movie review of the month!

Coraline – 8.6
Simply the best stop-animation movie I’ve seen, and it probably has the most imaginatively creative visuals ever in an animation like this. There are plenty of stories about a child who goes to another fantasy world, but Coraline is something very different from the rest, because this movie had all the elements of a good movie right; fantastic animation, superb story, weird and mysterious vibe and above all, one very enjoyable adventure! Even if you don’t like animation, I really recommend this movie! The best movie in 2009 that I’ve watched so far.

Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance – 8.4
This is one pretty wild Korean movie, and it has no mercy on the fate of its crazy but surely memorable characters. The main character cannot speak, but his misery, sadness, loneliness and pain were wonderfully portrayed onto the screen with such brilliant acting performances. I will never forget this movie, as many scenes sent waves of shocking imagery of pain and sadness tattooed onto my brain. Truly a gem in film-making, and I totally recommend this to anyone who likes something different and original in their movie-viewing experience. Now you really HAVE to watch this, don’t you?

Nanking! Nanking! – 8.4
This Chinese movie about the Nanking Massacre is perhaps, the most shocking and painful to watch war movies that I have ever seen. The visuals portrayed in the movie were so strong that the audience would feel the pain and sadness stabbing into their hearts, leaving an uneasy after taste and a reminder of how evil we humans could be to each other. Although extremely heavy and suffocating to watch, the movie has a tight plot development and chock full of contents and stories that made me glued to the screen, not knowing what will happen next. This black-and-white movie has a strong anti-war message, and I totally recommend it to anyone strong enough to take such strong imagery.

A Moment To Remember – 8.5
Holy damn it, this movie managed to get me ALMOST teary-eyed. This Korean romantic tear jerker was pretty good; the hero was good looking, the heroin beautiful and the story-development very interesting as it sets all the elements needed to make you felt attached to the main characters, and then they start the conflicts and hardships rolling. A pretty basic formula for these types of movies, but the director did a fantastic job at it. I don’t watch romance that often, but I really enjoyed watching this one. Highly recommended!

Transformers Revenge of The Fallen – 7.0
Transformers 2 is here! And the story sucked, the humor/jokes felt forced and the acting worse and I left the cinema not really remembering anything spectacular. But who gives a shit about all of that, this movie got the transformers blowing shit up and destroying all sorts of things and that is way too cool! Megan Fox was hot too, and that’s pretty much why she was in the movie. The first Transformers movie was better overall, but if you like that, you’re sure going to enjoy this one. Anyways, to sum it up, this movie got robots that kick the shit out of each other, it got loads of gigantic explosions and Megan Fox wears hot-pants! No young male could say no to that! Micheal Bay has the creative imagination of an 13 years old kid.

Handsome Suit – 7.6
The plot of this Japanese romantic comedy is pretty simple: an ugly guy obtains a suit that magically made him unbelievably handsome! The heroin, Kitagawa Keiko, is ever prettier in this one! I can safely say that anyone could enjoy this light comedy, and if you don’t mind some silliness, why don’t give this movie a try? I enjoyed it!

Happy Flight – 7.5
This Japanese light comedy might have the simplest storyline and plot development ever, but if you take a closer look, you will notice all the details and hard work put to make the movie as close to the real thing as possible. Happy Flight is a movie about ANA’s crew; the flight attendant, the pilot, the tower watch control, ground crew and all the other people that made flying possible. The movie does not emphasize much on comedy, but there were some great comedy moments albeit small ones. Haruka Ayase was pretty cute in this one, and I confess, she is the real reason why I watch this to the end.

Speedy Scandal – 7.8
I enjoyed watching this Korean comedy very much! The casts were cute, the story was interesting and there were a lot of laughs to be had here, and some unexpected sappy moments too. This movie is well balanced with all the elements that made a decent, good movie. If lyou ove love Korean comedy, you’d probably enjoyed this too!

Knowing – 7.2
Yet another sci-fi cum disaster movie that evolves around mysteries of accurate predictions… and of course extra terrestrials! The story was light and easy to follow and I think the special effect was amazing, especially during the intense and dramatic disaster scenes; they really did a good job in making it look as real and as violent as it could be. Nothing special though.

The International – 7.3
An action thriller starring Clive Owen about an Interpol officer who tries to uncover the role of a famous bank in arms dealings, and how they deal with thoso who tries to expose them. The story was slow and convoluted at times, the acting was nothing memorable, the pacing is quite bad and the first half of the movie was pretty boring… but the second half was not so bad and did make out to be a decent thriller. It’s just not good enough.

The Homeless Student (ホームレス中学生) – 7.5
Based on the best selling Japanese novel about comedian Tamura Hiroshi’s life, as a homeless kid, who lives in a slide that looked like a pile of human dung. The acting by the main character was probably the worst that I have ever seen in a Japanese movie, but the story were very easy to follow and the expression of emotions were very clear, making it easy for the audience to sympathize and follow through the story to the end. One Japanese movie worth watching…maybe?

