a revisit.

hey... haven't blogged lately because.... well, i didn't. anyway, maybe now i feel like blogging because i was over at Yong Hao's today, and i sort of felt more alone than i would normally feel in my room because of the comparison with an hour ago. oh well, now even shane is going at it more than i do. but, even so, blogging naked is a new experience for me.

and a new experience for you as well to hear about someone blogging naked.

in any case. if you refer to shane's blog, on friday we watched North Country by recommendation from YH. that was my first intutitive critical attack at a film, and Niki(sp?) Caro's direction was really quite an eye-opener. before the classes, i wouldn't have caught the darkness befalling the car just after Charlize says "Yea, i know what I'm doing.", or the "Ear protection, ladies!" right after Charlize hears the miner say "cunts." Wow. But somewhere through the story it made me focus more on the storyline than the direction, because the storyline was rather interesting.

should i do a little review? i think i should, since it's worth watching. Josey Aimes, a single mother of two children, decides to work at a mine, where the male-to-female ratio is 30 to 1. There, she meets with tonnes of problems with the guys, mostly sexual harassment and unequal rights. She fights it, and the rest you can (or rather, should) pretty much guess for yourself. Well, i felt this movie is one of those movies that deserve a place in those award shows, but not exactly amazing, because of the drama-ness of it. as i discussed it with YH, we felt that the focus of the story shouldn't have been of the Mother-son relationship between Josey and Sammy, but rather about the predicament of the women in the workplace at that time, which this film is ultmately based on. while indeed, we can see that the director knows her stuff and inserts subtle innuendoes, i think it's more of the scriptwriter's skill that brought the necessary life into the story (isn't that always the case?). Nevertheless, we should applaud the movie for its attempt at greatness (i.e. to do a societal expose piece), and if you are a sexist you should watch this movie.

in comparison to The Devil Wears Prada that i watched yesterday, i could definitely pay attention to the latter as a whole. A girl goes to work at a famous magazine Runway, and turns from one of the amigos to a high-class snobby b^tch, after working there for a few months. I reeeeaaallly don't want to spoil the movie for you, but whatever you imagine to come next is probably right. TDWP had an interesting premise, actresses who made the piece work (ah!! Tracy Thoms!), but hardly anything beyond your run-of-the-mill feel-good movie. In fact, throughout the movie, i was constantly calling out for them to hit me with what they had to, like giving a second side to the villain, amongst others. (this seems to be a problem with North Country, according to many reviewers.) Let's look at the actresses then, since we don't have anything else to talk about. Anne Hathaway -- the only problem i have with her is WHY THE HELL DOES SHE LOOK LIKE A DUCK ON THE POSTER? omg. is it on purpose? anyway, she fit her role well. very pretty as well, even before the makeover. Meryl Streep -- ah, classic. but her character was too stereotyped. but, she brings her class of excellence into the picture anyway. Tracy Thoms! -- i don't know why i pick to talk about her, but i loved her in Rent, and i loved her in TDWP. my only regret is that she didn't get to play a role that was different from Rent; i sort of saw her twirling around in the same Rent circle, and she should break out and do more. she definitely can achieve more. and why didn't she sing?

ahh, haha, that was fun. reviewing movies. i should do that more often, and moreover with all the new movie bursting out of their seams at the cinemas. well, i have the series premiere of Vanished waiting for me in another window, before i have to get back to my tonnes of work. see ya.

posted by wei @ 9:04 AM