How long would you wait for love?

Florentino Ariza (Javier Bardem) spends his lifetime to wait for the woman of his life, Fermina Daza (Giovanna Mezzogiorno). At a very young age, the telegraph operator has set his heart for the beautiful young maiden. They have even agreed to marry, until Fermina’s father sends her to live in the village far from City of Cartagena. Living apart, Fermina realises that this love is just an illusion which blinded her heart. She agrees to marry Dr Urbino (Benjamin Bratt), who’s handsome, well-educated and a highly-respected person.

Rejected by Fermina after waiting for so long doesn’t make Ariza changes his heart. He tries even harder to make himself a ‘better person’. He vows to stay pure for her. When he finally breaks the vow to some 600 women in his lifetime, his heart never shift its devotion from Fermina.

The movie is an adaption work from a masterpiece novel of the same title written by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Although I’ve never read the novel, I wouldn’t be surprised if people despise the movie. I, for example, couldn’t see the relation between cholera and love from this movie. If I should refer about this only from Ariza’s mother’s statement who mistakenly remembered her son falling blindly in love for Fermina with a cholera, I think that’s very shallow and insignificant way of making the connection.

For a Don Juan, Ariza seems growing far too old than the other main characters in the movie. I understand he carries a huge burden and desire all of his life, but I would expect him to look at least similarly old with Fermina & Urbino (not older) after some 50 years later and so many women! He even looks older than his own uncle.

Nonetheless, this is an excellent and inspirational love story. A so-so movie with great settings, though.

My rating: 3/6

This is the weirdest movie I’ve seen! I still don’t get what the movie is all about, yet I actually enjoyed watching it especially with the role that Reynolds played. Consists of three parts, small part of each linked to the others although each part can go as a stand alone “short movie”. However, it’s the combination of those three that explains what is The Nines and what is “wrong” with Gary/Gavin/Gabriel (Ryan Reynolds).

Basically every life-being has a number, and God being number 10 and human number 7. In between there are The Nines, who are almost perfect, and Koalas. Unconsciously, Gary controls his fate and the kind of life he wants to live in. Strangely enough, he can’t make them perfect because he always bumps into problems that force him to wake up and re-shape the life, incidentally killing the characters that were previously involved in his life. On every “life”, there are three other characters who always there: the witty and charming Margaret/Melissa/Mary (Melissa McCarthy), the sharp and mysterious Sarah/Susan/Sierra who keeps giving the wake-up call (Hope Davis), and the kid, Noelle (Elle Fanning).

Because each part runs in a short span, we cannot predict what’s coming our way until it changed into a different story altogether. It’s the kind of a lite sci-fi movie, even though you don’t get it, you can still enjoy it. All in all, you can use your imagination to comprehend the whole thing. Was Gary an angel though??

My rating: 5/6

This movie airs in cinema sometimes last year. I just happen to miss it until I saw this weird plush toy at my friend’s car. She said it’s CJ7. What on earth is that?

Although very poor, Chow Ti (Stephen Chow) dreams big for his son. Chow Ti sends Dicky (Xu Jiao) to study at an expensive school hoping that one day his son will have better future. Dicky is practically a mock for the whole school. He wears dirty uniform and ragged shoes his father found at the garbage dump. Chow Ti feels bad that he couldn’t afford fancy toy like CJ1 robot for Dicky, so he went to the garbage dump and found an orb for Dicky to play with. He told his son that this orb is way much better than CJ1.

Strange thing happens at night when Dicky was locked inside the cabinet because he was very naughty. The orb transform into a cute little pet. Dicky’s imagination goes wild, he believes his new pet is the solution for all his problems including getting high score on the school test. So when he failed, he blamed his pet which he named CJ7.

Okay, now I remember why I didn’t watch this movie although I knew Chow was in it. It has aliens! I just don’t click with aliens. The movie is a bit weird, I never get the full laugh or the full melancholy. It still has comical jokes a la Chow though and it’s a good watch for the kids so they’ll learn about parents unconditional love, making friends, study and things that money can’t buy.

