Bolt 3D (2008)

• My 3rd full featured 3D film, and oh boy are they getting better and better! This is a story about a superhero dog (Bolt), who has spent the better part of his life protecting his owner Penny from the evil clutches of The Green-Eyed Man. Unfortunately, his superpowers, and all that he knows about the world is nothing but an elaborate setup from the movie studios to to trick the dog into believing everything is real (think Truman Show). Bolt gets a rude awakening one day when he finds himself all alone across the other side of America and he struggles to get himself back to Penny’s side.. while making some odd friends in the process, a depressive cat (Mittens), and a hamster who happens to be a die hard fan of Bolt’s movies (Rhino).
• This is a heartwarming family movie, regardless whether you are an adult or a kid. The Pixar team contributed to the story arc and characters, and the quality shows. Bolt’s tenaciousness, fierce loyalty and love for Penny knows no bounds and is touching to watch, and he’s super adorable as well! The characters are all unique and memorable in their own ways especially the pigeons! Jeepers, I had to suppress my chuckles every time the pigeons started talking. Mitten’s carefree despondence and perpetually lazy look couldn’t resemble real life cats any better, while the overly optimistic Rhino was an inspiration despite his craziness and “ridonculousness”.
• Pending the release of the next Pixar movie, you can’t go wrong with Bolt. But PLEASE DO try to catch this in 3D.. it’s a much more overwhelming experience.

Ip Man (2008)

• True blue kungfu films are a rarity nowadays, especially since the great martial arts actors of our decade have all declared retirement (Jackie & Jet). The one other guy I’ve been eyeing and waiting to rise up to the limelight, is no other than Donnie Yen. I have nothing but total respect for this dude after his mind blowing mixed martial arts performance in Flash Point – the most realistically brutal in any movie I’ve seen. If you have not yet seen Flash Point, you can find his scenes all over YouTube. Go catch them before watching this. And then you can imagine why I’m so excited about Donnie Yen stepping up to take his share of the wushu pie in Ip Man.
• Little is known about the real Ip Man character, save that he opened a ‘Wing Chun’ branch of martial arts school in China after WW2. He is also famously known as the grandmaster who taught Bruce Lee most of his fighting skills. Much of the movie is about Ip Man’s humble life (with generous over dramatization), how he learned martial arts as a hobby, balancing his time as a family man, while fighting only when necessary to defend the honor of his township. Movie takes on a more serious note halfway through with the invasion of the Japanese army, as he is forced to pit his skills against the Japanese.
• This film was PACKED with awesome fights. If like me, you came for that, you won’t leave disappointed. The Wing Chun style of fighting isn’t particularly flashy or fast moving, but that doesn’t detract from the awesomeness of well choreographed scenes. Suspension of disbelief was easy, and the opponents weren’t as campy as some in Fearless. As with most Asian films, melodrama was injected into it but nothing too tragic (overacted maybe). No matter how God-like Donnie Yen fights, I have to say that he still isn’t that great an actor. But screw that – Jet Li couldn’t act for nuts either. Sammo Hung’s choreography was top notch, and you’ll find yourself holding your breath whenever the fighting starts.
• The only complaint I have is that watching this in Singapore means that I have to endure a Mandarin dub of the original Cantonese version. Despite it being a Monday evening, the hall I was in was PACKED FULL. The audience was immensely supportive of the movie, laughing at scenes that I didn’t even find funny, and applauding whenever Ip Man wins a fight. Some even gave standing ovations at the end (I didn’t think it was THAT good). But hell, I WOULD watch this again without a moment’s hesitation, AND download it just to fast forward to the fight scenes. And best of all, there is going to be an Ip Man sequel, which includes Bruce Lee…
• Update: I did go and watch this again a 2nd time, and it was still good..

P.S. I Love You (2007)

• Based on the novel of the same name by Cecilia Ahern which I actually read back in January. Holly’s (Hilary Swank) wife Gerry (Gerard Butler) passes away from a brain tumor, but before he dies, arranges for a series of letters to be sent to her after his passing in order to help her recover and move on with life.
• Touching in some scenes, and mostly hilarious in others. P.S. I Love You is a pretty straight to the point chiq drama. It’s only average at most in regards to originality, screenplay, and directing. Although the film was still quite enjoyable for me, this movie isn’t going to get on any critics good side. RottenTomatoes gave this a measly 21% overall rating.
• Hilary Swank still gets my admiration for her acting prowess despite her being in such a lightweight happy movie (compared to most of her other movies which tend to skew towards a darker side). Gerard Butler, gosh I can’t imagine this was the same guy from 300. Thankfully, Lisa Kudrow’s supporting role also injected a lot of humor into an overly melodramatic film.
• Surprisingly, I much preferred this over the novel. I found the novel a little too bland and simplistic to read and hardly as emotional as the film. Of course, as with most novel adaptations, considerable changes was made to the original in order to fit and suit the big screen. These changes were done pretty tastefully in my opinion. Still, this IS a movie based on a chiq lit and you’ve been thus warned.

