Box Office

Little Fockers beat two Jeff Bridges movies...




http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-12-27/-fockers-tops-u-s-christmas-weekend-box-office-with-34-million-in-sales.html

Hantu Kak Limah Balik Rumah Ngangkung

Two horror comedies almost back to back released? Coincidence? Hmmm... and now there are at least three horror movies coming out soon... horror phase now?

Anyway, one's from the director of Zombi Kampung Pisang and the other's from David Teo...

Kak Limah tells the story of the same people from the movie Zombi Kampung Pisang... but this time they're dealing with the death and subsequent haunting of said Kak Limah... while Ngangkung tells the story of three guys who uses the supernatural to get a winning lotto number, with some consequences of course...

I saw Ngangkung first... to be honest, it does nothing for me... nothing much anyways... it's a pretty decent movie, a little laughing here and there... Shaheizy Sam's charms were kinda muted in this one... seems like a vehicle for Azad Jazmin...

Hantu Kak Limah on the other hand... very entertaining... and there were plenty of scary situations but interspersed with comedic moments and there were many scenes that would make you burst out laughing...

Although I don't like the part where Mamat Khalid tricks us at the end... it's the same like Zombi Kampung Pisang... they had to die in order to turn into zombies so how could you just inject a serum and have them all miraculously get back to being alive? Sigh...

And this revelation... about Kak Limah... cheated us out of the whole movie experience... a lot of the scenes doesn't make sense anymore... It's not a good practice to do that... you made something out to be one thing and then at the end, you say it's actually something else, so many scenes have been rendered useless and irrelevant now... sigh...

In this case, Ngangkung won because it did not do a 180 and declare it was just a dream...

Top 25

Inception and Johnny Depp tops IMDB 2010 Top 25 List...

http://popwatch.ew.com/2010/12/20/johnny-depp-inception-imdb/

Box Office

Tron Legacy beats out its competition!


http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1654595/20101219/story.jhtml

Nominations - SAG

Pretty soon, it'll be Oscar nominations...

http://www.sagawards.org/media-pr/press-releases/17th-annual-screen-actors-guild-awards-%C2%AE-nominations-announcement

Nominations - Golden Globes

The Golden Globes have announced its nominations...


http://www.goldenglobes.org/blog/2010/12/the-68th-annual-golden-globe-awards-nominations/

My faves are The Social Network, Inception, The Kids Are All Right, Tangled, Toy Story 3 and of course Glee! :)

Review - My Soul To Take

Wes Craven is definitely the king of horror. Wait, maybe it's Stephen King... but anyway, I kinda did not know this was Wes Craven's work.

I first saw the trailer on Trailer Addict and was instantly captivated by it. So I was looking forward to catching it when it comes out. Yes, yes, I am a horror/slasher movie junkie. One of my favorite movies is Scream (which is incidentally Wes Craven's handiwork as well).

And just like Scream, this movie started out with an intense scene, very bloody and kinda scary.

My Soul To Keep, the phrase, is a part of a classic children's prayer... also because the movie is all about souls... :)

The movie tells of a person with many souls in them... like multiple personalities... and that once the person dies, the souls linger on... the night the Riverton Ripper was finally killed, seven babies were born... and in each of them, the parts of the souls of the murderer lies in wait...

But only one of them got the evil soul... every year, on their birthday, the Riverton Seven does a ritual in which they defeat the 'Ripper' so that the Ripper would not be able to come after them in real life...

This year, they were interrupted... and the Ripper appears and offed them one by one until he gets to the one he wants... his own son...

The plot sounds great to me... hehehe... and so was the execution... unfortunately, the killings were a bit sudden and abrupt... like there was no milking of the tension and suspense of a cat-and-mouse scene between the slasher and the victim...

For example, one girl's throat was slashed immediately upon encountering the evil guy... not even allowed a scream or running away...

But I think all these quickie murders are setting up for the final showdown, which was quite a long one... So guess it works... :)

Acting-wise, everybody was not too bad considering they're a bunch of unknowns... except for the mother, who was Susan (Ross' ex, Carol's life partner) on FRIENDS.

