Kung Fu Panda 2 [ Quote ]

Wolf Boss: "Lord Shen I saw a Panda!"

Lord Shen: "A Panda?"

Wolf Boss : "The Kung Fu warrior, he fought like a demon,
big and furry, soft and squishy
kinda plush and cuddly "

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 Character [ Poster ]

Kung Fu Panda 2 [ Movie Review ] ★★★1/2

The Pitch

Kung Fu Panda was a blast. It was an awesome American comedic homage to Asian Kung Fu movies. Plenty of funny moments, memorable casting choices, loveable characters, heartwarming at times and blazing Kung fu action sequences that would please most Kung Fu fans. Needless to say, it made lots of money and became a household name. When that happens, Kung Fu Panda 2  naturally happened.

Well most of the original cast are back for this sequel and that's a good news. The Furious Five (Angelina Jolie, Jackie Chan, Lucy Liu, Seth Rogen and David Cross), Sifu (Dustin Hoffman), Mr Ping (James Hong) and Po (Jack Black) will all be back for the second adventure. Gary Oldman will be taking over the antagonist role of Lord Shen and Michelle Yeoh will be spouting words of wisdom as the Soothsayer (effectively a replacement for Oogway). There's also a surprisingly supporting role of Master Croc for Jean-Claude Van Damme, well known for most Hollywood martial arts movie in the 80s and 90s but had been missing from the spotlight in recent years.

Will Kung Fu Panda 2 become a worthy successor or just another disappointing cash grab sequel (like many of it's animated peers)?  or  will Kung Fu Panda 2 achieved a rarity by being on par with the first one or even outshine the original material like what Shrek 2 and Toy Story 2 did? This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

The Plot

Po is now living his dream as The Dragon Warrior, protecting the Valley of Peace alongside his friends and fellow kung fu masters, The Furious Five – Tigress, Crane, Mantis, Viper and Monkey. But Po’s new life of awesomeness is threatened by the emergence of a formidable villain, who plans to use a secret, unstoppable weapon to conquer China and destroy kung fu.

It is up to Po and The Furious Five to journey across China to face this threat and vanquish it. But how can Po stop a weapon that can stop kung fu? He must look to his past and uncover the secrets of his mysterious origins; only then will he be able to unlock the strength he needs to succeed.

(Plot Write Up taken from Kung Fu Panda's Facebook Page)

The Perspective

In a nutshell, Kungfu Panda 2 was entertaining and enjoyable. But it lacks that special ingredient to make it as awesome as the first one. This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

It could be that the threat that could end Kung Fu wasn't really a legitimate threat that could really stop Kung Fu. It's a threat that any fast moving stealthy martial art experts could get around it and disarm it. It felt that for the sake of a plot device, the Kung Fu experts had to "dance" around it to make it look more fearsome than it actually is.

It also doesn't help that Lord Shen wasn't really that effective as a villain as compared to Tai Lung. Yes, it's a different type of villainy and Gary Oldman was having such a dastardly time with his character that it was remisence of his performance as the over the top DEA officer in Leon but it just lacked the oomph that Ian McShane was able to bring for Tai Lung.

Sifu was notable absence for the bulk of the movie and the pairing of Tigress with Po lacks that certain chemistry that Po shared with Sifu in the first one. Besides Tigress, the other furious four didn't really have much to do except to assist Po for the big fight scenes and tagging along in general. Rather poor usage of the other "main" characters if you ask me. This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

Finally, the last nitpick would be that Jean-Claude Van Damme's Master Croc and the other Master felt excessive and unnecessary to the plot. There wasn't really enough dialogue for him to catch that distinctive Van Damme's accent in his portrayal of Master Croc either.

But then again, there were a few nice touches for Kung Fu Panda 2. Michelle Yeoh was a nice replacement for Randall Duk Kim as the voice of the wise man in this series. The parallelism between Po and Lord Shen's past was a nicely done to entertain both the kids and adults viewers. The choice to explore Po's past was an excellent idea as it helped to build more layers to Kung Fu Panda's mythology and set up some rather touching heartwarming scenes of this movie.

Last but not least, it was a blast to see all the characters once again. It's like meeting up with old friends and Po specially, is still so endearingly funny. It's also impressive to see how they managed to keep the fight sequences fresh and exciting. With all that being said, there's plans to make 6 movies out of Kung Fu Panda franchise and if the quality could maintain at this current standard, I would be catching everyone of them when it's released in the cinema. This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides [ Movie Review ] ★★★

The Pitch

Do we need another Captain Jack Sparrow's Pirates of the Caribbean adventure? The first was blast and it gave us the iconic Captain Jack Sparrow. The following back to back sequels were not that good and frankly, the novelty was wearing off. But the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise had been racking in the cash and in Hollywood, when there's profits to be made, it will be made.

