Velvetier Reviews

Why Has Bodhi-Dharma Left for the East? (1989)

Plodding Korean art film from the 80s

[3 May 2018]

Now the words "Korean art film from the 80s" should be enough to get film snobs and Asian cinema fans to watch this film. And how many films are about monastics, to boot? I agree with the reviewers who say this film is slow and incomprehensible. The Korean art professor who made this seemed more interested in making a pseudo-profound art film than an actual good film. The Zen koan-like utterings from the monks seem just a bit cliched. There was even a monastery cat in the window sill. Does it get any better than that?

Art films, especially foreign ones, will get a lot of rave reviews from critics and audiences alike for simply being pretentious and artsy. New York Times raved about this way back in 1993. Actually, this reminds me of Ponette (1994) - another very slow-moving, boring foreign film from around that time.

Still, I give 5 stars for some beautiful cinematography, hot actor (why doesn't he have any other credits besides this film?), and the unique subject matter. The hot actor looks like Sang Woo Kim, the British Korean model/artist on Instagram.

I watched this streamed on YouTube, but had a really hard time following and keeping interested. Maybe it's better if you watch it in a theater. This is a very little-known film from the 80s, but I can see art film houses screening this these days. This reminds me of a more recent monastery film, Into Great Silence (2005), a German documentary that followed around Carthusian monks in a French monastery. That documentary had no narrative, just silent, and just followed the monks about their lives.

Anyway, this is a decent film to attempt watching (good luck) if you want to add to your tiny arsenal of monastery films. You'll learn about Korean stuff you probably didn't know about, like the purple rice (black rice added to white, turns it purple).

Coco (I) (2017)

Good enjoyable film - but something's missing from it

[13 February 2018]

Coco is a film with an interesting premise and great animation, if you look at the trailer to try to decide whether to watch the film. Dia de los Muertos and a Land of the Dead fantasy storyline is really intriguing. And the Mexican holiday is something you almost never come across in mainstream films - a plus for elitists who like to think they're exploring and opening themselves to different non-Anglo cultures.

Coco is a really good, enjoyable film. There's not much wrong with it, if anything. The music is beautiful, especially when Mama Imelda was singing her gorgeous song on stage with Ernesto De La Cruz, though he was being mean and swinging her around roughly.

I really liked the skinny, unfortunate Hector character - and not surprisingly, it was voiced by Gael Garcia Bernal, himself a very charismatic actor. I liked the part where Hector was disappearing because no one was remembering him, and he turned his shot glass upside down. When he dressed like Frida Kahlo a couple of times, that was amusing too.

The epic animation of the Land of the Dead, such as that bridge with the the golden leaf-like piles, was really stunning. The film was glowing in a very positive, technicolor, gorgeous way. The Land of the Dead wasn't some scary or somber place - it seemed fascinating, happy, and spectacular.

What I liked best about Coco were the Hector parts, the magical bridge, the stunning Land of the Dead "cityscape," and the animation overall.

Coco is far better than some of the other major animated films of the past couple of years, like Moana, Zootopia, or Kubo.

But I guess something was missing from Coco. It seems like an enjoyable way to spend two hours, and it would probably be the best of the films shown at the theater at any given time. Coco seems like it's supposed to be full of heart and soul - it was about a soulful kid wanting to pursue his love of music, and it was about familial love, too. But what is that something that's missing? Maybe its just me. Maybe I'm more fond of films that are more classic fairy tale-like, such as Frozen or Disney's Beauty & the Beast (1991). Maybe those just speak to me on a deeper level because I loved fairy tales so much my whole life. Coco is not a film I will fondly remember years to come - but maybe that's just me.

Anyway, this film is definitely worth watching. It seems like it would nominated for the Academy Awards Best Animated Feature - if they don't forget about it by the end of the year. :) And maybe it will be nominated for cinematography and music, too. If you're trying to decide whether to watch, it, just go for it. Most likely, you'll enjoy it a great deal.

Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017)

Cute, fun way to spend 2 hours

[2 January 2018]

I'm going to go against the downward trend right now and give an overall positive review for this film. I actually enjoyed The Last Jedi, and that means a lot, because I can't stand most movies these days.

WHAT'S TO LIKE ABOUT THE LAST JEDI?

-A return of beloved Star Wars characters, like the iconic Luke & Leia, R2D2, C3PO, Chewbacca (Chewie!!), Storm Troopers, and of course, Yoda.

-Lots of new and cute types of creatures: (1) The huge-eyed, puffin-like Porgs on Luke's island. (2) The sweet, deer-like Fathiers who were with the kids in the stables. (3) The most striking creatures of all - the shimmering Vultex, with their strip-like crystals of "fur." All adorbs!