All in all, it was a nice outing for me... I enjoyed the movie very much... being the horror/slasher junkie that I am...

Have a good weekend guys! Tonite is Hantu Mak Limah Balik Rumah at Midvalley...

Trailer - I Am Number Four

I Am Number 4 is based on a book of the same name... about aliens on Earth, hunted down and killed in sequence... even mentioned Malaysia... starring Alex Pettyfer, better known as Alex Rider from the Stormbreaker movie... also starring Timothy Olyphant and Glee's Dianna Agron.

Casting

Cate Blanchett will reprise her role as Galadriel in The Hobbit movies...


http://insidemovies.ew.com/2010/12/07/the-hobbit-cate-blanchett-joins-the-cast-as-galadriel/

British Independent Film Awards

The British Independent Film Awards recognized The King's Speech, along with its actors Colin Firth, Helena Bonham Carter and Geoffrey Rush.

http://bifa.org.uk/

Box Office

The Disney Princess with the long golden hair finally stomped The Boy Who Lived...

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-box-office-20101206,0,5261379.story

National Board of Review

The Social Network is named Best Film and Jesse Eisenberg Best Actor. Jennifer Lawrence of Winter's Bone is Breakthrough Actor.

http://www.nbrmp.org/awards/

It's clear that The Social Network and Winter's Bone will be shoo-ins for the award season...

Grammy

Grammy Award nominees have been announced... leading the pack is Eminem...

http://malaysia.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20101202/ten-entertainment-us-grammys-db3f2d5.html

Full list of nominations -> http://www.grammy.com/nominees

Independent Spirit

Awards season has started full swing:

The Independent Spirit Awards have announced its nominees with Winter's Bone leading the field, followed by The Kids Are All Right

http://www.spiritawards.com/nominees

Yesterday, the Gotham Awards announced its best film recipient - Winter's Bone...

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31749_162-20024090-10391698.html

The hosts for the Oscars have been announced...

http://www.gossipopi.com/2010/news/30/11/james-franco-and-anne-hathaway-oscar-hosts-2011

RIP

Leslie Nielsen... the comic actor behind the Naked Gun series... may he rest in peace...


http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iiLPcfxwWNkRmEww3NUugTfOk9KQ?docId=CNG.858923f48f29b289900fd8cf167e12f7.591

Box Office

A certain Disney Princess is giving The Boy Who Lived a run for his money...


http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/news/2010-11-29-boxoffice29_ST_N.htm

Review - 2 Alam

I have missed quite a few Malay movies lately... either I was too busy to go see it or from a lack of interest... normally, I'd go to a preview but I haven't been to one in quite a while...

Anyway, I've heard so much negative review about this movie, I had to go see it... actually I wanted to see this movie originally because of the interesting premise of the movie, this one and Anu Dalam Botol...

This week I was at RTM for a course on copywriting so everyday I'd drop by Midvalley, which was a stone's throw away...

I was lucky enough to get a ticket for the 5pm show... lucky not because it was selling out, because it was I had arrived in time for the 5pm show instead of waiting for the 7pm show... and yes, it was not filled to the brim with people... exactly 6 people in there... 5 if you don't count the one walking out in the middle of the movie...

Okay, so I heard the movie's about a guy who had surgery done on him to turn into a woman and then he/she died and the family has issues on how to deal with her death and burial because she was born a he... interesting yes?

But this movie barely touch on the subject matter... in fact they just skimmed the surface of the subject and choose to focus on how he/she was living in sin and how the earth refused to take her after her death because he/she was too sinful...

And that is one of the things I had problems with... the movie itself was sorely lacking... it felt like watching an extended music video, ya know, where the singer's acting out the song in a movie type fashion and it would stop the song every once in a while for the artist to act out a scene... yup, this movie feels like that... or a like a cheap karaoke video...

I heard that the first director quit so the second director had to take over... my guess is there was not enough footage from either director to make one cohesive movie so they decided to cut and paste the entire movie by recycling shots from previous scenes...

