Posts Tagged ‘Film’

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Total tally for films watched in 2007 stands at 21 in theatres and 84 on dvds, making that a total 105, or an average of 2 films per week. ( Click here to see the entire list. ) This is a 2nd consecutive drop from 124 in 2006 and 178 in 2005, but considering how busy work on Freedom is I think 105 is still a fairly decent number. Here are my top 10 favourite films of 2007, in no particular order :
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I believe I first heard of the obscure word Chiaroscuro many many years ago as an art elective student in Victoria School – My then art teacher, a distinguished Irish gentleman named Paul O’shea, was an accomplished artist who taught the subject with such passionate fervor that Art history left a deep, lasting impression on me and continues to be a big source of inspiration for my works today. Mr O’shea also pronounced Chiaroscuro ( and Contrapposto ) beautifully; I lucidly remember my classmates and me grinning in childish pleasure every time the word escaped his lips.

Chiaroscuro, simply put, means light and darkness. In painting terms, it denotes the use of deep variations in and subtle gradations of light and shade to create the illusion of three-dimensionality, often to dramatic effect. The Baroque artist Caravaggio was a champion of Chiaroscuro, creating paintings ( Supper at Emmaus, below ) as hauntingly beautiful now as they were 400 years ago.

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One of the perks of living in a big metropolis like Tokyo must be the wide and wonderful choice of art exhibitions. Over my 3 years of stay here I have been fortuitous enough to attend some truly breathtaking ones like Mucha and Pixar’s 20 Years of Animation, certainly not exhibitions that strut by your house everyday.

Kazuo Oga’s exhibition at the Tokyo Museum of Comtemporary Art, which I visited with Ros yesterday, is the latest addition to that fine list.

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Watching 300 on the big screen was a pretty intense experience. ( Yes, I know, Singapore had already screened it during the last ice-age, but in Japan the folks so need their subtitles. ) I don’t think I’ve felt so exhilarated watching a film ever since Ang Lee’s Hulk took to the skies, and that’s a full 4 years ago. I guess Japan makes up for its slow releases by printing really nice Pressbooks ( pictured below ) neat little booklets that feature the film’s synopsis, photographs, etc. As far as I know Japan is the only country that has movie Pressbooks.

While we are on the subject of 300, let’s talk alittle about Gerald Butler ( King Leonidas ). Did you know that he once appeared in 007’s Tomorrow Never Dies ? ( the one with Michelle Yeoh as the Bond Girl ) He was a crew member on a battleship and appears on screen for about one second and had a one liner – blink, scratch your nose, and you’ll miss him. Even the radar he was reading off had longer screen time. Here’s another actor with a similar story; Alfred Molina ( Doc Oct in Spiderman 2 ) in Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark. ( made in 1981, when I was two, my goodness ) Remember the early scene when Jones steals the Aztec Gold figurine and his partner makes off with it, only to get impaled on spikes ? Yep, that was Alfred Molina for you.

What’s my point ? Everyones’ gotta start somewhere, I guess. We might be small fries now, but with hard work, perseverence, and a little luck, we might just make it big in whatever we are doing…or not. Still, you enjoyed that little movie trivia…no ?

I swear, after watching Zack Snyder’s dizzyingly intense trailer for his film 300 I almost wanted to leap out of that weary cubicle seat of my, hunt down the nearest gym and sign up for 2 lifetime memberships to start working out some serious abs. Well, almost, until the thoughts of Jiro ramen ( the biggest, baddest ramen you’ll ever eat ) for lunch wafted my mind, certainly something as satisfying as having beautiful abs, though somewhat significantly easier to accomplish. Speaking of which, California Fitness Club should definitely do a tie-in with this film, and I bet they’ll see their membership numbers shoot right through the roof.

In any case, an eagerly awaited film. And when is medieval Japan’s release date for this ? Check it; June 2007, a full 3 months behind the entire universe, so lengthy a time I could have worked out leaner abs than Gerald Butler by the time it hits Japan shores. I just need to get Jiro out of my head.