Last weekend was a weekend full of longings and post-travel blues. Unrequited ones. Woes. ( So I decided to sleep it all off and stay awake long enough to crave crispy fried chicken from Shihlin before falling back to sleep )

I am now back from my six days long trip to the capital of Taiwan. Mainly for Mayday’s D.N.A.’s World Tour concert with Rachel and Emily. For those who really knows me, I guess it’s not much of a surprise anymore to know that I have the tendency to attach ‘concert’ and ‘traveling to foreign country’ together in one big happy package :3

So, Taipei. Have a picture of Taipei. ( My personal view of the 101 Building was not half as good though XD; )

As for the rest of the pictures and notes from my trip, it shall have to wait until they got off from the stringent QC-ing ( and meticulous photoshopping ) from Ms. Rachel ( so that we don’t look like half-dead sleep deprived zombies; which sad to admit, we were ).

Until then ~!

( btw, Mayday’s D.N.A. concert @ Taipei was just so awesomely amazing; more coherent and eloquent words failed me kaaay? )

 
And wow, I just realised it had been a two month gap between the last I posted here @.@; Whooops?

So uhh… this is not actually a Japanese movie per se, but I’m dumping it here because the orignal story IS from a Japanese animated film back in 2001? And well, Saya is Saya and it is set in Japan? Errr…

I’m a fan of Blood : The Last Vampire animated movie. I’m an even bigger fan of Blood+ ( which is the alternate universe/interpretation of the story and characters from Blood:TLV so I figured I might as well watch the live action movie just to see how it goes even if I went in without a single hint of expectation.

And guess what? Without expectation is still not quite enough to describe how hilariously bad this is XD;

On the surface, Saya is a stunning 17-year-old, but that youthful exterior hides the tormenting soul of a 400-year-old “halfling.”

Born to a human father and a vampire mother, she has for centuries been a loner obsessed with using her samurai skills to rid the world of vampires, all the while knowing that she herself can survive only on blood like those she haunts.

When she is sent onto an American military base in Tokyo by the clandestine organization she works for, Saya immediately senses that this may her opportunity to finally destroy Onigen, the evil matriarch of all vampires.

Using her superhuman strength and her sword, she begins to rid the base of its evil infestation in a series of spectacular and elaborate showdowns.

However it is not until she forms her first human friendship in centuries with the young daughter of the base’s general that Saya learns that her greatest power over Onigen may well be her ability for human connection ….

Okay, this is a serious case of “The description of the movie is much better than the entire movie itself”. Let’s move to what’s so loltasticly bad about it okay?

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So uhmm… at least I had a good time snarking at the movie with Star Wars quoting friends in the cinema itself?

But oh! Watch out for the awesome ninja-fights scene. That was really well done and I think the best thing that happened to the movie are the ninjas and the old man fighting them :D

There’s no secret I’m a fan of director Nakashima Tetsuya’s work after seeing Rolling Bomber Special years ago. But it was pretty much Shimotsuma Monogatari/下妻物語 the one that cemented my love for his fast paced, psychedelic style ( an even more over the top Guy Ritchie’s Snatch, minus the profanity imho)

When I was looking through the movies list the film festival has to offer this year, I made a note to myself saying that if I’m to watch only ONE movie from the list this year, it’ll be Paco ( because, seriously, I can’t get enough of his style :D )

There once was a hospital where patients and even doctors & nurses were all weird. Above all, Onuki, a patient who built up his company all by himself from scratch, is a super cranky old man. One day, he meets up a girl called Paco, who cannot retain memory beyond one day due to a car accident. She is reading the same picture book everyday. Onuki starts bonding with Paco after some incident, and begins to doubt his way of living.
~ from AsianMediaWiki

I must admit the description of the movie made me did a double take, and after seeing the trailer, doubly so. So Nakashima directed a kids’ movie… with his usual suspects of crazy casts and antics @.@ After watching his Memories of Matsuko/嫌われ松子の一生 ( which is a really depressing movie deep down that I’d only realised after the ending credit started to roll which showed how awesome it was ), I do wonder what Paco has in store ( because seriously? The trailer and description doesn’t say much at all XD;)

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Personally, I didn’t think Paco and the Magical Book as well done a story as Memories of Matsuko, but considering intended younger audiences and the bizarre fairy tale-like premise the story took, it’s really a very psychedelic fun and yet moving story that can be enjoyed by both young and old.

