A Nutshell Review by daface

last SG · 2005-05-29T10:42:43+00:00

A Nutshell Review: I Hate Valentine’s DayI haven’t seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding from start to end, but from what I gathered from scenes, Nia Vardalos is qui...

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Ah Long Pte Ltd

I think Jack Neo's latest movie is hogging the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Firstly, the talk about it being promoting Ah Longs (illegal loan sharks). Seriously if that's the case, then a whole slew of Hong Kong triad movies won't be able to make it to our shores too, but they do. So what's this double standard that we're trying to apply to Singapore films? If anyone were to have watched the movie, I think they probably had switched off during some of the rather heavy-handed moments of the story where it rants about the demerits of their behaviour, and of course, the inevitable.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/ah-long-pte-ltd.html (with Q&A as well which containing spoilers)

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Kung Fu Dunk

This project was originally conceived as the movie version of popular Japanese manga SlamDunk! and that's not something new to Jay Chou, who made his movie debut playing a character from another wildly popular manga Initial D. Along the way, it was decided to incorporate some kung fu into the movie, so hence the title, even if the idea wasn't very original, with Stephen Chow's Shaolin Soccer coming to mind with martial arts and ball games combined.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/kung-fu-dunk.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: CJ7

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Away From Her

I have a morbid fascination with the Alzheimer's disease, with the Japanese movie Oriume shown during last year's Japanese Film Festival being one of the earliest movies I've seen tackling the subject head on. I've always wondered how life would turn topsy turvy for the caregivers to anyone suffering from the disease, which inflicts the brain and cause total chaos with one's memory, leading to very peculiar mood swings or just complete and genuine loss when presented with a friendly face, and the hurt cuts more deeply when it belongs to a loved one.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/away-from-her.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: P.S. I Love You

P.S. I Love You is a no-brainer for it to be released this Valentine's Day here, though the challenge of course will be putting couples into seats. Nonetheless everyone's in need for some form of love story, and this will likely fit the bill, although the story's as cliche as love stories can be, and it's not exactly new material for the screen, given that there's a Thai movie called "The Letter" (Jod Mai Rak) which likely had took a leaf from the source material, the novel P.S. I Love You written by Cecelia Ahern.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/ps-i-love-you.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Jodhaa Akbar

Today marks the premiere of Jodhaa Akbar here and the reasons for wanting to watch this film are simple - the pairing of Hrithik Roshan and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, director Ashutosh Gowariker, and musician A.R. Rahman. It's simply an irresistible combination, one that everyone in the cinema hall would attest to, given the full house, and the full house in the next screening.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/jodhaa-akbar.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: There Will Be Blood

Money is the root of all evil. It's needed to fuel the economy, and it's needed to further various gains, be it personal, political, and even religious to a certain extent. Too much money and people will see green, wanting to know the secret formula to creating and hoarding wealth, because of the various forms of satisfying utility that comes with the spending of money. And precious commodity like oil which is in high demand, automatically equates to wads of cold hard cash.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/there-will-be-blood.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: No Country for Old Men

The second movie watched today is also released by Paramount Vintage and Miramax, and shares with There Will Be Blood, eight Academy Award nominations, in a fight for most of the major honours. The brothers Coen's new film have been gathering wave after wave of honours, but somehow it didn't really quite work for me, despite the premise being something I would go for, and most likely to have enjoyed. Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/no-country-for-old-men.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Feast of Love

But to those who decide to do so, Feast of Love lives up to its namesake. Based on the novel by Charles Baxter, almost every conceivable notion of the modern relationship gets worked into the entire story. And it helps too with an ensemble cast filled with beautiful leads, from young upstarts to wisely veterans. As with most movies with a huge cast, everyone's connected to one another through the inevitable six degrees of separation, naturally for convenience, but in this aspect, it played to the early monologue and we take on the role of the Greek Gods, who introduced the notion of love and see how each of our human creations scuttle around trying to make sense of it, and through their individual journeys, succeed or fail, laugh or cry, get spurned on to heights unimaginable, or get thrown into the depths of heartbroken despair.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/feast-of-love.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Things We Lost in the Fire