What's the point of all those musical montages? They did not add anything to the storyline... oh, wait, I take it back... they add annoyance to the movie-watching experience... and what's with the constant playing of the theme songs? I swear to God it's like an extended video of Amy Search... Salam Terakhir has been soiled by this movie... the song will never be the same again... sigh...

There were plenty of plotholes as well... like how exactly did the funeral was relatively media free? Where were the papparazi? She's supposed to be this hugely famous singer right? And then before she died, her big secret was exposed. You'd think the media would be all over her. And when her guy wanted to marry her, she said that he would have to get circumcised. Dude, seriously? Legally, you're still a guy in Malaysia. You can't get married.

And why did she stick around for so long before running away when the thugs were fighting who gets to do her first? And when she finally grow some balls (hahaha, geddit?) to fight and run, the thugs still bickered but you can see her in the background sashaying away...

Sigh. But that's just me nitpicking...

Acting-wise, not a single one of them was impressive. Except maybe the mother whose name eludes me till now. But then again, all the mother had to do was look sad and cry. Everybody else was basically stoic and wooden. Aaron Aziz's character should have more expressions since his childhood friend who snipped off his penis had died. But the ustaz was emotion-less, even when the earth rejected his/her body.

Then, there was this issue with the music. No, not the Salam Terakhir or that Ramli Sarip song. The soundtrack and background music. It was too eerie and a bit frightening for a non-horror movie. I kept expecting to see an entity jump out and scare the living daylights out of the six of us. Like the scene of the 'mandi mayat'... the shot showed the people doing it and then slowly move to the floorboards below them and show the water trickling down. I suppose they thought it was incredibly clever of them to then cut to a scene of Amy showering but with that damned music, you'd expect to see a Hantu Penanggal or something like that to be licking the water that's trickling to the ground... if they made this into a horror movie, I think it'd be a better movie... the soundtrack has the perfect ambience to scare people...

Overall, this movie stinks so bad that it made Lu Pikirlah Sendiri The Movie Oscar-worthy... yes, I hate this vile excuse for a movie... if there's a Razzie Award in Malaysia, this movie will dominate! I used to think Razak Mohaideen was a poison to Malaysia's movie industry but now we have a new face as The Poison... Dr Rozmey, come on up and accept your award!

Oh, just so you know... 2Alam is close to collecting the RM40 million that Dr Rozmey's been screeching in his bought advertorials and to anyone who'd listen... about 39.77 million to go...

http://www.ohbulan.com/kutipan-filem-2-alam-sekadar-rm230-ribu-jatuh-tersasar-dari-rm40-juta/

AJL 2011

Here are the finalists of AJL, after three weeks of duking it out in the semi finals:

1) Hanyut - Faizal Tahir

2) Kebahagiaan Dalam Perpisahan - Shahir

3) Noktah Cinta - Hafiz

4) Drama King - Meet Uncle Hussein ft Black

5) Ku Ada Kamu - Adira

6) Cinta Sempurna - Yuna

7) Pelita - API

8) Berlari - Tomok

9) Sofea Jane - Black

10) Mencari Konklusi - Hujan

11) Selamat Malam - Faizal Tahir

12) Ekstravaganza - Bunkface

13) Jahat - Stacy

14) Tolong Ingatkan Aku - Ana Raffali

My faves: Shahir and Adira... AJL will be aired live January 9th, 2011... stay tuned :)

Box Office

Not a surprise that the penultimate Harry Potter movie dominated the box office eh?

http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1652782/20101122/story.jhtml

American Idol

American Idol will be showing at a new time...




http://malaysia.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20101120/ten-entertainment-us-fox-db3f2d5.html

Trailer - Red Riding Hood

New version of Little Red Riding Hood... looks good :)

Poster

Teaser poster for next year's Cowboys & Aliens... looks awesome!

Box Office

Megamind continues its dominance of the box office and effectively stopped Unstoppable...

