It wasn’t that bad that I missed my flight and had to pay an extra CAD$130 to take an afternoon flight. Because I wouldn’t know what to do in Montreal at 7am in the morning anyway. Shops here are mostly closed (”FERME” - yes in caps and yes, I don’t have the accent mark on my keyboard.) because of St Jean Baptiste except for food outlets and I’ve all of $50 or so in my wallet after paying off the Greyhound fees to NYC. Will update on the food in a next post.

Montreal’s kinda cool. The best thing about the city is that there are these lockers you could rent for $3 for a whole day. I stuffed my 40kg luggage (i kid you not) in there and only had to carry my 10kg backpack and 14kg unicycle around town.

It might be how I’m walking around in the ugliest tee and shorts combo possible or how I’m carrying my uni around but people seem to think I’m local. And not chinese. I walk into shops and get spoken to in French. I’d walk around the streets and get addressed in French. I’d go into McDonald’s and order a Cafe Glace, Vanille and would have been quite convincing if I actually knew what Small/Medium/Large was in french. I went into this grocery store manned by some Chinese who were speaking mandarin. I asked for the cost of something in mandarin and got a shocked stare and no answer. Very weird.

I wish I had more time to spend here though. 6 hours of walking around with baggage is very very troublesome.

My hair was getting a little untidy so I thought I’d go get a haircut.

For some reason, I had a sinking suspicion I’d screw up and get a totally weird cut, I took a ‘Before’ pic. The guy who cuts my hair cracks me up. We had a conversation that went like this:

Me: You grew your hair long! (I’m bad at small talk)

Him: No I didn’t. It’s a wig.

Me: Huh?

Him: It’s a wig.

Me: Why’re you in a wig?

Him: Because I’m going for reservice (army) and I don’t want my customers to see me in short hair.

The back of my head now looks like this

I find it pretty amusing though which is why my pic’s here. There’s this distinct line across the middle of my head which is apparently some attempt (or experiment) at a ‘not so boring’ haircut (in the words of hairstylist).

Actually if I had known he was going to shave a line across, I’d ask for my name to be spelt. Because you know, when I wear a bicycle helmet, you’d still be able to identify me.

 Spoiler Alert - Don’t read on if you intend to watch the movie. Actually maybe you should read on and NOT watch the movie.

We had a screening for the new Indy movie today. Admittedly I’ve not watched any of the prior Indy movies and the only Indy offering I’ve been exposed to was Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. It was a great game with smart, funny writing typical of LucasArts games and I had assumed the same captivating plot to have been characteristic of the movies.

So today was the first Indy movie I’ve watched.

First Grouse:  Shia LeBeouf

I wish I weren’t so superficial but well, like I’ve said tons of times before, if I wanted to watch regular Joes, I’d sit on a bench in the park. When I watch movies, I expect leading men to be fantasy material, not uh… like that.

Second Grouse: Father-Son sub-plot 

“Luke, I’m your father.”

Sounds familiar? Hell yes, because that’s what happens in this show. Rebel son finds out that -gasp- overaged hero is actually his father!

Third Grouse: Elderly Kissing Scene

When done right, old people kissing in movies can be considered artistic or loving or cute or all of the above. If it’s done expertly, the audience gets a warm fuzzy feeling.

Yes, unfortunately for all of our eyes, Indiana Jones get a full french exercise here and it makes you uncomfortable in your seat; the same sort of feeling you get when you’re 10 and stumble accidentally into your friend’s grandparents’ room when they are having sex. You feel dirty watching them. Now go rinse your eyes.

 Fourth Grouse: Skull Can Be Found at Souvenir Shops - at $5.99

For a big budget movie, you’d think that they could have engaged Swarovski to carve some pretty skull prop for use. Instead, the star of the show is a glass/plastic-looking lump that won’t look too lost in a rip-off souvenir counter. You can almost imagine one of them being a free gift if you subscribe to a year’s worth of Readers’ Digest.

Fifth Grouse: Shameless Reuse of Movie Plots

Skull shaped like in Aliens.

Alien lifeform that belongs to ET

UFO that came from Independence Day

Crazy natives that speak ancient languages which is a staple of many other shows

The list goes on.

Sixth Grouse: Very VERY bad writing

Between the many age-related jokes that Shia cracks (I can’t even remember his name in the show!)  and the I’m-old-but-knowledgeable dialogue lines, I can’t decide what’s worse.

BORING.

I caught We Will Rock You today with some friends. It’s a musical based on some of Queen’s better-known songs and we managed to get pretty good seats a few rows away from the front. We didn’t get the original cast playing here (I googled) but rather the Australasia crew where the lead actor, MiG Ayesa was the second runner-up of Rock Star: INXS, this reality show contest where the winner got to play for INXS. Which explained the in-joke where an actor quipped that that guy sucked so much INXS didn’t want him.

I did think he sounded quite whiny initially but the songs were done pretty well considering that he had huge shoes to fill. The story was very touch-and-go - it didn’t stick and it’s not particularly brilliant but you’d attend the show just to hear Queen songs anyway.