Street Fighter The Legend of Chun-Li – 3.0
They shouldn’t have made this terrible movie of such gargantuan failure. Based on Capcom’s famous Street Fighter video games, this movie has no resemblance to its original source! For starters, Chun-Li was in the Hong Police force in the game, but in the movie, she’s a Wushu-thought concert pianist! WTF?! The story was terrible, the acting was decent, the fight scenes were boring and even the cute Kristin Kreuk makes this one of the ugliest videogame-based movies out there. How dare Capcom approved such a disgrace to gaming’s first female video game protagonist?!

I.K.U. – 5.0
This artsy Japanese movie is perhaps the weirdest shitty film about sex robots that I have ever seen in my entire life. There is no plot, and each and every scene is filled with the weirdest sex scenes ever, it’s fucking crazy. Might be a good movie to watch when you’re high as fuck though.

National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets – 5.0
Err… what the fuck just happened? Believe me… don’t waste your time watching this crap.

The Pink Panther 2 – 6.8
The first Pink Panther was a pretty decent comedy, and if you liked the first one, you would know what to expect in this second movie. The ‘idiot french detective’ formula worked on me somehow, and I had some laughs watching this.

hey! new movie reviews!

今、会いにゆきます (ima, ai ni yukimasu) – 9.2
What an amazing movie; I don’t remember being moved by a movie as much as this. I’ve seen tons and tons of Japanese movies in my life, and this is definitely one if not, my most favorite. What a beautiful portrayal of love between a husband, wife and their son. The distinct quality that I love about Japanese movies is its detailed story and subtle presentations, and this movie has both in such harmony that I got sucked into it right from the start. If you don’t have a liking to Japanese movies, please try and watch this one. If you love Japanese movies (like me), you should do what ever it takes to try and grab hold of this movie, and watch it entirely. If you’ve been agreeing with my past movie-reviews, there is no reason that you would disagree with me this time. Highly recommended. Really… forget about Slumdog Millionaire, watch this movie instead.

The Good, The Bad and The Weird – 8.4
The Italians got their Spagetti Western. The Japanese got their Sukiyaki Western. The Koreans, on the other hand, might got their own version of a Western movie with The Good, The Bad and The Weird; should I called it Kimchi-Bibimba Western? The lack of strong story in the movie is backed up by high-production action sequences and lots of funny scenes. If you like action-comedies (with a heavy emphasis on action), you’re going to love this. The characters are colorfully crazy, the gun fights are awesomely cool and the environments and set-pieces are truly memorable and unique. This is a very light movie, not complex at all, and the entertainment value is very high. I’m sure anyone would have a great time watching this. Highly recommended.

Sepi – 8.2
Sepi is a surprisingly awesome Malay movie! Yay! The story is not spectacular or anything, but the way it was cut, edited and presented made it a truly watchable movie to be enjoyed. The film starts pretty slow and boring at the beginning, but it didn’t take much time to grab and suck you into the story line as it was revealed to the viewer, piece by piece. The movie tries to portray people from everyday life and how they cope with loneliness. I really think that this is a very good Malay movie, and it got my recommendation.

The Magic Hour – 8.0
Coming from the director of Uchoten Hoteru, this is another funny and well-put -together comedy from Koki Mitani. Although I do think that the story is too over-the-top and sometimes silly, the barrage of funny scenes made me dismiss my latter complaint as nothing biggie. I really enjoyed this Japanese comedy, and if you liked Uchoten Hoteru, there is no reason that you’re NOT going to love this one. Recommended!

Body Of Lies – 8.2
My favourite actor Leonardo DiCaprio with Russel Crowe in the middle-east! No way is this action movie going to suck! The story was really interesting and it managed to keep me constantly on the edge of my seat, guessing what is going to happen next. Great performances by two great actors and lots of stuff getting shot and blown off to pieces, going BOOM! This is a pretty good action movie, and it got my recommendation.

インストール (Install) – 7.0
A ten years old boy introduced a high school girl who lost the will to go to school, to the world of sex chat. Their budding relationship grows deeper as they discuss the depth of erotica, sex and everything about growing up. What a way to play the innocence of children and teenagers to apply a new, different filter in the way we look at sexuality.

秒速５センチメートル – 8.0
This is probably the most beautiful anime that I’ve ever seen. It’s like watching paintings in motion. I really like the art style and that alone is worth the admission fee. The structure of the movie is not like the ordinary one, as it contained several stories that is totally different from one another, but they all share the same theme of desperateness, confusion, hope and sweetness of being in love. The visuals really had a calming effect on me, and I felt really relaxed watching this movie. If you love anime/love stories, you should really check this one out. Recommended.

人のセックスを笑うな (Don’t Laugh At My Romance) – 7.4
This movie is very Japanese in its presentation. The plot moves very slow, the acting method is very relaxed and ‘realistic’, and the dialogues really serves no purpose other than to ‘carve’ the characters into real people with real thoughts and problems. The story is quite amusing though; a collage student fall in a lustful love with a rather unique girl, whose weird character would made all the events in the movie pretty hard to believe that it would happen in real life.

