Passengers is about a psychiatrist (Anne Hathaway) treating five survivors of a plane crash. As she grows closer to one of them, played by Patrick Wilson (who totally doesn't sing in this movie argh), her patients start going missing one-by-one. Suspicious airline official David Morse (as usual) mentions that there were no survivors in that crash, and when Anne gets a hold of that passenger list, she sees her name on it.
In other words, Passengers is like the Night Visions episode The Passenger List, starring Aidan Quinn and Paul Guilfoyle.
Except Hallmark-y.
Which is why the Night Visions episode is much more superior to this movie, and no, not because Aidan Quinn was in that. *swoon*
Passengers starts off as a thriller. People go missing, David Morse acts suspicious, some of the people she knows acts suspicious, Patrick Wilson keeps seeking her out like all suspicious-like. And the ending was anti-climactic.
It turns out that the five (well, six) are actually in limbo (technically), and the people around Anne Hathaway were actually supposed to help her come to terms that she's dead, and to move on. Except for Patrick Wilson, of course, because he was on the plane as well.
I would've preferred a conspiracy involving the airline.
In The Passenger List, Aidan Quinn is a crash inspector who receives a call about an airplane crash. Heading on-scene, the coroner tells him that there were no survivors and they've got all the bodies, except for one person who's literally in pieces, and since they're in the process of putting him back together and the passenger list isn't back yet, there is no ID on the guy. He becomes romantically involved with this lady whose family died on the plane, and as he investigates, suspicious things (I can't remember what; it's been a long time since I saw this) start to happen. Eventually, he gets a call from the coroner who tells him that they've finally pieced the body together. By the time he gets there, the passenger list has been faxed/despatched over as well, and viewing the body, he sees... him.
As in, himself. It's his body.
Flash-forward (or something like that), and he wakes up on a plane. THE plane. As he panics, he sees familiar faces, ones he's (and we've) seen throughout the episode, and the lady he's currently dating. The plane malfunctions, and the episode ends with the first few people to arrive onto the scene, telephoning Aidan Quinn, and his cellphone starts to ring a few feet away from them.
See? THAT'S how you make a thriller. Although The Passenger List is only a half hour, but seriously, it's Hollywood. They can hire people to make it an hour and a half longer. I will blog about my love for Night Visions another time; I want to finish this and watch TV now).
Anyway, the only thing I like about the movie was the ending, and not because it meant the movie was over, but because it was... sweet. Anne Hathaway and Patrick Wilson turned out to be acquaintances on the plane, and as it was crashing and Anne's panicking and screaming, "We're all gonna DIE!!", Patrick consoles her and tells her that he is there for/with her, and flashbacking through the movie, HE was the one who kept meeting up with her, and kept her company, and seeking her out, and generally, was WITH HER.
I thought it was sweet, and basically the only thing in the movie that made it even worth the two hours. Sappy, but sweet.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Passengers (2008)
On the radio...
While driving today, I noticed that out of the five stations I have on the car radio (five because there were only five buttons), three of them were playing Jazz music. And these stations were Hitz, Mix and Lite.
Three radio stations as different as night and day, which means that they NEVER play the same thing at the same time. Let alone Jazz. Ugh.
Red.fm was having piano music, which was nice, but kinda disappointing because I was looking forward to some Lady GaGa. Fly was the only one playing songs, current ones too, like that annoying Fall For You song, but even though they had the announced, "Fly... FM," every other song, still no DJ, no ads.
It's nice to know that even with airwave issues, Fly.fm is still awesome.
Which makes me wonder... would Fly.fm survive a nuclear meltdown?
Monday, January 4, 2010
Avatar (2009)
Or, as it's commonly known on the Internet, Dances with Blue Furries.
I get nauseous easily, and that's why I'm very reluctant to watch a movie in 3-D because 1) 3-D is more expensive than regular movies and 2) I don't want to pay extra money to get a headache and puke all over the person in front of me.
But, the first thing I thought when the movie ended was, "Dammit, I should've seen this in 3-D."
For once, it's not overhyping on the moviemakers' part. The CGI is absolutely gorgeous, and the star of the movie is so obviously Pandora, the planet the film is set on.
Now I'm totally kicking myself for not opting for 3-D the first time.
Storyline, however, is just meh, and because of its total and utter 'meh-ness', doesn't warrant a second round in the cinemas. As you may have heard, the plot is recycled. So is every other Hollywood film, actually, but when the fact is so obvious that the movie just screams, "BORROWED MATERIAL!!", it's not a good sign.
