Ip Man best Martial Arts Movie in a Long Time

Ip Man -an Instant Martial Arts Classic
by Paul Grant (follower of Basho)
(Ip Man trailer at bottom of post)

Ip Man (the title Ip Man is pronounced as “Eep-Man”, not “I-P Man”) is a 2008 Hong Kong martial arts biopic that is based on the life of Ip Man,a translation from Chinese ideograms that also might have been translated Yè Wèn or Wing Chun.)

Ip Man is perhaps best known as the celebrated martial arts master of Bruce Lee, though his meeting with Lee happens long after the movie's time frame.

He was also the first to teach the Chinese martial art of Wing Chun ( a form of Kung Fu, a close combat form openly.)

The movie (in Subtitles) combines excellent directing, excellent acting, great fight scenes (though not as `fantastical' as many of the current martial ats movies have shown) history and drama and some philosophical ideas.

This movie just shows apart of Ip Man's life in the city of Foshan between the 1930s to 1940s during the Second Sino-Japanese War
.
The movie begins when Ip Man is a young man, fairly successful, married and with a young boy. He practices his Kung Fu privately, though sometimes spares with friends. Through a series of events (no spoiler) his reputation grows. Many want him to teach his style of fighting but he refuses.

Then the Second Sino-Japanese War takes place (July 7, 1937 to September 9, 1945) This was the largest Asian war in the twentieth century. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the Second Sino-Japanese War merged into the greater conflict of World War II as a major front in the Pacific Theatre.

The city of Foshan was mostly destroyed. Ip's home was confiscated. There was great poverty. Ip worked digging coal. By chance one of the Japanese generals overseeing the area was a fan of Kung Fu and set up matches with Chinese willing to fight Japanese practitioners. Ip comes to the forefront in an amazing fight against ten men. The Japanese General wants Ip to train his men with his style of Kung Fu, but Ip refuses. He challenges the general to a duel knowing the consequences are dire whether he wins or looses, but allowing time for his wife and child to escape.

To this date there have been neither movies nor publications about Ip Man. Because of the success of this film a sequel is coming out.

Donnie Yen

"During an exclusive interview with the American-born actor in Hong Kong recently, Yen explained that he spent more time researching and preparing for the role than any other movie he has ever done, as the movie is not only a biography about a well-known kung fu master who not only influenced Bruce Lee, but is also a master of the most practiced martial arts style all over the world.
“To portray a character like this, any actor must be fully prepared to the most accurate and truest to both the historical facts and the characteristics of the character,” Yen said. “I spent a great deal of time researching and preparing for this role, far more than any other role I have ever done ... no, far more than every role combined!”

According to Yen, Ip Man is a character that is very different from the usual stereotypical kung fu master one usually sees in the movies.
“Ip Man was a very family-oriented man. He was also very subtle, and never forced his philosophy or style on others. His personality was like that of your next-door neighbour – very down to earth and humble, and I think this sort of personality will appeal to audiences of all ages and gender.
“You can relate to a person like this because he is a very soft spoken, down to earth and a nice guy. It just happens that he is a kung fu master as well!” he said with a laugh.
While preparing for the role, Yen not only did as much research on the legend as he could, he also tried to be Ip Man as well.
“I wasn’t just acting the role – I actually lived it. I was totally in that world to come out as accurate as possible. My mind and spirit was all about playing Ip.
“For example, I would wear his clothes all around the hotel, drink tea the way he used to, and even changed the way I walked and talked,” he said. “I usually do things and talk very quickly, but Ip is a lot more laid-back. So I adjusted my tempo, and slowed everything down.”

Physically, Yen also had to go on a special regime just so he could look like the master.
“For a while, I was pretty muscular so I had to go on a diet to slim down. I was eating one meal a day, sometimes just drinking a glass of water, just to make sure that physically, I would look exactly like Ip, who is very scholarly and slim.
“I would also discuss every single detail of the role with the director to make sure we got it right. Sometimes we even called Ip Chun to ask him if his father would do something like that.”
At the end of the day, Yen’s ultimate goal for the movie is not to showcase the Wing Chun fighting style, but to highlight the positive moral values that Ip Man stood for.
http://www.star-ecentral.com/news/story.asp?file=/2008/12/16/movies/2795492&sec=movies

Directed by famed art-house director Wong Kar-wai.