Tokyo Decadence – 6.0
This weird Japanese movie introduces the audience to the weird Japanese fetish of S&M play, and the weird people behind it. It was quite shocking to see such perverseness in a developed society such as the Japanese; but I guess it can’t be helped, because just like the many characters in the movie, ‘sukebe’ people is all over Japan. I think the director did a good job in shocking the viewer with his images, but the storyline is extremely convoluted and felt like a stupid artsy movie at the end. This movie is bad, but the shock factor of it made it worth the watch. Especially to fellow perverts…

Tokyo X Erotica – 4.5
I am very confused with what kind of a movie the director wants to make here: an erotica or artsy bullshit? Unlike Tokyo Decadence where the setting for erotisms was not so jarring as it was the meat of the presentation, I find the erotism in Tokyo X Erotica tasteless, cheap and have no point in the story. The movie think it is cool but it is dumb and totally a garbage of one.

Amoros Perros – 8.0
This brutal and gritty Mexican film contains 3 stories, and all were connected to one tragic accident. This movie portrays the harsh reality of life and love, and how people cope with it. The whole atmosphere of the movie is very real, and made me cringe at the reality of life.

The Third Jihad – 6.0
The message of this movie is simply put: AARRHRAAHAH!! THE MUSLIMS ARE COMING TO FUCK THE WEST!! AAAHHHHAHAHHAA BE FUCKING AFRAID!

Sex Is Zero 2 – 7.5
Korean American Pie? Maybe. But this movie is still very funny and probably way betters that Hollywood original. Anyways, I was really surprised at how sweet the movie chooses its path to conclude the movie. Recommended, but you should be warned that this movie has lots of suggestive sex scenes and boob flashing, but it is also funny as hell and I had a great amount of laughs watching this while in the same time maintaining a boner. Awesome stuff.

Kami The Movie – 7.8
I’ve never seen a single episode of this malay drama series, but the director did a pretty good job to let even people like me to understand the story; and the detailing of each character with their own back-story is well done and not too confusing. The plot was quite interesting and the story elements in the movie were presented in a nice flow of pacing right to the end. Not bad, not bad at all. This is a Malay movie, and I enjoyed watching this one.

Wayang – 7.5
This movie has a lot of amateurish mistakes, I don’t know where to start, but the most annoying one is the ‘melodramatic’ background music every time a tense scene is on. Next one is camera work. Eman Manan (lead character) gave a great performance in this movie, but the lousy and extremely lazy camerawork has destroyed and diminished his fine efforts. And lastly, this film is poorly edited; meaning that the feeling of discontinuity between scenes is very anti-immersive and totally ruined the movie. All of these technical issues are very disappointing and unfortunate, and it could be easily fixed with a better budget and equipment(and better crew to handle all those equipments?). With that said though, I was very impressed with the level of authenticity the director tried to portray. Although the story did have some clichéd elements from a typical Malay movie about disabled people, the well mixed combination of awesome dialogues, realistic stories, and a rare focus on wayang kulit in the spotlight has really made this movie quite special and memorable. Or is it because of the Kelantanese accent used? I am a born and bred Kelantanese and I can safely assure you that the Kelantanese accent used in this movie is pretty close to the real thing. In a nutshell: I really want to like this movie, but I can’t just overlook the technical issues and brush it away. Anyways, here is a short message to my pkpx maresmart friends: cuba teka sapa dak batch kita yg keluar dlm satu scene dlm movie nih? Here’s a hint: khan.

Sex In Japan (BBC) – 8.0
This is the kind of bullshit that I love: Combining Sex with Japan, and calling it educational! This documentary tries to reveal the unknown sexually of the Japanese people, and I’m sure those coming from conservative societies are going to be shocked and would be like “no, way! That’s fucked up”. Well my friends… believe if. I’m the witness.

The T-Back Game – 3.0
A 新米 (shinmai – newcomer) idol, refused to follow her senior’s advice to fuck her way up the ladder of idols, decided to work her own way up with her own ideas and effort. And that effort is of course, by entering the T-Back Game; and T-Back means Thong in Japan. This is another one of those bad Japanese movies that relies on nothing more than how much skin can the actress show during the whole movie. Avoid this at all costs.

new ***movie reviews***

This time, I have had the chance to watch a lot of great movies in a very short period of time, and I’m glad that I have the time to watch all these great (and not so great) masterpieces. I plan to watch more and more movies, and for sure I’ll write the reviews in my arrogant ways. Anyways, the deal is like my previous movie reviews; basically if I recommend the movie, it must be worth the watch. If I think that it is a must watch, then you will have to find the ways to watch the movie because I seriously think that you won’t be disappointed. I am really that confident!

The Wrestler – 8.9

Wrestling might be fake, but this movie is as real as it gets. At first I thought the main character was really a pro-wrestler, because his body personified his character too well: a worn out, battered but still moving, tank. Then I found out that it was Jimmy Rouke, a veteran actor on a come-back, delivering one of the best performances in a film that I have ever seen. It was so fucking real. This movie is full of emotion. The emotion of sadness, happiness, lust, discontent, loneliness and that one stubborn trait of us human beings not wanting to give up what one loves doing, because that is what living a life is. This movie inspires us to work hard on what we love to do, and just enjoy the moment. The story of an old pro-wrestler struggling with his dying career and his desperation to cure his loneliness may not click well with some people, but this is definitely my most favorite movie of 2008, and I recommend it to everyone.