Adapting Tim Power's book, On Stranger Tide to fit into the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, this installment would see Johnny Depp's Captain Jack embark on a quest to seek out the fountain of youth. There will be old and new crew joining force to helm this latest installment. Geoffrey Rush (amazing performance in The King's Speech) and Kevin McNally would be returning as Barbossa and Gibbs respectively while Penélope Cruz will be playing Captain Jack's love interest Angelica and Ian McShane (Kungfu Panda) will be taking on the villainous role of Captain Blackbeard. Rob Marshall (9 and Chicago) will be taking over Gore Verbinski as the director.

Could this installment kick start another trilogy for Disney? or will it reaffirm that this series need to be put to rest? Will the absence of Gore Verbinski,  Elizabeth (Keira Knightley) and Will (Orlando Bloom) hinders the success of Pirates of the Caribbean On Stranger Tides ? Read on to find out This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

The Plot

The Spanish had discovered the map to the Fountain of Youth and they are on their way there. Not wanting to be outdone, King George II wants to send Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) who had the map to the Fountain of Youth to guide an expedition to locate the Fountain of Youth before the Spanish. The expedition will be lead by Jack's old enemy Captain Hector Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) who turned into a privateer after losing Jack's ship, the Black Pearl and his leg.

Unwilling to comply, Jack escapes and soon found his father who warned him about the dangers of the Fountain of Youth. He also discovered an impostor who had been recruiting a crew for the search of the Fountain with his name. That impostor turned out to be Angelica (Penélope Cruz) a former lover whom Jack had abandon many years ago. This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

Jack was unable to escape from Angelica's clutches and ended up on board of Blackbeard (Ian McShane)'s ship, The Queen Anne's Revenge. He found out that there's a prophecy that Blackbeard would be killed by a one-legged man and to circumvent that prophecy, Blackbeard wants to locate the Fountain of Youth. Jack also discovered that to make the Fountain work, a tear from a mermaid and two chalices from Juan Ponce de Leon would be needed. This set up a race between the Spanish, the British naval lead by Captain Barbossa and the Pirates consisting of Captain Jack, Angelica and Blackbeard to locate the fabled Fountain of Youth. This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

The Perspective

On Stranger Tides serves it's function as a entertaining blockbuster for the summer crowd. If you are not expecting much, you would be satisfied with Johnny Depp doing his Jack Sparrow routine and the mystical pirating fun adventures that one would expect from this franchise. But if you are looking for more substance and comparing it to the first movie, this series is getting tiresome and this installment was not well constructed to give the audience the same buzz that the first movie had achieved.

The biggest problem with this movie was that it tried to take on too many characters and subplots. There's three different groups of people heading for the Fountain of Youth, two different couples trying to make their untimely (and unlikely) romance work and there are two archetype of villainy at play here. These characters and their motivation were adequately presented but there were enough time or focus to make us care about them.

The weakest character in the midst of all the new characters woul be Blackbeard. The pirate that all other pirates fears was not that scary at all. There were hardly any buildup to make it believable that he was the pirate that everyone else feared. The script didn't help when this fearsome pirate was on a quest for the Fountain due to a prophecy that he would be killed by a one legged man. How's that for bravery? Ian McShane was fantastic as the villain to reckon with when he voiced Tai Lung in Kungfu Panda and sadly the same result didn't replicate here.

Mermaids, best part of the show

The romance between the two couples here felt mishandled. It's not as clear cut or well established like the romance between Will and Elizabeth. The chemistry between Angelica and Jack Sparrow felt that it needed a little bit more work on it or maybe a little bit more screen time to make it convincing. The love story between the mermaid Syrena and Philip, the religious man who tried to redeem Blackbeard soul felt rather squeezed in to make the Fountain plot device work. It could have been easily written off and it would not have make any major impact to the story. Personally, the love story between Syrena and Philip bogged the pace of the story down. This review belongs to filmsblitz at blogspot

If On Stranger Tides was the first movie, I don't think they will be making so much money or churning out sequels like this franchise did. This installment felt bland and is running out of creative juice to drive this franchise. But then again, my friend who went in with low expectation had a jolly good time watching Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. Perhaps it would be wiser to be less critical of this movie and just go with the flow on this one.


Coda

There's a scene at the end of the Credits. (Scroll Over to Read)It shows the abandoned Angelica sitting alone on the beach and She discovered Jack Sparrow's voodoo doll being washed up on the shores. Angelica takes the doll and smiles with a wicked intention for revenge (End of Scroll)

Pirates Of The Caribbean On Stranger Tides Character Poster

Pirates Of The Caribbean On Stranger Tides Character Poster

Updated: Movie Review

The Dark Knight Rises's Viral Campaign?

