It is a long-awaited reunion. After the success of Monsters, Inc (2001), it has taken 12 years for well-loved characters such as enthusiastic one-eyed Mike Wazowski and genial blue-furred Sulley to appear in a new movie.
Unfortunately, Monsters University is nowhere as magical. Add to that the clunky ride that was Cars 2 (2011) and one begins to wonder if Pixar is losing the lustre of its early years.
And is it mere coincidence that both titles rehash old material rather than creating something new from scratch?
The Pixar of old often told the most engaging story in a most beautiful way.
Its first feature film Toy Story (1995) pushed the envelope on computer animation with a simple but entertaining story. The film was filled with memorable characters, from Woody the steadfast cowboy doll to Buzz Lightyear the arrogant space explorer.
And Monsters, Inc’s central concept of children’s screams powering a city was fresh and different, even as Pixar made strides in animation techniques to make Sulley’s fur appear more life-like.
It is no accident that key Pixar figure John Lasseter is a big admirer of Japanese animation house Studio Ghibli and its co-founder Hayao Miyazaki. Miyazaki is the man behind modern classics such as Spirited Away (2001) and Ponyo (2008), beautifully imaginative works which thrill the eye and warm the heart.
Pixar’s creations embodied that same generosity of spirit and fecundity of imagination. But with Disney’s acquisition of the company in 2006, there has perhaps been a touch of greater corporatisation in the studio’s works.
The critical reception to Cars (2006) was less enthusiastic compared to previous Pixar flicks, but it was Cars 2 that bottomed out with a 38 per cent rating on review-aggregating website rottentomatoes.com.
Merchandise-wise, this franchise is a winner – its anthropomorphic cars are seen everywhere in shops.
This is not to say that Pixar was previously averse to commercialism.
The Toy Story series (1995, 1999 and 2010) was an obvious candidate for spin-off toys and I personally have a soft spot for its three-eyed aliens. More importantly, the trilogy shows that sequels can be done thoughtfully and make a story more layered and fulfilling.
Nowadays, it seems as if the merchandising deal is signed, sealed and delivered at the stage of the movie’s conception. Sell toys, T-shirts and towels by all means, but Pixar needs to hold to heart Lasseter’s mantra that story is king.
Pixar, post acquisition by Disney, has actually delivered quite a few winners. The sci-fi flick Wall-E (2008) was a poignant cautionary tale about environmental preservation which was gorgeously animated and movingly told.
Director Terry Gilliam said: “A stunning bit of work. The scenes on what was left of planet Earth are just so beautiful: one of the great silent movies.”
And the stirring Up (2009), about an unlikely friendship between a cranky widower and an earnest little boy, is one of three animated movies ever nominated for a Best Picture Oscar.
Not forgetting last year’s inspiring Brave (2012) which featured Pixar’s first female heroine, feisty princess Merida, in its first fairy tale.
The question about whether Pixar has lost its touch is not a straightforward one to answer. It could be that after an extraordinarily successful start, it is going through some growing pains.
In a way, it is a victim of its own success. If viewers have high expectations of it, it is only because we have been spoilt by its stellar creations in the past. So, please, continue to spoil us.

BEST 3 PIXAR MOVIES...
FINDING NEMO (2003)
It is testimony to the depth and quality of Pixar’s work that picking its top three films is a deliciously difficult task. But no matter what your criteria are, Finding Nemo is likely to land a spot because it brings the aquatic world spectacularly to life, features great voice acting from Albert Brooks and Ellen DeGeneres, and has a timeless, exciting and humorous story about fatherly love.

TOY STORY (1995)
Any of the Toy Story instalments could have made the list but the first one is special. It introduced enduring characters from Woody the cowboy to Buzz Lightyear and catchphrases such as “To infinity... and beyond!”. And it made me go: “Wow, so that’s what computer animation can do. And I’ll have a three-eyed alien please, thank you very much.”

THE INCREDIBLES (2004)
Pixar’s sixth feature was the first to have human protagonists and writer-director Brad Bird knocked it out of the park. It was a smart take on the superhero genre and wittily answered the question of why capes are strictly a no-go when it comes to costumes. Bonus points to Bird for voicing the imperious fashion designer Edna Mode.

...WORST 3
CARS 2 (2011)
The ills of sequel-itis struck hard. Cars 2 featured international settings such as Paris and Tokyo and was louder, bigger and brasher, with an overblown story involving spies and an international conspiracy. They should have slammed the brakes on this one.

CARS (2006)
This was Pixar’s final indepen- dently produced movie before its purchase by Disney. Too bad it was not much of a last hurrah. Instead of humming and purring like a top-notch vehicle, this was merely a ho-hum offering about talking cars.

MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (2013)
This prequel to Monsters, Inc lacks the element of surprise and coasts by on the goodwill generated by characters such as Mike Wazowski and Sulley from the earlier film.
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Waiting
Olivia Ong

Hard To Put It Down
Tiger Huang

Feeling frazzled from the fast pace of urban living?
Slow down, take a deep breath and calm your nerves with local songbird Olivia Ong’s Waiting.
She serenades on the title track: “Accompany pure white to wait for a splash of red/Accompany sweetness to wait for sadness/Wait and you’ll know what you’re waiting for.”
Her soothing vocals are best suited for midtempo tracks and ballads, and The Pursuit Of Happiness and Love Enough are among the stronger offerings here.
The lone English track, Wonderland, picks up the pace and Ong has a hand in writing the lyrics and music here. It is not quite as wonderful, though, as the sunny Let It Rain off her last album, Romance (2011).
Taiwanese singer Tiger Huang’s latest album is also at its best when she sticks to the tried and tested.
She emotes with restraint on the title ballad and offers a touching promise: “Whether it’s rain, snow, wind or frost, when you need me, I’ll be by your side.”
Lover mixes it up with Mandarin, Cantonese and Minnan lyrics. Although it feels gimmicky at first, Huang has the vocal chops to pull it off.
Songs such as Still Lonely and Youth revisit familiar territory – the poignant persona of a single woman of a certain age that Huang fearlessly embraced on her comeback album Simple/Not Simple (2009).
It’s a hard-luck life, but there is a moving resilience in her husky voice and songs.
Brave Love is a fast-tempo number that works – that is, until it gets to the ill-advised, cliched English rap.
Huang awkwardly urges: “Come on everybody put your hands in the air/Put your hands together like you just don’t care.”
By all means, try something new, but leave the posturing to the party popsters.
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Miracle In Cell No. 7
Lee Hwan Kyung
The story: Lee Yong Gu (Ryoo Seung Ryong) is a simple-minded man who is determined to get a Sailor Moon bag for his six-year-old daughter Ye Sung (Gal So Won). He ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time and is sentenced to death for the murder and sexual assault of the police commissioner’s young daughter. Realising that Yong Gu is a good-hearted man, his cellmates help to reunite him with his daughter (Park Shin Hye as an adult) and to prepare for his trial.

For a film with no big stars and a modest budget, this flick performed a, well, miracle at the South Korean box office.
Released domestically in January, it chalked up more than 12 million admissions and is now the third- highest-grossing domestic movie, behind sci-fi thriller The Host (2006) and crime caper The Thieves (2012).
It is all thanks to a story that tugs at the heartstrings as well as winning performances from the leads.
Ryoo Seung Ryong (Masquerade, 2012) is totally convincing in the role of the mentally handicapped father who would do anything for his daughter – a character that could have been impossibly saintly if Ryoo had not made it real.
Writer-director Lee Hwan Kyung effectively milks his character Yong Gu’s plight for maximum sympathy.
Yong Gu is an innocent man who is tricked and browbeaten into admitting a crime he did not commit. His inability to articulate that injustice will have audiences seething in frustration.
As the smart little girl who believes in her father, Gal So Won is excellent. The adorable actress is a natural and has a sweet rapport with her on-screen father, which overcomes thoughts that the treatment of their relationship is baldly manipulative.
Even though the film is a tearjerker with its share of scenes that will turn on the faucets, particularly towards the end, there is also plenty of humour dished out along the way.
Yong Gu’s cellmates are a hodgepodge of criminal types, but luckily for him, they are all of the heart-of-gold variety.
It helps that he has a cute daughter to bring out their protective and paternalistic side.
How they smuggle Ye Sung into a jail cell and then keep her squirreled away from the eyes of the wardens is amusing. The scheme ends with a flight of fancy that is undeniably harebrained but still, you root for it to succeed.
All of this is told in flashback as a grown-up Ye Sung argues her father’s case at a mock trial many years later, in an attempt to clear his name.
Get your hankies ready when she makes her final arguments and Yong Gu’s fate is revealed.
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Monsters University
Dan Scanlon
The story: Before they were best buds teaming up in Monsters, Inc (2001), Mike Wazowski (Billy Crystal) and Sulley (John Goodman) did not always see eye to eye. As, um, “freshmons”
at Monsters University, an eager and studious Mike and a laidback Sulley take an initial dislike to each other. But after they get kicked off the scaring programme, the only way for them to get back in is to work together to win a scaring competition.