My rating: 3/6

Earl Brooks (Kevin Costner) has just been voted as “Man of the Year”. He is calm, successful, a loving husband and father. Everything is perfect for him. But behind the perfect life of Mr. Brooks, hides a psycho who’s addicted to murder, who takes murder as an art, who’s extremely good at it. No one ever suspects him, until his latest murder takes a witness. His secret is in jeopardy if the witness talks. If that is not enough of a problem, now his daughter also comes home with a huge secret which daddy has to take care of.

It’s not everyday to watch Kevin Costner plays a bad guy like this. Even as a psycho, we could still his usual charming character. In this movie Costner has an alter-ego (played by William Hurt) whom Mr. Brooks communicates with regularly. This character emphasizes Mr. Brook’s smartness and sharp mind as an individual with double personality. The alter-ego is strong, but not too powerful. Mr. Brooks proves he’s in charge most of the time.

I have a mixed feeling about this movie. Costner is good, considering he’s not much of a killer type but he manages to make me think that “Wow, even prince charming could commit murder!”. I personally would like to see more from Demi’s role in here. Demi Moore as an ambitious police detective is too forget-able. The best part of the movie is definitely the impression it made afterwards. A psycho can hide in everyman. A psycho is about controlling mind. A psycho is also human with basic feelings: love and fear.

My rating: 4/6

Most often, we prefer what others have than our own. We think others live a better life than what we’re going through. Meet Penelope (Christina Ricci). A sweet girl born to a super rich family. She has everything any girl wants, but freedom. Her family was cursed. The first daughter born from the Wilhern family will have the look of a pig!

She’s locked in her house all of her life while Mom (Catherine O’Hara) is trying to find a ‘ pure blue blood’ to marry Penelope so that the spell can be broken. Every rich boy who saw her face ran away in agony. Who wants to marry a girl with a snout? Penelope suffers because she doesn’t have the ‘normal’ look, but her Mom makes it worse with her marriage arrangement, possessiveness and constant whines!

After more than a decade, this is the first time again I saw Ricci on a film. The last one was “Now and Then” in 1995. Surprisingly, her look doesn’t change much. She plays very well in this modern fairy tale, not too pretty and not overly ugly. Her snout makes her just unusual and we don’t pity her at all because she has stronger personality inside. James McAvoy also plays very well. Casual, charming and down to earth. The kind of guy next door that we want to meet. I wonder if the chemistry between them is real? It’s too believable!

With or without curse, love will find its way. And Penelope is not always an obedient girl, her spirit finally breaks free after she ran away from home (from Mom to be exact). She learns to love herself the way she is (mmm… and this kinda reminds me of “Ella Enchanted”).

My rating: 4/6

Norton’s Hulk looks way superior compared to the previous one (definitely better hair). This time the green superhero looks decent, rather handsome with sparkling eyes. This version of Hulk should be used as future Hulk reference and the previous one should never again be mentioned!

Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) lives as fugitive because the gamma radiation he got from a university experiment makes him unable to control his emotions. Every time his heart-pulse increase, Bruce is transformed into an angry monster. Living far from the people he knows helps him to keep calm. Unfortunately, an incident at his work in Brazil leads the army to spot his location. Bruce is now racing to find the person who can cure him, while the army is one step behind to capture him.

It’s good that the movie balances the actions with showing Banner’s life while in exile. How hard he tries to control his emotion, living as normal as possible without making a scene, he tries every possibility to get the cure. Norton’s soft face is perfect to play the man with so much pressure and secret on his chest. Hulk gets a real match when Major Blotsky (Tim Roth) is transformed into Abomination, a combination of heartless and ambitious man with superpower.

The Hulk never looks this good both as a monster and as a fugitive.

My rating: 4/6

As a terror analyst at Control, a spy agency similar to CIA, Maxwell Smart is one of the best. However, his deepest dream is to become the real field agent, just like the inspirational Agent 23 (Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson), the charming mojo at work. Recently, Control Headquarter was attacked and undisclosed information about all its agents has also been compromised by terrorist group K.A.O.S. Have no other choice, Control’s Chief must now send Smart to be an agent partnering with Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway) whose identity is still intact. They must find out K.A.O.S plan and stop it.

