some kids are dumb.

Elephant

Honestly, my ratings on elephant wasn't very high. I live through a long school day and I don't need my day to be any longer because of a movie with a kid whose day is just as long. Although the cinematography was interesting because it showed all different types of shots and angles, these shots can not make the day any more interesting.
I was not amused by watching 3 kids run down the same hallway, each one for 5 minutes. This movie based on Columbine was very predictable. Although I wasn't able to tell who was going to die, you could tell who was going to kill. I got impatient waiting for the action to happen. I was upset that it took so long and there was no follow up at the end.

However, this was a very realisitc movie. Many of the students were kids I could imagine in any school. For example, the jocks, the "popular skinny girls", the dorks, and all the nice guys. I could totally imagine all the conversations that were taking place. However, I can not relate to this movie because for me, Great Neck is nothing like this. Because I could not relate to this, I believe it was harder for me to like.

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVV.

Honestly, the mask kinda freaks me out. But so does 99% of all other masks. Anyway, Renee's movie choice was V for Vendetta. I've heard of this movie before, but, for some reason never saw it. I never knew what it was about either, but instantly in the first 5 minutes, I was hooked. I was hopelessly confused but I soon understood.

To me, this movie is about freedom and democracy - how far would you go to defend it? For V it is easy. It's his life. He spent many years plotting on his revenge towards the government. The government that killed its own people in order to gain control . This vengence is his way of showing and bringing back justice from a once great society. Besides all the chaos and killings in this movie, the plot thickens when the other protagonist, Evey (Natalie Portman) develops a particular relationship with V.
The most shocking part of the movie was when Evey was put into the same tortures as V was. Only the torture she was in was all done by V. While underground for some long period of time, the only thing that kept her going was a letter from a girl who happened to be a lesbian. The story, the only thing she had to leave behind, inspired Evey to keep going on. The most disturbing point of this was that V did this because she wanted to never fear again. A powerful statement that at the time, I don't think worked because she was too shocked. But in the long run, the only fear she had was not to become a democracy again.

Another thing I learned from this movie was that a mask creates chaos. Because of one mask, you are unknown and can do anything you want. For example on halloween, the people who have mask on, run around the school. With a mask on, you are irrational and do not think clearly, which in this movie, is a good thing.

eh. western... eh.

I never thought I would enjoy a western type film… and I didn’t. Honestly, this movie was boring. It was a typical western film. The main character, Marshall Will Kane (Gary Cooper), takes up the whole movie, minus 10 minutes, walking around his town, asking the towns people if they want to help him fight the bad guys. Obviously no one wanted to because who would be crazy enough? And stubbornly enough, all the people (people with no place in society) who wanted to fight, were turned down by Will. Will, stubbornly, fights the bad guys alone, almost gets killed, and then gets saved by his wife. The movie was predictable and boring.

But, again, Mr. Daszenski comes to the rescue to explain what this movie is about. Since I find new things interesting and amusing, this also applies to learning about movies. I think in order to fully enjoy this - or any other- movie you would have to know the time period it was filmed in. A lot of the sub text in this movie had to do with the time period; the 50's a time period where the US believed in pacifism. And after I found out that Will stands for America, everything made a lot more sense. And I started to actually... respect the film. hahaaaaa. But even with this new perspective... its still a boring movie, nonetheless. Sorry, no more movies about walking around a town please and thank you.

how to lose a guy in 10 days

I've heard a lot about this movie - all good things too. And for some reason, it’s everyone’s favorite movie. So it was on TV the other day and I finally decided to watch it. This actually exceeded my expectations. How To Lose a Guy in 10 Days is a classic chick flick. I feel like this is one of the model movies that started the modern chick flicks.

