Category: Romance

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Comedy Movie Reviews Romance

27 Dresses – Girls Would Love This

27 Dresses

If you have just started dating a girl not for long, bringing her to watch “27 Dresses” would probably up your rating for a good few notches. She may even remember this chick flick as the movie for the both of you.  So you better prepare to write down the date and place and what she wears for your future reference.  Believe me, girls have super memory when it comes down to dates and clothes.

Despite my rather vehement protest of watching yet another romance comedy two days in a row, Cynthia leaped in joy when she heard the words “27 Dresses”.  TK seconded that because he needed something to relax.  In the name of democracy, I booked “27 Dresses”.

The close to 2 hours movie has quite a straightforward storyline of a perpetual bridesmaid (Jane) who has a secret crush with his boss (George) and one day, her sister (Tess) turns up and falls in love with George.  Meanwhile, a journalist (Kevin) stumbles into Jane’s life and perhaps, having attended 27 weddings as a bridesmaid, it is time for Jane to start thinking about herself.

The chemistry between Jane (Katherine Heigl) and Kevin (James Marsden – the prince from Enchanted and the cyclop from X-men) is pretty good. I especially enjoy watching the performance of Katherine Heigl who is an Emmy-winning and Golden Globe-nominated American actress best known for her role in Grey’s Anatomy.  There are sufficient humors in “27 Dresses” that keeps the movie entertaining to watch. Some scenes – though very much like scenes straight from a TV drama – are pretty memorable (such as the one when Kevin is trying to teach Jane how to say no). The overall plot is also pretty believable without making me cringe too much. Believe it or not, Cynthia did shed some tears in some parts of the movie.

If you like the chick flick genre, “27 Dresses” maybe for you.  I personally get a bit “wedding overdose” at the end of the movie. “27 Dresses” has definitely a higher entertainment value than “Mr. Average” but scores lower in the area of originality.

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Foreign Movie Reviews Romance

Sugar And Spice – My Heart Bled A Hundred Times

Life is fragile. One moment you are up in the sky, hopping from cloud to cloud. Everything looks bright. You love the caress of the wind on your face. Another moment, everything you stand onto crumble into pieces. What you believe in, what you live for … and you ask yourself: Who am I? What am I? Are we the projection of what the people see and think about us? Are we the shadow of our past and who we are not? Or we are what we identify with? The curse of empathy. We humankind promotes love but yet we have conflicts everywhere, every single moment. At this very moment, millions are displaced in the war-torn eastern African nation of Somalia, the Saudi rape victim is sentenced to 200 lashes and six months in prison (what does human right means as a female in an Arab country?!), whales are being brutally killed as the source of protein … but no, how I feel now is nothing to do with civilizations that I have yet to encounter or yet another species we are driving to extinction. How I feel, what I feel is the very conflicts or hostility I experience somewhere not thousands of miles away. Then I ponder, is the ability of being able to empathize a curse? What if no one cares about how I feel, who I am, or what I am? Why do I care so much to people around me? I remember those FHM girls lined up in front of a car so that photographers could take a good picture with them, and the car. Someone shouted: which number, which number, how much? That was disrespectful, totally disgusting. We don’t spend time dressing up to work just to be emotionally abused. I don’t spend time dressing up to …

So, our identity can falter. Our will power can falter. And our body follows, feeling weak and all.

I am coughing today. My nose has been running mildly. It’s been one of those days when I don’t feel as though I am hopping from cloud to cloud. And through this process of crumble, through the serendipity of you are not alone, my good buddy – the name cannot be exposed for reason you will find later – met me up for lunch, and then dinner, and then a movie that I was dying to watch but no one seems interested.

I have no idea why The Straits Times rated the movie “Sugar and Spice” so bad. Then again, I have been consistently disagreeing with them. The acting is solid, especially hands down to Yuya Yagira, the award winner of Cannes in 2004. The scenery shots are beautiful. The presentation with the actors narrate throughout the movie is poetic. “Sugar and Spice” is about the passion of first love, and the passion of love. Being the king of “dumpee”, I can so totally relate to every single moment of the intensity of falling in love and to face the eventuality of … love is a journey, an experience, and feeling the pain at times make us feel alive. “Sugar and Spice” bears it all and it reminded me of what I have been through. Then I thought, perhaps the reviewers at The Straits Times just not having the opportunity to experience love at all. I asked my good buddy who has yet to experience love if the show is enjoyable. The answer is yes. I was surprised. And my good buddy was surprised at The Straits Times’s review too. Too bad, today is the last day “Sugar and Spice” being shown in Singapore.

I wish this blog entry is just another movie review but it is not. All this world needs or what we need is empathy, the ability to love someone or something (such as whales), and the ability to love oneself. And for God’s sake, stop hurting each other with the words we say, the things we do, the words we didn’t say, and the things we didn’t do.