Slumdog Millionaire – 8.7

The story format of the movie is very interesting: a contestant of ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire India’ is one question away from winning the highest prize money, just to be taken away by the police for the suspicion cheating. He was forced to explain how he managed to answer each question, and the story behind those questions leads to the revealing of his interesting life starting as a boy living in horribly poor slums and how he managed to feed himself when her mother died. This is a movie about growing up, about believing in destiny and love. The shocking reality of poverty stricken communities in India might be too much for some, but it really made the film atmospheric and memorable. The soundtrack really fit the movie well and there was never a boring or dull moment in the movie; I’m at the edge of my seat the whole experience. This is an experience, and it is a good one. You have to watch this movie, and I could not stress it enough that I highly recommend this movie.

Gandhi – 8.6

This 1982 movie is about… Yes you guessed it right! Mohandas Karamchand Ghandi, aka Mohatma Gandhi. This epic movie follows the life of this great philosopher of peace from his early participation of a civil movement in South Africa, and back to India; further into the process of an independent India from the ruling British Empire. Ghandi is a living hero for us who still believes in humanity, and much should be learned from the small brown man with a stick. Ben Kingsley, who played Ghandi in this film, is absolutely amazing; the way he speaks, the way he moves; he embodies the spirit of Ghandi in every way. They don’t make these kinds of film anymore these days, and I’m glad that I’ve watched this. Of course, Ghandi’s teachings might be a little bit too philosophical to be applied onto today’s reality, but his truthfulness and love stands strong for many more generations to come. Highly recommended.

Grand Turino – 8.5

Who would’ve thought that a grumpy racist old man could be so like-able? Clint Eastwood played his best character in a movie (second to Dirty Harry, of course) and his brilliant performance will surely be remembered for a long time. Well, at least for me. The film is very well written and directed; it is funny, the story is very interesting, the character development is intact, the pacing was just right and every scene was never a boring one. Although Clint Eastwood did a brilliant performance, his supporting actors especially the Hmong kid was really terrible, that sometimes it broke the immersion of the whole movie. A movie about an old men trying to reform the neighborhood and protect a troubled teenager might not sound good enough in paper, but you’ll never be able to guess what is going to happen next. This is a very good movie; and I highly recommend it.

Waltz With Bashir – 8.5

This Israeli animation is a documentary about the 1982 Lebanon-Israel war and follows an Israeli war vet who visits his friends during the war to relive his lost memories during the Sabra and Shatila massacre. IMO, this is one of the best animation that I have ever seen for the past 10 years; and this is for a firm reason. The dreamy images used in the film perfectly depicted the shady memory of a 19 year old soldier caught up in war. The choice of animation successfully retracted the audience from reality and I think this is a brilliant technique used by the director to give the audience what it feels like when someone saw war at it’s most horrible ways, and filters it with ‘camera vision’ to make it unreal; just for the sake of avoiding craziness. The ending was just horrifying and will leave you speechless, shattering what ever ‘cleaned up’ illusion that you have about war and the cruelty of human beings. This film couldn’t come out at a better time (I’m referring to GAZA), and I highly recommends this masterpiece.Yes, this movie is from Israel, and I suggest you to watch it.

Budak Kelantan – 7.4

The movie starts well with the director focusing on trying to differentiate the two main characters with some details but at the end, it felt like they were trying to wrap up things too sudden, and that leaves you kinda hanging at the end. Anyways, this is pretty good for a new director, and the ‘shaky-cam’ cinematography really add a gritty, realistic feel to the whole movie; something that you don’t see much in Malay movies. The plot though, with it’s little approach to explain certain plot defining story-points, is very unrealistic and not convincing enough, breaking the ‘gritty and realistic’ feels that it achieved through camera work. Anyways, the use of the kelantanese dialect was pretty spot-on, and I’m just glad that it was not bad. Try watching this, you might like it.

Anak Halal – 6.9

Anak Halal is both good and bad. The first half of the movie was very fun to watch; it’s funny, charming, sweet and sometimes emotional but the last part of the movie was just full of discontinuity and it seems like the director didn’t care about believable story plots anymore. Terrible ending plot aside, the fighting scenes was actually quite good, although sometimes it make me felt like I was watching a different movie all of a sudden. This movie is different from other mediocre Malay movies, but it was not that great.

Lawrence Of Arabia – 8.1

They sure don’t do make movies as EPIC as this movie is anymore; the scale is just HUGE and overwhelming. The cinematography is just amazing and captures the harsh desert environment so well. This 1962 movie based on a true story is about a British military officer who leads the Arab Revolt against the Turks (of the pre WW1 Ottoman Empire); and how he united the many Arab tribes into one army that pushed into Damascus to finally conquer it. The story was pretty good and character development is well laid out. This is an old film, but it is still a masterpiece to this day, and if you like epic, historic movies, you’d surely enjoy this movie. Recommended.

