Light
Power Station
Aboriginal Taiwanese rock duo Power Station are still going strong, 16 years after their debut Cruel Love Letters (1997).
Their brand of blazing emo rock is alive and well on tracks such as Never Forget The Earliest Inspiration.
Yu Chiu-hsin and Yen Chih-lin’s voices soar as they sing: “Never forget, that year, that day, the dream in our hearts when we set off.” Although they are now in their mid-40s, there remains a youthful idealism in their cover of American country-pop group Lady Antebellum’s Never Alone.
Lead single Elena is a definite highlight here.
The music has a tribal folk song feel to it and the title is both a woman’s name and also sounds like “lover ah” in Minnan. The poignant chorus goes: “Elena, I’m back, know how much I’ve missed you/Elena, I’m back, your heart is my home”.
Parts of the album, though, feel like they could have been recorded back in the 1990s or early noughties. The challenge for the duo is whether they can power ahead and not just power on.
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AV Idol
Hideo Jojo
It is counter-programming time as behemoth Marvel’s Iron Man 3 opens in cinemas this week. And this sex comedy is as different as it gets in terms of content.
Japanese adult video star Ryoko (played by real- life AV idol Yui Tatsumi) reluctantly heads to Korea to shoot a new flick. After a series of mishaps, she bumps into the innocent Yuna (Yeo Min Jeong), who has dreamed of being a (legit) idol star all her life.
There are some funny bits in here, such as when the filming crew has to pass through Korean customs with their sex aids and later on, when the hack of a director blatantly rips off hit Korean TV drama Winter Sonata (2002) for the plot of his cross-cultural porn flick.
As a silly sex comedy though, its tone is uneven and it never hits the heights of, say, Pang Ho Cheung’s AV (2005), which managed to be both salty and sweet.
Ultimately, the movie does not stray far from its AV roots and both sweet girl-next-door Yuna and sexy goddess Ryoko disrobe for sex scenes.
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Finding Mr Right
Xue Xiaolu
The story: Jiajia (Tang Wei) arrives in Seattle from Beijing to give birth to her child with a married man because she cannot give birth legally in China. She is loud, spoilt and demanding, and clashes with almost everyone. Only Frank (Wu Xiubo), a driver sent to pick her up from the airport, is patient enough to deal with her. He used to be a doctor back in Beijing but now takes care of his daughter as his wife makes more money. Gradually, Jiajia and Frank come to care for each other.

Hanging over this movie is the shadow of another – the Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan romance Sleepless In Seattle (1993).
It is a film that Jiajia holds dear to her heart and she even takes Frank’s daughter to a screening of it.
The problem is that it feels as though writer- director Xue Xiaolu is using that as a crutch to bolster Finding Mr Right’s own credentials as a romance.
Neither does it help that the ending of this movie is pilfered from Sleepless’ finale atop the Empire State Building.
Sleepless In Seattle paid homage to An Affair To Remember (1957) in the way it used that iconic building as a setting; Finding Mr Right merely rips off Sleepless In Seattle.
It is rather disappointing considering that this is the second feature from writer-director Xue. Her debut film was the well-received tearjerker Ocean Heaven (2010), which starred Jet Li as the father of an autistic son.
The romance is also too long and muted.
Jiajia inadvertently hits upon another reason for the film’s sluggishness when she says to Frank: “You know what your problem is? You’re too nice.”
He is nice to the point of being a doormat, even picking up his ex-wife’s wedding gown for her upcoming nuptials.
The saintly Frank is underplayed by well-known China television and movie actor Wu Xiubo (The Four, 2012) and is just too passive.
In contrast, Jiajia is a brash spoilt brat and Tang Wei, best known for her intense turn in sexy espionage thriller Lust, Caution (2007), has fun with the role.
Predictably, there is a redemption story arc and Jiajia learns to be a better person.
The two actors have a believable low-key chemistry when they are together, though it would be nice to have the heat turned up beyond simmering.
After a slow-moving build-up, Xue inexplicably piles on the schmaltziness for the resolution and it feels out of step with the rest of the movie. Unfortunately, she failed to find the right note for the ending.
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365
JPM
The boys of JPM seem to be in the mood for love, judging by this follow-up to their debut album, Moonwalk (2011).
But that does not mean the Taiwanese trio – LilJay, Prince and Modi – are pensive.