The Internet is buzzing with the news that The Dark Knight Rises official website has come alive. Clicking on the link, it will bring you to a blank page with a wav file attached. The wav file contains a chant which I can't really make out but folks online are saying that it's chanting The Fire Rises.

Soon a twitter account for The Fire Rises was found and it's been twittering a link (http://www.thedarkknightrises.com/image.html) to this awesome image. a Mosaic picture of Tom Hardy as Bane! I am guessing that they are using the pictures of fans who click on the link and allow the website to access their facebook or twitter account. If you scroll over those the mosaic, you could see mosaic magnified. I can't locate my picture just yet but to think that I am involved with something so cool just put a smile on my face. If this is the start of their viral campaign, I can't wait to see what else are they going to do.

But even before the mosaic has been completed, the image has already been uncovered by the fans and here's the proper picture of Tom Hardy as Bane... look pretty awesome to me

Thor [ Movie Memorabilia ]

Thor Double Sided Poster

Thor Mini Torchlight

Thor Card

Thor Shirt

Insidious [ Movie Review] ★★★1/2

The Pitch

James Wan and Leigh Whannell first burst into the Hollywood scene with the original Saw movie. That low budget "torture porn" became a surprisingly hit and went on to spawn six sequels. Their next collaboration as director / writer didn't fare that well as Dead Silence received mostly negative reviews and was a box office bomb . Insidious would mark their third collaboration and even though it poaching on the overused haunted house / possessed kid elements, this movie might just mark a return to form for them.

Beside the Saw franchise creators, Oren Peli, the guy who wrote and directed the latest horror box office phenomenon Paranormal Activity would be performing producer duties for Insidious. Can the creators of the two highly successful horror franchises come together to create another horror hit or perhaps another horror franchise?

Looking at Insidious US box office collection, this $1.5 million movie went on to earn a gross revenue of $51,681,000 (as of May 15th). That's around the ball park of the first Saw box office collection. Does a healthy box office collection equate to a good horror movie? Read on to find out...

The Plot

The Lambert family just moved into their new house. Things appeared to be normal until the night when Dalton heard noises in the attic and decided to investigate. He had a fall while trying to turn on the light. His cries caused his parents Josh (Patrick Wilson) and Renai (Rose Byrne ) to rush up the attic.

The next day, Josh tried to walk Dalton for school but Dalton was unresponsive. The panic stricken parents rushed Dalton to the hospital where the doctor couldn't find anything wrong with him. Dalton remained in the unexplained coma and the parents decided to bring him home. That when the spooky eerie stuff started to escalate. Renai had enough of these paranormal activities and wanted to move out of the house. Feeling helpless with the chain of events, Josh agreed but the haunting kept taunting Renai.

Josh's mother (Barbara Hershey) believed that the haunting that Renai encountered were true and introduced her friend Elise (Lin Shaye) who specialized in supernatural exorcism to them. Elise and her team went into Dalton's room and she quickly identify a red face demon who was watching over Dalton comatose body.

Sensing the direness of the situation, Elise revealed the truth behind Dalton's unnatural coma and attempted to rescue Dalton's spirit before it's too late. But the demon turned out to be too powerful for Elise to handle. Running out of options, Elise revealed a past that Josh had forgotten and seek his cooperation to attempt a dangerous rescue mission for his son .

The Perspective

Insidious started out in a slow and mundane fashion. It might be a bit of wait but when the haunting escalate, it's one heck of a scary ride that don't stop till the end. The spooky moments are well set up that it kept me on the edge of my seats and some scenes stood out for it's eeriness.

The revelation of what happened to Dalton and Josh past was a refreshing change from the usual horror flicks. While it's a bit of stretch, the filmmaker made it work for Insidious. Personally I also enjoyed Lin Shaye's performance as the exorcist and the "inventive" exorcism.

But there might be complaints on how unoriginal Insidious was and to a degree, it's true. There are traces of Poltergeist, The Exorcist and Paranormal Activities but personally, the film was such an entertaining ride that comparison of the similarities came only as an afterthought and it didn't diminish the enjoyment of watching Insidious.

If it's anything, it was the ending that was a bit of a let down. Personally I felt that they tried to be too smart for the audience and while it's chilling, it contradicts a couple of things that were set up during the movie.  Otherwise, it's a good o' school horror school with plenty of scary moments. Insidious comes highly recommended.

