It’s probably not the best of times to be celebrating a new year, because it means that you’ve got another year of headaches, deadlines and tight pants to wear to work.
Gee I need to shop for new clothes, but in any case..
Yep, have a blastful new year people!
Exactly 12 months ago, I fell in love, not just any kind of love but one that was deep, emotional and sort of entrenched kind of love.
It was our first date at the cinema, and I remember clearly that it was a cool Sunday morning at Lot 1, where I nervously donned the black rimmed, polarised glasses and took my seat, preparing for the inevitable connection.
I’ve heard what people have said and how they’ve reacted, but I had to be sure and witness it for myself.
Moments before it was revealed, everyone grew silent and as their attention glued, the lights dimmed and every sensuous perception of the body heightened.
A faint half-scream-half-warcry cracks the moment before a hectic beating of drums (or was it my own heartbeat?) and I was teleported into a lustful world, unlike any other that I’ve ever experienced.
That’s right folks, I fell, deeply, in love that day — It was my first date with Avatar, the movie.
Pathetic eh? I know. Read on. :p
So it spawned this ‘probably the longest Avatar movie review of all time‘ post and also kickstarted my evidently geeky and inexplicable passion for this virtual Pandoran world, where mountains of rocks float and gigantic trees have voices.
So how could I not relive that intimacy without another viewing of the movie, in HD no less and in it’s anniversary right?
If at this point of time, you’re thinking “Gee, this geek sure has some love issues — and with a movie?? Like Wtf???” — but that’s probably normal of you, because I guess I’m just abnormal enough to admit that I do oblige in indulging into a fantasy world sometimes, and where even close pals and normal people find that amusing (or maybe just plain silly and childish), well I sure don’t mind being silly and childish.
Relived those 3 hours of awe I did, but this time around, the awesomeness level wasn’t as skyrocketing as they used to, but that’s not surprising considering the insane amount of times that I’ve viewed it right?
Insane indeed, but to me, it’s all about injecting a little bit of fun and joy into an otherwise mundanely routined world of sleep, eat, work, eat, live, where a shortened acronym of those words would be S.E.W.E.L, and I’d implore you to ask your Malay friends what S.E.W.E.L is (Try saying that acronym as if it’s one full word..).
Nevertheless I’m nowhere near any thoughts of what a boring and unexcitable movie it has become, like how some movies are when you try to view them for the 28th time, but I doubt that there’s much movie that’ll even get viewed half that many times within your lifetime.
I still love the whole effing movie, and I’m still helpless and fruitless when it comes to finding faults with it.
As much as I try to dissect and infiltrate every plotline and turn over every bioluminescent leaves, I simply just can’t find any, but I guess love is indeed blind?
Love is blind, but love is like oxygen, a many spledored thing that lifts us up where we belong, and all that we need is love! (In case you didn’t notice, I just altered a line/quote off Moulin Rouge~ See what I did there?)
In case anyone asked, where though I know you didn’t ask, thusly I mentioned ‘in case’, I was tired, and exhausted, and weary, and felt a little overwhelmed, and somehow I was in need of a good pick-me-up tonight.
So I turned to Avatar, my long lost love, and I wasn’t disappointed.
Love do last forever and indeed it’s not that hard to go back to something that you once love and lost before.
Ahh.. the powers of the bond, or should I say Tsa’Haylu?
Peaks towards the beginning and somehow levels out towards the end.
I will repeat this later on when I say that it wasn’t awesomely inspiring and nor was it tremendously mind-blowing or grippingly enchanting.
No, not Harry Potter & The Insipidly Photos, but rather Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows.
Neither was it a delectable sensory treat, one which would make you savour its beauty again and again, unlike its much heralded predecessors whereby there seems to be danger lurking behind each corner and a twist waiting to be unravelled for a startling revelation.
Instead what you’ll get is an introduction to Voldemort’s reign of power for the next installment, and which is also the final release in the series, of Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows.
Yes, if you were aware of my box office misadventure yesterday, where I met up with a movie theatre that was under renovation at Shaw Lido, today I made good after calling up Shaw’s customer service and requested if they would ever be so kind to let me switch yesterday’s tickets for today’s showing.
Yep, same time, same place but a different day, and thanks to a lady named Penny, who works with Shaw, I managed to catch the final blockbuster of my 2010 at NEX, the spankling uber new mall, supposedly the biggest mall in the North Eastern part of Singapore.
It’s huge and magnificient indeed, saturated with excitement and bubbling with enthusiasm, and in case you’re wondering, yes I’m still describing the mall and not the movie.
Ok back to the movie.
Perhaps my anxious expectations wasn’t fully met cos the pacing of the movie seemed lethargic, while the action scenes felt contrived and forcefully slotted into the plot in a vain attempt to prevent us viewers from falling under the sleeping curse.
