sentimental for my taste. I would've preferred the movie to stay a bit longer in India, and end there. [Spoilers end.]

Worth watching once.

Saw this at KLPAC a month ago. The highlight of the play, I think, is Calvin Tan Han Jin's performance as the younger version of the titular Birdy. That the actor is just eighteen-years-old is all the more remarkable; definitely a promising talent that had the good fortune of being offered a role that he's probably quite suitable for (as long as he is daring enough to grab it by the horns and give it everything he's got, which it looks like he did) this early in his career, and probably also due to the direction of experienced KLPAC and T4YP director Christopher Ling.

The play itself, which I later found out was based on a movie (itself based on a novel) directed by Alan Parker (Bugsy Malone, Evita) and starring Matthew Modine and Nicolas Cage, is intriguing for its subject matter. I often find it a mystery how playwrights arrive at the particular plot for their plays: they're almost never obvious the way movies are, and also (for lack of a better word) rather arbitrary. The play depicts a pair of boyhood friends – one an eccentric outcast who becomes increasingly infatuated with birds, the other suffering domestic abuse but otherwise suffering from the usual teenage-boy hormonal issues – in two stages of their lives: their carefree adolescent days, and during the war after both have been scarred by their experiences.


The writing is nothing to shout about, it's fairly straightforward and it works. The problem it presented is that it is an American play that has to be delivered by Malaysian actors using neutrally international accents. Try as they might it just never quite works, as it is not easy for Malaysians who don't naturally have at least a faux-British or faux-American accent to pull it off consistently and undistractingly, and the only actor in the play who managed to do it without pulling me out of the play is Darius Taraporvala, who plays the army psychiatrist Weiss. It helped if the performance was compelling, and in this case Calvin Tan's performance does actually help reduce the disconnect caused by his slight Malaysian-tinged accent. Tung Jit Yan and Michael Chen, who play Birdy's friend Al in two different ages, didn't fare so well here – though the latter better than the former.

Michael's a friend so this may be slightly uncomfortable but it has to be said: he still needs to improve on his acting. One big positive is that at least technically he's sound: he told me himself he's got the most lines (and it's heck of a lot) but I never heard him slip up once. The thing is though, there is no variation in his performance. Granted the grown-up Al Columbato is one fucked-up, angry sonofabitch, but I doubt it warrants him speaking in the same seething tone through the entire play. In my mind his performance would've breathe and connect with the audience if he had been able to vary his intonation and delivery according to the changes of beats to the scene.

The score and sound design bears a mention. Basically they work; though with the sound design, occasionally the ambient city rumble and birdcalls overpower the dialogue (or equally, we could blame the actors who could've spoken louder), but otherwise having these diegetic sounds is a welcome supplement to the experience of the play.

Overall it wasn't a boring play, and continues to support my theory that of all plays staged in Malaysia, Western-originated plays are far, far less likely to disappoint than locally-written plays.

... which I won't talk about, actually. They're all disappointingly dull and predictable, right down to the obligatory annual nod to anything and everything made by the Coen brothers (though I salute the nomination on young actress Hailee Steinfeld, who hasn't been nominated much this awards season, though she should be).

No, instead, I will just mention the Rising Star Award, which continues its streak as being the ONLY nominations of any category of any awards show that makes 100% perfect sense.

This year's nominees for the Rising Star Award are:

Gemma Arterton
You barely see her in Casino Royale, then suddenly she appears in two major fantasy adventure movies in quick succession – Clash Of The Titans and Prince Of Persia: The Sands Of Time. Which ain't much of a stretch on her acting skills, but then there's the little seen small town British comedy Tamara Drewe (which I have yet to see too).

Andrew Garfield
I've had my eye on this fellow since Lions For Lambs in 2007 (just like I had my eye on James McAvoy long before The Chronicles Of Narnia), and was surprised to find out that he's British-born - in fact he then lived in the US, so he's fluent in both accents. Then I saw Boy A, and that cemented his prestige in my mind, so I was always on the lookout for stuff he's in. Already he's playing the big stakes with likely nominations for his role in the Best Picture frontrunner and an upcoming superhero role.

Tom Hardy
Obviously this British actor struck it big this year in Inception, surprisingly making an impression despite his very much minor role. Mostly I remember him as one of the young, skinny American soldiers in Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down.

