Category: Movie Review

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “Music and Lyrics” at UA Cinema, Time Square, Causeway Bay

Impressive performance by Drew Barrymore. She sure have come a long way since her performance in Steven Spielberg’s “E.T.” and her come back movie “Charlie’s Angels.

On the other hand Hugh Grant’s performance is nothing special. He plays his typical British school boy character that he does in every movie he appears in.

All in all this was a movie designed to be released during Valentine’s Day. Although entertaining I should not have paid to see it at a theater.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “Night at the Museum” at Ocean Terminal, Golden Harvest Theater, Tsim Sa Tsui.

Another typical Ben Stiller style movie. Like the characters he played in the “Meet the Parents” series, his character in this movie is also common and a bit nerdy, who is down in his luck.

There were a lot of famous cast to support Stiller’s performance, like his opposite from Meet the Parents, “Owen Wilson, Robin Williams, Dick Van Dyke and Mickey Rooney.

Even with all the big names supporting casts the movie is only barely entertaining. Fortunately, I have the large quantities of CGI to fill the my remainder lack of interest for the movie.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “Blood Diamond” at UA Cinema, Time Square, Causeway Bay.

This movie was not originally on my Must See Movies list, but after running into a friend and he gave the move rave review, that led me to revisit the possibility of watching this movie in the theater.

At first when I saw the preview and heard Leonardo DiCaprio‘s accent I don’t know whether I can belief him to be a South African. When I watched the movie I was able to forget totally that he was an American.

The movie appears to give a very true portrayal of the racial conflict in Sierra Leone. Of course, I would not know since I was not actually there during the 1990’s.

Hopefully this movie will cause people to be more conscientious of the source of the diamonds they purchase, and the possible atrocity associated with the mining of the diamonds.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “The Holiday” at UA Cinema, Whampoa.

The cast chosen for this movie were just perfect, Cameron Diaz, Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Jack Black and Eli Wallach. The characters fit the stereotypes of what majority of people have for these actors. Some may say it was to extreme, but to say anymore will give away the movie.

All I can say is, if you’re a women in a relationship, a women in a bad relationship, a women in the end of a relationship… oh well… if you are a women you should go see this movie. If you are a sensitive man; even if it is self proclaimed, you should go see this movie also.

If you have seen my previous review, then you will too be surprised that I give this movie a higher penguin rating than “Casino Royale“. It is mainly due to this movie’s entertainment factor and Casino Royale was very disappointing to me.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “Casino Royale” at UA Cinema, Time Square, Causeway Bay.

I feel this new James Bond (#21), Daniel Craig, just doesn’t have the flare that a James Bond character should have. The usual must-not-miss opening scene was extremely disappointing. Normally it is one of the most anticipated part of a James Bond movie. After seeing the opening scene from the latest James Bond movie, I should have known not to expect too much for the rest of the movie.

Not that I must have the sexual connotation female character names that one expects in all James Bond movies, but this one does not have any of them. The Bond girl, Vesper Lynd; played by Eva Green was a newbie who did not look old enough to be a Bond girl.

They tried to have twist and turns in the plot, but as a result left the audience wondering when and if the movie is ending.

At the end they did the cheesy scene of showing the audience there is more to come, which is the already announced sequel, working titles “Bond 22” and “Risico”, anticipated release of 2008, again staring Daniel Craig as James Bond.

If it is not because I will watch every James Bond movie and that there was nothing else to watch, I would have waited for the DVD or iTunes.

So this holiday season, if you are sick of eating left overs, watched every Christmas themed movie and saw all other movies in the Theater then give this one a try.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “The Guardian” at UA Cinema, Time Square, Causeway Bay.

It has been a while since I’ve seen any Kevin Costner movies. I was going to watch “The Upside of Anger” (at IMDB) and “Rumor Has It…” (at IMDB) last years (2005), but never got around to them.

The last movie I saw Costner in was “The Postman” and he was not that good. So I was presently surprise to see Costner’s performance in this movie, but then it may be because I did not have too high of expectation.

The other characters in the movie except Ben Randall’s (Costner’s character) wife (“Sela Ward“) were actors whom we were accustom to staring in comedy movies, so it was a bit hard, for me, to see them in serious roles. Through out the movie I was expecting these other actors to break out in some sort of comedy skid.