His first major international recognition was at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival where he won the Best Director prize for Happy Together (1997). A film that "uses gorgeous, saturated images set to an eclectic soundtrack of tango by Argentinian maestro Astor Piazolla, Brazilian singer Caetano Veloso and Frank Zappa instrumentals to chronicle the stormy affair of a gay couple living as expatriates in Buenos Aires."^[2]
Despite his background as a scriptwriter, one of Wong's trademarks as a director is that he works largely through improvisation and experimentation involving the actors and crew rather than adhering to a fixed screenplay. This has been a frequent source of trouble for his actors, his financial backers and many other people connected with his films, including sometimes himself.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wong_Kar-wai)
He also directed, "Lady from Shanghai," starring Nicole Kidman.

His English-language debut was, "My Blueberry Nights," which stars Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz and Norah Jones.




You can stream the entire movie now to your PC, Mac, most tablets and most Smart Phones for only $2.99 through Amazon's Instant Streaming Videos. Click Here

Clint Eastwood engages in entertaining Gran Torino

Gran Torino is an interesting and enjoyable action, drama, thriller (with a comic edge) directed and starring Clint Eastwood.
Gran Torino trailer at bottom of post

The notion of a 78-year-old action hero may sound like a contradiction in terms, but Eastwood brings it off, even if his toughness is as much verbal as physical. Even at 78, Eastwood can make "Get off my lawn" sound as menacing as "Make my day."

Stars: Clint Eastwood, Bee Vang, Ahney Her, Christopher Carley, John Carroll Lynch
Director: Clint Eastwood
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Rating: R for language throughout, and some violence
Running time: 1 hour, 56 minutes

MacGuffin

The 1972 Gran Torino, for which this movie is named, is a MacGuffin (a plot device) that motivates the characters and advances the story, but the details of which are of little or no importance otherwise. In this case the car brings together a crank newly widowed man named with a fatherless Hmoung (from the country of Loas) boy Tao ,played by Bee Vang, who, in an initiation to a gang tries to steal it. (Ahney Her to play Tao’s older sister, Sue.)

When we first find out about the car it is from a disrespecting granddaughter played by Geraldine Hughes, who suggest that he should leave the car to her and give her one of his sofas for her dorm room. Walt Kowalski (Eastwood) doesn't dignify the girl with an answer, just spits and walks away from her. (In general woman do not fare well in this film, it's definitely a more male film.)

When the boy is caught attempting to steal the car, we get to see the familiar Clint Eastwood with a gun. And though he had time to shoot, he hesitates and then slips and the boy, whom he knows is the neighbor, escapes, not to be pursued.

1972

In 1972 Clint Eastwood directed and starred in a memorable Western called "High Plains Drifter." In that movie Eastwood plays a gunfighting stranger who comes to a small town and is hired to bring the townsfolk together in an attempt to hold off three outlaws who are on their way.

In Gran Torino, Eastwood, though a long time local, has become a stranger to the heavily Asian neighborhood. The Asian's remind him about his fighting in Korea while in the military, and about fellow soldiers that were lost. Mind you that these Asians in his neighborhood are Hmong from Loas, a mountainous people who fought with the US during the Viet Nam war, and after the US pulled out were abandoned. Most who did not flee were murdered by the Communist, some were brought to the US at the sponsorship of different Church groups. (I as a teen actually taught Hmoung English as a second language in Chicago.) So Hmoung are not the enemy.

The enemy though turns out to be a group of gangbangers, from whom the neighbors find need of being rescued from. At this point we get a classic Eastwood line : "Ever notice how you come across somebody once in a while you shouldn't have messed with? That's me"

There are several interesting similarities between the two movies, in High Plains Drifter, the Stranger's dark side is revealed by how he treats woman (raping one fairly early on). In Gran Turo it's the constant racial slurs and general angry demeanor that sets up his dark side.




The end of "High Plains Drifter" has a slight supernatural effect, that might be argued to counterpoint the ending of Gran Torino - but I cant spell it out without possibly spoiling both movies.

