Heartbeat
G.E.M.
By the time Hong Kong-based singer G.E.M. released her latest album, fans were already familiar with several of the tracks.
The star of the second season of televised contest I Am A Singer (2014) has been steadily releasing singles over the year and tracks such as Long Distance and One Way Road have topped music charts.
The ballad Long Distance is a winner with its cascading piano accompaniment and an earnest chorus: “I can get used to the long distance, love isn’t always up to us/Would rather use a different way, to love you from afar.”
All of the songs, wholly written by G.E.M., are catchy material that plays to her strength as a powerful and emotive singer.
But the album feels like a disparate collection, its parts never quite coherent as a whole – which may be the reason for or the result of the piecemeal release strategy.
(ST)

Best Asian gigs of 2015
For Music, For Life... Liang Wenfu Concert 2015
The Star Theatre/April 10 and 11
Singer-songwriter Liang Wern Fook, whose name is pretty much synonymous with the home-grown Mandarin music movement that is xinyao, held his first solo concert and showed why he is the quintessential chronicler of Singapore life.
So what if he is primarily a songwriter and not a singer? His modest voice has a charm of its own and the fans lapped up the little anecdotes behind the famous compositions.

Jolin Tsai 2015 Play World Tour – Singapore
Singapore Indoor Stadium/July 25
Taking inspiration from her album Play (2014), Jolin Tsai morphed from Medusa – complete with a headpiece of writhing mechanical snakes (left) – to roaring 1920s flapper girl to underwater princess.
The Taiwanese diva shimmied with a bevy of statuesque dancers and delivered on both the high- octane tracks as well as the ballads. She even performed We’re All Different, Yet The Same – a song banned on radio and television here for its homosexual content – by presenting it as a broader anthem of inclusion and acceptance. Well played.

JJ Lin Timeline: Genesis World Tour
Singapore Indoor Stadium/Sept 5
Home-grown singer-songwriter JJ Lin kept it all in the family in the homecoming leg of his latest tour. He sang duets with his mother, father and elder brother and proclaimed to the full-house crowd: “Don’t blame me for being partial on my Singapore stop.”
There was also an SG50 moment when he sang Our Singapore, the English theme song for this year’s National Day celebrations. Singapore fans had no problems with him playing favourites at all.

Worst
S.H.E. / Aaron Yan Forever Stars 2015 Singapore
Singapore Indoor Stadium/ Nov 10
Popular Taiwanese girl group S.H.E. find themselves in this awkward spot no thanks to their labelmate Aaron Yan. He had problems with pitching and high notes and the loudest applause came when he announced his final number. Enough said.
(ST)

Best Mandarin albums of 2015
Amit2
By A-mei/Mei Entertainment
On her second record under the moniker of Amit, Taiwanese diva A-mei gets darker with songs such as Freak Show and Matriarchy.
She flirts with reggae and electronica on Jamaican Betel Nut and bristles with disdain on What D’ya Want?. Through them all, her pop instinct remains unerringly spot-on.
A Bloody Love Song makes you want to embark on a grand gothic romance simply because you have found the perfect soundtrack for it.

Aphasia
By Tanya Chua/Asia Muse Entertainment
Who knew that Tanya Chua and electronica would go so well together?
The Singapore singer-songwriter takes a gamble on her 10th Mandarin album by venturing into a new genre with long-time lyrics partner Xiaohan.
The result is Tanya as you have never seen or heard before. The term aphasia might refer to a speech disorder, but she is far from tongue-tied in this game-changing album.

Why? Art
By Yen-j/B’in Music International
Taiwanese singer-songwriter Yen-j draws on jazz, electronica and rap on this album. He also taps into a whole gamut of moods, from anger to playfulness to wistfulness.
The title track Ashtray is pulsing with energy and wordplay, while Traveller is languorously beguiling. This is artful pop music.

Worst
Because There’s You
By Ocean Ou/ Ocean Entertainment
Somebody has to tell Taiwanese singer-songwriter Ocean Ou that this is 2015, not 2003 – so move on already. His lone big hit of yore, Lonely Northern Hemisphere, actually appears here twice – as a reworked album opener and again in a karaoke version. Milking it much?
(ST)

Best films of 2015
Ex Machina
Novelist Alex Garland of The Beach (1996) fame makes an auspicious directing debut with this cool, stylish and deeply unsettling sci-fi drama.
Programmer Caleb (Domhnall Gleeson) is tasked by his mercurial boss Nathan (Oscar Isaac) to probe the thin line between human and artificial intelligence, and artificial intelligence just happens to come in the shapely android form of Ava (breakout Swedish actress Alicia Vikander, above).
The questions come fast and furious: Why was Caleb chosen? What is Nathan hiding? Are deception and seduction uniquely human traits? The disturbing ending is just perfect.

The Theory Of Everything
While only Eddie Redmayne won an Oscar, he and Felicity Jones gave two of the year’s best performances in this warm, honest biopic of famous theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking directed by James Marsh.
Redmayne’s Hawking was a layered one – cheekily charming, prey to doubts and frustrations and someone capable of falling in and out of love. Jones was just as compelling as the fiercely supportive first wife who was very much his equal.

The Songs We Sang
Film-maker Eva Tang’s documentary about the Singapore music movement known as xinyao is both heartfelt and meticulously researched. It is ambitious in scope as it traces the roots of today’s glittery Mandopop to the music written by students in the last days of Nanyang University before it merged with the University of Singapore in 1980.
Besides interviews with key musicians such as Billy Koh and Liang Wern Fook, there is also rich use of archival material from televised performances and newspaper articles.

Worst
Blackhat
For a movie that was supposed to be a globe-trotting cyber thriller, Blackhat was deadly dull. The story made little sense and wasted the international A-list cast assembled, from Chris Hemsworth to Tang Wei. The director responsible for this travesty was Michael Mann, whose previous work included well-regarded titles such as historical epic The Last Of The Mohicans (1992).
(ST)

Winter Endless
Sodagreen
Singapore might not experience winter, but Sodagreen’s ballad Rainy Night is still perfect for the season.
Lead vocalist Wu Ching-feng croons gently, offering comfort: “On a rainy night, your heart is shattered, let the rain quietly hide your tears.”
Six years after the luminous Daylight Of Spring (2009), the acclaimed Taiwanese band finally complete their ambitious four-
season Vivaldi project.
Following from the fervour of Summer/Fever (2009) and the melancholy of Autumn: Stories (2013) comes the darker-themed Winter Endless.
Song titles such as Accusing A Murderer, Dream Of Chernobyl and We Don’t Know evoke death, destruction and uncertainty. As if in contrast, the music can be lush and orchestral, blooming against the stark imagery.
The band also venture into new territory with their first all-English track, but the lyrics seem rather plain in comparison to their Chinese ones, which draw on everything from Sisyphus of Greek myth to a nuclear plant explosion.
Album closer Must Keep Singing offers a glimmer of light, but Wu is weary and conflicted even as he soldiers on: “I must keep singing/I cannot keep trying/I must keep dreaming/I must keep cheating myself.”
This seems like a rather sombre note on which to end the four seasons, so good thing there is a second disc.
It features largely instrumental pieces, including a four-movement piano concerto, Ode Of Winter.
It feels like the seed the band planted in Daylight Of Spring, in the track Symphonic Dream, has finally borne fruit.
The circle and cycle are complete.
(ST)

Hubert Ng
Hubert Ng
This four-song EP marks the debut of Singapore singer-songwriter Hubert Ng as well as points to potential pop idol, given the styling of both his songs and the photographs.
Moreover, the business undergraduate has fresh-faced looks and a voice that passes muster.
Opening number Can’t Let Go shows a good grasp of the tuneful ballad with a chorus that soars into falsetto territory. He switches things up with the breezy Angel, which chugs along with rhythmic claps, and the electronic dance-pop of Game Strong.
The lyrics need a little more work – they can sometimes feel too run-of-the-mill.
The challenge with putting out accessible pop is not to stick too closely to the middle of the road – you can easily get lost in the mass of traffic there.
(ST)

Li Fei Hui Concert
Esplanade Concert Hall
Last Saturday
Home-grown singer-songwriter Roy Loi’s solo gig was equal parts music concert and story-telling session.
His signature hit is the ballad Waited For You Till My Heart Ached. But some fans got to know about the singer, better known as Li Feihui, from the classic ballad he wrote, Love Like The Tides, sung by Taiwanese star Jeff Chang.
Still others encountered him as an actor first, including from his turn as a baddie in the long-running Channel 8 drama 118 (2014-2015).
Over the course of four hours, the full-house audience of 1,600 got to know him better.
He recounted how he started out listening to Western heavy metal and hard rock, was inspired to pick up the guitar on his own and how he was given a chance to release his first album in 1988, despite being overweight when the record label first contacted him.
He was a personable presence on stage. He could laugh at himself and was also happy to crack jokes at the expense of old friends such as singer Eric Moo, who was performing in Taipei that same night.
At one point, he sang a snatch of Moo’s hit, Too Foolish, before cheekily adding: “That’s not written by me, you won’t hear it tonight.”
After all, there was more than enough material for him to cover.
As a singer in his own right, he released five albums in Singapore and then three in Taiwan in the mid-1990s, with hits such as Please Pass Through My Heart, Time Flies, Love Flies and Only You Can Complete My Song.
He also penned songs for the biggest stars of Chinese pop and the likes of Andy Lau and Jacky Cheung sent their best wishes in video segments played during the concert.
Loi displayed a talent for mimicry when he imitated Lau’s way of singing for the track Practice.
Impressively, he even sang the xinyao classic, Friendship Forever, in the distinctive styles of a few singers.
Even those who know him as a talented songwriter might be surprised at how prolific he is.
Sandy Lam’s Shadow Lover, Daniel Chan’s A Man Like The Wind and even the theme song of Jack Neo’s long-running sketch show Gao Xiao Xing Dong (Comedy Tonight) were all penned by him. Neo showed his support by turning up to sing that familiar number.
The evening ended, of course, with a mass singalong of Waited For You Till My Heart Ached.
The concert may be over, but with Loi continuing to write songs and to act in more projects, it is clear that he is not quite done with telling stories just yet.
(ST)

Five things for anime fans to do in Japan

Relax at Animax Cafe
At Animax Cafe in Akihabara, Tokyo, the staff dream of becoming professional seiyu, or voice actors, and handily belt out songs to entertain diners.
The theme at the concept cafe changes regularly and extends to the merchandise, food and drinks menu and also the coasters. The popular taiyaki snack, a fish-shaped cake with various fillings, gets an anime twist and is shaped into characters from shows.
A new branch of the cafe opened in Osaka in June.
When The Straits Times went to the Tokyo cafe last month, Star-Mu, an anime series about high school students of a music academy, was in the spotlight, while collectibles from the swimming series Free! were on sale.
Where: 3-7-12 Sotokanda Chiyoda-ku Tokyo
When: Noon to 10pm (weekday), 11am to 10pm (weekend)
Admission: 500 yen (S$5.70) plus a mandatory food and drink order for the table area and a mandatory order of either food or drink at the cafe area
Info: cafe.animax.co.jp (in Japanese)