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-15/dreamworks-megamind-repeats-as-top-weekend-movie-with-30-million-sales.html

23rd

The Simpsons has been renewed for a record breaking 23rd season!




http://content.usatoday.com/communities/entertainment/post/2010/11/the-simpsons-to-hit-new-milestone-for-primetime-television/1


Meanwhile, I've watched Let Me In yesterday... was spoiled by unruly (and stupid) audience... and today will watch Skyline... and hopefully on Sunday will watch both Megamind and Unstoppable... have a good weekend guys! :)

Mark Twain

Tina Fey was honored with the Mark Twain Prize for Humor! Go Tina! You're my idol! :)


http://content.usatoday.com/communities/entertainment/post/2010/11/tina-fey-gets-teased-at-mark-twain-prize-show/1

Box Office

The team behind The Hangover loses to Mega Mind...

http://movies.yahoo.com/news/movies.ap.org/ferrells-megamind-makes-mega-debut-with-477m-ap

AJL

It's almost end of the year and that means it's time for Anugerah Juara Lagu... 30 songs have been picked as semifinalists and the song presentations will be spread out over 3 nights and at the end of the third night, the 12 finalists will be announced... here are the rundown:

8 November 2010, 10 – 11.30PM:
Gerak Hati – Azlan & The Typewriter
Inilah Cinta – Akim
Kebahagiaan Dalam Perpisahan - Shahir
Mencari Konklusi – Hujan
Cinta – Mohd
Noktah Cinta – Hafiz
Hujan Bunga Di Kuala Lumpur - Ana Raffali
Nadiku – Sabhi Saddi
Cinta Sempurna – Yuna
Oh Juwita – Nubhan
Sejujur Hatimu – Adibah Noor
Hanyut – Faizal Tahir

15 November 2010, 10 – 11.30PM:
Tika Masanya – Mirwana & Hujan
Manifestasi Cinta – Fiq & Mirwana
Kau Harus Ada – Hujan
Drama King – Meet Uncle Hussain & Black
Menggegar Dunia – Adam & Stacy
Tolong Ingatkan Aku – Ana Raffali
Jahat – Stacy
Susun Silangkata – Aizat
Cinta Kosmik – The Fabulous Cats
Ku Ada Kamu – Adira
Sofea Jane – Black
Adrenalin – Faizal Tahir

22 November 2010, 10 – 11.30PM:
Realiti Dewi – Alyah
Pelita – A.P.I
Berlari – Tomok
Extravaganza – Bunkface
Bersamamu – Joe Flizzow
Selamat Malam – Faizal Tahir

Sumber: http://www.budiey.com/

Casting

Leonardo DiCaprio to play a serial killer? Interesting... :)


http://malaysia.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20101102/ten-entertainment-us-dicaprio-db3f2d5.html

Box Office

The seventh and final film in the Saw franchise tops the box office...

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/entertainment/2010-11/01/c_13584653.htm

Bat Title

The new Batman sequel has a title now...

http://blog.movies.yahoo.com/blog/57-the-next-batman-movie-has-a-title-but-no-riddler

Tron Trailer

Tomorrow night! Tron Legacy trailer special preview showing at Pavilion GSC. What's so special? It's in 3D and it's 23 minutes long! Yup, 23 minute trailer! :)

http://www.gsc.com.my/RD1/offersup2.asp?search=tronlegacy_offer

Box Office

Scaring up the competition, one week before Halloween... Paranormal Activity 2.... :)

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-box-office-20101025,0,5064770.story