I find that the opening 10 minutes of a movie is almost always the most important moments of any movie, as it sows the vital seeds of any plot, at the same time setting the premise and purpose of the movie itself, and as much as I understand and finds it heartful that our three lovelies (Harry, Ron and Hermione) are made to suffer an altruistic ‘sacrifice’, I don’t think newcomers to the series would understand much, but it’s a scene that I won’t go any deeper than I already have.
It’s just not that engaging enough, i thought to myself as the next integral scene brings us right into some early broomchase action sequences, which ended with one of Ron’s twin brother with a.. wait a minute, I’m not gonna spoil it for ya! Pfft!
So whatever it was, I’d have to say that the opening 10 minutes weren’t as ‘complete’ as it should be and somehow this ‘incompleteness’ seems to be carried forward throughout the movie.
Oh, don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad movie, per se, because it’ll entertain you still, but you somehow get the feeling that this edition is lacking something, like as if you’re watching Muhammad Ali float mesmerisingly in a boxing ring and that infamous ‘sting like a bee’ is nowhere to be seen.
Where we’ve previously been treated with the fight on giant chessboard against giant snakes, battles of life and death against life-sucking dementors, a race against death in a corrupted competition, as well as that memorable battle against Voldermort at the Ministry of Magic, now we’re being discounted with a quick deli-food dight, a skirmish against a polyjuiced (?) python, a footrace against some Snatchers and an escape from captivity by a freelance house-elf that happened to be around, just because.
So it’s kind of a different angle that’s being played by David Yates (Director for the 3rd time), where the focus this time around is on the drama and saga surrounding our three lovelies (H, R & H), and their intricacies and intimacies, but I just wished that there was more screen time for development elsewhere.
Granted, I’ve yet to read the book till this episode, so I might not know that much about the whole storyline.
As I yearn to find out so much more and this without reading tons of pages, I guess I’ll have to somehow try to build up another batch of anxiety and enthusiasm for the final chapter of the series, part 2 f Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows, when it comes around.
So did I like the movie?
Of course, and I enjoyed it as well, but without a climax, nor anything that resembles a tenseful build up towards a climax, it does feel incomplete.
And as promised earlier I repeat again, that it wasn’t awesomely inspiring and nor was it tremendously mind-blowing or grippingly enchanting, but I guess it’s a good enough introduction.
And here’s to hoping that Hermione is as sexyummilicious as ever I get my ticketing thingy right and proper, the next time round
3 more days till 1st Jan, but HAPPY NEW YEAR PEOPLE!
..I had realised, before heading to Shaw Lido at Orchard, that my movie ticket was actually meant for Shaw Theatres at the newly opened NEX shopping center at Serangoon!!
Because Shaw Lido has been under renovation since 1st October, and unfortunately I only knew it 5mins before I was about to pick up my tickets!!!
I felt anger, despondency and uncontrolled bewilderment, but mostly it was all silliness, as I stared at the usual escalator, which led to the box office, that was perplexedly not working and cordoned off.
Here I was all ecstatic that I wasn’t about to miss Harry Potter #6 and probably catch the final blockbuster of the year, and it turns out that my failure to read the online order receipt properly led to this near-repeat of a previous box office boo-boo while trying to watch Kick-Ass.
And you’d thought that one would learn from that mistake uh?~
So this was a review, that wasn’t to be and since I’m not particularly fond of wasting any bits and bytes of the interwebs, I thought I’d scour the web for something that’s a little close to the movie and to my heart as well.
Pictures such as:
I love reading, but not when a sinister black cat head is staring back at me!
I bet you never knew that cats enjoy reading as much as humans do right?
Except they read humans instead.
Looks a little like Barney to me..
I wonder if he had anything to say to this next feline..
Like wtf right?
KTHNXBAI
Tra lalalalala.. lala.. la.. laaaaaa~
Oh common, smile won’t ya?
He’s a bandit, he’s a rogue thief and he’s self-absorbed.
He’s not royalty, he’s not an upstanding citizen of the kingdom, but he does have goodness in him — who is he?
Flynn Rider, of course, of Disney’s 50th animated feature film, Tangled, or some might affectionately refer to it as Rapunzel.
With an estimated cool budget of US$260Million, it also happens to be Disney’s most expensive animated film ever — and, after spending one of the best two hours of my life in recent weeks in a packed theatre full of animation nerds, I’m glad they spent it building a world that’s gorgeous, smooth and lush.
She tames the beast.
It is a technical achievement in 3D animation that’s worth watching over and over and over again, as hair, cloth and rushing water flows like the way they should, while the textures, models and characters are brilliantly executed.
Rapunzel, I mean, Tangled is an animation masterpiece to behold where the only gripe that I have from watching it, earlier today, is that it wasn’t in Real 3D.
Oh how a magnum opus this movie, supposedly Disney’s final ever movie revolving around a Princess, would have truly been, especially during the wondrous-emotional-home-coming-lantern-boat scene, had I been invited to watch it in 3D by Irfan.