Revolutionary Road – 8.0

Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio really make a good pair, the chemistry between them transcends the silver-screen, or at least they managed to make it looks like so. The movie is really good with great performances from all the actors and actresses, but I was just hoping for something more… memorable and unique? Pretty fun movie nonetheless. Recommended.

The Lives of Others – 8.0

A writer in Germany during it’s socialist era had his house bugged so that the government could listen in to whatever activities he and his liberal writers are up to. An interrogator was tasked to listen and record all the activities that happened in the house and report it to his officer, but his interest in the lives of those who he monitors has affected his work, and leads to unpredictable results. This is one good German movie, and it has my recommendation.

Network – 7.5

This 1976 movie is about a worn-out newscaster on a minor broadcasting company who, in his last days, started to preach his highly provocative views on how we the television viewers are very much influenced by TV and how ridiculous it is to let TV leads how we live our life. The script was very well written and the prophecies made by the preachy newscaster was actually quite an accurate reflection of the Television culture today; it’s pretty scary. This movie is hard to recommend to young moviegoers because of the ‘OLD’ style in screenplay and soap-opera like camera work, but it’s definitely NOT a bad movie.

Vicky Christina Barcelona – 8.2

This is a movie about love, but it is not a romantic movie. The story basically evolves around two American friends who spent some time on a holiday in Spain, crossing path with a flamboyant local artist and his crazy ex-wife. They fall in love, they questioned their love and conflicts were bound to happen in this kind of drama, and they did; albeit in a very interesting but convincing fashion. This is a very good drama, and I enjoyed it. Therefore I recommend it to those who love dramas that has some comedy, romance and crazy bitches.

Femme Fatale – 7.8

Femme Fatale – means ‘deadly women’ in France, is a movie about a beautiful con artist who double crossed her partners, and got away with it. The story get more interesting from that point and although some might say the method used to expand the plot was kinda cheap, it was pretty well done and I ended liking it. The early lesbian scenes and some other very important, sexually charged events happening in the entire movie does help you get interested through the end. This is a sexy thriller, and straight guys will have a boner or two; it’s healthy!

Frost/Nixon – 7.5

Ok, before watching this movie, I have no knowledge about President Nixon, and his political scandals that leads to this presidential resigning, but I still enjoyed the ‘intense’ acting and how well they put up a story behind an interview. After watching the movie, I’ve compared the interviews made in the movie with the original, and although a lot of alterations were made in the movie to make it tighter for the mass audience, I’m very impressed with the actor playing Richard Nixon, because he sounded just like the real guy. This film also encouraged me to make some research about Nixon and his Watergate scandal and all, and it was a pretty interesting history lesson, so I won’t complain much. I always like interesting history. But I can’t recommend this movie to anyone that has no interest in America’s political history because that is all that this movie can offer. I had a great time watching this movie, though.

Max Payne – 6.0

first movie review compilation 2009?

Léon The Professional – 8.8
If you haven’t watched this movie, you need to do it RIGHT NOW! I was blown away by the brilliance of Natalie Portman’s performance; at the age of 12, she managed to pull off something that a professional actor might take years to accomplish. I’ve seen many movies (one movie a day is probably too much though) and I can say that her performance in Leon was by far, the best child performance in the history of movies. Period. Jean Reno, by the way, is as awkwardly cool as ever, and Gary Oldman was just creepy. The story is quite bizarre and made you check your moral compasses on the boundaries of sexuality between a hired killer and a child. Close-to-being-a-pedophile main characters aside, you just have to see this movie. If you like action movies involving gun fights and sympathetic and weird characters, by all means, watch this. Highly recommended!

サイドカーに犬 (Dog In Sidecar) – 8.4
A pleasantly sweet story about the bonds between an innocent girl with her father’s new lover, a free spirited women full of mystery. Although this movie is set around a dysfunctional Japanese family, the director successfully fleshed out many details about the characters that made this film full with small moments that made you smile. The details in the acting, dialogue and scene progression is definitely distinctive of those few good Japanese movie directors, but even if you don’t like Japanese movies, you should really try this one out. The script and screenplay was brilliant, and the main character played by Takeuchi Yuko and the uniquely different child performance of Matsumoto Kana was just superb. I like this movie, and I would recommend it to those who like Japanese family-comedy-drama movies.

Happy Go Lucky – 8.2
The movie evolves around an always-happy, always-sarcastic elementary school teacher; her overly happy-go-lucky attitude might sometimes be questionable whether it’s pure or not, but it’s still fun to watch nonetheless. The movie does not have a story or plotlines that have to be wrapped up at the end; it’s just a simple charming movie, with an abundance of appropriately funny scenes. Recommended for sure!

Bangkok Dangerous – 5.5
Just another dumb Hollywood action movie, but this time the location is in Thailand. Bad acting, bad story line, bad movie. Don’t bother to watch this crap.

X-Files I Want To Believe – 7.0
The X Files series used to be the best TV programs during the 90’s, and I used to follow the series whenever I can. They used to make a movie before, and it was not so good; but I’m glad that this time around, it was definitely an improvement from their previous efforts. David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson fits each other like a glove, but still, the story was not so interesting enough but at least I paid attention to it to the last minute, which is probably good enough. If you didn’t like X-Files, I don’t think you would enjoy this movie though.