Here’s We Will Rock You and Bohemian Rhapsody as done on RockStar.

I think this is very funny.

From here.

Having watched Alexander yesterday, I’ve got one thing to say.

Colin Farrell does not look 19.

The show is HORRID and I’m so glad that when the film was released, I chose to watch Troy instead of this shit. At the very least, Brad Pitt was hot then and is still hotter than Colin Farrell as Alexander.

I don’t even know how to start dissing the show. It’s bad because Colin dons a blonde wig (I assume it’s a wig because it looks like a little puppy). It’s bad because Colin tries to imbue Alexander with a sensitive side by acting gay with doe-eyes. It’s bad because Angelina Jolie acts as HIS MOTHER and as such, is made up to look mature. And most of all, it’s bad because it’s made as an objective history lesson; a documentary.

To prove my point that it’s boring, the cover (I’ve the director’s cut here) brags that this version is ‘Newly inspired, faster paced, more action-packed’.

The original must surely be torture.

Bad boy Hong Kong celeb stupidly sends computer to shop for repairs without deleting the multitudes of porno pics of him getting cozy with his female colleagues (famous stars themselves) in it.

 We all know what he did last summer.

Mystery person with computer smarts gets hold of the pics from his computer and a few years later (which is now) decides to distribute them on the internet. There’re over a thousand photos and since the female leads are rather nubile young things, everyone’s lapping it up. Literally.

While in the West, such stunts have proven to be quite the PR material (see exhibit Paris Hilton), the conservative Easterners paint such girls to be sluts but still good gossip material.  Despite the unspoken moral superiority one and all seem to have over them, everyone’s hanging on every last new detail to emerge about this terrible scandal (or “strange strange ordeal”, in Edison’s words).

Apparently, the latest buzz is that one of the girls has now split up with her husband, Edison’s high school buddy and another hot Hong Kong celebrity, Nicholas Tse (more famous than Edison would ever be too if it weren’t for the pictures, ironically). He’s pissed that she two-timed him with smooth lover-boy here. And here’s where self-righteous netizens come in once more to impose their PoVs. Choice comments left on gossip blog sites include:

“This is quite screwed up tho the pics are nice.. this is screwed up admit it

I think we should stop seeing these images, lol everyone have their own weaknesses should forgive them”

 ”Obviously these ppl do not care about destroying marriages, and leaving a son with a Broken Family…

Although I do view the pics too, but come to think of it this is really f**ked”

This one’s my favorite:

Comment #1: why people say edison will die? who wants to kill him? cecilia’s father? vincy’s dad and uncle? nicholas? i don’t think bobo’s ex-boyfriend can do this, he looks like pussy.

Reply:  Well..if he does look like a pussy, that probably means edison has a set of photo for him as well.

I Am Legend is the Worst. Show. Ever, beating out even Crank as the worst show I’ve watched in recent memory. Let me copy and paste the sypnosis from someplace so I don’t waste my time recounting that wasted 100 minutes.

Robert Neville is a brilliant scientist, but even he could not contain the terrible virus that was unstoppable, incurable…and manmade. Somehow immune, Neville is now the last human survivor in what is left of New York City…and maybe the world. But he is not alone. He is surrounded by “the infected”–victims of the plague who have mutated into carnivorous beings that can only exist in the dark and that will devour or infect anyone or anything in their path. For three years, Neville has spent his days scavenging for food and supplies and faithfully sending out radio messages, desperate to find any other survivors who might be out there. All the while, the infected lurk in the shadows, watching Neville’s every move, waiting for him to make a fatal mistake. Perhaps mankind’s last, best hope, Neville is driven by only one remaining mission: to find a way to reverse the effects of the virus using his own immune blood. But his blood is also what the infected hunt, and Neville knows he is outnumbered and quickly running out of time.

Sounds pretty darn decent doesn’t it? This is the third movie I’ve fallen asleep in in my life and the 2nd one didn’t really count because I was re-watching it. The show starts with Will Smith as the lone survivor guy walking around in New York City doing stupid unfunny things like talking to non-living things and his dog. About half an hour later, I fell asleep and when I woke up at around the 65 minute mark (I looked at my watch), he was STILL WALKING AROUND doing the EXACT SAME THING. It’s like reality TV gone wrong.

Some time after I woke up (it was hard staying awake), some semblance of action began and his dog got killed by Killer Mutant Dogs. More repetition later, we see him saved by the Sole Surviving Mother and Her Kid who are later, predictably saved in return by our Sole Survivor Hero Dude who gives up his life. Mother and Kid find a small crowd of survivors and proclaim Hero dude a legend. The end. The events in this paragraph took up about 30 minutes of the movie.