Play at J-World Tokyo
Shonen Jump is a long-running weekly manga anthology and many of its popular titles have been adapted into anime, including ninja action drama Naruto, pirate comedy One Piece and volleyball series Haikyu.
At J-World, step into the shoes of your favourite character and, for example, solve puzzles to collect Dragon Balls or try to spike a volleyball set up by star player Kageyama. There are also limited-edition merchandise to buy and character-themed food and drinks to tuck into.
Where: 3-1-3 Higashiikebukuro, Toshima-ku, Tokyo Sunshine City World Import Mart Building 3F
When: 10am to 10pm daily Admission: An Unlimited Attractions Pass costs 2,600 yen for adults and 2,400 yen for children (aged four to 15) and includes the entrance fee and unlimited one-day access to rides and attractions. A Night Passport for use between 5 and 10pm costs 1,800 yen for adults and 1,600 yen for children
Info: www.namco.co.jp/tp/j-world/en/

Learn at Suginami Animation Museum
Find out what goes into the making of an anime.
Learn the basics of animation in a workshop and take a shot at dubbing a character’s voice at an interactive display.
There are also exhibits on the history of the genre, a library stocked with anime-related material and photo opportunities such as pretending to be a member of classic character Chibi Maruko-chan’s family. Note that most of the material is in Japanese.Where: 3-29-5 Kamiogi Suginami-ku, Tokyo
When: 10am to 6pm. Closed on Mondays, from Dec 28 to Jan 4 and on the day after a national holiday
Admission: Free
Info: sam.or.jp/english–home

Work out at an Anisong concert
Animax Musix, organised yearly by Animax Japan since 2009, is one of the biggest anisong (anime song) live concerts in Japan.
At the Nov 21 edition at the 17,000-seat Yokohama Arena, fans were on their feet for more than six hours in a song-and-dance extravaganza, waving their lightsticks in perfect timing to the rhythm of every track.
Apart from hearing their favourite anime theme songs from more than 40 acts, they were also treated to one-off collaborations between artists.
Rocker Gero caused a stir when he appeared in drag as the seventh member of girl group iRis for the pairing Gero-Ris.
The next Animax Musix concert will be held in Osaka on Feb 13.
Info: musix.animax.co.jp (in Japanese)

Get a sensory overload at Robot Restaurant
This could well be a draw for those who love mecha, a specific genre of robots and humanoid machines with titles such as Gundam and Neon Genesis Evangelion.
The kaleidoscopic waiting area, with its lights, mirrors and glittery surfaces, is merely a tease for the over-the-top neon fantasy to follow – performers drum up a storm, laser beams bounce off the walls, a clown sits in the lap of a giant female figure and, yes, there are robots dancing.
Sit in the first row and have the action take place a hair’s breadth away.
Where: 1-7-1 Kabukicho Shinjuku Shinjuku-ku Tokyo
When: Daily shows at 4, 5.55, 7.50 and 9.45pm. Arrive 30 minutes before showtime. Closed from Dec 31 to Jan 3
Admission: 7,000 yen a person, discounts available on the website
Info: www.shinjuku-robot.com/pc/?lng=en
(ST)

Cooties
Jonathan Milott and Cary Murnion
The story: Clint Hadson (Elijah Wood) is a struggling writer who returns to his old elementary school in Chicken, Illinois, as a substitute teacher. His high school crush, Lucy McCormick (Alison Pill), is teaching there too, but she is dating the boorish physical education teacher, Wade Johnson (Rainn Wilson). Meanwhile, the children start to exhibit terrifying behaviour as an infection spreads rapidly through the school.

The recent Scouts Guide To The Zombie Apocalypse crossed the zombie flick with the teenage sex comedy to middling effect. The more successful hybrid is Cooties because it energises the genre by juvenilising it.
If you have always had the sneaky suspicion that children are little monsters, well, this movie is firmly on your side. It smartly blurs the line between pint-sized terror and flesh-eating hellion because really, who can tell sometimes when it comes to kids?
And so we get this macabre scene of an infected child taking a bite out of another pupil – and it does not strike the substitute teacher as anything out of the ordinary.
Kudos to the debut directors Jonathan Milott and Cary Murnion, as well as writers Leigh Whannell (Saw, 2004) and Ian Brennan (co-creator of horror comedy television series Scream Queens, 2015), for not handling the subject matter with kid gloves.
They pull no punches with the gore and violence in the scenes of carnage on the playground, even showing the kids playing with detached eyeballs and substituting human intestines for a skip rope.
There is a generous serving of humour as well, from the oddball characters to the droll dialogue. When things start spinning out of control, Wade exclaims: “You can’t eat the teachers, man.”
It would be tempting to write off Wood for slumming it after the blockbuster success of The Lord Of The Rings movies by making smaller, quirky movies. That would be doing him – and the offbeat charms of films such as Cooties and mystery thriller Grand Piano (2013) – a grave disservice.
(ST)

Sweet Lemons
Derrick Hoh

Beautiful Melody
Ming Bridges

On his previous Mandarin album Change? (2010), Singapore singer-songwriter Derrick Hoh cleverly sampled Aaron Kwok’s When I Know That You’re In Love and built a new song around it.
Buoyed by its success, he repeats that trick twice on his new album.
The title track Sweet Lemons riffs on Tarcy Su’s Lemon Tree (1996) – itself a cover of a song by German band Fool’s Garden. And the song Forever, previously collected on his English-language EP All I Want (2014), works in the 1994 PJ & Duncan hit Eternal Love.
Whatever happened to originality?
Being an okay cover singer/sampler of other people’s songs will not be enough to break Hoh through to the big time. Sticking to the chirpy dance-pop of Let’s Give Love Another Chance might well be a better strategy.
At least fellow singer-songwriter Ming Bridges is trying to crack the Taiwan market on her own merit.
The opening English- language title track is a declaration of her womanhood as she coos: “Say my name, make my body move/In the way, only you can do”.
The Mandarin version, with lyrics by Xiaohan, is less sensual and more romantic.
Hao Ren Jia, confusingly translated into English as China Wind, is the strongest offering here.
The ballad by Eric Ng and Xiaohan is tailored for Bridges’ voice as she yearns affectingly for a good man to appear.
She still needs to work on her enunciation though, as it sounds a little stiff in parts.
(ST)

Go Lala Go 2
Andrew Chien
The story: In this sequel to the hit 2010 romantic comedy, Du Lala (Ariel Lin) finds herself facing challenges on both the private and professional fronts. Her photographer-boyfriend Wang Wei (Vic Chou) seems to have no intention of proposing, while at work, it falls upon her to pull off an important assignment involving a fashion label headed by Chen Feng (Chen Bo-lin). When Chen starts to take an interest in Du, she finds herself torn.

Even though this is billed as a sequel, the cast are completely different from that of the earlier film.
Some key characters remain the same, but previously, Du Lala was played by actor-director Xu Jinglei while Wang Wei was played by singer-actor Stanley Huang.
With Taiwanese television stars Ariel Lin and Vic Chou stepping in and the addition of Chen Bo-lin as a new love interest, the feel is now very much that of an idol drama series.
Specifically, the popular romantic drama In Time With You (2011) casts a long shadow here.
Lin and Chen left such a deep impression as the central couple that it throws one off-balance to find them paired up once again in Go Lala Go 2.
On the one hand, it seems clear that moviegoers should be cheering on Du and Wang.
On the other hand, it is almost a reflex reaction to root for Lin and Chen instead, given their past history in an unrelated show.
What is also problematic is the fact that the tightly wound Du comes across as shrill most of the time and it is hard to see why the laidback Wang would fall for her.
Despite her protestations to the contrary, Du is very much a driven professional who wants to shine in her company and much of the movie is about the shenanigans that take place at work.
To tie the two strands together requires the contrivance of Wang working as a photographer for a corporate project and this plays out to largely frustrating effect.
While the movie offers some honest moments of reflection and self-awareness from the characters, it never fully satisfies as either a romance or a workplace drama.
(ST)

Crescendo Original Soundtrack
Various artists
The Channel 8 television series Crescendo casts the spotlight on the home-grown Mandarin music movement that is xinyao.
But as the soundtrack makes clear, it wants to be more than an exercise in nostalgia. As the movement’s pioneer Liang Wern Fook says in the promotional material: “I hope that xinyao is not just an antique; we still have new songs, fresh talent. In my heart, what’s precious about xinyao is its spirit of innovation.”
So apart from guitar-backed covers of xinyao classics by a fresh generation of singers, there are three new numbers here.
There are the evocative ballads Wish To Tell You, written by Liang and huskily performed by A-do; and Look At You Quietly, written by stalwarts Roy Loi and Xing Zenghua and sung by Tang Wei’en. The light-hearted Happy Youths is a slice-of-life ditty from new names He Shenghui and Guo Weiqi.
The rest of the collection comprises faithful and competent takes on songs such as Xie Hou (Encounter), Lian Zhi Qi (Love’s Refuge) and, of course, that anthem of a generation, Xi Shui Chang Liu (Friendship Forever). There are also pop hits from the likes of singers Stefanie Sun (I’m Not Sad) and Mavis Hee (Regret) included here.
I will always have a soft spot for the originals, though, as those were the versions that formed the soundtrack to my life.
Here’s to hoping that xinyao’s waters keep on flowing and continue to nourish Singapore’s music scene.
(ST)

Wallace Ang
Wallace Ang
On his second album, which comes seven years after his debut album, Roles (2008), Love 97.2FM DJ Wallace Ang shows he has a decent set of pipes for singing and, on a few tracks, some potential as a songwriter .
Opening number Suspended Happiness builds drama with a melody that has him shooting for the high notes: “Happiness that’s suspended/ Can’t embrace it, can’t shake it off”.
The lazy, jazzy vibe of Inconsolable strikes a refreshingly different note. However, it seems that the first half has been packed with stronger material.
As the proceedings take a dip with run-of-the-mill love ballads Good For Both Of Us and The You Before My Eyes, the record ends up feeling top-heavy.
(ST)

Bad Guys Always Die
Sun Hao
The story: Qiangzi (Chen Bo-lin) is teaching Chinese in Busan, South Korea. A leisurely road trip on Jeju Island with his younger brother Papa (Yang Xuwen) and good friends San’er (Qiao Zhenyu) and Datou (Ding Wenbo) quickly spirals out of control when they help a woman (Son Ye Jin) injured in a car accident. There is murder and mayhem as a contract killer comes after her.