Masculinity:

Early in the movie, and not really by his initial choice Walt Kowalski sets out to reform his neighbor, the young Hmong teenager. He sets about making the fatherless boy more of a man.

Eastwood promotes this idea of male identities to the self-meaning that are embedded in the masculine role, such as doing masculine type work, rather than the seemingly feminine gardening that the boy enjoys.

In The Perils of Masculinity Andreas G. Philaretou writes:..the greater the identification with the idealized masculine identity, the more motivated the individual will be to perform and excel in masculine -role related behavior." And this is what happens, not just for the boy, but also for a young priest.

Eastwood, through his portrayal of Walt Kowalski, demonstrates to them the:"Ethos of Masculinity", where socialized men are to be tough and to avoid any kind of public or interpersonal display of emotional pain or upset.

Morality



In his famous Dirty Harry movies where he was criticized by some for his portrayal of a rouge cop who exercises brutality against presumed guilty- he defended the character saying Harry was a before his time champion of victims rights, and characterized Harry as attending to a higher morality.

In an interview in the magazine Positif (March 1994) he said: Dirty Harry provided simple solutions to horribly complicated problem.

As Kenneth Toran wrote in the Los Angeles Times about this movie: "Gran Torino" will start to feel familiar and create concern that this is all there is to the film. It is familiar, but only to a point. Suddenly, that point is past and much more serious questions come up, questions of responsibility, of vengeance, of the efficacy of blood for blood.


Other notes:



Walt Kowalski: His last name may or may not be a reference to the Dodge Challenger-driving counterculture hero, played by Barry Newman, of Richard C. Sarafian's cult classic "Vanishing Point," although the two characters have little in common other than, perhaps, their fondness for a nice set of wheels





Clint Eastwood">Clint Eastwood

Has acted in 66 movies and as of now has directed 33.

Born on May 31, 1930.

when he was a teenager he attended a Jazz at the Philharmonic and heard Charlie Parker for the first time and began playing jazz piano informally at the Omar Club in Oakland, In 1987 after extensive research and acquiring original music material he makes the film biopic `Bird" about Charlie Parker.

Eastwood wrote an original song for Gran Torino, as he has done for other of his movies. The song he wrote fro Gran Torino is up for a Golden Globe.

Eastwood has worked worked as a lifeguard, a lumberjack, fought forest fires and tended a blast furnace for Bethlehem Steel. In 1951 he applied to Seattle University where he planned to major in music. Instead he got drafted.

Returning from a furlough in Seattle, he was nearly lost at sea when the two man plane he hitched a ride nwith went down. He had to swim three miles back to shore.

Discharged from the army he meets and marries Maggie Johnson (1953)

He attends Los Angeles City Collage on on the GI Bill. He begins taking drama lessons.

At the Golden Globes in 1988 he won the Cecil B. DeMilles Lifetime achievement award.

In an interview he said: I try to concentrate on the story, because it is there that it is all tied up..Then I try to see how the images can best agree with the story, what form I want the story to appear in, what sonorities.(Jousse and Nevrs 1992)

On the role of the audience: "They must participate in every shot, in everything, I give them what I think is necessary to know, to progress through the story, but I don't lay out so much that it insults their intelligence,I Try to give a certain amount to their imagination. (Thompson and Hunter interview in 1977).



References:





Collier. R. (1995). Masculinity, law, and the family. London: Routledge.







The Perils of Masculinity: An Analysis of Male Sexual Anxiety, Sexual Addiction, and Relational Abuse
By Andreas G. Philaretou
Published by University Press of America, 2004


http://www.calendarlive.com/movies/reviews/cl-et-torino12-2008dec12,0,1818950.story
MOVIE REVIEW
'Gran Torino'
Clint Eastwood, at 78, shows he's still a formidable action figure.
By Kenneth Turan MOVIE CRITIC

Movie Review: Eagle Eye fast paced action

Eagle Eye movie review, major cast interviews and trailer for the movie.


Eagle eye is an implausible story with great camera work and directing with a good actor. Who needs a plausible story in an action film as long as their is excitement and the story moves quickly. As far as acting I thought Shia LaBeouf was `into it' at a much higher level than Michelle Monaghan or Billy Bob Thorton.

