Category Archives: movies

movies

i want the boxed set!!!

batman begins is awesome! gives me reason to love the character more. i havent explored the books but ive been a fan of the first two films and although continuity is disrupted from this prequel to the next two films by tim burton, it doesnt matter either way. batman begins is batman.

fantastic cast! fantastic script! it nailed me the first few minutes into the film! direction was great, nolan didnt disappoint. he understood well the man behind the mask, the man who is defined not by who he is but by his actions. the thesis of this superhero is that he never had supernatural powers. and this batman isnt superhuman. he gets bruises and he falls down too. it’s fascinating being privy to the psyche of the bat-man. he clearly has his issues. and when he picks himself up, we cheer.

too bad bateman’s kevlar suit wasnt inherited by his descendant michael keaton who wore rubber suits in the supposed next two films, which protected him from bullets at point blank but suffered punctures from catwoman’s nails. im not the least disappointed, tim burton’s versions were fun (batman) and bittersweet (batman returns). nolan’s was memorable.

like i said, kill schumacher. “off with his head.”
vicky vale: “i like men in black rubber.”
batman: “try a fireman. less to take off.”
– batman (1990)

batman: “why are you doing this? let’s just take him to the police, then go home together. don’t you see, we’re the same, split down the middle. Please.”
catwoman: “bruce, I could live with you in your castle forever. just like in a fairy tale. i just couldn’t live with myself. so don’t pretend this is a happy ending.”
– batman returns (1992)
 

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movies

rent !

mygas! ive waited for so long for this and finally it will happen. a movie version of the broadway hit RENT is currently nearing the end of shoot and will find its way to theaters by november. im so excited!

Rent

ive listened to it a hundred times and it always affects me. the message is timeless and universal. i wanted to try out (audition) for this but back then i was too shy (now im just shy hehehe) so i resorted to performing the whole thing mostly by myself in showers, while cooking or on roadtrips and just about anywhere.

cant wait! most of the original cast are in the film (anthony rapp, adam pascal, jesse l. martin, taye diggs, idina medzel, wilson jermaine herrera, –o memorize ko pa sila hahaha– and newbies rosario dawson and tracie something) and that’s like, some ulitmate trip. kinda like watching a new beatles movie with the resurrected beatles acting in it.

coolness! yeba!

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movies, musings

john williams and the galaxy

one of the few people i know who have traveled far into the cold depths of the galaxy is john williams. it just explains why he has rendered such beautiful and classic musical scores for sci-fi films like star wars, superman and e.t.

i scrambled around the metropolis to buy the album soundtrack of episode 3 coz i thought that was the best. not only did the movie showcase key themes from past star wars films (duel of the fates, across the stars–love them of anakin and padme, imperial march, luke and leia’s theme, yoda’s theme, etc) the album also includes a dvd insert that features music videos of these themes heheheh

cool advance birthday gift for myself. hehehe

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filmmaking, movies, musings

getting excited of going back to roots

jhem and i had been talking about doing his full length video again, “blangko,” a horror-comedy. independent films are fun especially if youre doing it with friends. i miss the feel of indie productions where you chip in instead of getting paid, and the fact that your equipment is low standard because you cant afford the big keg lights. yet the film output is great because the concept has always that.

in the meantime we slave over the production of “agua de mayo” which is taking the toll on our health and our psychological state of minds. ive been plagued by wants to run off the boondocks of mindanao or the depths of the ocean. be a hermit up in the hills or bum around the family house in cagayan. nothing wrong wih the production, it’s just getting so stressful for me.

hay naku, buhay. in the meantime, here’s a pic of me with liza lorena. she is one of a kind, makulit, exremely thoughtful and very kind. we got to eat at her house while checking out her costumes. she sends forwarded messages and quotes once in a while.

ok, another pic. with charlene who’s remained beautiful and statuesque. during the shoot of lactacyd tvc and print-ads with aga muhlach (printad photographer raymond isaac)

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movies

LOTR extended versions boxed set p350 quiapo

i already bought the extended versions of LOTR: fellowship and two towers.i will be getting return of the king extended version soon (the boxed set i got only has the theater version of ROTK). watching this film, i cant believe the setmen and crew are soo cuckoo. filming for 16months, the logistics is a nightmare, and the continuity of props hell! i salute their production artdept crew! the scope and breadth of the filming is indeed a gargantuan task and the art department had been more than capable and id love to work with these people just to experience the disclipline and their dedication plus acquire their work ethics.