True, the plot is just a device to show off the entire ecosystem created by the makers, but come on, we're talking about a big-budget studio movie. Don't tell me they can't come up with a storyline better than what we've been given. Jeez.
And that's why I'm not gonna watch Avatar again. I feel it's not worth a second time.
If you do want to see it on the big screen, do watch it in 3-D. Saves you the money, and the energy expended in kicking.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Twilight Chapters 15-24 + Epilogue = Finally finished!
So sorry for the delay. I've been putting off my reading because it's such a drag to read everything from a screen.
[Note: I ALWAYS finish a book I've started.]
So in Chapter 15, we get to meet the Cullens.
Full chapter on Carlisle, which is good, since it diverts from the love-talk. The Vulturi also makes an appearance in a painting, though their collective name is not mentioned (probably because Meyer hadn't thought of it yet), only the individual members.
And then we have baseball!
[Supermassive black HOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLEEEEEEEE!!!]
I'm enjoying the reparté. Whether it's truly witty, or I have finally lost my mindgot used to the idea of pleasant banter for the sake of it, I'unno. It's surprisingly not painful. The book also explains why James didn't kill her father. The movie, aside from saying that he's ruthless and crap, didn't explain any further, so Hollywood basically just made him look inefficient.
Additional proof that the book is ALWAYS better than the movie. Except for Perfume: Story of A Murderer (which is equally balanced in awesomeness).
Chapter 22, though long, was interesting enough as we find out about Alice's mysterious origins. Mind you, we still don't know much about her, but at least we know how she came to be. James did the first and foremost mistake in villainy, and that is monologuing to his prey. But anyway, if he didn't do that, there wouldn't be Chapter 23, which was a bit cringe-worthy because every other sentence with Edward in it refers to him as "the angel". "The angel is screaming", "The angel is so beautiful", "The angel bollocks." *rolls eyes*
The epilogue could be a few pages shorter, as most of it was of Bella crying and whining in the car about how she doesn't want to go to the prom and how she didn't see it coming and crap. It was absolutely annoying. Everyone pretty is at the prom, with special elaboration on Rosalie, which reminds me of how Movie Rosalie's prettiness can't match that of Movie Alice. Not by a long shot.
And so I'm done with Twilight. I'm not used to romance novels and teen lit, so my recounting may be a bit biased, so anyway read it at your own risk.
Twilight can also be considered the first book I've finished reading in 2010, so yeah. That's that.
Friday, January 1, 2010
Happy New Year, everyone!! Plus, 2010 Movie List!
Chug out the leftover 'nog and bring out the fireworks! We're hittin' the '10, folks!
************
It is now 2011, and I have seen six out of 10. Not too bad, methinks. Colored ones are the ones I saw.
It's that time of year again, and below are the movies I'm looking forward to this year, in chronological order:
1) Alice in Wonderland
2) Clash of the Titans
3) A Nightmare on Elm Street (but only 'cuz Jackie Earle Haley's donning the iconic knife-nails)
4) Iron Man 2
5) Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (this movie has been on my list since last year. Stupid people who pushed it back)
6) The A-Team (Final-friggin'-LY!!)
7) Toy Story 3
8) The Sorceror's Apprentice
9) The Expendables (which promises cheesy lines, and loads and loads of action)
10) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (it's more of a ritual, now)
As a side note, one movie I'm looking forward to, but not in a good way, is The Last Airbender. Here's to hoping that the movie wouldn't be epic, as a movie that disrespects source material SO MUCH shouldn't be successful.
[Unlike Watchmen, who mostly definitely didn't disrespect (95% of the time), but wasn't very successful anyway. Damn general public.]
Sunday, December 27, 2009
[Belated] Merry Christmas, everyone!!
Chug out the 'nog and the prezzies, folks! :D
************
Really sorry guys, thought I'd posted this on Christmas day itself (or at least, yesterday).
Right, update of sorts: I'm still working on Twilight, and contrary to everyone's belief and to my own surprise, I'm not sick of it. It's just been a bit tedious for me to read the entire thing on my computer, when I'm more of a paper, book-in-hand person. And besides, I've had a massive headache the past week, so I've been trying not to exert my eyes much by reading the screen.
Right, update of sorts: I'm still working on Twilight, and contrary to everyone's belief and to my own surprise, I'm not sick of it. It's just been a bit tedious for me to read the entire thing on my computer, when I'm more of a paper, book-in-hand person. And besides, I've had a massive headache the past week, so I've been trying not to exert my eyes much by reading the screen.
