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Tonight was the first night of Dark Knight’s release in Vietnam. I saw it at Vincom in Hanoi, had the best seats in the house, in my opinion. (Thanks Thuy)

As much a Batman fan as I am, I have to side with Kyle “you won’t be disappointed. you just may not think it’s the greatest movie of all time.” it’s not but it is very, very good” and Trench.

John said it was the best movie of all time, something I suggested myself in January, but more jokingly. Emil and Mike really liked it as well.

So, it was very very good. But there was something…missing.

For me, a movie has to hit an emotional edge to really get me to just love it. Batman Begins was excellent but was missing this. The Dark Knight is the same way. I never felt extremely excited, happy, or sad, just not real super strong reaction to the movie. Movies that can make me feel a certain way keep on resonating through time. For me, The Matrix, My Sassy Girl, Heat, Godfather, those are the movies that ultimately rank among my favorite movies of all time.

The story has incredible depth. I can tell it will hold up amazing through multiple viewings, and I think I will end up seeing 3 times with various people within the next 2 weeks. The movie is about constant struggle for balance. An action means a equal reaction. Things that should happen (but usually don’t in movies for the sake of a good or happy ending) do happen here. Things in this world are “fair”, which make not make sense until you watch the movie. Characters have to balance each other, events have to balance. To me, this is the ultimate Joker story regardless of whether you’re talking about the comics, animated series, whatever. This is the true Joker. I just reread The Killing Joke, and some of the interactions between Joker and Batman are similar to those in The Dark Knight.

The movie asks so many questions about the character of humanity, question of sanity, I would use the term “morality play”, but I don’t even know what that word means.

I gave it a 9/10 on IMDB.

Other random notes:

• It’s long. Not that I don’t like long movies, or that maybe this was too long, but I did notice it was long.
• Everything shown in the various trailers, (I think I’ve seen 6 or 7 different ones) only takes you to half of the movie. I was quite surprised, and basically had no idea what was coming. What I assumed what was the end of the movie was just the middle part of it.
• Normally, you see a great movie, and you’d love to see the sequel ASAP. But with this, I feel like it was such a deep story, that you need time before seeing another one. Especially with the movie’s ending, we actually need a good length of real time to transpire so we can be ready for the next story.
• Batman Begins was focused on making a real-life based what-if version of the character, but Dark Knight starts to lose some of that. This is where you get into an extreme of an extreme unlikelihood.
• This is a mature and adult story. Like I said, it will hold up for a long time and repeated viewings.
• “Why so serious” “Let’s put a smile on that face”- I am fairly certain the way they sound in the trailers versus how they sound in the movie is not the same.

As a side note, I’m going to try to buy the Vietnamese version of the Dark Knight movie (Vietnamese text) poster. I’ll put up a picture of it if I’m successful.

There’s two I’ve seen, one’s the motorbike one, and the other is this one, the Joker one. I’ll be wanting the Joker.

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I think I’ve already seen this, I think Kyle showed me this a long time ago, but it was taken down (bootleg camcorder footage in a theater). I think it’s even in a previous post of mine.

Nonetheless, watch this hopefully more legal (have not watched, speed to slow for me at home) version:

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Continuing my recent man crush parade on Ryan Reynolds, I checked out The Nines, a movie released late last year.

It’s really hard to describe the movie, and when I read the general plot line, it didn’t seem interesting at all. Even if you watch the trailer below, it doesn’t seem that interesting.

But I watched it for Ryan Reynolds (ladies, he takes off his shirt in this, and if you have ever seen him with his shirt off, you will understand and appreciate why I mention this), and it was worth it. He is excellent in this, but so is everyone else.

(I wish I had his abs. When I watch basketball, I sometimes get excited and want to go shoot hoops- Ryan Reynolds makes me want to go do crunches.

Whoa. That is very much a least some homo there. Moving on….)

It’s quite a good movie, it’s a bit of a conceptual piece (though not as much as The Fountain that slowly comes into focus. You just can’t really talk about it or describe it in a way to make people understand if they should see it or not. At the same time I can see it being a this-is-weird, miss, or this-is-awesome, hit type of movie.

I’m on the side of hit, giving it a 7/10 on IMDB.

Like I just said it feels a bit off, but I think that’s what’s intended. It’s hard to know how to rate it. I have some more to say about it, but I consider it a bit of a spoiler, so it’s after the trailer. I suggest not reading in order to focus more on the movie experience.