Monsters, Inc (2001) was both a critical and popular hit. It earned more than US$562 million worldwide and received a glowing 96 per cent rating on the review aggregator rottentomatoes.com.
Its central concept was fresh and clever – the screams of children powered the city of Monstropolis and so monsters would harvest them by scaring the little ones at night. Add quirky, welldesigned characters and a generous sprinkling of humour, and the result was a film that appealed to the young and old.
There is even a heartwarming twist at the end – the monsters realise that laughter generates even more power than screams and change their mission to entertaining kids instead.
Perhaps the twist was too neat and happy that capitalising on the film’s success with a sequel would have been tricky. So Disney Pixar scares up a prequel instead, complete with the problem that plagues most prequels – the lack of surprise.
As creative as the Pixar team has been all these years, Monsters University does not solve this conundrum in a fully satisfactory way. The key plotline here has Mike and Sulley taking part in a scaring contest that they need to win to get back on the scaring course.
Although they are the underdogs, there is not enough excitement in watching how this plays out.
The school setting is also too familiar, from the classroom scenes to the rivalry between fraternity and sorority houses, even if it is given a monster makeover.
Still, the characters have generated so much goodwill from the first film that there is some pleasure here in watching how Mike and Sulley go from being at loggerheads to being best pals.
The origin of their rivalry with the chameleon- like monster Randall Boggs (Steve Buscemi) is also revealed here.
There is also visual appeal in the vividly coloured film and some cute throwaway jokes, including a snail rushing to get to school on time.
Among the new characters, Helen Mirren’s formidable Dean Hardscrabble leaves the biggest impression, and the scuttling of her many legs each time she appears is a nice touch. But her character could have been better embedded into the story.
The themes here of friendship and finding your place in the world are well-meaning but have been explored to better effect in past Pixar offerings such as the Toy Story movies (1995, 1999, 2010).
Monsters University could well take a lesson or two from them.
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Mayday Nowhere World Tour 2013
Singapore Indoor Stadium/Last Friday

Every single member of the audience was part of the performance at Mayday’s gig.
Thanks to the specially designed lightsticks which were programmed to sync with the songs, the stadium transformed from one colour to the next in striking unison as fans waved them about fervently.
After rising Taiwanese newcomer Bai An warmed up the crowd with two songs, the Taiwanese band held the near- capacity audience of 8,000 in thrall for three hours.
Mandopop’s biggest group also sold out a second show on Saturday.
Vocalist Ashin promised, though: “We want to use up our energy tonight.”
Their latest tour revolved around the concept of Noah’s Ark, a track found on their end-of-the-world-inspired album, Second Round (2011).
Doomsday is not exactly the most uplifting idea but the band have seized upon it to deliver a message of being in the here and now. Do not wait to live your life is the exhortation on songs such as the title track Second Round.
Dressed in white tops and black pants, Ashin, guitarists Monster and Stone, bassist Masa and drummer Guan You emerged in a cloak of smoke and kicked things off with a string of rousing rockers including DNA.
The tight-knit band could get your pulse racing one minute and then your heart stirring the next on sensitive ballads such as Starry Night.
When they performed You Are Not Really Happy, the lightsticks were all dramatically extinguished before Ashin sang the final line: “Begin to live again.”
The thumping track Jump! The World had fans on their feet dancing and singing along loudly: “I won’t let myself feel wronged one second more.”
The concert’s sense of drama was heightened by the visually arresting video projections. Even the platforms which could be raised and lowered were made of screens so the band members would stand on top of a shifting landscape of images.
And during costume changes and short technical breaks, there was a concert- themed idol drama starring Jerry Yan and Ariel Lin about the end of the world to keep fans entertained.
We also got to see the lighter side of the band as they joked about onstage. Guan came in for some good-natured ribbing and Ashin and gang pretended to forget about him during the thank-yous.
To the amusement of the crowd, Guan also told a joke about doors which hinged on a slightly saucy pun.
The evening ended with the ballad Onion and a cheekily titled new number Sad People Don’t Listen To Fast Songs.
Ashin said at one point that he hoped that their songs would always be around. He also sang on OAOA: “I believe rock ’n’ roll can live forever.”
On a night like this, we could all believe it too.
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The People I've Known
Bevlyn Khoo
Breezy & Sunny is the name of a track here and it is exactly how this album starts out.
Over the cheerful strumming of a guitar, home-grown singer-songwriter Bevlyn Khoo invites you to laugh along with her on The Haha Song. When one is feeling down, she gently suggests: “Serious people are all the same/Mulling it over in your head, why not laugh instead?”
The vibe continues on Breezy & Sunny, which lightens your mood with its effortless bossa nova groove. And then on the title track, the mood turns contemplative as she ponders the passage of time.
The versatile Khoo also delivers a few tracks in English. Her last release Feel About You (2011) was also bilingual. But it is the Mandarin material that feels more distinctive and on which the sentiments are a tad more compelling.
Still, there is an honesty and simplicity to this record that is charming.
By the time she is crooning about her Soulmate on the closing track, you feel glad that you have had the chance to get to know her through her music.
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Switch
Jay Sun
The story: Dwelling In The Fuchun Mountains is a priceless painting that all the gangsters are after. And hot on their heels is super agent Xiao Jinhan (Andy Lau). His insurance executive wife Lin Yuyan (Zhang Jingchu) is drawn in as well, while Lisa (Lin Chi-ling) is the femme fatale he gets entangled with.

This movie is so stupid that even The Three Stooges would be embarrassed by it.
Essentially, the painting is split into two parts. Different groups of baddies are after them and the clock is ticking away as an exhibition of the joined-together work looms.
The action flits about restlessly from Dubai to Zhejiang to Taipei to Japan and cuts among a British smuggling group, twisted Japanese baddie Yamamoto and a mysterious figure known as Empress.
The set-up is tedious and confusing, and there is zero suspense over who will get the painting and who will double-cross who because one cannot be bothered. Everyone is overacting badly and you wish the cheap-looking scroll would just go up in flames already.
If Taiwanese model-actress Lin Chi-ling thinks this is her big break, she is sorely mistaken.
She is like a dress-up Barbie here – dolled-up in dominatrix leather in one scene, appearing as a nun with a clean-shaven head next and even putting on that tired cliche of a nurse’s uniform. None of the disguises though can disguise the fact that she cannot act.
The other actors do not escape unscathed either.
Hong Kong superstar Andy Lau must be wondering how he ended up in this turkey and his matinee idol smile gets tighter and tighter each time he has to flash it.
Meanwhile, Zhang Jingchu gets to grimace grimly as a bevy of women unleash their killer acrobatic moves on her.
Writer-director Jay Sun pilfers freely from movies such as Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011) but does so in a half-baked, haphazard manner.
And stretches of the boring and long-drawn-out flick look like a tourist promotion video for Dubai as the camera pans about the interiors of locales such as Atlantis, The Palm and the tallest building in the world, Burj Khalifa.
Add woeful-looking CGI to the mix and this is one Switch that will turn you right off.
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Opus Jay 2013 World Tour
Singapore Indoor Stadium/Thursday

It has been a long wait of three years for fans of Mandopop king Jay Chou.
Not counting his gone-in-a- flash appearance at the Formula 1 SingTel Singapore Grand Prix last year, his previous major concert tour here was in 2010.
That slickly produced gig at the Indoor Stadium was filled with bells and whistles and a hologram version of the singer. While that was a frenetic affair that could have done with a breather or two, it so happens that the 34-year-old’s latest concert could have done with snappier pacing.
As it was, it ambled along without really building to a climactic high over close to 2½ hours.
The evening had actually started out quite dramatically, with a flying vehicle seen in an introductory video clip appearing, stationary, on stage.
And Chou emerged from it in a red outfit, looking as though he had haphazardly raided Ali Baba’s treasure cave and piled on the gold accessories. The most eye-catching accessory, though, was doubtlessly his fab abs.
He launched into the fast-paced Exclamation Point and Dragon Fists backed by a phalanx of dancers as jets of flame burst forth on the edge of the stage.
It was a fiery start but Chou seemed to be in a nostalgic, almost pensive mood when he spoke to the sold-out crowd of 9,000. He thanked fans for their support over the last 12 years and asked: “Have I gotten older? Have my fans become dads and mums?”
He was not subdued exactly but maybe he was holding back a little given this was the first of three sold-out nights at the stadium.
Or maybe he has been stretched thin with his upcoming nostalgia musical The Rooftop. He plugged that with an entire sequence as the stage was transformed into a makeshift movie set and he put on 1970s-inspired retro garb.
The mini-musical did not work too well partly because there was no plot and partly because there were stretches when those singing were not named Jay Chou.
The concert was most enjoyable when it reminded one of the genius of the songs the star has penned over the years.
The giddily entertaining Dizzy Eunuch was a definite high point on his most recent album Opus 12 (2012) and the words tumbled out at such a furious pace your brain could barely keep up with his singing.
At the other end of the spectrum were winning ballads such as Quiet and Obviously, which Chou performed on an ornate piano that Liberace would have felt at home with.
A medley of past hits stripped down to guitar and vocal accompaniment had fans cheering in delight as they recognised each familiar refrain. But it was a pity that Chou launched only into snippets of classic tracks such as Starry Mood.
During the second encore, the mood brightened up when he brought a Hawaiian party vibe along for Ukelele, complete with giant beach balls bobbing about in the crowd.
As the concert ended to the strains of Common Jasmine Orange, one could not help but wonder if the energy level would pick up over the next two nights.
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First Love
Aska Yang
Even established singers are getting a fillip from reality competition shows now. And not as judges but as contestants.
China’s I Am A Singer has reminded everyone how gorgeously Terry Lin can sing and former One Million Star contestant Aska Yang has been wooing fans anew with his clear and soaring vocals.
The Taiwanese singer’s pipes are made for emotive ballads and that is where the focus of his third album lies.
Yang contributes lyrics and works with a roster of top names including composer-producer Jonathan Lee and singer-songwriters such as William Wei, Yen-j, Wu Jiahui and sodagreen’s ubiquitous Wu Ching-feng.
The mood is mildly melancholic as Yang sensitively parses love, loss and loneliness in an urban landscape. On opening track Actually Nothing At All, he sings: “In a city with rapid footsteps/I still live alone/I’ve had hope before but nothing came of it/Can only count on a song to tell my story.”
The title track has him in a nostalgic mood: “Thinking of my first love, thinking that my earliest dreams are there no longer/Thinking of youth, I was once fearless, failure mattered not”.
Even when the material is not as strong, Yang’s voice keeps things consistently compelling.
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Zombie 108
Joe Chien
Being eaten alive by the undead would be less traumatic than sitting through this Taiwanese zombie movie.
The 108 refers to the postal code of Ximending, where a deadly viral outbreak occurs. Cops and mobsters are reluctantly thrown together and have to figure out how they are going to stay alive.
The zombie part of the film is not particularly horrific or fresh, given what can be seen on the small screen nowadays with The Walking Dead (2010 to present).
Instead, what is truly stomach-turning here is the inclusion of a grotesquely deformed sicko who keeps naked women chained up in his basement and violates them for his amusement.
The vile visual assault of this nasty piece of exploitative trash from writer-director Joe Chien will leave you shellshocked. And that is why it gets zero stars from this reviewer.
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Now You See Me
Louis Leterrier
The story: Four street magicians are brought together by a mysterious figure, and for their first show as The Four Horsemen in Las Vegas, they rob a bank while on stage. Daniel Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg), Henley Reeves (Isla Fisher), Jack Wilder (Dave Franco) and Merritt McKinney (Woody Harrelson) appear to be executing some larger game plan even as FBI agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo) and Interpol agent Alma Vargas (Melanie Laurent) chase after them. Rounding out the star-studded cast are Michael Caine as Arthur Tressler, an insurance magnate who bankrolls the Four Horsemen’s shows, and Morgan Freeman as Thaddeus Bradley, a former magician who makes money by revealing the secrets of others in the trade.

