Change Your Image
funnlim
Reviews
Rise of the Legend (2018)
Awe inspiring semi biopic
Just saw #LeeChongWeiMovie some slow parts & cliche. Villains r BAM board? But overall any badminton lover must watch. Beautifully shot, its a love letter to badminton & athletes of malaysia. Love misbun part, v moving. Lin Dan no dialogue but actor spot on.But I love most is #leechongwei guest appearance & his message 2 all kids who aspire 2 b like him. He said "don't be like me, be better than me" and win the gold at Olympics which he couldn't. But like #messi that does not negate his legacy. I salute Dato lee chong wei! I don't believe 30% of what was depicted especially his father and poor azmi or underground betting. I do believe he was called a circus monkey. Misbun didn't quit bcoz he lost. And parkson was not d only sponsor over d years! I do believe what happened with him & misbun.
(repost from twitter)
Highly recommended.
Beneath (2013)
A effort for B movie with C list actors who can actually act!
Just watched it and I thoroughly enjoyed this B rate horror film. Surprisingly the actors were very good, no bad actors in here. The only fault is the fish which is like rubber floating. Other than that the atmosphere, the story, the acting were all surprisingly fantastic. The story is pretty horrible and intense. Some actions may be nonsensical, but I like the ending. No one is truly good, the only one who was good also ended up with a bad ending. The worst of the lot deserved his comeuppance. I am satisfied with the ending.
Overall, this is an A effort for a B movie. Better budget, more famous actors with better CGI and this movie may actually be box office material.
Yôgisha X no kenshin (2008)
An answer to Charlie Ishiyama's review
The following is my reply to Charlie Ishiyama's queries raised in his review in this site;
"First, why was the suspect X or the math genius in terrible despair?" If attention is paid to the entire length of the movie itself, subtle hints were dropped throughout which I feel answered this query adequately. We know he would have had a brilliant career if not for his mother's illness which took him away from his work and ended up in a dead end job as an under-appreciated Math teacher in high school. He was alone, lonely and naturally emotionally despair. He looked old despite his relatively not that old age and he is unsatisfied both in life, love and especially in his career, not having realized his full potential and to have Yukawa declared him as a genius, it is quite obvious for the reasons for his terrible despair.
"Second, how could the heroine and her daughter cheer up this unsociable mathematician and help him to rebound from that despair?" Again subtlety explained this question. The end of the movie revealed why. He was about to kill himself when he was interrupted by friendly new neighbor, in the form of the heroine and her daughter, both cheerful and lovely. That woke him up and listening to their daily banter through the thin wall separating the 2 tiny apartments made him feel like he was part of their family that he so craves. He was lifted out of despair with the promise or rather the hope that one day he might be part of that family although he may wished but never really actually wanted to try to do that. The fact that he is unsociable and he seems so surprised at the knock on the door meant he has never had such welcome before by friendly neighbors. His loneliness dissipated with their appearance and along the way he fell for her.
"And third, how could the accidental death of the pimp or the ex-husband of the heroine be significant enough to involve all innocent people into tragedy and had them resign to their fate? It was a premise to thoroughly describe above why and how to develop characters and convince me of X's self-sacrifice or his unconditional love, I thought." There wasn't many innocent people, just 2, one is suspect x himself and the other I shall not reveal to preserve the integrity of the ending. The point is that of shock and to bring into question about how far suspect x would go to preserve the life of his beloved. That is the shock element in the end, one that even Yukawa never thought of despite his genius in deduction and in the end not just left the heroine broken due to her conscience or Suspect X due to his cruel foolishness but also Yukawa who had more faith in his friend than his friend deserves and that broke Yukawa as a person. If you have watched from the TV series to the movie itself, Yukawa is a man of logic but in this movie he contemplated other things other than logic and that presented a different facet of Yukawa. In the end this is a movie about Yukawa Manabu and how his friend suspect x broke him down in the sense Yukawa may have won the deduction battle but he still lost in the end. In fact everybody losses. A significant dialog that summarizes Yukawa's conflict and Ishigami's sacrifice is the question posed by Yukawa to Utsumi and Utsumi's answer to him at the end. It sounds simplistic, that one word, love but it is perhaps as complicated as presented in this movie.
"By the way, If I were the X, I would recommend she give herself up to the police and confess that she had no choice but protect her and her daughter in self-defence." Maybe the stigma is different in Japan? Maybe the sentencing is different?
I believe this movie is really clever in presenting the situation and how 2 men approach the same situation differently. If you're thinking this is about how one man created alibis and how the other solves it, you're wrong. This is a movie that goes beyond that. It is repetitive at some places, some slow paces but in the end it is a brilliant movie that after it finishes and a long time after makes you think; is Suspect X a villain or the good guy? Was the heroine foolish to do what she did in the end despite the sacrifices of the other? Was Yukawa right to reveal the truth which would hurt everybody? How far would one go for the sake of love? How much would one do for the sake of gratitude? How much would one reveal for the sake of the truth? This movie reveals that through 3 important characters.