It is not the best movie ever made and pails in comparison to the Bourne Identity for an action flick. It does touch on the `big brother watching' concept, but really at the end of Eagle Eye, there's no lesson, no moral, no ethical conundrum that makes it all worthwhile. It was just, hey, stuff happened, it was a rush, let's move on with our lives. It does get extra points for filming in Chicago.

There is a lot of talk about how much of the ideas was lifted from other movies- I'll list those at the bottom of the post.

Plot via IMD :

Jerry and Rachel are two strangers thrown together by a mysterious phone call from a woman they have never met. Threatening their lives and family, she pushes Jerry and Rachel into a series of increasingly dangerous situations, using the technology of everyday life to track and control their every move

Quick details:

Steven Spielberg served as executive producer on the film.

The writer Dan McDermott previousllywrote 13 episodes for a non renewed television series series called Angele's Eyes.

Directed by D.J. Caruso

Born in Norwalk, Connecticut, Caruso came west to play tennis and study Television Production at Pepperdine University. Interned at Disney Studios in the Product Placement department and later hooked up with Director John Badham, who mentored him into a second-unit director, after Badham lost his 2nd-unit director Rob Cohen to a first-unit directing career. He hooked up with writer Scott Rosenberg, who penned a short film for him entitled, Cyclops, Baby (1997). The film helped launch Caruso's directing career.

Other movies/ shows directed:

1. Disturbia (2007)
2. "The Shield" (4 episodes, 2002-2006)
   - Kavanaugh (2006) TV episode
   - Extraction (2006) TV episode
   - Pay in Pain (2002) TV episode
   - Cherrypoppers (2002) TV episode
3. Two for the Money (2005)

Actor Shia LaBeouf was 22 when he acts in this movie. Born June 11, 1986, in Los Angeles, California, he was an only child. His parents are divorced, and he lives with his mom in Los Angeles. He started his career by doing stand-up comedy around places in his neighborhood, such as coffee clubs. He's well known for playing Louis Stevens in the popular Disney Channel series "Even Stevens" (2000) and has won a Daytime Emmy for his performance.

Recent movies he's made:

1. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008) .... Mutt Williams
2. Transformers (2007) .... Sam Witwicky
   ... aka Transformers: The IMAX Experience (USA: IMAX version)
3. Transformers: The Game (2007) (VG) (voice) .... Sam Witwicky
4. Surf's Up (2007) (voice) .... Cody Maverick
5. Surf's Up (2007) (VG) (voice) .... Cody Maverick
6. Disturbia (2007) .... Kale
   
   
7. Bobby (2006) .... Cooper
8. A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints (2006) .... Young Dito
9. The Greatest Game Ever Played (2005) .... Francis Ouimet
10. Constantine (2005) .... Chas Kramer
    ... aka Constantine (Germany)
11. I, Robot (2004) .... Farber
    ... aka I, Robot (Germany)
12. The Battle of Shaker Heights (2003) (as Shia La Beouf) .... Kelly Ernswiler
13. Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003) .... Max

Chuck the Movieguy interviews Shia LaBeouf for the movie Eagle Eye. Presented in You Tube HD.




Michelle Monaghan soon to be a mother, plays the heroic female lead.

Michelle Lynn Monaghan was born on March 23, 1976,in Winthrop, Iowa.
She studied journalism for three years at Chicago's Columbia College. In order to pay for college, she took a job as a model. In 1999, she quit college and moved to New York to work full-time as a fashion model.she starred opposite Robert Downey Jr. and Val Kilmer in the black comedy Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005). Later in 2005, Monaghan was filming in China, Italy, and the United States on Mission: Impossible III (2006), as the female lead opposite Tom Cruise.Other recent movies she has made:Made of Honor (2008)
Other Recent Movies:

Trucker (2008) .... Diane Ford

The Heartbreak Kid (2007) .... Miranda

Gone Baby Gone (2007) .... Angie Gennaro

Mission: Impossible III (2006) .... Julia

North Country (2005) .... Sherry

Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005) .... Gwen
... aka Mr. and Mrs. Smith (Australia)

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005) .... Harmony Faith Lane

Constantine (2005) (uncredited) .... Ellie

The Bourne Supremacy (2004) .... Kim

Billy Bob Thorton. Academy Award winner Thornton is involved in several pursuits, from acting to directing and even jamming out with his hillbilly band, the Boxmasters, who just released a new album.



