moon's Talk

The Princess and the Frog

Pleasant enough animation about a poor African-American girl named Tiana living in the French Quarter of New Orleans, who longs to open up her own restaurant. Not the comeback that Disney has been hyping, but it is colorful and lively nonetheless. The problem is the main characters are bland and the songs, while adequate, are instantly forgettable once you leave the theater. Many of the supporting characters are notable however: particularly Ray, a lovesick Cajun firefly, Louis, a jazz-singing alligator, and Tiana's best friend Charlotte, a rollicking spoiled diva. These characterizations boost what is a mostly formulaic entry in the Disney canon.

Bye Bye Birdie

Bright campy musical set in 1958 inspired by the phenomenon of popular singer Elvis Presley and his draft notice into the army. This enchanting adaptation of the 1960 Broadway hit takes a regrettably jaded view of rock and roll music. Luckily, the brilliant cast elevates this daffy comedy into the sublime: Dick Van Dyke is charming as always, Paul Lynde and Maureen Stapleton are hilarious and Ann-Margret is a saucy minx as the all-American teenager. Wonderful score features the songs "Put on a Happy Face", "The Telephone Hour" and "A Lot of Livin' to Do".

The Bohemian Girl

A very nice, rather unknown feature film of Laurel & Hardy. The duo made three comic operas, merging music with comedy. It works quite well in this feature, although nobody will watch the movie for the music, but for the comic genius of Laurel & Hardy. They play good-hearted but empty-pursed gypsies, which is a great vehicle for their comedy.

The Act of Seeing with One's Own Eyes

The White Ribbon (Das weisse Band)

at last,a haneke film that i could endure (and what a masterpiece it is,an extraordinary crafted tale).There are two things that makes this film stands out from other haneke's film. The first is the narrative. by telling the story from the first person perspective (in this case,the teacher of the village),the film never loses its grip. the story,flows perfectly. The second is its beautiful black and white cinematography and beautiful landscape.unlike any other haneke film,which is,just so simple and boring (image-wise),but in white ribbon,well,you could capture any image of the film,send it to a photography competition,and you could win from it.it's THAT beautiful. as the story itself.no need to say,this is as good as any other of his story.The difference is,this time he captures it on screen perfectly!

Badlands

1973 "badlands" is an idyllic film about a young couple whose lives have been led astry by fate's mishappenings...strangely, "badlands" is supposed to be a horrific story about morbid trigger-happy young fellows who have caused the deaths of a couple of innocent people due to momentary spur. but it is not, it's a lyrically romantic tale about a naive but hell-bent first love of a guileless young girl, and the killings done during the movie all seem to be forced by the circumstances despite the girl narrates "he's the most trigger-happy person i've ever seen in my whole life"...

now it comes to my routine reciting of the scenario: a plain-jane type of young girl meets a somehow handsome proletariat young man who lives on the wrong side of the track..pleasantly they conversed on the sidewalk, and she knows he's just a petite garbage-man.. but when he requests to see her again, she silently assents...then they see each other more and more in their exclusive retreat..someday the girl's father discover this romance and wanna forbid it, but the boy insists on eloping with the girl so he breaks into the girl's house and starts packing for her...spotted by the girl's father, the boy shoots the father dead after being provoked with criminal charges and the jail sentences. all of a sudden, our anti-hero grabs his girl on the road after setting the house aflame...on the way of their fierce escape, they dwell into a wooden nest by the lake of cottonwoods, dining on raw chickens and fishes like two people in oblivion of civilization until some intrusive bounty-hunter invade into their sanctuary of wilderness..so our anti-hero shoots every single man and keeps on rolling...a spree of killing occur when our protagonist gets anxiety-stricken under the fright of getting caught...at last, the couple set their way within the desolate desert heading the borderline of montana, living in an even more primitively exclusive way like eating grass until one day the girl awakens to realize that this man ain't for her...