This caper movie pulls off the neat little trick of assembling a top-drawer cast and then delivering a fun flick with plenty of nifty sleight-of-hand setpieces. Director Louis Leterrier (Clash Of The Titans, 2010) works with a light touch here and keeps things moving along.
The Four Horsemen are quickly sketched out in compact little scenes at the start of the movie and the casting helps to establish their personalities.
Eisenberg’s (The Social Network, 2010) Daniel is a cocky whiz-kid who is something of a control freak. Fisher (Confessions Of A Shopaholic, 2009) is his lovely former assistant who is perhaps there to prevent the enterprise from being too testosterone- driven. Harrelson’s (Zombieland, 2009) Merritt is a rascally hypnotist with a flirty leer. And Dave Franco, younger brother of the more famous James, is the charming Jack who has a knack for picking locks.
The repartee is quick and quippy, and it would have been nice to have more of that interplay among the four.
And the magic shows that follow, in Las Vegas, New Orleans and finally, New York, are staged with oomph and pizzazz and are engaging in their own right. All the while, you wonder how the stakes will be raised from show to show and what the end goal is. Are the Horsemen in on what is happening or are they willing pawns in some scheme that is bigger and beyond them?
As the FBI agent hot on their trail, Dylan (Ruffalo from 2012’s Marvel’s The Avengers) is led around in circles and is always two steps behind. Likewise,
Leterrier carefully plants scenes as well.
A story about a former magician whose final trick went fatally wrong and a playful scene of Eisenberg trying, and failing, to read magnate Tressler’s mind, pay off in spades later.
Some of the mumbo-jumbo about the power of The Eye of magic feels hokey and the romance
between Ruffalo and Laurent is a little awkward but they are minor quibbles.
When Leterrier eventually whips away the curtain, the big reveal is a surprising and satisfying one.
Sure, he used smokescreens and mirrors but one does not mind being hoodwinked when the result is a snappy piece of entertainment.
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Galaxy Crisis: The Strangest Midnight Broadcast
Joanna Wang
At the Spring Wave Music Festival earlier this month, Taiwanese singer-songwriter Joanna Wang stood out with her striking green outfit and her inimitable brand of offbeat musical story-telling.
Those who had dived into her previous English album, The Adventures Of Bernie The Schoolboy (2011), will know to expect a richly imagined world of whimsy here as well.
This time, she ventures even further off the beaten track to come up with what could be a soundtrack to a space fantasy with titles such as Garden Party On Mars and Meteor One (Inside The Mind Of A Wrestling Fanatic).
Her musical influences are deliriously diverse and match the out-there themes of her songs.
The retro bossa nova-influenced Coins has her threatening: “I’ll buy you out, I’ll buy your house!/Yes that’s what it’s all about, I’ll buy them out!”
Other tracks will have you smiling at the mood of theatrical silliness.
The Antagonist begins thus: “This song falls in the category of/Those songs where protagonists feel sorry for themselves/Except I’m not the protagonist.”
The cartoonish-sounding Evil Nerd Theme has an unlikely refrain: “Yes deep down, deep down he’s just/A guy who likes anime!”
The smoky-voiced Wang could have just coasted along doing covers of jazz standards and Mandarin evergreens.
But thankfully, she has little interest in doing so.
She is having too much fun exploring the boundless music universe, so buckle up and enjoy the ride with her.
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Here We Go
MICappella
Local vocal group MICappella are on a roll. In the wake of their second-place showing in the television singing competition The Sing-Off China last September, they have now released their debut album with a gung-ho statement of intent.
The more upbeat numbers such as Maroon 5’s Moves Like Jagger and Jam Hsiao’s Princess are energetic and feature voice effects that are particularly impressive, given the guitars, synthesizers and drums used in the originals.
It is harder for them, though, to leave a distinctive stamp on ballads such as Mayday’s Minnan number Zhiming And Chunjiao and Hu Xia’s Those Bygone Years – their renditions are merely passably pleasant.
Also included on the album are two original tracks. The title track is a dancey thumper which spells out what they do: “Don’t need any instruments/Just need a type of voice/My efforts will have the world listening carefully.”
The emo ballad Forget It, in contrast, shows their more sensitive side.
Covers are well and good, but to really leave a mark, original material is still the way to go.
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At Any Price
Ramin Bahrani
This week’s other movie with fast and furious racing cars stars Zac Efron as Dean Whipple, a restless young man stuck in rural small-town America.
His father, Henry (Dennis Quaid), is a bitter seed salesman who favours his absent elder brother. This fuels Dean’s desire to get away. Car-racing offers a ticket out but when he chokes in an important competition, he gets overwhelmed by his frustrations.
The film takes an odd dark turn near the end and a terrible shared secret between father and son leads to an improvement in their relationship.
Efron cuts a dashing figure on the race track – no surprises in this department since he remains best known for breaking out as a teen idol on Disney’s High School Musical (2006).
But despite his golden-boy looks, his recent movie choices suggest he does not want to coast by on that alone. From the lurid The Paperboy (2012) to this family drama from writer-director Ramin Bahrani (Man Push Cart, 2005), Efron seems to be seeking more challenging projects.
Kudos to him for showing some ambition but he needs a better vehicle than this ho-hum flick which never kicks into top gear.
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Emperor
Peter Webber
The story: World War II is over and Japan has surrendered. General Douglas MacArthur (Tommy Lee Jones) arrives in Tokyo for the occupation of the country and tasks Brigadier General Bonner Fellers (Matthew Fox) with a key mission – determine the extent of Emperor Hirohito’s (Takataro Kataoka) guilt in the Japanese war effort.

There is a famous black-and- white photograph depicting General Douglas MacArthur and Emperor Hirohito standing next to each other.
MacArthur is resting his hands on the back of his hips, while Hirohito’s hands hang formally by his side. There is an awkwardly large gap between the two, a gulf reflecting the difference in the two cultures and the insurmountable distance between the victor and the vanquished. Neither man is smiling.
The movie Emperor is essentially the story of what leads up to that single iconic moment.
Even so, director Peter Webber (Girl With A Pearl Earring, 2003) opts for a more subtle set-up. For much of the movie, Hirohito is investigated and discussed and judged, but the man himself is not shown. It is as though the moviegoer is watching a version of the surrealist play Waiting For Godot (1953), in which the protagonist never appears.
Instead, it is left to Matthew Fox to carry the movie. In television dramas such as Party Of Five (1994-2000) and Lost (2004-2010), he plays bruised characters who are decent at the core.
Fox once again channels that quality of inherent decency into the character of Fellers, who has to maintain a delicate balance in his investigation.
On the one hand, Japan is teetering on collapse and a denunciation of the god-like emperor could tip the country over into outright revolt. On the other hand, there is demand for justice to be served in the aftermath of a brutal war.
Complicating matters is Fellers’ personal affection for Japan and his love for a Japanese woman, Aya (Eriko Hatsune). The latter could have all too easily been a tired cliche but it does provide an opportunity for Fellers to delve deeper into the Japanese psyche through his contact with Aya’s military official uncle.
Lightening the mood a little in the sometimes sombre proceedings is Tommy Lee Jones as he swaggers about as MacArthur, a man as keenly aware of the power of the media image as he was of the power of the gun.
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Christmas Rose
Charlie Young
The story: Public prosecutor Tim (Aaron Kwok) takes on an explosive case in which handicapped piano teacher Jing (Guey Lun-mei) accuses well-known doctor Zhou (Chang Chen) of molesting her during a medical check-up. It all hinges upon their contrasting testimonies as Jing and Zhou were the only two people in the room at the time.

How do we know what we know? How can we be sure of what we know?
Two movies opening here this week, Christmas Rose and military drama Emperor, explore the idea of the slippery nature of truth and, given that, how and whether we can determine guilt.
The stakes are higher in Emperor as the fate of post-war Japan hangs in the balance and the issues are handled with a lighter touch. Actress-turned-director Charlie Young tackles the same issues with a heavier hand in Rose.
Her legal drama’s he-said she-said set-up calls to mind David Mamet’s play Oleanna (1992), in which a male professor and his female student tangle over a charge of sexual exploitation.
It is no easy task to have audience sympathy shifting one way then the other, depending on who is holding court at the moment. While you do get tugged this way and that in Rose, it also feels quite manipulative in part due to Young’s penchant for close-ups and zoom-ins.
Guey’s Jing appears at first to be a defenceless young woman who falls prey to a wolf in sheep’s clothing, but the film is overly skewed towards her and it is not till much later that we get to hear Zhou’s conflicting version of events.
The verdict is revealed an hour into the film and the last act is essentially one shouty, teary revelation after another. It is meant to be cathartic, but instead feels mildly farcical as court proceedings are turned into a mass therapy session. For an effective court melodrama, watch Deannie Yip and Andy Lau in The Unwritten Law (1985) instead.
The cast of heavyweight stars here also means that plotlines have to be spread around, not necessarily to the film’s benefit.
Kwok’s Tim has a backstory that dovetails with the case, but it does not fully resonate and his half-hearted rivalry with the defence lawyer (Xia Yu) is mostly a distracting sideshow.
Tim even has an emotional breakdown scene over his father, but instead of being moving, the tears feel like they are merely award-baiting.
It is an ambitious project for a first- time director but, unfortunately, Christmas Rose is an unseasonal bloom that fails to fully blossom.
(ST)