Still 2D never disappointed as the colours are brighter and richer than their 3D counterpart, so I’m not really complaining.
But what’s to complain when the story rarely lags from it’s teasing opening sequences, melodramatic plot-starters and incessant comedic moments?
Pascal deep in thoughts.
From Pascal, a chamelon that acts as Rapunzel’s advisor, to Maximus, a horse that’s bent on arresting Flynn and yet with a heart to help him in the end (thanks to Rapunzel’s eggings), the movie is a loaded barrel of laughter that’s long been missing from Disney films of late — no, make that of recent animated movies in your memory.
Megamind, Despicable Me, Toy Story 3 — sure they were funny, but Tangle’s hilarity is in a league of it’s own, and experiencing it can be likened to watching Dory and Nemo’s Father for the first time. (Note: I’d have said Marlin instead of Nemo’s Father, but I doubt that many will remember Marlin huh?~)
Tangled is solidly paced, enchantingly animated and endearingly engaging, and there’s really not a moment that passes by without you getting a pleasant surprise and longing for more of the comical tension and burly exchanges of Maximus, a horse that doesn’t talk but wears the heart of a proud dog, and Flynn.
What smells?
Also, it’s hard not to fall for the two leads — Rapunzel, voiced by Mandy Moore, and Flynn, voiced by Zachary Levi — even when the hero is as rogue as he can be or when the heroine is as stubborn as she can be, because you can’t help but root for Rapunzel as she falls back into her ‘fake’ mother’s lap time and time again, as she (fake mother) conceives and deceives her.
Wait — I hear some of you say what’s a guy watching a show about a kidnapped Princess who lives in a hidden tower?
Actually, it’s quite manly and rugged, and that’s why the movie was aptly titled ‘Tangled’ and strewn with plenty of action sequences and macholy chaotic musical scenes.
Make no mistake, this is not your typical princess story (which I happen to read a lot of when I was still a child~ but of course I’m not going to tell you I’m still reading them now, am I? Na-uh~) with a happy ending, but rather this is a story of a little girl’s growing up adventure which is quite manly and rugged, mind you.
What happens if I get my dream?
It doesn’t take much to appreciate the soft touch given to the movie’s plotlines and subtle messages, where as always Disney excels with that subliminal nuances of morality and the wisdom of growing up.
I oh-so loved the lantern-boat scene, if only it’s because Rapunzel realises that this is it, the moment that her dream might come true, where she finally gets to see with her very own eyes the stars that float on the eve of her birthday, and then when she asks what might happen when this dream of hers is realised, Flynn tells her aptly “And then you look for another dream.”
Oel 'Ngati Kameie -- I see you.
Awwwww… Just what would we be without dreams?
A rock.
Or something that’s lifeless and pointless I guess, but if you still hadn’t figure out your own dreams, then join Rapunzel and Flynn in theirs, and I’ll bet that if you ’empty your cup’ off Princess movies before watching this, then you’d be greatly impressed by the impeccable, tight, juggernaut of a Disney movie.
I know I was.
My friends were too, heck even the whole theatre was too — judging by the raucous applause (twice it went off) as the movie ended.
You know what?
I’m pretty sure that the last time I felt this great about a movie was when I watched a certain Blue Cat-like Alien movie, which was a year ago and I guess it’s been long time coming!
Well, if you think that this is going to be another cheesy Disney Princess movie, it’s not — there’s too much goodness in this for it to sour at all.
See what I did there? Plus I guess this much critics can’t be mistaken uh?
Even Avatar lost in ratings!
I was surfing.. and surfing.. and surfing.. and my tummy groaned.
Have you heard of sprees and how some people got spree-scammed (in a way, unfortunately)?
Well how about a website where you can get the best deals everytime, and not worry about being scammed?
Best of all, it’ll stop any tummy from groaning and moaning.
Tada: Hungrydeals.sg~!
In the websnapshot above, you can see that not only is it limited to the first 20 customers, but that there is also a window of opportunity to get the coupons before it goes away.
Act fast and let the tummy decide, but afraid that it might be another tantalising scam huh?
Don’t worry, and don’t let that huge ‘Buy’ button fool you into thinking that you’re going to spend S$15 immediately when you hit it, because you’re not.
What happens when you choose to buy, you’re actually ‘booking’ yourself to one voucher/coupon/groupon/whatever and only when the required number of people signs up, and only then does the deal triggers and $$$ is deducted from you treasure chest.
You’ll be sent an email on the success of the deal and both you and your tummy will be a happy couple, forever after.
However when there isn’t enough hungry tummy that signs up, the deal is scrapped and nothing happens.
That’s right, no bills will be sent your way, just a bento box of dissapointment indeed.
Go ahead.
Be a man (or woman)
Do the right thing.
Take it. And go. = )
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