Opener 365 Days is a catchy dance track that is more about moving the feet than the heart: “Why is the love I have for you so strong, miss you every day/Every day every night.”
She Wanna Go, meanwhile, is a breezy slice of rock-tinged pop that sees the boys hanging tough: “I’m already so grown-up, I can withstand this hurt/If you wanna go, just go.”
Also of interest is Internet, a look at romance in this brave new digital world, featuring singer Kimberley Chen: “Although we haven’t met/And you haven’t replied to my messages/Waiting for you to say hey, even a ‘like’ from you is OK.”
The boys flounder on the slow sappy numbers, though, such as I Don’t Miss You That Much.
Such tracks could have been dropped from the record and I would not have missed them at all.
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Machi Action
Jeff Chang
Remember those cheesy Japanese live-action series with a hero who transforms into a suited-up warrior in order to do battle with all manner of monsters?
Machi Action clearly has a soft spot for those shows and some of the scenes showing how the fictitious Taiwanese series Superhero Fly is filmed can be quite fun.
Mostly, though, the film flounders about like a clumsy monster with no clue what it wants to achieve.
Chen Bo-lin is the nice-guy actor, Tie-nan (literally “iron man”), who plays Fly.
Cast adrift after a new superhero, Face (Owodog), takes his place, Tie-nan goes from hawking dubious products on television to, inadvertently, signing up for a porn flick.
The scattershot film even has a tearjerker melodrama skulking about on the edges as there are flashbacks to Tie-nan as a child, acting as a superhero to cheer up his seriously ill younger brother.
It seemed like a fun film to make, judging from the outtakes, but it was not a fun film to watch.
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Judgment Day
Ong Kuo Sin
There is nothing like impending doom to put things in perspective.
With 72 hours to go before a meteorite wipes out Earth, priorities are straightened and secrets start spilling out faster than worms crawling out of the woodwork.
Family man Fu-an (Henry Thia) announces to his wife and children that he wants to be a woman; a cop (Jeffrey Wang) confesses to his colleague (Mark Lee) that he took a bribe many years ago; Shuzhen (Alice Ko) tells her husband (Tender Huang) that she has fallen for her superior (Guo Liang); and Rebecca (Rebecca Lim) chooses to go to Cambodia instead of accepting a marriage proposal from Richard (Chua Enlai).
After a promising set-up, writer-director Ong Kuo Sin has no idea what to do with the various stories, which mostly get neatly resolved with a Big Speech moment.
And because there are so many threads and characters, the treatment of the material inevitably feels glib and clumsy.
Judgment Day also features the late John Cheng, better known as Ah Nan, as a temple medium who knows how to bend with the wind. He has some interesting observations about religion, but too bad the scene concocted for him to share them is completely contrived.
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Dark Skies
Scott Stewart
The story: Strange things are happening at the Barrett residence. Lacy (Keri Russell) and Daniel (Josh Hamilton) try to make sense of what is happening while protecting their two boys, Jesse (Dakota Goyo) and Sammy (Kadan Rockett).

This is the kind of movie where the less you know about it, the more effective it is.
It opens with scenes of normal suburban life – children playing in the streets, a lawn being watered, a barbecue gathering.
Then something happens in the Barrett household.
Someone, or something, comes into their kitchen at night and leaves a mess. It could almost be a prank though Lacy wonders what would eat the lettuce but leave the bacon. A giant rabbit with opposable thumbs is her husband’s quick comeback.
From this almost innocuous incident, writer-director Scott Stewart (Priest, 2011) slowly escalates the tension and the stakes as the incidents get harder and harder to explain away.
A big part of why the movie works is due to the casting.
Keri Russell was defined by the college student title role she played in the television drama Felicity (1998-2002) and it is nice to see that she has matured into a compelling actress without any offscreen drama, thank you very much.
She is well-matched by Josh Hamilton, an actor better known for his work on Broadway in award-winning plays such as Proof (2000) and The Coast Of Utopia (2002).
They are believable as a regular couple coping with ordinary pressures, from keeping up with mortgage payments to trying to build a better life for their family.
Adding to the sense of reality is Dakota Goyo (Real Steel, 2011) as a 13-year-old beginning to be interested in girls and to chafe at parental restrictions. At the same time, he is also a protective sibling to his younger and possibly over- imaginative brother (Kadan Rockett).
