First look at Transformers

Here's a first look at the robots from the upcoming Transformers movie. Looks very cool. This is THE movie to watch out for this summer.

Silver Surfer posters

Here's a couple of cool promo posters of Silver Surfer from the upcoming movie 'Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer'.



In this movie, the Fantastic Four meets their greatest challenge as the enigmatic, intergalactic herald, Silver Surfer, comes to Earth to prepare it for destruction. As the Silver Surfer races around the globe wreaking havoc, Reed, Sue, Johnny and Ben must unravel the mystery of the Silver Surfer and confront the surprising return of their mortal enemy, Dr. Doom, before all hope is lost.

The true 'happyness' of Chris Gardner

I have just watched 'The Pusuit of Happyness' over the weekend and I must say that it's one of the most inspiring and touching movies I've seen in a while. We all take what we have for granted....but watching the movie makes you realise that there are so many unfortunate people out there who are jobless and homeless. And with determination, faith and ambition one man breaks free from his chains to become successful.

The movie is based on the true story of Chris Gardner, a struggling salesman whose wife left him to take care of his son alone. In the face of this difficult life, Chris has the desperate inspiration to try for a stockbroker internship. Together, father and son struggle through homelessness, jail time, tax seizure and the overall punishing despair in a quest that would make Gardner a respected millionaire.

I thought rather than going at lengths about the movie (which eventually all of you will see), I will share some quotes from the real-life Chris Gardner instead.

I asked the guy two questions. One was, ‘What do you do?’ The second was, ‘How do you do that?’

I was homeless, but I wasn't hopeless. I knew a better day was coming.

One of the things young people always ask me about is what is the secret to success. The secret is there is no secret. It’s the basics. Blocking and tackling.

When I look back at the journey from homelessness to prosperity, I hold one thing dearer than all else – my commitment to my son. Doing a movie with the top movie star portraying me, doing a book with an editor who's last book won the Pulitzer Prize – all that stuff is great, but the most important thing that I will have ever done in my life was break the cycle of men who were not there for their children.

As busy as I am wherever I am, I try to get out and walk the streets, to remember how far I’ve come and appreciate every baby step of the way.

I went to some very successful business people when I was trying to open the doors of my company, and none of them would give me the time of day. I made a promise to myself and to God. I said, 'God, if you ever let me get to a certain level, I am not going to be like that.'

The coolest thing in the world is walking up the street in Chicago, New York or San Francisco and having someone say 'Hey, you might not remember me, but thank you for helping me get in the business'. That was 12 or 14 years ago. These kids have graduated from college and gone to law school or gotten their MBAs and are running departments in some of the biggest financial institutions on Wall Street.

You know how mountains get moved? Everyone who can move a couple, move a couple. Those who can move rocks, move rocks. Those who can move boulders, move boulders. That’s how mountains get moved. If every one of us did everything we could, I believe we would be in a different world.

You have to be committed, and you have to find something that you are passionate about. And forget about money. I’ve learned that money is the least significant aspect of wealth.

No matter how much money is involved or no matter how easy it is for you to do, if you’re not happy, you are nothing more than a slave to your talent and money. Do something that makes you happy and makes you feel good about yourself. Do something that makes you feel your work is significant and meaningful. If you just want to make money, that’s a whole different trip. I can’t help you with that.

Living with a baby tied on my back, trying to work, he recalls. It can be done, but you have to make it happen. And no matter what, you have to cling to it like it’s life itself, if that’s what you really want to do.

There's a choice: you eat or you stay in a hotel. We chose to eat. And we stayed in a subway station. We rode the trains. We slept in bathrooms.

I wanted to be world class at it or world class at something. At 18, Miles Davis was in New York playing with Charlie Parker and John Coltrane. At the same age, I was playing with some cats named Pookie and Ray Ray. It wasn’t going to happen. But I made a commitment to be world class at something.

We all understand genetics. You get your eyes from your dad, your mom’s nose, there’s nothing you can do about that. But your spiritual genetics you can choose, pick, embrace and commit to. That’s what I did.