Which is something like what... I'm... doing... now. Shit.
Anyway, I'm at the hospital scene. That whole action sequence in the movie was just two pages in the book. Yawn.
Paul Sussman has a new book! Titled The Hidden Oasis, it's selling in MPH now. And since this one DOES NOT HAVE Inspector Khalifa, well, I'll just wait for the book to hit RM32.95 mark. I bought myself the first book, The Lost Army of Cambyses, but that one was just alright, after the awesomeness that was the second book, The Last Secret of the Temple [YOU MUST REEADDDD!!~!].
Aside from that, I watched the first two Psycho movies, and the third and fourth, like, glimpses here and there. For the third, the two female leads annoyed the crap out of me so I kinda zoned out whenever they were on (which was for a considerable time), and for the fourth, I went to bed early. One thing that annoys me off is that they keep repeating Psycho II. Someone please put on the first one, I'd like to see it again.
[Plus, Anthony Perkins isn't so yummy in the second one. Understandably, of course, since it was made 20 years after the first film.]
I'm still working on my posts for the first two Psycho films, and expect one on Avatar, which I
Storyline, however, is just meh, so you may want to weigh that against the RM15 for Digital 3-D. Read More......
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Storm Warriors (2009)
Storm Warriors is the loudest movie I've ever seen, and I've seen Transformers 2 and G.I. Joe.
It is also awesome and fail all in one. This is the first time I've felt that way about any movie.
Why? Because Aaron Kwok bloody dies, that's why! More on this later.
SW is the follow-up to Storm Riders, from over 10 years ago. This time around, Wind and Cloud has to contend with Lord Godless, a powerful Japanese warlord that wants to take over China, and his son, Heart. To defeat him, both Cloud and Wind have to train and increase their martial arts skills; Wind taking the evil path, and Cloud taking the normal one. Wind becomes demonic, so it falls to Cloud to stop him before he does any more destruction.
First, the good stuff:
The CGI is fan-bloody-tastic, very comic-bookish, and very 300, except more color. Cue 60-plus seconds of badassery 10-15 minutes into the movie, with Heart, Earth and Sky, and a whole ton of
Plus, montages of innocent people dying, yeah!
The fight scenes are very comic book-ish, and the choreography is pretty good as well, although some instances they just stand there and throw chi / energies / [insert correct term here] at each other. Doesn't lessen the cool factor, though.
Then, the not-so-good:
The theme song for this movie kinda blows. It's awesome that they got both our leads to sing it, compared to the previous one where it's just Aaron Kwok, but I preferred the theme for the first movie. Overall score is lovely, though, and really went well with the fight scenes.
The love interests are annoying as usual, especially Charlene Choi, whom I've never really liked. I mean, the writers had the chance to kill her off and they didn't. Girls are pointless in these types of movies. It's a bit like Supernatural: we only want to see the boys and the monsters (or in this case, the kung-fu), and only them.
[Everything else can jump off a bridge.]
Speaking of female presence, where is Shu Qi? I didn't even know her character from the first film was carried forward to this one till I got on Wikipedia. As such, I managed to guess that her character was going to die, but kudos to the filmmakers, her death was so abrupt that I didn't see it coming.
[Just as well, though; ChoCho was even more pointlessly-annoying than the first film.]
The final fight scene should've been longer, and Wind's evil side shouldn't have been defeated that easily. (Though it was pretty cool.). Evil eye should've opened all the way, too.
Annnddd... the downright unpretty:
Pulling a Cyclops (an X-Men 3, if you will) with Heart and the Emperor's soldiers. The whole bunch just vanished into thin air after Wind
As I mentioned earlier, Aaron Kwok dies. Or seemingly dies. Whatev. To save the falling Wind-and-Choi, Cloud dives down after them and
And I don't know whether there were any after-credits scene, because the theatre people shut it down halfway through the credits, and Wikipedia is not being informative at this moment.
ARGH!
And there was absolutely no mention (in interviews and news articles) of the movie being the first part of a larger story-arc, which really pisses me off because if I had known of the ending, it wouldn't have been so anti-climactic for me. I still wouldn't have liked it, but at least I wouldn't have ended up being disappointed. Despite the movie's treatment of Nicholas Tse / Heart, I was planning to watch the movie a second time, but the ending just blew me off.
At least the Harry Potter people have already announced their movie plans for Book 7.
Overall, CGI and fights are simply lovely; just the stupid ending and that Nicholas Tse-part that killed it for me. Sorry if my review is a bit awkward; it's difficult to rant about all of this in English :P Read More......
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