There is also a nice dynamic between Lacy the believer and Daniel the sceptic when things get more hairy, a gender reversal of the Mulder-Scully relationship in the iconic sci-fi series The X-Files (1993-2002).
Even when the movie moves into familiar Paranormal Activity (2007) territory as Daniel installs surveillance cameras in the house, Stewart manages to hold your attention.
The film could have easily elicited snorts given its subject matter, but by the time the word “aliens” is mentioned, the moviegoer is an hour into the film, and Dark Skies has cast an unsettling spell.
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Good Rogue
Eric Lin
Unless you are a fan of televised singing competition shows, you are not likely to be familiar with Malaysia’s Eric Lin.
Even though he released his first EP in Malaysia back in 2002, it was his stints on various contests, including the popular Chinese Million Star, that have raised his profile in recent years. It has even paved the way for him to release his first full-length album, Good Rogue.
As the title suggests, the persona here is one of a sensitive tough guy. He sings on the Percy Phang-composed title track: “I just keep loving/Keep loving/You can criticise as you wish/Even if it’s arrogance/I’m a good rogue”.
Lin has a decent set of pipes and he is versatile enough to handle faster-paced tracks and even take on English, as Like A Love Song proves. But he could do with more distinctive material. It gets hard to tell apart one mid-tempo ballad from another after a while.
Instead of this album, it might well take another television appearance to boost his profile once more.
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Don't Cry Mommy
Kim Yong Han
The story: Recently divorced Yoo Lim (Yoo Seon) lives with her only daughter, highschooler Eun Ah (Nam Bo Ra, below). Her world falls apart when Eun Ah is raped by three schoolmates (U-KISS member Shin Dong Ho plays one of them) and ultimately takes her own life. Faced with a legal system that coddles juvenile offenders, Yoo Lim decides to mete out her own brand of justice.

Rape is a horrific crime. And it is frustrating when the perpetrators get away with little more than a slap on the wrist if they happen to be underage, in the case of South Korea’s courts.
Faced with this devastating injustice, Yoo Lim takes matters into her own hands when she tracks down the three schoolboys who attacked her daughter.
Writer-director Kim Yong Han wants to draw attention to a serious issue and a glaring loophole in the courts. But Don’t Cry Mommy ends up pushing easy buttons in a lazy way.
The rapists are absolute scum with no humanising qualities whatsoever. They even videotape the vicious rape and end up blackmailing Eun Ah with the footage in order to abuse her further. You, too, will be baying for their blood.
What is interesting is that one of the perpetrators is actually a baby-faced boy whom Eun Ah initially had a crush on. He could pass off for a boyband member and, in fact, is played by one, U-KISS’s Shin Dong Ho. Kudos to him for taking on such a risky role.
Too much of the movie is frustrating though. Eun Ah (a sweetly innocent Nam Bo Ra from The Moon Embracing The Sun, 2012), and Yoo Lim (Yoo Seon from The Sons Of Sol Pharmacy, 2009) keep getting placed in situations that leave them vulnerable to attack. The actions of the mother, in particular, will have you sighing loudly in exasperation as she clumsily confronts the boys responsible for the heinous crimes.
The movie is not satisfying as a vigilante flick nor does it engage with the issues in a thoughtful way, when other Korean films have shown that it is possible to do so. There is Lee Chang Dong’s Poetry (2010), which was also triggered by the gangrape of a schoolgirl, but he juxtaposes the ugly crime with lyrical beauty in a film of quiet power.
Then there is Park Chan Wook’s vengeance trilogy (including Oldboy, 2003), which explored the theme in far greater depth. It is smart enough to have you baying for blood – and then satiates that with generous doses of violent payback.
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Ricky Is A Nice Guy
Ricky Hsiao
Who says nice guys finish last? Not Taiwan’s Ricky Hsiao. The blind singer-songwriter’s fifth Mandarin album makes it all the way to the top of the G-Music album charts at home.
The opening track Live My Own Life is a winner with Lin Xi’s poignant lyrics paired with Hsiao’s memorable melody. He sings with a sense of purpose lines such as “I live the life I want, so long it’s not life living me” and “I own time, and time doesn’t have my notice”.
The folksy strains of Lotus Seed Heart also complement well a moving tale about a past love.