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movies

star wars episode 3: the end of george’s scriptwriting days

have watched episode 3 and i thought production was great, the nostalgia one feels is much greater here and that has become the factor for people to forgive how bad a scriptwriter george lucas is. at best it’s a fitting introduction to episodes 4 5 6. i loved the sets, great homage to the original star wars decayed environment.

and i want to get the soundtrack of episode 3. it’s sort of a compilation of the great themes for star wars by john williams. in the film you hear everything from battle of the fates, anakin’s love theme, luke and leia’s theme, imperial march, yoda’s theme, star wars main fanfare and more. great album i bet 🙂 and it got a dvd extra hehehe

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filmmaking, movies

back from pampanga and still alive

had to work out the remains on the shoot of dante mendoza’s new film, now currently titled “agua de mayo,” title courtesy of service driver andy oyo-a.

im still alive, thank God. it’s been a harrowing experience shooting the reception scenes. who would have thought the costume rentals didnt send johnny delgado and cherry pie picache’s barong with the rest of the gowns? and we were to shoot in 10 minutes? and the barongs are to come from angeles pa, about 30 to an hour away? and liza lorena arrives on the set in pampanga and realizes her wigs and accessories are left in antipolo (and you cant get angry because she’s such a nice person)?

and you begin to run out of food props because the extras started eating them all up? and they didnt bring polos and some came wearing spaghetti straps for a wedding? and the waiters didnt bring enough uniforms with them? and i sent for a few more? and the waiters forgot to bring them down the service vehicle? and when we were to start shooting the service vehicle suddenly left? and you run out of excuses? and there really is no way to take out the frown on my forehead except at end of the day because it’s the end of the day?
still from the film currently shooting (pics by julius). here is gammy viray, johnny delgado and alan paule (seated on the couch).

kaleldo 1

pic of cherry pie fixing her lapel (body mic). there’s me, direk dante and AD william.

kaleldo 2

it’s hard working production designer when your director is also a PD. the pressure can be terribly mind-blowing. i wont go into details, all i can do is keep my head at bay and continue working. although i learned that in this line of work there are no quitters (patayan na kung patayan), im near collapsing and giving up already. yet life goes on and perhaps something good will do come out of this. thus the wind continue to blow through angel aquino’s hair.

pic of me (in a more relaxed mode) and juliana palermo in between takes. at least i can still joke around with juliana while preparing for the next setup. she of course is bisaya (from davao, we first worked together in http://www.xxx.com) and she is jus very kalog and easy to work with. people will see her in a different light in this film, it’s a far cry from her public image, and her character here showcases her real easy-going self.

juliana palermo and ben padero

juliana palermo

it’s almost 9pm and i havent had dinner. will get back to you.

(2 hrs after dinner – box o’ rice jamalaya regular)

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movies

the aviator

the aviator: flying friendlier skies
the wave of the future

watched aviator last monday when my boss dante and i found ourselves with time to waste in between meetings in makati. i was surprised by the film because i didnt really think id like it, but i did. leonardo’s performance was really good here, i never really liked him and although people have lauded his talent since he was a kid, i never was bowled over. in the aviator i felt he just upped himself and entered jack nicholson’s level of intensity. you cant get away with the boyish body that he possesses but his performance was engaging. at one point i even saw him get into tom cruise territory (tom in born on the fourth of july) –although i also dont really like tom cruise. actually he’s better than tom probably hehehe the only time i liked tom cruise were in born on the fourth of july and last samurai. ok you can add top gun to the list (we grew up watching that flick).

titanic was alright, though it was more kate winslet’s film (who, btw, didnt win for eternal sunshine, which is a bummer, my bet was on her on account that it was my favorite film). i liked leo better in baz lhurmann’s romeo and juliet, mainly because he was more fitting as the other half of two young star-crossed lovers there. but in aviator he surprisingly fitted howard hughes’ bearded look and age.

cate blanchett was a real thrill in the film. she was wonderful as katherine hepburn, her characer had the tendency to just be a copy of somebody famous except that cate filled her up with this feeling, breathing character who loved hughes despite everything else. i loved that scene at the door when hughes tells her he cant come out because he havent shaved. she retorts, “so have i.” and all throughout the scene we see all this history and pain and graciousness between these two ex-lovers. asteg talaga the film (spoken like a true cono hehehe).

scorsese could have won oscar for this film but maybe he’ll only get a lifetime achievement award (hopefully not posthumously). anyhu, there are still ray and constantine that i have to watch before they find themselves out of the theater. if i had the resources i could have just watched them on pirated dvds but my player’s conked out. that leaves me no choice but to dish out for greenbelt glorietta and galleria.