Taiwan’s Chen Bo-lin has been a very busy man after the success of his 2011 hit television romantic drama In Time With You.
He has several key movie releases this year, including the Anthony Chen-produced anthology Distance, which premiered at the recent Golden Horse Film Festival, and the romantic comedy Go Lala Go 2!, which is slated to open here on Dec 3.
In this intriguing South Korea- China co-production mixing comedy, suspense and violent action, Chen Bo-lin is well-cast as Qiangzi, who gets into scuffles, but is essentially a good guy in a dark thriller filled with physical humour.
Even as mystery shrouds Korean actress Son Ye Jin’s femme fatale (Who is she? What is she after?), there seems to be a different movie running alongside it.
When San’er and Datou, despite being strangers in a strange land, try to save Qiangzi and Papa who are taken hostage, the story plays more like a bumbling comedy that could well be titled Lost In Jeju.
To director and co-writer Sun Hao’s credit, he manages to transition effectively from one strong thread to the other as the paths of characters criss-cross but, tantalisingly, never meet. The ending is packed with gunfire and plot twists.
While the bullets eventually find their target, some of the revelations fall short of being convincing.
(ST)

Aphasia
Tanya Chua
The term aphasia refers to a speech disorder caused by damage to the brain.
In feted singer-songwriter Tanya Chua’s new Mandarin album, it is a metaphor for the difficulty of communication, of saying what we truly feel. On the title track, she laments: “Turn what we wish to say into babble, each and every one suffering from aphasia”.
She has always dealt with the subject of modern, urban relationships in her records from lonely- in-the-city Stranger (2003) to the emotional extremes of Angel Vs Devil (2013).
On her milestone 10th Mandarin album, there is a darker edge to the subject. The album opens with the throbbing electronica of Strange Species – complete with artfully seductive music video – a clear signal that Chua is venturing in a very different direction. Song titles such as Best Way To Die, Peep Show and Cat And Mouse suggest that this is a city with seedy edges, one in which desire and danger lurk.
She sings mesmerisingly on Strange Species: “We belong to the same class of organism/Use skin to mask our true faces/Not clear who you are but the chemistry is unmistakable”.
Her fruitful partnership with lyricist Xiaohan has previously yielded hits with striking imagery including Darwin I, Projectile and Amphibian. This time, Xiaohan is single-handedly responsible for all the lyrics to Chua’s music.
They continue to complement each other well from the louche vibe of Peep Show (“Come put on what you’re good at, a real-life peep show”) to the playful and teasing Cat And Mouse (“Want to come home with me, if you can catch up with me”).
Ten albums in and Chua is taking chances instead of coasting along. Hearteningly, she still has plenty to say.
(ST)

Bakuman
Hitoshi One
The story: Moritaka Mashiro (Takeru Satoh) can draw. Akito Takagi (Ryunosuke Kamiki) is good at writing stories. So the two high school students team up to work on an original manga. Their aim is to land a series in venerable compilation Shonen Jump Weekly, which is already featuring the work of genius high school student Eiji Niizuma (Shota Sometani). Based on the manga of the same name by writer Tsugumi Ohba and illustrator Takeshi Obata.

For an aspiring manga artist, walking through the hallowed hallways of Shonen Jump Weekly’s offices is like a musician stepping into the legendary Abbey Road Studios. It is a big deal.
Landing a weekly series is an even bigger deal, especially for a couple of high school students with no experience whatsoever. While it is not too much of a surprise as to whether their dream comes true, you still find yourself rooting for the boys as, ink-stained and sleep-starved, they have to overcome one hurdle after another.
A manga about manga has an added frisson of meta-ness about it, but it still works as a film adaptation.
In a memorably executed sequence, Mashiro and Takagi face off against their rival Niizuma against a backdrop of swirling comic book panels as they wield various writing implements as their weapons of choice.
For fans of the genre, there is also the fun of getting a glimpse into the world of manga with its cut-throat popularity rankings and the different motivations – from fame to fear – driving the writers.
Paying homage to Shonen Jump Weekly’s time-honoured themes of friendship, struggle and triumph, director Hitoshi One (Moteki, 2011) does a good job exploring how youthful passion trumps adversity in the movie.
Satoh and Kamiki – who are in their 20s and had acted together in the period action Rurouni Kenshin films from 2012 to last year – can still pull off being high school students, convincing in their portrayal of the agony and ecstasy of being artists.
(ST)

S.H.E. | Aaron Yan Forever Stars 2015 Singapore
Singapore Indoor Stadium
Tuesday
Taiwanese idol singer Aaron Yan’s equal concert billing with girl group S.H.E. was of little consequence to the fans – there was no question whom they had come to see.
It did not help that the vermillion suit Yan wore was the most memorable thing about his segment. That, and the backing vocalist who outshone him on the English duet Don’t You Wanna Stay.
Yan was floundering all the way through his 45-minute segment as he had problems with pitching and hitting the high notes.
Tellingly, the biggest response from the audience came when he announced his last song, Unstoppable Sun. The title of a ballad he performed earlier, Duo Yu De Wo (Unnecessary Me), turned out to be uncomfortably close to the truth.
The 21/2-hour show took off the moment Selina Jen, Hebe Tien and Ella Chen came onstage with the stomper Super Star.
Unlike their 2gether 4ever concert here in October 2013, this was not a full-fledged affair. Instead, it was a no-frills gig without even a change of costumes: Jen was in a bright and colourful ensemble, Chen a sassy short outfit and Tien wore a graceful long skirt.
But their show was packed with hits picked from their debut album Girl’s Dorm (2001) all the way to their last release, Blossomy (2012), and that was enough for the fans.
In recent years, the women have ventured in different directions with their own projects.
Chen is starring in a play in Taipei while Jen is hosting a show about food and health. All three have also released full-length albums on their own, with Tien enjoying the most success as a solo artist. She is working on her fourth album and will be holding her solo show in Singapore on March 5.
Urged by her group mates, Tien gave a sneak preview of the upcoming gig by singing the chorus of her latest hit, A Little Happiness, the theme song for the box-office champ, Our Times (2015).
Given their various commitments, it is clear they relish the opportunity to share the stage as a trio. They were comfortable and relaxed and their chemistry came through in their good-natured ribbing and bantering.
When Chen attempts to make some point by saying that they all sleep in separate beds, Tien quips: “Of course we do. If not, I would be sleeping with your hubby.”
There was also a moment of surprise when singer-songwriter Yoga Lin was announced as a guest star. It turned out to be Chen doing an exaggerated imitation of his nasal style of singing.
Many of the 7,500 fans had grown up with the trio’s songs and they sang along fervently, even to the lesser-known numbers.
Impressed and touched, the group thanked the crowd for letting them be a part of their youth. Jen made a plea for S.H.E. to be part of their middle age and old age as well.
They want to be your stars forever.
(ST)

Scouts Guide To The Zombie Apocalypse
Christopher B. Landon
The story: High school sophomores Ben (Tye Sheridan) and Carter (Logan Miller) feel that they have outgrown the scouts, but stay on with the troop for the sake of their friend, Augie (Joey Morgan). When a zombie outbreak occurs, the boys put their scouting skills to good use.

In an attempt to make his work stand out in a sea of zombie shows on TV and at the movies, director and co-writer Christopher B. Landon (Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones, 2014) mashes up the zombie genre with sex comedy.
But the result is a patchy film.
The characters are paper-thin cut-outs with barely more personality than the zombies who have suddenly overrun the town.
Ben is the decent guy trying to do the right thing, Carter is desperately trying to lose his virginity and Augie is the loser fat kid.
At least there is a female character helping to save the day, but it is a case of taking one step forward, two steps back – actress Sarah Dumont is squeezed into a tight tank top and tiny denim shorts as strip-club waitress Denise.
The humour here spans the gamut from sophomoric to gross-out, including scenes of Ben grabbing onto a zombie’s remarkably stretchy penis and a high school girl unwittingly making out with an undead suitor.
Buried beneath all this is a potentially moving story about childhood friendships that might not survive the teenage years.
Yet, Scouts Guide To The Zombie Apocalypse is no Stand By Me (1986).
Comedy fans might enjoy the turns from David Koechner from The Office (2005-2013) as a toupeed scoutmaster and Blake Anderson (Workaholics, 2011-present) as a luckless janitor.
For everyone else, the mash-up fails to breathe new life into the zombie genre.
(ST)

When Sorrow Being Downloaded Twice
Sandee Chan
Electronica has been Taiwanese singer-songwriter Sandee Chan’s playing field for a while now.
A Low-Key Life (2013) wrestled with fidelity and the limits of love, while I Love You, John (2011) served up playful electro-pop in which music itself is a theme.
As one-half of the duo 19 on the eponymous album (2011), she turned George Chen’s film scores and commercial work into accessible songs.
She continues to find ways to invigorate the genre. On this album, she works with 10 creatives for a colourful show of sparks.
On The Afternoon, her laidback melody and hypnotic arrangement are paired with acclaimed film-
maker Tsai Ming-liang’s spare lyrics about death and commitment: “What would you do if one day/I should leave ahead of you/Will you cry and hope/We’ll meet in the next life”.
Elsewhere, she collaborates with authors, a poet, a scriptwriter, a designer, a film critic and a food writer. The music is varied, by turns poignant, tender and quietly urgent as befitting the words.
Graphic designer Aaron Nieh paints a dark picture on Shut Up: “I have eaten up the night, finished the cigarettes” and later on, “The stars don’t shine, don’t compel”.
Meanwhile, food writer Craig Au Yeung is whimsical on Just An Egg: “Gently break me/Casually beat me/And then whisk me evenly with a burst of effort”.
Frustratingly, the title song is not part of the 10-track album.
It was available only as a pre-order limited-edition single bundled with the record.
Track down the elegantly atmospheric number on platforms such as iTunes and Spotify and check out the music video with its fascinating DIY scrapbook aesthetic.
There is a case for not including the track.
First, it is a duet, which none of the other songs is.
Second, the album is a marriage of her music with others’ lyrics, whereas Sorrow is the reverse, melding Yoga Lin’s memorable melody with Chan’s morose musings.
As it stands, the album is thematically a cohesive whole and rewards careful listening.
(ST)

Wish You Well
Rene Liu
“I think I’ll always be lonely, all my life, this lonely,” Taiwanese singer-actress Rene Liu once sang in the mournful ballad A Lifetime Of Loneliness.
She is now alone no more. She got married in 2011 and gave birth to a son in January this year.
While she still thinks about loneliness here, the circumstances have changed.
On the mid-tempo number I Dare To Be Lonely In Your Embrace, she sings: “Always comparing the benefits of being alone, of being together/Can’t remember how I used to share life’s joys and sorrows with myself.”
Liu is not a showy performer but there is an honesty and earnestness to her singing that has won her fans since her debut album in 1995.
Having found happiness, she wants everyone to be happy as well. Zhou Xun, Guey Lun-mei and Tang Wei join her in the title track, which is probably one of the most glamorous paeans to friendship ever.
(ST)

Burnt
John Wells
The story: Adam Jones (Bradley Cooper) was once a cocky young chef in Paris until drugs did him in. Years later, he resurfaces in London and seeks redemption by going after that elusive third Michelin star by cooking at Tony’s (Daniel Bruhl) restaurant.