Coexistence
Denise Ho
It was big news when Hong Kong singer Denise Ho came out of the closet at the Hong Kong Pride Parade in November. The bigger news is that doing so has freed her as an artist. She sounds honest and open here – completely comfortable in her own skin at last.
Opening track Alcohol And Cigarette is a loose- limbed piece of garage rock that sets the tone, if not genre, for what is to follow.
Faceless Person tackles head-on questions of identity and the lyrics point to the painful process of someone coming to terms with herself: “Every time I look at myself, that me I don’t recognise/ Will my life/Be forgotten like today’s news/Am I existing? Or am I merely living?”
Even though the lyrics are by prolific Wu Ching- feng from Taiwan’s sodagreen, there is no denying how close to the bone they cut.
The album title itself is a naked plea to live and let live but Ho has no interest in wallowing in victimhood. To the question of the song titled What Do You Love?, her response sounds like a manifesto: “I love freedom and my life/It’s not for anyone else to call the shots/And what do you love?”
She even makes a joyous foray into dance on Bye Bye, bidding farewell to “a world of the old me”, “a world of shallow rules” and “a world that’s upside- down”. The sound of Coexistence is a beautiful one indeed.
(ST)

The Incredible Truth
Leong Tak Sam
The incredible truth about this movie is that it is spectacularly bad. Hong Kong’s Christy Chung should have stuck to slimming advertisements instead.
She plays Wei Ling, a stylist who travels to Japan to search for her friend, Jia Jia (Liu Yan), who has gone missing. Showing a complete lack of self-preservation skills, the stylist stays at a strange resort peopled by creepy characters. Chief among them is innkeeper’s daughter Michiko Shimizu (Megumi Kagurazaka), who goes from being intimidating to seductive to flat-out crazy.
The musical cues are loud and jarring and the acting is hammy and laughable. Chung tries her earnest best but fails in the face of a ludicrously lazy script.
For example, Wei conveniently finds a diary in the forest which spells out everything that happened.
It is so terrible that The Incredible Truth is good for a few laughs.
(ST)

This Is 40
Judd Apatow
The story: This is the spin-off sequel to writer-director Judd Apatow’s Knocked Up (2007), in which the moviegoer was first introduced to the characters of Debbie (Leslie Mann) and Pete (Paul Rudd). She now runs a clothing shop and he owns a tiny record label. They are still married, have two daughters and are about to hit the speed bump that is the big 4-0.

Is writer-director Judd Apatow losing his Midas touch? After hits such as The 40-Year-Old Virgin (2005) and Knocked Up (2007), one was expecting yet another raucous comedy filled with potty- mouthed dialogue and laugh-out-loud situations.
Instead, this feels like Apatow’s attempt to go in a more dramatic direction.
This Is 40 strings up scenes from a marriage between the more uptight Debbie and the laidback Pete and ends up feeling episodic in nature.While there is plenty of smutty dialogue, much of the talk about sex is graphic in a way that is not particularly funny.
Where it works is in Apatow’s ability to convey that volatile mixture of intimacy and resentment that long-time couples share. One moment, Debbie can be needling Pete about his junk food-eating habits; the next, she is reluctantly examining his bottom for haemorrhoids.
It comes together in a sweet scene in bed when they fondly talk about how they would kill each other off.
Paul Rudd (I Love You, Man, 2009) and Leslie Mann (Funny People, 2009) make the relationship feel lived-in and the frustrations of the characters keenly felt.
That said, the movie is simply too long and the moments of genuine emotional connection are few and far between.
Instead of focusing on family – what with Debbie’s distant father Oliver (John Lithgow) and Pete’s childish dad Larry (Albert Brooks) and his brood of three very young sons – the script is burdened with unnecessary extras. There is Megan Fox as an employee Debbie suspects is stealing from her and Melissa McCarthy as a mother Pete has a run-in with.
You wonder how much of his own marriage Apatow is channelling since he and Mann are married in real life with two daughters, Maude and Iris, who play 13-year-old Sadie and eight-year-old Charlotte in the film.
There is more blurring of reel and real as the artist Pete is promoting is real-life under-the-radar act Graham Parker & The Rumour.
Perhaps a greater separation of fact and fiction would have helped. As it is, This Is 40 feels self- indulgent to an extent that previous Apatow comedies did not.
(ST)

Glass Anatomy: The Musical
Various artists
Often, soundtrack albums serve as a souvenir of a show one has enjoyed.
This is one of the rare occasions where the record works better than the full-fledged musical, an adaptation of the Taiwanese film Papa, Can You Hear Me Sing? (1983). Glass Anatomy is currently playing at the Esplanade Theatre until Sunday.
For starters, the songs are presented in their entirety, not in snippets. Also, they are not repeated ad nauseam as they were during the show.
Classic numbers such as The Same Moonlight and Please Come With Me are given an orchestral makeover complete with harmonising. Do You Have Any Beer Bottles To Sell starts off mournful and builds to a dramatic outpouring of emotions.
Pop star Della Ding Dang does a decent job taking on numbers first made famous by veteran singer Julie Su Rei. Having the requisite lung power certainly helps.
Also effective is local actress Audrey Luo’s take on the movingly steadfast Holding Hands, a track marred by overuse in the production.
Take the songs here and build your own musical in your head instead.
(ST)

The Big Wedding
Justin Zackham
The story: Alejandro (Ben Barnes) is getting married to Missy (Amanda Seyfried) and the guest list includes his divorced adoptive parents, Don (Robert De Niro) and Ellie (Diane Keaton), as well as Don’s current partner Bebe (Susan Sarandon). Also attending are his Colombian Catholic biological mother Madonna (Patricia Rae) and sultry birth sister Nuria (Ana Ayora). The catch: Don and Ellie have to pretend they are still married in order not to offend Madonna’s conservative sensitivities. A remake of the French film My Brother Is Getting Married (2006).

Going by the movies made about weddings, one would think that there is no such thing as a small, low-key ceremony.
From My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002) to Bride Wars (2009), the occasion has to be big, bold and brash. And there has to be mayhem as one crisis after another unfolds, though everything gets neatly tied up by the time we get to “I do”.
The Big Wedding does not stray from the template. Even though it does not break the mould, it is pleasant enough as a sweetly amiable family comedy.
Here, the young couple getting married are almost incidental and in fact, Ben Barnes and Amanda Seyfried do not take up too much screen time.
Rather, part of the movie’s charm comes from watching veteran actors just doing their thing.
Robert De Niro gives a loose, relaxed performance as the patriarch who cannot commit to his new partner and is more likeable here than in the shrilly exaggerated Meet The Parents (2000).
There is an easy vibe to his squabbling and bantering with one-time best friends Susan Sarandon and Diane Keaton as the three of them sort out their relationships.
And Robin Williams is nicely restrained, for once, in the role of a priest counselling the young couple.
To justify the “Big” in the title, there is also Katherine Heigl (27 Dresses, 2008) as a brittle sister whose marriage is on the rocks, while Topher Grace (That ’70s Show, 1998-2006) rounds up the ensemble cast as a doctor brother still holding on to his virginity.
Writer-director Justin Zackham (writer for The Bucket List, 2007) works in secrets, revelations, punches and a touch of naughtiness before the de rigueur happy ending rolls around.
(ST)

2013 Spring Wave Music Festival
The Meadow, Gardens by the Bay
Last Saturday
Spring Wave swept into Singapore for the first time last Saturday.
And the popular Taiwanese music festival brought with it a swell line-up of artists, including indie queen Cheer Chen, rocker Wu Bai, popster Jam Hsiao, smoky-voiced Joanna Wang, pop-rocker Chang Chen-yue and home-grown singer Olivia Ong. Each performed a set between 30 and 40 minutes long.
According to the organiser, Taiwan’s Friendly Dog Entertainment, 5,000 people attended the concert.
First among the headliners to take the stage at The Meadow at Gardens by the Bay shortly after 3pm was Ong. Dressed in a black and white sleeveless top and a yellow skirt, she offered some breezy pop to help beat the heat.
She sang her own material such as ballad When The Seas Run Dry And The Stones Go Soft and covered English pop numbers such as Venus. She also tested fate with Let It Rain but the weather held.
The early birds who braved the sun came armed with umbrellas, caps and wet wipes. One group came with its own shade.
Mr Sun Jianhang, 26, from Shenyang and working in the logistics industry here, brought along a blue and orange tent. This was the result of experience gleaned from attending past festivals, such as the Strawberry Music Festival in China, he said.
Teacher James Wong, 41, was there with three friends and they came well equipped with mats, food and even card games. He said: “The concert is a very long one. To outlast it, we thought we had to be more prepared.”
Apart from the line-up of artists, there was also a showcase segment for the Singapore Press Holdings- organised Singapore Entertainment Awards 2013 (see other story).
Taiwan’s Bai An was the only regional artist present to collect her trophies for Most Popular Regional Newcomer and Singapore Entertainment Awards Media Award – Newcomer of the Year.
She graced the stage in a little black dress and performed three songs from her debut album of electronica pop, The Catcher In The Rye (2012).
The Singapore singers on hand to receive their prizes were Ming Bridges for Best Local Singer and Best Local Album, as well as The Freshman duo – comprising Chen Diya and Carrie Yeo – for Best Local Lyrics.
Singer Wang, dressed in striking green, took the stage next. From Coins, “a sarcastic song about spending money”, to lilting ballad Apathy, she entertained with her brand of kooky musical story- telling. She even turned American rock band Soundgarden’s Black Hole Sun into a whimsical ditty.
Rocker Chang then turned the dial up to party mode. With his infectious sing-along hits such as Love’s First Experience and Freedom, he had the crowd up on its feet and dancing happily along.
He was dressed in what looked like a light khaki safari suit and he cheekily shook his bum as a farewell gesture after his final number.
In contrast, the vibe for indie queen Cheer Chen’s set was mellow and chill, thanks to the sensitively wrought ruminations of tracks such as Jealousy and Travel With Sound. But the versatile musician proved that she could also pick up the pace when she had a go on the drums.
It was left to consummate showman Hsiao to really work the crowd and he did so with ease, pointing to fans when he sang “miss you, you, you” from Can Only Miss You.
He powered through rock numbers Princess and Holmes and sassed his way through Michael Jackson’s Black Or White.
Even the light drizzle could not dampen the mood and it gave Hsiao the opening to quip: “It’s raining so I have to go.”
Six hours after Ong, veteran rocker Wu Bai came on stage. He closed the evening with an invigorating blast of music, taking the audience from an explosive Volcano to anthemic Minnan number No. 1 In The World. The concert ended close to 10pm.
He revelled in the outdoor setting and acknowledged every segment of the crowd, from those in front to “those on the left of the left”.
At his command, he also set off the Mexican wave on the sea of green. And the fans roared in delight.
Among them was teacher Bernice Tan, 24, who said that it was a good experience overall. Given the variable weather, she added: “Maybe they can have some shelters if they have another one in future.”
While Spring had come and gone for the concertgoers, for those planning to boogie at the late-night dance party, there was still another Wave to ride.
(ST)