Aaron Johnson
He lands the slightly talked about role as the young John Lennon in the small British film Nowhere Boy, then lands the even bigger role of Kick-Ass in the American superhero comedy Kick-Ass ... before he even turned 20. On top of that, he romanced his 40-year-old director, they get pregnant, and engaged, and is now a father ... yes, by 20.

Emma Stone
You may remember her in The House Bunny. Halfway a Mila Kunis lookalike (they should play sisters one day ... maybe they already have, since both are in Friends With Benefits with Justin Timberlake), she broke out this year with the witty comedy Easy A. Despite being the only American on this list, she's probably the least well-known name here ... but perhaps not for long.

As it stands on March 27, 2011 ...

Movies Seen: 127 Hours, Aftershock, Black Swan, Buried, Casino Jack And The United States Of Money, Exit Through The Gift Shop, Countdown To Zero, Fair Game, Green Zone, Harry Brown, Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows, Hereafter, How To Train Your Dragon, I Am Love, Inception, Inside Job, Iron Man 2, Kick-Ass, Never Let Me Go, North Face, Rabbit Hole, Restrepo, Robin Hood, Salt, Shrek Forever After, Shutter Island, Tangled, The Fighter, The Ghost Writer, The Karate Kid, The Kids Are All Right, The King's Speech, The Social Network, The Way Back, Toy Story 3, Tron Legacy, True Grit, Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

Movies Yet To See: Carlos, Made In Dagenham, The Illusionist, The Town

[If a movie is listed as one I've seen but doesn't appear in the list below, it means I didn't think it belongs on the list. Of course, the list of movies I've seen and yet to see are not exhaustive – it's really movies that I think have a shot at Oscar nominations, or should.]


BEST PICTURE
Black Swan
Harry Brown
How To Train Your Dragon
Inception
Never Let Me Go
Shutter Island
The Kids Are All Right
The King's Speech
The Social Network
Toy Story 3


BEST DIRECTING
Black Swan, Darren Aronofsky
Inception, Christopher Nolan
Shutter Island, Martin Scorsese
The Kids Are All Right, Lisa Cholodenko
The Social Network, David Fincher


BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE
127 Hours, James Franco
Harry Brown, Michael Caine
Shutter Island, Leonardo DiCaprio
The King's Speech, Colin Firth
The Social Network, Jesse Eisenberg


BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE
Black Swan, Natalie Portman
Fair Game, Naomi Watts
Rabbit Hole, Nicole Kidman
Salt, Angelina Jolie
True Grit, Hailee Steinfeld


BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Rabbit Hole, Miles Teller
The Karate Kid, Jackie Chan
The King's Speech, Geoffrey Rush
The Social Network, Andrew Garfield
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, Michael Douglas


BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Black Swan, Barbara Hershey
Kick-Ass, Chloë Grace Moretz
The King's Speech, Helena Bonham Carter


BEST WRITING, ORIGINAL
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The Other Guys
Toy Story 3


BEST WRITING, ADAPTED
How To Train Your Dragon
Kick-Ass
Scott Pilgrim vs The World
Shutter Island
The Social Network


BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Black Swan
How To Train Your Dragon
Legend Of The Guardians: The Owls Of Ga'hoole
Robin Hood
Shutter Island


BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Black Swan
Kick-Ass
Robin Hood
Shutter Island


BEST ART DIRECTION
Inception
Never Let Me Go
Robin Hood
Shutter Island
The Ghost Writer


BEST MAKEUP
127 Hours
Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows, Pt 1
The Way Back


BEST FILM EDITING
Black Swan
Inception
Shutter Island
The Social Network


BEST SOUND
Buried
Harry Brown
Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows, Pt 1
Inception
Tron Legacy


BEST SOUND EDITING
Black Swan
Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows, Pt 1
Inception
Tron Legacy


BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Alice In Wonderland
Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows, Pt 1
Inception
Shutter Island
Tron Legacy


BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
Green Zone, John Powell
How To Train Your Dragon, John Powell
Inception, Hans Zimmer
Never Let Me Go, Rachel Portman
The Social Network, Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross


BEST ORIGINAL SONG
"Coming Home", Country Strong
"If I Rise", 127 Hours
"Me And Tennessee", Country Strong
“Sticks & Stones”, How To Train Your Dragon
"To The Sky", Legend Of The Guardians: The Owls Of Ga'hoole


BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
Despicable Me
How To Train Your Dragon
Shrek Forever After
Tangled
Toy Story 3


BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
Aftershock (China)
North Face (Germany)


BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Inside Job
Restrepo


BEST ANIMATED SHORT
Banana