Where the Wild Things Are

Rating: 6.5/10

Genre: Fantasy

Overall value for money and time: 6.0/10

Fantasy: 1/5

CG effects: 1/5

Soundtrack: 4/5

Story: 2.5/5

One of the few movies with great soundtracks, songs which seem to be able to touch that soft place in your heart... I was extremely disappointed when I learnt that this movie would not be screened in our local cinemas, recalling someone telling me about what was written in the newspapers that this movie would not be well received by the local audience.

So when it first came out on dvd, I bought it at what was possibly the highest cost for a code 3 DVD. The only other dvd which shared the same privilege as this was Ong Bak 2; even though they'll selling Ong Bak 2 very cheap nowadays. Well, I didn't regret buying the dvd, but it'll probably be my one and only time viewing it. There was nothing fantastic about this movie.

Where the wild things are, a supposed child fantasy movie about a little boy who ran away from home and landed up on an island inhabitated by big and cute furry creatures. The poster features the main creature, but and it seems... *spoilers ahead* looks can be deceiving. Not just the poster, but the creature itself.

What I didn't like about this movie was that it didn't reach up to my expectations of what a fantasy movie should turn out... in fact, it felt more like a real life situation where the creatures looked extremely life-like... almost felt like humans dressed in mascot suits. The details of the facial features were convincing but part from that, everything about the creatures felt... off. I liked how the "fantasy" world was a subtle representation of the male protagonist's world, but it wasn't enough to boost this movie into my top rankings for fantasy movies.

If you're thinking something like Harry Potter or even Spiderwick Chornicles, this movie will disappoint. Because there's nothing fantasy about it, the island which the creatures inhabitated was just like any other Survivor series' islands and the male protagonist didn't have a likeable personality. One of the reasons why I think Singapore didn't let this movie be shown on the big screens is because of some of the qualities portrayed... this movie felt like it was ok for kids to run away from home to discover themselves before coming back to appreciate what "home" really was...

Still, the moral of the story wasn't that bad, the ending scene was one of the sweetest, but rather subtle and left a fairly feel-good feeling when the credits rolled. The special features helped me to appreciate the movie slightly better, the technical difficulties in filming a short scene at the start of the movie with a dog running and barking at the same time and how the children around the entire crew were given that much freedom to "direct" and play in the sets to create that added feel in a children's fantasy world (though it didn't quite show in the movie). But most important, the kids had fun, the director and crew had fun, and I had... a pretty good time watching this movie.

Zombieland

Rating: 6.0/10

Genre: Horror Comedy

Overall value for money and time: 5.5/10

Horror: 1/5

Comedy: 1/5

Gore: 3/5

Story: 1/5

Didn't work for me. Either that or my expectations were too high. I did hear about how this movie was supposed to be more of a comedy. Yup, it's true that the horror level wasn't quite there, but even the comedy was a little too slapstick for me.

In a world dominated by zombies, the last remaining survivors must find a way to continue their way of life. There's really not much to say about it, a typical zombie movie with the horror factor lowered injected with cheap humor. I didn't like the development of the storyline, it was pretty refreshing at the start, but after a while, the "rules" which the male protagonist went by to survive in a world infested with zombies dulled the movie with predictability.

Everything in the movie was just too "convenient" and made little sense. A decent movie to watch if you have a load of time on your hands and if you're rotting at home, or have lots of money to splurge catching it at a cinema near you... but ultimately not worth your time or money for the typical Singporean.

Alice In Wonderland

Rating: 6.7/.10

Genre: Fantasy

Overall value for time and money: 7.0/10

Let me just cut to the chase, a rather disappointing dark movie about the story of Alice in Wonderland, featuring Alice returning to wonderland to end the Red Queen's evil reign. It's like a sequel, dark sequel, which doesn't have much originality in it. Felt like a fusion of 3 movies; Avatar's world, Chronicles of Narnia's teenage warriors and Brother's Grim's darkness.

Johnny Depp acted as the stereotypical eccentric Mad Hatter (nothing refreshing, reminded me of his roles in Pirates of the Carribean and The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus), so did Helena Bonham Carter as the stereotypical fantasy evil Red Queen (reminded me of her roles in Harry Porter and Sweeney Todd). It's another collaboration of the 2 stars after Sweeny Todd and I must say, they go extremely well together, the most compatible oddball combination on screen.

Alice, though shining with her looks in this movie, felt kind of weak in performance, while Ann Hathway's role as the White Queen, though taking on a fresh bimbolic character, didn't work for me. The characters which I really liked were... CG-fied, if there's even such a word, the "fake" characters. Sadly.

It could be due to my movie experience as well, catching it 3D, a bad 3D experience since my 3D glasses "dimmed the lights" and made the supposedly bright colors of the movie look rather dull. Never knew 3D was such a double edged sword only until watching this movie. I might not regret missing out on Avatar's 3D after all...

Tim Burton added a couple of his trademarks, or cinematography flairs in this movie, one of the most prominent being his favourite "Tree". The leafless tree, with creepily extended branches was featured in this movie, a tree similar to the one in The Nightmare Before Christmas and almost identical to the one in Big Fish.

Still, this is a movie not to be missed, though not excellent, it still packs a good experience to lose oneself in the newly interpreted fantasy world of Alice in Wonderland amidst the hectic Singapore lifestyle.

The Blind Side

Rating: 7.0/10

Genre: Drama

Overall value for time and money: 7.0/10

I had to catch this movie after all that hoo hah about Sandra Bullock winning Best Actress award in the oscars. After catching it, I couldn't really fathom why. She wasn't outstanding in this movie, true, she had to adopt a new accent, and probably brought out the personality of the actual female protagonist, but apart from that, it was just... ok for me.

