Heads

Romanticization: ヘッズ (Heads)
Author: Higashino Keigo 東野 圭吾
Artist: Mase Motorou 間瀬 元朗
Status: Complete
Span: 2003
Volume #: 4
Wiki page: none
Series can be read at: here


I haven't read anything overly serious in a while. Oh, this is not only serious, this is serious drama. Things take some pretty wild turns, and you are forever on the edge of the seat. I suppose that is why Higashino Keigo is such a successful mystery/thriller novelist in Japan. Many of his novels have been made into films. As to the artist, Mase Motorou, I rather enjoy his down-to-earth style. Makes everything more realistic, which is all the more terrifying.

Plot: Naruse Junichi is a gentle, shy young man who loves to draw and paint. Life often bullies him, and he just takes it passively without arguing. One day, he randomly gets the courage to ask out the girl who works in the art supply shop that he always visits (mostly because he's had a crush on her for a while and wants to see her). And she actually accepts. Life may finally work out for Junichi. He and Kei (the art shop girl) fall madly in love.

When he visits a real estate corporation for information on bigger apartments (so they can move in together), he is shot in the head by a robber when he attempts to save a little girl. Of course. The next time he wakes up, he's in a hospital. Apparently he became vegetative and went under a radical brain transplant and was subsequently revived. Everything seems miraculous as the crying Kei runs back into his arms and he recovers and is released from the hospital.

But then he gradually starts experiencing emotions that are not his own. Kei's freckles, which he used to love so much, now seem the flaw on an otherwise unremarkable specimen (yes, even his love for Kei seems to fade). He has random outbursts of reckless rage, and he now refuses to get screwed over by life. What exactly is causing all these changes? Who was the mysterious brain donor? What is going to happen to Junichi as his consciousness slowly loses out to the invader's thoughts and feelings?

The story is based on things that could happen in reality (though we are ages away from successful (?) brain transplants), but it has some faint flavours of science fiction and explores a lot of philosophical questions, all the while remaining a page-turning thriller. Junichi and Kei's love is also heartbreaking. Combined with the very fitting art style, this is one comic series that you do NOT want to miss. I'll also try to track down more novels by Higashino Keigo.

Iona - Sexy Dynamite in Elementary School

Japanese:イオナ―Sexy dynamite in elementary school
Artist: Sawai Ken 澤井 健
Status: Complete
Span: 1999
Volume #: 9
Wiki page: none
Series can be read: none

A shockingly little amount of information can be found on the web regarding this way hilarious comic series. The drawing can be quite beautiful and provocative when it's not gut-bursting, and the leading lady has a killer avant-garde sense of fashion. If you do not have two X chromosomes, do not be turned off -- her sense of fashion also leans dangerously toward the exhibitionist side. This is by no means an erotic series, but you do see quite a bit of skin sometimes.

Iona is a substitute elementary school teacher who has taken over a fifth grade class when the original teacher in charge takes a maternity leave. She comes to her first day of class extremely late and hung over. Oh, and she is also wearing a trench coat wearing only underwear beneath it. No, she's not a pervert exposer (fine, the jury is still out on that one). The pre-first day celebration caused her to drink too much, and by the time she woke up she was already late so she had no time to put on proper clothes. I know I know, sounds ridiculous. Just wait until you get to know her. And her students.

Shuu is the adorable boy she especially favours... for no particular reason. Shuu is a sensitive, occasionally shy boy with a sense of justice who is a pacifist and loves animals. At first he finds Iona's affection embarrassing, but with time he accepts her and develops an early-teen crush on her (honestly, with that body of hers it's no surprise). Shuu's mother died when he was little; now he lives with his widower dad who's pretty clueless and an older brother who takes care of the family (cooking, cleaning, laundry, etc) and seems pretty detached.

Youichi is Shuu's best friend with naturally red hair (being Japanese that's a big deal). Always the troublemaker, he has pretty atrocious grades and is not afraid to cut some corners to make his life easier. He also has an understanding of sex unexpected of an early adolescent. But when the chips are down, Youichi is still a good person. His mother seems a bit overweight, and he always pokes fun at her (accidentally?) for that.

Madoka is the stereotypical feminist class president who is pretty and headstrong and competitive and good at everything she does. She starts out hating Iona because she thinks Iona uses her sex appeal to get what she wants, and this debases all women. She comes from an upper-class family; her dad is a pediatrician with his own clinic, but her family is extremely matriarchal. Her mom basically calls all the shots and her dad lives eternally on tiptoes. It doesn't help that she lives with 2 sisters and a grandmother who are exactly like her. Madoka thinks Youichi is an idiot and the two constantly bicker, and in the comics world that can only mean one thing: romance. Their relationship gradually develops throughout the series.

Tetsuya looks very much like Puck from the new TV series Glee. He has a Mohawk and wears a baseball jacket all the time. Living with his divorced mother, he really misses his dad who has remarried and had more kids. He also does his best to cheer up his mother, who's a bit overworked and sad.