In the middle of the movie, one of the characters is doing a test pilot focus group. People are watching a TV show pilot and then giving feedback on the show. When I watched the movie, that’s how I felt- I felt like there was some concept or some idea that was being pushed to me. Not as focused or mature as it normally should belike you’d seen in a TV show in its 3rd of fourth year, but I felt like the person being tested, being gauged to see if I could follow the movie, was it interesting, did I like the characters.

Very unique, and my assumption is this was intended.

Trailer:

(The Nines Trailer)

*****Potential Spoilers******

I read an article a couple of months ago talking about how there’s a good possibility we’re (our universe/world) just part of a simulation. Kind of how we’re trying to make video games now that simulate real life, this world could be someone’s advanced artificial intelligence simulation. This idea was somewhat shown at the end of Men in Black- remember how they kept zooming out and eventually the entire universe was shown as one marble an alien was playing marbles with?

Basically, we are not all that in the universe, where universe means everything we can or cannot imagine. It’s an idea I very much believe in, and on a religious level, I know that there was no way I could understand the concept of a higher being or a god. Having that kind of awareness will instantly make me insane.

Anyway, let’s going back to The Nines, this is the concept that the movie wraps itself in.

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The first time I watched this was October 2006. I’d received a copy of the Japanese version with English subtitles from Mike, and I’d just had surgery to repair my torn ACL.

My impressions back then were that the visuals were really good, very action heavy, no real plot.

At the time I was drugged up with vicodin, could not walk, and not so able to focus. I also hadn’t played the game in a very long time and didn’t remember much about it other than the general plot.

When I decided to replay FFVII, I felt I should revisit Advent Children as well, and it was a much better experience this time around, no doubt helped by my recent memory of the game as well as the very good English language dubbing.

The general story is, well taken from Wikipedia:

Two years after the events of Final Fantasy VII, the Planet is recovering from the devastating attack by Meteor, while the survivors of Midgar have begun to build a new city, aptly named “Edge”, on the outskirts of the old metropolis. However, a strange disease known as “geostigma” has arisen. After his showdown with Sephiroth, Cloud Strife established the “Strife Delivery Service”, with the aid of Tifa Lockhart, whom he has been living with in Edge. Marlene Wallace and an orphaned boy named Denzel have been entrusted to their care.

And then…some problems occur. Some old enemies show up. Conflict. Battle.

The story, while not deep by any means, provides a good supplement to the game, and again, the CG visuals are outstanding. From a distance, things do look fairly “real”.

The action is fast paced and exciting, and it’s a little thrill when you get to the moment where all the characters from the game finally show up, and it’s time for a video game style “boss battle”.

It is, a “cool” action movie, the type of movie where the characters do all these things you want to do, the kind of things that in the middle of the movie, you say to yourself, I wish this were a videogame.

My Rating: 8/10 on IMDB, a rating definitely affected by my affinity for/interest in the characters.

The Trailer:

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Batman Gotham Knight is to the upcoming Dark Knight movie what the Animatrix was to the Matrix movies: sharp, anime inspired animated shorts featuring different takes (from different creative talents)and different stories surrounding the subject material. (by the way, isn’t it great that for once, a sequel doesn’t add on to the original’s name for franchising/marketing reasons? Batman Begins: The Dark Knight would be bleh.)

The visual look varies throughout each short (each about 12 minutes long), some feel more anime inspired than others, but overall you very high production values, fluid animation, good CG. The look in terms of the style is definitely not related to the Batman: Animated Series, and whether that’s good or not is up to your personal style.

The DVD is all new material and is meant to be, in at least a superficial sales-boost way related to the Dark Knight movie- they’re both released in the same week or so. David Goyer, one of the screenwriters for Batman Begins, writes one of the stories, a look at Scarecrow post-Begins storyline.

For me, the stories didn’t really excite me. The presentation is extremely stylish, but there’s no real depth to the characters or actions. You don’t really learn anything that’s important to the core of the characters, showing a new side of Bruce Wayne or Batman. If I were to compared these to the Animated Series, these stories would rank in the middle, basically be average or perhaps slightly below average episodes.

I would have preferred stories from Paul Dini and Bruce Timm, the big driving forces behind the Animated Series, even though you’ve got a lot of big names associated with this project.