as for why it's romantic? i suppose, in a way, both characters have a residue of innocence within them, particularly the childlike detachment sissy spacek holds, her character is like that sort of person you feel comfort in getting along with even you may not notice her that much, she seems like that sort of person who won't pass a judgemental contempt to you no matter what you have done, she just quietly does her own thinking without casting a disturbance on anyone like a misanthropic child who just enjoys galloping in the forest on her own...martin sheen, in that stage of his career, appears fresh-lookingly handsome with an undercurrent rebellious temperament, a freewheeling youthful air infuses a light-headed charisma into him..his character is more like wondrous man who accidentally commits a horrible crime but he continues doing it just to see whether he could make a freeman out of himself again by killing off all the witnesses because he's an adventurist who's willing to take all the risks... he's also a romanticist who would stop the cadillac in the middle of barren desert at dark night to dance with his girlfriend along the melody of nat king cole spontaneously flowing from radio, whose ultimate fear of death is just that he doesn't wish to die alone without a girl to scream his name out, who's poetic by soul to be in awe with the grand sight of tangerine sunset with clouds etwined like a gigantic castle....eventually he surrenders to the police under the pretense of flat tire because he doesn't wish to carry on alone with the girl by his side, and also he voluteers to keep the girl's records clean before he's sentenced into the electric chair..

sissy specek's narratives just feel so self-absorbed like someone's reciting her own precious diaries, and the movie takes the woman's visage to move on, and the tone of her voice sounds apathetically introspective..she doesn't seem to be happy or particularly sad, and far from angst-ridden..she simply exists and encounters a gorgeous boy who looks like james dean, who seems to appreciate her as what she is, for that, she's gratified even he's the murderer of her father and he seems to have a hidden violent streak. but strangely she tends to live along with that fine as if her senses are buried into an autistic universe of naive wonderments for the world until she starts to acknowledge the consequences of things at last, so farewell to girlhood and puberty!

"badlands" is a subdued treat to the eye for baring the poetic inland america, and middle-east states could be quite enchanting with a simplistic allure which is originally american, and as the audience, i feel the grusome aspect of those spree-killings is shielded out of a vacuum of outlandish reveries within the core of the protagonists' hearts which are filled with every bit of purity and candidness in a society which wouldn't take individuality into its frigid consideration as if life's a fast-living dream and at next moment you die in an electric chair after slumbering over a melodic tune of nat kind cole's..after all, the world ain't for dreamers!

Next

Next left me a bit disappointed, yet it is not a bad film. It is entertaining enough to continue watching, but the acting and script could have used a bit of tweaking. The role for Mr. Cage was a perfect fit for him. He did a great job. Julianne Moore is usually a much better actress than this film showed. Ms. Biel, who normally is horrible, did fine with the script. The bit players weren't interesting enough and the story really needed a bit more bang for the buck.

Yes Man

Yes Man is an entertaining romantic comedy. It's not your typical romantic comedy, as if any film with Jim Carrey could be labeled 'typical'. You either like Jim Carrey or you don't. I do and he is hilarious in Yes Man.

The Killing Room

Killing Room is an interesting blend of human psychology and government experiments. It is definitely a movie for those who do not mind thinking during a film. Quite a twist ending and quite believable, which causes one to think after the credits have rolled.

The Wind That Shakes the Barley

historical dramatization of the events leading up to Irish independence from Britain, and the beginning of the subsequent Irish Civil War.

Up in the Air

Quietly affecting story about a middle aged confirmed bachelor who makes a living by flying around the country firing people. Romantic comedy takes its time to develop, but as it does, the humor gradually draws the viewer into its easy-going rhythm. Director and screenwriter Jason Reitman's follow up to Juno is a similarly quirky and talky examination of a life. What makes the film so impressive is the witty repartee, particularly between stars George Cooney and Vera Farmiga who plays a sexual liaison he meets while traveling. Together they exhibit a playful sexiness that is surprisingly poignant. Cast also features relative newcomer Anna Kendrick in a breakout performance as a fast-rising recently hired co-worker. Occasionally the dialogue can be a bit pedantic, but it's also that concern for detail that makes these characters so humorous and moving.

Sling Blade

uh huhhhh, i strongly recommend this one.

Natural Born Killers

"natural born killers" is oliver stone's anarchic anthem in the 90s, tackling into the subject of adolescent spree-killers as a satirized version of 1973 "badlands" featuring still fresh-faced martin sheen and sissy spacek but the 1970s piece is more like dirge for the dazed youth when individuality is buried by social conformity as the young couple extend their excessive energy in astray direction while the 90s interpretation is more targeted upon the obsession with fame and celebrity culture induced by the avarice of media. now here comes the turn for woody harrelson and juliette lewis in their prime youth of edginess exploded in a violent tale like "natural born killers"