In his latest action thriller, "Eagle Eye," Thornton plays Thomas Morgan, an FBI agent working against the clock to thwart a plot against the government.

Other Recent movies:

1. Eagle Eye (2008) .... Agent Thomas Morgan
   ... aka Eagle Eye: The IMAX Experience (USA: IMAX version)
2. Mr. Woodcock (2007) .... Jasper Woodcock
   
   
3. The Astronaut Farmer (2006) .... Charles Farmer
   
   
4. School for Scoundrels (2006) .... Dr. P
5. The Ice Harvest (2005) .... Vic
6. Bad News Bears (2005) .... Morris Buttermaker
7. Friday Night Lights (2004) .... Coach Gary Gaines
8. The Alamo (2004) .... Davy Crockett
   ... aka The Alamo (Philippines: English title)
9. Chrystal (2004) .... Joe
10. Bad Santa (2003) .... Willie
    ... aka Badder Santa (USA: longer version)
11. Love Actually (2003) .... The US President
12. Intolerable Cruelty (2003) .... Howard D. Doyle
13. Levity (2003) .... Manuel Jordan
14. Waking Up in Reno (2002) .... Lonnie Earl Dodd
15. The Badge (2002) .... Sheriff Darl Hardwick

Unscripted "Eagle Eye" Shia Labeouf, Michelle Monaghan and D.J. Caruso




"Eagle Eye trailer"





Other Movies Eagle Eye has been compared to , as in using very similar ideas:

Emily Behrendt and Pax Whitmore wrote

Eagle Eye can be almost entirely pieced together by using clips from other, better movies, including I, Robot, Terminator, Live Free or Die Hard, Enemy of the State, The Man Who Knew Too Much, The Fugitive and War Games.

Lisa Miller Wrote:

“Eagle Eye” assembles bits from a host of better films to form a watchable collage. Though little is original, the film borrows well from classics such as “The Matrix,” “North By Northwest,” “Terminator,” and “Enemy of The State.”

James Scott however suspects it rips off Hitchcock:

"I missed Disturbia (starring Shia LaBeouf) in the theaters, and after I’d heard that it was basically a watered-down version of Hitchcock’s Rear Window, I saw no compelling need to rush out and buy or rent it. Now, LaBeouf and Disturbia director D.J. Caruso regroup for Eagle Eye, which can charitably be called a watered-down version of Hitchcock’s The Man Who Knew Too Much, replete with a shameless rip-off of the famous “Albert Hall sequence, plus a few overtones of North by Northwest."

Babylon A.D = Volence and Stupidity & Vin Diesel

Rating Advisory: for intense sequences of violence and action, language and some sexuality. Trailer at bottom of post.
Starring : Vin Diesel,Michelle Yeoh,Melanie Thierry,Girard Depardieu,Charlotte Rampling

Synopsis :
It is the not-too-distant future. Thousands of satellites scan, observe and monitor our every move. Much of the planet is a war zone; the rest, a collection of wretched way stations, teeming megalopolises, and vast wastelands punctuated by areas left radioactive from nuclear meltdowns. It is a world made for hardened warriors, one of whom, a mercenary known only as Toorop, lives by a simple survivor's code: kill or be killed. His latest assignment has him smuggling a young woman named Aurora from a convent in Kazakhstan to New York City. Toorop, his new young charge Aurora and Aurora's guardian Sister Rebeka embark on a 6,000-mile journey that takes them from Eastern Europe, through a refugee camp in "New Russia," across the Bering Straight in a pilfered submarine, then through the frozen tundra of Alaska and Canada, and finally to New York. Facing obstacles at every turn, Toorop, the killer for hire, is tested like never before, in ways he could never have imagined--as he comes to understand that he is the custodian of the only hope for the future of mankind. For the first time in his life, Toorop has to make a choice: to make a difference or walk away and save himself. Too bad it came on the day he died.



Vin Diesal

This is a Vin Diesal dominated film. If you appreciate Vin Diesal, and all his subtly, you will like this movie. If you are a critical movie watcher, however, this movie will rate low. Even the director panned it, saying the studio (Fox) destroyed what he had hoped to make.