FFM23 Winners 2

Anugerah Khas Juri FFM23:
1. Cinta Ais Kacang
2. Woohoo
3. Estet
4. Muallaf

Anugerah Lakon Layar Terbaik: Jumaatun Azmi – Haq
Anugerah Cerita Asal Terbaik: Ahadiat Akashah – Lagenda Budak Setan
Anugerah Sinematografi Terbaik: Raja Mukhriz – Niyang Rapik
Anugerah Penyunting Terbaik: Hisyam Jupri & Syamsul Yusof - Evolusi KL Drift 2
Anugerah Skor Muzikal Asal Terbaik: Edry Abdul Halim – Magika
Anugerah Filem Animasi Terbaik: Buas
Anugerah Dokumentari Terbaik: Suatu Ketika Laskar Senoi
Anugerah Filem Pendek Terbaik: Project
Anugerah Pelakon Veteran Lelaki FFM23: Seniman Tamam Idris
Filem Boxoffice FFM23: Adnan Sempit
Anugerah Pelakon Veteran Wanita FMM23 : Seniwati Datuk Sarimah Ahmad
Anugerah Khas Penggiat Belakang Tabir FFM23 : Johari Ibrahim
Anugerah Pelakon Lelaki Terbaik: Bront Palarae – Belukar
Anugerah Pelakon Wanita: Lisa Surihani (Lagenda Budak Setan)
Anugerah Pengarah Filem Terbaik: Shamsul Yusof (V3 Samseng Jalanan)
Anugerah Filem Terbaik FFM23: Magica

Yay Lisa Surihani! :)

FFM23 Winners

These are Anugerah Cipta... announced yesterday...

1. Anugerah Poster Terbaik – Belukar

2. Anugerah Kostum/Busana Terbaik – Hasnan Yaakub (Magika)

3. Anugerah Lagu Tema Asal Terbaik – Edry Abdul Halim (Magika)

4. Anugerah Penataan Bunyi Terbaik – Brian Ng (V3 Samseng Jalanan)

5. Anugerah Penataan Seni Terbaik – Anuar Paharudin & Johan Lucas (Magika)

6. Anugerah Pelakon Harapan Lelaki – Shashi Taran (Estet)

7. Anugerah Pelakon Harapan Wanita – Daphne Iking (Belukar)

8. Anugerah Pelakon Kanak-Kanak Terbaik – Fimie Don (Magika)

9. Anugerah Pelakon Pembantu Wanita Terbaik – Norliana Shamsudin (Adnan Sempit)

10. Anugerah Pelakon Pembantu Lelaki Terbaik – Shaheizy Sam (Evolusi KL Drift 2)

11. Anugerah Pengarah Harapan – Edry Abdul Halim (Magika)

12. Anugerah Filem Komedi Terbaik – My Spy

The rest of the winners will be announced tonite... watch this space... :)

My predix - Best Actor: Bront Palare for Belukar and Best Actress: Lisa Surihani for Legenda Budak Setan... alternates Farid Kamil for Legenda Budak Setan and Maya Karin for Pisau Cukur.

Paranormal Activity 2

Paranormal Activity opens this weekend in the States... hopefully it'd reach here soon... the first one was kinda exciting and scary...

http://blog.movies.yahoo.com/blog/48-hidden-easter-eggs-give-clues-about-the-spooky-stuff-in-paranormal-activity-2

Meanwhile, I've seen Reign of Assassins, Buried and You Again... waiting to be seen is Jangan Pandang Belakang Congkak 2 (coz of Lisa Surihani and free tickets), Red and Life as We Know It... but it's looking to be a skipped affair for Life as We Know It... despite Josh Duhamel... :P

Trailer - Scream 4

Scream 4's trailer is up... can't wait for this movie... *drools*

FFM23

Magika leads the pack with 12 nominations for FFM23... and my girl Lisa Surihani got two nods! One for actress (Legenda Budak Setan) and one for supporting (V3)... yay!

http://www.gua.com.my/hiburan/berita-hangat/Magika_Dahului_Saingan_FFM_23_Dengan_12_Pencalonan.html

Trailer - Vanishing on 7th Street

Hayden Christensen, Thandie Newton and John Leguizamo... looks eerie and nice... if you can understand that... hihihi

Box Office

Jackass 3D grabbed the lead in the box office race... who knew...

http://www.themarshalltown.com/zine/2010/10/18/jackass-3d-grabs-50-million-wins-weekend-box-office/

Adam Lambert

Did not really care for Adam Lambert when he was in Idol coz he tend to over-scream a lot. Yeah, dude, we know you can reach those high notes.