Stories Untold
JJ Lin
He made his debut in 2003 with Music Voyager and a decade later, local singer-songwriter JJ Lin is a star releasing his milestone 10th album.
From a fresh-faced boy singing about being Booksmart, the still-boyish singer is now a bankable entertainer who continues to have a knack for writing strong tunes even as his range broadens.
Take lead single The Dark Knight, a canny collaboration with Mayday’s Ashin. The rousing rock number does not lazily ride on superhero popularity but thoughtfully explores that world: “Why after catching all the thieves, with no robbery witnessed in years/Yet poverty is like a flood, drowning the dignity of survival/At the peak of civilisation, mankind and bats are back living in caves”.
Another singer-songwriter making an appearance is Taiwan-based Wang Leehom, who plays the violin for the dramatic pop of lone English track One Shot.
Even Lin’s family gets in on the act as his brother Eugene duets with him on the nostalgic Fly Back In Time. Fun fact: The brothers were part of Ocean Butterflies’ Very Singers’ Training Course in 1999.
Of course, Lin gets to shine on his own as well with a classy romantic ballad Practising Love and a cheerful slice of upbeat pop Here Because Of You.
Less successful is the gimmicky Remember Me A Thousand Years Later. The point of the song seems to be to spot where snatches of melody had previously appeared in his earlier works. The title helps you with one example with its reference to 2005’s A Thousand Years Later.
Aside from the odd little homage to himself, Stories Untold is mostly a solid effort from a consistently entertaining home-grown star.
(ST)

Identity Thief
Seth Gordon
The story: With a simple phone call, Diana (Melissa McCarthy) steals the identity of accountant Sandy Patterson (Jason Bateman) from Denver. She goes on a spending spree with his credit card information, lands him in trouble with the law and even jeopardises his new job. With his life spiralling out of control, Sandy has to travel to Florida and bring Diana back with him to clear his name.

Identity theft is committed by people who are actually good at heart, according to the makers of this film. The thieves are just a little bit lost and surely it is not their fault if they had a terrible childhood.
If you buy this, I know a Nigerian bank account you can send some money to in order to claim your lottery winnings.
The problem is not that the film makes light of a serious issue. It is that it does not do it well.
The first act of the film is essentially a convoluted set-up to justify Sandy and Diana travelling together. And in order to get them on a good old-fashioned road trip as opposed to a quick plane ride, some other lame reason is whipped up by screenwriter Craig Mazin (Scary Movie 4, 2006).
Not trusting Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy, the Oscar-nominated breakout star of Bridesmaids (2011), to hold your attention, he overcooks the plot by throwing in a bounty hunter (Robert Patrick) and two gang members who are after Diana as well.
There is also an extended and unnecessary interlude with a cowboy character (Eric Stonestreet from sitcom Modern Family) Diana picks up in a bar.
The jokes mostly miss the mark and a lame one about Sandy being a girl’s name is, lamentably, repeated.
Bateman (TV’s Arrested Development, 2003-2006, 2013) and McCarthy are a riot when given good material.
But they struggle here to overcome the thin characterisation: Sandy is mostly mousey as the guy who plays by the rules while Diana is a pathological liar the moviegoer is abruptly asked to feel sympathy for at the end.
Director Seth Gordon (Horrible Bosses, 2011) has to shoulder some of the blame as well for the film’s uneven tone and problematic pacing. There is even a makeover scene for Diana which is not just cliched but also gratuitous.
The biggest crime this movie is guilty of is stealing your time.
(ST)

Light
Power Station
Aboriginal Taiwanese rock duo Power Station are still going strong, 16 years after their debut Cruel Love Letters (1997).
Their brand of blazing emo rock is alive and well on tracks such as Never Forget The Earliest Inspiration.
Yu Chiu-hsin and Yen Chih-lin’s voices soar as they sing: “Never forget, that year, that day, the dream in our hearts when we set off.” Although they are now in their mid-40s, there remains a youthful idealism in their cover of American country-pop group Lady Antebellum’s Never Alone.
Lead single Elena is a definite highlight here.
The music has a tribal folk song feel to it and the title is both a woman’s name and also sounds like “lover ah” in Minnan. The poignant chorus goes: “Elena, I’m back, know how much I’ve missed you/Elena, I’m back, your heart is my home”.
Parts of the album, though, feel like they could have been recorded back in the 1990s or early noughties. The challenge for the duo is whether they can power ahead and not just power on.
(ST)

AV Idol
Hideo Jojo
It is counter-programming time as behemoth Marvel’s Iron Man 3 opens in cinemas this week. And this sex comedy is as different as it gets in terms of content.
Japanese adult video star Ryoko (played by real- life AV idol Yui Tatsumi) reluctantly heads to Korea to shoot a new flick. After a series of mishaps, she bumps into the innocent Yuna (Yeo Min Jeong), who has dreamed of being a (legit) idol star all her life.
There are some funny bits in here, such as when the filming crew has to pass through Korean customs with their sex aids and later on, when the hack of a director blatantly rips off hit Korean TV drama Winter Sonata (2002) for the plot of his cross-cultural porn flick.
As a silly sex comedy though, its tone is uneven and it never hits the heights of, say, Pang Ho Cheung’s AV (2005), which managed to be both salty and sweet.
Ultimately, the movie does not stray far from its AV roots and both sweet girl-next-door Yuna and sexy goddess Ryoko disrobe for sex scenes.
(ST)

Finding Mr Right
Xue Xiaolu
The story: Jiajia (Tang Wei) arrives in Seattle from Beijing to give birth to her child with a married man because she cannot give birth legally in China. She is loud, spoilt and demanding, and clashes with almost everyone. Only Frank (Wu Xiubo), a driver sent to pick her up from the airport, is patient enough to deal with her. He used to be a doctor back in Beijing but now takes care of his daughter as his wife makes more money. Gradually, Jiajia and Frank come to care for each other.

Hanging over this movie is the shadow of another – the Tom Hanks-Meg Ryan romance Sleepless In Seattle (1993).
It is a film that Jiajia holds dear to her heart and she even takes Frank’s daughter to a screening of it.
The problem is that it feels as though writer- director Xue Xiaolu is using that as a crutch to bolster Finding Mr Right’s own credentials as a romance.
Neither does it help that the ending of this movie is pilfered from Sleepless’ finale atop the Empire State Building.
Sleepless In Seattle paid homage to An Affair To Remember (1957) in the way it used that iconic building as a setting; Finding Mr Right merely rips off Sleepless In Seattle.
It is rather disappointing considering that this is the second feature from writer-director Xue. Her debut film was the well-received tearjerker Ocean Heaven (2010), which starred Jet Li as the father of an autistic son.
The romance is also too long and muted.
Jiajia inadvertently hits upon another reason for the film’s sluggishness when she says to Frank: “You know what your problem is? You’re too nice.”
He is nice to the point of being a doormat, even picking up his ex-wife’s wedding gown for her upcoming nuptials.
The saintly Frank is underplayed by well-known China television and movie actor Wu Xiubo (The Four, 2012) and is just too passive.
In contrast, Jiajia is a brash spoilt brat and Tang Wei, best known for her intense turn in sexy espionage thriller Lust, Caution (2007), has fun with the role.
Predictably, there is a redemption story arc and Jiajia learns to be a better person.
The two actors have a believable low-key chemistry when they are together, though it would be nice to have the heat turned up beyond simmering.
After a slow-moving build-up, Xue inexplicably piles on the schmaltziness for the resolution and it feels out of step with the rest of the movie. Unfortunately, she failed to find the right note for the ending.
(ST)

365
JPM
The boys of JPM seem to be in the mood for love, judging by this follow-up to their debut album, Moonwalk (2011).
But that does not mean the Taiwanese trio – LilJay, Prince and Modi – are pensive.
Opener 365 Days is a catchy dance track that is more about moving the feet than the heart: “Why is the love I have for you so strong, miss you every day/Every day every night.”
She Wanna Go, meanwhile, is a breezy slice of rock-tinged pop that sees the boys hanging tough: “I’m already so grown-up, I can withstand this hurt/If you wanna go, just go.”
Also of interest is Internet, a look at romance in this brave new digital world, featuring singer Kimberley Chen: “Although we haven’t met/And you haven’t replied to my messages/Waiting for you to say hey, even a ‘like’ from you is OK.”
The boys flounder on the slow sappy numbers, though, such as I Don’t Miss You That Much.
Such tracks could have been dropped from the record and I would not have missed them at all.
(ST)

Machi Action
Jeff Chang
Remember those cheesy Japanese live-action series with a hero who transforms into a suited-up warrior in order to do battle with all manner of monsters?
Machi Action clearly has a soft spot for those shows and some of the scenes showing how the fictitious Taiwanese series Superhero Fly is filmed can be quite fun.
Mostly, though, the film flounders about like a clumsy monster with no clue what it wants to achieve.
Chen Bo-lin is the nice-guy actor, Tie-nan (literally “iron man”), who plays Fly.
Cast adrift after a new superhero, Face (Owodog), takes his place, Tie-nan goes from hawking dubious products on television to, inadvertently, signing up for a porn flick.
The scattershot film even has a tearjerker melodrama skulking about on the edges as there are flashbacks to Tie-nan as a child, acting as a superhero to cheer up his seriously ill younger brother.
It seemed like a fun film to make, judging from the outtakes, but it was not a fun film to watch.
(ST)

Judgment Day
Ong Kuo Sin
There is nothing like impending doom to put things in perspective.
With 72 hours to go before a meteorite wipes out Earth, priorities are straightened and secrets start spilling out faster than worms crawling out of the woodwork.
Family man Fu-an (Henry Thia) announces to his wife and children that he wants to be a woman; a cop (Jeffrey Wang) confesses to his colleague (Mark Lee) that he took a bribe many years ago; Shuzhen (Alice Ko) tells her husband (Tender Huang) that she has fallen for her superior (Guo Liang); and Rebecca (Rebecca Lim) chooses to go to Cambodia instead of accepting a marriage proposal from Richard (Chua Enlai).
After a promising set-up, writer-director Ong Kuo Sin has no idea what to do with the various stories, which mostly get neatly resolved with a Big Speech moment.
And because there are so many threads and characters, the treatment of the material inevitably feels glib and clumsy.
Judgment Day also features the late John Cheng, better known as Ah Nan, as a temple medium who knows how to bend with the wind. He has some interesting observations about religion, but too bad the scene concocted for him to share them is completely contrived.
(ST)

Dark Skies
Scott Stewart
The story: Strange things are happening at the Barrett residence. Lacy (Keri Russell) and Daniel (Josh Hamilton) try to make sense of what is happening while protecting their two boys, Jesse (Dakota Goyo) and Sammy (Kadan Rockett).

