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: The Final Destination 3D

If you’re a fan of the franchise, you’d know the drill by now, and can probably mentally run through all the cliché moments you’ll be expected to see being played out on screen once again. Start with a spectacular death-defying escape from certain demise, and because Death cannot accept those who cheated on him, hence begins that hunter-prey game where the Death’s invisible hand starts to design some elaborate life-ending sequence for its victims, sometimes with some wickedly black humour thrown in.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/08/fin…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: The Time Traveler’s Wife

The Time Traveler’s Wife is one book that I’ve always wanted to read, but just didn’t find the time to get down doing so. I suppose with some travels later this month and the next I would be able to read what friends have been positively talking about, and I’m especially intrigued about the component of time travel here, in how it could wreck crazy havoc in a romantic couple’s life since nobody knows how and when one of them could just come and go randomly. Which of course sounds like what anyone can do these days if you’re tired of hanging around with someone else, and I’m sometimes guilty of that as well.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/tim…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Blood Ties

I had developed a keen interest in Chai Yee-wei’s body of short films, besides personal reasons that my friends and I did go up against his many years back in a competition (no guesses who won of course). In fact it was during that 48 hour contest that made me sit up and take notice that here’s someone who can tell a good, entertaining story under similar constraints and resources, and his shorts throughout the years are testament to that. Some two years ago during a screening of Blood Ties the short film, he had made mention that he’s developing the feature length version, and here we are today. My verdict? It’s a stellar debut feature film from a young director from our shores, and possibly one of the very best debuts we’ve seen over the last few years.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/blo…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Blood Ties

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/blo…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: I Love You, Beth Cooper

Thumb through a video store catalog, and there are a dime a dozen of many teen comedies out there that you’ll be hard pressed to find something that either didn’t deal with hard partying, road trips, one crazy night of post-graduation party, self-discovery, friendship and the likes. In fact, I Love You, Beth Cooper, has almost all those cliché moments filled with stereotypical characters, but under the direction of Chris Columbus, this story by Larry Doyle actually came across in quite enjoyable terms, thanks to what I thought made the movie – a line that was uttered upon stark realization, and the fear as expressed by the titular character, which made it quite distinct and standing out amongst the competition.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/i-l…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: G-Force 3D

Before you laugh at me for watching this obviously made for children movie, I thought it was somewhat interesting to observe how a Jerry Bruckheimer produced film, his first 3D one at that, would have fared should it have gone up against his long time director Michael Bay in the summer blockbuster stakes. While Transformers 2 had made cash registers worldwide go into overdrive, I thought G-Force had plenty going for it to have trounced those mega-robots. In my opinion, yes G-Force is way better than Transformers.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/g-f…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Dance Flick

One wonders about the appeal of parody movies, taking genres that happen to be the flavour of the moment, and then adding doses of comedic spoofs into something of an abomination of a film, very much like a patchwork Frankenstein brought to life by the need to make fun of everything. While I could have swore off such films with the likes of the very unbelievably bad film Meet the Spartans, somehow the need to laugh after a rigourous in-camp training, and wanting to give the Wayan brothers a chance as I’ve enjoyed their Scary Movie spoof, brought me to their Dance Flick.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/dan…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Gamer

One wonders if social networking coupled with MMORPG similar to the likes of 3D avatar-based Second Life, would take off on an extremely large scale, with the hardware to support it, coupled with some X-factors to actually induce active participation. We know how fractured such sites and high-tech designs can be, though it didn’t work against Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, famous for their Crank movies, to think up of a cautionary tale about the obsession with the virtual over what is real.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/gam…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Aliens in the Attic

I think I’m in a phase now where this holiday season’s family friendly fare such as G-Force have more than surprised and satisfied in its entertainment value. They’re not fantastic films, and perhaps my judgement over them has given way to nostalgia, where once I had unabashedly enjoyed films such as Honey I Shrunk the Kids, and Home Alone, with kids triumphing over the clueless adults in the films.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/ali…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: 9

Just like how Peter Jackson had produced Neil Blomkamp’s first feature film District 9 and I loved that to bits, 9 has visionaries in Tim Burton and Timur Bekmambetov lend their producing creds in Shane Acker’s animated science fiction film, and the result is nothing less than stunning, telling a crisp narrative with plenty of scrumptious apocalyptic styled visuals.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/9.html