How things have changed for actor Bradley Cooper.
Ten years ago, he was starring in a sitcom called Kitchen Confidential (2005), playing a bad-boy chef who was once addicted to alcohol and drugs trying to make a comeback. It was cancelled after four episodes.
Now, he is an award-winning actor with critical and popular hits such as American Sniper (2014), in which his name appears above the title in the movie poster.
Which is why Burnt is such an odd choice for him. Why take on a familiar role that he had played before?
If this was some ill-conceived attempt to do over the past, well, it failed.
Kitchen Confidential was based on chef Anthony Bourdain’s best-selling book.
Even though Burnt is not beholden to a memoir, its chef is in the same mould – one with a fiery temper to go with the mercurial talent. The thing is, we have had this dish before.
It seems rather unbelievable as well that Jones would be so hostile to sous vide cooking one moment – “cooking in condoms” – and then capitulating the next, simply because Helene (Sienna Miller) says so.
Helene is supposedly a talented cook in her own right, but really, she seems to be there as an all-too-convenient love interest for Jones. At least she seems more integral to the plot than Emma Thompson’s cookie-cutter psychiatrist who dispenses bland advice.
There is an attempt to cook up some drama over the arrival of the mysterious Michelin inspectors, but there is no excitement over the predictable developments.
At least London’s vibrant multicultural food scene serves as a colourful backdrop and Daniel Bruhl (Rush, 2013) is quietly affecting as someone carrying a torch for Jones.
Not quite burnt then, but this dish could certainly do with greater depth and intensity of flavour.
(ST)

Baby Steps
Barney Cheng
The story: Danny (Barney Cheng) is gay and lives with his boyfriend Tate (Michael Adam Hamilton) in Los Angeles. His mother (Gua Ah-leh) who lives in Taipei is in denial about her son’s sexuality and desperately wants a grandchild. When Danny decides
to have a baby, they finally have something in common – until she realises he is planning to do so through surrogacy.

While the title is a reference to the desire of the characters to hear the pitter-patter of little feet, it is also about the baby steps that Danny’s mother takes as she gradually accepts her son and the modern family he is creating.
It is a role that borders on the overly familiar at first, but in the capable hands of veteran actress Gua Ah-leh (The Wedding Banquet, 1993), she becomes a more nuanced character whose emotional tug-of- war with her son feels entirely natural, underpinned as it is by love for her child.
Not for nothing has Gua won the Golden Horse Award four times and the Golden Bell Awards, for her television work, twice.
Barney Cheng acquits himself commendably as writer and director, drawing out the emotional drama between mother and son and also exploring the issue of surrogacy.
The process is a logistically challenging one – it takes the movie from a home for surrogate mothers in Mumbai to a fertility clinic in Bangkok, embracing ethnic diversity in the process, unlike too many Hollywood movies.
Cheng also captures the fact that it is an emotionally draining and complicated undertaking for everyone involved, including the surrogate.
And while it takes time to get there, the ending is a sweet and touching one in which love and acceptance eventually triumph.
Baby Steps may be a sequel in spirit to Lee Ang’s seminal gay- themed The Wedding Banquet, but it also stands on its own two feet.

I’m Promising
Fang Wu
The competition in the music scene sure is heating up.
Taiwan’s Fang Wu has had to take part in several singing contests – Asian Millionstar, Duets and Super Idol (two seasons) – before finally getting the chance to release her debut album, on which she had a hand in composing the music and writing the lyrics for all the songs.
Wu has a sweet and clear voice and there is plenty of room for her pipes to shine in the mostly mid-tempo numbers, even if the music occasionally veers towards the pedestrian, as on Breaking Point.
More satisfying are album closer Tomorrow Is Another Day and lead single Accumulated Loneliness, a delicately spare concoction on why people come together (“Because the sum of loneliness makes us rely on each other/Embrace each other’s wounds, even if we can’t have them”).
Lyrically, she draws inspiration from everyday events and objects around her.
The track Challenges uses gaming and levelling up as a metaphor for overcoming hurdles, while Seesaw is about the difficulty of finding that balance in life. She sings on Marathon Girl: “Lalalala/Run this marathon with me.”
Good to know that she plans to stick around for the long haul.
(ST)

The resurgence of Taiwanese films at the box office continues with the winning youth romance Our Times.
It is the No. 1 domestic film of the year thus far with takings of NT$400 million (S$17.1 million). This puts it at No. 34 on the all-time list and in fifth position on the list of top-earning Taiwanese films.
This is a wave that started to rise with drama Cape No. 7 (2008) and shows no sign of breaking just yet. That modestly budgeted drama about a no-hope amateur band is the most successful local film in Taiwan, grossing NT$530 million.
Since then, films such as historical epic Seediq Bale (2011), comedy David Loman (2013) and youth romance You Are The Apple Of My Eye (2011) have been cleaning up at the box office on home ground.
The diverse genres of these films suggest that there is no easy formula to coming up with a hit.
It might seem obvious that tinkering with the school romance plot of You Are The Apple Of My Eye is a sure thing now that Our Times is a bona fide hit. But the fact is, even if one carefully lined up similar elements, lightning might not strike twice.
Before Our Times, Sung had starred in Cafe.Waiting.Love (2014), also a youthful romance mixing comedy and drama. Like You Are The Apple Of My Eye, it was based on a novel by the popular writer Giddens Ko and boasted an appealing cast. While it was by no means a flop, its takings of NT$260 million were substantially less than Apple’s NT$410 million.
A closer examination of the most successful films reveals some noteworthy trends.
On Chinese Wikipedia’s list of the 15 highest-grossing Taiwanese films, the oldest entry is Lee Ang’s erotic spy thriller Lust, Caution (2007) at No. 10 with NT$280 million earned. But it is primarily seen as an international co-production involving the United States and China as well.
Hence it is Cape No. 7 that is credited with kick-starting this heady new chapter in the Taiwanese film industry.
What was remarkable is that the film was neither helmed by any big names nor featured heralded stars. The feature debut of writer- director Wei Te-sheng, it had the leading actors Van Fan, better known for being a singer past the modest peak of his popularity, and Chie Tanaka, who had little prior acting experience.
With his follow-up film, Wei showed that Cape No. 7 was no fluke. The two-part Warriors Of The Rainbow: Seediq Bale (2011) featured a cast of unknown aborigine actors and earned more than NT$790 million. Its two instalments land at No. 2 and 7 on the list of top-grossing Taiwanese films.
It is the films that are making stars out of actors, from Kai Ko in You Are The Apple Of My Eye to Vivian Sung in Our Times (Ko won for Best New Actor, while Sung has been nominated for Best Actress at the Golden Horse Awards next month). This is very different from the modus operandi of Hollywood films in which A-list talent often drive opening weekends and are paid handsomely for doing so.
Instead, the most popular Taiwanese films of recent years are distinguished by strong stories, often with a strong Taiwanese identity.
The southern-most town of Hengchun was not just a setting in Cape No. 7, it was also an integral part of the movie with its gorgeous scenery and the never-say-die spirit of its denizens. The success of the movie even resulted in a tourism boom for Hengchun as fans flocked to filming locations.
Seediq Bale depicted an uprising of the Seediq people against colonial Japanese forces in Taiwan in 1930. Kano (2014, NT$330 million earned) was about a Taiwanese baseball team playing against the odds when the island was under Japanese rule.
Din Tao: Leader Of The Parade (2012, NT$317 million earned) offered a look at the traditional Taiwanese practice of performing at religious festivals. Monga (2010, NT$258 million earned) made Taiwanese gangsters cool and the title refers to a rough-and-tumble district in Taipei.
Beyond Beauty: Taiwan From Above (2013), the highest-grossing documentary in the territory with NT$220 million earned, was a labour of love on the environmental damage wrought on the island in the name of progress.
The diversity of the Taiwanese top earners is a heartening sign. Instead of trodding down familiar paths, film-makers would rather venture into new territory. And audiences are following right along. Maybe there is a lesson here for local film-makers.
(ST)

Our Times
Frankie Chen
The story: Truly (Vivian Sung) is a Plain Jane high school student who has to do the bidding of troublemaker Hsu Tai-yu (Darren Wang). They eventually become friends and she helps him woo the popular Minmin (Dewi Chien), while he nudges her in the direction of dreamy basketball player Ouyang Extraordinary (Dino Lee).

Think of this as the 2011 hit You Are The Apple Of My Eye, seen from the perspective of a girl.
In the feature directorial debut of Frankie Chen, the protagonist is now a female student and events unfold from Truly’s perspective, whereas You Are The Apple Of My Eye’s point of view was that of Kai Ko’s mischievous character, Ko Ching-teng.
But both movies revolve around young love set in a high school, feature an appealing fresh-faced cast, and found favour at the box office.
Our Times is the highest-grossing Taiwanese film on home ground thus far this year, with takings of NT$400million (S$17.1 million).
So what if Our Times does not reinvent the wheel? Sometimes, you just need to execute well what is tried-and-tested.
Indeed, Our Times is very much aware that it is tapping into an evergreen set-up. The characters are introduced as the dreamboat every school has, the bad boy that is always present and the school belle every boy dreams of dating.
As for the lead character, at 18, Truly is awkward and clumsy, but not to worry, she gets to have her makeover moment. Sung
(Cafe. Waiting. Love, 2014) makes her real and likeable, from her Andy Lau crush to her innate decency as a person.
Just as You Are The Apple Of My Eye turned Ko into a star, Our Times is model-actor Wang’s moment. He gets to be the tall and handsome (as described by Truly when cornered) bad boy whose defiant antics hide a painful past.
What starts out as a reluctant association between Truly and Hsu turns into a deeper friendship and their feelings are tested when they have to cheer each other on for someone else. Well, the device worked in Some Kind Of Wonderful (1987) and it still works here as the characters find themselves tongue-tied in the face of their true feelings.
The film stumbles a little at the end, though, with a distracting high-profile cameo and different actors playing the grown-up characters, as it takes viewers out of a carefully constructed world that is funny, charming and moving in its exploration of first love, heartache and friendship.
(ST)