This is the kind of movie where the less you know about it, the more effective it is.
It opens with scenes of normal suburban life – children playing in the streets, a lawn being watered, a barbecue gathering.
Then something happens in the Barrett household.
Someone, or something, comes into their kitchen at night and leaves a mess. It could almost be a prank though Lacy wonders what would eat the lettuce but leave the bacon. A giant rabbit with opposable thumbs is her husband’s quick comeback.
From this almost innocuous incident, writer-director Scott Stewart (Priest, 2011) slowly escalates the tension and the stakes as the incidents get harder and harder to explain away.
A big part of why the movie works is due to the casting.
Keri Russell was defined by the college student title role she played in the television drama Felicity (1998-2002) and it is nice to see that she has matured into a compelling actress without any offscreen drama, thank you very much.
She is well-matched by Josh Hamilton, an actor better known for his work on Broadway in award-winning plays such as Proof (2000) and The Coast Of Utopia (2002).
They are believable as a regular couple coping with ordinary pressures, from keeping up with mortgage payments to trying to build a better life for their family.
Adding to the sense of reality is Dakota Goyo (Real Steel, 2011) as a 13-year-old beginning to be interested in girls and to chafe at parental restrictions. At the same time, he is also a protective sibling to his younger and possibly over- imaginative brother (Kadan Rockett).
There is also a nice dynamic between Lacy the believer and Daniel the sceptic when things get more hairy, a gender reversal of the Mulder-Scully relationship in the iconic sci-fi series The X-Files (1993-2002).
Even when the movie moves into familiar Paranormal Activity (2007) territory as Daniel installs surveillance cameras in the house, Stewart manages to hold your attention.
The film could have easily elicited snorts given its subject matter, but by the time the word “aliens” is mentioned, the moviegoer is an hour into the film, and Dark Skies has cast an unsettling spell.
(ST)

Good Rogue
Eric Lin
Unless you are a fan of televised singing competition shows, you are not likely to be familiar with Malaysia’s Eric Lin.
Even though he released his first EP in Malaysia back in 2002, it was his stints on various contests, including the popular Chinese Million Star, that have raised his profile in recent years. It has even paved the way for him to release his first full-length album, Good Rogue.
As the title suggests, the persona here is one of a sensitive tough guy. He sings on the Percy Phang-composed title track: “I just keep loving/Keep loving/You can criticise as you wish/Even if it’s arrogance/I’m a good rogue”.
Lin has a decent set of pipes and he is versatile enough to handle faster-paced tracks and even take on English, as Like A Love Song proves. But he could do with more distinctive material. It gets hard to tell apart one mid-tempo ballad from another after a while.
Instead of this album, it might well take another television appearance to boost his profile once more.
(ST)

Don't Cry Mommy
Kim Yong Han
The story: Recently divorced Yoo Lim (Yoo Seon) lives with her only daughter, highschooler Eun Ah (Nam Bo Ra, below). Her world falls apart when Eun Ah is raped by three schoolmates (U-KISS member Shin Dong Ho plays one of them) and ultimately takes her own life. Faced with a legal system that coddles juvenile offenders, Yoo Lim decides to mete out her own brand of justice.

Rape is a horrific crime. And it is frustrating when the perpetrators get away with little more than a slap on the wrist if they happen to be underage, in the case of South Korea’s courts.
Faced with this devastating injustice, Yoo Lim takes matters into her own hands when she tracks down the three schoolboys who attacked her daughter.
Writer-director Kim Yong Han wants to draw attention to a serious issue and a glaring loophole in the courts. But Don’t Cry Mommy ends up pushing easy buttons in a lazy way.
The rapists are absolute scum with no humanising qualities whatsoever. They even videotape the vicious rape and end up blackmailing Eun Ah with the footage in order to abuse her further. You, too, will be baying for their blood.
What is interesting is that one of the perpetrators is actually a baby-faced boy whom Eun Ah initially had a crush on. He could pass off for a boyband member and, in fact, is played by one, U-KISS’s Shin Dong Ho. Kudos to him for taking on such a risky role.
Too much of the movie is frustrating though. Eun Ah (a sweetly innocent Nam Bo Ra from The Moon Embracing The Sun, 2012), and Yoo Lim (Yoo Seon from The Sons Of Sol Pharmacy, 2009) keep getting placed in situations that leave them vulnerable to attack. The actions of the mother, in particular, will have you sighing loudly in exasperation as she clumsily confronts the boys responsible for the heinous crimes.
The movie is not satisfying as a vigilante flick nor does it engage with the issues in a thoughtful way, when other Korean films have shown that it is possible to do so. There is Lee Chang Dong’s Poetry (2010), which was also triggered by the gangrape of a schoolgirl, but he juxtaposes the ugly crime with lyrical beauty in a film of quiet power.
Then there is Park Chan Wook’s vengeance trilogy (including Oldboy, 2003), which explored the theme in far greater depth. It is smart enough to have you baying for blood – and then satiates that with generous doses of violent payback.
(ST)

Ricky Is A Nice Guy
Ricky Hsiao
Who says nice guys finish last? Not Taiwan’s Ricky Hsiao. The blind singer-songwriter’s fifth Mandarin album makes it all the way to the top of the G-Music album charts at home.
The opening track Live My Own Life is a winner with Lin Xi’s poignant lyrics paired with Hsiao’s memorable melody. He sings with a sense of purpose lines such as “I live the life I want, so long it’s not life living me” and “I own time, and time doesn’t have my notice”.
The folksy strains of Lotus Seed Heart also complement well a moving tale about a past love.
He might be nice but that does not mean he is bland. He gets emo on the Tanya Chua-penned ballad Who Said You Could. He wallows in misery here: “Who said you could, no one said you could, think I don’t care/But actually I hate myself, why did I fall for you”.
Not to worry, though, the album ends with a breezy pick-me-up, Simple Happiness. He lifts you up as he sings: “I’ve learnt to want the simple pleasures/Use love to experience each day I live”. A sweet sentiment from a nice guy.
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Lay The Favourite
Stephen Frears
The story: The phrase “lay the favourite” comes from the arena of sports gambling. It is a world that private dancer Beth (Rebecca Hall) discovers when she moves to Vegas for a fresh start. She works for Dink (Bruce Willis), clashes with his wife Tulip (Catherine Zeta-Jones) and ends up making a pivotal bet on a basketball game. Based on Beth Raymer’s 2010 memoir of the same name.

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

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

Jazz Channel
Yoga Lin
While most cover albums by Mandopop singers seem like a lazy way of cashing in, this two-disc offering from Taiwan’s Yoga Lin is happily different.
He is a singer of some sensitivity and interpreting the material here – including a wide range of English songs from jazz standards such as As Time Goes By to Bonnie Raitt’s ballad I Can’t Make You Love Me – in a lightly jazzy idiom prevents this from sounding like a karaoke session. But his less-than-perfect English enunciation is a little distracting at times.
The Mandarin covers work better, whether he is taking on the Teresa Teng chestnut I Only Care About You or Sandee Chan’s regret-filled Not In Time. He even reworks two of his own tracks – Gone With The Wind and Fairy Tale from Senses Around (2009) – to good effect.
In particular, Gone is sparer and more haunting as Lin sings: “I play this song for you on a sunny day/I fall deeply asleep on a cloudy day/And you’re gone.” Tune into Jazz Channel when you want to soak up the blues, but not if you want to chase them away.
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Midnight's Children
Deepa Mehta
The story: Saleem Sinai is born at the stroke of midnight on Aug15, 1947, the moment of India’s Independence. His life and the lives of the other special children born in that first hour are inextricably linked and play out against the birthing pains of a nation. Saleem (Satya Bhabha) has telepathic powers, charismatic Shiva (Siddharth Narayan) is his nemesis and Parvati (Shriya Saran) is the witch who flits between the two men. Based on Salman Rushdie’s 1981 Booker Prize-winning novel of the same name.