Milk – 7.5
Based on a true story of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay official who was assassinated during the American counterculture of the 60’s and 70’s. It told the story of how the charismatic butt-seks-lover decided to get out in the open and fight for gay rights in San Francisco. Because this IS a story that revolves gay people, there are going to be several disgusting gay intimacy scenes in the movie, but don’t get that normal human emotion from turning you down, because the story was pretty interesting and Sean Penn really did a great acting performance; you’d believe that he loves to suck cock even in real life!

Appaloosa – 7.0
Unlike the many western movies before it, the gun fights in this movie feels very real; and that adds so much tension to each fight scene. Two men were hired by a troubled town to protect them from the outlaws terrorizing the peace there. Then of course, there is going to be a woman to complicate things further. Great performance by Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen, but I don’t think Renee Zellweger is fit enough to take the role of a women that alpha males would be chasing for. A pretty good Western, nonetheless.

Saw V – 4.0
I slept on the beginning of the movie out of boredom, and then I slept again during the end. They should really stop making Saw movies now. It is boring, unoriginal, overly recycled and definitely not scary anymore. Don’t bother seeing this.

Disaster Movie – 6.0
You already know what to expect from a parody movie like this. Some jokes might work, some might fail miserably but at least it was not so bad that it’s unwatchable. Silly jokes and hot chicks; that is all that these types of movies need, and that is what they offer.

Hard Candy – 7.0
The premise of the film was quite interesting: a smart 14 years old girl tricked and trapped a pedophile in his own home, then resort to torture to ‘teach’ the poor bastard a lesson. But unfortunately, the ‘interesting’ bits of the story feel like ‘draggish’ later on into the movie that you really felt like ‘o when will she finally kill the guy and get it over with? Enough talking already!’. Ellen Page did a decent job in this movie, but it was not that great compared to Juno.

Zack And Miri Make A Porno – 7.0
The title says it all. 2 high school friends (a guy and a girl) were so broke; they decided to shoot a porn movie. Put lots of porn jokes in the beginning, make it a little romantic in the middle and try to make it seem all right at the end by finishing it off like a clichéd love story made for teenagers. The jokes were still funny, but there is nothing interesting about this movie except the title. And dumb me got lead right into the trap.

Resident Evil Degeneration – 7.0
Previous Resident Evil movies were not bad, but it’s a shame that although Degeration is a full CGI movie, it is definitely better than their Hollywood-made live action versions. Staying true to its video game roots, the movie has lots of slow zombies, zombies suddenly jumping out of glass windows, big scary BOSS zombies, main characters constantly jumping away from huge explosions at the last minute, and of course, betrayal! If you love the game, you’ll enjoy this. They got Leon and Claire in this one! The story is pretty bad and doesn’t make any sense though.

Nereikalingi zmones (Loss) – 8.0
This is the first Lithuanian movie for me, and it’s such a different experience; I’ve never seen a movie as unique as this. The story unfolds like a mystery movie and creeps at you slowly. Yes, this movie IS very slow, but it leaves space for the viewer to process the connection between each character in the movie, which is quite bizarre in how they’re connected to one single accident. This is a movie about the tragedy of the human heart, and how we cope with it by trying to connect with others. Worth the look.

Perfect Hideout – 5.0
This movie is so bad, it’s actually funny by being too ridiculously serious and dumb. This movie is funny because it tries so hard to be cool. This movie is so bad, that somehow it felt good. Still a crap of a movie though.

Salo, or the 120 Days of Sodom – 4.0
This movie is the sickest movie I’ve ever seen. It insults your brain with its sick imagery, it numbs the mind with its mindless and overtly crazy story, and you were left wondering: who the fuck enjoys watching this shit? Avoid this movie at all costs, but if you’re wondering, this movie is all about sexual torture, sadisticm, and eating shit. It tries to unnecessarily depict the evil and cruelness a human being could conflict on another human being, the reason by just being bored. You will feel like you’ve lost you humanity after watching this. Crazy stuff. *This is an Italian movie*

War Inc – 7.0
A fairly entertaining movie that mocks and parodies the American military industrial complex and its out right ridiculousness and inhumane nature. Although entertaining, it is quite useless and brings nothing to the table of serious discussion, but I hope this kind of film will make some of the stubborn people think ‘holy shit there is something wrong with the American government!’

Religulous – 8.0
Bill Maher is a known Atheist who is not afraid to voice his opinion about religion, and he made a documentary about it. Although the documentary is extremely biased and pretty offensive to the people of faith, he did a pretty decent job in making it easier for people to understand why he thinks that religion is a silly hoax. Pretty decent ‘documentary’ for people who is interested in all sorts of religions, but be aware that you might get offended; IF you believe in GOD that is.