Papa I Want To Be A Star
WonFu
It is impossible to listen to Taiwanese band WonFu without a smile playing on your lips. Always full of sunshine and good cheer, their songs are just the ticket for these hazy times.
“If you dare to sing out loud, someone will listen/Use my voice to bring joy to people’s hearts,” they sing on the retro dance pop of the Minnan title track.
On I’m Shameless, they get a little cheeky, though it never gets more heated than PG territory: “The sunshine of summer makes you want to strip naked/A beer in one hand, an ice cream in the other.”
Since their last album WONderFU in 2013, there have been major life changes among the band’s members. Lead vocalist Hsiao Min and bassist Twiggy got hitched and are now the proud parents of a baby daughter.
The lullaby Cuckoo is dedicated to the little one, as Hsiao Min coos to her: “Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t wrinkle your skin/Cradle you in my arms and rock you gently.”
The arrival of a baby seems to have triggered greater introspection as well.
After the band coast through surf rock, bossa nova and funk, On And On finds them in a contemplative mid-tempo mood. Life is a giant central station and there are comings and goings, missed stops and slow trains. Through it all, “family always gives me strength” and it ends the album on a heartwarming note.
(ST)

Why? Art
Yen-j
Less than two months after the release of his fifth album Thanks Giving, Taiwanese singer-songwriter Yen-j released his sixth, Why? Art.
Despite the worryingly short time between the two, the new work is no slapdash effort.
It is touted as the more experimental counterpart to the more mainstream Thanks Giving, but to fans of his first album, it is the follow-up they have been waiting for.
Kaohsiung-born, Los Angeles-bred Yen-j burst onto the scene at 22 with the fresh sounds of Thank You For Your Greatness in 2010, pulling off the rare feat of sounding different from the rest of the Mandopop scene.
He made Mandojazzpop sound like the most natural idea in the music book and even sampled the jazz standard Take The A Train on the playful Love Is Curry.
But, on subsequent albums, he moved towards the middle of the road with more radio-friendly offerings such as Good Things and Good Lover.
With Why? Art, he is once again invigorated and inspired as he draws on jazz, electronica and pop.
He samples the legendary Miles Davis’ recording of On Green Dolphin Street on the synthpop-rap track On Idealism Street.
Yen-j professes: “On idealism street/I don’t need a gold watch/Or jewellery/I don’t care for these/I only want some time to write/Music that’s never been done.”
It seems as close an admission as any that in the real world, he has to write music for a living as well. And he has had to put his ambitions on hold.
Finally, he gets to unleash his thoughts here.
There is anger on the scathing electro track Contemporary Art, he raps: “This is contemporary art, contemporary art/Nudity can be artistic/What about the music, man?”
His inventiveness is in full play on opener Ashtray with its use of repetition, rhymes and puns, echoing in vibe Thanks Giving’s humorous opening number Coin-Eating Tiger.
The lyrics are decidedly personal.
Whirlpool finds him in a confessional mood: “I work hard to improve/Occasionally I’ll backslide/Take it as a beautiful mistake.”
On Warrior, he reveals what motivates him: “This city/Doesn’t need to remember my name/Glory comes from accomplishing the impossible.”
On the languorously beguiling Traveller, he croons: “I linger before each beautiful landscape/Many unknown dreams await there.”
Over the course of a bracing and wonderfully varied album, Yen-j shows his listeners all manner of scenery and all of it is lovely.

Happy Or Not
Wang Dawen
On his 2013 debut Mandarin album, American-born Taiwanese singer- songwriter Wang Dawen introduced himself with a cheery Hello.
Now, he wants to share his heart with listeners. “Happy or sad, the bitter experiences in life/I want to share them with you without reserve,” he sings on the opening track, You Already Know My Heart.
He gets emotional on Writer’s Block and laments over the gently despondent-sounding plucking of strings: “Wrapped in the scarf you gave to me/In the living room strumming the ukulele.”
However, the high-spirited Wang is still around on Cram School Sucks, which blows off studies in a light-hearted manner; Roller Coaster, a sweet ride through the first blush of romance; and Turbulence, which twirls over the bumpy patches of a relationship.
On this more varied and well-rounded album, Wang proves a talented enough songwriter to sprinkle little surprises in his compositions to keep you listening.
Lyrically, he has improved as well from the more straightforward offerings on his debut.
So, yes, this is a follow-up to be happy with.
(ST)

Hero 2015
Masayuki Suzuki
The story: A socialite is killed in a car accident in an alley behind the Neustria embassy in Japan. Prosecutor Kohei Kuryu (Takuya Kimura) and his paralegal Chika Asagi (Keiko Kitagawa) are assigned to the seemingly straightforward case, but are hampered by the regulations of diplomatic immunity and extraterritoriality. The death also attracts the attention of Maiko Amamiya (Takako Matsu), Kuryu’s former assistant and now a prosecutor in another district.

Hero 2015 is best enjoyed by those who are at least somewhat familiar with the other versions of this popular Japanese title.
It started as a highly rated television series in 2001, spawned a two-hour special in 2006, a film in 2007 and a second season last year. All of them star Kimura, who has managed to remain atop the Japanese entertainment industry since the mid-1990s, both as a member of the idol group Smap and as an actor.
Kuryu is someone who is extremely dogged in his pursuit of the truth and does not always play by the book.
Of course, this being a work of fiction, he dresses like a movie star, with stylish locks and an orange down jacket. It was also established in the first series that he was particularly susceptible to infomercials.
Little details such as these make their way into the movie, essentially for the fans.
The most important thing for fans, though, is without a doubt the reappearance of Amamiya.
Is there something more to the relationship between him and Amamiya? How much more? Complicating things is the presence of his new assistant, Asagi, who first appeared in the second series.
Kimura and Matsu undoubtedly have chemistry and were previously paired up in the classic romantic drama, Love Generation (1997).
Together, they generate sparks as well as laughs. The awkward conversation that results when they meet up for drinks with all their former colleagues is a hoot.
A pity then that the case itself is rather disappointing, especially considering that scriptwriter Yasuhi Fukuda was also responsible for the excellent murder mystery Suspect X (2008).
Mostly, the involvement of a fictitious foreign country is an opportunity for director Masayuki Suzuki (Hero, 2001) to make some blandly positive point about how even seemingly different cultures share common ground.
Regardless, the fans turned out for the film and made it No. 1 at the Japanese box office in its first two weekends in July. Which means that Kimura might not be hanging up his orange jacket just yet.
(ST)

Taiwanese auteur Hou Hsiao-hsien is the man to beat at this year’s Golden Horse Awards. His period wuxia drama, The Assassin, has earned the most nominations – 11. They include nods for Best Feature Film, Best Director and Best Leading Actress for Shu Qi in the title role. He was earlier named Best Director for the film at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival in May.
Hou, known for his realist and minimalist style, is also receiving the Outstanding Taiwanese Filmmaker of the Year accolade and his body of work includes the following feted titles.

A TIME TO LIVE, A TIME TO DIE (1985)
This was inspired by Hou’s own coming-of-age story and is part of a trilogy that includes A Summer At Grandpa’s (1984) and Dust In The Wind (1986). It is set during the years 1947 to 1965, spanning the protagonist’s childhood and college entrance exam, and the use of Hakka and Minnan in the movie was unusual. The film won several international awards, including the FIPRESCI Prize at the 1986 Berlin International Film Festival.

A CITY OF SADNESS (1989)
Widely regarded as Hou’s masterpiece, this historical drama starring Tony Leung Chiu Wai as a deaf-mute was the first Taiwanese film to win the prestigious Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. It was an act of courage to deal with the ruling Kuomintang government’s tyranny post-1945 and it was the first film to depict the anti-government uprising that was the 228 Incident of 1947.

THREE TIMES (2005)
Prior to the Assassin, Taiwanese actress Shu Qi had worked with Hou on Millennium Mambo (2001) and on Three Times. In Mambo, she plays Vicky, a bar hostess torn between two men. Here, Shu and actor Chang Chen, who is also in The Assassin, appear in three chronologically separate love stories. Three Times won for Best Taiwanese Film of the Year, Best Taiwanese Filmmaker and Best Actress at the Golden Horse Awards.
(ST)

Everything
Men Envy Children
They were not jesting when they named their album Everything.
Over a foundation of melodic melancholic pop, Men Envy Children throw in a little bit of rock and a little bit of rap.
This record marks the debut of a quartet which feature female vocalist Mify, previously of girl group Roomie, with Vince and Hanz on guitars and Kai on drums and they are clearly keen to show what they are capable of.
Happily, they also tackle more than the perennial subject of love in their lyrics.
One of the stronger tracks is My Dear Baby, a mid-tempo number lamenting the “dangerous, invasive, shattered” world a child has been born into.
When they do address love, the sultry This Is Not The Love I’m Looking For is a good way to go. It showcases Mify’s emotive pipes as she expresses longing, helplessness and regret over the course of this emotional roller- coaster ride.
On the closing track Goodbye, she sings: “This is not the end/But the start of the next destiny.”
For a new band, the best thing would be getting to release a next album. It is a prize that Men Envy Children have earned.
(ST)

Pawn Sacrifice
Edward Zwick
The story: Bobby Fischer (Tobey Maguire) is the great American hope of chess at a time when the Cold War with the Soviet Union is in full freeze. The prodigy faces off against reigning world champion Boris Spassky (Liev Schreiber) in Iceland in 1972, a heavily hyped match with high personal and political stakes. Can Fischer keep his increasingly eccentric behaviour in check, or will chess consume him?

The cerebral game of chess had its rock star in the 1960s and early 1970s – the firebrand grandmaster Bobby Fischer.
He was a prodigy from Brooklyn who loved mouthing off brash pronouncements which made for great headlines. Like a selfabsorbed rocker, he would also make all kinds of outrageous demands before he would play – even the purr of a recording camera was deemed to be too loud and distracting.
Maguire, who co-produced the film, is a compelling presence as the electrifying chess genius who could not wait to be No. 1 and then became increasingly psychologically fragile as that possibility drew nearer.
The tragedy was that Fischer ultimately crashed and burnt. The interesting thing is that director Edward Zwick (Blood Diamond, 2006) and scriptwriter Steven Knight (Eastern Promises, 2007) suggest chess is both his downfall and his salvation.
As a child of a Russian emigrant mother and an absent father, chess gave him focus, purpose and a sense of control.
When Fischer gets frustrated, his chess companion and perhaps lone friend, priest William Lombardy (a grounded Peter Sarsgaard), calms him down by rattling off chess moves.
At the same time, Lombardy also recognises that “the game is a rabbit hole that takes you very close to the edge”.
When the game becomes inextricably bound with Cold War politics, the rabbit hole opens up.
Fischer listens to rants on conspiracy theories and comes to believe that he is being bugged. In fairness, his Soviet opponent Spassky has similar suspicions.
Zwick captures that fraught era, whose climate encouraged paranoia, through the drama surrounding the games.
He also makes the historic matches come to life, such that even non-players will appreciate the gripping excitement and intellectual rigour to be found in the battle of wits that is chess.
(ST)

Lost In Hong Kong
Xu Zheng
The story: Xu Lai (Xu Zheng) never managed to kiss his college love Yang Yi (Du Juan). Years later, he marries another fellow student Cai Bo (Vicki Zhao Wei). Yang Yi, now a successful artist, invites him to her show in Hong Kong. He is determined to go, but first, he has to shake off Cai Bo’s wannabe film-maker brother Lala (Bao Bei’er), who is equally determined to make a documentary about Xu Lai.