Though my mom had too many of her own dreams denied, deferred and destroyed, she instilled in me that I could have dreams. And not just have dreams but had a responsibility to make them reality. My mom taught me from a very early age that I could do anything I wanted to do.

We were homeless, we were not hopeless. There’s a world of difference. A lot of folks don’t realize it, but it’s estimated that 12 percent of all of the homeless people in this country have jobs and go to work every day.

Baby steps count, as long as you are going forward. You add them all up, and one day you look back and you’ll be surprised at where you might get to.

More Asian remakes from Hollywood

Following the success of movies like 'The Grudge', 'The Ring' and recently the Oscar-winning 'The Departed', Hollywood is planning to 'bastardize' more Asian movies. Why do the film-makers think that people would prefer the English version to the original version? I guess maybe Americans can't read subtitles...lol.

Anyway, like it or not, here's a bunch of remakes on the way to your local screens soon.

• One Missed Call: According to Variety, Intermedia has paired with Kadakowa USA to produce and finance the English-language remake of the Japanese horror hit. The story is about several people who starts receiving voice-mails from the future foretelling the date, time, and details of their deaths. The remake will star Edward Burns and Azura Skye.

• Shutter: Joshua Jackson and Rachael Taylor will star in Regency Enterprises' psychological thriller 'Shutter', which begins shooting March 12 in Tokyo. This is a remake of the 2004 Thai movie. The remake will be directed by Masayuki Ochiai and will be released in 2008.

• Confession Of Pain: After the success of 'The Departed', Oscar-winning screenwriter William Monahan will be adapting another Hong Kong flick 'Confession Of Pain', which was also made by the 'Infernal Affairs' team of Andrew Lau, Alan Mak and Felix Chong. Leonardo DiCaprio is in line to produce and star.

• The Eye: Jessica Alba takes on the role as the girl who receives an eye transplant that allows her to see into the supernatural world. This is the remake of the Hong Kong horror movie directed by the Pang Brothers.

• Bangkok Dangerous: The most promising thing about this is that the original movie's directors, Pang Brothers, are going to direct the remake as well. The new version will be titled 'Time To Kill'. Nicholas Cage stars as a hitman who comes to Bangkok to pull off a series of jobs and falls for a local woman.

• My Sassy Girl: The remake combines the original Korean story, the French whimsy of director Yann Samuell, the Indian spice of writer Gurinder Chadha (Bend It Like Beckham), and the American midwestern setting. The remake stars Jesse Bradford and Elisha Cuthbert.

The lowest grossing movie in history

The movie 'Zyzzyx Road' opened at the box office on February 25 this year made history recently...but not in a good way. The movie - which cost $US2 million ($2.5 million) to make and starring Leo Grillo, Tom Sizemore and Katherine Heigl - has become the lowest-grossing American cinema release ever, with total box-office earnings of US$30. The movie closed six days after it opened.

Wow! With an average ticket of US$5 per ticket, that only means 6 people watched it over a period of 6 days. The reason could probably be because nobody could pronounce the title correctly at the ticket counter...lol.

The following article was taken from Wikipedia.

Zyzzyx Road lasted only six days in release, from February 25, 2006 through March 2, 2006. The film was released in only one theater, in One of the most widely recognized aspects of Zyzzyx Road is its notably low box office draw. The film is possibly the lowest grossing film of all time, earning just $30 at the box office from exactly six patrons. Unofficially, its opening weekend netted twenty dollars. The ten dollar difference is due to a personal refund by Grillo to makeup artist Sheila Moore, who had worked on the film, and her friend.

The release was purposefully shown for a short amount of time in the single theater, which the producers had rented for $1,000, to fulfill Screen Actors Guild rules that allow a low-budget film to pay actors a lower rate as long as that film is released in the United States. This showing in Texas was to fulfill that obligation without compromising the chances for future nationwide distribution through a distribution company.

