April 2010 Archives

SF often have these short and sudden showers, they'd start misty, then drizzle and suddenly clouds would rush off. So on this cloudy day there was nothing special, except the serendipity of timing, the clouds were thinning as the night begins to fall. Everything for that brief 10 minutes turned into blue.

Pictures of my one year in Boston are up, click here to check them out, comments are welcome :)

This is the second year I'm covering Earth Hour in my city. This time, I was expecting massive blackouts in various neighborhoods caused by SF residents. Techies, Hippies, Gays, who doesn't want to safe the planet in this city right? Besides, California is nearing bankruptcy, if I'm a government official, I'd shut off as much lights as possible for one hour.

Just like a lot of calculations I made in my life, I was wrong again. I stood on my balcony totally stoked thinking that I could document the dramatic switch off, but instead, things pretty much stayed the same, except for Coit Tower and the Golden Gate bridge off in the distance.

Shame on you San Francisco.

There was absolutely no change before and after 8:30pm, what an embarrassment.

I used to bitch about China's SARFT all the time when I was in China. As a part of the culture department, they're responsible for letting western movies gain rights to play in the Country, and their motive is often either obvious, or just bizzare and terrible.

Art house movies are not heavily promoted, I totally understand that, but, when it came to New York I Love You, I couldn't understand how terrible of a promotion job the studios did for this movie in the States. There was absolutely no promotion. I'm a die hard fan of Paris J'taime, and even I had hard time locating the movie.

Now for those of you who doesn't know the significance of Paris J'taime, the concept is very simple. Take a group of world famous directors and allow them to make up their stories themed around love and the city. Because they all have to share this 90min slot, they have to make their stories to about five minutes. In 2006's Paris J'taime alone, it featured works from directors such as Gus Van Sant, The Coen brothers, Christopher Doyle, amongst other masters.

In New York I love you, the concept was carried out in the English speaking setting, in New York. I was also really excited especially because it featured the work of my favorite Chinese director Jiang Wen. He has almost a god status amongst the Chinese my generation because of his willingness to take risk with brilliant wit in Mainland China's environment, it is near impossible for a director. Another reason I was particularly curious about his work is that his last film was considered a failure, after his 8 year hiatus, this second act of his needlessly to say, is very important. Thank god he delivered, his piece is the opening film, and it was very entertaining to watch. I loved how effortless it was for him to mix some Chinese element into the story too, its absolutely brilliant.

The Cove became the only piece of communication that made me pick up my mobile and dialed in to donate money, its just that good. I don't want to divulge further on how and why this documentary is so smart, you just need to watch it to understand it. Of course, I hope you could dial in and donate some money for the cause as well after you finish watching it.

The Ghost Writer featured two of my favorite actors and a brilliant director - Roman Polanski. It was another art house film that was under promoted. I'm glad I caught this one in the theater, I don't really dig Polanski's style as I tend to think he's a bit old fashioned and has a slower pasting, this thriller is not any different, but, I did enjoy this film a lot, its definitely worth it compare to "clash of the titans".