Monday Movies: Paul & Beck

Last week I was SO busy and next week I am still going to be So Busy

I long for a holiday. I really miss blogging, both writing and reading. All my posts last week (except for my winner announcement post) are scheduled post. I tried to take a 2 hours break to write this post, I really want to share these 2 movies (and I still have 2 books to be reviewed).

These past 2 weeks, I watched 2 movies (I bought 11 DVDs 2 weeks ago)…one was one of my anticipated movies and the other was something I bought because I love Japanese movies. The funny thing is the one I was eager to watch was the one that got low rating while the one I bought without reference was the one that got higher rating. Tho my rating is 100% personal taste

Without much introduction, here are the movies I have watched (Hoping Friday will come tomorrow so that I can watch more movies)

Monday Movies : 1 Zombie, 1 Rewatch and 2 War Movies

Since I bought new DVD player (to replace the broken one), I have been on movie spree. I watched at least 3movies a week. Because of the unfortunate case in my country (Read: Bye Bye Imported Movies), I have no other means to watch movies but DVD. I really hope the problem will be solved really soon.

I decided to make a button for this post because I know that as long as I keep on blogging I will continue writing Monday Movies to wrap up movies I have watched recently. The button is my dearest nephew holding the TV remote….it is really difficult to take the remote away from him

Let’s move on with the movies!

Last week, I watched 4 movies; 1 zombie movie,1 re-watch movie, 1 animation movie and 1 war movie. I don’t want to write long introduction, here are my thought on each movie I saw last week.

28 Weeks Later (2007)

Director : Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
Staring : Robert Carlyle, Rose Byrne, Jeremy Renner, Harold Perrineau, Catherine McCormack, Mackintosh Muggleton, Imogen Poots, Idris Elba.

I have this movie  since last year but I couldn’t make myself watching it till last week. The reason is quite simple, I am not a zombie person and I tend to compare movies.

After watching it, at first, I wanted to make a battle movie between 28 Weeks Later with 28 days later (just like what I did with Shaun of the Dead VS Zombieland)…but I changed my mind.

Waterboys (The Movie)

A Hilarious All Boys Synchronize Swimming Team

My 3^rd time viewing and still made me laughing so loud

I have some movies stack on my shelf but all of them are serious movies. Lately, I am in the mood of watching something funny and since I don’t have any funny new movie, I decided to rewatch Waterboys – ウォーターボーイズ (a movie by Shinobu Yaguchi).

As most Japanese high school themed movies, Waterboys is not only entertaining but also gives some moral for the young generation who watch the movie. The moral isn’t as strong as the Dorama (Japanese TV Series) but you can still feel it.

Snapshot taken from http://www.goddesscarlie.com

Waterboys is centered upon 5 high school students who were tricked by a beautiful new teacher to join their school’s swimming team. The school is an all boys school, but the new teacher didn’t want to teach them to be a swimmer, she wanted to teach them synchronized swimming. All the boys who wanted to be in the team because of the teacher left the team immediately…all but 5 students.

Okuribito (おくりびと)

Beauty sometimes comes in Death

That was my first impression after watching Okuribito (Departures). I once watch Six Feet Under which is a US TV series about the life of people who runs a funeral house, but I found that series as boring and has no heart at all. With the same theme, Okuribito managed to deliver EVERYTHING…the laugh, the sadness, the beautiful art of sending the dead to the next life, and most of all the heartbreaking moment that everyone must face sometime in this lifetime.

Okuribito was directed by Takito Youjiro. It tells the story of a man named Kobayashi Daigo (Motoki Masashiro) whose dream was to become a professional a cello player but his dream was shattered when the orchestra was disbanded. Along with his wife, they moved from Tokyo to Yamagata. He got the first job he applied in that small town, he was sort of tricked into it. The ad said it was a job dealing with journey…but the journey turned out to be a journey to the next life.

Not ‘helping out journeys’, it’s helping out peaceful departure.

Moon Child

Moon Child is a Japanese movie about a vampire and his life around a human child. It is directed by Takahisa Zeze. I’m not too eager about vampire movie, the cast is the main reason I want to watch this movie badly. The main casts are Hyde, Gackt and Wang Lee Hom. Hyde is the vocalist of my number one band L’Arc~en~Ciel. Moon Child is his first movie debut, it was shot during L’Arc~en~Ciel’s first long break. When I first heard that Hyde is going to play in a movie, I was so exited…whether his acting is good or not, I HAVE to watch it.