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Movie Reviews Romance

No Reservations – Zeta-Jones Oh Zeta-Jones

Dear friends. Sorry for the infrequent updates lately and infrequent visit to your sites. Life has been busy lately. Arrgghh! Good news, I have finally found time to watch “No Reservation” – quite possibly Catherine Zeta-Jones’s finest acting (not saying it is an Oscar wining performance). I have always enjoyed watching Catherine Zeta-Jones on screen. Her porcelain skin and irresistible mischievousness and her contribution to Ocean Twelve, Intolerable Cruelty, Chicago, America’s Sweethearts, and Zorro … just to name a few of my favorites. Gosh, I love her … on screen I mean.

In “No Reservation”, she plays the character of Kate Armstrong. A chef of a posh restaurant who is a control freak with frequent visits to her shrink and has total dedication to her craft. For a moment, I thought of Ratatouille like some others do. But to compare the rat Remy to the beautiful Catherine Zeta-Jones is just not … nice. Com’on guys.

As the story unfolds, Kate Armstrong finds herself having to take care of her niece (Abigail Breslin) after her sister has passed away. And here comes the charming chef assistance (Aaron Eckhart) who posts a threat – in Kate’s own mind – to her chef position. Worse still, this new assistance is sort of … charming. I am sure by now you can guess where this movie is heading towards.

I enjoy Aaron Eckhart’s acting a lot in “Thank You For Smoking”. What I did not realise is that how charming he can be on screen. My only complain is that his airtime in “No Reservation” is somewhat limited. Would have been good if he was to play a bigger role.

The little girl Abigail Breslin, 11 years of age, nominated for the Academy Award for her role in “Little Miss Sunshine”, in my humble opinion, is the gem of the entire film. Her acting is awesome. She out-acted Zeta-Jones by a few miles in my book (sorry Catherine). Abigail Breslin is a natural actress. I am confidence that she will do great on screen in time to come.

I love cooking and naturally, I enjoy the behind-the-kitchen scenes. It is rare to see on screen, I know. However, the storyline is somewhat predictable in the Hollywood sense. I can almost foresee what the next stage of the script was going to be. Forgettable storyline but not so forgettable acting.

Oh well, I agreed to watch “No Reservation” because of Catherine Zeta-Jones and Catherine Zeta-Jones only. Call me shallow but hey … I am a guy. One more thing, don’t expect to see Zeta-Jones in all beauty in “No Reservation”. She plays to her part that may not require her to look gorgeous and she does a good job out of it.

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Animation Foreign Movie Reviews Romance

Paprika and Who Slept With Her – A Mixed Review From Us

After a rather disappointing outing to watch the Korean sex comedy “Who Slept With Her” last week, I tried to make amend and choose a better movie this time for the Movie Review Squad – the Japanese anime “Paprika”. Turns out that three of us have different opinions on these two movies. TK actually enjoyed the B-list movie “Who Slept With Her” with the expectation of a mindless laugher. I was mildly entertained by it while Cynthia found the jokes crude. In short, “Who Slept With Her” is definitely the male’s version of a chick movie (a dude movie?!). As for “Paprika”, I thoroughly enjoyed watching that and it has exceeded TK’s expectation (I suspect it was not that high to start with) while Cynthia found the story confusing.

I like “Paprika” a lot because the story is interestingly original and the artwork is beautiful. In some scenes, I was actually paying attention to all the background objects marveled at the amount of details on the screen rather than the main attractions. Color contrast plays a part to make some of the scenes dramatically beautiful. Although the characters are in 2-dimension, the way the postures are presented as well as the small movements look real enough. And these 2D characters are often set in backgrounds that are rendered with realistic 3D shading. Because the storyline of “Paprika” intertwines the reality with the dream world, the contortion of the surfaces, the morphing of characters and objects, and the flashbacks of scenarios – making it perhaps one of the most artistic Japanese anime I have seen.

What is the story of “Paprika” about? Without giving too much spoilers (you know I won’t!), a device that enables therapists to enter patients’ dreams has been fallen into the wrong hands. Now, people are losing their minds doing things against their will. It is up to the young and beautiful doctor Atsuko Chiba and her team together with her alt-ego that exists in the dream world “Paprika” to save the world. The story has its tense moments, moments of violence, and brief moments of (artistic) nudity. I guess that is why “Paprika” is rated NC-16 in Singapore.

I can understand why Cynthia finds the story confusing. Quite a number of times, the dialogues happen faster than the rate we can digest the subtitles. Perhaps the animation itself is too captivating. I at time find it hard to fully follow the plot. Some of the translation can be hard to gasp at first read. Maybe the concepts are foreign to non-Japanese or maybe the plot can be so unexpected at times. Either way, there is lots of speed reading to do while watching “Paprika”, at least to me.

I can also understand why Cynthia find “Who Slept with her” too crude to her liking. I did not know that it is a B-list movie (TK?! Why didn’t you …) and the last Korea sex comedy I watched with TK (as gently reminded by the man himself) was “The Art of Seduction”. Now, that was a good one. Funny and tastefully done. “Who Slept with her” starts with a Vice Principal suspects that a trainee teacher is having sex with someone inside the school library at night and the story then rewinds to the point when that trainee teacher just joined the school. The three usual suspects are a handsome student, a wrinkled face student (acted by an old man obviously) who has an enormous “tool”, and a student with nothing but sex in mind. The trainee teacher (played by “Kim Sa-rang) is really hot though – Miss Korea back in year 2000. Still I wish that she plays a much larger role other than merely some men’s object of desire. However, if you are in for a mindless laughter, “Who Slept with her” may be your cup of tea.