You can almost be assured of quality acting here in having both Halle Berry and Benicio Del Toro play off each other as an unlikely couple who find strength in each other to overcome a major loss in their lives. To Audrey (Berry), David Duchovny's Brian Burke is the all-encompassing loving husband, who has a knack in raising up their kids, as well as the one who cuddles her to bed each night. But she shares her husband's time, to much of her dislike, with his best friend Jerry Sunborne (Del Toro), a recovering drug junkie who's known him since young, being the only person who cares for Jerry when everyone else shuns him.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/things-we-lost-in-fire.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: The Deaths of Ian Stone

The premise made this look like a distant cousin of movies like Groundhog Day, only that it's more bizarre, and containing an element of gore. Imagine if you wake up but find yourself living a different life from before you slept, not just repeating the last 24 hours. And each iteration actually ends in death, where you feel pain, and knowingly being hunted down. Then you rinse and repeat, with little recollection and little opportunity to figure things out before you get hit again.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/deaths-of-ian-stone.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: The Eye

So I haven't watched the original Eye movie by the Pang Brothers, but I guess with remakes these days, it doesn't really matter, since most of the time, the Hollywood remade version pales in comparison with the original, despite having a bigger budget, bigger stars and of course, better visual effects. And what almost always seem woeful, is the attempt to try and recreate the atmospherics for a spook fest that Asian horror had perfected, and I'm inclined to suggest that they should adapt the storyline (since there's a creative dearth of ideas), but leave the mimicking of mood at the door.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/eye.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Fool's Gold

Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson paired up in a chick flick some 5 years back in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, with the latter making the former fall in love with her, and then having to shrug him off as part of a social experiment, only to find herself really loving him instead. In Fool's Gold, our couple reunites, with Kate Hudson's Tess going down deja-vu avenue in wanting to divorce husband Finn, played by McConaughey because she just had enough of his lack of keeping to promises, which even a fantastic sex life couldn't help.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/fools-gold.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: The Leap Years

The Leap Years, aka Leap of Love, was a long process in the making. Having tracked this movie for a number of years now, it is going to make its debut this year premiering exactly on Feb 29 no less. While there were the usual production woes, I thought that this was one of those projects that remain in development hell, and given the overlong trailers being played in the cinemas - I didn't time it, but it was more than 3 minutes long - I thought it would be one of those that would sink immediately upon release, despite having international flavour with the casting of Joan Chen and Ananda Everingham. Well, the good news is the Singapore's first English language romance movie passes the litmus test.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/leap-years.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: The Spiderwick Chronicles

I guess movies based on children's fantasy books are money spinners that are just too hard to be passed up. But for each Harry Potter and Bridge to Terabithia, there's Eragon and The Golden Compass. The latter two have ready literary installments, but their dismal box office result means they are unlikely to be made anytime soon. Which is probably why The Spiderwick Chronicles decided to combine multiple books into a palatable 100 minute movie that just gets to the point without unnecessary meandering.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/02/spiderwick-chronicles.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Meet the Spartans

With my workload getting increasingly heavy, and working on super secret projects that hope to see the light of day by end of the year, you should come to expect my reviews here returning to their titular roots, presented as far as possible in capsule style. And I kind of expected it to be so with the first movie I've seen after consciously making that resolution.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/03/meet-spartans.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Charlie Wilson's War

We've seen the state of the world as it is in today, and movies like The Kingdom and Lions for Lambs have continued to paint scenarios that are based in the realities of today. But if you've ever wondered how events have unfolded to become what it is now, then you can probably look no further than Charlie Wilson's War for a quick, up to date summary.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/03/charlie-wilsons-war.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: August Rush

Freddie Highmore could be the current hot property as far as male child actors go, and Singapore has lined up two of his movies this week, with The Spiderwick Chronicles for the kiddie audience, and the more mature drama August Rush, which I thought was almost an Oliver Twist with music inclinations.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/03/august-rush.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Sky of Love

You can trust the Japanese romance stories to stick to almost the same formula each time, and yet still being able to draw the masses to their theatres for dishing out more of the same material. There'll be the melodramatic, over the top sob moments, together with love filled with various forms of tension ranging from competition to the usual blowing of hot and cold, my my, the list just goes on.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/03/sky-of-love-koizora.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: One Foot Off the Ground

I didn't really know what to make of One Foot Off the Ground. As it twists and turns in and around its dizzying myriad of characters and the lives, it's easy to get lost, and those without patience would find themselves tempted to walk out of the cinema hall. The payload only gets delivered from the midway mark, as writer-director Chen Daming takes his time to set up each subplot, before developing them richly into satisfying conclusions. Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2008/03/one-foot-off-ground-ji-quan-bu-ning.html

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