the story goes like this without all those distractive boisterous mtv-montages: mallory comes from an abusive family with her father sexually moistering her since childhood, and then she meets the meat-deliverer mickey to rescue her from her obnoxious father by ferociously killing off the whole family. so they elope and make a pact of eternal bond, seeking their exclusive pleasure by slaughtering off everyone they encounter whenever they feel like it. all of a sudden, they've become the nationally well-known heroic figures against the authority, idols for youngers, and perfect material for a cheesy tv show called "american maniacs"..finally the couple got some fatal snake bite and besieged by police force, so they're sentenced into separate prisons awaiting to get executed. somehow the greedy reporter played robert downey jr. detects a great opportunity to catapult his personal status by interviewing this about-to-be-dead serial murderer, so he has a live interview with mickey, during intervals mickey obtains a chance to kill his way off for survival and re-union with his beloved mallory. in the end, the reporter is slaughtered as the director's metaphoric grudge against this corruptive cultural phenomenon...

oliver stone was excellent with those mtv-montages, for example, he sets the episode of mallory in the form of "i love lucy," using 50s sit-com to render the story of a child with a pedophilic father to create a harsher sense of grotesque and to enhance its undercurrent disturbance, a father grabbing his daughter's butt in the background of light-weighted 50s homely melody. or mickey and mallory embrace under the song of edith piar's "life of rose"...numerous examples like that...

stone tries to caricature how fame could empower any half-witted hillbilly in this media-manipulated nation called america, and the dialogues contain great contempt for authority and government and how the commoners are thrilled with a deranged form of anarchism represented by outlaws since the days of john dillinger and bonnie and clyde. stone, in this stage of career, does have lots of political concerns to vent in his movies, thus "natural born killers" has become the utmost pinnacle of oliver stone's career as well as woody harrelson and juliette lewis'.

the soundtrack has some precious gems like underground all-female punk-band L17, which only existed briefly, their classic song "SHITLIST" which is flowing along with juliette lewis' striptease dancing in the outset sequence, and the camera shot and the spunk fit the this smashing punk anthem so wonderfully that it still lingers over my mind endlessly even after a decade when i firstly "natural born killer" as a teenage. then i start to recall the ballistic juliette lewis in the 90s, in my belief she's the best actress ever to play the troubled and neurotic youth, despite she may not be top-drawer of world-class beauty, but there's an agelessness in her that i consider incredible...who else could do the psycho-bitch so well meanwhile preserve a chic it-girl-ness so un-apolegetically like lewis?...maybe courtney love or patricia arquette, but they seem to be more like tenderized vixens who appear more like the objects of desire, the femme fatale type. unlike lewis who could render an extreme spunkiness blended with a frail naivete. same for woody harrelson who seems perfect for this role, un-replacable.

in the 90s, people would critize "natural born killers" as merely sex and violence, but now you see all those pervert slashers made in 2000s like saw and michael bay's texas massacres, "natural born killers" could only be considered cartoonish right now, and oliver stone at least has lots of wits and intelligences upon the subject of violence, such as he uses the interivew of charles manson in mickey's confrontation with the reporter "i kill because it's fate, just like a woolf doesn't know why he's born a woolf and a deer doesn't know why he's born a deer"...now the violence of those 2000s horror pieces are truly more upon the degrading of human impotence without a trace of contemplation upon laws of nature or the course of society or the purpose of humanity. time has proved oliver stone is right and "natural born killers" remains one of the most interesting movies in cinematic history. oh, man, I LOVE THE 90S!

Elmer Gantry

a tour de force performance by Lancaster.............

Zombieland

This zombie splatter comedy film is winning on pretty much all fronts it is fighting on without giving a shit about the conventions of the genre, like slow zombies or a commentary on society. Not only is it incredibly funny, but also really gory and exciting as a horror film, and works as buddy movie with characters you love to care about as well. How the movie manages to do all that in just 90 minutes is a little wonder and one of the most pleasant surprises of the year. To top it all, it includes the probably best cameo appearance ever (Billy Murray), has an excellent soundtrack, the second best title sequence of the year (after Watchmen): "For whom the bell tolls" and many more really fresh and fun ideas, like the main character's interactive rules for zombie survival. Harrelson has never been cooler and it's nice to see that Abigail Breslin is as excellent as a young teenager as she was as a kid. By the end of the film you are in love with those characters, as happy about a twinkie or the trashing of an Indian gift shop as they are. We demand a sequel, bring on Zombieworld!