The synopsis is as follows:

Grant is an accountant with a bad marriage and a daughter whom he loves. He takes to the road to service his accounts in Las Vegas. While there he meets seductive Marissa. They have a week-long affair which culminates in the arrival of Marissa's ex-boyfriend, Joey. Joey attempts to kill the lovers, but Grant gets the upper hand. Grant and Marissa then drive Joey's body to Zyzzyx Road and Grant buries Joey in the desert there. But in the morning the body is missing and something is trying to kill Grant and Marissa.

New movie for Stone Cold

Fans of wrestling star 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin will be glad to know that he will be appearing in his first starring role in the upcoming summer release 'The Condemned'. Steve Austin will play Joe Conrad, a convict waiting the death penalty in a corrupt Central American prison. He is 'sold' to a wealthy television producer to participate in a reality show where he must fight nine other condemned killers to the death.

Personally I feel that the plot lacks originality. I'm sure we have seen this story before sometime, probably with Van Damme, or Swazenegger or one of those action stars.

I used to like Austin as a wrestler in WWE. I believe he has great acting potential and screen presence. It's a pity his first movie could not have been a better one. Anyway, I think I'll still watch the movie just for the fun of it :-)

"The Door" - China's First Horror Movie

'The Door' (Men) is China's first domestically produced horror movie. This is a major milestone in China's movie industry considering that foreign horror movies are generally banned by the China censorship board.

[Shanghai, China, January 23, 2007]

The only female director in China’s post-Cultural 'Fifth Generation', Shaohong Li has released her psychological thriller 'The Door' in mainland. The horror story set in the contemporary China centers on a young intellectual’s ominous journey to find his lost girlfriend and the truth behind the breakup. The film was released in theatre nationwide, as well as Shanghai Media Group’s digital TV channel SiTV, IP TV channel BesTV, broadband online TV channel SMGBB, and mobile phone TV platform DNM.

This is the first film in China’s filming history to be simultaneously released in traditional big screens and new media platforms. Besides going to theatres, Chinese audiences now have another four new media channels to choose from, and thus do not have to wait six months to watch the film through TV or rentals. To film producers and distributors, this is a new distribution channel expanded to explore more profitability of a film.

Shanghai Media Group currently has 6 million digital TV service subscribers through SiTV, about 200,000 IP TV users, and a large broadband TV and mobile phone TV service subscriber base. The company has implemented encryption technology to eliminate piracy through airing on these four channels.

Source: Entertainment Asia Network

Nominations for the 2007 Oscars

Here are the nominees for the 2007 Oscars. The 79th Annual Academy Awards ceremony will be hosted by Ellen DeGeneres on Feb. 25.

Best Picture
"Babel"
"The Departed"
"Letters from Iwo Jima"
"Little Miss Sunshine"
"The Queen"

Best Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio - "Blood Diamond"
Ryan Gosling - "Half Nelson"
Peter O'Toole - "Venus"
Will Smith - "The Pursuit of Happyness"
Forest Whitaker - "The Last King of Scotland"

Best Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin - "Little Miss Sunshine"
Jackie Earle Haley - "Little Children"
Djimon Hounsou - "Blood Diamond"
Eddie Murphy - "Dreamgirls"
Mark Wahlberg - "The Departed"

Best Actress
Penélope Cruz - "Volver"
Judi Dench - "Notes on a Scandal"
Helen Mirren - "The Queen"
Meryl Streep - "The Devil Wears Prada"
Kate Winslet - "Little Children"

Best Supporting Actress
Adriana Barraza - "Babel"
Cate Blanchett - "Notes on a Scandal"
Abigail Breslin - "Little Miss Sunshine"
Jennifer Hudson - "Dreamgirls"
Rinko Kikuchi - "Babel"

Best Director
Clint Eastwood - "Letters From Iwo Jima"
Paul Greengrass - "United 93"
Martin Scorsese - "The Departed"
Stephen Frears - "The Queen"
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu - "Babel"

Best Original Screenplay
"Babel"
"Letters from Iwo Jima"
"Little Miss Sunshine"
"Pan's Labyrinth"
"The Queen"