China’s Xu Zheng saw his popularity rocket after the hit comedy Lost On Journey (2010). The follow-up, Lost In Thailand (2012), on which Xu took on directing duties for the first time, was an even bigger hit.
This latest instalment of the Lost series is on its way to blockbuster status as well, with an opening day of 208 million yuan (S$46.6 million).
It is a love letter to Hong Kong pop culture, from its movies to its music. The prolific crowd-pleasing director Wong Jing spoofs himself in a guest role and the script is littered with references to movies such as Days Of Being Wild (1990), Chungking Express (1994) and 2046 (2004).
Apart from letting audiences play spot-the-Wong-Kar-Wai-reference, the movie also puts viewers in the mood for Cantopop with a soundtrack which includes poignant Leslie Cheung ballads as well as Grasshopper’s up-tempo Passionate Samba.
The Hong Kong urban landscape gets a shout-out in a fun scene: Xu Lai and Lala raise a ruckus in a brothel and then get chased through a quintessentially Hong Kong apartment block where varied denizens live together cheek by jowl.
The madcap humour can be a bit hit-or-miss and Lala is mostly an annoying unwanted sidekick. But Xu has viewers rooting for him as the hapless and luckless Xu Lai – a bra designer despite his youthful artistic leanings and now the butt of jokes in his wife’s family.
Drama is mixed with comedy in the finale which presents a classic conundrum: Between your wife and your first love, who would you choose? The dilemma is played out on a huge pane of glass suspended high above ground and emotions run high as Xu, Cai and Yang try to maintain a precarious balance.
And how did they end up in such a situation in the first place? Well, there was a homicide which Lala had accidentally caught on tape while making his documentary and there are bad guys after that footage.
This might be a China movie, but it has the anything-goes energy of a Hong Kong flick.
(ST)

Li Jian 6th Album
Li Jian
Chinese singer-songwriter Li Jian continues to breathe life into lyrical mid-tempo tracks with his exquisite pipes, picking up where he left off with his breakout fifth album, Classic, which earned a clutch of nominations at last year’s Golden Melody Awards, including for Best Mandarin Album.
Many of the songs evoke the natural world such as Deep Sea Search, Beautiful As Dawn and Wind Blows At Dusk. The imagery is apt given that one can easily imagine his voice in such settings.
It can be as gentle as a sunbeam, as bright as a sparkling sea or it can take flight on a gust of wind. He croons on Disappearing Moonlight: “When I welcome the fragrance the spring wind brings/How I wish you could linger by my side.”
There are darker undercurrents as well. On Fog, he sings: “Your place is like the ocean/ Some struggle and sink to the bottom, never heard of again.”
That is a fate that seems unlikely to befall Li. He is touring China and maybe the wind will blow him to Singapore’s shores someday soon.
(ST)

Attack On Titan 2: End Of The World
Shinji Higuchi
The story: In part one, mankind’s last walled stronghold is breached by the mysterious, gigantic Titans who feed on humans. The home of Eren (Haruma Miura) and Armin (Kanata Hongo) is destroyed and their friend Mikasa (Kiko Mizuhara) is gone. Two years later, Eren and Armin join a mission to repair the hole in the wall. They meet the suave Captain Shikishima (Hiroki Hasegawa) and a changed Mikasa. They are able to take down Titans with ease by aiming for the back of the neck. At a critical juncture in a battle with the Titans, Eren is swallowed by one and transformed into a Titan himself. Part two picks up with Eren back in human form, bound and under interrogation. It also delivers some answers to key questions: Can the mission to plug the hole in the wall succeed? Where did the Titans come from? Why is Eren special? Based on the manga of the same name by Hajime Isayama.

Writer-illustrator Hajime Isayama’s vision in the epic manga Attack On Titan, which has been going strong since it started in 2009, is a dark and gruesome one. The live adaptation does not flinch in its depiction of this post- apocalyptic world.
What makes the Titans particularly horrifying is the fact that they are grotesquely human-like. Except that they lumber with the gait of the undead, grin maniacally, have no sexual organs and snack on people.
In a harrowing scene in part one, Eren struggles to save Armin from the cavernous mouth of a Titan, with its monstrous teeth and throbbing tongue, and ends up sliding down the gullet to its stomach.
The computer graphics are top-notch, conveying the dreadfulness of the creatures as well as the devastated landscape of this bleak world. Director Shinji Higuchi, a veteran special-effects supervisor who has also helmed films such as The Sinking Of Japan (2006), is clearly comfortable with working on a project of this scale.
Part 1 has been pilloried by fans for deviating from the source material. Nevertheless, it topped the box office in Japan when it opened on Aug 1. In Singapore, it has earned more than $820,000, becoming one of the biggest Japanese-language titles in recent years.
Often, a follow-up movie suffers from a lack of surprise as the direction it is headed is already signposted in the earlier instalment.
Impressively, Titan’s Part 2 still has some intriguing cards up its sleeve. The audience learns the grim truth behind the origins of the Titans and see Captain Shikishima turn unexpectedly from smooth saviour to seductive rebel. Even the mission to repair the wall is called into question, and Eren and his friends are forced to make some difficult decisions about whom to trust and what to do.
While it is titled End Of The World, the sinister final scene suggests that this might not be the end of the Attack On Titan films.
(ST)

Office
Johnnie To
The story: The idealistic Li Xiang (Wang Ziyi) and woman of mystery Qiqi (Lang Yueting) join a major company, Jones & Sunn, as it prepares to go public. The office is a place of conflicting interests and complicated relationships and the key players include dragon lady chief executive officer Zhang Wei (Sylvia Chang), smooth-talking executive David (Eason Chan) and dedicated worker Sophie (Tang Wei). Meanwhile, chairman He Zhongping (Chow Yun Fat) keeps a watchful eye in the background. The script was adapted by Chang from the 2009 stage play Design For Living, which she co-wrote.

The Intern
Nancy Meyers
The story: Jules (Anne Hathaway) is the founder and chief executive officer of fashion e-retailer About The Fit. The go-getter is coping with a rapidly growing company and juggling that with a husband and young daughter at home. She finds unexpected help from old-timer Ben (Robert De Niro), who is part of an inaugural senior internship programme.

A workplace musical is certainly something you do not see every day.
And kudos to versatile director Johnnie To and writer-actress Sylvia Chang for delivering a far from workmanlike Office.
Chang has streamlined the story from the original play, made some choice changes to the relationships among the characters and done away with the overly melodramatic ending. Li Xiang is still the obviously named neophyte – his moniker means “ideals” – and he is the audience’s entry into this world of complex interests.
As he seeks to survive in this competitive battlefield, will he eventually be corrupted as well? Will he follow in the footsteps of the older, disillusioned David?
David is a cautionary tale of reckless ambition and singer Eason Chan conveys both his slick charm and increasing desperation. When he makes use of Sophie to cover up for him, the tragedy is that he does so despite feeling something for her.
Perhaps Li will triumph at the workplace as Zhang Wei appears to have done by weighing every calculated move carefully. But she has paid a high price by putting her career ahead of everything else and the character portrayed by Chang is by turns steely and vulnerable.
Or maybe Li is merely a pawn who will ultimately be destroyed.
It is a bleak portrait that is leavened by the big song and dance numbers written by veterans such as singer-songwriter Lo Ta-yu and master lyricist Lin Xi.
The film is also visually appealing as the sets have been inspired by the theatrical origins of the production and one can well imagine the skeletal outlines of the office building and the commuter train being used on stage.
The Intern is also a movie set in the workplace, but it takes a completely different approach.
It sounds at first like a high- concept flick that is strictly for laughs: Robert De Niro, better known for his tough-guy persona, plays a senior citizen intern. Thankfully, it is more substantive than the similarly named The Internship (2013), in which Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson clowned about at Google.
But while it surfaces, among other things, the challenges women face at the workplace, writer- director Nancy Meyers handles everything with such a light touch that the drama ultimately feels more like a fantasy.
So it is up to the likeable cast to draw viewers into the film.
For once, De Niro has zero edge to him. Even in comedies such as Meet The Parents (2000), he played characters with a sense of menace. Here, he is all cuddly like a teddy bear you want to squeeze. He is the perfect senior citizen intern – has a wealth of experience, is good with people, can be always be counted on and has absolutely no problems with much younger people in authority. Every office should have one.
Anne Hathaway – how time flies – has gone from playing the newbie in The Devil Wears Prada (2006) to sitting on the other side of the table as the boss.
She is wrestling with guilt over juggling work and home, and wondering if she can have it all.
Too bad the resolution is so pat and tidy.
For all its stagey artificiality, Office is a far more gripping, if deeply cynical, portrayal of corporate life. And it works.
(ST)

Cat And Mouse
By2
At the age of 23, Singaporean pop duo By2 are already music veterans.
Twins Miko and Yumi released their debut, 16 Underaged (2008), when they were, surprise, all of 16.
Cat And Mouse, their sixth album, does not mess much with the formula of dance tracks mixed with love ballads.
The good thing is that the icky jail-bait factor is now far behind them when one listens to something like the title track, an invitation to “play some cat and mouse”.
But do not think that they are ones to be toyed with. Instead, they purr: “I’m a wild kitty, the pick of the litter/I’m a wild kitty, keep your eyes on me.”
If You Love Me Say It Out Loud keeps the groove going and these dance tracks throb with energy and a sense of purpose.
Too bad the balance tilts towards the ballads here. These are less successful in part because the duo are not strong enough singers.
The light-hearted album closer How Do I Make Clear My Feelings Now suggests a different direction for the duo to try.
All they have to do is dial down the cutesy enunciation.
(ST)

Visions
Kevin Greutert
The story: After a traumatic car accident, Eveleigh (Isla Fisher) moves to wine country with her husband David (Anson Mount) for a fresh start. She starts hearing voices and seeing visions, but her husband brushes them off and wants her back on anti-depressants. Her only friend seems to be Sadie (Gillian Jacobs) from antenatal class.

