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Its More Fun in The Philippines!

2012-01-13T11:50:00.003+08:00

Let me see if this still works...

2011-08-24T20:14:00.003+08:00

Its been a while since I last posted. Although a lot of you may not be reading this but would probably just be backtracking and thinking. What the heck this post about? I just logged in after 2 years basically. A lot has happened and I don't know if I would have the time to go about and start blogging again. I might turn this into a daddy blog. I never got around doing the travel blog I always wanted, probably because I did too much traveling and too little blogging. That would have been nice since I got myself into photography and am really getting the hang of it. I got married and will have a baby boy on the way.

Man! A lot has happened and I haven't really written anything down! That's so very not like me...on second thought, that is kind of what I am in a nutshell these days. Tons of plans, very little execution. I haven't really watched a lot of movies recently so I can't really do a movie entry anytime soon. Everything will depend on this little snowball push I'm making. Well, If it doesn't make the first few inches, at least I got some finger exercise typing this silly little set of paragraphs.

My 5 Celebrities that Look Like Each Other.

2009-07-13T11:49:00.004+08:00

I have always wondered how some celebrities look and even act like each other despite the fact that they are in a business where individuality and uniqueness is key. Here are some that I was able to think of:

Zooey Deschanel and Katy Perry

Not only do they look alike, they act alike too. Zooey and Katy both have that doe-eyed charm that made them famous. Zooey is known for picking offbeat roles and Katy for singing offbeat pop songs.

Johnny Knoxville and Josh Duhamel

I’m sure that in the smarts department, Josh has a hand over Johnny. Both actors, both moderately successful, both have been in summer blockbusters (Josh in Transformers, Johnny in Men In Black).But mostly, both look like they are in need of a shower.

Matt Damon and John Cena

Ok, so they don’t really look alike. But imagine Matt Damon all juiced up like a pro baseball player. Then we’ll talk….

Christian Bale and David Beckham

I am only referring to how CB looked like in his most recent movie Terminator: Rise of The Machines. There are parts of that movie where I was waiting to hear not his gruff barking voice, but a high pitched nasal, whiney voice that I’m sure Victoria has gotten used to by now.

Chad Smith (drummer, The Red Hot Chili Peppers) and Will Ferrell

Ok, there have been sites and message boards in the internet who have talked about this for years. Not only do they look exactly alike, they share the same resentment for being referred to looking like one another during interviews. I heard Chad is a little shorter than Will (as that Will Ferrell is a giant of a man), but put their mugshots aside, you’d think that they share the same DNA. A friend once mistook Will for being the “former drummer of the Chili Peppers.”

Movie Review: "Crank 2: High Voltage" (2009)

2009-05-05T21:12:00.004+08:00

I just got back from watching Crank 2. This one is definitely faster, raunchier and flashier than the first one. It starts off exactly where the last one left off, with Jason Statham's (The Transporter) character Chev Chelios limp body being picked up from the street seconds after he falls off a helicopter to later find out that his still working heart is removed from his chest and replaced with a battery powered ticker. He then goes into a wild goose chase to look for his heart encased in a coleman cooler being brought by a chinese triad henchman all across LA. What comes after is a trail of blood, bodies and girls. Definitely a guy's movie. The main difference that this movie had from the first one was that this one is a lot lot funnier than the first one. The laughs kept on coming up until after the credits rolled. Hehe, I'm still laughing this one out 'till now.

Rocketboy's Rating: **** (four stars)

Movie Review: "Slumdog Millionaire" (2008)

2009-03-10T14:30:00.002+08:00

This movie has received so much praise, there isn't anything I can add to what has already been said. It is said to be a "hymn to life" by some critics. Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, The Beach, Sunshine)is used to showing us gloomy facades and immediately sees the good in these dismal venues. Slumdog is no exception. He makes Mumbai a place pulsating with life and has us engaged in this tale about a boy who's fate brought him to the set of the Indian franchise of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. Curiously, he knows the answers to pretty much every question thrown at him. The story focuses on how he got there in the first place, but most importantly, why.

Rocketboy Rating: ***** (5 out of 5 stars)

Movie Review: "Traitor" (2008)

2009-01-27T15:51:00.003+08:00

I like this one because Don Cheadle is the man!! Ever the improbable star, he continues to impress audiences with his 'everyman' quality and his rather hesitant charisma. This guy can act circles around Will Smith if you ask me. His role as a conflicted Special Services agent who happens to be Muslim inspires true introspection on the debate on the State vs Religion topic and all the while, entertains us with a lot of punches, kicks and 'splosions! Great guy flick.

Rocketboy's Rating: 4 stars (****)

Movie Review: "Taken" (2008)

2009-01-27T15:40:00.005+08:00

Not quite as good as Bourne, but a darn good action flick if you just turn your brain off for a couple of hours. It does try to be brainy for a bit and fails miserably, but you cant blame Luc Besson for trying since he is more well known for his penchant for high action.
Liam Neeson brings credibility to an otherwise dawdy script. But hey, don't we just enjoy seeing him break arms, chop throats with his hand and stabbing East European gangsters in the legs with electric metal prods? Schindler's List really prepared him for this role. Hahaha. That last one was a joke.

Rocketboy Rating *** stars

The Rocketboy Oscar Special

2009-01-27T15:20:00.003+08:00

Well, I'm employed again. Thanks to months of perserverance and a lot of prayers I was able to land a job I love which is closer to home. I deeply apologize fort my absence the past few months. I just needed to straighten out my priorities and get my life on track. I am glad to report that I am In good health and most of all, the happiest I've been in years.

Anyway, enough of that. I will be reviewing Slumdog Millionaire in a couple of days and will make sure that you get to know what that is about. I have read F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Curiuous Case of Benjamin Button online and have yet to see the movie. I will get all that done in my spare time, which I don't have a lot of these days. Anyways here are some quick movie reviews for you from the very few movies I did get to see these past few months.

Just Chillin'

2008-08-12T11:11:00.003+08:00

Well, it has been a while since I moved out of Manila and settled permanently in San Fernando. Things have been very slow recently. I keep myself busy by cleaning the house and watching older movies. I really don't know what to do with the hundreds of DVDs I have in my room. I might be able to sell some of them that still kind of have value, like the rare ones. Bu mostly I want to keep them just for posterity's sake, so that my kid will one day find out that daddy actually plunked cash for "Just Married".

Anyways, I have an idea I'm kind of playing around with in my head. I'm thinking of shifting my focus from movies to travel. I don't know if you guys would like to read about me going to the market, or about my latest Cebu beach trip, I guess it's all about what I want to write about. You see, I love movies, but there was a time in my life when movies were all I really cared about. Now things have changed. When you're 30 and you still talk about movies rabidly like a zit-faced fanboy, it kind of makes you stop and think.

Still, writing is in my blood. It is the one talent I know I am good at, that I get a lot of praise for, and I will not put it on the wayside just because I don't want to watch Hancock.

What do you guys think? Should I write about other stuff, or should I stick to movies and music?

Movie Review: "The Dark Knight" (2008)

2008-07-17T15:25:00.003+08:00

Cebu is a great place to be in duing the summer. Tommorrow we are going to hit the beach but for now, its movie time.

Some friends and I went and saw The Dark Knight in its first screening in Ayala Cinemas in Cebu. I was expecting a packed house...even at 12 noon. When I went there, I mean...It was PACKED. We have seen in the internets that it has been breaking box-office pre sales records in the US. The Bat has made more money than some movies make in a two-week run even before it hit the theaters.

Now on to the movie. Everything we came to expect about Batman was here. Moves, gadgets, Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) and his trademark swagger,and a brand new costume that lets him turn his head around. Alfred (Michael Caine) is his usual old self and so is Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman). Lt. Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) also had very significant moments in key scenes. Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal) had very little to do.

The movie owes itself, every bit of it to the late Heath Ledger as the Joker. As if his postumous presence in the movie wasn't creepy enough, he comes accross as a wildcard, a Deus Ex Machina that totally propels the film into more a than just a comic book movie. The movie itself didnt feel like a comic book movie, but more of a police drama in some parts, with dialogue too complex to be put in dialogue baloons. This is what will set it apart as a comic book movie for grown ups.

Rocketboy's Rating: 5 out of 5 stars (*****)

The Rocketboy works his last day.

2008-06-28T03:34:00.002+08:00

Today will be my last day working for my company. It was a good 5 years while it lasted, but I needed to make some adjustments to make my life less complicated and give myself some personal space. Plus, like Christian Siriano, I needed a 'vay-cay'.

Now, what does this mean for The Rocketboy Chronicles? Given that I started this blog out of boredom because I had full internet access at work and have had so for the past 5 years which will end in the next 6 hours, I could say that I might have less posts,or more, now that I have more time for posting, since work gets in the way so much, hahah. But definitely, The Rocketboy Chronicles will go on. And even if I may post less frequently (oh come on, I post at least once a month anyway),you can enjoy more meaningful, more well written, well edited posts, since I will have more time to concentrate on research and grammar and less time making money.

Movie Review: The Incredible Hulk (2008)

2008-06-13T17:06:00.002+08:00

Marvel has really been stepping things up lately. With the recent success of Iron Man, our Marvel friends now give us the re-do of The Incredible Hulk. Now the first one in 2005 (I think) wasn't actually that bad, but it failed to generate excitement and completely disappointed the loyal comic book fans with its light, cartoony portrayal of the green giant. The new script written by Zakk Penn with embellishments by Edward Norton himself and with the high octane action directing of Louis Letterier (Transporter 1 and 2) is akin to the old Hulk series back in the '70's with Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno (who has a cameo in the movie as a security guard), with Bruce Banner as a lonely wanderer escaping the military's grasp instead of a short tempered genetics prof with daddy issues.

The story begins swiftly where Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) is already changed by the gamma rays that tun him into the Hulk. He is on the ruin from the army and is posing as a humble factory worker in Brazil. His free time is consumed by his search for the cure that will ultimately rid him of his condition. Not much later he is discovered by General Ross(William Hurt) the Draconian military leader responsible for the experimentations that led to Banner's predicament, so begins a wild goose chase for Banner's cure and his reunion with Ross' scientist daughter Betty (Liv Tyler).
Meanwhile, Ross is still playing god with his biological weapons and testing them on Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth) who is hellbent on destroying Banner. His desire to stop The Hulk turns into obsession as he seeks to become more powerful using every chemical means necessary.

This version of The Hulk is miles better than the previous one. The human story is more accessible and the emotional transfer was more believable. Thanks to Norton's additional writing, The Hulk and Banner become more than just comic book characters come to life, they become key elements that drive the story.
There is more action in this movie than pretty much any Marvel comic book movie that has come before it. In the ending fight sequences, you can almost feel the fatigue of all the punching and pulling between the two large behemoths, The Hulk and The Abomination, as they slug and slam each other out to a pulp.

I don't want to give too much out because I highly recommend you see this. Now it looks like the gates are open for an Avengers movie now that Tony Stark has decided to join and the invitations are open.

Rocketboy's Rating: (*****) 5 out of 5

Movie Review: The Happening (2008)

2008-06-13T08:36:00.003+08:00

M Night Shyamalan wrote and directed the phenomenal The Sixth Sense, which is in a lot of people’s best movies list. He also wrote and directs Unbreakable, which is on MY best movies list. After these movies he came up with Signs with mixed reviews, then The Village, then things started going down…

Just a few years ago M Night was revered as one of the best new filmmakers, now with all the press attention he’s getting about being misunderstood and the steadily depreciating quality of his movies, he’s slowly turning into Hollywood’s greatest hack, not even he saw this twist ending coming.

The Happening is MNS’s sixth film. This movie is his first R rated movie (due to graphic violence and intense scenes) and was supposed to be his redemption from the box office shortcomings of his two efforts. It starts with an occurrence in New York’s Central Park, people suddenly stopping in their tracks and then killing themselves. The government and the media immediately call it a terrorist attack. Panic ensues. We follow Elliot Moore (Mark Wahlberg) a Pennsylvania schoolteacher and his wife Alma(Zooey Deschanel). As they go with the torrential flow of people trying to evacuate the perimeter of ‘attack’ they see themselves dodge the presence of corpses in the street, watch their group-mates execute themselves and knock into a couple of houses. No explanation or clues are offered as to what may be causing the strange phenomena, but don’t worry M. Knight is going to dazzle us with his expert storytelling and show us how all of this is going to come full circle…

…NO!

Here’s the thing, you come into an MNS movie with expectations. Okay, lets say I ‘lessened’ my expectations due to the fact that his last 2 movies have been disappointing. At least I expected an explanaition as to what was happening through the whole freaking movie. He sets up the entire movie on this wind that when hit by it, you go crazy and hit yourself. People offer theories. Plants? Terrorism? Nuclear power plants? Fear? I came up with theories myself. But in the end, the explanation is… “There are things that occur in nature that just cannot be explained!” WOW! Why didn’t I think of that! Looks like we got a winner here M. Night! Nobody saw that coming!

I once wrote a script myself, I was 7. It was 2 pages long. I thought it was better than this crap.

Aside from the asinine plot, the acting was terrible. Everybody acted like they were in a community play. WTF? Mark Wahlberg? You were nominated for an Academy Award! What happened?

I have officially lost faith in M Night.

Rocketboy Rating: No stars (yes you heard it right!)

Movie Review: Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay (2008)

2008-06-13T05:41:00.003+08:00

Stoner flicks are a genre of their own nowadays. From Cheech and Chong to Judd Apatow, movies where tokin' weed has had its highs and lows. This season happens to be a high (man all these puns, where do I get them?) Harold and Kumar are their own franchise now just like C&C and Jay & Silent Bob (like Jedi, the come in twos). We last saw them getting back to their apartment after a night of eating like 80 White Castle burgers and deciding to follow Harold's crush and next door neighbor Maria to Amsterdam...

We begin where they left off. On the plane to Amsterdam harold and Kumar (John Cho and Kal Penn) are mistaken for terrorists, mostly because Kumar decided to bring his electric bong which looks like a terrorist assembled bomb in the plane. They are questioned, mostly by the inept FBI agent Ron Fox (Rob Corrdry) and detained in Gitmo. After a close encounter with a security guard, they escape and find themselves in a raft with immigrants, in Florida in a drug-lords pool full of 'bottomless' women and in a redneck's house with their inbred daughter, oh and sure they also get to meet and 'bond', meaning get plastered, with Dubya.

Look, these movies are meant to be shallow, crude and downright tasteless. This is the reason these movies are fun. However, sometimes, these movies try too hard. All These stoner comedies try to one up each other in terms of crudeness and complete lack of taste that in the end, sometimes, it just becomes a crap movie. The charm that the first Harold and Kumar had is gone and was drowned in a pool full of women exposed beavers and litteraly just went up in smoke (Man! I'm on a roll! "Roll", haha, another pun! Man, pot references are really useful ).

Rocketboy's Rating:(**)2 out of 5 stars

Movie Review: Made of Honor (2008)

2008-06-13T04:49:00.005+08:00

Chick flicks aren't usually my thing. In fact, I never really set out to watch Made of Honor but just kind of got sucked into it.

We all know Patrick Dempsey became hugely popular after becoming the resident man-candy McDreamy in Grey's Anatomy. In MOH, he takes his scrubs off to be the more generic rich 'playboy' Tom Bailey with a girl named Hannah (Michelle Monaghan) for a best friend. Like any other guy/girl best friend situation, sex and sometimes, even the talk about personal feelings for each other is taboo, so they become perpetual shopping partners and restaurant and art critics. One day art-conservationist Hannah is called to Scotland and leaves poor Tom to fend for himself. Tom feels an emptiness without Hannah's latte beside his, and decides to confess his love for her when she comes back to New York. And when she does, she has a beau in tow.

The thing about MOH is that, it is the most generic romantic comedy I've seen, so far. If you ahve seen Four Weddings and a Funeral, My Best Friend's Wedding, 27 Dresses, Runaway Bride or anything with the word 'wedding' or 'friend' in it's title, you've probably seen this. I'm not saying it's a bad movie though. It's just that a lot of ths schticks used in MOH have all been done before. There's a lot of stuff in here that Gary Marshall has done a million times before and it unabashedly exploits them. Plus this is, as clear as the crystal in a champagne glass, a film made for women, girls, chicks...only. Patrick Dempsey...nuff said. The filmmakers make it a point that Tom looks as pitiful and pretty as possible to get the women to go 'aww' and want them to be his girlfriend instead. I mean there is a scene where Tom and his 'guy' friends play basketball and debate about how 'meaningful' it is to be in a relationship instead of 'playing around' and another of the guys prepping the goodie baskets for the bridal showers. I'm not saying it doesn't ever happen, but there is so much estrogen in the final cut of the scene, I was afraid I might grow boobs.

Generic as it is. It is effective to it's target audiences, women and girls who cry during weddings and love puppies and kittens. The kissing scene towards the end (you know which one it is when you see it) is one of the best I've seen so far. The buildup toward it is just consistent and it almost feels like a reward for sticking with the film for the first 50 minutes.

Rocketboy's Rating:(***)3 out of 5 stars

Movie Review: Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008)

2008-06-13T04:04:00.004+08:00

Pretty much everything that Judd Apatow touches nowadays turns into gold. Judd and his crew are really busy nowadays cranking hit after hit. After 40 Year Old Virgin, Superbad and Knocked Up, and the upcoming Pineapple Express, it seems like there's no stopping this buncho of used-to-be hollywood misfits. Just a couple of years ago Judd and his team were considered box-office poison for putting out brilliant, but unpopular shows like Freaks and Geeks (also with Jason Segel, Seth Rogen and James Franco) and Undeclared. Now they have practically re-inverted the R rated comedy/stoner genre and have introduced us to rauchy comedies with heart.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall is about Peter Bretter(Jason Segel), a dead end musician with a steady paycheck from scoring TV shows who happens to be the boyfriend of rising TV star Sarah Marshall(Kristen Bell). one morning Sarah confronts Peter to break up with him (in one of the funniest, if not, most unsettling film breakups ever). Not able to cope with the trauma of being single after being with Sarah, peter decidesd to go on vacation in Hawaii and checks in hotel where, in a freak coincidence, Sarah and her new boyfriend Aldus Snow (Russel Brand) are staying. The hote's receptionist Rachel (Mila Kunis), haveing had a recent breakup of her own, sympathyzes with Peter and goes out of her way to make him feel better during his stay, some feelings develop and a lot of hilarity ensues.

FSM is a script that Jason Segel, the movies lead actually wrote himself. It turns out a lot of the events within the movie, especially the one where Sarah breaks up with him while he was naked from just getting out of the shower, were derived from his own experiences with breaking up with his old girlfriend. A lot of the comedy in FSM is improvised, and to good effect. this is probably the reason wy Apatow produced stuff is hilarious, because he gets good funny talent and lets them do their thing. Russell Brand is a brilliant discovery. Apparently this comedian is very popular in Britain and has developed quite a following in global audiences after his take in FSM. Director Nick Stoller obviously avoided for this comedy to be 'formula', as a lot of romantic comedies become. the comedy is low key but effective and the reactions are genuine. Although this may not be the funniest of the Apatownians, it ranks as one of the most realistic.

