Far East

2046

Wang Jia Wei's award-winning film (Cannes + HK) is certainly easy on the eyes. Zheng Ziyi, Faye Wong, Carina Lau, Gong Li, and Zhang Man Yu are the featured eye candy, and little more than that. Tony Leung is a guy staying in a hotel writing a story about a guy staying in a hotel writing a story. Beyond that I couldn't tell you what it's about.

Thanks, Coach

Just got finished watching Antwone Fisher, and was blown away when I saw in the second credit (after director Denzel Washington's) that the screenplay was written by the title character. It's hard to imagine the courage necessary to not only write your life story (and this one ain't pretty), but to market it to a major studio and eventually write the script for it. I have trouble talking about some of the hinky s**t that went down in my own childhood, let alone publishing it to the web, and it pales in comparison to what he went through. Very powerful and disturbing, though a bit too much on the ending, being so happy and all. Anyone who went what he went through is going to have some permanent scars and serious issues for the rest of their lives.

Pleasant

Didn't get Pleasantville the first time I watched it, as consumed with the novelty as I was. On second viewing, with the mayor's exhorting his citizens to stand up for 'values' --which involved burning books and desecrating art they didn't like, just to begin with-- the message of the movie finally hit home. Protecting 'values' is all about keeping everything in a 1950s permanent status quo, with the wife in the kitchen, subservient and hopefully pregnant, and the rest of the citizens following along like sheep to whatever Snowball (the mayor) says is right. One of those films that came along a little bit too early.

Hustled

Stephen Chow (周星馳) is perhaps the greatest living actor on the planet. Not a bad director or screenwriter, either. His film Kung Fu Hustle (功夫）is one the best films I've even seen. He spent three or four years making it, and it truly shows. I'm a huge fan of his, mostly from his comedic work; he's sometimes referred to as the 'Chinese Jim Carrey', but that's something of a misnomer. He's so much more talented than Mr. Carrey, whose only serious role to date was in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. This film may become as influential to today's Chinese as Bruce Lee's JinWuMen was to his generation. If you see only one foreign film this year, make it this one.

I, Approve

Though only loosely approximating Asimov (the credits read 'suggested by') in that there are robots, murder, and a shrink named Calvin, still a kick-ass flick. Particularly when Will Smith starts using his own deep dark secret against the robot menace.

Never Make It Here

Series that I'd love to see that will likely never be subtitled in Mandarin:
I, Claudius (amazing historical novel by poet Robert Graves)
Brideshead Revisited
Upstairs, Downstairs (68 episodes, ~$300!)
Rumpole of The Bailey
Fawlty Towers
Monty Python's Flying Circus

Similarly, movies that probably won't ever be subtitled:
Life of Brian
Meaning of Life
Monty Python and The Holy Grail
Jabberwocky
Brazil

We get every version of Rocky, Rambo, Aliens, Die Hard, and Look Who's Talking, though.
Such is life (sigh).