Best Adapted Screenplay
"Borat"
"Children of Men"
"The Departed"
"Little Children"
"Notes on a Scandal"

Best Animated Feature Film Of The Year
"Cars" John Lasseter
"Happy Feet" George Miller
"Monster House" Gil Kenan

Best Foreign Language Film Of The Year
"After the Wedding - Denmark
"Days of Glory " - Algeria
"The Lives of Others" - Germany
"Pan's Labyrinth" - Mexico
"Water" - Canada

Best Original Song
I Need to Wake Up - "An Inconvenient Truth"
Listen - "Dreamgirls"
Love You I Do - "Dreamgirls"
Our Town - "Cars"
Patience - "Dreamgirls"

Imported US Titles into China for 2007

[Beijing, China, January 11, 2007]

'Miami Vice' and 'World Trade Center' are finishing up their run in China’s theaters drawing a close to imported US titles in China's film market for 2006. From 'King Kong' to 'Miami Vice', 20 imported foreign films generated more than $102.4 million at the Chinese box office. Recently, a list of films recommended by 7 major Hollywood film studios to be considered for new imports to China market was turned in to the China Film Group, China’s leading film distribution company based in Beijing.

Many highly anticipated hit films were included such as 'Spider-Man 3', 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix', 'Transformers', and 'Pirates of the Caribbean: At Worlds End'. The majority of imported films to be released in Chinese theaters in 2007 will come from this list, upon review by the State Administration of Radio Film and Television, China’s main film bureau and censoring engine.

In 2006, 'The Da Vinci Code' with its concurrent global opening topped the mainland box office among all imported foreign films with $19.19 million before it was yanked by the government before it finished its run in China. 'Mission: Impossible III' was originally intended to be released simultaneously around the world as well, but was released in Chinese theaters two months and a half later than in the US. The movie was still able to climb among the top 3 titles in China for 2006 taking in about $10.4 million total.

Many industry analysts believe that concurrent global openings of imported films could be a promising endorsement to positive box office results in China. In 2007, the most probable imported film that would simultaneously open worldwide would be 'Spider-Man 3'. The previous two titles of the 'Spider-Man' series accumulated more than $12.8 million at the mainland box office.

Since the first imported action film in China was 'Fugitive' in 1994, action films have traditionally been the most selected among all imported foreign films in China for the past few decades. In 2006, 8 out of 20 imported titles were action films, where 3 made it to the top 10 box office for 2006. This trend is predicted to carry over into 2007 as well, as it is clearly shown among all the recommendations submitted to China Film Group for importing are in the action category.

On the list are 6 animated films to be considered for 2007 release including 'Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles', 'Meet the Robinsons', 'Ratatouille', 'Shrek 3', 'Surf's Up', and 'The Simpsons Movie'. In 2006, there were 5 animation titles recommended and all were imported and released. Because of terrific box office results of many Hollywood animated films in 2006 like 'Ice Age 2: the Meltdown' and 'Garfield: A Tail of Two Kitties', industry analysts believe it is highly possible that all of the 6 new recommendations will be presented to Chinese audiences this summer.

In the first quarter of 2007, there will be 9 imported foreign films dropping in Chinese theatres: 'Arthur and the Invisibles', 'The Guardian', and 'Casino Royale' in January; 'The Restless', '16 Blocks', and 'Night at the Museum' in Feburary; 'Deja vu”, 'The Devil Wears Prada', and 'Click' in March. 'Casino Royale' would be the very first of the many “007” series titles to make it to the big screens in China since it was first introduced 45 years ago. With scheduled opening on January 30th, it is anticipated to exceed 'King Kong' box office total of $12.8 million.

Source: Entertainment Asia Network

Chow Yun Fat in Pirates 3

As fans would already know, Chow Yun Fat will star in the upcoming sequel of Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World's End. He will play Captain Sao Feng. Here's a first look at the promo poster.

George Bush has been assasinated.....