-They have a spunky Asian female character in there - Rose, played by a bubbly newcomer, Kelly Marie Tran. It's nice to have a fresh new face, played with such positivity and energy.

-Rey (Daisy Ridley) is a small step up from Felicity Jones, her dead ringer in Rogue One. Jones was terrible in Rogue One, but the equally-beautiful Ridley is slightly better in terms of acting skills and charisma.

-Rey's costumes (two of them?) were both fantastic. When she was with Luke on his island, her costume seemed so beautiful, understated, and right for her role as an aspiring Jedi. It looked like Lululemon meets Link from Legend of Zelda. I really loved her costume. And then when she was in that giant room with Kylo and Snoke, she wore another beautiful but understated costume, with a dark gray v-neck shirred or pleated top. It's would be perfect for a chi-chi Toronto yoga class.

-Ben Solo/Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) is a striking and interesting villain. You keep wishing there's something between him and Rey - is there some chemistry, a love interest? But doesn't happen. Driver is handsome yet strange-looking at the same time. He kind of looks like Marilyn Manson. Would like to see more of him.

-Snoke as a villain didn't seem at that, but his face was very interesting. It's a nice feat of CG effects and/or theater prostetics, I guess.

-The alien-filled, glamorous party that Rose & Finn crashed - now why couldn't they have stretched that part out longer? The creatures and their glittering costumes were so beautiful and dreamy.

-The Matrix-like, Zen, metaphysical parts - such as Rey & Kylo reaching for each other across time and space. Or Daisy feeling the force(?) up on Luke's meditating rock. Or Luke's last moments spent on his rock, his cape or scarf drifting away in the wind.

WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE ABOUT THIS MOVIE:

-No chemistry between the two POC sidekicks, Rose & Finn. Rose (Kelly Marie Tran) seemed to like Finn, but Finn never paid her any mind. He always seemed cold and uninterested in her. Maybe John Boyega just isn't a very good actor - the word "wooden" comes to mind. It all surprised us when Rose kissed Finn right before she died - because there was no chemistry at all, much less romantic, building up to it.

-They had to make both Asian characters die. Asian characters are unimportant and expendable, thrown in there because you want to look PC and diverse. Early in the movie, they killed off Rose's sister. And they had to make both Asians in the movie related? It's like how in Rogue One they threw the two Asian characters together, like they were Siamese Twins. People think Asians need to band together and can't be independent, separate characters on their own. And yeah, they killed off Rose because Asians are expendable - just minor, lesser things you don't care about.

-The Middle Eastern contribution is actually a Hispanic actor, Oscar Isaac. His character, Poe Dameron, was VERY annoying in the film - just as Isaac is in real life, I guess. I don't understand his relation with Leia, and his little feud with the Laura Dern character, Vice Admiral Holdo. She called him a "flyboy" - but based on body language and vibe, I think they really liked each other. They should've built that into a cougar romance. Now that would be nice and edgy from Star Wars! Dern is slightly annoying in the film, but she and Isaac match in annoyingness, so a steamy romance seems possible. Her purple hair and glamorous high-neck costume seemed a little odd.

-As everyone else mentioned, this is a very confusing, badly put-together film. It's full of plotholes and side stories that go nowhere. You don't know what's going on most of the time. Like other recent films, the filmmakers were very lazy here. They just thought up a bunch of creative things, and threw them together in a messy and haphazard way. They definitely needed to edit this film significantly.

-WHY did beautiful, mature Leia fly into that pod and lay/slept there? Did I miss that much of the film? And how did she resurrect again? And why did she and Dern's character talk like old friends, squeezing each others' hands, towards the end? How did they even know each other, and what was their relation?

-What was with the deer-like creatures and the kids in the stable? There were lots of "off" things about this movie, but that was one of the most random.

-The very end of the movie - what were they trying to imply with the little white boy from the stable, staring off into space? It's The Last Jedi - but is he going to continue with the Jedi legacy, or something like that? It was kind of lame and puzzling. The movie didn't end too well.

The first quarter of the film was pretty good, but it went downhill from there. It dissolves into a pretty and entertaining but confusing mess.

Still. The film overall was enjoyable for me, and very few films are these days. So I'm giving it a 7/10 - a much higher review than all the ones I'm seeing lately on IMDB.

Arrival (II) (2016)

Why do people either love this or hate it? (Some spoilers)

[20 November 2016]

I'm surprised at all the 1 star and 10 star reviews of this film. So people either love it or hate it? Most films are around 6-7 stars for me. Films tend to be a mixed bag for me.