It’s been years since I last watched this movie, I watched it few months after its official released in Japan, April 19, 2003. I had to wait for few months because the DVD came out months after the movie was released, I wish I could see it in theater…unfortunately Japanese movie was not a common movie in Indonesian Theater. I remember watching this movie few years after that. Two days ago, I finally watched it for the 3rd time, I missed this movie a lot. Well actually, I missed Kei a lot.

Now, let’s talk about the movie

The story began in year 2000 and ended in 2045. The prologue of the movie showed 2 men running away after killing someone. Luka, the older man, said that he had enough, he wanted to be over. They went to the beach and Luka let himself burn under the sun. The younger man, Kei, watched his friend died in front of him. Both Luka and Kei were vampires.

The Girl who Leapt Through Time

Toki o Kakeru Shoujo (時 を かける 少女) or The Girl Who Leapt Through Time is an animation from Japan….or should I say another great animation from Japan.

I don’t know if I ever said this or not, I never can appreciate digital animation as much as drawing animation (I don’t know how to differentiate these two animations). Digital animations are the kind of animation produced by Pixar while Drawing animation is the kind of animation from Studio Ghibli and almost all Japanese animation still use this technique. Zee of Mywordlyobsession had written better sentences to differentiate these two kinds of animations. I have the same feeling as her, for me digital animation lacks of art value and therefore no matter how great people said about Toy story or any other animation alike, I always end up saying those are good animations but never could say those are great animations.

The Girl Who Leapt Through time is made by the animation studio Madhouse and directed by Hasoda Mamoru. It was published in 2006 and will be made into Live Action Movie in 2010…I want to watch it, I hope I can find its DVD next year. After doing a little search, I found out that Toki o Kakeru Shoujo was based upon a novel by Tsutsui Yasutaka. When I read his name, it sounds so familiar…I went through my book review and found my review of one of his books, it was called Hell. I wonder if the JF-Library has this book, I want to read it.

Across The World: Pandemic, Ondine, Mother and The 4th Kind

These past few weeks, I have been watching one great movie after another, If I write them per post it will be too much to write, so I decided to put them all in one post.

I choose Across The World as the title because these 4 movies come from around the world, I have movies from Japan, Korean, Ireland and Hollywood (US). All four of these movies will be shared for my R.I.P Challenge V, they all have their own kind of peril. One of them will be shared in my Read The Book See The Movie Challenge.

I’m going to write it based on the order when I watched the movie. Because each movie

1. Pandemic

Pandemic is a movie from Japan. The movie was made into a Manga, I read that Manga early this year. At that time, I thought the movie came out after the manga but I was wrong, the manga was actually based on the movie. Its real title was Kansen Rettou. The movie is less horrified than the manga, I guess because it’s difficult to pile up bleeding people into a huge pile. There’s nothing much to tell because I’ve already written how I feel about this Manga in my previous post, and what I felt toward the Manga is the same with what I felt toward the movie.

The story is, of course, exactly the same with the manga. There was a new breed of virus that can killed people easily. Japan was in danger of extinction. The doctors were fighting the virus all they can, but even doctors can not be saved from that virus. An embassy from WHO came and helped them saves people’s life. For more details on the story and to see the graphic of the Manga, please read it here.

My rating for Pandemic is 3 Stars (I like it). This movie is shared for my Read the Book and See The Movie Challenge.

Ringu

Ringu remains as my number one horror movie since 2000, although it was released in 1998 I had my chance of seeing it in 2000. Ringu is not merely a ghost story with no other intention but scaring people, Ringu has a great and deep story. It is the first movie I’ve seen that deny all cliché which often seen in horror movie.

Ringu is based on a novel by Suzuki Koji with the same title. I found out about this fact few years later. I finally found the book 2 years ago and had reviewed it here. The basic story is the same but the detail is so different. There are a lot of differences between the book and the movie. I love both versions. I have already written about Ringu somewhere in 2005 but it was written in my native language, I decided to rewrite it in English.

The story is about a cursed video that will cause the death of its viewers a week later. Asakawa Reiko (Matsushima Nanako) is a reporter who recently interviewed some teenagers about a cursed video. Few days later she found out that her niece, Tomoko, who died recently might be the victim of that cursed video. From the pictures left by her niece, she found the cottage where Tomoko and her friend used to stay. She also found the video and watched it. Right after the video was over, she received a strange telephone call.

Asakawa was afraid of the curse, she asked her ex-husband, Takayama Ryuji (Sanada Hiroyuki), to help her. Ryuji was a bit different than normal people, he could feel bad aura from around him. He watched the video and asked Asakawa to copy it for him. Together, they found some leads to discover the origin of the video. Unfortunately, Yoichi, their son, saw the video too. He told Reiko that Tomoko told him about the video. Asakawa had to fight the curse not only for her but also for her son.