He might be nice but that does not mean he is bland. He gets emo on the Tanya Chua-penned ballad Who Said You Could. He wallows in misery here: “Who said you could, no one said you could, think I don’t care/But actually I hate myself, why did I fall for you”.
Not to worry, though, the album ends with a breezy pick-me-up, Simple Happiness. He lifts you up as he sings: “I’ve learnt to want the simple pleasures/Use love to experience each day I live”. A sweet sentiment from a nice guy.
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Lay The Favourite
Stephen Frears
The story: The phrase “lay the favourite” comes from the arena of sports gambling. It is a world that private dancer Beth (Rebecca Hall) discovers when she moves to Vegas for a fresh start. She works for Dink (Bruce Willis), clashes with his wife Tulip (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and ends up making a pivotal bet on a basketball game. Based on Beth Raymer’s 2010 memoir of the same name.

The best thing about this film is Rebecca Hall.
Somehow, she manages to give stripper- turned-gambler Beth an aura of innocence. The wide-eyed naivete is all the more impressive considering that the English actress is now 30.
Even when she is putting the moves on Dink, randomly hooking up with a stranger (Joshua Jackson) or just making bad decisions in general, there is an essential sweetness about her that is endearing.
From Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) to The Town (2010) to the stage production of The Winter’s Tale, the chameleonic actress has slipped into a wide variety of roles and imbued them all with a ring of authenticity.
If only the movie were as good as she is. There is a gentle sense of humour to the proceedings, but this is a film that could have done with a more brazen tone.
Oddly enough, there are brazen roles here, including Vince Vaughn (Wedding Crashers, 2005) as showy bookie Rosie and Catherine Zeta-Jones (Chicago, 2002) as the tanned and formidable Tulip who warns Beth: “Do not f*** my husband.”
They are not meaty enough, though, to make for interesting character studies.
At the same time, there is not much momentum propelling the story forward.
The pivotal bet placed on the outcome of a basketball game is supposed to introduce some tension, but it feels a little abrupt and not particularly exciting.
Director Stephen Frears has done better work before – from Dirty Pretty Things (2002) to High Fidelity (2000). This is not among them.
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In The House
Francois Ozon
The story: Claude (Ernst Umhauer) insinuates himself with a classmate Rapha (Bastien Ughetto) and gets invited to his home. He then writes about Rapha and his parents (Emmanuelle Seigner, Denis Menochet) for a school assignment. Teacher Germain (Fabrice Luchini) is intrigued by the voyeuristic essay and encourages Claude to keep writing. Unexpected consequences follow. Based on the play The Boy Who Sat In The Last Row by Juan Mayorga.

French writer-director Francois Ozon sets up a twisted little premise here and then lets it unfold in a darkly delicious manner.
The first time Germain reads about Rapha and his family in Claude’s essay, he gets a little concerned about the detailed description of an intrusion into someone else’s house. Even more troubling is the superior smirking tone of the essay which sets off alarm bells.
And yet, he is intrigued. Compared to the usual dross that is submitted, Claude’s writing has a spark. The whole “peeping through a keyhole” voyeurism transfixes him, and the audience. Each essay ends with the tantalising “To be continued”, and like Germain, the viewer wants to know more.
Is Claude a skilful manipulator or just an awkward, if talented, teenager? Is he imagining what is happening at Rapha’s house or is he faithfully recording events as they occur?
The set-up is also used to satirise the creative process.
At times, it even feels like a meta-commentary on the movie itself as when Germain expounds on what makes for a good ending.
Since this is a film by Ozon, who directed the sexy thriller Swimming Pool (2003) , there are also sexual undertones that gradually bubble to the surface.
Claude is attracted to Rapha’s mother, “the most bored woman in the world”. He shares an intimate moment with Rapha and there are hints of an attraction with the father even.
It prompts Germain to exclaim in exasperation that Claude seems to have wandered into a Pasolini movie. And Germain’s wife asks him point blank whether he desires Claude.
The cast is uniformly good from Fabrice Luchini (The Women On The 6th Floor, 2010) as the well-intentioned but misguided teacher to relative newcomer Ernst Umhauer whose enigmatic Claude keeps one guessing, to English actress Kristin Scott Thomas (Salmon Fishing In The Yemen, 2011) in a French-speaking role as Germain’s sceptical wife.
They bring the various characters to life as curiosity, creativity and perversity are blended together in this compelling tale.
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