History, as historian Arnold Toynbee once observed, is just one damn thing after another. And there is plenty of history to get through in Midnight’s Children.
There are the last days of the British empire leading to the partition of India and Pakistan, war between the two countries, and civil war in Pakistan resulting in the creation of Bangladesh. While a novel has the luxury of space to shape events into a narrative thread, a film, even one over two hours long like this, has much less leeway to do so.
After a while, the characters begin to feel like pawns of history, swept up in a tide that they have no control over.
Director Deepa Mehta (Fire, 1996, Earth, 1998, and Water, 2005) could have sharpened the focus of the film much more so that the backdrop of unfolding events does not overwhelm it. As it stands, it is not easy for the viewer to immerse himself in the story of the characters.
It is a pity because there is plenty of drama, melo- and otherwise, in the recounting of Saleem’s family history and the single rebellious act of a nurse that changes his fate as well as Shiva’s forever.
Satya Bhabha (Scott Pilgrim Vs The World, 2010) is the somewhat passive Saleem, whose telepathic power is thrust upon him courtesy of a bulbous and snivelly nose, while Siddharth Narayan (Bommarillu, 2006) is the charismatic Shiva, whose ambitions take a dark turn.
Unfortunately, while the rivalry between Saleem and Shiva is established early on, it does not really pay off till late in the movie.
The impact of the relationship triangle with Parvati (Shriya Saran from Sivaji: The Boss, 2007) is also diminished, given the short shrift the character gets.
Still, there is a point to the tangled web of relations and relationships woven here: Who is whose son, who is whose mother, who is whose father?
The film’s resolution suggests that, in the end, you make your own family, just as you make your own country.
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Ip Man - The Final Fight
Herman Yau
And this makes Ip Man number four.
Donnie Yen gave us a stoic and macho action hero in Ip Man (2008) and Ip Man 2 (2010). Tony Leung Chiu Wai gave us arthouse Ip Man in The Grandmaster (2013). Dennis To gave us Ip Man-lite in Ip Man: The Legend Is Born (2010).
Anthony Wong’s portrayal of the wing chun martial arts teacher is also stoic and comes with a tad more gravitas. Too bad it feels unnecessary.
The episodic film has something of a split personality with an odd mix of realist historical drama and chopsocky gongfu action. The setting is Hong Kong at a time of worker unrest in the 1950s and features Ip Man’s students (including Jordan Chan as a conflicted cop and Gillian Chung in a minor role) being involved in the strikes and clashes.
At the same time, setpiece fights have to be worked into the movie, including a final showdown between Ip Man and a triad boss.
The entire exercise just feels like overkill.
(ST)

The Host
Andrew Niccol
The story: A parasitic alien race has conquered Earth. Melanie Stryder’s (Saoirse Ronan) body is inhabited by a “soul” named Wanderer, but her consciousness refuses to just fade away. Eventually, they set off in search of her younger brother in a remote human hideout. There, she finds her boyfriend Jared (Max Irons) while another young man, Ian (Jake Abel), is drawn to Wanderer. Based on Stephenie Meyer’s 2008 book of the same name.

The last adaptation of a Stephenie Meyer’s work was a little series called Twilight. There are, naturally, some high expectations for The Host, but it is actually a very different creature altogether.
This feels like a more contemplative movie. After the basic premise has been set up, writer-director Andrew Niccol is happy to explore the ramifications in a low-key and understated manner.
Those familiar with his earlier works such as the sci-fi flick Gattaca (1997), starring Ethan Hawke as a genetically inferior man with big ambitions in a dystopian future, would not be too surprised by the approach.
The central idea here is of two personalities forced to share one body.
This has often been played for laughs such as in All Of Me (1984), in which Steve Martin and Lily Tomlin comically fought for control.
In The Host, though, the Melanie/ Wanderer struggle is played for dramatic effect.
The two start off as antagonists, as Melanie is understandably hostile towards the alien invader trying to probe her memories in order to ferret out the human resistance. Eventually, the two begin to, well, start seeing eye to eye.
Saoirse Ronan, nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar in Atonement (2007), is quietly compelling to watch as she makes both Melanie’s trapped frustration and Wanderer’s growing awareness believable.
What is also interesting here is the kind-of love triangle that is set up.
Melanie is in love with Jared (Max Irons from 2011’s Red Riding Hood) while Ian (Jake Abel from 2010’s Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief) falls for Wanderer.
The catch, of course, is that Melanie and Wanderer share one body. Some of what transpires treads on giggly teenage romance territory as when Wanderer kisses Jared and Melanie gets jealous.
The film is refreshingly honest. Wanderer tells Ian that he does not love her, but is merely in love with Melanie’s body. After all, her physical form is a tentacled ball of light and she adds that if Ian could hold that in his arms, he would crush her.
Adding excitement to the romantic tension are aliens hot on the trail of the humans, with The Seeker (Diane Kruger) particular hellbent on their destruction.
The various threads are resolved by the end, some more clumsily than others, and the tacked-on coda could have been dropped.
Still, for a good stretch The Host envelops you in its strange world.
(ST)

52 Hertz
The Verse

Parallel Universe
The Girl And The Robots

There is plenty of dance music in the Asian pop scene, thanks to the Koreans. But thoughtful explorations of electronica are few and far between.
On 52 Hertz, indie singer- songwriter Cheer Chen teams up with her producer boyfriend Tiger Chung and noted composer Chen Chien-chi for a fruitful expedition.
The Verse prove to be a most flexible outfit as they sing in English and Mandarin over a diverse range of music.
Only Love Can is dreamily romantic with English lyrics to match: “We’re swimming in the moonlight/ We go to another side of world/In the wave moved by the star”.
The title track works in EKG- machine-like beeps, underscoring the fragility of life as Chen croons delicately in Mandarin: “Because I love, because I live, because I’m lonely, I search”.
There is playfulness here as well, as the arrangement for Six sounds like a tinny video-game soundtrack while Rapid Eye Movement edges into dance-rock territory.
The world of electronica is definitely a big one, big enough for Taiwanese trio The Girl And The Robots to venture to a Parallel Universe on their second album.
They sweep you up in the title track as female vocalist Riin sings: “Take me away/Take me away to another universe/A universe with you”.
There is a strong dance vibe here but the group want to engage your head as well as your feet. Fish, for example, explores an unusual point of view: “Fish/Says he wants silence/ Says you don’t understand/Spits out a mouthful of froth.”
And for those who associate Minnan with old-school ballads and getai techno, Waiting comes as a classy surprise. It might change your view of Minnan pop just as these albums might get you to rethink what you know about electronica.
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Gambit
Michael Hoffman
The story: The put-upon British art curator Harry Deane (Colin Firth) has come up with a ploy to take revenge on his bully of a media mogul boss, Lord Lionel Shabandar (Alan Rickman). To pull it off, he needs the help of Texan cowgirl PJ Puznowski (Cameron Diaz) and the counterfeiting skills of his pal, The Major (Tom Courtenay). A loose remake of the 1966 film of the same name starring Michael Caine and Shirley MacLaine.

Gambit wants to be a light-footed caper but ends up flailing and stumbling.
The script is by Joel and Ethan Coen, though the acclaimed team behind gems such as Fargo (1996) seem to be dialling it in here. Their trademark sharpness of wit and humour is hardly in evidence.
Maybe they knew it was not quite up to snuff because instead of them directing it, Michael Hoffman (The Last Station, 2009) took it on instead.
Colin Firth (The King’s Speech, 2010) tries his best in the role of the mousy fumbling Englishman. Too bad the lacklustre script does not give him much to work with.
A scene filled with naughty double entendres as Harry Deane talks about The Major feels tired and might only raise a weak smile or two at the most.
The bigger problem is the big fat zero in chemistry between Firth and Cameron Diaz (What Happens In Vegas, 2008), which means that the bantering and bickering between the two fall flat.
And she lays it on so thick for the role of a smarter-than-she-looks hick that PJ comes across as fake as opposed to spunky and likeable.
At least Alan Rickman (from the Harry Potter fantasy series) has some fun as the imperious boss who does not bother to disguise his contempt for Harry.
The caper flick also flirts with farce. In a mildly amusing sequence, Harry scampers about the classy Savoy Hotel without his pants on.
It could have been pushed even more, though, for bigger laughs.
The ending is not too satisfactory either, hinging as it does on an unlikely security system and even more improbable rodeo roping skills.
This Gambit could have done with more time on the drawing board.
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Tennis
Esplanade Theatre Studio/Last Friday
Tennis serve up images of sun, sea and surf with the laidback vibe of their retro pop.
It is not quite what one would expect given that the husband-and-wife duo of guitarist Patrick Riley and singer/key- boardist Alaina Moore are from Middle America Denver.
But they had taken a seven-month- long sailing expedition together and that trip has seeped thoroughly into their music.
You can practically smell the brine from the titles on their debut album Cape Dory (2011). From Seafarer to Waterbirds, the shore is never far away.
The chill and easy feel of their songs translated well to a live setting in which Moore and Riley were backed by a drummer and another guitarist.
Her voice tended to get overwhelmed by the music when she went for the low notes. But otherwise, her sweet-but- not-twee pipes, his Hawaiian shirt, the breezy melodies and the bouncy beats all helped to evoke a cosily specific time and space during the hour-long gig.
Tennis ventured further afield thematically on their second album Young & Old (2012) though they continued to play with a nostalgic pop sound.
There is more to them than nautical adventures even as the band remained on the move. Moore sang on It All Feels The Same: “Took a train to/Took a train to get to you”.
In between numbers, she did the talking. Referring to her mane of frizzy curls, she quipped at one point: “I hope you guys can appreciate what your weather does to my hair.
She had prepared some dance choreography for My Better Self but confessed that she “discovered the hard way” that she could not sing and groove at the same time. No matter, her fans were happy to see her self-described “high school dance talent show” moves.
There is a charming sunniness to their material that shines through even when the inspiration might have been something darker in the first place.
Moore explained that Marathon was one of the first songs they wrote and it came out of the scary experience of sailing at night. But the cascade of “ooh-ooh-oohs” that follows the line “Will we make it out alive” feels more comforting than distressing.
And Baltimore is actually about them facing the bleak prospect of being unemployed after college. The lyrics are stark as Moore croons: “Can we get a job, can we get a job/We need off this dock, is that asking a lot”.
She tells the audience cheerily though: “You should try starting a band cos somehow that worked for us.”
(ST)

Contradiction
Hanjin Tan

Disturb Love
Steve Chou

Hanjin Tan is a talented and inventive songwriter. But you would not know it from his latest Mandarin album, Contradiction.
Musically, the Hong Kong-based Singaporean has opted to go for a stripped-down approach here. But minimal does not have to mean single-minded and the mid-tempo guitar strumming on track after track gets repetitive.
I Love You leaves an impression, in part because it sounds more upbeat. Tan sings: “Happiness is loving you/I have no hesitation/The biggest decision in my life turned out to be so simple.”
There is no mistaking the honesty of his lyrics and his clear tenor pipes, but he could have made the going a little easier on the musical front. Check out Who Is Hanjin Tan? (2011) instead for a more compelling portrait of the man.
Still, a less-than-stellar record from Tan feels more vital than Taiwanese singer-songwriter Steve Chou’s new album, Disturb Love. There is greater diversity here in the music, which ranges from synth-pop to radio-friendly ballads, but it only runs the gamut from mildly pleasant to forgettably bland.
Rejection pairs a light-hearted melody with heavy-hearted lyrics and is one of the stronger numbers here: “The sky is dark, can the lights remain off/Let my defeated heart, possess total darkness.”
Album closer Not The Same repeatedly asserts the title sentiment – a point that should have been made by the material instead.
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Warm Bodies
Jonathan Levine
The story: R (Nicholas Hoult) is a zombie shuffling about aimlessly until he meets the lovely, and human, Julie (Teresa Palmer). When he decides to protect Julie instead of feasting on her as a second course after her boyfriend, it sets off a chain of events with momentous consequences for the zombie horde. Based on the 2011 novel of the same name by Isaac Marion.