Rocketboy's Rating: (***)4 out of 5 stars

Movie Review: Iron Man (2008)

2008-05-01T07:38:00.002+08:00

Looks like we've got another good one with John Favreau's take on the Marvel superhero Iron Man. I can honestly say that I haven't had this much fun in the theater since Transformers.

Tony Stark is a billionaire playboy/ military weapons supplier with a glass of brandy on one hand and no sense of nostalgia whatsoever. He is played pitch-perfectly by veteran actor Robert Downey junior. Stark is full of the character flaws that makes him the charming hero/anti-hero that he is, plus with Downey's quick wit adds another dimension to his already endearing, man's man persona. Think of Clooney, only a hundred times richer.

As Stark goes through one of his routine weapon demos in the Afghan desert, his detail is raided and killed as he is almost fatally wounded by one of his own missiles. He is abducted by local rebels where he is held captive and promised freedom only under the condition that he build a missile just like the one he demoed for the US Military. Instead he builds an armor with guns and torches, which he uses to escape the clutches of the rebel soldiers.
With his escape comes a newfound respect for life. He swears to protect the people he means to save from the very weapons he created. Thus we have an upgraded version of the desert armor, later to be known as the Iron Man.

The supporting cast is in every way as stellar as Downey. Terrence Howard is great (and funny) as Rhodes, Stark’s best friend ally in the military. Gwyneth is gorgeous as Pepper Potts. The onscreen chemistry between Downey and Paltrow is undeniable as they fumble through their awkward employer/employee dynamic. Jeff Bridges is surprisingly good as a comic book villain.

There are also a bunch of little surprises and winks at hardcore fans that will catch your attention once in a while (look for Audioslave and RATM’s Tom Morello and Stan Lee’s cameos). But all in all, this movie is just a great story told well, set in the great amazing Marvel universe.

Rocketboy’s Rating: 5 out of 5 (*****)

Movie Review: "There Will Be Blood" (2007)

2008-04-02T06:09:00.002+08:00

This a very long overdue review. I had only recently acquired the DVD for Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood, the movie that earned Daniel-Day Lewis his 2007 Oscar.

There Will be Blood is based on an Upton Sinclair novel entitled Oil! And is a story about Daniel Plainview (Day Lewis), an oil prospector and his descent to greed and isolation. The movie has an all throughout dark and grim atmosphere that is not very unusual to a PT Anderson movie (Punch Drunk Love, Magnolia, Boogie Nights), however this one almost has a sense of Biblical ancientness. It takes place in a desert village called New Boston where Plainview leases the land for drilling. It almost feels like the Israelites wandering in the desert after fleeing Egypt. The themes of God and miracles are very sparsely tackled in the film, but are central to the film’s plot. The finale will be remembered in film history and will be a pop culture reference for many years to come.

Rocketboy’s Rating:(*****) 5 out of 5 stars
"

Post Oscar Post

2008-02-27T18:23:00.003+08:00

I'm glad that No Country for Old Men won Best Picture this year. The Coen Brothers have long been an important fixture in American cinema and it is but fitting that they get the award for their best work yet. Javier Bardem winning Best Supporting Actor was no surprise since he pretty much won every award that let to the Oscars. Everybody was surprised that Tilda Swinton won Best Supporting Actress for Michael Clayton...including herself, so much that she gave a pretty trippy acceptance speech with George Clooney and the Batman nipples and stuff. i LOVE that Diablo Cody won Best Original Screenplay for Juno (That picture above is her, by the way, still holding her Oscar after a night of celebrating. Sweet.), I didn't know that she used to be an exotic dancer, "Enjoy the paycut" says Jon Stewart, who made a vast improvement with his hosting chores this year than last time.
It was no surprise also that Daniel Day Lewis won Best Actor> I've yet to see There Will Be Blood, if you are not aware, they DID show it here in Manila...in only ONE theater! In Gateway (I'm in Makati)! Now it's gone. I'm gonna have to drink my milkshake some other time...

My Official Oscar Nomination Reviews

2008-02-01T17:05:00.000+08:00

I've been pondering on doing another review for a great while now, but I thought I would give it some for the movies to stew in my brain so I could give them a fair assessment. Plus it would be great exercise for my severely atrophied writing skills.

The writer's strike is still going on and it is directly affecting our business at the office (we transcribe and caption US shows), It would be nice if this all could end so I don’t have to go through the internet and read about what Britney ate for breakfast and that she had her 345th breakdown while driving her newly bought (and dented) Mercedes to a school where she was going to pick up her kids she couldn’t even legally see. I miss writing about how crappy some movies and TV shows are.

Now we see that the Academy Awards are just around the corner and that the strike may take this thing down as it did the Golden Globes, part of me thinks "Heck, we don’t need the Oscars." We don’t need this over-produced pomposity that is more of a jewel-encrusted, botox-injected pseudo-fashion show smorgasbord rather than an official cultural event (like the SAGs were this year). But another part of me thinks, "I need to see what they are going to do to this year's opening sketch".

Anyhoo, after I saw the nominees this year, I have to admit. I was satisfied with the choices. There were definitely good movies to begin with. Sure I preferred some that were not included, but this year's nominees for Best Picture were definitely, in my opinion, the best of the year.

I sought out these movies at my local DVD pirate bay and found a copy for all of them except one. I think we all can agree that the quality and packaging for pirated DVDs as of late has greatly diminished, and it sucks especially for committed collectors like myself, But I couldn't pass of the opportunity of not being able to see these movies first and imposing my pompous opinion to the world like I normally do in this blog.

The only movie without a review in this list of Oscar noms is There Will Be Blood, and word is it is the best of the bunch. But I have yet to see it. But these are the ones I've seen...

Movie Review: "Michael Clayton" (2007)

2008-02-01T16:57:00.000+08:00

Alright, lemme start with one of my favorites in the bunch. George Clooney (who I pretend is who I would look like If I were white), stars as lawyer turned legal cleanup master Michael Clayton. He's a lawyer plagued with financial problems and ethical issues which would pretty much come full circle when he is assigned to "clean up" a big crap-cake of a legal problems with one of their large corporate clients generated by a colleague's meltdown (Tom Wilkinson) at a hearing. As the company CEO Karen Crowder (Tilda Swinton) finds ways to clean the mess herself, Clayton does some deep investigating and finds the client company and his firm hiding documents that prove them guilty, putting him in a very compromising situation.

This movie kind of reminds me of another Clooney starred politico-legal drama, Syriana. The pace and density of the dialogue is very similar, only in Michael Clayton, the dialogue is easier to follow. If you really pay attention, you wont get lost. This is the result of good writing and editing. Tony Gilroy did a good job of pacing the dialogue, which is pretty much the meat and bones of the movie, in away that legal and corporate terms are made understandable but not dumbed down.

But the film's real glory point is it's ending. I'm not going to spoil it, but it's the kind of ending that makes you want to get off your seat pump your fist and say "yessss".

Rocketboy's Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Movie Review:"Atonement" (2007)

2008-02-01T16:51:00.000+08:00

If any of these Oscar contenders has an up in terms of accolades, it would be Atonement. So far, Atonement has won the Golden Globe for Best Picture. Not that it really matters because as we have seen in the past few months, the Writers strike has reduced these lavish awards ceremonies into mere press conferences. And this will greatly affect its handicap for the other awards up for it.

Atonement is Joe Wright's (Pride and Prejudice) second collaboration with Keira Knightley in a period film, this time based on a novel by Ian McEwan. The story revolves around a couple and their lives and how a small false accusation turned their lives into tragedy. Newcomer Saoirse (love the name) Ronan plays Briony, a 13 year old who, despite naiveté accomplishes to sabotage the lives of his sister Cecilia (Knightley) and servant's son Robbie Turner (James McAvoy) and take them into the belly of history of World War II.

Atonement isn't really my kind of movie. I never got to see Pride and Prejudice because I really wasn't into the kind of British tea and biscuits movie that I thought this was. i have to admit though that the scenes involving Briony were quite mesmerizing and I was caught up in the tune of her charisma (I thought that last sentence up with an English accent). I can say, acting wise, she was the best part of the movie. The rest of the movie was an incoherent series of patched up story pieces that don’t have any sense of cohesion. The one shot sequence at the beach was particularly amazing, but see the point is, Atonement is just that, a lot of scenes like that thatched together and presented to us as we are told that we are actually watching one movie. the scenes don’t gel together as they should. I got bored halfway through it as I waited for a redemption scene that would never come.

If you are a fan of Keira, I guess its a must see just for the scenes with her in that green dress and for the guy fans, for the wet-in-the fountain scenes.

Rocketboy's Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

Movie Review: "Juno" (2007)

2008-02-01T16:45:00.000+08:00

Juno is said to be this year's Little Miss Sunshine. That little runaway hit that was made with a meager budget but eventually made it's way to peoples hearts and into film history.

Ellen Page is Juno, a pregnant 16 year old with the mouth of a 25 year old college dropout. Her best friend Bleeker (Michael Cera) is the father, but he can barely leave his bedroom except when he goes out to run with the track team, much less be a father. Juno's life turns upside down and right side up, depending upon your point of reference, as she nonchalantly goes through serious moral decisions like abortion, adoption and even a little involvement with a married man as she drinks her blue big gulp and criticizes modern music and cinema.

Again it’s the dialogue that makes this movie. We are treated with shallow banter and deep philosophical insights, often in the same sentence, at such a rapid pace, that you probably would need to see it more than once just to catch the quotes. Writer Diablo Cody will definitely be one of the writers to watch in these next few years. Ellen Page of course, delivers most of the lines that has more bite to them, and she delivers them with such finesse that you'd wonder how that brain got into that body.

Aside from the banter, the story, simple as it is, delivers what it is supposed to deliver. A story about a girl, dealing with life... as she deals with the jerks around her.

Rocketboy's Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Movie Review: "No Country for Old Men" (2007)

2008-02-01T16:22:00.000+08:00

It’s happened to you before. You go and watch a movie. After it's done, you get out confused. You ponder as to what it meant, why they made it like that. You walk home, you ponder more. You figure it out. Then it becomes one of your favorite movies. It happened to me couple of times. It happened to me when I saw Pulp Fiction. It happened again when I saw 2001: A Space Odyssey. Before Sunset. For No Country for Old Men, it happened to me again.

No Country for Old Men is written and directed for the screen by the Coen Brothers (Raising Arizona, Fargo, The Big Lebowsky) adapted from a novel by Cormac McCarthy. the story is about a Texan Vietnam veteran (Josh Brolin) who finds 2 million dollars in cash in a duffel bag in the middle of a blood spattered, body strewn failed drug exchange rendezvous in the middle of the desert. A she runs, a bounty hunter(Javier Bardem) seeks him out and virtually kills anyone who gets in his way. In the middle of it all is an aging sheriff(Tommy lee Jones) who makes sure that these two who are in his small town are brought to justice. What we get is an exciting cat and mouse chase without the frills and effects, just pure intelligent filmmaking, but we also get a philosophical look at life and how it treats us despite our best efforts.

This is officially may favorite movie in the group (and I love the other movies too). very rarely do we get to see a movie that doesn't feel like it was made in 2007. With characters who are as rich as they are well-defined. Not a line of dialogue is a wasted sound byte. Everybody in the small cast shone in his own way.

But one shone above the others. Javier Bardem's character Anton Chigurh is probably the best conceived character in film in the past few years. Chigurh is a badass. He makes Jack Bauer look like baby poo. He is evil personified. A calm, charismatic presence that is both enchanting and frightening. If this movie were released in the summer, you would see dozens of people dressed as Chigurh on Halloween. There is a scene where he tells a sales clerk at a store to call a coin-toss he just made. the clerk is puzzled as to what it was for, but we all know, based on the past few scenes, that the clerk's life was at stake. So he had everything to gain, and at the same time, everything to lose. So many sites in the Internet have been dedicated to explaining how his mind works, what his concept of free will is, and so forth. There is so much more going on in this character than just a ruthless hit man with a pneumatic tool for a weapon.

One of the most controversial aspects of this film is its "ending". This is what puzzled me when I first saw it. Anyone would be. I can’t even imagine how audiences would react to the ending if it were shown here. In some articles I had read that some people just stood up and cussed at the projector guy. I later read in some reliable review sites that it was meant to be that way to emphasize on an aspect of the movie not closely attended to by the audience, the philosophical side of the film, because we were so caught up in the cat and mouse chase. Anyways, I know it probably doesn’t t make sense to you who have not seen it, you just need to watch it. And I highly recommend that you do.

Rocketboy's Rating: 5 out of 5

Movie Review: "I Am Legend" 2007

2007-12-29T06:34:00.000+08:00

Will Smith is the perennial savior in most of his movies. If he's not flying around canyons shooting aliens, he's pretty much flying around shooting robots. Well, this time, he's running(or in some cases driving around) shooting half-dead zombies while seeking acure for a virus that has wiped out about 95% of the world's population. Think 28 Days Later with a semiautoimatic rifle and a Mustang.

The film starts out very strong with the visuals of a post-apocalyptic New York city sans the traffic and the cussing taxi drivers. Manhattan island is overrun by wildlife and wild crop among the ruins of what used to be the concrete jungle of buildings, fire hydrants and thousands of cars and trucks. Corn growing in Times Square and lions hunting for gazelles in Wall Street. Lurking in the shadows and emerging in the night, however are totally different more ferocious creatures. What used to be human beings have mutated into UV light sensitive vampire zombies out to kill every single living thing. Oh yes, and Will Smith is in the picture too as the only surviving human being with a pet dog named Sam.

The story moves back and forth between flashbacks and the present to kind of distribute the pacing of the narrative, although this technique worked in some levels, in most it just dragged us to the only moderately entertaining middle section of the movie.

By the time the last 20 minutes of the movie runs, you are treated with a teduious "what is he going to do now" feeling that just leads you to a very mediocre ending. According to rumors (which is just about as reliable as anything in the internet), test screenings showed that the original ending sucked major balls and eventually forced the producers to reshoot, which resulted with the half-baked ending we see in theaters now.

Great first half. Mediocre ending.

I Am Robot- I mean I Am Legend opens January 8 in Manila.

Rocketboy's Rating: 31/2 out of 5 stars (***)

Speed Racer and Batman Pics online

2007-12-11T09:25:00.000+08:00

Hey there. In case you have not seen these. Just take a glance and go about your normal business and get back to work.

It's not my fault. My job makes me dull.

Here's Rambo giving a dude some cold steel.

Here's Batman and his new duds (note the new flexi-adjustable neck)from The Dark Knight

Here are some shots from the new Speed Racer movie by the Wachowski Bro-sters.

My Take on the Writers Strike

2007-11-14T11:06:00.000+08:00

Ok. While I ignore the most pressing news coverage of Rene Saguisag being in the ICU of The Makati Medical Center accross the street, the impeachment petitions in Congress and the announced Pakistani elections, let me focus on the most pressing and most life-critical of all the world issues, the Writers Guild of America Strike!

Oh noes! We's got no shows to watch!!!

Ever since the strike began we all have had to brace ourselves for the impact it will have in our lives in the coming weeks. I for one am affected by it now. Being in the Philippines, US shows dont get around until about 6 months after they are previously premiered in the US, for MOST it takes longer. I happen to be one of the many who watch these shows in the internet on streaming video. And the strike just gets me irked that I wont be watching my shows in a couple of weeks after all the pre-strike scripts have been shot and cut.

My Take? GIVE THE WRITERS WHAT THEY WANT!!!!!

Isn't it about time that the studios admit that they are making silos of cash while the writers dont get any royalties for digital content like online earnings and DVD royalties. Just give them a bigger piece of the pie! Your slice already looks like pacman!

JUST GIVE THEM WHAT THEY WANT!

New Blog Post after a Million Years

2007-11-14T10:30:00.000+08:00

Wow, I cant believe I've been neglecting my blog for almost a month and a half. It seems hard to write about movies if you kind of lost your interest in most of the new stuff coming out. Believe it or not, I havent seen a movie in the theaters in almost a month, mostly because I'm into a lot of what I would call Reality Stuff. You know, hanging out with friends, taking vare of my folks and all the stuff I used to neglect because I was so into my own little world of cinematic bliss.

I havent written anything of real note this past few weeks as well. I can feel my writing muscles atrophy as I write "Wow" or describe my feelings as "awesome" or "pretty good". The honest truth is, I have been experiencing a decrease in enjoyment in wathing movies. Is it because ther arent a lot of good movies out? I doubt it. There's 3:10 To Yuma, which I hear is awesome (there I go again, August Rush which is about music, combining the two things I love, and other frat comedies like Superbad and Walk Hard. Theres tons coming up like the Cloverfield movie from JJ Abrams, the new Indiana Jones and all this other stuff that I cant recollect.

Maybe it's because my priorities have changed, I dont know. But I still love movies. I do. And I will try to write about them as often as I can, but maybe not as frequent and as geek-like as I used to. Hope you understand.

Anyways gotta get back to my life.

Movie Preview: Return With Honor

2007-09-04T12:43:00.000+08:00

Apparently Excel Pictures missionary movie Return With Honor has won Best Picture in the recently held New York Film Festival. So it looks good, yes?

Check out the Trailer.

Movie Review: Paprika (2007)

2007-09-04T12:17:00.000+08:00

I had never really gone into Satoshi Kon's work during the days of Perfect Blue and Tokyo Godfathers. Even though there was an abundance of DVDs in Quiapo of his movie Millenium Actress, I never really got into it. Ireally dont know why, because Paprika is awesome.

I will skip the detailed synopsis for now, but Paprika is simply about the advancement of technology to the point where these scientists have come up with a device that can digitally interpret dreams and manifest them into your computer. The device gets stolen and is misused by one of its disenfranchised co-inventors and is now using this new untested technology to control the dreams of others. It is up to Paprika, a virtual dream manifestation of one of the projects developers to stop the mad scintist from driving everybody to a coma.

It is obvious that the real star of this movie is the trippy graphics and the dream like sequences that truly bring you to feel like you are in somebody else's dream. The jump cuts and the weird segues that can only be possible in REM state sleep give you the sense that time really does not exist. Also, the trademark weird cuteness that can only be japanese is present all throughout this peculiar exercise.

Overall Paprika is for anime fans who know how Japanese anime works and can appreciate or at least tolerate japanese eccentricity. The visuals are indeed a benchmark for traditional 2d animation and the story is reminiscent of the works of Phillip K. Dick (Total Recall, Minority Report). Over all, a great trip! Is your brain on anime?