Vin Diesel (born Mark Sinclair Vincent; July 18, 1967) is an American actor, writer, director, and producer. While he prefers to identify himself as a "multi-faceted" actor he has played a number of similar roles,this role falls into his `ussual tough guy character.'

Diesel has Italian and Black ancestry. He has described himself as "definitely a person of color" and stated that he is "of ambiguous ethnicity - Italian and a lot of other stuff". Diesel has never met his biological father, and was raised by his African-American stepfather, Irving, an acting instructor and theatre manager,

Vin Diesel has a daughter, Hania Riley, born April 2, 2008, with his girlfriend, model Paloma Jimenez.



My reaction to Babylon A.D

It opens with a gritty counterbalance between the sacred and the profane, a prayer before a meal, an execution without pity. It plays on the counter balance of technological advancement at the same time as societies decay. It puts the unholy with the holy, and plays with the ultimate meaning. That's how I felt after the first five minutes.

Much of the movie seems stolen from What do Children of Men, with little Fifth Element ( a movie the director had a small acting role in) and Minority Report, and is full of post-Matrix, follow-the-flying-projectile effects that had no payoff except a major explosion.

I especially did not like Melanie Thierry's character. As one reviewer wrote " As the plot's potential Mary (Typhoid or Virgin), she's a whiny, wounded little brat. When we're introduced to her, she's supposed to be wide-eyed and innocent. By the end, she's so smug and self-righteous we can't wait for her moment of martyrdom. In between tantrums aimed at showing how salient she is, Kassovitz treats her like a prop -- necessary for the narrative but lacking any reason for empathy or concern."

FUN pre-release trailer:
so-called official trailer to the Mathieu Kassovitz-directed/co-scripted action sci-fi has come out. Uniquely made, the video lampooned most of highlighted movies this summer from "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" to "Sex and the City" and "The Dark Knight".






The Director Slams his own film

Filmmaker Mathieu Kassovitz has blamed Twentieth Century Fox bosses for savagely editing his forthcoming film Babylon A.D., comparing the final cut to "a bad episode of 24".

The French director insists studio executives battled against him throughout the sci-fi movie's production, first slashing his budget and later cutting out 15 minutes of the film he believed to be crucial to the plot.


He says: "I'm very unhappy with the film. I never had a chance to do one scene the way it was written or the way I wanted it to be. The script wasn't respected. Bad producers, bad partners - it was a terrible experience.


"It's pure violence and stupidity... All the action scenes had a goal: They were supposed to be driven by either a metaphysical point of view or experience for the characters.

"Instead parts of the movie are like a bad episode of 24."


Now Kassovitz admits he regrets striking a deal with the corporation in the first place. He adds: "I should have chosen a studio that has guts. Fox was just trying to get a PG-13 movie. I'm ready to go to war against them, but I can't because they don't give a shit."
(Ref )

Though sending a bad vibe, the 41-year-old still noted that there are some parts of it that he likes saying, "I like the energy of it and I got some scenes I'm happy with. But I know what I had - I had something much better in my hands but I just wasn't allowed to work." He also said, "The scope of the original book was quite amazing. The author was very much into geopolitics and how the world is going to evolve. He saw that as wars evolve, it won't be just about territories any more, but money-driven politics. As a director it's something that's very attractive to do."

Adapted from Maurice Georges Dantec's French novel Babylon Babies.

http://www.aceshowbiz.com/images/events/LRS-038016.jpg = directors pic

Mathieu Kassovitz (born 3 April 1967) is a French director, screenwriter, producer and actor, and is considered one of contemporary France's top emerging film talents,

Kassovitz is most famous outside France for his role as Nino Quincampoix in Jean-Pierre Jeunet's film Amélie. Among many other credits, he also had small roles in La Haine (which he also directed), Birthday Girl, Café Au Lait and The Fifth Element. He also played one of the main roles in Amen. (2003) by Costa-Gavras. Kassovitz is also recognizable for playing a conflicted Belgian explosives expert in Steven Spielberg's controversial 2005 film Munich, alongside Eric Bana and Geoffrey Rush. He explained several times he accepted acting parts only for the experience of knowing what it is to act, to be able to be a better director of actors afterward, to meet directors he admires and learn from them by working with them, and to take part in great projects.