There is life yet in the undead genre.
Shaun Of The Dead (2004) had previously mashed up genres and billed itself as a rom-zom-com, a romantic zombie comedy. On the other hand, the ongoing television series The Walking Dead has been pushing the boundaries when it comes to depicting gore and violence.
With Warm Bodies, writer-director Jonathan Levine, who last helmed the cancer comedy 50/50 (2011), still manages to give us something fresh.
The book’s zombie point of view has been preserved, the unusual perspective generating some welcome humour.
We first hear R voicing the thoughts in his head as he wonders why he is unable to connect with anyone. “Oh right, it’s cos I’m dead,” he concludes.
He might be a sensitive young man on the inside, but from the outside, R is like any other zombie – a growling shuffler who looks like death and smells of rot.
His initial encounter with Julie is less than promising. He is part of a pack of zombies attacking her and her friends and he ends up snacking on her boyfriend’s brain. That means that R also consumes his memories of Julie.
Hoult, the About A Boy star (2002) recently seen in Jack The Giant Slayer (2013), is charmingly gauche as he goes about trying to woo Julie. He is frustrated by his own inarticulation and, instead, plays retro music on vinyls to signal that there is more to him than the average zombie.
And, yes, the film has a perfectly judged soundtrack from the nostalgic rock of John Waite’s Missing You to indie darlings The National’s broodily atmospheric Runaway.
Palmer (Take Me Home Tonight, 2011), meanwhile, does a credible job with the role of the spunky Julie, who begins to question what she knows about zombies.
There is more to Warm Bodies, though, than just some fluffy piece of entertainment with a canny mix of young romance and the popular undead genre.
It can also be read as a take on emotional alienation and its cure. Ultimately, this zombie flick makes the same famous exhortation as English writer E.M. Forster: Only connect.
(ST)

Mosaic Music Festival
Grimes
Esplanade Theatre Studio/Last Saturday

She looked like a runaway Las Vegas child bride with a pink wedding veil over a black-and-gold T-shirt and black-and- pink short skirt. And the music of Grimes is likewise a mix of delicate innocence and knowing attitude.
Over 55 minutes, the 24-year-old Canadian artist served up a seamless serving of eight tracks as one flowed into the next. Most of them were taken off her breakthrough third album, Visions (2012), on which her sweet girlish voice floated over hypnotic synth lines and a pulsating bass.
Grimes was a captivating presence on stage. She danced to the music, sang, twiddled knobs and fiddled with dials. She teased and threatened on Vanessa: “Hey hey you wanna play/But baby I can go go”.
There was a youthful playful energy that held the sold-out crowd in thrall as they danced along. It seemed entirely appropriate when bubbles streamed into the air late in the set.
She also kept the transitions between numbers interesting. At one point, she seemed to be reciting an incantation. Whatever spell she was casting worked as the energy level in the room went up a notch when the distinctive intro for Oblivion kicked in.
The segue into Nightmusic had a totally different vibe. She worked herself up into a scream and the interlude that followed was like the soundtrack to a nightmare you wanted to dance to.
Sharing the stage with Grimes were one back-up vocalist and two dancers. One of them looked as though she had come straight from the now-defunct Mandopop club Dragonfly and her thrusting proved to be rather distracting at times.
Because of the way the set was structured, it felt like an abrupt break in the flow of the music when Grimes spoke.
The first time she said: “Oh, by the way, thank you for having me. I’m having the best time in Singapore.”
She then added: “I will now continue. As soon as I start talking, it starts going downhill.”
Later, she proclaimed that her second show of the night was better because “I’m more into it”.
Actually, her speedy bursts of speech were rather charming.
The encore number was her collaboration with dance act Blood Diamonds, Phone Sex. It was the most conventional sounding track of the night but everyone was having too much fun to care.
She made you think that running away with her would be a most exciting adventure.
(ST)

Ming Day
Ming Bridges
This is a calculated effort to break local singer-songwriter Ming Bridges into the Taiwan market.
Essentially, her bilingual debut record released here, Who Knows (2012), has been repackaged with more Mandarin numbers. The English tracks, with lyrics by Bridges, are collected on a second disc.
Chirpy, teeny-boppy numbers such as Under The Stars and Have To Love You commingle with radio-friendly ballads including Tears Fall Like Rain on the main disc. But they are all polished to a sheen that feels generic.
Instead, it is the bonus disc that gives one a better sense of Bridges as a person, whether she is bemoaning her bad luck in love on Sweet Misfortune or overanalysing things on Miss Thinkalot.
It is a pity this does not come through more on the Mandarin material. Balancing her unique personality with a commercial sound is something she will have to grapple with in the days ahead.
(ST)

Stand Up Guys
Fisher Stevens
In The Expendables (2010), a bunch of ageing action stars were assembled together for a pleasantly B-grade outing. Stand Up Guys brings together a couple of ageing wise guys, but to lesser effect.
Val (Al Pacino) is released from jail after 28 years and is picked up by his former partner Doc (Christopher Walken). Val wants to live it up by partying with booze and women and Doc obliges him.
They later spring their old getaway driver Richard (Alan Arkin) from a nursing home and proceed to raise a ruckus. Meanwhile, the clock ticks away as Doc has a mission to accomplish by 10am.
There is some humour milked from the fact that they are all getting on in years. When two of them break into a pharmacy to get some “boner pills” for Val, Doc casually picks up refills for his meds for various ills.
However, there is not enough tension to propel the movie forward and the dialogue is not deadpan enough for a black comedy.
Having assembled veteran actors Pacino, Walken and Arkin, director Fisher Stevens cannot decide whether this is The Bucket List (2007) for tough guys or a more conventional gangster flick. A missed opportunity.
(ST)

21 & Over
Jon Lucas, Scott Moore
The story: It is Jeff Chang’s (Justin Chon) 21st birthday and his high-school buddies Miller (Miles Teller) and Casey (Skylar Astin) surprise him by turning up at his college to celebrate the occasion. The festivities start with plenty of booze, take in a detour to a Latina sorority and end with Miller and Casey walking through campus with nothing on but strategically placed tube socks.
Turning 21 is a majorly big deal in America because that is the age at which one can drink alcohol legally.
No more mucking around with fake identification and trying to scam the bouncers, which means one thing – the way to liver-destroying levels of binge-drinking is now free and clear.
With similarities of heavy boozing and wild shenanigans, you could think of this as The Hangover (2009) for the recently legal set.
This is no mere coincidence as Jon Lucas and Scott Moore wrote the earlier hit comedy. They write and make their directorial debut here.
So yes, 21 & Over is a dumb and crass comedy but it also has a little heart and some smarts.
The dumb and crass part is quickly established when Miller and Casey meet before heading over to Jeff’s place. The two argue about having sex with Casey’s sister and that sets the tone for the level of humour found here.
And when Jeff gets on a mechanical bull and makes like a merlion, the projectile vomiting is lovingly captured in slow motion.
Not surprisingly, he is too drunk to be coherent. With an important interview the next morning on the line, his friends try to get him back home.
This is where the heart and smarts come in.
The central theme in 21 & Over is really about growing up and what happens to once-cherished friendships when everyone embarks on different paths after high school.
What start off as one-note roles – obnoxious and pushy Miller, sensible and stuffy Casey, over-achieving pre-med Asian guy Jeff – begin to feel like plausible characters struggling with the transition to adulthood.
The film also works because Justin Chon (The Twilight Saga film series, 2008-2012), Miles Teller (Rabbit Hole, 2010) and Skylar Astin (Pitch Perfect, 2012) are game actors who have no trouble making utter fools of themselves.
This is a spirited comedy in more ways than one.
(ST)

If You LuVVVVV Me
Eve Ai

Yellow Jacket
Rachel Liang

It seems British singer- songwriter Adele has become a favourite point of reference for Taiwanese female newcomers. First there was Jia Jia, who made her solo debut with Unforgettable (2013), and now there is Eve Ai.
Ai, the fifth champion of the singing competition Super Idol (2010-2011), certainly has a set of alluring pipes. She is also versatile enough to handle a variety of material from the sassy swing of Dark Angel (“I’m a dark angel, dark angel/ Observing which girl is too accommodating towards love”) to the lovely ballad Critical Juncture (“The critical juncture when love comes/See a sunny day I haven’t seen in a while”).
There is even an English track, Metal Girl, which she co-wrote. It is a jazzy number about toughening up in the face of heartbreak: “Like I said, when you’ve been through it, then you’re a metal girl/Lift your pride, girl wipe your eyes, girl let it shine.” Ai is definitely one to watch, Adele comparison or no.
Taiwan’s Rachel Liang, another star from the singing competition reality show circuit, is onto her fourth album.
I could not recognise who it was on Yellow Jacket’s cover when I first saw it – and that is a good thing. She was in danger of becoming too predictable with sweet vacant poses paired with records dominated by love ballads. The new disc sees her taking on upbeat numbers and she has had a styling makeover as well.
The title track is a cheery song about a cherished piece of clothing: “If god lets me bring just one item to a desert island/And I have 15 seconds to decide/I think I only have this quality product I can’t bear to leave behind.”
There are still ballads here, of course, and the standout is songwriter-producer Adia’s What Is Love with its slow-burn chorus: “I miss you, I miss you/Unable to break away/I love you, I love you/Unable to hold back.”
Yellow Jacket’s direction is a good fit for her.
(ST)