Rocketboy's Rating: ****1/2(4.5 out of 5 stars)

Movie Review: The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)

2007-08-18T07:35:00.000+08:00

Well, its been a few days since I saw the latest chapter of The Bourne Legacy. And I can say, I'm not dissapointed. This movie had the potential to lose steam after having been made and released so long after the previous Bourne Supremacy.

Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) is still in pursuit of his identity and his journey takes him around the world from London to Madrid to Morrocco to New York City. Along the way, he dodges bullets punches and the pursuits of his creators pretty much like your typical action hero story only there's less cheesy dialogue and more geek talk and just as many shaky cam asskicking and 'splosions!

Here's a quick overview of my personal comments and observations.

> Matt Damon will always be Bourne to me. Even if he wears glesses and whines like a 5year old to his mom he still looks tough.
> Joan Allen just got better in this one because her role is more substantial.
> Julia Stiles (who I have always had a crush on)still has a small role, but gives us a hint on why she is important to the Bourne story.
>David Strathairn (Good Night and Good Luck)gives us probably the best antagonist in the franchise.

All in all it's a great escape movie for all the stunts and car crashes, but it also has brains, just like the first ones. It may be considered a thinking man's action movie, but it doesnt really need a lot of brain power on your part to be absorbed completely. It still, however gives you a sense that you didn't havw to check your brain at the door.

Rocketboy's rating: (****) 4 out of 5 stars

Movie News from ComiCOn

2007-08-03T11:31:00.000+08:00

The San Diego ComiCon has now developed itself as the mecca for all things geek, not just for comic book fans but for movie and TV fans as well. Hollywood has realized this and has focused their attention on the San Diego COmiCon for launches and exclusive previews for upcoming projects. Sometimes I just wish I had stayed in California just so I could see all the action. Then again, It's just movies.

I am going to do some embed links for some of the stuff I found cool from the recently concluded 2007 ComiCon. Hope these are the same things you are interseted too, because I'd hate to have to post something and no one read it. Is anyone reading this right now?

The preview for Heroes Season 2 was revealed at ComiCon, and it looks mighty sweet except that you dont get to see much because the camera dude didn't want to get caught with a camera in a camera restricted theater. Anyway, still cool.

Heroes Season 2 Generations Comic Con 07 Sneak Peek
Uploaded by anil31

Heroes Creator Tim Kring announced that they got a hold of a real fan of the show to be directing the new Heroes: Origins episondes (or at least one of them) and he is....Kevin Smith!

Steven Speilberg made a special video feed in for the fans at COmiCon straight from the set of the new Indiana Jones movie. I didn't know that Ray Winstone was there too. He was about the coolest thing in The Departed and is also going to star in the CGI animated version of Beowulf.

Conférence Indiana Jones 4
Uploaded by quivoila

John Favreau and Robert Downey Jr. revealed the Stan Winston created costume of Iron Mans Mark 1. Fans all over the worrld just wet themselves

There are so many more things I would like to add but you know what to do. You can look for the things you are interested at in YouTube and Dailymotion. More news as it happens.

Props to TheMovieBlog

Movie Review: The Simpsons Movie

2007-07-27T18:18:00.000+08:00

I don't know of anyone who was either directly or indirectly influenced by The Simpsons. As far as I can remember, The Simpsons have been a major influence in my youth and was very material to the development of my sense of humor. The Simpsons Movie was a gigantic undertaking in a sense that it was set to either be an incredibly great summer movie or a total franchise disaster. Its a good thing that it rocked the way it did.

The movie focuses on Homer and his lovable ability to screw things up for his family and himself. The story focuses on the pollution of the Springfield lake and the campaign to clean it up. Homer, decides to save a pig from becoming a new bag of hoenycured bacon and keeps it as a pet. This sets of a chain of events that eventually led to Springfield being quarantined and kept in a large fiberglass bubble. The US President Schwarzenneger (yes!) is misled to decide that Sprignfield is a hazard to the rest of the country and orders its annihilation with a bomb. Now it is up to our beloved dysfunctional family to save their hometown and find a new level of respect from Springfield.

The original writers of the earlier Simpsons seasons were hired to write the movie, and it did feel like na extended Simpsons Season 5 episode. S5 also happens to be one of the seasons when Conan O'Brien used to write for the show (although he wasn't involved in the movie)and is considered to be the best Simpsons season of all.

If you have been following the show in the beginning, you can notice all the significant side characters make little appearances all over the movie. Its almost a shame that the movie was only an hour and a half long. I wish there would have been more of Principal Skinner and Nelson(Ha-hah!), but they had to make room for the others I guess.

Some memorable moments include Bart skatboarding in the buff and exposing himself in one of the most surprising 1.5 seconds in the show and Homer's "Spiderpig" song. The guys in the theater were singing the Spiderpig song as we were going out after the movie was finished. Make sure you stay until the credits FINISH! There's lots of comedy gold that a lot of people missed because the needed to go to the bathroom.

All in all, the happiness I feel is complete in The Simpsons Movie, I really dont mind a sequel as long as the writers stay the same.

(Rocketboy's Rating= ***** (5 out of 5 stars)

X Files 2...Hopefully.

2007-07-17T12:13:00.000+08:00

I was one of the kids who was really addicted to The X Files to the point that I studied the whole alien/abduction scene and read and bought books about aliens. What X Files has taught me is that, you dont have to be a "believer" to enjoy the mythos. I personally took everything with a grain of salt, kind of like what Scully is to Mulder. It makes things more interesting, I think. If you "want to believe", all things no matter how absurd, become possibilities. I didn't like that. I wanted overwhelming evidence, which I got, sometimes, which is scary.

The "X-Files" film sequel is heating up. Co-star David Duchovny indicated Saturday during the Television Critics Association press tour that the film, which has been the subject of speculation for the past few years, is one step closer to becoming a reality. "I'm supposed to see a script next week," Duchovny said at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, adding that creator Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz wrote the screenplay and that Carter is set to direct.

Duchovny also reiterated past remarks that he and "X-Files" co-star Gillian Anderson "are on board" the follow-up to the 1998 film and the series that ran on Fox from 1993 to 2002.

I am looking forward to this, honestly because it will tie up a lot of loose ends that the series left in its finale, which was a big pile of crap. The 2 new X Files Agents Dogget and Reyes were not bad and would rock in the new movie, if ever.

Now, If something could be done with Millenium. I know that Lance Henriksen has been quoted as being more than willing to get a Millenium movie done. It's just a matter of rekindling public interest. After all the 2000 year mark as already passed. I hope that X Files success will regenerate this dead franchise so that people will know how great a show this was.

Props to themovieblog

Two Awesome Trailers!

2007-07-10T06:44:00.000+08:00

Hello There, how's your Transformers hangover? Well, we've got a good summer season so far, few dissapointments in the past weeks and some promising stuff going on in the near future. This is a good time to market the movies of the next few months post-summer. Boy did I come across some really awesome stuff!

I was supposed to post this last week but was afraid that the lik would die before anyone had the chance to see it. You see, somebody with a videocamera taped the trailer from insiode a theater in the US and leaked it into the internet

Paramount recently released a teaser to a movie produced by Bad Robot productions, the production outfit of Lost creator and MI3 director JJ Abrams, which doesn't have a title yet. In it you see a bunch of twentysomethings in what looks like a farewell party for one of their friends. The shots are like as if it was taken by one of the partygoers with a video camera, you know, Blair Witch style. Then a big growl is heard outside the building...

Then you have to see it for yourself. It is freaking awesome.

For the higher resolution Quicktime trailer Click now. Click now. CLICK NOW!

Observing the theme of post apocalyptic madness, I have come across another trailer for a Joel Silver production staring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig called Invasion. It has a plot akin to a cross between 28 Days later and Invasion of The Body Snatchers. The trailer is creepy and pretty slick at the same time.

For the Quicktime trailer, Click HERE!

My Mandatory Review: Transformers (2007)

2007-06-28T14:24:00.000+08:00

I just got out of the very earliest screening of Transformers on opening day. The US wont be able to see this movie until July 4th and we here in Manila got to see it before they did.

I had been waiting for this movie to opoen since I first learned about it in 2004 (yes, that long ago). This movie carries a lot of weight from very large expectations from fans all over the world to its studio, who expects it to be the biggest moneymaker of the year.

The early word on this movie is that it is pee-in-your-pants awesome. From the early screenings it looks like it's going to indeed be the biggest blockbuster of the year.

I always make it a habit to let a movie simmer in my mind for a while before I make a review about it. This lets me analyze the story and everything I see in the film and determine how I really feel about it. But I make an exception since the validityu of this review depends on its freshness. Im going to keep it short. It will have spoilers.

The earth is under threat from an ancient alien force. These lifeforms have come to earth to look for the allspark. A powerful cube with the power to create life from machines. A US military base in Qatar is attacked by a mysterious machine-like life form looking for information that will lead it to the allspark, this sparks a national emergency that awakens a controversial covert agency called Sector 7.

Sam Witwicky (Spike in the cartoon)(Shia LeBouf)just wants a new car and get the girl. He gets both, but it turns out to be one of these machine aliens and acts as a herald to his group, the Autobots. Once the Autobots reach earth, the battle of these two machine factions begins and we end up being collateral damage.

I will state the obvious qualities of this movie first. The CG work is flawless. Everytime a robot transforms is gold. You can't wait for the next action sequence. The cvomplicated transforming sequences obviously took a lot of time and thought to execute and is definitely the biggest quality of the movie.

First off. The comedy is great. You get a lot of the signature Michael Bay quick cuts and ambush quips. Shia Lebouf delivers excellenty as the dorky heroic Sam. Megan Fox is a sight to behold. Although at times she looks a bit odd and looks kind of grimy, even in the non-action scenes she looks like she just changed your oil (and I mean that in a non-sexual way).

I have to mention John Voight's cool take on the Rumsfeld-like Secretary of Defense. John Turturro also shines as a perfect Bay-esque antagonist. Sinister, yet goofy. Tyrese was tolerable. Josh Duhamel was almost insignificant. Anthony Anderson was more noticeable as his usual self in the light comedic scenes.

Now as cool and realistic as the robots were, there is just something odd about how the Autobots were acting in some of the scenes. Jazz jive talking, Prime being a klutz in Sam's front yard, and going,in the deep commanding voice of Frank Welker, "My bad!" , et al. It kind of turned me off. I understand that it was a take to kind of give these large clunky robots some humor, but they really didn't need it. Them crowding around Sam's house to retrieve the glasses to me was just stupid. I don't know, maybe it's the fan in me. In the Decepticons side, Starscream was definitely the coolest of the bunch. Though he was badly underused, all of his scenes were among the action highlights of the entire movie.

As amazing the final battle scene was between Prime and Megatron, there was just something really lacking in the way it was executed, the allspark being kind of what the Matrix was in the cartoon movie.

I might change my mind with some of the things I said here, but I most likely wont. My mind is just too close to the movie and I would need to take a few paces backward and look back at the movie with fresh eyes.

For a summer movie, its good enough. For a Bay movie, its probably the best I've seen. It has it's flaws, but I think they are reserving some of the good stuff for the sequel.

Rocketboy's Rating: **** (4.5 out of 5 stars)

First Indiana Jones 4 Pic.

2007-06-23T18:34:00.000+08:00

Here is a shot of old Harrison Ford acting really old and sitting down like an old man with arthritis as old Indiana Jones.

BTW. The photo was taken by Steven Speilberg himself.

Props to aintitcool.com

New Batman "The Dark Knight" Pics...With The BatPod

2007-06-21T06:59:00.000+08:00

Some of the images below have been floating around the web as of late. I am already feeling that Chris Nolan's The Dark Knight is being set up to be the best Batman movie yet. Nolan has hit the right nerve with the franchise and the fan reaction to the Batman Begins is a testament of that. Check out some of the stuff that Christian Bale will be playign with in the Bat sequel. Click on the images to enlarge.

The new costume is a bit more tapered than last. Also, you can observe that the neck region of the mask is completely moveable! Unlike the old fixed helmets that were used in the last few movies, this one actually allows Batman to move his neck and turn around in case somebody tries to stab him from behind. A heightened sense of things is good, but nothing beats peripheral vision!

The now famous BatPod. Batman's new toy. I really dont know what features this baby has yet, but I want one.

Props to aintitcool.com

The Rocketboy at Toycon (The 6th Phillipine Toys Hobbies and Collectibles Convention 2007)

2007-06-20T19:54:00.000+08:00

I was so sleepy I could not appreciate the beauty of my surroundings.

I wish I was more rested when I dropped by for the 45 minutes I was there. Undeniably, it was the largest gathering of geeks and nerds in the country. A lot of people in costumes and of course toys. Iwas of two minds on whether I should get the new Ironhide toy (the coolest of the new Transformers toys) but I was too spaced out to realized that I forgot to withdraw cash. Bummer.

What I found really funny was these two guys walking around dressed as Leader 1 and Cy-Kill from The Gobots, one of them holding out a sign that said, "Give Gobots a Chance!" LOL!

Here I am, all groggy and spaced out from my nightshift duty. I could have just easily went home to sleep, but how could I miss a big geek reunion.

Here's what we oldskoolers call The Superfriends or what you young snots call the "Justice League" (lame!) lining up for the P500 buffet. Superman was first in line as always, but what he doesnt know is that the Flash is back for seconds already! Batman didnt really want to eat but he heard that the gambas were awesome.

Revisiting Millenium

2007-06-20T17:22:00.000+08:00

"I see what the killers see. I put myself in his head. I become the thing we fear the most. I become capable of it, I become the horror what we know we can become only in our heart of darkness. It's my gift, it's my curse" - Frank Black, Millenium Pilot Episode

If you were an avid follower of the old Chris Carter psychological drama Millenium back in the late '90's, you're someone I'd like to have a long conversation with over what, in many respects was my favorite TV show, ever. And I mean it.

I was a fan of The X-Files during it's earlier run. Creator Chris Carter, then riding on the success of his alien conspiracy drama serial, developed a series that focused on the the inner workings of the criminal mind set in the context of the grim outlook of a degenerating present on it's way to a doomed future, seen through the eyes of Frank Black, a retired FBI agent with a gift of seeing what "a killer sees".

The show aired for a short while over RPN 9 from 1996 to 97. It never really caught on with the mainstream audience in the States, which is why it only lasted 3 short seasons. Moreso here, where the second season was short-lived and the show had to be cancelled midway. It's sad because, for a time it was the most intelligenty written TV drama during it's time.

I many ways it was ahead of it's time. Being all about criminal psychological profiling and forensics, it would be the precursor to today's CSI franchise, Bones and even my favorite currently running TV drama, House. Also it was about the supernatural occurences associated with the Apocalypse and involved a protagonist that had a 'gift' of seeing crime through the eyes of the perperators. very much a precursor to the undeservingly popular Profiler, the more recent Ghost Whisperer and Criminal Minds.

The main guy Frank Black, expertly played by veteran character actor Lance Henriksen was a very unlikely, unorthodox hero. A middle-aged FBI retiree with a young family trying to escape the violence and darkness of his FBI agent days by moving in to his hometown and buying a nice yellow house, very much like the leading man in a good intelligent novel rather than a primetime TV show.

The reason I wrote this entry is because I for the longest time was longing for a DVD copy of the entire series. I looked far and wide into the corridoors of Arlegui in Quiapo but to no avail. At one time, I actually saw a box-set! Season two! But at that time I had already forgotten what the story was like in season I and I really needed to see it all again to refresh. I still don't know why I never came back and bought that boxed set!

A month ago I in the web I come upon the tv-links.co.uk and bookmarkd it right away. Here I got to watch advanced episodes of Heroes, House, Weeds, The Tudors and other shows I was into at the time. Sure enough it was a matter of time before I spent out all the seasons, left with nothing new to watch I browsed the older shows. To my surprise, Millenium was there. All three seasons! I started with the pilot. It was 1996 all over again.

I am almost done with Season one, again. And i cant wait to get into the episodes I never got to see. One more surprise I got was that, even though the show was cancelled permanently after Season three, the writers still wrote "virtual episodes", probably material that they did not want to go to waste. And they were all in the web. the materials go all the way to season five.

They dont write shows like Millenium anymore. Real grounded stories with no stupid dialogue, no cheesy character setups, no 'beautiful people', even. If you haven't seen the show, here are some links to some free episodes. I recommend you give it a look.

Seasons One Two and Three

The Virtual Fourth Season

The virtual Fifth Season

Newsload For The Week

2007-06-13T17:59:00.000+08:00

Well, here we are again in the middle of a week post-Independence Day. I hope all's well with you and your pet chinchilla. Here are some of the things I got to find out during the week.

A Tale Of Two Sisters Remake a Go.

Anyone who has seen Kim Jee Woo's A Tale of Two Sisters knows what a solid slow burn movie it was, and that it was so good, it stands along with The Ring as the foremost Asian Horror movies. The Hollywood re-hash is to be directed by brothers Thomas and Charles Guard. And get this... it looks like they have acquired the services of Hollywood "it" girl Elizabeth Banks (40 Year Old Virgin, Slither). I'm thinking she's going to be the mom, because she can NOT be one of the sisters.

The Lovely Bones Gets Rachel Weisz

We all know Peter Jackson has achieved acclaim so great that only a few directors in their lifetime will ever get. He is now up there with Speilberg and Cameron as the best blockbuster filmmakers of our time. After two big franchises (LoTR and King Kong) he had decided to lay it low and dabble on some arthouse filmmaking, a respectable move considering all the stress and investment he had poured onto the past movies he'd made. The Lovely Bones is a novel about a young girl's story as told posthumously by the main character after she had been raped and killed. The kind of arthouse you would normally see Todd Field or Paul Haggis sink their teeth into. Jackson has a cquired the rights and the services of Rachel Weisz in the cast. No more word as th when it will be released. Stay tuned.

Thundercats Movie To Be Animated

After Transformers, very many people would be quik to point out that the next Saturday-morning cartoon to be made a live action flick would be Thundercats. I would not be one of those people, but what the hey. It would be cool to see Lion-O in the flesh. But wait, not a lot of people think it's a good idea to flesh out the characters. Hence, the decision was made to make it an animated feature.

Do I think it's cool? Maybe. Will it sell? Fo shizzle! Will I watch it? I'm going to sleep now.

Props to themovieblog and aintitcool.

Movie Review: Ocean's Thirteen (2007)

2007-06-07T19:34:00.000+08:00

It's been a while since I went back into the theater. I missed it. Too much work has made rocketboy a dull boy. I was waiting for a good movie to return to the theater to. Pirates of the Carribean was such a big hit at the ofice that I didn't bother to make a review. I haven't seen it yet, but Im sure it was good. Ocean's Thirteen was perfect. No frills, but completely Hollywood. Plus George Clooney is like the coolest guy in planet earth.