Beastly [ Movie Review ] ★1/2

The Pitch

Beauty and the Beast adapted to cater for the Twilight crowd. Good looking Hollywood youngster like Alex Pettyfer, Vanessa Hudgens and Mary-Kate Olsen are likely cast to draw in the teenagers. Last but not least, put one or two really talented actors (Neil Patrick Harris and Lisa Gay Hamilton) in to support the main cast, just in case the main cast performance turned out to be disastrous.

Should be able to rake in a decent amount of profit out of the teenage demographic.

The Plot

Kyle Kingson (Alex Pettyfer) is a rich, good looking, rude and arrogant high school student. During a green committee president election, he cross path with an eccentric school mate Kendra (Mary-Kate Olsen) who vandalized his election posters. He also encounter Lindy (Vanessa Hudgens), a green committee treasurer nominee whom he had a spark of romance with.

At a post election party for his victory, Kyle attempted to set a public humiliation to insulted Kendra for being ugly. He didn't expect that Kendra is actually a witch in disguise and for the last insult, she cast a spell on Kyle, rendering his face and body horribly disfigured. To remove the spell, he need to find someone that truly love him within a year or stay disfigured forever.

The Perspective

I didn't promise you a rose garden ... but I love you so I built one for you

Beastly achieved the unimaginable. It's actually worse than Twilight. Looking beyond the angsty teenage romance, this movie couldn't even deliver a simple and effective "Beauty and the Beast" love story. The delivery was choppy, unconvincing and filled with weak characterization. The attempt at romance was cringeworthy, juvenile  and rather hard to swallow.

The adaption tried to squeeze as much of Beauty and the Beast into this movie while catering to the Twilight crowds. The result was blatantly bad as the insertion was awkwardly done it only serve to remind us how good the classic was.

The only remarkable performance from this movie would be Neil Patrick Harris as Kyle's blind tutor and Lisa Gay Hamilton as the house maid. Their performance was at least entertaining and a breathe of fresh air after going through Alex Pettyfer and Vanessa Hudgens's subpar performance. In no way is this a recommendation to watch this movie solely for Neil Patrick Harris and Lisa Gay Hamilton. It's wasn't not that good.

Do yourself a favor. Skip this and grab the Disney Beauty and the Beast Dvd instead.

The Detective 2 | B+侦探 [ Movie Review ] ★★ 1/2

The Pitch

In the original Oxide Pang's The Detective, Aaron Kwok's Chan Tam was a C+ Detective (a C grade detective). In this sequel, Tam gets a "promotion"after solving the case in the original movie and now he is a B+ Detective.

While the original movie wasn't as well known as Oxide Pang and Danny Pang (the Pang Brothers)'s The Eye, it was definitely better than Forest of Death and other crappy stuff that they have been churning out. There's something about C+ Detective that stood out even though the story wasn't that good (C grade at best).

The thing that stood out for the first movie would be Aaron Kwok's performance as the C grade detective and his partnership with Liu Kai Chi. The last movie also captured a distinctive dirty gritty atmosphere in Thailand that hard to replicate elsewhere.

Now that the main cast from the original film are back in Thailand for another go at The Detective story, will B+ be better than a C+?


The Plot

After solving the murder mysteries in The Detective, Tam (Aaron Kwok) gained popularity as a private detective. His pal in the police department, Chak (Liu Kai Chi) had just been promoted. But they have not gotten out of the downturn yet. Tam is still hounded by moneylender and Chak's new supervisor is a tough guy to work with.

In order to help each other, Chak enlisted Tam's help to solve a new set of mysterious serial murders.

A man was stabbed to death at his home with a confession letter from his wife but the victim was a single man. A prostitute was murdered and the murderer gave the impression that she was raped when he actually used a pipe to fake the rape. A loan shark was killed at home with his penis sliced off and stored it in a jar.  A beautiful young drug peddler was killed by a pencil and her tongue has been cut out by a kid's scissor.  There are not apparent linkage between these murders but Tam think otherwise.

Before they could get any further with the investigation, Chak was assaulted by a black van and Tam was chased down the alleyways by a biker with steel rod. Undeterred by the threats and hitting a brick wall in solving the case, Tam decided to seek help from a psychopathic criminal that he helped append recently.When he was told to get into the psychic of the killer, he finds that the killer shares an eerie connection.

The Perspective

To put it bluntly, there not much improvement from C+ to B+. The whodunit aspect of this movie runs largely on autopilot and was incoherent at times. There are hardly any sensible deduction of the murder cases. It felt like the filmmaker was making the things up as they move along. The elaborate murders mysteries did not produce an satisfying revelation or explanation. To summarize, The Detective 2 is not the type of classic murder mystery movie that you go for.