It is decidedly darker than the TV series but no less brilliant in its plot, clever in the ending and made very stylishly. Performance wise, I find everybody brilliant and a great big credit must go to the 2 very charismatic actors, Fukuyama Masaharu for standing his ground against a more accomplished & well known as an actor, Tsutsumi Shinichi and of course Tsutsumi Shinichi himself. I didn't quite like Matsuyuki Yasuko because I do not like the typical acting by a Japanese actress (heavy breathing, slow mo action). My only other complaint is the stupidity of the police and the lack of role given to the brilliant Kou Shibasaki.
Highly recommended. A pity it was not released worldwide. Do watch the TV version, Galileo. More lighthearted but really clever how the crimes are committed and then solved.
For a fuller review, do check my review at my site, www.point2e.com under the Movies section.
Cheung gong 7 hou (2008)
Not his best but better than the rest
This movie was one of my most eagerly anticipated movie of the year and it opened in Malaysia on the 1st day of Chinese New Year. My entire family went, the cinema was packed with not just Chinese but Indians and Malays since slapstick humor is universal in its appeal and then the movie began. I don't know what happened to Stephen Chow but ever since he made King Of Comedy, every film after had his deeply personal touch, like almost a clue into the man himself. He has yet to make a bad film since, the good of the film is of course the variable in the equation. With money, studio backing and age he seems to settle down to making movies he wants to make and yet the movies he wants to make is also highly entertaining.
CJ7 is a highly entertaining movie. Many compared it to ET. I find it has no similarity to ET except for the obvious nod to the idea of ET, cute alien and cute children in the story. Personally I never liked ET. The central theme in CJ7 to me is more like Lilo & Stitch, an alien dog befriending a young child and in the process teaches the child the value of family and sacrifice. It is a simple premise that all parents, especially Asian. Some reviewers complained the story about the bullying at school was too simplistic, I in turn find them very real. In Asian school system where everyone wears the same uniform, how one arrives at the school is very telling. This movie began with Mercedes Benz arriving at the school and the status issue is further emphasized with clothes, school bags and even the latest toys. If adults could sneer at another who does not have the latest I-phone or cars, more so children.
However what is wonderful about the process of this movie lies beyond just the superficial. It shows children although mean at first are capable of recognizing a friend and an equal. I love the scenes of tenderness between father and son. Without much money and no TV, their source of entertainment was killing cockroaches. Scary but apparently derived from Stephen Chow's own childhood. In fact like King Of Comedy, I believe this may be Stephen Chow's most personal movie yet.
The acting was top notch. So the ladies had little time, less and less in each of his new movie but more and more prettier if I may add, it was the little girl who played a boy that was perhaps the very reason why this movie is so good. I watched the Cantonese version which meant it was dubbed but it was very well dubbed actually. Xu Jiao was not just cute, but also handsome in a boyish way, tall for her age but looks believably skinny as a poor malnourished boy and her actions were boyishly charming. She was in almost every single scene and yet she was totally mesmerizing. Towards the end in that one single scene when he was told of a news that no child should ever hear, her performance was flawless. If this kid is not nominated for the Golden Horse, I don't think anyone should. The supporting actors, from adults to children were good too.
Now the alien dog, CJ7. I can't find the plush toy version, disappointingly and I hope it will be released soon because that alien is just so cute. Yes it looks a little bit like Chicken Little. No dialog but very expressive and there was even a spoof scene of King Of Comedy by that cute alien dog. The technology may not be the greatest but for a film from Asia, I find CJ7 very well designed and of course very lifelike.
To those who feels this movie is catered for children, well that may be true. But there were moments of intense drama and frankly I think this movie is also catered for adults who once had that kind of childhood or that kind of bond with their parents that they too could appreciate. This movie shows positive values, that no matter how poor, integrity is first and foremost and I think that makes this movie beyond the understanding of a child but it is for an adult to appreciate and to explain to the child the significance of what the father told the son repeatedly.
It is not Stephen Chow's best film but it is better than most of the competition out there because it is cute, it is fun, it is funny and more importantly it is personal. It is like a small window to Stephen Chow's soul and I thoroughly enjoyed it. My conclusion is whatever Stephen Chow offers, I will accept. My compliments to Mr Chow too for being an excellent casting director. He has yet to make a bad casting call thus far and my respect too for his ability to step aside to let the lesser known to shine. He was never one to grab the limelight and even though in this movie his role is significantly smaller than his all other movies combine, he is still a star with screen presence. And that I admire him more because being such a huge star he could still step aside and let a little girl, a little alien dog and a bunch of children and adults alike to dominate the screen instead of himself so as to allow the story to flow smoothly. That what makes him a great director.
A must watch for all fans of good movies worth the price of a ticket.