Danny Ocean (George Clooney)is once again doing what he does best. Stealing for the sake of stealing. Together with Rusty (Brad Pitt) his band of experts (I'm sorry, I'm too lazy to write all their names), he arranges a job to get casino mogul Will Banks (Al Pacino) on the opening night of his new casino in Las Vegas. This job is different, though. Will cheated their friend Reuben (Elliot Gould)on a deal on his casino and caused Reuben's heart attack.
The job was to get Banks' money on opening night to teach him a lesson, Ocean style.

One can't help but notice the absence of the ladyloves of our two protagonists. We aren't given much information on the absence of Julia Roberts and Catherine Zeta-Jones in this sequel. We just learn that they are not in the job because "this isn't their fight". Okay we forgive you.

The pacing and flavor of Ocean's Thirteen is basically the same. In terms of visual styling like split screening and 70's style motifs in editing are abundant in the film as well. The explainations of plots and subplots and heist procedures and what not are just as complicated as in the previous movies. But for some reason, they are more understandable. maybe it's because I was really in it and I really paid attention to the dialogue this time, or maybe Soderbergh toned the dialogue a bit lower. It sure wasn't "dumbed down", because you reaaly had to listen to get it. One particular piece of equipment I found amusing was the "Gilroy", you'll see what I mean.

A lot of websites had criticized Pacino's performance here as mediocre or unnecessary of Pacino's screen presence, but I beg to differ. Sure, it was a toned down Pacino, not an in your face "your out of order, this whole courtroom is out of order, Hooowah!" Pacino. He made a good antagonist in this movie in my book. Seeing him together with Andy Garcia kinda gave me the Godfather fuzzies all over again. Ellen Barkin was mediocre in this pic, I wish they could have gotten a more bankable sexy actress "of a certain age" like Demi Moore or Sharon Stone.

When it comes to the main characters, this time it's like how they were in Ocean's 11. Everyone had a part and there was a plan. It wasn't a scattered mess like Ocean's 12 where they were reacting to a situation. This kind of made the acting more relaxed and prepared. Ocean's 12 looked like a bunch of Hollywood A list friends coming together with cameras and shooting a movie of themselves fooling around and sending it to the producers who put it straight to the can.

All in all, I liked Ocean's Thirteen liked I liked the first one, and way more than the second one. Sometimes, third time really is the charm! Place your bets! My money's on 13.

Rocketboy's Rating: ***** (5 out of 5)

Movie Preview: Sicko

2007-05-31T17:45:00.000+08:00

I may not necessarily agree with his political stands, but no doubt, Michael Moore is a force to be reckoned with, not only in the movie business, but in American politics as well.His first film, Roger and Me dealt with the problem of unemployment, specifically among the people of his homeown Michigan. His second, Bowling for Columbine, dealt with the legality and misuse of guns in America, with emphasis on the largest gun club in the world, the NRA, and its ties with American politics. His third, and most popular work is the infamous Farenheit 9/11, where he tackles and subjectively criticizes the Bush administration for basically everything bad that's happening around the world.

His latest outing tackles the American health care issue. It's amazing how underdeveloped Americn healthcare is compared to that of all other industrialized countries. Considering that we are talking about the richest country in the world. I mean compared to the Philippines, of course, we are in a much worse state, but remember we are a dirt poor country with a lot of debts. The US has no excuse to be a poor healthcare provider to it's citizens. There is said to be a part where Moore actually brings some 9/11 heroes (Firemen and policemen, rescuers during the 9/11 incident whose health got compromised while doing their job) to Cuba to avail of the healtcare benefits provided by a communist country. This caused a major stir and was brought out in the news a couple of weeks ago. You gotta give it to Moore, if he really wants to make a point he usually does a good job.

Whether this movie will rock or suck is still open for debate, but the healthcare isue isnt. I wonder if Moore laid off all those chicken wings after doing this movie?

Try and click here to see if the trailer is available in your area.

Props to themovieblog

Transformers Trailer. Up. Speechless.

2007-05-18T19:43:00.000+08:00

The full trailer of the Transformers movie is upon us. I should have posted this earlier. But I am a working man and would like to keep my job. I was itching to get home the moment I turned my PC on in the office this morning just so that I could watch the 2 minute trailer. Oh, my was it worth it.

You have a choice, go to youtube and be like everyone else and break the servers in half, or just download it from yahoo.

No words. Just watch.

Iron Man Hi-Res Photo

2007-05-10T18:13:00.000+08:00

Sweet.

Man, I hope this doesn't suck!

Click on the image for a larger view.

My Five Favorite TV Shows

2007-05-10T17:44:00.000+08:00

My Name Is Earl

Its very difficult to pull of a show like My Name Is Earl. Given that it takes place in a relatively rural town in the heartland of the USA, has a cast that portray a bunch of redneck halfwits, yet exhibits the many complicated facets of the ancient oriental principle of Karma and succesfuly exhibits and puts into play many numerous moral conundrums, most of which are unwittingly dealt with by these characters. We, the audience are treated to an intelligently written show featuring characters who think that "prerogative" and "preservative" are the same thing.

Earl is a no good, small time racketeer who has done many bad things. One day he purchases a winning lottery ticked using a stolen dollar and gets run over by a car before he could cash in the ticket. He learns about Karma while watching Carson Daly from his hospital bed and concludes that all the bad things going on in his life are the compound result of all his bad deeds. He then makes a list of all the bad deeds he has made throughout his life and sets out to correct each one. There are hundreds of them so, it was fitting that they make a TV show about it.

The Office

Watching the episodes of The Office in increments is almost impossible. There is no way I could keep myself from watching the next episode. It's quite simply the funniest new sitcom on TV right now.

The name of the company is Dunder Mifflin. Their boss is Michael Scott. He loves his job and his managerial position, and has very weird ways of showing it. His employees don't share his enthusiasm, and sometimes, they let him know that.

The mockumentary-style presentation makes The Office more real and is its strongest appeal. Somehow a lot of the jokes hit home with people because it deals with jargon, situations and drama that most of us in the workforce experience everyday. Imagine taking a camera crew to work one day just to see what happens. Itwill most likely look like an episode of The Office.

Prison Break

I have to admit, I have not gotten into the Prison Break bandwagon. I have had the DVD of the first season for ages, but never got around to watching it. I just thought it was worth mentioning here because my brother, parents and everybody who borrowed my Prison Break 1st Season DVD has loved it and says its their favorite TV show to date. You can't ignore that kind of accolade.

The story of two brothers in prison, one is set to be executed, and the other commits a crime to break himself into the prison where his brother is detained so they can break out together. They have a plan for their escape in the form of a very detailed map of the prison tattooed into the skin of the rescuing brother. A very effective tribute to brotherly love (not the prison kind, though.)

Heroes

I have never been more excited to see the next episode of a series after I get to the end of a Heroes episode. Initially, my interest on this series was piqued by curiosity. Just like everybody, I was intriged by the vocality of its following.

Ordinary people from all walks of life discover that they have extraordinary powers and are dealing with it differently. A New York congressional candidate who can fly, an office clerk from Japan who can bend time and space, a Las Vegas internet stripper and single mom who has dual personalities, a hospice nurse who seems to absorb the abilities of others, and a lot more.

Its the type of series that shoul have been written long ago but seemed for some reason, to have only come up now. With its surprising twists and turns every episode, you really have no idea how the story is going to end up. Yet given the dynamics of the story, there are millions of ways it can end up interesting.

The first season is set to wrap up in a few weeks. Better get ready for the complete season DVD.

House

House is what entertainment journalists call an anti-hero. Somebody unconventional, sometimes unattractive and uncharismatic, who ends up gaining the sympathy of the audience because of his sheer arrogance and infallability to break conformity. House is also what many in the medical field regard as the closest TV has ever gotten to portraying a real doctor. They aren't idealistic, clean, morally rigid professional practitioners who look like they did commercial modelling on the side. Most of them are unkempt, morally gray and look like they got passed over for Beauty and The Geek.

Dr Gregory House is the best doctor anywhere. He heads a diagnostic department for the Princeton Plainsboro Hospital in New Jersey. Along with his protege doctors, he solves medical mysteries like a modern day Sherlock Holmes with a medical license, often using unconventional methods such as not talking to his patients as not to be misled by their "lies" and even breaking into patients' homes to search for medical clues.

Album Review: "10-4 Baby!" Various Artists, Created By SimonIddol.com

2007-04-12T16:26:00.000+08:00

Browsing through the vast landscape of the internet, you get to see a lot of weird stuff. Most of the stuff you get to sift through is crap, but sometimes, you run into some diamonds in the rough. If you know what a Mash-Up is, the story of Gnarls Barkley's Danger Mouse first comes to mind (Danger Mouse is the skinny one in the duo.)and his whole mixing of songs two different albums (The Beatles' White Album and Jay -Z's The Black album) to make the appropriately named Grey Album. This became an internet phenomenon where the album was downloaded millions of times by basically everybody who was curious enough, because, hey, its FREE MUSIC!

This turned into a big copyright infringement debacle over the two different record labels who own the rights to the two albums. An illegal union between two great musical works by an unordained DJ that resulted in a handsome bastard-child album.

But this is not about Danger Mouse or the Grey Album. I was listening to a Mash-Up album called 10-4 Baby compiled by Mash-Up blogger Simon Iddol. I recently became a regular visitor in his website when I downloaded a Mash-Up in his blog called Killing Boombastic by DJ Zebra. It is a fusion of Shaggy's Boombastic and Rage Against The Machine's Killing in the Name Of. An interesting combination, if I may say. A good conversation piece with any music fan.

The completed album was released complete with album art and a cartoon. Talk about value for NO money! So If I were a pirate, I would simply burn the songs into a disc and print out the album cover with the attached jpeg.

But the real issue here is the songs in the compilation. Songs parts from Jimi Hendrix to Muse, from Nelly Furtado to T-Rex can be found in a lot of the very nicely Mashed-Up songs. One of the stand outs is Dip it Joe (Hendrix "Hey Joe" vs. Christina Milian "Dip it Low"). Akon and Nelly Furtado should have thought of working together before DJ Meilwon mixed Say it Right with Smack That to make Smack it Right.

My Favorite piece is the Fergie vs. The Fray Mash-up She is Glamorous.

Ahh I love how the internet really takes record companies' ridiculous profit margins and shoves them right into their shoothole.

CLick Here to go to Simoniddol.com and download the album

Tasty News

2007-04-03T17:20:00.000+08:00

Some news over the web.
There's a tasty image of Robert Downey Jr. as Iron man alter ego Tony Stark out in the web.

Downey is a perfect casting choice ofr Iron Man/Stark because, not only do they kind of look the same, they also both have an extensive relationship with substance abuse. I guess it's a good thing.

Last week I downloaded a tasty set of Transformers trailers from IGN.com. One of which has a shot of Starscream transforming mid air and perching on a scaffolding (I think). And another with Bumblebee transforming. Go do yourself a favor and get it straight from the horse's server. Click on the image for the page.

Props to TheMovieBlog.com and IGN

The Philippine Blog Awards 2007

This is a shout out to the organizers and participants of the recently concluded Philippine Blog Awards 2007.

I was fortunate enough to have been invited to the awards ceremony as a finalist in the Entertainment category. The Entertainment blog of the year went to the deserving Retzwerx.
I of course, sulked and cried in a corner (the Eddie Murphy walk-out bit gets a little too old).

Congratulations to the winners.

New Transformers Posters!.. And More News.

2007-03-28T16:21:00.000+08:00

Optimus Prime and Megatron look like they're about to kick each other's mufflers in this one (Does Megatron have a muffler?).

The first posters for the Transformers movies coming out on July have surfaced on the web just a few hours ago and are currently being reproduced digitally, Photoshopped and turned into desktop wallpers at an alarming rate. I put a couple of these babies in the old computer myself. Want one?

More Transformers related news - its official! Hugo Weaving is the voice of Megatron! Yes! Agent Smith. Elrond. V. Also Keith David (bottom) of '80's shocker The Thing(I almost threw up during this movie when I was a kid), They Live ( a really cool Wes Craven camp-fest) and other movies where he is the token black dude is cast as the voice of Decepticon, Barricade.

Coolness emits from this movie like Energon cubes.

Props to Dark Horizons

First Pics: Set of Rambo IV

2007-03-27T11:06:00.000+08:00

I just stumbled upon an interesting set of images from, the set of the upcoming Rambo movie.

What? Another Rambo movie?

It seems to me that old Sly is trying to make a graceful exit by beating new life into his old '80's cash cows, the Rocky and Rambo movies.

Is this old geezer milking the cow too much? Or is it just appropriate that he close these books with guns blazing. A better question would probably be, will this movie close the series with guns blazing?

Man, is he big or what!?

Click the thumbnail picture for a larger view of his large largeness!

Props to the The Movie Blog

Movie Preview: "The Last Mimzy"

2007-03-22T16:34:00.000+08:00

I have been looking through the trailers in apple.com and I have come across the trailer to The Last Mimzy. It's a story about a couple of kids who are apparently geniuses and are getting information from the future on how to conduct a very significant event.

The trailer doesn't reveal much. But that's what a trailer is supposed to do. Give out enough to get us interested without spoiling the movie. And boy, did this get my attention.

I have clicked on almost all the links in the apple.com/trailers page, but this trailer really got me excited.

For all I know the movie could be a boring load of crap. But from what ZI see in the trailer. This could be a potential revival of the old "80's Speilberg type childrens' sci fi genre. There definitely was an E. T./Close Encounters of The Third kind/ Goonies feel to it.

Here's hoping to that.

Click here to go directly to The Last Mimzy trailer page.

Props to Apple.com

Emile Hirsch In Talks For Wachowski Bros. "Speed Racer"

2007-03-22T16:22:00.000+08:00

The guy that was lucky enough to hook up with Elisha Cuthbert in The Girl Next Door may also be the chosen one to pilot the iconic Mach 5

Emile Hirsch is in talks to star in "Speed Racer," the live-action version of the anime cartoon being directed by Larry and Andy Wachowski.
Based on the classic 1960s series created by anime pioneer Tatsuo Yoshida that was retooled for North American audiences, "Speed Racer" follows the adventures of young race car driver Speed (Hirsch) in his quest for glory in his thundering gadget-laden vehicle, Mach 5. The movie will feature other characters from the show, including Speed's family and his mysterious arch-rival, Racer X.

I can totally see Hirsch in that white and red bodysuit and helmet. Also, dont you think his face is sublty kind of anime-like in a way, too?

Pirates Of The Carribean: At World's End - Trailer is Up!

2007-03-21T18:26:00.000+08:00

Pirates of the Carribean is probably one of the most exciting movie franchises ever made, I have to say. Although it had only sprung from a Disneyland ride, it has developed into one of Disney's many bankable brands. For what it's worth, the POTC movies do make for great summer entertainment. The third (and posibly last?) Pirates movie is coming in May.

Are you excited to see it?

Personally, I can't wait till the Transformers movie kills in the box office, but since that will be waaay ahead of Pirates, this will have to be the great opening to a potentially hot summer.

Catch the HiDef trailer here.

And who doesn't like to look at Keira Knightley for at least an hour and 45 minutes?

Extra: 300 Page-To-Screen Comparisons

2007-03-12T18:15:00.000+08:00

I have been wanting to post this for a while. Solace in Media a while back posted a comprehensive page to screen comparison between Frank Miller's 300 and the WB movie 300 by director Zack Snyder. The similarities are breathtaking. Sometimes, loyalty to the source material is the real way to go.

For more page to screen pics, click here.

Movie Review: "300" (2007)

2007-03-08T15:53:00.000+08:00

I was walking around Barnes and Noble chain in Orange County when I found a book, a graphic novel that I had been looking for for a long time. I read the entire comicbook/novel in the store. The pages I wanted to buy it for my collection, but I had other things in mind to get at that time.

The anticipation for Zack Snyder's take on Frank Miller's amazing graphic novel is almost as unexpected as it was great.Once people got a glipse of the film's trailer, it was immediately added to everyone's to-watch list. Sparta was not a very popular civilization and it's legend was buried in time and ignorance and was only brought to live by a rubber sandal company. Zack Snyder is not a very popular director, not yet at least. So what was the attraction? The movie is so stylized and well, it just looked great on film!

Sparta is in the verge of change. the great nation of Persia has conquered most of the worrld and has amassed their armies and has turned into an unstoppable force. Leonidas(Gerard Butler)is the King of Sparta. A warrior by birth and trade. His heart cannot take surrender. With an army of only 300 dedicated and well trained Spartan soldiers, he bravely faces destiny and marches into the glory of his great nation and people.

If awesomeness had an odor, my clothes would have reeked for days.

Blood spatters frozen in mid air, mangled bodies gray with decomposition, ripped hard bodies, skies blackened by millions flying arrows. This movie is so full of the cool stuff that blinking is almost a burden.

You'd think that given the ingredients above that this would be more of a guy film. Not so my friend. There were an equal number of chicks in the sold out theater I was in in Glorietta 4 as there were guys. In the Tonight Show with Jay Leno last week. Gerard Butler was greeted with hysterical shrieks from ladies in the audience. The Spartans and their hard rocking bodies, especially Leonidas, were medeival eye candy for the honeys.

Having read the graphic novel, it was obvious that the goal was to get it as near as possible to the source material. Like in Frank Miller's Sin City. The director played it shot by shot, rendering the page to screen treatment as close as physically possible. And boy did they get it close.

After all is said and done, critics will always resort to whether the story is of any merit. Actually I didn't care at this point if the story or dialogue sucked, because it was so visually satisfying. However, simple as the story was, it was delivered with such verve and passion that it kind of gave me the LOTR fuzzies all over again. With David Wenham (LoTR's Faramir) as Dilios the loyal messenger in the cast, the movie brought out the message in the story any respectable filmmaker would want to convey.

This is the perfect movie to go to with a loved one, with your no good friends or by yourself. Man, treat yourself to this piece of cinema that will surely be a classic!

Now it's time to hit the gym!

Rocketboy's Rating: ***** (5 out of 5)

Congrats Marty!

2007-02-27T16:34:00.000+08:00

Well, whaddaya know.

Nothing much to say here except...ITS ABOUT FREAKIN' TIME!!!

Click here to see my review of The Departed.

Movie Review: "Blood Diamond" (2006)

2007-02-21T17:26:00.000+08:00

Edward Zwick is as always, the master of sweeping epics. The commercial appeal of his works is based on his mastery of camerawork and his ability to pull off real characters from drawn aout caricatures like an Irish settler (Far and Away) Civil War soldiers (Glory) Samurai warriors (The Last Samurai) and African revolutionaries in Blood Diamond.