Only in America can you make a fictional movie about the assassination of the still-living President and get away with it! 'Death Of A President' is a fictional account of the events surrounding the assassination of George Bush. Set in year 2008, the film is shot in the style of a documentary.

The movie interestingly combines real archive footage of Bush and Cheney with staged actors to create the fictitious scenes. In one scene, Cheney even gives a funeral eulogy for Bush.

Similar to Michael Moore's 'Fahrenheit 9/11', this movie tells of the effects of the Iraq on American families. It's also frightening to see how the US government and secret service reacts, by pointing fingers at innocent people to find a scapegoat.

Whilst this film is a work of fiction, it is disturbing enough to make you think this could easily have happened anywhere and anytime. The movie could have easily been called 'Death of Democracy'.

This is the REAL Bond!

After watching 20 Bond movies back-to-back for the last 2 weeks on Astro, I'm kinda glad that director Martin Campbell has decided to give 'Casino Royale' a breath of fresh air.

Everything, from the gun barrel intro to the title credit sequence are different. The new Bond wears T-shirt and khakis instead of a suit. No MoneyPenny. No Q and his gadgets. And sadly, Bond does not get the girl in the end!

However, a lot of people will agree that this is the best Bond movie ever. The action is raw, hard-hitting and realistic. And not to mention Daniel Craig is surprisingly a good actor and has definitely take on his role very well.

My only complain is that the villain was killed off too easily and some questions were left unanswered.

By the way, Sony seems to have a good time advertising their products any chance they get, from the Sony-Ericsson phines to the Vaio laptops.

Remember Get Smart?

Steve Carell (40 Year Old Virgin, The Office) will star as bumbling secret agent Maxwell Smart in Warner Brothers’ upcoming movie Get Smart, a remake of the 1960s TV series, which starred Don Adams, Variety reported. His sidekick Agent 99 will be played by Anne Hathaway (who was originally played by Barbara Feldon).

Warner has been trying for several years to make a film of the spy spoof, created by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry. Peter Segal, whose credits include The Longest Yard, 50 First Dates and Nutty Professor II, will direct.

The Covenant

I think Renny Harlin is one of the most underrated director in Hollywood. His success came after he directed Die Hard 2 and subsequently Cliffhanger but soon faded to oblivion when his last few movies flopped at the box office. Harlin's Deep Blue Sea is my favorite creature movie of all times and Cutthroat Island was a great swashbuckling flick (long before Depp and Bloom took to the seas).

I had high hopes for Harlin's latest flick The Covenant which is based on the graphic novel by Aron Coleite. I was disappointed because it was not as action-packed as Harlin's previous movies.

The story is about 4 young men, better known as Sons of Ipswich, who possesses supernatural powers passed down from their ancestors. When the body of a dead student is discovered, their secrets begin to unravel and threaten to break the covenant of silence that has protected their families for hundreds of years.

The build-up was slow and the first half of the movie focuses too much on character development rather than on thrills and suspense. The plot had everything going for it....hot guys, sexy chicks, witchcraft, supernatural powers, rock music, cool effects....but somehow the end result didn't quite work out. Don't get me wrong...it's not a bad film, but it's not great either.

Bond trivia

In conjunction with the opening of James Bond's latest movie, here's some trivia that might interest you:

• Sean Connery was NOT the first actor to play James Bond. It was Barry Nelson. He played "Jimmy" Bond opposite bad guy Peter Lorre in an excruciating adaptation of "Casino Royale" for a 1954 episode of TV's "Climax!"
  
