I Recommend The Departed

Wow it's been awhile. Sandy had a busy busy week and so this weekend was just relaxation. On Sunday after church we ended up playing some badmintons. Sandy complained of soreness afterward but I have to say she is improving, even if she was playing a bit tipsy that day.

After that we decided to relax and catch a movie, something we haven't done for awhile. The movie we saw was Scorsese's The Departed and well to sum it up, it was "really worth the $5.50".

As usual Scorsese's direction was awesome but I think Leo DiCaprio totally nailed it. The original is an HK movie called Infernal Affair starring Tony Leung and Andy Lau. I won't spoil the plot for you but I'm definitely recommending it. Makes me want to visit Boston just to see if people from that city really have those accents.

Lastly, don't eat at that sushi place next to AMC Mercado. They were some of the most tasteless, horrible sushis I have ever had.

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Thought Provoking Al Gore Doc For $1

I thought I'd pop in to jot down a quick "I'm still here" entry as well as to say that Sands and I saw "An Inconvenient Truth" last night. In the tradition of docs like "Super Size Me", "Fahrenheit 9/11", and "When We Were Kings" this one posited some very interesting questions, but remains both entertaining and intellectually stimulating.

Here are some notes from what I learned:

- The previous decade from 1998 - 2005 recorded some of the hottest days on Earth. (Al Gore couldn't have hired a better PR to spin this movie as we in Cali just had some crazy heat wave couples of weeks ago.)
- For 650,000 years carbon dioxide (CO₂) level has been pretty consistent. Starting in the year 2000 it jumped A LOT!
- the US produced the highest gas guzzlers while the Japanese produced some of the lowest. Even China is outpacing the US in terms of emission standards and miles per gallons set for their cars.
- Gore's black-and-white point of view is just that. Of course there are lots of gray areas about global warming (as the corporations would like to add) but his main point is still: we have a moral responsibility, no make that obligation, to curb global warming so that our children will be able to survive on this "pale blue dot".

Do yourself a favor. Go see it. It's only $1!!! At the very least it will leave you with a better understanding of the consequences of global warming as well as the diminished quality of life for future generations (our children) should this pattern continue.

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An Italian Weekend, Good Times

For some odd reason Ian (that's SIR to you) McKellen is in all summer movies these days.

Last Friday I went to watch the The Da Vinci Code with Sandy and some friends. Did anyone notice all the super villains making their appearances in this movie? There was Magneto, Doctor Octopus, and The Cleaner. And had they hired Liam Neeson as Robert Langdon we would have Ducard of the League of Shadow.

Some people are still trying to process the movie. I recommend reading the book.

Happy Birthday Euge (PongOR). Thanks for a nice and relaxing BBQ last Saturday. It's always nice to see such a close knit group of friend (the TASers) having fun. And I am glad I was able to become an "honorary" TAS member. Good times, good times.

I uploaded Eugene's Birthday BBQ to flickr so enjoy them.

On Sunday I'm reminded why men don't go to the opera. It's long, and slow, and NOT in English. Maybe because Madame Opera is a tragedy, but I would have preferred a comedy, like The Marriage of Figaro. I don't know, opera just feels like a very expensive anime. Thanks to Markus for organizing and Jen as the guest of honor.

I uploaded the opera pics here: Jen's Madame Butterfly Opera Party.

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Superman Returns

It's going to be a nice summer. Last year it was 06.15 with Batman Begins. This year 06.30 for Superman Returns.

It's now my absolute favorite trailer at Apple's trailer site. Two of them in fact. I remembered watching the teaser in the theater, and that classic soundtrack (by John Ottman to sound like John Williams) with the montage of the Kent farm, I got goosebumps. And by golly did they find some kid who looks just like Chris Reeves.

Does this sound like anything you have heard before?

— "Even though you've been raised as a human being you're not one of them."
— "They can be a great people if they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all their capacity for good, I have sent them you... my only son."

Ah, I'm looking forward to being that teenage kid again (at Comics & Comix in Sunnyvale, I was 15, I think). Sigh.

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78th Oscar Results

Did you guys watch the academy awards tonight? I was rooting for Ang Lee and he finally won. My fav Ang Lee films: The Ice Storm, Sense and Sensibility, Eat Drink Man Woman. He should have won for Hidden Dragon Crouching Tiger but got snuffed by LOTR.

In honor of The Farm's tradition here are the 78th Oscar results from Yahoo.

Best Picture

Best Director

Best Original Screenplay

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Gift Parties and Weekend Plans

Last night Sandy stole back a white elephant gift that is something I have been thinking of getting...a Sony headphone for my old-school G4 iPod™. When you go to these white elephant gift exchanges I learned that it is of advantage when you partner up with someone, say your significant other, i.e. your girlfriend. I'll call this the 'couple's advantage' rule. (NOTE: we didn't come up with this scheme as someone at the party suggested it.)

In return I stole from her what she wanted a: photo wheelset. Hopefully she will use that for our photos. Hint hint.

Two gift exchanges/white elephant parties down, two more to go. Tonight I will not have the couple's advantage...but it's not required as it is a Secret Santa gift exchange, then on to the family during Christmas Eve. Sandy and myself will be lost among the throngs of shoppers looking for gifts for my nieces and nephews and the siblings at the mall tomorrow. To those last minute shoppers good luck and God be with you. haha.

Narnia vs. King Kong

I willl be seeing Narnia this weekend with Sandy although King Kong looks pretty good, too. In the end good old-fashioned C.S. Lewis storytelling along with what I heard are lots of Christian themed ideas won us over. That plus the enthusiastic endorsement by Helen (wife of our church's senior pastor). BTW did anyone see the BBC version with the human scaled Beaver family. They looked pretty goofy. I hope the special FX will be much better in the film.