Kassovitz set up the film production firm MNP Entreprise in 2000 "to develop and produce feature films by Kassovitz and to represent him as a director and actor."[4] MNP Entreprise is responsible for the co-productions of a number of films including Avida (2006) in which Kassovits acts and Babylon A.D. which he directed. Kassovitz purchased the film rights for the novel Johnny Mad Dog by Congolese writer Emmanuel Dongala. The film was also co-produced by MNP Entreprise, and directed by Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire. The premiere of the film was made at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival where it was screened within the Un Certain Regard section.[5] MNP Entreprise's upcoming titles are Rebellion and MNP. Kassovitz will both star in and direct Rebellion, a war film based on a true story of French commandos who clashed with tribes in New Caledonia, the Melanesian territory of France. The film will start shooting at the end of 2008. The science fiction film MNP is named after Mir Space Station, whose writing in Cyrillic letters (Мир) look like the letters MNP, and also the production company. The film is set to start shooting in 2011. [6]

ACTUAL TRAILER

Pineapple Express: Great directing, great acting.

Trailer at the bottom of the post  

Be aware: Despite a "warning," the movie is enthusiastically pro-pot.

But really it's not a `pot film' it's a buddy flick.
This is a classic buddy film. The two buddies happen to be potheads, (but not like Cheech and Chong,) The pot smoking acts as a central prop, and allows for some deep conversations and considerations. Don't be put off though- lots of violence and a classic car chase. The directing is spot on, and the movie flows pretty quickly.


A buddy film, according to The Complete Film Dictionary, is "a film that features the friendship of two males as the major relationship". Ira Konigsberg, author of the dictionary, further defines the genre: "Such films extol the virtues of male comradeship and relegate male-female relationships to a
The definition of a buddie film subsidiary position. Male relationships have always been a significant element in our popular culture, from the Leatherstocking Tales of James Fenimore Cooper to television beer commercials."

According to the Journal of Popular Film and Television, buddy films emerged in the 1970s in response to the feminist movement. The journal reported, "To punish women for their desire for equality, the buddy film pushes them out of the center of the narrative and replaces the traditional central romantic relationship between a man and a woman with a buddy relationship between two men. By making both protagonists men, the central issue of the film becomes the growth and development of their friendship. Women as potential love interests are thus eliminated from the narrative space.

That describes this movie. I don't think women will like it as much as males.

I have been told that if you liked Superbad, chances are you'll find something in Pineapple Express to like. While Superbad
 concentrated on friendships between boys during their teen years, this new Seth Rogen movie focuses on men in their mid twenties.


Plot summary for Pineapple Express (2008)IMD

Lazy court-process clerk and stoner Dale Denton has only one reason to visit his equally lazy dealer Saul Silver: to purchase weed, specifically, a rare new strain called Pineapple Express. But when Dale becomes the only witness to a murder by a crooked cop and the city's most dangerous drug lord, he panics and dumps his roach of Pineapple Express at the scene. Dale now has another reason to visit Saul: to find out if the weed is so rare that it can be traced back to him--and it is. As Dale and Saul run for their lives, they quickly discover that they're not suffering from weed-fueled paranoia: incredibly, the bad guys really are hot on their trail and trying to figure out the fastest way to kill them both. All aboard the Pineapple Express.


Director:David Gordon Green
Writers (WGA):Seth Rogen (screenplay) &
Evan Goldberg (screenplay) ...
Release Date:6 August 2008 (USA)
Genre: Comedy | Crime | Thriller



You can stream the entire movieit live now through Amazons Streaming Video Service- CLICK HERE

Wanted - The Movie - Great Fun

Wanted:
Directed by: Timbor Bekmambetov
Written by: Michael Brandt, Derek Haas, Chris Morgan
Starring: James McAvoy, Morgan Freeman,
Angelina Jolie, Thomas Kretschmann, Common

Wanted is two thumbs up.

It is similar in ways to the Bourn Identity, Spider Man and the Matrix (especially in special effects) and more recently Iron Man. If you liked those movies you will most likely like this.