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed – 6.0
A failed attempt at raising an irrelevant issue of whether creationism and Darwinism should co-exist in science classroom in the States. I watch this documentary because I was trying to find another documentary that could answer to Bill Maher’s Religulous, but this one doesn’t even hold a candle to that. Dissapointing.

more movie reviews woot

Tropic Thunder – 7.5

I expect a silly movie and Ben Stiller didn’t disappoint. The story of the movie is pretty bad, but what makes this movie watchable it its set of funny characters full of personalities. Ben Stiller is still funny, Jack Black is as always, the shouting fat guy and Robert Downey Jr is just brilliantly silly; his character is really refreshing if you consider how Ben Stiller likes the characters in his movie to be always the same. I recommend watching Apocalypse Now first though to understand some of the spoof in the movie. The movie also spoofed lots of other famous Hollywood movies, like I am Sam, Forrest Gump, Once Upon A Time In America, Mad Max, Rambo etc. and it makes it easier to understand the jokes if you’ve seen all those movies. Funny movie, but you have to have some decent movie knowledge to fully enjoy it. If you’re a fan of Ben Stiller movies, you probably won’t be blown away by Tropic Thunder, but you’ll surely enjoy the ride.

Pineapple Express – 8.0
Seth Rogen is really a screenplay genius; he really knows how to write some seriously funny dialogs. James Franco (the son of Green Goblin in Spiderman) really surprised me with his amazingly brilliant performance as a lazy-ass stoner. The story is pretty silly but the whole cast in the film is funny with their distinct personalities and I just can’t stop laughing through the whole movie. If you like comedies, you’re going to enjoy this. Recommended.

Traitor – 8.0
I don’t want to spoil the storylines but I must say, this is a refreshing take on action movies about religious extremist and their way of doing things. The story about the cat and mouse relationship between a CIA Agent and a high-profile terrorist, seems quite cliché at first, but it got really interesting quite quickly that you’re always at the edge of your seat, wondering what will happen next. If you like the thinking man’s thriller, you’d probably want to watch this.

The Bank Job – 8.2
Another worth-watching movie about bank robbers, and how they got away with it, with Jason Statham as the lead. The movie starts slow but it get really interesting pretty fast and suddenly you were presented with all sort of small plots that tides up the end very well. I love thrillers about bank robbers, corrupt police and politicians, and I enjoyed watching this movie. And to realize that this movie is based on a true story, I was really impressed by how interesting the events that happened, and how they’re stringed together. Very easy to recommend.

She Cyborg (僕の彼女はサイボーグ) – 6.0
Like a lonely guy’s most desired dream come true, a pretty, genki girl appeared out of no where; turning one guy’s boring life into a fun, exciting one. The film borrows the time traveling cyborg plot very heavily from The Terminator, and made it more unnecessarily confusing and long, especially at the end. The first-half portion of the movie is quite enjoyable, but the second half is not. Thankfully, Haruka Ayase made a pretty good looking female cyborg.

The House Bunny – 6.5
I always liked Anna Faris in all those funny Scary Movies series; she definitely played that ‘stupid blonde’ character so very brilliantly, and she did it again in this movie. It was pretty funny but I think Adam Sandler (the director) is depending too much on Anna Faris to bring ‘life’ to the movie. I know, that’s what main characters do, but it seems a little bit too much. If Anna Faris is not in this movie, it would be unwatchable at all because the story is predictably lame and it was obvious that this is a ‘chick flick’ with all the outfits and themes of sister-bonding. Funny movie, but you’ve probably seen these types of movies before, and they’re better than this one.

Superhero Movies – 7.6
The barrage of parody movies never stops, and this time, it’s the superhero movies’ turn to be parodied, and as a silly and funny movie, you can’t ask for more. The jokes are stupid and fun; just don’t expect to be laughing all the way from start to finish. I enjoyed watching this because I didn’t expect much from these types of movie; it is light, silly and probably worth the watch if you’re bored and got nothing else to do.

Taken – 8.2
Liam Neeson is a kick-ass secret agent retiree on a rage to save his daughter who was ‘taken’ by human traffickers. This film reminds me of 24, the Bourne series and a little bit of Hostel. The movie starts slow but once the action starts rolling, it was really worth it. The fighting sequences were fun to watch and the main character didn’t stop to think about whether he should pity him enemies, he just gave them what they deserve: PAIN. This is a popcorn action flick, so the sense of believability is very low but that didn’t bother me because I was on the edge of my seat the whole time to the end. Very entertaining movie and I would recommend this to action movie lovers.

Eagle Eyes – 7.2
The story of this movie immediately reminds me of I Robot and maybe a little bit of Die Hard 4; you know, the kinda story about artificial intelligence trying to control our human lives. Yes, it is not the best movie in the ‘computers controlling human’ genre, but the action sequences were done well and the actors did their job. I just hope Shia LeBeouf stop playing the same character that he has been in his previous movies like Constantine, Transformers, Indy 4 etc. This is just another decent Hollywood action thriller; quite entertaining but nothing special.

Sztuczki (Tricks) – 7.0
It’s hard to describe this Polish movie; it seems like the director has no intention to put a proper, normal plot into the narration. Instead, the viewer is left with a cute innocent young boy with his playful ways of spending his free time. The acting in this movie is superb, but the lack of a strong ‘point’ makes it hard to fully appreciate it. This is a good movie, but it’s not for the mainstream.