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The Dude

Steve Buscemi is awesome. He's ugly cosmetically challenged which gives all of us hope we can one day be actors...including me. But of course he can act and I can't. So nevermind.

Last night I watched on Comedy Central one of my favorite Coen Bros. film — Big Lebowski. Walter, the Dude, Jesus (pronounced Hayseus),...and of course Steve Buscemi's character Donny where he's the typical third wheel relegated to jumping into mid conversations. Hilarious!

Fargo by far is my favorite Steve Buscemi film. (also from the Coen Bros.)

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Quatre Fantastique

Saw Fantastic Four Sat night and some comments:

Since MIT is a private school, does that mean whenever MIT is mentioned in the script that they will get a royalty? (If I was the dean at CalTech, I would revitalize the CalTech brand to compete with MIT and push for screenwriters to use CalTech as the top engineering school.)

Jessica Alba's Sue Storm is younger looking than Chris Evan's Johnny Storm. Also why can't they find someone at least resembling each other to play siblings.

Jessica Alba went to MIT and became the top researcher for Victor Von Doom. Believable? LET'S not!

Stan Lee must be loving it, appearing as a mailman in one scene. Does anyone know if every Marvel films so far has Stan Lee as a cameo? Now that's paying respect to the Godfather of comic books.

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Stern Grove

Spent most of Sunday in the City &mdash Stern Grove — better than expected. We (Andrea, Louise, Sharline, me) arrived to an overcast-foggy outer Sunset, somewhere between Sloat and 19th Ave.

Sandwiches on a slope hill listening to Dvorak's Symphony No. 9 From The New World. Thanks Andrea! I swore it sounded like Star War's Phantom Menace Duel of The Fates. It was fun being outdoor and listening to classical. Reminded of Disney's Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 and his idea also of a concert film shown in the outdoor.

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War of The World

The movie business is abysmal right now. Sales have been down. According to an article in The Wall Street Journal "weekend box-office receipts have been down for 18 straight weekends, the longest stretch recorded in at least two decades". Also according to WSJ movie chains are at the mercy of Hollywood, which is a content-driven industry. In other words we all knew the principles we learned in grade school—I'll call it "show-n-tell", for lack of a better word—that is "content is king."

If content is king, and by content we're talking about original, entertaining, and _______ storyline, then Hollywood has lost this focus. Instead of gambling and taking chances with great stories (see Batman Begins, and the stalled Darren Aronofsky's "Batman: Year One" project) studios have resorted to formulaic and dull reworking of old materials. Let me prove this point with the Gross Box Office for the weekend of 6/24-6/26

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GrX Missions Worship Night

Awhile back I had a discussion with my brother about Hotel Rwanda. He mentioned what a privilege we have living in the US. He qualified this statement by saying how his friends were shocked that he doesn't lock his door sometimes when he's running his errands. Contrasted that with the poverty and tension in some of these third world countries and my brother and I are both glad for our middle class existence here.

We complained about our state of affairs here, yet there are people who live in shanties and walk up and down dirt roads. These are the conditions that some of the people at GrX will have to deal with as they're heading to various places to serve God on their short term missions. Some of the missions are in Mongolia, China, Thailand, and Mexico. I know some of the missionaries that are going, too.

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Thoughts on Sith

** NOTE: SPOILERS AHEAD. PLEASE DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THIS FILM.

Ah...yes the many discontinuity problems that arises when you analyze this film. I saw it Sat. morning with some friends who works at Adobe and got a private screening. The opening scene was amazing, visually stunning but leaves you feeling cold and empty--all eye candy. Personally I find it overwhelming.

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Sith happens

I woke up at 7am this morning and met up with some friends from Adobe who had special screening tickets to Revenge of the Sith. We (3 of us) made our way to a local coffee shop Java N Juice, grabbed some expresso and headed over to meet the rest of my friends (7 or them).

We got there (Westfield Oakridge Mall) an hour in advance for the 10am screening and got pretty good seats, right in the middle. The people there were all Adobe employees and friends of Adobe, which ranged from kids to older viewers. Then the lights dimmed and the opening credit scrolls up "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away..."

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The Lucas Effect

I was just thinking about George Lucas and browsed over to the USC page to check out if they made a big deal of him being an alumni of USC Film School.

When we were at 'SC, George donated a huge amount of money and so they named our editing building after him and his then wife Marcia (Marcia and George Lucas Editing Building). The editing building was in the main Production quad and consisted of rooms with old splicing tables for film and Media 100 editing consoles.

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100 Best Films

#1 Citizen Kane (1941, Orson Welles)
#2 The Rules of the Game (1939, Jean Renoir)
#3 Vertigo (1958, Alfred Hitchcock)
#4 The Searchers (1956, John Ford)
#5 The Man With a Movie Camera (1929, Dziga Vertov)
#6 Sunrise (1927, F.W. Murnau)
#7 L'Atalante (1934, Jean Vigo)
#8 The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928, Carl Theodor Dreyer)
#9 Au Hasard Balthazar (1966, Robert Bresson)
#10 Rashomon (1950, Akira Kurosawa)

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That special time of year...

I'm testing a blogging entry on my website using Movabletype. Let's see if this works.

Have you seen Tank Girl. It's weird but at the same time very creative. It's based off a comic book, although I have never read the comic book. The film is a mixture of Sci-Fi, musical, and action. The dialong can be cheesy at times but it's fun overall.

Do you prefer to host your own blog site or to have a 360.yahoo.com blogging site? I don't mind which way as long as I can find a way to have fun sharing my thoughts.

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