I must admit to trying my damnedest not to cry at certain moments in the movie; which took me by surprise because the story can be hilarious most of the times, and was so over the top you wondered what everyone on the casts were smoking during the filming session.

( I kept hearing sniffles from the crowd when I was in the cinema, so I’m glad I was not the only one who were really touched and saddened by this weird cocktail of a movie )

My GrandAunt MMS-ed this to me a few days ago <3 I can't wait to get home to see them!

I still can’t believe they were born on the same day. The dark coloured pup is at least half the size of her elder brother @.@

I started doing this as a collected 4 movies review in one post but I found myself going waaaaaaay too lengthy ( especially in bitching about the ones I disliked ). So uhmm… Part 1/4 hey ho! Here we go?

Somehow I’d managed to catch four Japanese films in the cinema in the span of six weeks or so. In Malaysia. Strange, I know. But the experience can best be described as a see-saw. Because for every good movie I watched, I ended up watching a really horrible one the next. Thankfully I started with an awful one, and I ended the J-movies spree with Departures, which was just amazing. Anyway, onwards, brave trooper! To tl;dr-ville!

Dance, Subaru / 昴 スバル

WHAT IS THIS I DON’T EVEN

Let’s just say I’m glad I’d got free movie passes to this because it’ll pain me to even pay RM6 for this movie. Did you watch the trailer? Did you read the movie summary online? Not yet? Here you go!

Subaru and her twin brother Kazuma share a dream in becoming ballet dancers, but their passion is discouraged by their father. After Kazuma’s death from a hereditary illness, dancing became Subaru’s only happiness and she yearns to lose herself in dance. Her life takes a dramatic turn when she runs into cabaret owner Isuzu, who recognizes the talent in Subaru and trains her in her nightspot.

But to become a professional ballerina, Subaru has to overcome harsher challenges. Spurred on by her rivaling dance companions, Subaru enters an international dance competition, to vie for recognition and a scholarship to any top ballet company in the world.

~ from AsianMediaWiki

Done? Yeah, congratulations! You’d just watched the movie inside out! I had not been so BORED out of my mind in a cinema for ages. Even as mind numbing as Transformer 2 was; even as plothole-riddled as Terminator: Salvation was, at least I was not screaming mentally to myself as I was watching this wanting to strangle the characters for being so CARDBOARD and annoying.

So it’s supposed to be an inspiring movie. Reach out for your dreams and NEVER give up despite the harsh conditions you’re in.

Well I’m sorry but I think I’d been jaded by the whole loads of moeroooooooo seishun!-stories from Weekly Shonen JUMP. Subaru, as a heroine is as likable as a day old sour milk. I .. supposed her character was meant to be portrayed as ‘cooly eccentric genius and slightly socially inept’. But personally, I think she’s just REALLY, REALLY STUCK UP AND UNLIKABLE. Someone please send Noda Megumi from Nodame Cantabile over right now. THAT is one eccentric genius who’s socially inept that I love.

So, spoilers under cut and all the jazz. Click to show/hide.

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Most reviews about this movie online had been really positive. I don’t know why I had this extreme nerd-like movies aficionado rage against it. Maybe it’s the overly predictable plot, the unlikable and flat characters, and the uninspiring dance movements ( except maybe the last dance sequence, that was kind of good )? But seriously? Uninspiring dance moves in a MOVIE ABOUT DANCING? That’s just criminal!

A-and..Subaru is like… the Bella Swan minus the sparkly vampire boyfriend @.@; whom I kind of want to slap every now an then because she OFTEN brought trouble to herself because she doesn’t seem to care for ANYONE else except for herself. Ugh.