Zwick's film usually demand breathtaking locations and fractured protagonists in a foreign land, as is the case in BD. Danny Archer (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a mercenary turned smuggler trying to make a fast buck in the fast rising yet unstable African diamond trade in Sierra Leone. Meantime, Solomon Vandy(Djimon Hounsou) a native fisherman, gets separated from his village and his family to work as a slave for the rebels in their diamond mines. Solomon stumbles upon a very large pink diamond and hides it near the river where he finds it. This news gets to Archer, now our story begins. In order for them to both get what they want, Archer contacts American journalist Maddy Bowen (Jennifer Connelly). Hungry to expose the truth about the bloody diamond trade, she grants Archer and Vandy access to records that would lead to Vandy's refugee family. The deal is that Vandy would give the diamond he hid to Archer in exchange.

Zwick keeps the story simple but engaging. This year we have seen a lot of movies based on African tyrrany and violence (Last King of Scotland, 3 Needles) BD would probably be the most epic of the lot.
Although the delivery is obviously very hollywood. It doesn't mean that it isn't a really great story told effectively.

Leo never ceases to amaze me. This guy is just an awesome actor. He has proven us that he can play tough guy in The Departed. He is one of the few who can effectively shed his prettyboy image and turn into a man's man in a whim. He got the South African variety of english down. In one scene I find funny, he speaks in some sort of Swahili-inspired english with an african native. It seems that in reality you had to speak like that to them for them to understand you.

Djimon Honsou always gives out a great performance, although it was kind of a cinch for him to play an African peasant.

The pacing is great, except for a few dead spots in the middle, overall it's one of the best movies of the year. Its pretty easy to dismiss this as a 2 and-a-half hour informercial on the African diamond trade. But I have to hand it to the guys, it was a great buddy tale, too.

Rocketboy's Rating: *****(5 out of 5)

Movie Review: 'The Fountain" (2006)

2007-02-21T17:22:00.000+08:00

I first heard of The Fountain in one of the many movieblogs I frequently visit. That was almost a year ago. A lot of buzz has been genenrated about this movie that got me curious. It is said to be an entirely new approach to the sci-fi genre. It is also been referred to as a groundbreaking work in drama. It has also been referred to as a stinking piece of crap.

I have been aware of Darren Aronofsky and his work in the cult favorite A Requiem For A Dream, I personally ahve not seen Requiem and yes, I know what I am missing. Aronofsky's movies are not for the average weekend viewer, that's for sure. He is often dismissed as a new generation MTV synaptic 300-cuts-per-minute extended music video director, but he isd much more thatn that.

The Fountain is about...(pause, looking at the keyboard). Its really hard to explain without making it look stupid, which is why not a lot of people went to see it.

Hugh Jackman plays three characters. A Conquistador, a scientist and a man in a floating glass ball in space. Rachel Weisz plays Hugh Jackman's wife Isabel in one story and the Queen of Spain in another. In an intertwining narrative. The film talks about life, love, death and the significance of accepting the future rather than fighting it.

The story unfolds non-sequencially, of course, emphasizing parts of the story wherein one correlates with the other in either theme or significance. At the beginning we are presented with Jackman's conquistador persona ascending the steps of what seems to be a Mayan temple encountering a priest or guardian at the summit, then it cuts into space (reminded me a lot of my favorite film 2001: A Space Oddysey) with Jackman, bald, in a lotus position floating in a glass ball with a very old tree inside with him. He talks to the tree like he would a person. He then sees Weisz's Isabel, camera cuts to her in the ball with him, cuts back to him, with hair, this time in an office.

Honestly, the first two acts of the movie are pretty boring. In fact I was ready to dismiss this as a failed piece of art around 45 minutes into it, then the third act came. It's funny, I usually decide whether I like a movie or not at around the middle of it. A movie usually does not redeem itself as abrubptly as The Fountain did on its last 15 minutes. It finally occured to me that it was Aronofsky's intention to give that effect. He could have made the first and second act more, say, appealing. But no, he didn't, he had other plans. He knew what he was doing.

Seriously, The Fountain helped me look into hw we see life from this side of the fence. And if we did find a way to live forever, is dying really that bad?

Then I went out and bought myself ice cream.

Rocketboy's Rating: **** (4 out of 5 stars)

Movie Review: "Little Children" (2006)

2007-02-14T16:45:00.000+08:00

I have seen a good number of the currently nominated films for the upcoming Academy Awards, you know to try and see who really has the handicap for winning. I have realized that. Among the current nominations, great movies as they are (a great crop of movies compared to last year's and the year before that, even), probably one of the best and most affecting movies of the bunch was not even included in the Best Picture roster. Boys and girls, I bring you Little Children.

Little Children ironically a movie about adults. The way they behave, and they way they are supposed to behave. It is clear throughout the movie that every character in the film has a quirk or special something that makes him or her a little less like normal person. All this is captured in an wonderfully crafted piece of atmospheric filmmaking by Todd Field (In The Bedroom). Now I haven't seen In The Bedroom yet, and I'm beginning to regret that I didn't. But if you enjoyed Sam Mendes' American Beauty as I did, or any of Korean filmmaker, Kim Ki Duk's movies, you will definitely enjoy Little Children.

Sarah Pierce (Kate Winslet) is a bored housewife with a Master's degree with a daughter she constantly ignores and a husband with a penchant for keeping to himself in front of the computer (hmm). Brian Adamson (Patrick Wilson) is married to a busy film documentary maker (Jennifer Connely) and has never passed the bar exam after 2 previous attempts, his third try is just around the corner and he doesn't think he likes to take it anymore. Sarah and Brian meet at the kid's playground one day and begin a mutually beneficial friendship of filling each other's gaps in their lives. At this point, we all know they are gonna get 'bizzay'.

On the other hand, Ronnie McGorvey (Jackie Earle Haley) just got out of prison for indecent exposure. A registered sex offender, his return to the neighborhood became a concern for this community of young families.

I can't get over how good Jackie Earle Haley is in this movie. He is currently nominated for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar, and IMHO, deserves to win. What a performance! He got the sex-offender role down to a T, it's scary. He also made Ronnie a real person. All sex offenders are in a way, monsters. But he also makes us feel sorry for him, not in a "he's-gonna-rot-in-hell-I feel-sorry-for-him" way, but in a wounded puppy sort of way. How did he pull this off? Talent, my friend.
Equally compelling to his role is the road he took to get the role. We haven't heard of Jackie Earle Haley before right? Well, it turns out that he used to be a child actor and was in the cast of the original Bad News Bears.

Jackie Earle Haley's history leading up to this role is pretty amazing. He started out as a child star, he was in TV commercials at 6 years old, was in the original Bad News Bears and played side by side with a young Dennis Quaid in Breaking Away. But then like a lot of child stars he lost work as he aged. People in the know in Texas knew where to find him, they would call for pizza, he delivered it for quite a while in that state. He also worked as a security officer, limo driver and a furniture refinisher. Life was starting to take on a different but nicer turn for him when he started to direct commercials and such for a local cable station when someone in Hollywood finally remembered his talent and gave him a call.
When Haley saw the script he knew he had to play the role and he also knew that he was going to have to do something huge to win the producers over. So, he made a 20 minute film focusing on the life of his character. The production value on it was so good that when this story was told at a local SAG screening Q and A, the director joked that he was worried when he watched it that he might be out of a job. Luckily all Haley wanted was to act, so he was cast.

I dont know when they will be showing Little Children here, I just hope they (when I say they I mean the MTRCB) wont be buthcering it like the did Babel.

Rocketboy's Rating ***** (5 stars)

Props to TheMovieblog

Hiatus...

2007-02-08T17:46:00.000+08:00

My blogging days had been put to a halt temporarily. You know how companies are. But wait for something good to happen. I'm pretty excited about getting my own hardware. Soon I will rule the internet again!

Freezing my pinecones off...

2006-12-20T02:41:00.000+08:00

Well, Its been well over a month since I've been in the States and still can't believe how lucky I am. L.A. has so much to offer that I ended up overwhelmed and just stayed in my hotel room most of the time, but I did find time to go and see some sights and go to really cool places like Palm Springs where I got to ride up the mountain tram and SEE SNOW FOR THE FIRST TIME. Showing everyone what an expert I was in the snow, I tried to start a snowball fight and ended up with a collarful of the stuff all day. As if the iceburn wasn't enough, I tried hiking through the trail at full speed. At 8,000 feet above sea level, that's like squeezing your lungs and not letting go.

And for my movie related comnment, next week I am planning to see Children of Men, because I know it will already turn out cool.

..Oh here's a picture of a pincone I found in the snow.

Come on...you get the metaphor...

The Rocketboy in Hollywood

2006-11-24T10:39:00.000+08:00

It was a pretty light week at work in Newport Beach. We were introduced to the crew and we were given a little tour of the office premises. We were checked in at a really sweet hotel. I have never seen so many sportscars in my life.

Just this afternoon after a hearty Thanksgiving lunch my aunt suggested that we go somewhere fun. peaople made suggestions, Beverly Hills, Disneyland, Universal Studios... Butsince I got here to LA there was only thing I wanted. A picture with Martin Scorsese's star in the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

I've known LA all my life through the movies I see and the stories from vast numbers of Filipino's who've been there, from the freeways to the multiracial mix to the great class divides between communities like Newport Beach and communities like Compton nad Watts. Not until I experienced LA for myself did I really appreciate the different issues they've been shamelessly publicizing through their movies and TV programs. I always thought the whole race thing was overblown, until I went downtown and felt the tension between people in this great cultural melting pot. They live amongst one another, yet they are watchful and tense.

Yet I just went about my business and focused on the tourist trail. The home of showbusiness.

More to come.

The Rocketboy Goes to LA

2006-11-17T12:51:00.000+08:00

Sometimes you do get lucky.

Work as been very hectic lately, but I was lucky enough to have been selected as one of the people at work to be sent to LA for an business 'immersion' trip. Of course I had to rummage through the old baby album and get my birth certificate so I could get my passport (I have never left the country before)and go through endless concourses of human ant-trails in the government offices to get my legal documents, all in the space of two work filled weeks. And of course there's the dreaded VISA interview at the Embassy. Two weeks of perpetual anxiety...all it took was 40 seconds for the consul to decide I was good.

I will try to post as many pics as possible from my trip and I hope to run into some Hollywood stuff while I'm there. Hey maybe I may run into somebody and make an ambush interview. Or maybe I can just shut up and work on the stuff I'd been sent there for in the first place.

Movie Review: "The Prestige" (2006)

2006-10-26T18:04:00.000+08:00

Chistopher Nolan's interesting style is always a treat for me. In The Prestige,he noticeably goes back home to his Batman Begins frame of mind in terms of visual style. The dark brooding atmosphere accentuates the darkness of the times they were in. He also goes home to his Memento days with his trademark non-linear storytelling style.

Two rival magicians Rupert Angier (Hugh Jackman) and Alfred Borden (Christian Bale)outwit each other by sabotaging each other's shows and stealing each other's secrets. Eventually this rivalry had very innocent roots as that they were former calleagues with dreams of making it big as the best magician in England.
In this charade of one-upping each other Angier decides to do some further research by retiring for a couble of years to visit the famed scientist Nikola Tesla (David Bowie) who Angiers reputes to have assisted Borden with his act. The obsessive Tesla creates the machine that Angiers funds him to build for his act not knowing what dangers lay ahead for him. All this sacrifice, all this effort to be the greatest magician ever.

The movie has it's strong points as well as weak ones. The best part of the movie is the way the one-upping of each magician is so brilliantly paced by the non-linear storytelling. You can hardly tell up to the very end who will one-up who. Who was smarter than the other. Who, in the end will prevail.

David Bowie as Nikola Tesla is awesome. His charisma in this role is unprecedented since his role in Labyrinth, I was a kid when I saw that and I can still remember him as the wizard with the cool crystal balls. His entrance in one of the scenes one of the coolest I've seen in a long time. From the darkness, he walks across a platform to appear in the fore ground while bolts of electricity from his large electromagnet streak across his body from above into the floor.

One of the weak points is kind of a spoiler, so I'll skip that. The film kind of feels akin to Sympathy for Mr Vengeance and Oldboy (notice I compare almost everyhting to Oldboy). Michael Caine just breezed throug this movie like a belch, by the way Scarlett Johannsen was weak in this movie. She contributed almost nothing to the plot. I would have preferred seeing more of Piper Perabo.

Anyway's, it's a good film to watch, just watch it with a smarter person, or someone who won't bug you with questions while easily getting lost in the story.

Rocketboy's Rating: **** (4 out of 5 stars)

Movie Review: The Departed (2006)

2006-10-05T09:37:00.000+08:00

Martin Scorsese is a force in the film world that cannot be denied. Almost every young filmmaker out there has been influenced by his work. He is a definite hollywood legend and The Departed is proof of this.

He has received a lot of criticism for choosing to adapt a very successful Hong Kong cop thriller Infernal Affairs to be his next project with Leonardo Di Caprio. Perhaps he's run out of ideas, they say. That may be true. But as I saw the movie, I began to understand why he chose this route rather than use an original story. It was probably the mafia story each hollywood filmmaker wanted to make, the chinamen just beat them to the punch.

Im just going to throw in a few bulletpoints to make it easier on both of us.

> It has Scorsese's trademark fast scene sequences. You'll see what I mean.
> The movie is surprisingly funny. A lot of funny one liners courtesy of Jack Nicholson, Alec Baldwin and Mark Wahlberg (yes, he was actually funny in this movie)
> The soundtrack is to die for. I was walking to the office today with the song Comfotably Numb in my head.
> I expected more from Matt Damon. Vera Farmiga was a miscast.
> Leo is the man. He outshone Damon for sure.
> A lot of violence, but not as violent as Casino or Goodfellas, some of Scorsese's trademark movies. The story is the hero here.
> In terms of loyalty to the original. Very loyal. More loyal than I expected. I was expecting Scorsese to make it his own. Surprisingly he did stay loyal to the original while making it his own. I remember some key scenes such as the hand cast scene and the climax as very close to Andrew Lau's Infernal Affairs.

>Some trivia. In Sullivan's (Matt Damon) new apartment, when his girlfriend (Vera Farmiga) movies in with her boxes of stuff, you can clearly see what he was watching in the widescreen TV on the background...Takashi Miike's shocker Audition!

All in all, a great time at the movies and a great time for cynics. I for one am a very happy camper. Go see it.

Rocketboy's Rating: ***** (5 out of 5)

News Today...Gone Tomorrow

2006-10-05T09:29:00.000+08:00

Teaser for Im a Cyborg, And It's OK

To those who care. A new teaser trailer for Chan Wook Park's new romance comedy with a twist I'm A Cyborg, And That's Ok has been doing regular rotations over the web. Personally I'm excited to see how Park is going to do around the romance-comedy genre. For sure there is going to be a lot of twists and turns with the storytelling and the visual style and that it's not going to be just your typical run of the mill Korean romcom.
It stars Im So Jung of ..ing and A Tale Of Two Sisters and Rain (Bi), a popular recording artist in Korea and star of the hugely popular (here in the Philly at least) Full House.

Click here for the streaming trailer.

Robert Downey Jr is Iron man

Robert Downey Jr is cast as the damamged superhero Iron Man. Personally, I like it. And good for him! He matches the profile of Tony Stark as being a generally good person with a bad addiction. His reputation for being a junkie gives him kind of a dangerous yet likeble charm, because he is indeed very talented. If you've seen Heart and Souls you know what I mean. Anyways, this is cool and has added to my anticipation for the Iron Man movie.

Movies To Look Forward To

2006-09-24T23:34:00.000+08:00

Ok, it's getting harder and harder to deny that I don't have time for my blog anymore, but I'm not going to abandon it. The tide may turn and I may get fired and I will then have more opportunities to put in more posts...but don't count on it.

I have been eagerly anticipating a few upcoming movies which I will be enumarating in this entry. A lot of the more popular ones like Transformers, Spiderman 3 and the Wolverine spinoff may be too far away for me to make a buzz report on, but there are a few movies coming in the next few months that not only showe promise, but are slated to be movies to be so groundbreaking, they might leave a trail for other movies to follow. here ar my most anticipated movies for the next few months.

The Illusionist- Edward Norton is fun to watch on screen. But Jessica Biel is more fun.

The Prestige- Yet another movie about turn-of-the-century magicians. This one though, is helmed by Memento's Christopher Nolan. Which makes it more important than The Illusionist.

The Science of Sleep- Michel Gondry knows trippy. His Eternal Sunshijne Of The Spotless Mind was probably one of the most critically acclaimed movies of 2003, and is my second favorite for that year. Gael garcia Bernal has been showing a lot of promise with his movie choices after The Motorcycle Diaries. This is probably the role that those ignorant Americans are going to recognize him by.

Babel- From Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu, creator of Amores Perros and 21 Grams comes another story of intersecting lives and the triumphs and tragedies of the human experience. Sure, it has been done via Crash and Traffic, but if you hadn't seen 21 Grams or Amores Perros, you best shut up.

The Fountain- Darren Aronofsky is said to have completely created a new sci-fi subgenre whith this movie. Set in three differrent time periods, The Fountain is said to ba a trip through time devoid of logic and chronology, let's just hope it actually gets released here!

The Children Of Men- From Alfonso Cuaron of Y Tu Mama Tambien and the rarely credited but hugely inspired version of Great Expectations. Set in England in the near future, it deals with how people deal with their loss of the ability to reproduce. This sounds like fun, seeing that the youngest person in the earth at that time is already 18 years old. You know what that means? No annoying child actors!!

I'm A Cyborg, But It's Okay- Chan Wook park of Oldboy and Sympathy for Lady Vengeance is trying to steer away from the revenge drama and is shifting his attention to a lighter subject matter, a girl and boy with mental disorders inside a nuthouse. Now, don't get soft on us, Chan Wook.

Flags of Our Fathers/ Red Sun, Black Sand- Clint Eastwood is like--what, 100 years old? And he still comes up with the most novel cinematic idea in this entire list.
Two movies, diferent release dates (FOOF in October, RSBS in December), same event, same subject, different points of view. Flag of our Fathers rallies behind the American Triumph of Iwo Jima as depicted in that iconic photograph of the soldiers
raising up the American Flag. Red Sun, Black Sand deals with the Japanese General who reluctantly leads his Imperial troops into a deathtrap in the beach. Both films show the courage of both parties and their integrity amidst difficult decisions in a war they were reluctant to join. How cool is that?

Movie Review: "Snakes On A Plane" (2006)

2006-08-25T09:19:00.000+08:00

Yep, its been a wile since I last went to Glorietta and saw a movie. Anyways I saw David Ellis' Snakes on a Plane. What do you really expect from a movie that is based on a really flimsy idea so moronically insane that it would generate such internet buzz as it did to a point that it was mostly marketed out of word of mouth instead of paid advertisement as a movie "so silly, it's awesome"?