But if you are going for Aaron Kwok's quirky performance as Tam, the camaraderie he share Liu Kai Chi and the general moody atmosphere that could be found in the first part, The Detective 2 isn't that bad as a time waster. It would at least draw you in with the hope that the final revelation would be worth the wait. It wasn't but then again, there are bits and pieces in The Detective 2 that were genuinely good.

Such as the scene when Chak get knocks down by a van and he could only lie helplessly on the ground while the van hangs around with murderous intent. It managed to capture a sense of helplessness when Chak had very few options in that situation. It put the viewer in Chak's shoes,  feeling the dread and wondering how could one outsmart the assailant while being immobile.

There's also a possibility of a third movie that becomes strangely an attraction. Given that both the first and second movie are mediocre at best, there's a strange unexplainable desire to catch the third movie if they ever get to that stage. I am guessing that it would be an expansion of the subplots on Tam's parents that had been brought up in the first two movies but had not been fully explored. It could be the last major case that Tam takes in part 3 when he finally becomes A+ Detective. I would attribute to the endearing factor of Aaron Kwok's Tam and his supporting acts that make me interested in finding out what happened to his parents.

Gantz | ガンツ [ Movie Review ] ★★★1/2

The Pitch

Gantz has been in publication as a Manga series since 2000 and is currently going on strong. This gory manga depicts a group of people who were plucked right before their death and given a mission to kill aliens with futuristic weaponry. Folks who had not read the manga and wondered about it's popularity could finally get a taste of Gantz with the two part movies adaption.

To sweeten the deal, this film stars Kazunari Ninomiya and Kenichi Matsuyama as the two protagonists of Gantz. Kazunari Ninomiya career in Japan ranges from being a singer, songwriter, actor and radio host. For movie fans and the rest of the world, he probably more well known for his performance as Private Saigo in Clint Eastwood's Letters from Iwo Jima.

Kenichi Matsuyama on the other hand, has been making regular appearance in recent Japanese movies that were shown in Singapore. Movies such as the Death Note franchise (as the iconic L), Detroit Metal City (switching from Johannes Krauser II and Souichi Negishi), Kamui Gaiden (as the reluctant ninja Kamui), Kaiji the Ultimate Gambler (doing a supporting role) and the recent Norwegian Wood which was shown just a couple of weeks ago. With these two popular Japanese actors / idols fronting the adaption of a popular manga series, it's intriguing to see what Gantz the movie has to offer.

The Plot

Kei Kurono (Kazunari Ninomiya) and Masaru Kato (Kenichi Matsuyama) tried to help a man who had fallen onto a subway tracks and after saving the man, they were hit by the oncoming train. Instead of dying a gruesome death, they were surprise to find themselves intact and teleported into a Tokyo apartment with a strange looking black sphere at one end of the room. They soon realized that they were not alone. The others were equally bewildered and no one could give a concrete explanation on  how they got there and what's going on.

After sometime, the black sphere known as "Gantz" was activated and presented a weird mission to the people in the apartment. Gantz then opened up and to their surprise, there a bald naked man with a breathing apparatus  They also found suits and a range of weapons inside three racks that protruding from Gantz. Before they could figure out what's going on, they were teleported back out to a Tokyo suburb to commence their alien hunting mission.

The Perspective

As a newbie to the Gantz story, this movie was an entertaining introduction to the world of Gantz. The premise for Gantz was pure escapism and high octane adventure that does not shy away from gore. The concept of hunting aliens in a wide variety of forms with a range of futuristic weaponry would appeal to fans of gaming, manga and fantasy.

Perfect Distraction

Not forgetting the babelicious eye candy Kei Kishimoto (Natsuna Watanabe) who provides a nice distraction from all the alien hunting going on in Gantz.

What the movie didn't do that well was the characterization of the Kei Kurono and Masaru Kato. Both came across as whinny as they struggle with their respective issues. The whole issue with Kei Kurono's childhood dreams of being a hero and Masaru Kato's being overly worried about his brother just slow down the pace of the movie. Instead of being excited about their new powers and thinking of how to  survive the next mission, they spend their time mopping about with their past problems. Personally it just felt like the wrong genre to explore such personal issues.

But overall, Gantz was fun and a great introduction to the manga series. It might inspire one to pick up the manga to see what's missing from the movie adaptation. It also wet one's anticipation for the sequel Gantz Perfect Answer. Let's hope that Gantz does well in Singapore so that the distributor would bring in Gantz Perfect Answer.

Kei Kishimoto (Natsuna Watanabe) So Sexy and Kawaii that I am going to post her picture again!