I don’t think it is a matter of watching either one of the show or both. There are quite a number of good movies are now showing. If you enjoy watching Japanese anime, you really should check out “Paprika”.

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Movie Reviews Romance

Music And Lyrics – You Won’t Be Inspired To Be A Songwriter, But …

My take is that you probably won’t get much out of it from a songwriting perspective. I certainly don’t compose songs like they do (though the recording bits are pretty authentic). However you will be in for a good laugh as the center character is played by Hugh Grant. I love the script especially – witty and humorous. Drew Barrymore’s acting is adorable too. If Grant’s acting reminds me of “Four Weddings and a Funeral”, Drew Barrymore’s acting does remind me of her “50 First Dates”.

Coincidentally, after watching “Music and Lyrics”, I watched “Walk the Line” on cable. And “Coyote Ugly” afterwards. The common theme? All about songwriting. Pretty coincidental don’t you think? As though God was talking directly to me.

Another interesting thing is that in the story of “Music and Lyrics”, there is a teenage pop megastar “Cora” who is supposed to be bigger than Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera combined. Cora’s music direction is more towards Buddhism or Indian-ish trance. I bought the new Hilary Duff CD and when I played it on my Hi-fi (on the same night), I got shocked by the first track. Exactly the same influence as some of the songs in “Music and Lyrics”. Buddhism or Indian-ish trance/pop music must be the new frontier these days.

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Movie Reviews Romance

The Painted Veil – Redemption And Unexpected Grace In An Unlikely Place

Those who have read the book written by W. Somerset Maugham published in 1925 will immediately realise the differences between the movie adaptation and the original novel. The character development of the supposed to be shallow, poorly educated Kitty is very much compressed and the conclusion is missing from the adaptation. The novel portrays the spiritual journey of a woman while the adaptation evens out the focus among Kitty (Naomi Watts) and the passionate, intellectual bacteriologist Walter Fane (Edward Norto), someone whom Kitty married not of love. The movie also manages to bring out the beautiful backdrop of China, something the novel is lack of. It is a trade-off in many ways and both the novel and the movie adaptation are enjoyable in their own ways.

Shortly after the couple arrived in Shanghai (it was Hong Kong in the original novel), Kitty has an affair with a polished, married British official (Liev Shrieber) and as a punishment to either the doctor Walter himself or to his wife or to both (up to your own interpretation), Walter has volunteered to station at the mountain village of Mei-tan-fu that was ravaged by the deadly cholera epidemic bringing along his wife Kitty with him.

Though the plot may not leave a lasting impression, the drama is beautifully acted out by the leading actor and actress Edward Norton and Naomi Watts. The movie captures the landscape, the people, and the culture of the China well. Can a woman falls in love with a man with good virtue, I believe, is one of the movie’s themes.

A 2 hours long of romance and drama is worth watching for those who like this movie genre. For those who are interested in the title of the novel, many believe that it is borrowed from Shelley’s famous sonnet that begins with the lines Lift not the painted veil which those who live call life.

Related Sites: The Painted Veil Official Film Site and Lift not the Painted Veil Which Those Who Live

Categories
Movie Reviews Romance

The Last Kiss – A Portrait of Different Facets of Relationships

If you are a big fan of the OC girl Rachel Bilson and if you are a guy, I have good and bad news for you. Good news is, after the movie you will probably go to bed dreaming about that tastefully filmed sex scene of hers. Bad news is that she doesn’t have a lot of air time in this movie.

Jokes aside, “The Last Kiss” was written by Paul Haggis (“Million Dollar Baby” and “Crash”) that aimed to bring out the different facets of relationships through five couples – one who just couldn’t get over his last relationship, one who felt instantly in love with someone in a wedding party and realized that perhaps great sex by itself did not give him enough incentive to move onto the meet-the-parents phase, one who got stuck with a crying baby and a stressed up wife, and of course not to forget to mention Michael (played by Zach Braff from the TV series “Scrub”) who should be happy with his relationship with his girlfriend Jenna – recently pregnant with his baby – but yet he felt that being close to 30 meant that there would be no more surprises in his well-planned life and call it mistiming, he found this young college student Kim (played by none other than Rachel) simply irresistible. Did I mention five couples? Jenna’s parents – 30 years into a dull but not unblemished marriage – played a major role in the plot development as well.

What I really like about “The Last Kiss” is its seamless transition of what different couples have been going through in their relationships that portraits love, temptation, infidelity, forgiveness, marriage, and friendship. In another word, it is highly likely that you may identify yourself with the movie. If you choose to watch this movie, you will see lots of happy moments, sad moments, and heartwarming moments. “The Last Kiss” is not one of those typical Hollywood feel good movie so I suppose it may not be a movie for everyone. Overall, I enjoyed watching it.

What impacted me the most in the movie? If you are willing to give whatever it takes for the relationship to work, that means you should never give up. Because you can’t fail if you don’t give up.