When an expert agent meets an agent-wannabe, all they care is about who’s leading who and who has better gadgets, until they realize that it wasn’t so bad to work together, especially because Agent Smart is ready to give whatever it takes to prove that he’s worth a true agent.

With Steve Carrel on the spotlight, we can be sure to get many slapstick acts to trigger laughter. I was skeptical that this movie will do good, surprisingly it actually does, not much to keep the claps flowing but it is entertaining. The first quarter was a bit boring though, so be prepared not to give up too easily.

Anyway, the movie posters are total crap. Whoever designed it, has purposefully covered one face in there either with hairs or a tie or a gun. Bah. Is that’s supposed to be funny? I rather think it’s a bad design. Let me just put the one that has full faces in it, that’s the best one so far ^.^

My rating: 3/6

Who would believe that Po, the fat lazy Panda, is the Dragon Warrior? He could hardly move between the noodle tables, he struggles to climb the thousand stairs to the Valley of Peace, and he’s the son of a noodle seller. But somehow, Master Oogway points his finger to Po when choosing the Dragon Warrior. According to the wise master, there’s no such thing like coincidence. Everyone was amazed. Blown with shock, to be exact.

Trained by Master Shifu and the Furious Five, their mission is to get rid of the humiliating presence of Po in the valley. There’s no way a fat lazy Panda could be trained in such a short time, be given the big responsibility to hold the secret to everything, and to defeat the infuriated Tai Lung, a snow leopard warrior that excel above and beyond his own master.

As if we don’t have enough everything that made in China, now we have to believe that Panda is actually a warrior hahaha… Kidding :) His butt may be huge, but Po is a very determined Panda. They can hit him, insult him, burn him, acupuncture him… and he just laughs! Hahahaha… And there’s another thing that’s good in him besides his love for his birdie father (do you really believe that’s Po’s father??), Po will do anything for food! Well, at least his motivation comes from inside right?

Po is suitably voiced by Jack Black, Master Shifu by Dustin Hoffman, the sharp Tigress is voiced by Angelina Jolie and Tai Lung by Ian McShane and the movie is directed by Mark Osborne and Jack Stevenson.

Loaded with may good messages for both kids and adults, Kung Fu Panda is perfect to start the summer movies parade and the school holiday. It’s hillarious, colourful, and very cute! A must watch. Just never judge a Panda by the looks and its butt size.

My rating: 5/6

This is one of few most extraordinary action movies I have watched. The plot is simple, the main characters are around 5 people, but the settings, the effects and the ending are fabulous.

Some best friends are trapped in the middle of Manhattan, NY, when the whole city is attacked by a giant monster that came out of nowhere. They have to make decisions: to run away, or to save friends and come back for the ones they love. Tough choice.

What makes this movie such an interesting one is one of the characters, Hud (TJ Miller) also acts as a cameraman. He holds a regular video camera most of the time and with a lot of shaking and blurry focus, the audience feels like watching an amateur movie (like the ones we often do at Youtube). This gives the movie a realistic feel.

Hud is also accompanied by Marlena (Lizzy Caplan), Rob (Michael Sthal-David), Lily (Jessica Lucas), Beth (Odette Yustman), and Jason (Mike Vogel).

My Rating: 4/6

Robert Neville (Will Smith) has survived an epidemic in New York City. He’s a a military scientist and he never gives up trying to find what caused all the chaos. The epidemic has turned most victims into monsters, the ones he has to avoid all the time.

The way he plays a character, as usual, is outstanding. He goes around the city looking for his daily needs during the day, since the victims are so sensitive to the sunlight. He also broadcasts the information he has on the radio, hoping that some people out there would eventually listen to it. This movie somehow reminds me of The Cast Away, where the main character has to keep talking to a volley ball for the sake of staying sane. The difference is, Nevile has the conversations with his dog.

My Rating: 5/6