Agent Neville Flynn (Samuel L. Jackson)will need to transport a witness to LA from Hawaii to testify against a sadistic gang leader. They let off a decoy charter flight and borad on a commercial line instead. So they comandeer South Pacific Flight 121 (the logo font of South Pacific looks very much like Cebu Pacific's, I'm sure I'll remember that the next time I fly..) They are outsmarted by their guy and he loads the plane with hundreds of differet varieties of snakes in a cargo box. They also spray the passenges' complimentary leis with pheromones to agitate the serpents. The result is an unprecedentedly scary flight of reptilitan proportions.

True enough, there wasn't much advertising, and it may have been the reason why it only made $13 mil opening day. But for a film that only cost $35 mil to make all in all, let me repeat, with minimal to no advertising, it's doing pretty well.

It eas also said that some of the dialogue was taken straight out of internet fans who replied to Ellis' invitation to help him write the story. This might be the dawning of a new age in cinema where the fans have some sort of say in the film's outcome. Whether this is a good thing or not, still remains to be seen.

But the real question is, "is it any good"? Well, have you seen Tremors? That campy horror movie about gigantic carnivorous earthworms starring Kevin Bacon back in the early '90s? I remember seeing that movie in HBO and enjoyed the heck out of it. I got the same feeling when I say Snakes On A Plane. One thing you should NOT do is take it seriously. There is no way snakes of that quantity can pass airline security nowadays sure. But its a moooovie. And it is made sure that we are reminded that it is. Over all it's fun and full of one dimensional characters and ugly snakebite wounds. And it's got the Samuel Jackson we all love!

Rocketboy's Rating= **** (4 out ot 5 stars)

Some Adjustments

2006-08-25T09:12:00.000+08:00

First of all. I apologize for the lack of posts lately. Things change and priorities get modified a little bit. Something good happened this past few weeks that got me really busy, so its not negligence or laziness, I assure you.
Along with a promotion comes a lot of responsibility. Quoting Uncle Ben from Spiderman; "With great power comes...limited computer access".

Anyways boys and girls, I might resort to a weekly or bi-weekly blog entry from here on out. Given that I have very little time and much less resources, I night squeeze in all the movie and music news I can in one entry.

And I'll leave it at that!

AOL's 111 Wussiest Songs

2006-08-04T15:58:00.000+08:00

I just got this off of a blog called stereogum.com I got a laugh at the entries and I do agree with most of them.

Although I do love R. E. M.'s Shiny Happy People, it is reported that recording the song (and most likely shooting the video for it) wasn't one of their proudest moments.

Personally, I would have put James Blunt's Your Beautiful on the top spot. The loser's personal anthem. I 'still don't get why chicks dig this song so much. Touching and sensitive daw. Really? All I hear is a pathetic whine of how some guy isn't worthy to be with the prettiest girl at work/school/wherever you are. And that he is only resined to stare at her from afar. Come to think of it, it could be the stalker's anthem too.

Anyway here it is. You can click on the list for the complete 111 songs. I also highlighted some noteable songs.

111. 'Do I Make You Proud' - Taylor Hicks (2006)
110. 'Seasons in the Sun' - Terry Jacks (1974)
109. 'Kiss Me' - Sixpence None the Richer (1999)
108. 'Wonderful Tonight' - Eric Clapton (1977)......

59. 'Someone Saved My Life Tonight' (1975)
58. 'Bad Day' - Daniel Powter (2005)
57. 'She Believes In Me' - Kenny Rogers (1979)
56. 'Vindicated' - Dashboard Confessional (2004)
55. '(Everything I Do) I Do It for You' - Bryan Adams (1991)
54. 'Leaving on a Jet Plane' - Peter Paul and Mary (1969)
53. '2 Become 1' - Spice Girls (1996)
52. 'How Deep Is Your Love' - Bee Gees (1977)
51. 'Tutti Frutti' - Pat Boone (1956)......

25. 'Superman (It's Not Easy)' - Five for Fighting (2001)
24. 'All Outta Love' - Air Supply (1980)
23. 'Your Body Is a Wonderland' - John Mayer (2001)
22. 'You Light Up My Life' - Debbie Boone (1997)
21. 'True' - Spandau Ballet (1983)
20. 'Such Great Heights' - Iron and Wine (2003)
19. 'Right Here Waiting' - Richard Marx (1989)
18. 'I Believe I Can Fly' - R. Kelly (1996)
17. 'Close To You' - Carpenters (1970)
16. 'All By Myself' - Eric Carmen (1976)
15. 'Cry' - Johnny Ray (1951)
14. 'Dear Mama' - Tupac (1995)
13. 'You Don't Bring Me Flowers' - Neil Diamond & Barbra Streisand (1978)
12. 'I Want It That Way' - Backstreet Boys (1999)
11. 'Hello' - Lionel Richie (1984)
10. 'Fix You' - Coldplay (2005)
9. 'If' - Bread (1971)
8. 'Do You Really Want to Hurt Me' - Culture Club (1983)
7. 'What's Left of Me' - Nick Lachey (2006)
6. 'Longer' - Dan Fogelberg (1979)
5. 'Every Rose Has Its Thorn' - Poison (1988)
4. 'You're Beautiful' - James Blunt (2005)
3. 'Ben' - Michael Jackson (1972)
2. 'Sometimes When We Touch' - Dan Hill (1997) [I think they mean 1977.]
1. 'Shiny Happy People' - R.E.M. (1991)

Terrence Howard in Ironman

2006-08-02T18:39:00.000+08:00

Hey there. Check this out! Its my 301'st post!

Here's some news according to Quint of AICN.

A few days ago there was word that reached my ears about the role of Tony Stark in Jon Favreau's IRON MAN being offered to a very interesting actor. The word was that IRON MAN was being offered to HUSTLE & FLOW's Terrence Howard.

It turns out that Howard wasn't offered the role of Tony Stark, but that of Stark's successor James Rhodes. No guarantee he'll take it, but I think Howard is one of the most interesting actors working in the business today and his presence in the film will only make it better.

Elisha Cuthbert To Be Sassy Girl

2006-07-29T20:17:00.000+08:00

My Sassy Girl is one of those movies that will be remembered among friend's circles rather than in the cinema history books. It's critical acclaim is not among the film scholars and movie pundits but among romance fanatics and the general Asian cinema fanbase of which I am a proud member.

The dreaded topic of the Hollywood remake has been floating around for literally years now. It has gone through so many hands, most notably through Gurinder Chadha of Bend It Like Beckham. According to Variety, it has now landed into the hands of neophyte director Yann Samuel and get this.. in final negotiations for the role of "Sassy Girl" is Elisha Cuthbert.

Cuthbert would play a reckless, brazen girl who turns the life of a small-town guy from the Midwest upside down. Production is scheduled to start Oct. 16 in Gotham.

First of all, I am a little curious about how they are going to treat the new Americanized version. Is it going to be a completely new story? I am curious about what "Sassy Girl" will be like, compared to the one played to perfection by Jeon Ji Hyun.

I used to be very skeptical about the whole remake idea ...but now that Elisha is involved. I'm actually excited to see what changes they are going to make to acommodate the fiery sex appeal that EC is most famous for when we saw her in Girl Next Door. Whatever they're gonna do with it, I'm sure it's gonna be a big leap from "You wanna die?" and all those flying saucers.

New Iron Man Poster...Whoah!

2006-07-28T23:10:00.000+08:00

I was just jumping back and forth between sites when I stumbled upon this in RopeOfSilicon.com.

I like how they went for the more tapered design. Something freaky about his mouth area, though.

Click Iron Man for a much larger image.

Movie Review: "13 Tzameti" (2006)

2006-07-28T18:11:00.000+08:00

I havent been watching a lot of indie and European films lately. It's not that I've lost interest in them, Its just that I have basically exhausted most of the films that I found interesting within the last two years that not a lot of the new ones get around nowadays. I had the pleasure of seeing the trailer of 13 Tzameti in Yahoo Movies. Wow! Now that's a trailer. I went to my favorite Quiapo spot to look for a copy. But alas, after 2 hours of searching, I could not find one. Fortunately, an office of mine said that he had a relly good copy with English subs. So I loaned it.

Sebastien (George Babluani) is a down on his luck young man who does odd jobs for money. One time he was hired by an old man to fix his roof. This old man receives a letter, with and invitation and an train ticket. One day, the old man dies in his bathtub from a drug overdose, this means Sebastien wont get paid. All he knows about the letter is that there is cash involved so he gingerly tucks it away in his jacket pocket.
Sebastien uses the train ticket and follows the steps outlined in the letter and after following people around, oblivious to what he got himself into. He ends up in an isolated location deep in the forest.
What he doesn't know is that he had accidentally gotten himself in a high stakes gambling ring where he would be one of the contestants. The game? Russian roulette.

It doesn't help that he is also contestant number 13.

I would have soiled my pants If I were this guy.

Like a bad dream or being on Punk'd, 13 Tzameti puts us in this boy's shoes and makes sure that we piss in them. The suspense in the initial round of play just keeps revving like an engine and goes full throttle till the end. Shot in black and white, it almost demands respect and can be a potential suspense classic. There are already rumors of a hollywood remake allegedly by Brad Pitt (whooo boy, here we go again...)

13 Tzameti is a great watch. Although the beginning may be a little dragging with a lot of character development, it is all worthwhile when you see that lightbulb light up and hear the guns crack.

Rocketboy's Rating: **** (4 out of 5 stars)

Movie Preview: "The Fountain"

2006-07-22T20:13:00.000+08:00

The first time I saw the trailer of The Fountain, I didn't get it. It was because it was an alternate reality type movie. very hard to explain but bery deep and moving apparently. Much like my favorite movie 2001: A Space Oddysey. The new trailer is now out and, to tell you the truth I haven't seen it yet. Restrictions in my office computer won't allow me. It's got Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz and directed by Requiem Of A Dream and Pi director Darren Aronofsky.

If you can watch it, tell me what you think will ya?

here's the link

More News in the Horizon

2006-07-22T19:39:00.000+08:00

Peter Cullen To Be The Voice Of Optimus Prime.

News from the San Diego Comic-Con, It is reported that the original voice of Optimus Prime will be used for the upcoming 2007 Transformers. Peter Cullen, the original voice of Prime, as well as other transformers will be used for the live action/CGI movie. A reported 3 thousand Transformers geeks just wet themselves.

TMNT Poster

In the same Comic Con, the posters of the upcoming TMNT (yes they suggest that it be called TMNT, not Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) have been unveiled, showing the newer renditions of the famous four pizza gabbling warriors. The trailer is also found online...and I have it here.

It will also be released next year. Zzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Shaun Of The Dead makers Bring Us Hot Fuzz

I have been a big fan of Shaun Of The Dead. The guys who did that are geniuses. I' have also seen some parts of their show Spaced. And they are hilarious. The have since come up with a new movie called Hot Fuzz. Put this on your to-watch-out-for list, because it is in mine. Plus check out this Balls Of Fury poster from the makers of Reno 911 (love that show). Any movie with Christopher Walken in it is sure to be better of with him than without him.

Props to AICN,Twitch and TheMovieBlog

Oh yeah, by the way Heath Ledger is going to be The Joker. Man, almost forgot about that *rolls eyes*.

Movie Review: "Click" (2006)

2006-07-22T18:56:00.000+08:00

The Adam Sandler fan in me is just screaming to do a review for his latest movie Click, 'cuz it was just so nice. So Im giving in to the voices in my head and doing this one really quick.

Michael Newman (Adam Sandler) is a busy architect and building planner trying to mix both a professional life of kising up to his boss Mr. Ammer (David Hasselhoff) and a life with his wife Donna (Kate Beckinsale) and kids.

Complicated as his life already is, he tries to find some order by going to Bed, Bath and Beyond to find a universal remote control for all his household appliances. He stumbles upon one provided by Morty (Christopher Walken), a mysterious mad proffessior type working in the store's backrooms. The remote seems handy at first, until Mike discovers that can control not only the electrical appliances, but virtually everything around him including his nagging wife, his boring appointments and his dog's bowel movements. he soon discovers a new sense of freedom in being able to control his time and pause whenever things get rough or infuriating. At one point he pauses his boss in the middle of a statement and hits him in the face 4 times, unpauses him leaving him with a big headache all of a sudden.
Things start to get really bad when the remote automatically pre-programs his preferrences and just shuttles to the next thing in his life without his permission. He later finds himself shuttling through his life without experiencing it which results to him wanting out. But the remote is non returnable.

Adam Sandler comedies are shallow and juvenile, and that's just the way we like them. Although it plays between the college humor and heartstring plucking, it does not alienate either poles of its diverse audience. Like Wedding Crashers, its a college humor flick with a romantic twist.

Plus, did I mention that Kate Beckinsale is uber-hot in this movie. In most of the scenes she wears this pink number with a pair of boxers that is very difficult to forget. I will post a hi-res photo right here. You can take your time...

Done? Ok let's move on.

I enjoyed this film. I don't know hat you think about it, but I thought it delivered what it was supposed to deliver and more, unlike Sandler's previous recent movies, this one brings you back to Billy Madison, Happy Gilmore territory, plus giving you a little Its A Wonderful Life.

Rocketboy's Rating: ***** (5 out of 5)

Movie Review: "Nacho Libre" (2006)

2006-07-21T18:18:00.000+08:00

I have been a fan of Napoleon Dynamite director Jared Hess. Hess has proved something that the cinema world didn't think was ever possible.

You can make a funny, non-kid oriented film that appeals to a wide audience (not just the conservatives) without using a single cuss word or showing skin(well....female skin, at least).

I'm prety sure most of you who saw Napoleon Dynamite didn't even notice that, right? Thats because everyone, including myself has been desensitized to these things. We expect cuss words and skin in our comedies. Not this one.

Hess has continued this legacy with Nacho Libre.

Ignacio (Jack Black) is a friar in an orphanage who takes care of all the cooking duties. He has a hidden talent and desire for becoming a Luchador (mexican wrestler) which is suppressed by the conservative nature of the priesthood. One day he sneaks with his bum friend Esqueleto (Hector Jimenez) into a wrstling match and fulfills his long frustrated desire to kick butt. Only his butt gets kicked. But he still gets paid.

This new obsession (and source of income) continues as the orphanage continues to enjoy the fruits of his bruises and aches. He also earns the respect and admiration of the lovely Sister Encarnacion ( quite possibly the hottest nun in movie history)((Ana De La Reguera). Soon enough, his secret is discovered by the priests and he banishes himself into the wilderness into a journey of self discovery...for about 17 hours.

Nacho Libre has many choppy parts which prevent it from having a solid plot. It looks like a series of shots pasted together with scotch tape. Hess has a reputation for not being linear in his storytelling. There is no real plot in Napoleon Dynamite, nor is there much in Nacho. Much of the movie's appeal lies on either the Dynamite-isms in the movie like the blank stares into space and the food shots, or Jack Black just being Jack Black.

Nevertheless, I give Hess props for standing his ground and not bowing to cheap profanities and stuff that sells and just doing his own thing. Makes me proud of being a Mormon (Hess is a returned LDS missionary.. like me.)

Overall, entertaining and funny, but don't expect a story.

Rocketboy's Rating: **** (4 out of 5 stars)

Movie Preview: "The Prestige"

2006-07-15T20:01:00.000+08:00

There are a few directors in cinema that have been consistent with the quality of their work. Christohper Nolan is one such director, having brought us the reverse-storytelling masterpiece Memento and, of course Batman Begins. He is now set out to release The Prestige. A story based on a novel by Christopher Priest about two magicians in the 1900's competing for their audience. Much like David Blaine and Chris Angell nowadays. Their desire for prestige, draws them to extreme means, even murder.

The cast includes Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale (Batman himself) as the competing magicians. Also in the cast are Michael Caine (also in Batman), David Bowie, Andy Serkis and Scarlett Johannsen.

I only do previews like this when I look forward to a movie. Let's just say I'm looking forward with my face in the windshield...

Click here for the trailer.

Movie Review: "Pirates Of The Carribbean: Dead Man's Chest" (2006)

2006-07-14T20:51:00.000+08:00

The highest grossing movie opening in history! Wow. No one saw that coming! At $135 Million in 3 days. Pirates Of The Carribbean: Dead Man's Chest has entered the record books despite lukewarm reviews. I guess everyone was looking for a little sea and sand in their pants.

Jack Sparrow (Johhny Depp) is once more into one of his old antics. Ever in search for the next exciting thing. As he has always been a fugitive, he has been everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley) are also in the run from the law after aiding Captain Jack's escape. Their wedding was rudely interrupted by Lord Norrington (Jack Davenport) who placed the charges and subjected the pair in a compromise to assist him in searching for a very valuable item in the form of a chest. Sparrow is also in pursuit of the key, the clues of which was given by Will's very own father Bootstrap Bill (Stellan Skarsgaard, the coolest name ever), which apparently opens the chest Davenport was searching.

In the middle of all of this is athe enigmatic but equally dreaded team of supernatural pirates led by the ocean's most dreaded force Davey Jones (Bill Nighy) and his ship, The Flying Dutchman.
Johhny Depp is, as always. brilliant in everything that he does. As Jack Sparrow he doesn't dissapoint. Although this movie's Jack is a little more confused and confuse-ing at the same time, his trademark swagger and drunk uncle-ness still proves to be the most influential fabricated characters in the past 5 years.
I have to say Orlando Bloom is flat in everything he has done so far post-Lord Of The Rings. Keira Knightley, effortlessly prettly. She can act, but she still has a lot to learn (hey didn't she get nominated last year?).

The true gem and main foundation of this movie is without a doubt Bill Nighy as Davey Jones. Freakin' Bill Nighy!!! You've seen him as Viktor in the first Underworld, in Love Actually as the aging rocker guy and in The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxyas...well.. someone important. The thing is, behind all that CGI and makeup, Nighy comes accross as bright as the Carribbean sun. There really is no mistaking that it isn't him. His pirate swagger is so effective you really feel the dread once his peg leg starts thumping through the deck. The special effects, by the way are awesome in this movie, and very well executed. Escpecially the ones involving the giant octopus that swallows ships whole.

Entertaining and funny. The key to Pirates success is that it never takes itself too seriously. Its a movie about pirates! And treasure. It's supposed to be fun!

Rocketboy's Rating: **** (4 out of 5 stars)

Superman Vs. Batman Buzz

2006-07-09T01:47:00.000+08:00

A lot of buzz has been generated by the alleged tie up between the two DC Comics franchises Batman and Superman. Superman director Brian Singer seems to have his eye set on the project since Wolfgang Peterson (Troy, Poseidon) dropped the idea a few years ago.

Today, Singer tells MTV that he’s considering the “Batman Vs. Superman” film – but not before The Man of Steel has a couple more singly adventures.

"I've thought about it for a long time — even a longer time ago, actually," the director revealed. "But I don't know who would be the villain. I guess Batman would be the villain, but then he can't be too bad, because he is Batman”.