Still did not care for him when he released his album... but once I heard some songs, I was turned into a fan. So when he was in town for a concert, I jumped at the chance to go.

Concert was great! I loved it! :)

Have a good weekend guys! :)

Review - The Other Guys

I got chosen for the free tickets to watch the preview of The Other Guys via Advertlets --> http://www.advertlets.com/weblog/2010/09/10/advertlets-presents-the-other-guys-preview-screening-this-12th-october-2010/

Had the hardest time trying to figure out what to write. Even contemplated not going at one point. Yup, that was how hard the topic was... anyway, finally got down to it and this is the product of it --> http://moviewritings.blogspot.com/2010/09/other-guys-preview-screening-by-sony.html

Hopefully it would be good enough to get me tickets... and I got the email like Monday nite from Jason, telling me I got the tickets. Yay!

So I set out looking for a friend to go with me to the preview. Was quite hard. Not a lot of people were available and/or free to go. In the end, my colleague saved the day and we went to Midvalley together. Had dinner at Sushi King. It's RM2 per plate week! Yum!

Okay, so the movie... I had very low expectations of the movie. Mostly because of Will Ferrell. He is not funny to me. Quite annoying. In most of his movies.

But it turned out quite well. Will Ferrell was not annoying. Much. But the movie's quite good, with some crazy one-liners and pop culture references. It's not as fast-paced as a cop movie but since the title is The Other Guys, so it was okay that the movie was not rock 'em sock 'em blow 'em up style.

However, Mark Wahlberg was being the annoying one. God, he was overacting a bit. Now I see what people were talking about. That he does overact here and there. His face was in a constant state of "I'm constipated". Reminds me of The Happening... sigh...

On a different note, it's nice to see Vince from Will & Grace and also Michael Keaton. Looks so aged... nice supporting with the funny TLC references...

Oh, forgot to mention... when I was queueing up to get the tickets, they told me I won something, like the last time... I won Nightmare on Elm Street t-shirt... I was excited... but then, he said I did not win anything... April Fool's came a bit too early... :(

But then, after the movie's finished, Josh from Advertlets got up and presented the winning blog posts with presents... I was not bitter, I kinda had to pee... but then I heard my name called! What the... woah... hehehhe... this is what I got:

I placed second! So unexpected! Thanks to Sony and Advertlets.

P/S - Was disappointed You Again got canceled... I love Kristen Bell...

Casting News

Rhys Ifans has been cast as the villain in the new Spiderman reboot but no one knows which villain he is supposed to be...

http://www.screened.com/news/comic-movie-news-roundup-spider-man-the-flash-justice-league/1025/

Also in the news, Matt Damon might not be back for the next Bourne movie... WTF?

http://blog.movies.yahoo.com/blog/43-you-dont-need-jason-bourne-for-a-bourne-movie-apparently

Box Office

Facebook still rules!

http://movies.yahoo.com/news/movies.ap.org/social-network-repeats-no-1-draw-with-155m-ap

Trailer - My Soul To Take

Seems cool... but it's not on the Coming Soon list of GSC...

Have a good weekend guys! Might go catch Sammy's Adventure this weekend! :)

Casting - Spiderman

Gwen Stacy, and not Mary Jane Watson, has been cast for the new Spiderman prequel/reboot:

http://herocomplex.latimes.com/2010/10/05/andrew-garfields-spiderman-finds-his-gwen-stac/

Superman Director

The Superman reboot will probably feature muscular men fighting in stylish slo-mo...

http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/movie-talk-zack-snyder-superman.html

Review - Alpha and Omega

Went to see this with the kids last weekend at Midvalley. Another movie that went under my radar. Not that my radar's all that comprehensive but I do keep up with the entertainment news.

Anyway, I first saw this movie at CinemaOnline.com and then at GSC. Perfect timing to go see this with the kids.

Alpha and Omega is about a pack of wolves and the segregation amongst them. The alphas and the omegas. They can't mix. The lead wolves, Kate and Humphrey, are one such example. Kate's an alpha and Humphrey's an omega. And Humphrey's got a huge crush on Kate.