Overall, this movie was enjoyable and had good mixture or humor, romance and drama. I was taken by surprise to see Costner carried the movie mostly on his own.

So, if you have time give this one a try, but if there is a choice you can either save this one for next time round or wait for the DVD.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “World Trade Center” at UA Cinema, Time Square, Causeway Bay.

I went in to see this movie because of Nicolas Cage. Unfortunately, even with Nicolas Cage, this movie has very little substance.

I find that the movie is capitalizing on a sensitive subject and event, ridding on the coat tails of the audiences’ emotions on the subject and not the result of the performances of the actors in the movie.

I do not believe the movie studios are contributing any of the proceeds from the movie to charities, but I think they should. As I do not think it is fair for a company to be capitalizing on a disaster, which has such a large global effect.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “Click” on DVD.

First of all, I want to say that I do not illegally obtain movies or purchase illegal copies of movies. The DVD I saw the movie on was purchased by a friend and lent to me for viewing.

I am glad that I did not spend the, increasingly, expensive theater price to watch this movie. I had heard poor reviews in the USA when the movie was released there. I had already decided to wait for the DVD to be release before watching the movie.

The only thing that saved the movie was Adam Sandler. He was a his normal funny “mature” self. Fortunately, not the “Happy Gilmore” character.

I really do not know what happened to “Christopher Walken“, he keeps appearing in silly roles like this “Morty” character in Click.

If it was not for Sandler this would have been another flop for Sony Pictures.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I saw the movie “The Devil Wears Prada” on DVD.

First of all, I want to say that I do not illegally obtain movies or purchase illegal copies of movies. The DVD I saw the movie on was purchased by a friend and lent to me for viewing.

I am glad that I did not spend the, increasingly, expensive theater price to watch this movie. I had heard poor reviews in the USA when the movie was released there. I had already decided to wait for the DVD to be release before watching the movie.

Without the anchor of the academy winning actress, Meryl Streep, this movie would have been another flop.

For some reason I just cannot get away from seeing Anne Hathaway as the innocent little girl of the “The Princess Diaries” movies. May be is the overly large eyes of her. I did not see her in Brokeback Mountain, but she really needs to get more roles unlike the “Andy Sachs” character to rid that typecast; at least for me.

Yes, this movie does have many nice clothes, but just by looking at the title of the movie, you would have guessed the heavy than usual product placements in the movie. Some of the products placed were: Apple Computers Inc., Dolce & Gabbana, Karl Lagerfeld, J.K. Rowling, and of course Prada.

With all that product placements and a weak story plot, this movie is more like a elaborate commercial than a motion picture.

It is obvious where Fox Pictures found the money to pay the salaries of the actors, but will they [Fox] make a profit, that will depend on how many women wants pay to go see an on screen fashion show.

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere

My Rating:

This evening I went to see the movie “The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift” at GH Cinema Ocean Terminal, Tsim Sha Tsui.

Wow…. Awesome!!

This movie definitely did not fall into the sequel trap. Being the third rendition of The Fast and The Furious series: “The Fast and The Furious” and “2 Fast 2 Furious“, it came through with original scenes, special effects, story and most definitely driving.

I may be a bit bias, being one who love drifting for some time.

Anyone who had not seen drifting this movie will definitely show you what that is all about. All the drift shots were done by real professional Japanese drifters. Even the cast were given a 2 hours introduction to drifting so that they understand and get a feel of what the “sport” is all about.

There were many amazing shots, thanks to the professional drifters and stunt drivers. Being able to pull it off in the streets of Tokyo; a movie production hostile city, made it that much more incredible.

Last year there was a movie, Initial-D about Japanese drifters based on a Japanese cartoon, made by a Hong Kong production company, but this time Hollywood really showed the Chinese production company what Hollywood could do with a similar story.

I strongly recommend this movie to all those who loves driving particularly drifting.

All I can say is that, fortunately I do not have a car in Hong Kong at the moment or drove to see the movie…

Rating Legend:
	Not to be missed
	Wait for the DVD
	Buy from iTunes Store
	Rent it if you can
	Waste your time elsewhere