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Crows Zero II

Takeshi Miike returns to helm the second installment of Crows Zero, which is arguably amongst his more mainstream work, based upon the manga by Hiroshi Takahashi. Bringing back almost all the major cast from the first film, one should expect more of the same story of high school violence given the thuggish micro-society amongst the academic community, where it’s sans teachers and books, replaced by life’s experience though the school of hard knocks (at times literally), coupled with the opening of old wounds and settling them through some good ‘ol fisticuffs.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/cro…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Moon

Written and directed by Duncan Jones, Moon is strangely unique because while it contained a series of familiar cliches, it still managed to string itself together in an engaging manner, also in a large part thanks to Sam Rockwell’s stellar one-man show, acting against himself with the occasional banter with a computer voiced by Kevin Spacey and represented by a smiley emoticon interface.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/moo…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Thirst

The response to Park Chan-wook’s Thirst is nothing less than polarizing. You either love it like one of my friends who rated it amongst the best he’d seen, or you loathe it like another who had staged a walkout. Personally I do not think this film deserved such a negative response, however, it did get a little indulgent at times, and schizophrenic too in its narrative, but had its moments which basically boiled down to the power wielded by and given to the female of the species, and the havoc that it creates.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/thi…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Whatever Works

Whatever Works, worked. To a large extent, this Woody Allen film just happened to be right up my alley with its level of sarcasm, and impressions ranging ranging from relationships, religion and just about everything that life’s about under this crazy sun. Having jet-set to Europe with his last few films, Allen returns to New York, and has Larry David star as his mouthpiece, the self-proclaimed genius and know-it-all Boris Yellnikoff, who serves to be our guide through this quirky film with some keen observations and sharp commentary.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/wha…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Year One

Compared to the other comedy, I had somehow enjoyed Year One a lot more than Dance Flick if not because the latter had lacked more coherent scenes, slapping incident after incident of spoofs in clear narrative disregard in what would be a sad state of affairs where Hollywood comedies are concerned. Year One, written and directed by veteran Harold Ramis was a lot more fun, even though it had Jack Black and Michael Cera not in top form while playing off one another.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/yea…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: The Ugly Truth

Maybe it’s because I have bad taste, or a potty mind at times that took over, and found that hey, I could be the equivalent of a Mike Chadway (Gerard Butler) too, with filth that comes out of the mouth without thorough processing.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/ugl…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Inglourious Basterds

While Quentin Tarantino’s love for movies is unquestionable, Inglourious Basterds tops his previous efforts in genre revolution, tossing a whole of of ingredients together and mixing them up, and you’ll be put into a mental dizzy just keeping track of the numerous odes, homages, and pure love for the cinema that Tarantino included in this film, a misnomer most definitely that this is anything but a WWII movie about a group of US-Jewish guerrilla soldiers inserted into enemy territory to strike fear through their inhumane ways of exterminating Hitler’s army.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/ing…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Tokyo Sonata

Mention the name Kiyoshi Kurosawa, and inevitably you’ll think of cult horror films such as Kairo, Sakebi and Loft, since his name is synonymously linked with the genre. He’s turned in a surprise here sharing keen observations and an astonishing dramatic piece of Japanese society and of the family, showcasing the hallmarks of a great storyteller, being out of his comfort zone.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/tok…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: Phobia 2

With the success of 4bia, it’s a no brainer for the sequel to be made, now with the addition of Visute Poolvoralaks joining the original team of four in contributing to an anthology that sees each helming a segment, an opportunity to showcase their brand of scare tactics.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/pho…

daface SG

A Nutshell Review: The September Issue

Meryl Streep’s character in The Devil Wears Prada is rumoured to be inspired by Anna Wintour, the legendary editor-in-chief of the fashion magazine Vogue, and it’s not hard to see how so. A cup of Starbucks in hand, the bob hairdo, the cutting remarks, people going into a frenzy whenever her name is mentioned, and worse when dazzled by her presence. Even the vogue office does seem quite similar in terms of layout, and the number of assistants constantly scurrying around looking busy and executing to her every instruction.

Continues at http://anutshellreview.blogspot.com/2009/09/sep…

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