Twilight (2008)

• Sigh, I had such high hopes for this movie especially after all the positive comments left behind by my fellow female movie going friends. Should have realized that most of those comments were aimed only at the lead actor here, and at nothing much else.
• In short, Twilight is about a 108 year old vampire – Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), and an ordinary teenage girl – Bella (Kristen Stewart) who falls in love. Together they do teen things, like having to abstain from their overwhelming sexual attraction (disguised as bloodlust here), and deal with assignments and proms and stuff. Then of course another bunch of vampires appear to cause trouble, and some short lived lame drama kicks up..
• The on screen characters were admittedly quite smoldering. There’s nothing quite as interesting as mysterious personalities, either in the “I like to keep to myself” brooding Bella, or the stalkerish possessive “You have no idea how much I want to drink your blood” Edward. After all, which girl wouldn’t want to be lusted after as much as Edward does in this film? Oh wait, not ALL girls want that I guess – not after they realize how downright freaky it actually is.. Otherwise, most obsessive stalker nerds in this world would have landed their dream girls already – provided they have Edward’s good looks I guess. Sigh, girls. It ALL comes down to looks right?
• I particularly disliked the way Stephanie Meyer (the author of the books) ripped apart well known vampire lore, and created a watered down version fit for kids. What’s this about vampires appearing with glittery skin under sunlight? That was lame enough for people to laugh in my cinema hall. Or the fact that Edward is 108 years old, yet behaves like a lovestruck teenager. From the sound of things, it seems like there’s virtually no ‘negative’ side to being a vamp, since they can live a normal life like go to school and have a day job working as a doctor. Don’t give me crap about being turned into a ‘monster’, especially since there’s a family who can survive purely on animal blood. Diamond skin, super strength, speed, telepathy, prescience, not needing sleep, immortality, orange eyes, free lipstick, for Gods sake, TURN ME INTO ONE NOW. Also, if just a bite from a vamp can change a human, simple exponential mathematics would show that in just a few months, the WHOLE WORLD would have been converted by now (that or everyone is dead). ARGH, another fantasy movie meant for children. PLEASE BRING BACK ADULT FANTASY (no I didn’t mean THAT kind).
• Low budget with corny special effects. The way the vamps moved around (the fading effect) or the way Edward leaps and climbs trees had no style or grace to it. The final battle between Edward and the nomad hunter vamp offered a brief respite, but even that was very lacking in many departments, especially how the fight ended. There were also loads of cringe worthy corny lines here I assure you, which doesn’t help at all.
• I guess the writer hit the jackpot by creating a ‘Harry Potter’ meant for girls. Think of the whole thing as a premise for teen romance, attraction, sex, peer acceptance, proms, school life, parents, etc. Watch only if you are interested in seeing two teenagers get maddeningly infatuated with each other, otherwise I highly recommend you go pick up White Wolf’s Vampire The Masquerade RPG books or Anne Rice’s series (Interview with the Vampire) if you want proper vampire stories. Hopefully, the sequel called New Moon would be better, but I don’t have high hopes.
• What I AM waiting for instead, is for this top-notch Swedish vampire flick called “Let The Right One In” to be released. Synopsis quoted from IMDB: “Oskar, an overlooked and bullied boy, finds love and revenge through Eli, a beautiful but peculiar girl who turns out to be a vampire.” Supposedly much more brutal and real, at the time of writing, it’s already made it onto IMDB’s TOp 250 and won 16 film awards (while Twilight won’t be winning any for sure)…

What Happens In Vegas (2008)

• Big names in an average chick flick. Ashton Kutcher plays the good for nothing that just got fired from his father’s company. Cameron Diaz is the uptight high strung stock broker who just got dumped by her fiance. While taking a break by visiting Vegas, they end up meeting each other, got pissed drunk -> got married -> struck the jackpot and won 3 million dollars. Of course they don’t want to stay married, but each one of them wants a share of the money. A court ruling forces them to try and make the marriage work, or they will never see a cent of the 3 million. They have 6 months to do it. Can they?
• The jokes weren’t all that great, although there were some gems in Ashton and Cameron’s acting. The plot seems a little forced, especially during the parts when both the leads attempt to make the other quit the court arrangement by doing horrible things to each other. Even more so was the way the movie rushed towards the end with the whole change of heart (yeah like you wouldn’t see it coming), which was rather fake. And then, typical of these chiq fliqs, you have to bear with the campy lines like “You bet on me, You make me wanna bet on myself” yada yada yada..
• Just an amusing flick to catch if you are bored and having nothing else to watch. Or if you like Hollywood romance comedies. If you ask me, once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.