I think the one that made this movie different from any other typical chick flick was that this movie was actually laugh out loud funny – and not only at one part, MANY PARTS. I was laughing multiple times in this movie and that kind of surprised me. Why was it funny? It was clever and witty. The dialogue was surprising and all the plots are so out there it is impossible to not laugh. For example, the whole movie is about a girl, Andie (Kate Hudson), trying to get her “boyfriend”, Ben (Matthew McConaughey), to dump her because that is what her brilliant magazine article is about. So, throughout the whole movie she does what every girl shouldn’t do during a relationship. The plots she makes up in order to get the boyfriend to dump her are ridiculous. In the picture shown above, the girl pretends to have a complete meltdown over their dead love fern. Really – this movie was hilarious, intimate, and yet suspenseful – all in one.

you humans always make a mess of things

This is my second time watching this movie. Although the first time I watched this movie I really enjoyed it, watching it a second time in Art of Film really opened my eyes. The first time I watched this movie was a few years ago, I didnt think about the morals they were trying to teach, I was simply just watching the animation.

The one thing I noticed both times was the animation and imagination. The animation is so real and now that I learned that each frame was drawn, I am still mind boggled by that idea. The imagination of Miyazaki was also another thing I noticed both times. I still don't understand how Miyazaki can create such a world, with such great monsters and such an interesting plot just with his imagination.

This time, the two themes that stuck in my head - that I never realized before - was the theme of love and the environment. I dont know why but the first time I watched the movie I didnt realize that Chihiro and Haku were in love...even though Haku is a river....... [a person and a river in love?] But this love story was so inspiring because of how quickly they fell (not even fell, were destined) in love together.

The second theme I really admired about this movie was the environmental theme. I really thought it was so creative to incorporate it in an animation movie. The first point was Chihiro's parents turning into pigs. More points where we were able to see this theme was when Sen pulled out the thorn of the river god, how much no face consumed, and when Haku's river doesn't exist anymore because they built on top of it. I've never thought of a movie indirectly showing children what it is like to be gluttonous. I thought it was clever and I really think that more movies should show this concept to the world.

How To Do The Asian Squat

As an Asian... this really made me wonder about how true this was. I mean, I guess I subconsciously noticed that Asians squated differently. But... so differently that someone needs to make a short out of it? But, thats the point - to get people to notice these small cultural differences in a funny way.
Don't get me wrong - this was a pretty funny video. It was pretty ridiculous with the penny going under the shoe and the squat theory book. I'm not a fan of that kind of stuff.
But other then that... the whole short is true. "Western" squating does hurt after a while. And everyone in China, does squat like that if there are no seats available.
But this is going to make me very aware everytime I go into Flushing or Chinatown now - maybe even at home when my grandma chops chicken on the floor.
Asians have a whole different culture, so I guess this is why its so easy to make so many parodies of the culture. I had fun with this short and hope to see more.

If you liked this I recommend: Yellow Fever, by Wongfu Productions.
Its a short about how you always see a white guy with an asian girl, but never an asian guy with a white girl. It's video that a video group did for fun when they just started in college.

North by Northwest

Even though i watched North by Northwest backwards, (2nd half of the movie first, then the first half), I did enjoy it.

The movie started out great. It made me confused and wanted to know more. And by the time we find out that Kaplan is a CIA decoy, the whole movie starts to come together.

After the introduction to Eve and the scene of love, the action/thriller part of the movie starts. (Besides the plotted killing of Townsend and all the other ways of framing of Kaplan) R.O.T. gets chased down by a plane, goes to Mt. Rushmore, prentends to get shot, falls in love with Kendell, and almost falls off of Mt. Rushmore.

Besides all the heart attacks you almost get, this film, for 1959, has great special effects. This was a part of the movie that really amazed me. I was really suprised by the day for night effects and how it was used so much in this film; it seemed so realistic. The airplane blowing up was also a great effect.

I also liked all of the directors cuts. I had notice a lot that the cuts he makes in his movie are realistic and make the film better. A couple of the directors cuts that made the movie interesting was when Thornhill had bourbon poured in front of him and the next thing we see is was him driving drunk. Another example was when Thornhill and Kendell were in the room together, then Hitchcock cuts it and shows us the picture of the sunset and the darkness coming - we all know what was going to happen. All these cuts, make the watchers imagination be put to use and let us imagine things on our own.

All in all, the movie was pretty good. It felt cliched - but, I think I only say that because it resembles so much to the 007 movies. I recommend it to anyone who loves James Bond, aka people who love action, romance, thrillers and mysteries.