I thought this was a good movie, for the most part. It had a nice story, fine cinematography, a cerebral "puzzle", moving moments, and decent acting. I thought this would be nominated for a few Academy Awards. This reminds me of M. Night Shyamalan films - sophisticated puzzles, a "think piece," a bit gimmicky.

Racism and stereotypes are rampant in most American films. Arrival is based on a short story by Ted Chiang. He's Chinese American, but none of his stories have ANYTHING Asian in them. In the film, they put in the usual "China-is-the-bad-guy" crap - nothing new. They ALSO decided to make the white woman the SAVIOR who reforms the evil Chinese general. That's as old as Hollywood itself. A similar film is Anna and the King (1999), where Jodie Foster, the mighty and attractive white woman, comes to save the day - she "reforms" the backwards, misogynist Thai king played by Chow Yun-Fat. White people fixing up bad, backwards Asians is as old as time itself. And it insinuates itself into EVERYTHING, not just films.

Basically, US films, including Arrival, loves hammering in this:

-White = good, right, almighty -Asian/Chinese = wrong, backwards, evil, avoid, look down on

In the short story that Arrival was based on, Chiang failed to have ANYTHING Asian in it. That's the way he thinks and operates - every one of his 15 stories only have WHITE PEOPLE. To be an Asian American and to ONLY have whites in ALL your stories - what does that mean?! He thinks he's white, only hangs out with whites, and is, basically, white. For some reason, the film deviated from the story in that they decided to throw in an evil Chinese general who's out to destroy the universe. Maybe the Quebecois director decided to throw that in, and it had the COMPLETE approval of Chiang.

Chiang's one of the plentiful Chinese Americans who hate China and anything Chinese. That's a given - we grew up in a country that really hates us, so we hate ourselves and try to get as far away from our ancestral roots as possible. Chiang even wrote a New Yorker article bashing Chinese characters and claiming it's far inferior to English and Indo-European languages. Okay!

The guy who played the Chinese general is some actor named Tsi Ma. He has a long & acclaimed career, though none of us have heard of him. Despite his authoritative presence in the film, you can see Amy Adams looks down on him. See her face as she faces him in the grand party scene - she loses her usual pretty look and just looks blah. She's seeing a plain, slant-eyed Chinese man, and she finds his look, and his self, unappealing. That sums up how all people see Chinese people - even those with illustrious careers & an authoritative presence.

Adams' Mandarin is absolutely atrocious in the film. It shows is that she really doesn't like the Mandarin language, or Asian people. She doesn't BOTHER to want to learn to pronounce those few lines better. This reminds me of the time Emma Watson & Daniel Radcliffe spoke some Mandarin, and Watson butchered it in the most embarrassing way. That's because she, and most people, simply have no respect or love for the Chinese language, Chinese people, or China and its related lands.

Also, I have no idea why Adams' character spoke Mandarin to the Chinese general on the phone, and then he spoke perfect English to her when they met. This shows that people think Chinese don't know any English. Leave it to the brilliant, mighty white woman to bow down to the backwards Chinese by speaking (terrible) Mandarin - when pretty much all high-level leaders in the world speak FLUENT English, including, apparently, this general when they met in the formal ball scene. So if her Mandarin is bad, and his English is perfect, why does she speak her poor Mandarin to him on the phone?! It was so bad I didn't understand ONE word she said.

People who hated the film can point out a lot more plot holes besides this one. There are so many contradictions - the filmmakers really didn't have their head on straight.

In the short story, the daughter died of a rock climbing accident at age 25. But in the film, she died of cancer/leukemia as a young teen. It really would've been more interesting if they stuck with the short story on this one.

The love interest in the short story was named Gary, but in the film, they changed his name to Ian. I guess Gary doesn't sound sexy for a love interest these days. The story was written in 1998, and I'm not sure Gary even sounded sexy back then. But I don't think Chiang meant for him be sexy - he's a theoretical physicist, for heaven's sake. But in a film, you need cool, attractive characters, so Ian it is. Jeremy Renner might be considered attractive in an odd way, but he lacks charisma & presence. He seems really boring.

Adams looks young for 42, thanks to celebs' constant use of Botox. She has an enviable nose job that gives her a perfect front and profile view. I think she got the same plastic surgeon as Jennifer Connelly because they have very similar slim, pointy, perfect noses. Adams only rose to fame after her successful plastic surgery - like so many other actresses, e.g., Catherine Zeta-Jones, Nicole Kidman. No one looks this perfect without going under the knife!