Pacchigi! – 7.6
This is not just another movie about a Japanese boy who has a crush on a Korean immigrant during the 60’s in Kyoto; it’s more than that. The movie portrays the hardship of Zainichi Koreans, violence between Japanese school gangs vs Korean school gangs, about teen sex and all the good stuff during the 60’s. A lot of Japanese directors put a very huge importance on believability, and this movie has that in buckets full of it. The movie might put some people off because of the ‘realistic’ approach to acting and how slow the movie moves, but this is surely one of the Japanese movies that I am going to remember. The only problem that I got with the movie is that it took the director too much time to get to the point, and this is a very distinct personality of Japanese directors compared to Hollywood. Still worth the watch though.

Get Smart – 8.4
This film is simply hilariously brilliant. It is silly and doesn’t take itself seriously, but the jokes were delivered very well and the action sequences are better than an average action film. There were no boring moments in this film as it was full of funny moments, and of course, Anna Hathaway is freaking hot! Steve Carell is so funny even when he’s not trying to be. I have a good, healthy laugh watching this, so if you love comedy, I’d recommend this movie for sure!

Burn After Reading – 7.5
The directors of No Country For Old Men, the Coen brothers is back with a new film that is very different from their last achievement. You’d be disappointed if you expected a film as violently cool as their previous work, because Burn After Reading is not one of those movies; instead, this movie focuses of how idiots people could be and how paranoia could really mess you up and end up wasting your time without leaving any meaning at all in the end. This is a good movie in its own, but don’t expect to be blown away. And one more thing, don’t expect the film to have any deep meanings; you’d want to burn it after watching.

Star Wars The Clone Wars The Movie – 7.5
I never watched a single episode of the animated Clone Wars series, but that doesn’t stop me from watching the big screen version because I’m a shameless Star Wars fan. The story is pretty much what you would expect from a Star Wars universe. Although not entirely bad, I just wished that they put more crazy, over-the-top, balls to the walls, awesome action scenes in it, because it does feel a little bit ‘empty and hey that’s not enough!’. Well, this IS a movie for kids, so I guess I shouldn’t expect more of it.

Sukiyaki Western Django – 8.0
Taking heavy influences from Akira Kurosawa’s classic Yojimbo and also some famous spaghetti-western movies like Django and Fistful of Dollars, this latest film from the Japanese director with a cult status, Takashi Miike is all about visual, over content. This is probably the end result if you mix western, samurai, anime and off the chart, crazy saturated colors in a movie. This film is pretty bizarre in its weirdness, and the action sequences really make it a worth while experience. If you like unconventional movies, you’ll have to watch this. Just don’t expect it to make any sense at all.

JFK – 8.5
This is a very well directed and acted movie about the conspiracy theories behind the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Although it was long (about 3 hours), I was never bored because interesting story elements and information were told in the appropriate pace, making sure the viewer is not overloaded with information, trying to juggle all these set pieces and complete the complicated puzzle that is the JFK assassination. This is a movie about a very complicated investigation, so there were a lot of flash-backs and questions to be asked but everything was tight up pretty well to make it easier for the viewer to understand. If you like investigation movie that involves the secret service society, politics and the American military industrial complex, I’m sure you’re gonna love this one. The film demands you to think and to be able to manage and arrange information, so if you don’t like that, surely you would not enjoy watching this. Highly recommended to those few people who like intricate and detailed story-telling with a lot of information to chew on, but DEFINETELY not for the masses.

Shaolin Girl (少林少女) – 4.0
I love Stephen Chow’s Shaolin Soccer. I hate the Japanese adaptation of it, the Shaolin Girl. Instead of a crazy guy with mad kungfu skills, they replaced it with a normal girl who does lacrosse. The entire movie is boring; the special effects were lame, the acting was bad, the story is terrible and the director even has the nerve to put ‘emotional’ scenes in it to fish for emotions from the viewer. This is a bad Japanese movie. Stay away. Just stick to your 2002’s Shaolin Soccer.

My Sassy Girl (Hollywood Remake) – 5.0
Why does Hollywood constantly remakes good Asian films, ‘Americanizes’ it, and totally messes everything up as a result? The original My Sassy Girl (2001) was one of the early films that got me into Korean movies, by introducing a very sadistic female lead, but still being cute and funny at the same time, and made you want to GET hurt by pretty women. The new Hollywood remake failed to impress me because it was not funny at all, the set-up was so ‘American romantic comedy movie’ –like, and the acting was terrible. Although the storyline on this remake is a lot easier to understand than the original, it really felt like everything was being ‘dumbed down’ for western audiences. If it was not for Elisha Curtbert, I don’t think I would even want to watch this to the end. Forget about this Hollywood remake, watching the original for the 100th times is better than this crap.

Incredible Hulk – 6.5
Don’t expect an amazing story because this is a comic-book movie about a guy who turns into a mean green beast of a doofus when he got angry. The action sequences are decent enough and the last fight scene were pretty fun to watch. Other than that, this is just another lifeless comic book movie that is forgettable and so mediocre.