Also, there are the Eastern wolf pack who constantly barge in on their territory because of the lack of food. Kate and the Eastern wolf alpha, Garth, are supposed to get married to unite the packs

However, Kate and Humphrey was captured and sent away by humans to Canada to repopulate there. Kate and Humphrey rushed home to prevent a war over the land and its bounty. Along the way, Kate falls for Humphrey.

I gotta say, it's a nice enough story but there was something lacking. I am not sure what it was. Coz there's humor. There's cutesy. There's thrills. There's everything. Hmm... maybe not enough antagonism there. Sure, there's the rivalry between the packs but I guess there's not enough of the rivalry or villainy in Alpha and Omega to really pack a punch.

Even the kids thought it was just nice enough and kinda forgettable afterwards.

Oh, there was this one humor thing that nobody saw... I was the only one laughing... some signage about eating and getting gas... hilarious... :)

Box Office

The Social Network rules the weekend box office... Facebook is sure as popular as ever eh?

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/news/?id=2936&p=.htm

Review - Wall Street

I did not really wanna see this movie at first. Maybe just get the DVD, or mooch off of someone who'd downloaded it already. Yeah, yeah, I know. *shrugs*

But it did not seem that all interesting to me, even after I saw the trailer. And Shia LaBeouf? The dude just ruins movies. Well, not all of them, but the most glaring of all is Transformers. Did not help this movie's case... but then again, there's Carey Mulligan, who'd blew my mind with her ingenue act in An Education.

A colleague wanted to see this one and there was nothing else to do so we went to catch it at Pavilion.

Oh, just so you know, I'd forgotten completely about the original Wall Street. Not even sure if I had even seen it.

Anyway, Money Never Sleeps (MNS) started off with Gordon Gekko's (Michael Douglas) release from prison. Then it went on to Jake Moore (Shia LaBeouf) and Winnie Gekko's (Carey Mulligan) story. But then there's something about Moore's mentor (Frank Langella) and also Bretton James (Josh Brolin), who just happened to be Gekko's old rival that put him behind bars.

Sounds promising eh? But not really. It's fine as a drama but there's something missing. Mayhaps it's because Michael Douglas' role in this one is more of a supporting character, rather than the main protagonist.

Other than enjoying Carey Mulligan's performance as the constantly sad girl, and the fact that Shia LaBeouf isn't as annoying as he usually is in a movie... there's nothing else much to write home about... there's no tour de force acting in this one that would merit awards nomination, unlike the first Wall Street where Douglas got his Oscar...

Third Batman

Christopher Nolan confirms directing the third Batman film...

http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/movie-talk-christopher-nolan-directing-third-batman.html

Review - Magika

I saw the trailer for this months back I think. Did not really care for it much, until I saw that it was gonna be a musical and there were gonna be a plethora of Malay lore legends in it.

First of, I love singing and I love musicals. So yay Magika! Also, was curious as to how they were gonna incorporate all those legends of lore into the movie. Quite a big or epic movie, this one.

So when my colleague wanted to catch this, I seized the opportunity to join her.

The story began as we see two siblings squabbling - Ayu, the older sister played by Diana Danielle and Malik, played by Fimie Don.

The news about their mother passing away was not told in details yet, but Malik threw a tantrum saying that it was all his fault and run off. Ayu was forced to go seek him out. Malik fell into a well and was transported to Magika. Unfortunately for him, he was captured by the mean Nenek Kebayan to be used for her potions making.

Ayu jumped to the rescue and wound up in Magika too. Completely lost, she tried getting some help from the locals but they were all kinda kooky.

One by one, she met up with all kinds of Malay lore legends like Puteri Bunian, or at least I think she was one (Maya Karin), Pak Pandir (Aznil), Mak Andeh (Raja Azura), Mahsuri (Vanidah Imran), Awang from the lore of Lembing Awang Pulang Ke Dayang (Norman Hakim), Hang Tuah (Saiful Apek) and the other four Hangs (the Senario crew), Badang (Mawi), who wound up helping her the most.

