a sixth sense cannot make up for a complete lack of common sense
the resident
-best known as May Ching-
-09/01/1990-
-19 years 1.2 months-
-mugger/slacker/writer-
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Saturday, March 28, 2009, 11:32 am
Watched two excellent movies these past few weeks.
Departures (Japanese romaji 'Okuribito') came highly recommended by nearly every movie review I came across. I'd been looking for a movie buddy for ages to watch this but didn't find one for quite a long time...
Anyway, last Sunday, me, Priscilla, Hema and Cherie went to watch it. As usual, I was the first to show up (at the meeting time, damn it). Cherie arrived stunningly late, as per normal. Good thing the movie started at 3 something. After mooching around, we decided movie theatre snacks were far too exorbitant and dashed off to NTUC Fairprice to buy better stuff, resulting in s being slightly late for the movie. Thankfully Golden Village has way too many commercials for its own good.
The movie was brilliant. Genius. Not as obscure as most arthouse Japanese films on Okto, it was nevertheless slow, subtle and touching. Basically, the movie is about failed cellist Kobayashi Daigo (Motoki Masahiro) returning to his mother's house and inadvertently finding himself a job as an undertaker of sorts. (He cleans and prepares bodies for encoffinment.) Along the way, he dispels taboos about the job, finds an identity for himself and reconciles with his estranged father. The beauty of this movie (along with many other Japanese movies) is the way they manage to encapsulate so many themes and truths without appearing naggy or hyped.
However, many of the reviews stereotyped this movie as a 'black comedy'. I beg to differ. Sure, there are some moments in the film that can be called such, but most of the movie is too sentimental for that. Some parts are slow-moving (like the scene where Daigo realises how important his wife is) but the musical interlude with Daigo getting used to his job (and playing his cello) was pure genius.
The movie was scored by Joe Hisaishi, who I later found out scored other movies like Spirited Away, Howl's Moving Castle, My Neighbour Totoro and Princess Mononoke, all of which are famed Miyazaki Hayao movies. The lush score, particularly the main theme was stunning.
Credit goes to Motoki, who reportedly learnt to clean bodies and play the cello for this movie. His 'rubber face' endeared his character to the audience and perfectly captured the spirit of a musician.
I watched Confessions Of A Shopaholic the other day with Xue Xuan. While not as deep and erudite as Okuribito, it was certainly a good laugh.
The movie is actually an amalgamation of the first two Shopaholic novels as well as a great deal of creative licence. Like for example, Becky is American instead of British, Tarquin has become a lovable guy instead of wealthy, socially awkward British noble who no longer plays a big role in the plot as in the books, Luke does not set up Brandon Communications until the end of the movie. Instead, he is Becky's boss at Successful Savings. Throw in Alette, an over-zealous shopaholic support group and The Girl In The Green Scarf and you get a movie which is reassuringly familiar as well as being delightfully new.
Many hilarious scenes abound, like Becky's imagination about the shop mannequins and the horror that is her closet. Despite stretching for nearly two hours, the movie has relatively little romantic action which will surely disappoint the fans of the books. Also, Derek Smeath has been depicted here as a nerdy, pathetic villain, a quirk which I hated. In the books, he is a lovable, long-suffering man who eventually befriends Becky. In the movie, Becky has the last laugh as she pays off her $10,000 debt... in pennies.
A good, cheap laugh which doesn't need anything to be funny and appealing to all. I strongly recommend real-life shopaholics should watch this. (You know who you are).