I think kids will like it because of the flash and action, but the violence is more bloody than what you’d find with a TV cartoon.

Worth a rental, but that’s it.

If you really want to see quality, check out Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (still in my mind, the best Batman movie) or of course, the Animated Series.

More information and the trailer follows:

From: http://www.warnervideo.com/batmangothamknight/

Batman Gotham Knight is a fresh and exciting new entry into the Batman mythos, spinning out of a 40-year history in animation including the Emmy®-winning Batman: The Animated Series, widely considered a pivotal moment in American animation.

Six standalone chapters, each with stylish art from some of Japan’s greatest anime visionaries, weave together into a larger story that follows Batman through his transition from beginner to The Dark Knight.

Chapter-by-Chapter Synopsis

In “Have I Got a Story for You,” Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Josh Olson (“A History of Violence”) tells the story of how chance encounters with Batman by a group of youngsters leave each kid with a very different impression of the Dark Knight.

In “Crossfire,” acclaimed novelist/comics writer Greg Rucka tells the story of Gotham City police having to get over their distrust of Batman – while under fire from the mob.

In “Field Test,” writer Jordan Goldberg showcases the incredible high-tech arsenal Batman commands and reveals that there are some things even Batman won’t do in his pursuit of justice.

“In Darkness Dwells” takes Batman into the Gotham sewers to face “Killer Croc,” a deformed thug who seems even more monstrous after the Scarecrow, and his fear toxin, makes a resurgence, in a story by David S. Goyer, co-screenwriter of “Batman Begins.”

Award-winning comics writer Brian Azzarello explores an early chapter of Bruce Wayne’s training in “Working Through Pain,” showing how a mysterious and exotic Indian woman named Cassandra introduced Batman to techniques that would help him to conquer the physical and spiritual consequences of what he does.

Finally, in “Deadshot,” four-time Emmy Award-winning writer Alan Burnett ties together threads from all the Batman Gotham Knight chapters, as Batman must thwart an unerring assassin whose love of guns and disregard for human life lets him cross lines that even a Dark Knight shies away from.

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I suggested it before, in half seriousness, half-joking.

Even from Vietnam, well, for someone obsessed with Batman who loves to read and watch more and more about this stuff, the buzz seems deafening. Every trailer I watch, I ask myself, how could this not be so damn good?

Every trailer shows a different aspect of the movie, another level of depth, and I refuse to believe it’s not going to be supremely fantastic.

You watch these trailers, and you tell me it’s not good, that it cannot be one of the best movies of all time. Screw “best action” or “best super-hero”, I mean BEST MOVIE.

Either that or these trailers alone deserve to get some kind of special award. I’ve listed these in order of age (from what I can tell by YouTube)

Comes to Hanoi/Vincom/Vietnam end of August.

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Did I mention I really really like Ryan Reynolds? I just watched Chaos Theory (8 hrs after Definitely, Maybe), and it’s another fine example of how great he is.

Ryan Reynolds is legit!

Chaos Theory, like Definitely, Maybe, fits the romantic comedy category but not really the mold. Just a serious, intriguing story involving romance, real life issues and complications, and comedic elements.

I would describe the movie, at least a little bit, but it just wouldn’t sound very exciting.

Here’s the trailer, instead:

I gave it a 9/10 on IMDB.

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It’s been a long time since I liked a movie this much.

A disclaimer is required though- I have a mancrush on Ryan Reynolds. I watched his start in 2 Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place (The girl’s now in the TV show Monk, and don’t know where the other guy is) 10 years ago on ABC and have been a fan ever since.

Reynolds stars as a just divorcing father whose daughter just learned all about sex and wants to know why things are supposedly “complicated” in terms of her parents’ splitting up. As Reynolds stammers and tries to avoid the discussion of why he can’t just fix his marriage so easily, his daughter forces him to tell the story of how he met her mother, a tale that looks at his post-college move to New York and key relationships with three women- a examination of his life and love with the result being his daughter.

Definitely, Maybe is defined as a romantic comedy, but I think it contains a lot less fluff than my stereotype of a Matthew McConaughey/Sandra Bullock/Kate Hudson romantic comedy movie.

Consider it more of a drama in some ways, it’s just a serious movie, a serious look at the father’s life, but with plenty of charming and comedic elements. It’s smart and non formulaic, it feels complex and complicated and mysterious.

My score for it on IMDB, 9/10.