The playbook for Blumhouse Productions, home of small-budget horror hits such as Insidious (2010) and The Purge (2013), is still going strong.
First, line up a cast of recognisable but not especially huge stars, many of them from television in this case.
There is Isla Fisher from Confessions Of A Shopaholic (2009), Gillian Jacobs from comedy Community (2009 to 2015), Anson Mount from period drama Hell On Wheels (2011 to present) and Jim Parsons from comedy The Big Bang Theory (2007 to 2015) as a somewhat creepy gynaecologist.
You get credible acting chops without breaking the bank in terms of the production budget.
The same goes for the director. Kevin Greutert is well-versed in the genre as he edited the first five films of the successful horror franchise Saw (2004 to 2008) and later directed Saw VI (2009) and Saw 3D: The Final Chapter (2010).
Next, work with a strong concept. Think of writer-director Oren Peli and the idea of the supernatural caught on surveillance in Paranormal Activity (2007) and writer-director James DeMonaco on legalising all crime for 12 hours in The Purge(both of which have gone on to become profitable franchises).
Similar to The Gift (2015), also from Blumhouse, Visions plays with the tropes and conventions of the horror genre, such as the mysterious whistling kettle sound, a hooded figure whose face cannot be seen and an eerie pool of water in the dead of night.
A nice twist at the end recasts everything that has gone on before in a different light.
It is not quite as gripping as The Gift, but Visions is still worth watching. Sometimes, it pays to play by the book.
(ST)

Sicario
Denis Villeneuve
The story: Kate (Emily Blunt) is an FBI agent conducting raids on suspicious American properties near the Mexican border. She agrees to be part of a joint task force to track down a big-time drug lord, believing she can help to accomplish something meaningful by doing so. But she keeps getting stonewalled by her superior Matt (Josh Brolin) and she is uneasy about the presence of the taciturn Alejandro (Benicio del Toro) on the team. The word sicario means hitman in Mexico.

French-Canadian director Denis Villeneuve has a knack for making emotionally wrenching and riveting films.
Incendies (2010), in French and Arabic, was a mystery drama about a pair of siblings travelling to the Middle East and uncovering devastating family secrets.
Prisoners (2010), his English language debut, was an arresting thriller that kept viewers on the edge of their seats over the fate of two abducted little girls.
This time, it is the action that is explosive.
Sicario plunges right into the middle of a raid mission which ends up literally blowing up in the faces of the team.
Villeneuve then executes the extraction of a man close to the drug lord from Juarez, Mexico, back to American soil with terse precision. There are glimpses of dead bodies strung up on the underside of bridges, Mexican forces are seen in full riot-gear get-up and the staccato of gunfire can be heard. This is an urban war zone.
In contrast to the intensity of the action, Blunt’s Kate is a no-nonsense agent who keeps her emotions in check. She is also the moral compass of the scene and, as the film wades into a morass of complications, viewers look to her for direction.
Blunt’s (Edge Of Tomorrow, 2014) mix of naivete and desire to do the right thing is compelling and Brolin (No Country For Old Men, 2007) is suitably condescending as someone who knows far more than he is willing to let on.
Del Toro’s (Traffic, 2000) Alejandro is the intriguing wild card here.
Early on, he says ominously to Kate: “Nothing will make sense to your American ears. You will doubt what we do. But, in the end, it will make sense.”
Some pieces of the puzzle do come together eventually, but be warned, there is no light at the end of this particular tunnel of darkness.
(ST)

It sometimes feels as though Japanese pop culture is under siege. Be it music, TV dramas or movies, the Korean contingent of boybands, girl groups and perfectly groomed idols has edged ahead in the popularity sweepstakes.
Japanese fare is not about to roll over completely, though. When it comes to animation, the Land of the Rising Sun is still going strong.
I went through an anime phase in the early 2000s and then drifted away from it. After a recent return to its embrace, I am happy to report that the world of anime remains as wacky, moving and entertaining as before.
Titles that I watched back then included the inventive space western Cowboy Bebop (1998-1999) with its awesome jazz soundtrack, the battle for one man’s soul in the period actioner Rurouni Kenshin (1996-1998), the hilarious high-school comedy Azumanga Daioh (2002) and the sometimes head-scratching and
so-cool-it-didn’t-need-vowels sci-fi action series FLCL (2000-2001).
Studio Ghibli has international hits such as the fantasy adventure Spirited Away (2001) and the whimsically charming My Neighbour Totoro (1988), but there is much more to discover in anime films. The tip of the iceberg includes sci-fi techno-thriller Ghost In The Shell (1995) by Mamoru Oshii and the psychological thriller-horror flick Perfect Blue (1997) by Satoshi Kon, works which are far darker in tone than Ghibli’s family-friendly works.
My diet included the popular ninja series Naruto (2002-2007), although the supersized serving of 220 episodes proved to be too much to swallow. A single fight could stretch to more than 10 episodes and I gave up somewhere past the 100-episode mark.
For a long while after that, I lost touch with the medium.
But thanks to a long-haul flight on Japan Airlines, I rediscovered the myriad joys of anime.
I stumbled across a two-episode offering of Haikyu!!, Japanese for volleyball, and was soon hooked. Even without English subtitles, the show draws one in with its crisp animation, exciting ballplay and sharp characterisation.
Haikyu!! is a typical offering in the sports genre, but it is executed well. It has you rooting for the underdogs as pint-sized Hinata and his team aimed for glory on the courts. And when the ball finally lands with a thud in a crucial game that spans six episodes, I gasped out loud.
One reason for the high quality in anime is the large volume of titles produced. Just this spring alone, the gaming and anime blog Kotaku presented a guide to 50 new titles.
Mind you, that is merely for one season and not for the year. Animators have had tens of thousands of hours of content to hone their skills and it shows.
Very often, they draw on existing manga. Given there are at least 10,000 titles of manga compilations published in a year (as estimated by manga artist Dan Kanemitsu in a 2012 blog post), only the top titles get to be animated. The quality of the source material already gives anime a leg-up.
Live-action films based on manga continue to find big audiences. Post-apocalyptic title Attack On Titan (2015) has grossed more than $820,000 at the Singapore box office.
After the excitement of Haikyu!!, I decided to get into anime again, trawling the Web for recommendations on the best titles of last year. I settled on sports title Ping Pong The Animation, slice-of-life series Barakamon about a calligrapher, and set-in-hell comedy Hozuki’s Coolheadedness.
While Ping Pong and Haikyu!! both revolve around sports, they could not be more different. For starters, the animation in Ping Pong goes for a kind of ugly-realist style reminiscent of the rotoscoping done for the film Waking Life (2001). It also delves far more deeply into the psyches of the players. The ping pong games are depicted in an impressionistic manner as opposed to being the meat of the series.
Barakamon is in the slice-of-life genre and it offers gentle comedy and lessons in the tale of a calligrapher’s exile to a remote island – 23-year-old Handa’s friendship with the irrepressible six-year-old Naru is the heart and soul of this show.
Most unusual of the lot is Hozuki’s Coolheadedness, an episodic look at the challenges faced by the unflappable Hozuki, chief of staff to the head judge of hell. The landscapes of the netherworld are beautifully rendered and draw inspiration from ukiyo-e woodblock print illustrations. The gleeful theme song can also lay claim to the title of catchiest song ever written about hell. (Hell by the American band Squirrel Nut Zippers is a close second.)
There has always been more to anime than advertised-as- entertainment-kiddy fare such as Pokemon. There are shows of every genre, from the sublime to the ridiculous, to cater to every taste.
One title I will be steering clear of, though, is Naruto: Shippuden. It started in 2007 and has clocked 429 episodes. And it is not over yet.
(ST)

Jimmy Ye In Concert
Esplanade Concert Hall/
Last Saturday

Home-grown singer-songwriter Jimmy Ye was sweating bullets because of the General Election.
While the date of his gig had been fixed a year ago, he was left hanging for the longest time when there were rumours of Singapore heading to the polls with Sept 12 bandied about as the date.
“If today had been Polling Day...”, and he sprawled onto the stage to convey exactly how crushed he would have felt. He had, after all, waited 22 years for the chance to hold his own solo concert.
Ye made his debut as a Mandopop singer with Give Me Your Love in 1993 and released four more albums between then and 1998.
He chalked up hits such as Loving You Is Not For Others To See and My Heart Is Flustered and was a male idol singer to call Singapore’s own before the likes of JJ Lin and A-do came along.
Making his appearance as a bow-tied and bespectacled dapper gentleman in a grey three-piece suit, he said to the audience: “It’s been 17 years and you haven’t forgotten me and my music. I’m moved and grateful.”
The show opened with If We Fall In Love Again and Ye did a jazzy take on the ballad.
Despite the passage of years, he displayed a strong grasp of vocal techniques from vibrato to falsetto and he sounded as good as ever.
While there were some jitters, he smoothed things over with a dash of self-deprecating humour and some entertaining anecdotes.
Professing to be terrible in Mandarin and hence forgetful of lyrics, he announced that instead of sneaking peeks at the monitor, he would simply look at it openly.
While the election schedule had been a source of anxiety, the event also provided fodder for some interesting moments.
As it turned out, Ye has a song called Let You Decide which includes the line, “Let you decide/ Whether I’m free or enslaved”, and he dedicated it to the day of national reckoning.
The next number, I Keep Hearing You Say, was dedicated to the new government. He also joked about forming a new party with a less violent symbol – a music note as opposed to a bolt of lightning or a hammer.
While he had stopped releasing albums after 1998, arguably, he went on to scale greater heights as a composer.
A segment focusing on the hits he wrote for others included Jacky Cheung’s Wanna Go For A Walk With You, Jeff Chang’s Want To Love You Too Much, Jolin Tsai’s I Know You’re Very Sad and Leslie Cheung’s Left Right Hands, which Ye sang in its original Cantonese.
These are no less than the big guns of Chinese pop and his songs were their lead singles and no mere album fillers. Cheung once included that song in his setlist at the last minute when he realised its composer was at his concert.
Aside from his work in pop music, Ye also collaborated with xinyao pioneer Liang Wern Fook on the Mandarin musical December Rains.
The third run of it just ended recently, but the audience had a chance to revisit some of its songs when Liang and singer Hong Shaoxuan came on as guest stars.
The four-hour-long concert also saw Ye paying tribute to some of his favourite songwriters.
He took on John Legend’s All Of Me and Billy Joel’s And So It Goes as he tinkled the ivories, further showcasing his versatility as a musician.
He even wrote a new song, How Are You, including the Mandarin lyrics, specially for his fans.
From the standing ovation at the end, it was clear that Ye’s Music Party was a winner.
(ST)