There are others in the movie such as Awang Kenit, Bawang Putih (Sharifah Amani), Bawang Merah (Sharifah Aleya), their mother (Adibah Noor), Puteri Gunung Ledang (Ning Baizura), Orang Minyak (Nabil) dan Penunggu Tasik Chini (M Nasir) and of course the famous Naga Tasik Cini (digital f/x).

Oh, did I mention this was a musical? Hehehe. So guess that's why most of the actors here are singers eh? Well, the ones with singing parts and meaty parts anyways...

So... did I like it? Nyeh. So-so I think. On one hand, I did kinda enjoyed it. On the other, it was kinda getting on my nerves.

As a musical, it was not bad. It sidestepped the whole Yusuf Haslam convention in the early 90s with a singing montage here and there but it had nothing to do with the storylines. Magika's songs are telling the stories so that one was a plus.

Unfortunately, some of the songs are not exactly catchy ditties and some of the songs were not even necessary. Like the ones sung by the trees. And the songs sound kinda similar to each other. And why did Diana Danielle's pronunciation of some words while she sang sounded pretentious and kinda annoying? But that's just me...

One thing I don't like about most Malay movies are the quality of the dubbing. Most of the time, the characters' expressions and mouth movements do not match the voices. Characters were screaming when they don't look like they're screaming. I mean, is it really hard to record their voices as they act? Especially since most of Magika's scenes looked like they were recorded in front of a green screen. But kudos for KRU Studios for making it look kinda real. Yup, I had to really look hard for quite a while before establishing that those were green screen shots. But I guess it's not that hard to figure out since this was an effects-laden movie.

Anyway, speaking of screaming, why is it that the siblings are always screaming. Hurt my ears larr.

In any event, the script and storylines was not too bad. Sure, some of the dialogues were kinda corny but some parts of it were funny. And the way they unfolded the backstory was quite nice as well...

The acting was not bad as well. Diana Danielle was decent in this but I did not think she could pull off the singing, except for one or two songs. Fimie Don is cute and all, but good God, stop screaming already. Both of them are good together. Quite believable as siblings.

The other people in this movie are barely cameos, except for Ziana Zain's Nenek Kebayan and Mawi's Badang.

Let me tell ya, for all the crap I hear about Mawi, and I am kinda not partial to him anyway, Mawi did a good job with Badang. But then again, Badang was not a hard character to play. Okay, okay, I should just stop at the good job he did portraying Badang. Some parts he was actually kinda funny.

Ziana Zain's Nenek Kebayan was truly annoying. That voice! Guess they were looking to make Nenek Kebayan haggardly and witchy-poo but Ziana dun look like that. And her character is the one with the most dubbing sin!

Guess the movie was aiming for over-the-top. But some over-the-top works like the Mahsuri scene. Nenek Kebayan's? Not so much. Ayu and Pak Pandir's singing/dancing extravaganza looked kinda forced and choreographed. But I get it. They're trying to emulate all those great musicals.

All in all, it's a good effort in bringing all those lore legends to life. I did not feel like I've wasted my time or my money.

Oh, before I forget... the Naga Tasik Chini... doesn't look like that right? Is it me or are the Pahang dragons of the water variety? No wings? I am a Pahang boy and remembering the stories, pretty sure they are water dragons... hehehe....

http://www.krustudios.com/magika

Passing

Tony Curtis, father to Jamie Lee, and actor from, amongst others, Some Like It Hot... has died...

http://movies.yahoo.com/news/movies.ap.org/coroner-actor-tony-curtis-dies-las-vegas-home-ap?nc

Casting News

Christopher Plummer joins Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig in this Hollywood remake of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo...

http://malaysia.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20100930/ten-entertainment-us-plummer-db3f2d5.html

Casting news for the new Mission: Impossible movie is also out - http://movies.yahoo.com/photos/collections/gallery/2950/new-team-assembled-for-mi4#photo0