Since the show’s headliner is every mom’s favorite squeaky clean black actor, there needs to be some morals embedded in the show. Cue the brief morality talk that implies that the hero guy idolises Bob Marley because he’s a) black and b) peace-loving. It’s of course, only appropriate and coincidental (not the film’s intentions to be stereotypical!) that the last man on earth HAPPENS to be a black cop and the damsel saved HAPPENS to be white and spouts lines like “We are his legacy” bla bla bla at the end of the show. Or that, at what might qualify as the epic moment in the show (which is about as epic as the show itself), Will Smith’s character faces off with mutated humans and tries to reason with them before blasting everyone to bits with a grenade (dare someone say ‘Suicide Bomber’?). All that is definitely not to provide racial contrast I’m sure.

I laugh in the face of critics like this one from Entertainment Weekly and this from Rolling Stone which gave it 75/100 scores. Take away Will Smith from the movie and it’s a 1 star movie. His celebrity - not his acting - adds an extra star. Boooooring.

We went to watch Beowulf at the movies today. It reminded me a LOT of 300. Specifically,

“THIS IS SPAATAAAAAA!” vs “I AM BEOWUUUUUULF!”

Anyway, if you haven’t heard of the show yet, it’s this 3D animated epic based on a poem (I found that out just now) starring the voices and likenesses of Angelina Jolie, John Malkovich and a bunch of other bigshots that hypemachines like to hire for better publicity. And oh, the screenplay’s done by Neil Gaiman and Whatshisname so it adds to the credentials.

Well, the story isn’t too bad since it is based on some epic poem albeit with an interesting spin but the whole movie feels like a self-serving vanity exercise. The animation’s the most realistic I’ve ever seen. In fact, it looked exactly like a live-action show at some points and Angelina Jolie looks exactly like she does in real-life because mo-cap’s used. Which brings me to the point of why. Why bother splicing in animation that looks so realistic when it’d probably be cheaper hiring the actors in the first place. Heck, the actors ARE already hired so why are we watching pixillated replicas?

Overall, pretty decent show with great presentation but very redundant.

So well, because jL there suggested (see, I listen), I decided to dress up as me for Halloween. Because I’m scary. Specifically, I was a zombie (because it’s classic) dressing up as me because I’m the scariest.

I went to work with the mask on and I couldn’t see my way. So I pressed the wrong button in the lift. And there were people in the lift. So I got off at the wrong level, then slowly stumbled my way to the office.

This guy took the cake though.

It’s hilarious. He went for lunch like that.

And this is possibly my favorite photo of the day.

Trailer.

After hearing someone butcher this particular movie called 881 and having just caught it the week before with my mom, I thought I’d talk a bit about why I feel this is a pretty decent local movie.

Before anything more is said, you have to first understand that the Singaporean film industry is very small (and for that matter, the whole entertainment/media industry is ridiculously tiny). There is no vibrant theatre community here (come on, let’s be honest) and if you’re in theatre, you’re really in it for passion - misguided or otherwise. The same goes for the film industry. If you’ve starred in a local movie, that hardly means you’re a movie star nor would it make you more hireable. Perhaps, the TV people would take notice of you and get you to star in a few more drama serials but that’s it. The more popular local movies to date capitalize on either the star power of its cast (ie. popular TV actors with their own fan base) or the promised comical value (appeals to the common denomination).

What’s interesting about 881 is that it’s as cliched as the movies I mentioned. People will watch it because there’s quite a bit of buzz about the subject matter, getai, and that it’s purportedly funny. It features culture-specific humor that foreigners will probably not understand (this is a very common feature of most local productions) but its presentation as a musical is unconventional enough for people to either sit up and be mesmerized or squirm in their seats. In all honesty, the story is not great; in fact, it’s not even coherent at times, possibly emulating the rather over-the-top, extravagant nature of musicals (think Moulin Rouge and Singin’ in the Rain). Popular getai songs are used to narrate the story and I think the fantastical and loud aspect of getai was captured pretty well.

This is one of those shows you’ll sit through and be rewarded with a story at the end of it all; it’s rather, a show that you’d sit through to enjoy the spectacle. I think that’s what most people misunderstand about the show.

Tags: 881, movies, singapore

I bought a remote-controlled car. It’s the length of my index finger. It’s a Lamborghini. Which I can surprisingly spell. But that’s not the point.

It’s awesomely cute.

Tags: remote control, flashy cars, japanese, toys

So today, after watching Harry Potter, I was dead beat and a little pensive about having to complete an article when I get home. At the train station, I took out my Nintendo DS and had a go at Brain Age. I was at Yio Chu Kang (read: rather far north) when I realised I took the wrong train home (read: very far east). My brain age, if you’re wondering, is in its twenties. Oh the irony.

In other news, Daniel Radcliffe is no longer the rather, shall we say, mature looking  boy he once was in episode 1. He’s now buffed up, yet still scrawny and short like a 13 year old (I checked it up - he’s 1.68m tall. I was that height when I was 13 so don’t try to argue about 13 year olds not being very tall, yadda yadda).

I shall now retire to bed and leave you guys with this very disturbing image.

 Look at me! I’ve butt dimples!