10000 Hours
Cosmos People
What is 10,000 hours? Mathematically, it is just shy of 417 days – a little more than a year.
As the title of Taiwanese trio Cosmos People’s album, it suggests a contemplation on the passage of time, an intrinsic part of the cycle of life. On the title track, lead vocalist Hsiao Yu wonders: “How much time does it take for flat ground to form a mountain/How much time does it take for the coast to build a sandy beach.”
The idea of measurement is then extended to the emotional realm: “How does a love song measure the romance of when we first met.”
Elsewhere, the band wrestle with questions of identity and emotional apathy.
Against an upbeat, rousing tune, they sing of becoming numb on Rudderless: “I don’t feel anything towards wonderful things/When my heart is in pain, it’s hard to bear, the higher the expectations the greater the fall.”
The sentiments are sometimes dire, but the music remains engaging, from the whistling at the start of And You? to the brassy accents of Offline Friends; from the disco-tinged 15 Seconds Of Fame to the spare Minnan ballad Rainy Day.
Four albums on, Cosmos People are no longer playing dress-up as spacemen or detectives, even as they continue to play around with musical genres. This is the sound of a band growing up.
(ST)

JJ Lin Timeline: Genesis World Tour
Singapore Indoor Stadium / Last Saturday
Family was the theme of singer- songwriter JJ Lin’s homecoming concert here.
The Taipei-based Mandopop star shared a sweet moment on stage with his mother during the encore as they sang Japanese Rose In My Palm. He did not neglect the other members of his family, who were surprised by an invitation to go on stage as well.
He sang Jonathan Lee’s poignant Hills with his father and performed with his elder brother Eugene, Fly Back In Time, a track recorded for the album Stories Untold (2013).
The Lin siblings had performed together at JJ’s last concert here in 2013 but this time round, even his parents were roped in.
“Don’t blame me for being partial on my Singapore stop,” he said to the sold-out crowd of 8,000 fans.
Another treat he had in store was inviting actor Chen Tianwen as his mystery guest star. And the song they sang? The cheesy viral hit Unbelievable, of course, complete with Chen holding a head of broccoli as he serenaded the audience.
There was an SG50 moment when Lin sang the Dick Lee-composed Our Singapore, the English theme song of this year’s National Day celebrations.
Being on home ground was an emotional experience for him. Thanking his fans for their support since his debut album Music Voyager (2003), he embraced them as family as well. Some female fans repeatedly yelled out “lao gong” (hubby) throughout the night. His mother quipped after her number: “Daughters-in-law, how’s that?”
Lin also broached the topic of marriage. He said: “When I see my friends getting married and having children, I wonder when it’ll be my turn.”
In one of the concert’s most touching moments, just before he performed the ballad Someday, about his grandparents, he said: “I believe grandma is here as well.” His grandmother had died from liver cancer in the midst of his concerts in Taipei last July.
She would have been proud of his show. This was the 37th stop of his current world tour and the concert was like a well-oiled machine.
The movable concentric circles of rigging provided effective lighting and were part of the dramatic staging. The T-shaped stage extended into the audience and the fans around it got to see their idol up close.
Lin was in fine form vocally and musically over the three-hour-long gig. He played the keyboard, guitar, drums and beatboxed and crooned his crowd-pleasing hits and rocked out to the faster-paced numbers.
Listening to Genesis, the title track of his latest album, it is clear that he still has ambitions as a songwriter and singer. He mixes R&B and dubstep with aplomb and throws in rap and soaring falsetto to winning effect.
Whichever direction he takes on his next album, there will be 8,000 fans cheering him on. After all, that is what family does.
(ST)

Thanks Giving
Yen-j
With its fresh jazz-pop sound, Taiwanese singer-songwriter Yen-j’s (right) 2010 debut Thank You For Your Greatness is still my favourite among his albums, which subsequently drifted towards the middle of the road – less jazz and more pop.
Thankfully, there are sparks of that original playful inventiveness once more on his fifth album Thanks Giving.
The piano-backed Nothing Is Impossible would not sound out of place on Greatness.
A child-like sense of joy and wonder suffuses the opening track Coin-Eating Tiger (co-written with a mysterious Assistant A), which deftly uses humorous imagery about a coin-eating tiger machine (a phrase which refers to a slot machine) and the repetition of the lines “So love is like fireworks” and “So dreams are like planes”.
Also making an impression is his buoyant duet Lightly with Taiwan- born, California-bred newcomer Peace, whose lightly husky vocals remind me of Kimberley Chen. She is definitely one to look out for.
I am less enamoured of his other love songs though. Tracks such as You Are My Everything suggest that he is a stronger writer than he is a singer, while Tacit Understanding flirts with being cutesy.
Still, it is nice to see him reaching for “something real” as he spells out on the track Something, even if it can sometimes be “Something empty/Something lost inside of me”.
And there is nothing middling about that at all.
(ST)

Fear The Walking Dead
This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper.
Poet T. S. Eliot called it back in 1925 in his poem The Hollow Men.
In the hit horror drama The Walking Dead (2010-present), the zombie apocalypse is in full swing from the get-go. The threat of the decomposing undead is everywhere and human survival is a touch-and-go business.
The companion series Fear The Walking Dead takes us back to when things are starting to fall apart. At this point in time, the term “walker” refers to a baby’s best friend as he is learning to walk and not to a dreaded monster.
There is barely a whisper of what is happening and the ones who have the earliest inkling of the truth are those on the fringe – a drug addict, a misfit at school.
But they are all on the cusp of a world that is about to change irrevocably. And we are right at the precipice with them.
The makers of Fear ratchet up the tension slowly and also play with the expectations of viewers, many of whom are likely to be well-versed with the rules of a zombie universe. Enough of them tuned in to make the show the No. 1 series premiere in American cable TV history with a viewership of 10.1 million.
In hindsight, things seem thuddingly obvious. But as they are unfolding, there is resistance, disbelief and reasonable doubt.
After all, which is the more likely: a world-ending infection or a particularly virulent strain of the flu?
Are cops shooting an unarmed person that unbelievable or would it be more unbelievable that they are mowing down creatures that will not stay dead?
Against this backdrop, the key characters are also dealing with complicated family stuff.
High school guidance counsellor Madison Clark (Kim Dickens) has a junkie son Nick (Frank Dillane) and a resentful daughter Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey).
Madison’s boyfriend is fellow teacher Travis Manawa (Cliff Curtis), who is trying to be a father to his son Christopher (Lorenzo James Henrie) with his ex-wife Liza (Elizabeth Rodriguez).
In the second episode, we are introduced to the Salazar family. The father (Ruben Blades) is a refugee from El Salvador who owns a barbershop, the mother (Patricia Reyes Spindola) is deeply religious and they have a grown daughter Ofelia (Mercedes Mason).
Their paths cross with Travis, Christopher and Liza as the city begins to crumble.
Expect relationships to be tested as the apocalypse brews and the interplay of emotional and end-of- the-world-as-we-know-it action drama promises to make for exciting television.
Plus, there is always the suspense of wondering which key character is going to get killed first.
(ST)

Back To The Future
Da Mouth
Taiwanese group Da Mouth zoom in on an era of feel-good grooves on their fifth studio album, Back To The Future.
The retro dance of Funky That Girl features singer-host Pauline Lan and is already an ear-worm hit with its synth riffs.
Even the lyrics are retro with a reference to tapes no less: “Love is not less a cassette that can be rewound, wreck it and you can’t start over.”
Add a disco-ball and bellbottomed pants and the picture is complete. It is easily the most inspired thing here.
The rest of the album coasts along on a similar mix of dance beats, synth lines and rap, circling around one another the way men and women dance around each other – pleasant enough if somewhat forgettable.
But as Super Unclear makes clear: “It’s absolutely reasonable to pursue happiness, no need to ask if it’s permissible, don’t think too much, whether it’s appropriate or not.”
Shut up and dance is pretty much the message here.
(ST)

Woman In Gold
Simon Curtis
The story: Woman In Gold refers to a famous painting by Gustav Klimt that hung in the Belvedere Palace in Austria after World War II. To Maria Altmann
(Helen Mirren and Tatiana Maslany), it is a depiction of her beloved aunt Adele that was unlawfully seized by the Nazis from her family home in Vienna. Maria managed to escape to the United States and, decades later, with the help of an inexperienced but eager lawyer Randy Schoenberg (Ryan Reynolds), she seeks to claim back what is rightfully hers from the Austrian government. Based on a true story.

It was recently reported that the trauma suffered by Holocaust survivors can be passed on to their children. The ordeal was so devastating that it fundamentally altered them at some genetic level and the distress continued to echo in their offspring.
While Maria managed to escape the horrors of the concentration camps, she saw her family torn apart, her home looted and her neighbours and acquaintances turning on Jews.
Embarking on a mission to recover her family’s painting means that she has to relive the painful past, but she does it “for justice and so people remember”.
Mirren (The Queen, 2006), illustrious member of British acting royalty, slips easily into the role with a central European accent and a sometimes terse demeanour which masks an underlying vulnerability.
Reynolds, in a regular dramatic role as opposed to a glossy effects-filled flick such as Green Lantern (2011), starts out as an obedient Jewish boy doing his mother a favour by listening to Maria’s story.
Then, he gets persuaded to take on her case when he realises that the painting is potentially worth more than US$100 million (S$140 million).
Eventually, he finds a deeper and personal connection and he hangs on doggedly despite the odds stacked against him.
Mirren and Reynolds play off each other nicely.
Director Simon Curtis (My Week With Marilyn, 2011) handles the underdogs versus the high-handed authorities legal battles effectively.
While the Klimt painting was described at one point as the Mona Lisa of Austria, its Jewish subject was also obscured by the title of Woman In Gold, reflecting the country’s uneasy relationship with its history even as a restitution programme was officially underway to redress past wrongs.
The Holocaust is no longer a fresh wound, but it throbs with an ache that reverberates in DNA, in ongoing battles for justice and in films such as these.
(ST)

Getting Ready
Eason Chan
The mood on Eason Chan’s latest Cantonese album after 2013’s more varied The Key, is sweet and optimistic.
The tone is set by lead single Unconditional, a ballad about loving someone through all the vagaries and challenges of life. It is a song which plays to Chan’s strength as an emotive singer. Come what may, he croons: “I only know to love you every day.”
Heart On Fire and To Like Someone are two more Eric Kwok-composed tracks tailor- made for Chan to make you gently swoon.
And the jangly opener Boss, I’m Leaving Early puts a lighthearted spin on escaping the pressures of work.
This being an Eason Chan album, some curveballs are thrown in.
The later half of the album includes the atmospheric The Halloween Nightmare and the gentle rumination of Monologue From One Soul. The moving lesson learnt: “Whether I was right or wrong in the past, it’s too trivial to bicker about now/But I want to say that love is never a burden.”
(ST)