• Ian Fleming based James Bond on Dr. John Dee, the first British secret agent.
• Fleming picked the name James Bond because he was looking for a "flat, quiet" name. James Bond was the author of a book Fleming was reading, "Birds of the West Indies."
• The first Bond movie, Dr. No, was made for just under a million dollars.
• Ursula Andress' voice in Dr. No was not her own. It was dubbed by Monica Van der Syl.
• Dr. No was titled License to Kill in Italy.
• In James Bond movies, the armorer who supplies Bond with all his gadgets, is referred to as Q. The Q stands for "Quartermaster."
• Desmond Llewellyn, who played gadget-master Q, appeared in 17 Bond films.
• In the novel upon which Goldfinger was based, the character of Pussy Galore is a lesbian.
• Tom Jones recorded the Thunderball theme, and fainted after singing the sustained high note at the song's climax.
• The longest James Bond film was On Her Majesty's Secret Service, at 140 minutes.
• George Lazenby, who starred in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, was the only one who played James Bond once.
• Smirnoff is the brand of vodka used in all of James Bond's martinis.
• The first 007 movie in which Bond kisses Moneypenny was On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
• The evil organization Bond is often pitted against is SPECTRE. It stands for SPecial Executive for Counter Intelligence Terrorism Revenge Extortion.
• Another nefarious enemy of Bond is an organization called SMERSH. It's a Russian acronym for SMERt SHpionam, meaning "Death to Spies."
• The Man With The Golden Gun was the first James Bond film to be shown at the Kremlin.
• Moonraker is the only Roger Moore Bond film where he does not draw his Walther PPK.
• Roger Moore's contract demanded that he be provided an unlimited supply of hand-rolled Monte Cristo cigars.
• Steven Spielberg was in discussions to direct For Your Eyes Only when George Lucas offered him the opportunity to direct Raiders of the Lost Ark.
• Steven Seagal was the martial arts instructor for Never Say Never Again.
• The practice of using a disclaimer in movies stating "no animals were mistreated during production" got its start in Never Say Never Again. The disclaimer was the result of controversy over a horse jumping off a cliff in the film.
• The villain in A View to a Kill, Max Zorin, was originally going to be played by David Bowie.
• Christopher Walken was the first Academy Award-winning actor to star in a Bond film. He co-starred in A View to a Kill.
• The satellite dish used at the end of Goldeneye was the same used in the film Contact.
• Pierce Brosnan's contract for Goldeneye specified that he could not appear in any other film wearing a tuxedo.
• Goldeneye is the nickname of Bond creator Ian Fleming's beachfront house in Jamaica where he wrote the James Bond novels.
• The first James Bond film to ever be released on DVD was Goldeneye.
• According to Goldeneye, Bond's parents were killed in a climbing accident.
• The pre-credits action sequence in The World is Not Enough runs about 15 minutes, the longest in any Bond film to date.
• Moonraker contains excerpts the themes from Close Encounters of the Third Kind and The Magnificent Seven.
• Among the places where James Bond has made love are on a train, in a forest, in a plane, in a submarine, on a motorized iceberg, and in a hospital.
• Bond films have been nominated 10 times for Academy Awards, five times in technical categories and five times in musical categories.

A couple of Asian horror flicks coming in January

Here's a couple of Asian horror flicks that will be coming to our local screens in January 2007.....a bit late though considering that both movies were released in their home countries last August. (I'm still figuring out why nobody is releasing 'The Host' in Malaysia!)

9:56 (aka APT)
Country: Korea
Release Date: 4 January 2007

A young woman who lives in an old apartment notices that the apartment complex next door turns off the lights every evening at 9:56 PM. She begins to suspect that this pattern is related to a series of mysterious deaths in the neighborhood. She becomes deeply involved as she attempts to solve the mystery.

13 (aka 13 Beloved)
Country: Thailand
Release Date: 11 January 2007

Based on a comic book called 13th Quiz Show, this is a thriller about a salesman who receives a call from a seemingly omniscient quiz show moderator enticing him to complete 13 tasks as instructed through a mobile phone for an exorbitant amount of prize money. The tasks become increasingly disgusting, homicidal, and inhumane.

'Flushed Away' - great fun

With the current slew of animated movies on our screen recently, I was a initially sceptical about 'Flushed Away'. However I was pleasantly surprised by the movie...good storyline and brilliant animation. Created by the same people who made 'Wallace & Gromit', the look and feel bears a resemblance to W&G...even the British humour is prevalent in the movie.