Once this is confirmed, it will officially become the most anticipated superhero movie-ever. Forget that Superman Returns was less than great. Forget that Batman might become the villain. This will rock!! It also has the potential to become the riskiest superhero movie yet. The amount of baggage this team-up already has, couypled with the scrutinizing eyes of critics and fanboys alike. It will become a tightrope walk from pre-production to premiere.

Too bad the Spiderman/Daredevil tie up never happened. The two being owned by different studios. That would have been cool too.

Props to Moviehole via TheMovieBlog

More Updates before Meals!!

2006-07-07T18:35:00.000+08:00

Daft Punk Making a Movie!

I love Daft Punk. Their music is a smart and unique blend of elecric pop and a wide range of musical styles ranging from 70's disco to Herbie Hancock techno. I was excited to hear that they were going to come up with a movie called Electroma, directed by, themselves! They have previously gone through the movie path with their animated video series Interstella 5555. You might recognize some of these videos in rotation in MTV and Channel V for a while as videos for One More Time, Aerodynamic and Digital Love amongst others. And who can forget Around The World?

Click here for the YouTube trailer

Props to Twitch

Paramount pisses off The Movie Blog

The Movie Blog is probably my favorite blog site around and is my biggest source of movie news. Just yesterday, I found the TMB to be down, replaced by a GoDaddy banner. few hours later I log back in and find TMB founder John Campea, fuming mad with a large ranting post about how Paramount requested to have his site pulled down for exhibiting copyrighted material (i. e. a photo from the set of the Transformers movie). The site is back up and Campea has since replaced the rant with a less scathing summary of his complaint. Apparently paramount called him to settle things. Damage control is more like it.

It just comes to show that you do not mess with the core audience or you will end up cleaning your own mess. That's showing them John!

Click here for the entry.

Silver Surfer will be All CGI

Silver Surfer will make his first ever cinematic appearance in the new upcoming Fantastic Four movie. And he will be completely CGI.

Great deal. I never liked the Vin Diesel idea anyway. They oughta get the rights Joe Satriani's Surfing With The Alien as his theme too.

Props to TheMovieBlog

Triple H Eyed as He Man

Actually he's not a bad choice. We all know he's got the bod. It's not like his acting needs that much of a stretch. As long as it's not Fabio, I'm all good.

Props toTheMovieBlog

The New Transformers Teaser Up

2006-06-30T19:49:00.000+08:00

Not much to see here, but I can definitely see the direction Michael Bay is trying to go with this franchise. This looks to me a darker, more sinister Transformers. You cant really emulate the kitschy elements of the cartoon into the movie and be taken seriously. I kinda like the Mars rover angle. Obviously it was done to ground the concept in to the audience's collective consciousness that we may be invaded by giant robots that transform into trucks, camaros and F 15s.

That's a pretty tough thing to do.

Click here.

Click here for the site and to view the trailer in Quicktime.

And speaking of camaros, here's a pic I snagged from a site. It was pulled out of the site afterwards so it's special. Its a shot of a robot in earth. Shh, let this be our little secret.

Movie Review: "Superman Returns" (2006)

2006-06-30T19:06:00.000+08:00

Where to begin....

Okay. We have all seen it by now and we have our own little comments, favorites and probably even dislikes about what came out. After so many MANY years we finaly see the Man of Steel in the flesh incarnated in a young unknown Brandon Routh with The Usual Suspects and X-Men 1 and 2 director Brian Singer at the helm and Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor. How can this possibly go wrong?

Superman (Brandon Routh) is missing for five years. After having heard that astronomers have found remnants of his home planet Krypton, he embarks on a journey of discovery to learn more about his home, his, parents and perhaps, himself (cheese helmet...on!)

He comes back unannounced, as when he left, he makes his grand entrance by saving an airbus crash reminiscent of the mother of all plane crashes, the 9/11 tragedies. Coincidentally Clark Kent returns to the Daily Planet without much hulabaloo and discovers that his main squeeze Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth), has married and has a kid.

In the meantime, Lex Luthor hatches a plan to create another real estate venture much like the first one in Superman: The Movie. Only this time he utilizes the crystals found in Superman's Fortress of Solitude to create a new continent and bury the rest of North and South America underwater, Metropolis being in point blank range.

Superman's enormous responsibility seems great. Plus he has to deal with the whole Lois thing too. Well, being a superhero sucks sometimes.

The movie is great. But not awesome. I say this both because I expected a little more. More of everything. Dialogue, action. And maybe less of the romance, but more action against villainy. Like chasing cat burglars and boat robbers. I loved the airplane scene. It tops the Golden gate bridge scene in X Men 3, too bad I didn't even get to see it in IMAX. That would have rocked!

Superman is presented like a god in this movie. Routh is so good looking that he comes accross as iconic. What I mean is he is too good looking to be human. Which of course, Superman isn't. Bosworth, IMO, lacked the sass that Margot Kidder had. I have come to the conclusion that Spacey channelled a different Lex from Gene Hackman's. I saw the comic book Lex rather than the Hackman Lex in this one.

We all know by now why there's a kid in this movie. And what bearing he has in the story. Most people who I had sat with in the theaters knew it. Singer knew we would catch on. And it's all good. I'm still figuring out how Singer is going to handle all this in the sequels (we all know that too).

Over all my rating would be great, but not the greatest.

Rocketboy's Review: ****(4 out of 5 stars)

The Millenium Falcon Transforms!

2006-06-23T04:58:00.000+08:00

Once more...the geek in me emerges and rears its ugly but finely combed head.

I was late for work and completely bummed when I came in early this morning. So since our online tools were down I tried to check the updates in some of my reference sites. Sure enough I come across some really bordering the outer realms of ultra-coolness that it made me forget that I was probably gonna get a warning for my schedule adherence.

Just when I thought Hasbro has made its way through my childhood, it comes pulling me back in.

"With lots of electronic lights and sounds, this is a fun toy for everybody. Remember Han Solo boasting to Obi-Wan Kenobi about how great his ship is? This robot actually talks, using Harrison Ford's voice from the trilogy with such classic quotes as "I have a bad feeling about this!" and "She's the fastest ship in the fleet." The toy also features Chewbacca's classic roar, and a number of sound effects from the engines, guns, and computers of the Millennium Falcon."

In the same site, I also get to find a Slave 1 ship that turns into...well..Boba Fett!!

An officemate told me that this was actually availabel HERE already. What? I've been frequenting the toy department almost every time I go to the mall (that statement alone cost me 4 possible future dates), and I have never seen any of these treasures anywhere. Must look harder...must resist temptation. Just one more week till salary day... must.. resist. The force is too strong......

Props to TheMovieBlog.

Comparative Review: "The Lake House" (2006); "Il Mare" (2000)

2006-06-17T11:10:00.000+08:00

I just saw The Lake House yesterday expecting another crappy remake of another fine Asian original. Instead I was quite impressed with what they've done.

I had also only recently seen Il Mare on DVD. I have known about the movie for years because of my obvious infatuation with Sassy Girl Jeon Ji Hyun, but never really got around to seeing it for myself. My growing interest in the American remake prompted me to get the video and actually see it. here's how the story of both movies goes...

A woman (Sandra Bullock, Jeon Ji Hyun) moves out of her rented lake House and leaves a letter for the next tenant to forward all her mail to her new address. An architect (Keanu Reeves, Lee Jung Jae) moves in and replies to the letter and sends it to the woman. Woman wonders why the date of his letter is two years late. Man says "what do you mean?" Woman says, "It's 2006 (1999 in Il Mare)". man says, "No, it's 2004(1997 in Il Mare in case you can't do math)". Man gets curious and looks for woman's address... it's still under construction. they finally realize that they live two years apart through a mailbox that knows no time. And so begins their beautiful yet futile love story.

There are too many details in the movie I want to get into but can't because I have a splitting headache. So we will have to do with just that. Anyway you get the idea.

You cant help but compare the similarities in the movie such as the dog's paw prints in the walkway. The freak winter drizzle warning and the encounter in the train station. But here are a lot of variations between this story that are explored by both movies that were not in each other's script. For example, The Lake House turned Bullock's character into a doctor, which gives her character more relevance to the story, instead of Jeon's cartoon voice talent. There is actual 'tactile' contact between the Americans but the Koreans barely shared a glance in the moments when they were in the same place and the same time period.

Generally, Il Mare is more complicated story-wise. Emphasizing on the plot's complexity which is not very favorable for every viewer. Most times, we are left to figure out most of the story without clues. The ending is akin to your typical Korean tearjerker (although do cannot conclude that it has a sad ending). The rewriters of The Lake House obviously saw to it that the story was more simplified and added a lot of romatic undertones to many of the scenes such as adding jazz music and the Classics in the soundtrack (which is excellent). The ending is a little contrived for maximum kilig factor and is not necessarily logical, given that we are also dealing with the science of the consistency of events in the movie. Yes there is a major plot hole. The story was sacrificed for the sake of a giddy sigh from the girls in the theater.

Il Mare is a bit longer, but hey, all Korean movies are almost 30 minutes longer than hollywood movies. Both may have their faults, but all in all both are very satisfying two hours in the theater.

Rocketboy's Rating: "The Lake House" (***); "Il Mare" (****)

Transformers Set Pics

2006-06-16T04:16:00.000+08:00

Now there's not a lot, but we do see Tyrese and some other guys in it.

click on this thread for more Transformers pics that don't mean anything.

Props to TheMovieBlog

Movie Review: "Cars" (2006)

2006-06-10T07:06:00.000+08:00

Watching cars talk and interact with each other is probably weird but Pixar's new CGI masterpiece Cars just makes it as normal as orange juice in the morning.

The Cars concept came to director John Lasseter naturally because as hs said in an interview, Los Angeles (where the Pixar headquarters are) is a "car loving culture". Since they were exposed to vehicles both good and bad, it felt natural for them to make a movie about cars and car "issues".

Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) is a hotshot rookie out to win the coveted Piston Cup. He and his rivals end up in a 3-way tie in the final lap of the Piston Cup finals which resulted in a raceoff in california to determine the real winner the following week. En route to Cali Lightning's carrier truck dozes off on the road and accidentally drops Lightning off in a sleepy town called Radiator Springs on Route 66 where he causes a major road accident that damages their main road. He is sentenced by town authorities led by Doc Hudson (Paul Newman) to fix the road before going on his way to Cali. Stuck and bored, Lightning befriends the towns repairman Mater (Larry The Cable Guy) and develops feelings for the town lawyer Sally Carrera (Bonnie Hunt).

The thing about Pixar is that, compared to the other production studios out there, they are very story driven company, not 'star' driven (well considering they don't have actors yes, but animators can also be "stars" in their own right). Aside from raising the bar in CGI animation every single year, Pixar produces really good stories too. Cars may be a really simple story to tell. but it works on many different levels. The 'kid' level shows us a young hotshot rookie learning responsibility. The adult level shows us the the weathering effect of 'progress' and how it alienates us from what's important in life.

Not quite as good as The Incredibles, but a worthy addition to the modern classics that are the Pixar movies (I refuse to credit Disney, as that I believe Disney has turned into a money-grubbing corporate slimehole and is no longer the creative company that it used to be. Disney wouldn't even be in business right now if it weren't for Pixar)!

Rocketboy's Rating:****(4 out of 5 Stars)

Transformers The Movie Poster Up

2006-06-09T10:20:00.000+08:00

Their War, Our World.

AICN has just posted the first teaser poster for the new Transformers live action movie. I have to say that I am a little underwhelmed. The eye looks cool. Looks to me like Megatron. Anyway, since it's just a teaser, it isn meant to be revealing.

Can't wait to see how this is gonna come out.

Props to TheMovieBlog and AICN.

Stuff I've Won Over The Months

2006-06-08T06:25:00.000+08:00

Writing reviews is a hobby of mine that I've developed in the past two years. I have always wanted people to know what I thought about movies not only because I am an attention whore, (did I just say 'whore'? tee hee) but because I feel my opinions are valid and that people should listen to what I have to say. (Awkward silence) Ok, ok, I'm sorry. I love making reviews because it gives me the chance to voice out my humble opinions about one of my favorite things in the world...MOVIES. Both good and bad.

Aside from writing reviews in my rocketboychronicles.com, from time to time I join contests in PinoyExchange.com. Sometimes, PinoyExchange holds review contests in their international movies messageboard thread and give out really cool prizes. I have had the opportunity to join a couple. And as luck would have it, I've won some pretty cool stuff.

The first thing I won was a wallet embossed with the logo of the movie Syriana. This was when I joined their Syriana movie review contest back in March. (Click the image for a larger view)

A month after that, I joined their V For Vendetta Contest where they gave out a Guy Fawkes mask replica encased in the same cardboard boxes they used in the movie the masks were delivered in to the homes of the English citizens in the movie.

Luck turns out, and it's sweet.

Happy Blog-sary!!

2006-06-04T08:09:00.000+08:00

To everyone who has been visiting this blog since the beginning... What are you doing with your lives?

To those who just found out about it...Go visit the archives.

To those who don't care...you won't be reading this anyway.

Seriously. Thanks Guys.

Transformers, The Grudge 2 and Bryce Dallas Howard

2006-06-01T04:44:00.000+08:00

Some pics have surfaced claiming to be the first on-set photos of Michael Bay's Transformers movie. A Decepticon cop car? Apparently this was done this week, being the first week of shooting. No word yet if these are legit or which actors were on set. Bay has said that he learned a trade secret, apparently from Speilberg, that he only keeps one copy of the complete script around the set...in his laptop. And that he gives his actors snippets of the script, apt only for the days shoot, for them to read and rehearse. Smart move. Now I can get my hands on that laptop...

I may be a big fan of Japanese cinema, but I'm not exactly ecxcited about their American remakes. I did however, stumble upon a sweet teaser poster of The Grudge 2. Click on the image to scare your kid even more.

I recently changed my header again. Looks like Bryce Dallas Howard is really busy these days. Although The Village was IMO a sub par M. Knight Shyamalan film, she had managed to keep the movie interesting till the end. She has managed to establish herself as an A class actress without resting on the laurels of her very accomplished director father Ron Howard, nor has she been overshadowed by his success.

On a talk show, Ron Howard even related that Bryce wouldnt even tell him when she went to auditions and wouldnt practice lines with him even if he insisted, he being one of the most sought after directors in Hollywood and all. She will be in Lady In The Water this summer and has been cast as Gwen Stacy in Spiderman 3.

News from Everywhere

2006-05-27T07:32:00.000+08:00

New Poster for The Host..plus a peek ast The Monster

The Host has been gaining momentum these past few days. It just got rave reviews in its premiere in Cannes. I personally can't wait til Anwar has it on his stall near the meat section.

Anyways the international poster is out. It doesn't give away the mysterious creature living in the Han river, but I just saw a clip in Twitch...oh my. Sure, some mediocre Hollywood flicks have had more special effects shots than this movie will ever have, but the few moments this creature comes out is a Korean movie milestone.

If you want a peek at the creature, click here.

"I'm A Cyborg, But That's Ok"

Chan Wook Park hasd finally finished his revenge trilogy with Sympathy For Lady Vengeance. He has often stated that he would steer away from violent, revenge driven films in the next few projects, which leads him to involve himself in a most unlikely genre, a romantic comedy.

Of course, since Chan Wook Park is in the helm, this will not be without it's quirks.

The movie is called, ready for this? ,I'm A Cyborg, But That's Ok, it's about a girl who thinks she's a cyborg and there are a few scenes where she's in some sort of padded cell in a mental institution. Yes folks this is a love story.

That's Park for yah!!!

Tom Cruise Will NOT Be Iron Man

How many Tom Cruises do you need to screw a lightbulb?

Ok, that was a lame intro. but at least I bear somewhat good news. John Favreau, who is slated to be the director of the next Marvel franchise moneymaker Iron Man, says that he would be picking a relatively unknown actor to play Tony Stark/Ironman. So unless Tom Cruise is considered as a "relative" unknown, he may have a fighting chance. But the truth is, we have known Tom Cruise for many years now and CAN'T GET AWAY FROM HIM EVEN IF WE TRIED!!!

Ghost Rider Trailer Up.

Nicolas Cage (Boy, am I glad he's not Superman) will be Ghost Rider, and we have the trailer to prove it. I have posted pics a while a go, but the reslease schedule was since then been a little iffy. Now we have a definite date.

Click here for the trailer

Props to Twitch and TheMovieBlog

Movie Review: "The Da Vinci Code" (2006)

2006-05-20T13:30:00.000+08:00

(Note: I wrote this back on Thursday but couldn't go through the office firewall, pardon the delay)

First of all, The Da Vinci Code was the first book that I read where I didn't stop for 12 hours until I finished it. I could easily do it with a 200 page novel, but a book at 500+ pages usually takes me a week to read. The fast pace of the novel just won't let down and you cant lay the book down even if you wanted to, seriously.

My anticipation grew for The Da Vinci Code movie. Some people have waited years for this movie to come out. When Ron Howard's Imagine Entertainment and Tom Hanks were officially attached to the film, a wall of anticipation and criticism came their way right away. Some say Tom Hanks wasn't suited for the role. Some say his brilliant acting would see it through. Some just didn't want the movie done.

Then there's the religious issue...

Although The Da Vinci Code is, after all is said and done, a guaranteed hit. The movie did not come into fruition without difficulty. Protests from the Catholic church, the Opus Dei themselves, and lawsuits from authors claiming copyright infringement hit production left and right. However, this only piqued the movie going public's interest on the movie adaptation of the already well loved novel by Dan Brown.

Locally, there were pathetic last minute attempts by small groups calling the MTRCB to censor the movie completely. Which i think added fuel to the already burgeoning interest in the movie. Personally, Ithink whatever they did to stop it just guaranteed the movie 12 extra persons each theater come opening day.

Anyways, since I pretty much laid out the background, let me get to business at hand...

Robert Langdon (Tom Hanks) is a celebrated symbiologist on a tour to promote his book when police call him in to assist them with the murder of the curator of the famous Louvre museum in Paris. The body was laced with religious symbols written with the victims own blood while positioned in a very peculiar way. Langdon gose further deep into the mystery when he is led by Sophie Neveu (Audrey Tatou) away from the murder site whilst solving a series of cryptic clues left by the dead curator for them to solve.

This series of clues leads them to a series of objects and artifacts that eventually lead them to a secret treasure; a truth suppressed for thousands of years by the Catholic Church regarding the divinity of Christ.

First of all, I dont know what the critic were thinking when I first saw the results of the reviews on this movie. As of this writing, rottentomatoes.com has Da Vinci Code at 19% Rotten.
19 percent??

I dont know what movie they've been watching or what was in the popcorn. The movie rocked!

The Da Vinci Code movie was probably the closest book adaptation I have seen to date. Some changes were made also, which is very understandable since certain elements of the book would indeed drag the movie into a complicated mess of deliberation and intricate discussion.