A mediocre movie, based on a true story about the background of an American Football Star, Michael Oher, and the altruist wealthy blonde Leigh Ann Tuohy, who took him in when he was homeless and deserted. It's hard to tell what this movie really focused on, whether it was Michael Oher or Leigh Ann Tuohy is still a blur to me.

It wasn't a bad movie, good acting, good story, good story development. Just not, fantastic. I guess the reason why it's so well received is because it's based on a true story, and Sandra Bullocks critically acclaimed performance, and yes, not to mention American Football is a major sport in American culture.

For someone who is the least passionate about such a sport, it felt like any other "based on actual events sports" movie. I thought the most outstanding performance was that from the little boy, Tuohy's son, who really brought sparkle to the movie during his screen time. A movie worth catching, a movie you might forget after some time though...

All About Steve

Rating: 7.7/10

Genre: Comedy

Overall value for time and money: 7.5/10

Exceling in what she does, creating crossword puzzles for a daily newspaper and reaching out to many readers, a passionate crossword constructor found herself losing her job when she set eyes for a guy during a blind date her parents set up for her, as a result of creating a crossword puzzle... all about steve, a puzzle that no one could solve.

She thought of giving herself a break and started stalking Steve around the region, a CNN cameraman, convinced that they were perfect for each other. Led on blindly by Steve's colleagues, she gradually finds herself in outrageously difficult yet hilarious situations.

I was disappointed by the reviews online about this hidden gem. I was even more disappointed when I came to know Sandra Bullock won the "worst actress" for the "Razzie" award, an award I haven't heard of though. Sandra Bullock was perfect in this movie, I believe no one else could do it as well as she did. There are some Hollywood stars which have been stuck with roles which give them their "personality". Such as Sandra Bullock, smart yet bimbolic. Johnny Depp, we think eccentric. Vincent Zhao, Kung Fu master, so on and so forth...

Sandra Bullock has been cast as a smart yet bimbolic-like character in many movies, Miss Congeniality, The Proposal and this movie, All about Steve. And she has never failed any of the movies. A versatile actress, stunning and convincing me after her role in The Lake House, where she had to take on a more serious role, yet still exceling in it.

Enough said about her acting performance, though I'm not a fan of hers, I might be after this review. What this movie lacked was the romantic element in it. Note that the genre isn't romantic comedy, like most others, how they liked to fuse these 2 genres together, but this movie had almost naught romantic "aw" scenes in it. In fact, the ending left the romance hanging quite abruptly.

Still, that was probably the only downside of this movie. I enjoyed it because of the hilarious scenes, and especially, the content. I was pleasantly surprised by the content of this movie as I thought it was gonna be just another slapstick comedy. "Wow", was my reaction after the credits rolled. Though the situations were rather ridiculous, little too exagerrated, the takehome message was heartwarming and it was what made this movie for me.

True Legend

Rating: 7.4/10

Genre: Action

Overall value for money and time: 7.5/10

The story of Su Qi-Er, a decorated general and war hero who gave up being governor to lead a simple life with his family, and to open up a martial arts school. Years later, his once perfect life was ripped apart when his vengeful sworn brother returned as governor and took away everything from him; he killed his father, claimed Su Qi-Er's son as his own; and fatally damaged his right hand...

Returning to rescue his son, there was a twist of events which resulted in the birth of a new style of martial arts... The drunken fist.

That's the sypnosis, in a nutshell that is. The entire movie isn't quite your typical martial arts movie. First, it had story, well it had 2 main plots in fact. The first half focusing on the characters development and background of our male protagonist while the second half focused more on the development of the drunken fist. It was refreshing for me, it felt like I was watching 2 separate movies, True Legend 1 and True Legend 2. None of the main plots outlasted it's duration and kept me at the edge of my seat throughout.

Secondly, the main ingredient which makes every martial arts film... the action itself. Solid fighting scenes. Though one cannot help but compare this movie with previous martial arts film like Fearless and Ip Man, and true, the fighting scenes might not necessarily be on par... but I think it's all due to the essence of the stance itself. While fearless featured Jet Li in more stylistic stances, Ip Man featured Donnie Yuan in more forceful stances. Poor Vincent Zhao had to come behind the previous 2 martial arts artist just because his fighting stance wasn't that "cool".

Drunken fist is in itself a "lazy" fighting stance, and because of that, it might not necessarily appeal to most audience, because it lacks the force, the elegance, and the "coolness". Therefore, we can't fault True Legend's fighting scenes because of that... overall, all the actors excelled in bringing out their individual characters. Though personally, Jay Chou's presence as the God of Wushu and Drunken God seemed a little out of place.

*spoilers ahead* The part where Jay Chou appeared might seem a little too cheesy at first, but on reviewing the entire movie after watching it, I realised it still made sense. Because there was a scene in the movie which quoted something like, "There are 2 enemies, one external, and the other within yourself." Can't remember the exact quote but it made sense... because in the midst of the movie, it showed how Su Qi-Er was so "obsessed" with his martial arts that he had to first overcome the enemy within himself.

The movie started off strong, kept it going till the middle (end of first story) but dropped towards the end. What I didn't like about it is that it the ending scene felt like an imitation of Ip Man's. I shan't spoil the story for you any further, but overall, this movie isn't as bad as what most critiques claim. While it might not win the top spot of martial arts movies, it will definitely come within the top 10 of your list.