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movies

the phantom of the opera

trashing the phantom of the opera
schumacher’s folley

saw this last week. was texting diane (mod poink 123) and jm (epikunwari) and mike (checkeredegg) if they wanted to watch it with me one friday night (or was it a thursday). diane was off to baguio to do her thesis and jm was with a group date. mike and zee couldnt make it so it was gonna be just jetro (no cyber counterpart) and me.

spoiler alert. i will be nitpicking phantom here so if you havent seen it or dont want to read my review of a bad film, dont proceed hehehe

i had my reservations when i heard gerard butler’s voice in the trailer, he isnt musical theater material in the first place. i read he had a rock band background, but his voice, well, it seemed he was talking through his lines and you could only go so far as to doing this technique. and since some notes would need to be sustained for 4 bits or 16 bits, his droning becomes disturbing more than his character.

thankfully he was an actor enough to express all angst the phantom felt on the day they did not do all that the phantom asked of them. but what mainly got my goat with this film is schumacher. joel f*****’ schumacher. he is the curse of the phantom. no doubt about the set, which was fabulous, and the music of webber, a classic, the phantom of the opera was a ready hit for greatness on film. and then a director like schumacher comes in.

there are ways of course, on how to handle such a material and still make a killing at the mainstream movie box office. get good looking actors. schumacher got butler, who we saw as lara croft’s tomb raider boyfriend in the cradle of life and in crichton’s timeline. it however turned unfortunate that butler is too handsome to be terrifying or too young to be the phantom, i think. he lacked seniority and this particular dominating presence to overpower christine daae with his greatness at master class. on scenes when you should be enraptured not by all this mystery about the phantom but also the power of his singing performance, the actor doesnt soar. he however looks pathetic and comes out as some insane opera ghost, a fool roaming around the halls. and i dont blame butler for this, he was miscast.

another way to tackle this film is get a good-looking actor who could sing. emma rossum is beautiful and looks perfect as christine daae, angelic, sweet, innocent and likely to be victim to the angel of music’s hypnotic presence. and she can sing. unfortunately, she cant sing opera. and the role of christine requires you sing opera. it is amusingly irritating that after carlotta sings “think of me” christine replaces her with a below-standard rendition of the aria. an added blow yet, she sang it pop! in fact, there were a lot of singing that was made easy for her by singing in pop and the orchestra getting louder to drown out her sustained, unsustained notes, like her high c at the end of the song “the phantom of the opera.” again, another unfortunate casting. i was thinking they should have picked actors from broadway instead. and i hated when her notes is already sang out loud yet her mouth opens as if she was singing at a whisper! kainis. her face should have been distorted, with her mouth wide open and her veins sticking out, or at least like sarah brightman (who sang the original christine), her eyes would be wide open and you could see her brain from her esophagus. again i blame schumacher.

patrick wilson (playing the vicomte raoul de chagny) was a saving grace in the singing department. his performance in key songs like “all i ask of you” was more than welcome, to say the least. that would probably be all i can say about him. he was, btw, in angels in america. didnt know he could sing, and that was an interesting revelation.

schumacher directing the phantom of the opera is abysmal. choice of actors, treatment of the musical (pop singing in an opera?), acting direction (christine and her dazed, unaffected performance), blocking and staging (masquerade, point of no return, and wishing you were here again, among others, were sorely lacking of emotional and plot-driven direction), story development (schumacher too early revealed phantom’s itsura by putting too much light on him in the lair scene with christine) and so on and so forth.

so is it really that bad? not really. loved miranda richardson (as madam giry) and minnie driver (as carlotta) was great in the film. webber’s music is still magical, except that singing performances matter a big deal in musicals and we have substandard singers hitting his notes. didnt schumacher learn anything from the recent musicals that came out? chicago! moulin rouge! evita! aside from being good actors, everybody sang well and with so much emotion you cant help but cry.

dont get me wrong, i love the phantom of the opera. i havent seen the show onstage but i listened to the original london cast a whole lot and ive read the libretto. michael crawford, sarah brightman and michael ball. man, they were the best. and im not saying that because they were the original performers. like with les miserables, the singers change but the quality of the singing does not.