Ron Howard has extracted an engaging story out of this book and obviously did as much as he can to bring to life the images and events described in the book. Loyalty to the source material was definitely bhis highest priority. From Audrey Tatou's looks as Sophie to Paul Bettany as Silas, one can definitely say that they were definitive images of what we first thought them to look like when we first read the novel.

Most importantly, Howard, master filmmaker in action, didn't lose his style as well. The graphic representations of the code solving mind processes of Langdon are reminiscent to the effects we first saw in A Beautiful Mind where you see the characters light up and stand out in different patterns.

Much of the dialogue is very reference heavy and In my opinion, one who has read the book would be able to breeze through the plot very easily. However, if you haven't read the book, you might have to pay very, very close attention. It also pays to have a little background on the subtopics such as the Opus Dei, The Priory of Sion and the Gnostic gospels.

Well, that's what the Discovery Channel and National Geographic is for, right?

All in all. fans of the Davinci Code book should be satisfied with the outcome. I, personally, am very happy about it.

Rocketboy's Rating: ***** (5 out of 5)

My Favorite Movie Twist Endings

2006-05-12T15:47:00.000+08:00

Its another weekend and here I go again with one of my lists. This is a list I have wanted to do for a long time but just couldn't get together. I'm sure some people will be happy with it. I'm sure some people wont.

I love a movie with a good twist ending. Although it is something that filmmakers should exercise bothe carfully and sparingly. It seems like a lot of todays directors rely so much on the big twist in the end tyhat they neglect the fact thatthey need to have a greatly executed story FIRST in order to catapult the ending right into the viewer's face. Movies with twist endings are also very easily spoilable, meaning that the aesthetic value of the story usually wears off after the first viewing, essentially because the viewer would know what would happen in the end after he watches it again, eliminating the element of surprise. But there are movies with more than just that one time sucker-punch "gotcha" trick up their sleeve, they also have a more introspective, permeating reason for the twist in the story. Here are some of my favorite twist endings so far. Needless to say, they are very SPOILER rich. If there is any movie you haven't seen that's on this list, feel free to skip it.

Then again, If you haven't seen it by now, you deserve to get spoiled!

-----------------

Matchstick Men- Roy and Frank are small time con artists who have enjoyed moderate success, but the big con always seems to elude them. Roy has a little problem, he has OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) and likes everything clean and in order. He seeks the help of a shrink to get him back in working order as that his condition keeps worsening. He later learns through the shrink's background research that he has a daughter named Angela from one of his old flings. This new addition to his life just breaks the entire sequence of events and what's more, the little girl wants in on the business.

Twist: Frank ran away with Roy's share of the partnreship. In on the cut was the shrink who told him about Angela, and Angela, who wasn't really his daughter at all.

I enjoyed this movie because I didnt know anything about the story when I saw it. When the ending came, I was surprised because the story was actually good in itself. Adding that twist just floored me.

The Others-The house that Grace Stewart lives in may be haunted. Her daughter constantly communicates with a child named Victor who they never see. The house windows are blanketed and sealed because apparently, open sunlight is harmful to the children. Grace awaits the arrival of her husband Charles who went to war and longs for her family to be whole again.

Twist: Grace and the children witness an encounter session consisting of what they perceive to be ghosts. It turns out that these are people that are looking to buy the house but are bothered by the presence of ghosts. The ghosts being Grace and her children.

A great atmospheric movie altogether in itself. The Others transcends as more than just a great ghost story but an attention worthy study in film. Nicole Kidman's one hot ghost!!!

The Empire Strikes Back- Luke Skywalker has to begin his Jedi training. He is summoned to a swamp planet where Yoda, the only surviving Jedi Master resides. Darth Vader is fast on the heels of the rebel alliance, seeking vengeance for the destruction of the death star.

Twist: Darth Vader: "Luke, I am your Father."

Luke Skywalker: "Noooooooooooo!!!!!!"

Possibly the best of the entire Star Wars saga (I'm not even including the prequels). It is said that this is the part of the series that dealt with what was real. That life isn't fair and that you don't always win. In a three act play, the second act is always the best part.

The Usual Suspects-A group of usual suspects are hauled into a police station. They're there because whoever did what. ahe must be among them. Keaton is the more seasoned in the group. While awaiting bail, they are enticed by a mysteruious source to plot revenge. This mysterious man in control is a crime lord named Keyser Zose. A man who is said to be pure evil. This entire story is told to the customs chief by witness to the events and conspiracy hench Verbl Kint.

Twist: Proven innocent, Verbl Kint is released. With all the information provided by Verbl, Customs Chief Kujan, having gotten all the testimony he needs from Verbl, beams proud as he stares at the bulletin board. Suddenly he discovers that the board bore many of the names Verbl had been yapping about, he comess to a jaw dropping discovery...Verbl Kint is Keyser Soze.

Although The Usual Suspects is touted as one of the greatest movies of all time, I didn't care for it much at first. having only seen it recently, I have come to appreciate the impact of this movie on critics in general. It does catch you off guard.

A Beautiful Mind-John Nash is a brilliant mathematician with a penchant for cryptography. He is hired by the secret service to solve some of the codes that will let them win the war. He runs into trouble, only its of a different kind and has nothing to do with the war.

Twist: Nash actually has schizophrenia, he sees people who are not there. We are led to believe that he was hired by the government so we can experience what nash is experiencing. He was never hired by the government. He thought he was because he was constantly being visited by a government rep named Parcher. His broken codes were actually pointless congruences to nothing. He then has to figure out what is real at what his not. His wife Alicia, helps him in this life long struggle.

This is a great example of how a twist, although not exactly placed at the end of the film could be material in helping the viewer experience the character's dillemma firsthand. Great storytelling at its finest.

Fight Club-The story begins with a man and his insomnia problem. He starts to look for solutions like attending AA meetings and other far out ways to solve his problem. He soon runs into Marla. A woman who keeps attending the same meetings. The man also runs into Tyler, a soap salesman. Tyler follows his own rules and has a penchant for destruction. Together they form a club, and everybody wants in.

Twist: After Fight Club goes inter-state and turns into a series of terrorist cells accross the country called Project Mayhem, The man finds out through a member that he IS Tyler Durden,this means he has a multiple personality disorder. At this point the only way to get rid of Tyler is to get rid of himself.

Movies have the power to change your view of the world, but not necessarily for the positive. Fight Club tells you that the world is being conquered by the corporate machine with white collar slaves. I blame this movie for most of my verbal warnings in the office.

Oldboy- Oh Dae Su gets stuck in a police station after being a disorderly drunk. Next thing he knows he is imprisoned in a cheap hotel like room for along, long time. 15 Years, actually. After he is mysteriously let loose, he sets out to find the jerk who locked him up. He gets help from a female Sushi chef who took him in and some old friends and soon discovers what vengeance is all about.

Twist: He finds his captor Ji Tae in a penthouse, He is calm and collected and actually expecting Oh Daesu. Daesu asks why.Ji Tae answers, "you simply forgot". Daesu and JiTae were in the same school, where the alumni are called OldBoys. Daesu was an accidental witness to JiTae's incestuous relationship with is sister. Daesu spreads the rumor around campus then leaves for another school not knowing the repercussions. The discovery brought shame to JiTae's sister and prompted her to commit suicide.
JiTae led Dae Su to the female Sushi chef who he fell in love with and made love to the night before the Penthouse attack. The chef WAS Dae Su's own DAUGHTER. The child who after 15 years grew up not knowing his father. This puts Dae Su in a situation others would refer to as a fate worse than death. This entire setup was for Ji Tae's revenge against Dae Su all along.

The only foreign film in the list. This has to be one of the most effective twist endings in recent cinema. At a time when almost everything was already thought of and tried onscreen, in comes Park Chan Wook and his originally fresh perspective on the revenge drama genre and hits us with a hammer.

Unbreakable- David Dunn is a security guard for his home College in Philadelphia. He has never had a sick day in his life. He gets offered a job in new York and takes a train to go there. The train meets a horrible accident that kills all of the passengers except him, he gets off without a scratch. Seeking for meaning in all this he is befriended by a mysterious comic book collector/dealer named Elijah Price. Price shows him that there is a purpose behind all that's been happening to him.

Twist: Dunn realizes he has extraordinary physical strength and endurance and that his purpose is to rescue people who are weak and powerless. Later Elijah reveals to him that it was actually HE who staged the series of accidents to find his counterpart, his archnemesis, Dunn. Dunn is the superhero, Elijah is the super-villain.

My jaws were actually agape once Dunn shook Elijah's hand for the first time in the end of the movie. Its the kind of ending that makes you naiively think, "are there really super heroes around us, we just don't see them?". This movie affected me so much because I love comics, and I love the whole Superman myth. The movie is a more humanized, a more, for the lack of a better term,"realistic" version of Superman.

Se7en- Det. David Mills just moved into a bad crime infested city with an uptight veteran for a partner. One of the cases he and his partner get assigned is of a serial killer who seems to be using the seven deadly sins as his pattern. He chooses his victims carefully and kills them in very morbid and gruesome ways. They have to get him before he finishes his masterpiece.

Twist: John Doe turns himself in. He has two more murders to commit before completing his seven. He leads the two Dets to the desert. A truck delivers a box. Doe tells Mills how envious he is of him because he has such a pretty wife. His partner Somerset opens the box with Mills' wife's head in it. Mills gets pissed and shoots Doe. Doe's previous kills were Gluttony, Sloth, Greed, Pride and Lust. Doe was Envy, Mills was Wrath. The masterpiece is complete.

Se7en is one of those movie that will be remembered for being original and impossibly imitatable. The image of Kevin Spacey as John Doe is forever ingrained in the collective psyche of our culture, along with Hannibal Lecter, as the representative of the ultimately cool wacko.

The Sixth Sense- Cole Sear is a boy with a gift (or a curse) he is able to see spirits from the other side. Psychiatrist Malcolm Crowe tries to get into the boy's mind and attempts to unfold the messages Cole gets from these "spirits".

Twist: After effectively curing Cole of his fear of the spirits visiting him, he finds out the he himself IS one of the ghosts visiting Cole trying to redeem himself from a patient of his he failed to help (This confirms the opening scene where his patient shoots himself in the head after shooting him in the stomach).

Originally, someone told me the ending while the movie was playing , I still wonder, in retrospect, why I didn't punch her in the face after she told me that. I wasn't really into the movies back then. It wan't a big deal to me. Little did I know that it would forever be remembered as one of the best executed twists in Cinema history. The scene still brings me chills to this day.

We got the best. Now the mediocre movies I didn't bother making a list but I sure was in the mood to add something more. I've got some of the worst in my opinion right here.

The Worst Twist Endings

Hide and Seek- Dr. David Callaway tries to cope with the suicide of his wife. His daughter has been experiencing delusions involving an imaginary friend named Charlie. Charlie tries to fix his daughter's problem by convinving her that Charie doesn't exist. Then evidence shows up.

Twist: Dr. Calloway IS Charlie. (WTF???? GASP!!! Surprise, surprise)

Secret Window- Mort Rainey tries to cope with his wife's recent affair with another man by going into the woods and writing a book. In the forest he is visited by a strange individual named John Shooter,who claims that Mort copied his last novel who starts to harrass him and do weird things to the people he associates with.

Twist: Another split personality themed movie hanging on the coattails of Fight Club. I swear, from the moment Jim Shooter came on screen, I knew for some reason he WAS Mort. So did everyone else.

Artificial Intelligence: A I- Monica Swinton is coping (it seems everybody in bad twist movies is 'coping' with something) with her son being in a coma and unable to speak. She and her husband purchase an artificial boy to relieve their sorrows. The boy shows all signs of being a real breathing boy except the fact that it cannot love, or can it?

Twist: Although there is not much of a twist in the end, its more of a "How the heck are we gonna end this movie" ending.

After being stranded underwater and forgotten for 2000 years, he is dug up by aliens and given a second chance at being with his mommy. Nobody indeed expected an ending like that, its almost Monty Python like. After artificial humans comes alien chapters of the Make A Wish Foundation.

The Village- Set sometime in the early 1900s, a small isolated community happilly lives in their little quiet enclosure in the forest, fully aware that beyond the treelines there is a bloodthirsty demon ready to devour them anytime once they cross their line of the fence. They require someone to go out in search of medicine when one of them is hurt. Ivy a blind girl, decides to go out.

Twist: We are led to believe that the movie is a period piece when outside the borders, a jeep turns out to stumble accross Ivy. The town's Patriarch Walker was a psychologist who decided to study the behavior of a society under controlled conditions. Ivy comes back with medicine. Of course he never saw the trooper or the Range Rover and thought she was given a carriage ride.

Feel free to show your love and drop a comment, I can handle it....

Movie Review: "Mission Impossible III" (2006)

2006-05-07T09:31:00.000+08:00

As of events of late, I have not been the biggest Tom Cruise fan. This guy has done everything to basically kill his fame and make himself the butt of many late night monologue punchlines by openly poselyting for Scientology, questioning Psychiatric science, jumping up and own Oprah's couch, getting Katie Homes pregnant and eating her placenta after the baby was born and more recently, drinking olive oil stright out of the bottle. The guy's a tool. But Mission Impossible III is awesome.

This will be a review of the film, not of Tom Cruise, (which I'm basically done with, with the aforementioned rant).

Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) wants to start a new life with his new soon-to-be wife Julia (Michelle Monaghan) when the IMF starts calling him up during the most important time in his life. As that the mission involves the rescue of his captured protege Agent Lindsey Ferris (Keri Russell) from shady arms dealer Owen Davian (Philip Seymour-Hoffman), he is forced to go back into active duty and kick the collective behinds of the bad guys.
Things soon take a turn for the worse when they are messing with the most sought after ghost dealer in the business. Davian proves to be more difficult than most thugs they've dealt with. He manages to get hold of Ethan's most precious Julia and the dynamic suddenly changes. Who was once unattached and effective becomes volatile and impulsive.

I've left out a lot of details in the story so as not to spoil the twists.

JJ Abrams is an awesome action director. His experiance with Alias and Lost sure has paid off in his recent movie ventures like Serenity and MiIII, he has an uncanny talent for suspense. A case in point in the awesome opening sequence where Davian counts to 10 whit a gun pointed at Julia's head facing a tied down Hunt who is at the receiving end of questioning whether or not, he knows where the eponymous "Rabbit's Foot" is. This is also where Hoffman shines as the ruthless, determined Davian. Another scene would involve the chase between 2 helicopters in a field of power generating windmills in Germany. This has got to be one of the best action sequences of the year. The massive propellers of the winmills swishing against those of the copters plus guided missiles and detonating crainial implants is just movie magic.

Tom Cruise may be a tool, but he can sure carry a movie. His charisma is very material to the success of the character Ethan Hunt. His supporting team, led by the ever cool Vhing Rhames had some really funny lines to deliver. Some really rare gems are lines very liberally distributed among the cast like the jaw droppingly gorgeous Maggie Q and Laurence Fishburne ("I will bleed on the Flag to make sure the stripes stay red", classic). Back to Maggie Q, I have never seen Naked Weapon, but I have seen the beautiful screen shots of her. I Had doubts about her acting, but she did rather well given the role. Mere shots of her face and slender figure keep the guys glued to the screen until the next explosion.

I was surprised by the lack of Kerri Russel scenes, although you pretty much know why by this time. I would have loved to see her with more action sequences.

The movie is sure to make No. 1 easy next week. But I think it could have n=made more money or could make more money if Tommy Boy would just shut the @#$% up!

Rocketboy's Rating *****(5 out of 5)

Steve Carell in "Evan Almighty"

2006-05-06T06:10:00.000+08:00

I never really took this news seriously when it first came out. A Bruce Almighty sequel is apparently in the works, this time without Jim Carrrey, but is led by dead-on funny superstar comedian Steve Carrell, who if you remember was Evan Baxter (Baxtabber..) in Bruce.. He was remotely controlled by Jim Carrey's Bruce while doing a news broadcast, making him fart and say funny stuff like, "I do the cha-cha like a little girl" (snicker, cant get enough of that scene).

This time the news anchor has moved on to become a politician in Washington when God calls on him to build an ark. He resists, but God makes his hair grow long until he gives in. Obviously God has lost some of his skillz since the old days, since I know he used to have much greater convincing powers beyond hirsuteness.

This looks to have the potential to be even better that Bruce, IMO. What do you think?

Props to TheMovieBlog

Complete "Superman Returns" Trailer Now Online

2006-05-04T07:27:00.000+08:00

As promised here's the complete trailer of Superman Returns.

Enjoy!

Some Superman Footage To Knock Your Socks Off.

2006-05-03T07:35:00.000+08:00

This is a Superman Returns clip taken out of what looks to be a preview screener for a commercial in Australia. I'm pretty sure the full version will be leaked into the web in a few days. When It does you know where to check.

It just keeps getting better and better. I am ever so pumped!

Movie Review: "Little Manhattan" (2005)

2006-04-30T07:21:00.000+08:00

New York stories are a class all their own. It's amazing how just one city can generate tons of inspiration for musicians, novelists,playwrights, movie makers and even video game creators. Each New Yorker has his own story to tell...this is Gabe's story.

Gabe (Josh Hutcherson) is 10 and 3/4 years old and is a native New Yorker living within his 9 block radius of Manhattan which his mother designated for him to stay within. He's got tons of friends, a bright base-kicking future ahead of him, and like other 10 year olds, he hates girls.

Things take an interesting turn when he decides to tka karate to strengthen his legsfor his base kicking skills. He meets Rosemary (Charlie Ray), a kindergarten buddy who's now 11. Gabe starts getting funny little flutters in his stomach whenever he sees her and starts hanging out with her more often than his guy friends.

Of course, love isn't all peaches and cream. They get into tangles and the awkward situations and of course, there's the mysterious issue of the first kiss. Why are girls so hard to understand? Love Sucks!

Little Manhattan is probably one of the most effective love stories I have seen in a long time. I say this with a straight face bacause I, just as you do, dear reader, know how it feels to be in love for the first time and that it never EVER comes back the same. Call me mushy, but I felt for these kids more that I did with any Meg Ryan/Tom Hanks or Keanu Reeves/any other hot chick in Hollywood romantic comedy.

The two young leads have more chemistry than most hollywood pair ups. Josh Hutcherson is so relatable that you laugh with him and almost shed a tear for his romantic misfortunes and triumphs.

Basic is one word that describes the story best. Basic love questions, basic storytelling and a basic view of New York. I have learned a lot about New York in the little montages in the movie more than other movies intend to do.

>Great consideration was given to the fact that this may turn out into a corny lovefest. The movie was set in a realistic environment where parents are divorced. Aunts are knocked up before they're married and love doesn't last. However, doesn't love last? Does love really die after you stay with a person for a while? New Yorkers a a cynical bunch of pricks so it wouldn't be right to have them just swept away in romance.

All in all. A great movie. A gem among the hundreds of tepid love stories floating around.

Rocketboy's Rating: *****(5 out of 5)