Here’s the trailer:

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As the credits rolled, I thought to myself, they just don’t make movies like this today. This isn’t a movie, it’s more like a play.

And this is why Glengarry Glen Ross is so good.

My boss at work introduced me to this movie a few months ago, showing me one of the opening scenes of the movie, one that is also surely its most memorable.

• “Coffee is for closers”
• “The leads are weak? You’re weak”
• “A-I-D-A. Get out there - you got the prospects coming in. You think the came in to get out of the rain? A guy don’t walk on the lot lest he wants to buy. They’re sitting out there waiting to give you their money. Are you gonna take it? Are you man enough to take it?”

And that’s just from the above scene. (Thinking about that scene makes me feel like I’m going to get fired at work.)

The premise behind the movie is a real estate office- all the salesmen are trying to keep their jobs working with what they claim as lousy leads. The movie takes a look at all the salesman as they battle the pressure and the events that occur because of it. They feel the pressure to get results, but they all battle with themselves over why they are failing and how they respond when they’re in such desperate situations, focused on survival.

As I mentioned before, what stands out the most about Glengarry Glen Ross is its pacing. It doesn’t follow the standard format of a movie. Quick transitions, a non-stop feeling “something is happening right now”. The pacing is really fresh, and I wish you’d see more movies like this today. Even the timeline of the movie’s plot is quick, 15 hours or so, but there’s really only two specific periods of time in terms of scenes- a night and the next morning.

It feels very much like you’re watching a play stylistically, and the movie is only 95 minutes long.

Simplicity, yet with amazing depth in terms of the plot and characters.

(It turns out, this actually is based on a play-David Mamet wrote both the screenplay and the play.)

The extensive use of dialogue, but not in a Kevin Smith (people don’t actually talk that way in real life!) way, feels realistic, needed, and relevant to the characters. Here’s the primary cast, an excellent ensemble that worked well together:

• Al Pacino
• Jack Lemmon
• Alec Baldwin
• Alan Arkin
• Ed Harris
• Kevin Spacey

The characters don’t seem to do anything, yet there still exists this great feeling of action and suspense created by the dialogue and the tension created by the sales pressure.

See it, I definitely recommend it.

My Rating: 8/10 (see my IMDB for more)

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77% of the users who have seen (and rated) Street Kings on IMDB think its a 7/10 or better. (34% of press reviewers on Rotten Tomatoes)

To you guys, I say, you are on crack.

Let me start off with my biases. I LOVE Keanu Reeves. I cannot even say why. For those who say he is a terrible actor, I would ask, have you seen him in interviews? He’s the exact same way. So, I wouldn’t say he’s such a terrible actor, but that he in fact, is really unable to change his voice fluctuations the way you would expect of a “better” actor, even in real life.

Nonetheless, I love him (not literally), and he’s the only star whose presence makes a difference in terms of wanting to watch a film. Thus, that’s why I watched Street Kings.

There’s a good cast (or at least, well known) here, with Keanu (I wonder if he gained weight for the role, he looks more fleshy, but not necessarily fat), Forest Whitaker, Hugh Laurie (House), and Chris Evans (Fantastic Four), but Street Kings is a mess. It’s a police drama about bad cops, with one particularly bad (Keanu) cop (in this sense bad cop is someone who tries to do good things in a corrupt way) who realizes that he doesn’t think he is so bad or should be this bad after all. Time to clean up and do some good.

As the movie began, I started thinking, this must be a dream sequence. There’s something unreal about this, not quite right, so Keanu’s going to wake up, and that’ll start the movie. Never happens.

This movie is always missing something, some depth. Things are stated for you to tell you what is going on or why this has been happening, but what you see on screen doesn’t quite seem to say the same thing.

It’s supposed to be a dirty world, with tough cops and big stakes, but it doesn’t seem particularly “real” or “tough” to me even with all the violence and bad things going on. Keanu’s character, Tom Ludlow, has been affected from his wife’s death for years, but he doesn’t seem like a tormented soul to me.

You simply don’t have believable characters or circumstances, though if you read a plot summary, there’s nothing obviously bad about the movie.

Too bad.

3/10. This movie is just boring, from its first 10 minutes all the way to the end. (3/10 is the lowest score I have given any movie on my IMDB history of 330 ratings. I don’t hate the movie, it’s just so boring, no entertainment value at all)

Here’s the trailer if you’d like to check it out:

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