and comparing the works of past directors tackling a webber musical, alan parker and norman jewison did magnificently with evita and jesus christ superstar respectively. madonna may not be an actor but she outdid herself in evita, and her singing got a whole deal better. antonio banderas IS che. even if webber company released JCS 2000 i still loved jewison’s film version of jesus christ superstar. thing is, the singing was never compromised. they are musicals in the first place. and i cant help but compare POTO to evita especially. parker did such a great job with evita, the scope and grandeur of argentina, evita’s campaign for leadership and monopoly, historical facts and whatnot, they were all there. schumacher made crap of his film version. if he wanted great acting, he should have just gone to the real source and not based it from the musical. besides the acting wasnt even that good.

if baz lhurmann did the phantom of the opera, he might take it into a totally different direction but judging from his direction in strictly ballroom and his musical experience with moulin rouge, id think he’d do greatly with POTO. parker already done fame the film and evita. why didnt he just do phantom too? im griping and bitter. jhem (evil teleri) told me this has turned into another passion of the christ for me. i so wanted to love the film but it just left me frustrated and disappointed. i hope they dont compromise les miserables and miss saigon in the film versions. and rent should remain true to its spirit.

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movies

return to the point of no return

watching the phantom of the opera again

keep your hands at the level of your eyes
must be something in my head. although i hated the film i couldnt keep away from the music of webber so i coaxed faisal to meet up with me and watch the phantom last saturday. the 2nd time around it wasnt so bad. i got over how bad their singing were and just let the music and the book flow through.

but that still doesnt excuse schumacher. ha!

a lot of things were confirmed from the first time i saw the film, like indeed butler was too young (and apparently a lot of the reviews out on print followed this common perspective). the singers on the film are an acquired taste, and are hard to take in, but perhaps as it goes they grow on you. maybe after the 5th viewing i wouldnt mind much that this version is below standard. i also had an issue with the editing! how the film was cut totally prevented some scenes from soaring into nirvana. like when butler runs and starts singing “you will curse the day you did not do,” on the rooftop, among other things. the cut to the next shot was a bit late, so it stops you from going into a semblance of orgasm. in spite of butler’s singing that would have been a great scene if not for the editing. faisal also was not impressed by the film version, he being another connoisseur of musicals, classical or otherwise.

i forgot to mention in my first review that i was surprised webber acted as producer for this flick (and co-wrote the screenplay with schumacher). am i missing something here? maybe i just didnt get the grandiose setup of phantom of the opera the musical, as how he understood it or saw it in his mind. either that or webber is a lousy filmmaker.

was with astarte lorybeth and ronnie last sunday. the conversation during dinner was peppered with songs from phantom and angst from watching the film. loribeth claims she’d turn a better christine. astarte and i felt that the film could have been better. ronnie commented id enjoy pedro penduko more. and most likely i might.

even the trip to ncca intramuros and eventually malate last night was not saved from lamenting the doomed christine. drei (manofmars) enjoyed the film not as one, but more on its music (or that’s how i got it). his friend cedric also didnt like the film. jm (epikunwari) doesnt have plans to watch it so bully for you.

the second viewing of the phantom of the opera was nevertheless a more enjoyable experience. i was, in a way, over my disappointment and frustration. i came in the theater hoping to have a good time (and knowing that i know what will disappoint me i chose not to be distracted) and i did. funny that nearing the part that christine seeks out his father’s ghost and singing “wishing you were somehow here again,” i began to feel drowsy again. and so i noticed on both occasions when i watched the film i was beginning to doze off at the same part. i thought i was just tired during my first experience with the phantom but to have it happen to me twice!

what kind of dark, voodoo magic is the phantom weaving and casting on his audience?

minnie driver is still funny and miranda richardson demands your utmost respect, i love her cute french accent. the vicomte is still a sissy towards the end (i had the same reaction when i first heard the london cast recording), crying and singing out and being helpless and all.

surprisingly the “point of no return” was a rather powerful scene. i would have enjoyed it the first time if i didnt fall asleep. this time i was battling to keep awake, and i was successful half of the time. there was a particular intensity and a dark undercurrent of sensual power felt in the scene as christine and the phantom were battling their own erotic desires of belonging and submission. and i wished she didnt have to rip off his mask but just let the song go on and on past the point of no return.

in a way i cant hate musicals forever. in fact, there has never been one that i hated. that was why it surprised me why i reacted violently to the film. they still should have gotten actors from the stage. they should have gotten a musical director. wait, i meant a director adept at musicals. they should have gotten a different choreographer (masquerade was crap!). they should have built bigger sets. oh well. you cant have it all. not all can be a moulin rouge. or a west side story. and webber can apparently do a bad version of himself.

and what is it with keeping your hands at the level of your eyes? anybody, enlighten me please 🙂 cuzin ej? dianeski?

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