The story is about Roddy is an upper-crust "society mouse" who lives the life of a beloved pet in a posh Kensington flat. When a sewer rat named Sid comes spewing out of the sink and decides he's hit the jackpot, Roddy schemes to rid himself of the pest by luring him into a "whirlpool", ie the toilet bowl. Sid may be an ignorant slob, but he's no fool, so it is Roddy who winds up being flushed away into the bustling sewer world of Ratropolis, a replica of London City constructed from junk. There Roddy meets Rita, an enterprising scavenger who works the sewers in her faithful boat, the Jammy Dodger. Along the way, they meet the villainous Toad who despises all rodents, and want to get rid of them.

By the way, watch out for the singing slugs...they are so cute and funny. Overall this is one animated movie worth checking out.

Ghost baby in TGV

I was at TGV One Utama this morning and I saw a creepy promo of the upcoming Thai horror movie 'Colic'. There is baby crib with a cloth hanging around it. As you walk closer, the 'baby' will start to cry. Inside the crib is a scary looking baby, missing his hand.



Colic is a syndrome found in infants, which causes infants to cry continuously for hours. The reason behind this illness is usually credited by medical expects to a number of factors. However, some people believe that it's linked to something supernatural.

'Colic', the movie, tells a story of a couple Pongpob and Praeploy who gets married when Praeploy is unexpectedly pregnant. After the wedding, Pongpob brings Praeploy to his mother's house to settle down. On the night that Praeploy delivers her child, she witnesses the neighbour's house on fire. When the baby is delivered, he often screams and cries with no reason. The doctor considers it a case of colic ailment, but it doesn't go away. Several months later, the baby still can't stop crying, meanwhile the family's members encounter mysterious and unexplained experiences.

'The Departed' - don't compare with the original

When Martin Scorcese first announced that he was going to remake HK's Infernal Affairs, everybody was worried that this is going to be another Hollywood screw-up of Asian movies. Western viewers who have not watched the original is raving about it, whereas those who have watched the original says that 'The Departed' did not live up to the original. Of course credit should be given to Andrew Lau and Andy Mak for the great storyline and clever twists.

I guess for me, the movie was just ok, but not great. Definitely I prefer the sleek and stylish feel of Infernal Affairs. compared to the drab and mundane setting of Boston. My advice is to just watch it as it is and not make any comparisons to the original.

Matt Damon is well cast as the cool and sleek cop who is actually a mole for the mob. However I feel Leonardo DiCaprio is too 'baby-faced' to play the undercover cop. His goatee looks like it's been pasted on. Jack Nicholson, as always gives a memorable performance as the mob boss Frank Costello. I hope he gets nominated for an Oscar next year.

Now for the really, really bad news.....thanks to our local censorship board, the movie was butchered up badly especially the dialogue where every other word is a swear word. It sounded like everybody is talking through a bad phone signal where the conversation starts to break up. (For trivia buffs, the word 'f***' are said 237 time throughout the movie!) Amazingly, our censorship board considers 'cock' and 'cunt' as acceptable because they were not cut out! Some gory scenes were cut out as well, and for those who have not watched the original version, you will probably be wondering what the f*** just happened in the in the lift in the film's climax.

I urge all of you to avoid the cinemas for this one and just wait for the DVD. If you can't wait, then go and watch 'Infernal Affairs' again.

Adam Sandler in post 9/11 drama

I have always liked Adam Sandler....from his goofy days when he starred in Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison to his more serious roles in The Wedding Singer and most recently Click. Now Sandler is finally taking on a completely different role in his new movie 'Reign Over Me'.

The movie follows a man, played by Sandler, who lost his family in the September 11 attack on New York City and runs into his old college roommate who is now a psychiatrist, played by Don Cheadle. Rekindling the friendship is the one thing that appears able to help the man recover from his grief.

The movie also stars Jada Pinkett Smith, Liv Tyler, Cicely Tyson, Ted Raimi and Mike Binder, who also wrote and directs.