One reviewer ( at Salon.com) hit it on the head with this comment:

(Angelina Jolie), carves out a distinctly human space in the midst of the movie's outlandish, joyously depraved violence. "Wanted" is fast-moving and bloody, enjoyable even within its apologetically generic limits. But James McAvoy is its real secret weapon:


With his X-ray blue eyes and lips that look bitten with anxiety, he has the miraculous ability to fool us into thinking there's really something at stake here."

Robert Ebert warns: "“Wanted,” directed by a hot Russian actionmeister named Timur Bekmambetov, is a film entire lacking in two organs I always appreciate in a movie: a heart and a mind. It is mindless, heartless, preposterous. By the end of the film, we can’t even believe the values the plot seems to believe, since the plot is deceived right along with us. The way to enjoy this film is to put your logic on hold, along with any higher sensitivities that might be vulnerable and immerse yourself as if in a video game."

And maybe he's right, on one hand. But there is a deeper message that I took from the film- the stupidity to blindly commit violent acts( because your superiors told you too- after brainwashing you.)

The basic plot of the story is a young guy in a bad relationship and in a boring job, discovers that his father who left his mother and he when he was seven- was a member of an elite group of assassins. (With the religious reference some might suspect a little hat tip towards the Knights of the Templar as portrayed in the Di Vinci Code). Not only is he the son of one, if not the best assassin, but he has a unique skill of focused attention- something he had thought was severe anxiety, and was taking medication for.

As a reviewer, I thought McAvoy did the stand out job, followed closely by the special effect people. Jolie and and Morgan Freedman were greatly limited in capturing caricatures that meant `more' than just roles.

Another Hat Tip to the review at 353 Review whose haiku review is on target.

KILLING CREW
BOOMERANG BULLETS
MINDLESS FUN

Review by Paul Grant (Follower of Basho)

"Being a man doesn't come Easy" -Never Back Down Movie Review

"Being a man doesn't come Easy" -Never Back Down

(No Spoilers- Trailer and Xtra-Clips at the bottom:  Never Back Down Training WEpisode and Amber Heard interview)

Never Back Down is about a high school male Sean Faris (Reunion, Smallville) named Jake Tyler who has personal problems: his father, while drunk, drove into a tree and killed himself. Jake was in the car and survived. Jake knew his dad was drunk, but didn't make any attempt to stop him before he drove. (This all happens before the movie begins.)

Jake is conflicted because not only does he blame himself, but his mother (Leslie Hope, quite good) seems to hold it against him too. And as time passes he becomes a problem teen, whose problems his mother dramatically recites as a growing pattern of statistics.

The family, Jake, his mother and a younger brother (Wyatt Smith, cute) move from Ohio to Florida so that the younger brother can study tennis.



Jake discovers that at the new high school there is an under-ground fight club. The catch is that the top fighters don't just box. If they did, Jake might have had a chance. "Boxing is old school, as dead as Louis and Marciano."




The movie revolves around two major themes: Everybody has their own fight, and never back down. How do you do this? According to the movie by facing your demons and overcoming bullies.

The movie has been compared to Karate Kid and Fight Club. It is not anything like the twisted plotline of Fight Club (the movie is in a class all it's own), but there is a fight club and one of the actors Ryan (Cam Gigandet) does look and act a bit like the ripped Brad Pitt from that movie.

It is much more mature and violent than Karate kid, but it does have a mentor teaching a guy discipline. The actor Djimon Hounsou ( read more about this actor here) plays Brazilian from Senegal who teaches conditioning, restraint, doggedness, and winning the mental game. I thought he was great.

The dialogue is flip and hip, the fight scenes are well `clipped'. I have been told that they don't exhibit the best fighting- but how they are filmed I thought, made them intense. See the training the actors went through in video at bottom of post.)

Amber Heard on top of Sean Faris

There is a romance sub plot , and a `what you do for your friends' angle. There is the `now-ness' of instant communication via youtube like videos. And though the movie is predictable in it's outcome - what makes it fresh is how the character of Jake really comes to understand his need for controlling his temper and anger, even if sometimes, the only thing a bully understands is a beat-down.



You Can Watch The Entire Movie On-Line right now
for $2.99 through Amazon Streaming Videoes  Click Here
   


Never Back Down Training Webisode


Amber Heard interview