Ujiko. Oh Ujiko, poor Ujiko. She's a smart girl, likes to read (but not exactly nerdy), has good taste, but is a bit resentful toward the world because... she's so ugly. Her hair looks like two bundles of cauliflower and her face... oh her face. We meet her mom and dad, and only in comics can you do this: her facial features are the perfect mixture of her parents. Both her parents are normal looking, but they combine in the WORST way to form the catastrophe that is her face. And to make things worse, her little brother is extremely cute because he has the BEST combination (again, starting with the exact same features from the parents). Her parents seem to only see her little brother most of the time, and she feels adopted-- the fourth wheel on a tricycle. She is also extremely unlucky when it comes to animals (always the one bitten first).

Kimie, the shy clueless bespectacled girl who is nerdy-looking but pretty dumb in reality. Stumbles across explosive situations and sets them off without an idea of what's going on. Constantly being called an idiot, including by her best friend Ujiko. But the greatest thing about her is she's always pretty happy. And she probably has the most complete and functional family out of everybody.

Natsumi is the sickly pale girl who has asthma and is always sitting at the sideline during gym class. She's really pretty and dainty and soft-voiced so all the boys like to help her out. Madoka, of course, thinks she's a weakling and reinforces the negative female stereotype.

Alright, on to the main dish: Iona. She's a bit of a mystery; no one knows where she came from or how she got this job (she seems pretty underqualified, but she does prepare the students for tests really well). The old principal lets her have her way and gives her funding because he's impressed with her... physique (no, nothing too dirty ever goes on between the two). She's ever so glamourous, and she can change her outlandish outfits a few times a day. Weird thing is, her hair length and colour also changes with her outfits, but she doesn't seem to be wearing a wig (we get to know her hairdresser, Kimie's dad). She has a super conductive body and suffers a great deal from electrostatic shocks in dry or stormy weather. She drinks like a fish. She shows extreme favouritism (only toward Shuu). She's a terrible cook and often mooches off the students' parents' kindness. She's cheap on everything except when it comes to make-up and clothes. She lies, she's vain, she's bad-tempered, she's rude (sometimes). But somehow she always comes through when she is needed the most (though sometimes secretly it might be for her personal gain).

So the class has some spectacular (ly impossible) adventures together. There's a lot of brainy spoof on other comics and celebrities. The cover art for each chapter can be astonishingly creative and lively and beautiful. Some of Iona's outfits and poses.... *wolf whistles. And the chapter titles also capture the chapter content succinctly in famous sayings, usually in English, French, or Italian. Toward the end things started getting too mindlessly ridiculous, and I'm really not happy with the ending, but I admit it has a strange flavour and can have a very fitting interpretation. One of the strange things about this series: while it's exotic and impossible and outlandish, it also makes some very shrewd observations on life and has some scarily accurate portrayals of real people. All the families, each with its own problems and quirks, are extremely fun to watch. Adults are not necessarily always collected and calm; they have their extreme emotions too that they try so desperately to hide from each other and from their children. Iona's always honest with herself, and she rubs off on everyone she meets, no matter how much they hate or despise her initially. She may very well rub off on you too.

Night Watch / Day Watch (aka Nochnoy dozor / Dnevnoy dozor)

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
6.5/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
6.5/10

Year released: 2004, 2006
Runtime: 114, 132 minutes
IMDB page: here, here

This is supposed be the trilogy based on the popular Sergei Lukyanenko fantasy novels, but the last installment, Twilight Watch, is still being made. The films were great box-office smashing hits in Russia. And I can see why.

Plot: Anton is persuaded by a witch to curse his wife, who left him, supposedly pregnant with another man's child. This will come to have great repercussions on the Balance between Light and Dark. Through this incident, Anton becomes an Other (humans with supernatural powers who can enter the Gloom, a dimension superimposed on reality). He is on the side of Light and becomes part of the Night Watch (Light Others who make sure the Dark Others don't do anything out of line. Similarly, the Day Watch are Dark Others who monitor the Light Others' activities). The two sides keep a precarious Balance. It is prophesied that a great one will come and break the Balance, because he will choose one side over the other.

Cast: I'm not familiar with the Russian cast, but I'm impressed that they got everyone from Night Watch to come back for Day Watch, the sequel.

Script: The trilogy has been compared to Lord of the Rings, mostly because it earned more at the box office in Russia than LOTR. But the story is a bit more twisted and is like a mystery sometimes. And it actually makes sense at the end in terms of causality of events and the clever little clues that they left throughout the movies, so rewatch values greatly increase.

Production: It has a very gritty feel, exposing the less glamourous side of vampires and shapeshifters and other supernatural beings. The Night Watch drives a beat-up little van around that looks like the van from Ghost Busters. Their uniform looks a lot like Bill Murray's too. The fantasy elements are very much present, but the characters live in dingy little apartments, hold meetings in dingy little offices, have little problems like trying to quit smoking or ... bad hair and shedding. And you'd never know what kind of cool but destructive visual effects you can get from playing with a yo-yo.

I'm a bit pleasantly surprised with how much I liked the movies. Well, you have to be able to stand subtitles, because they certainly don't speak English.

Observe and Report

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
6/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
6.5/10

Year released: 2009
Runtime: 86 minutes
IMDB page: here

Most of the time things are funny in this movie with a slight tinge of sadness (in the pathetic sense). I watched this because it received a much better review than Paul Blart The Mall Cop.

Plot: Er... I'm a little bit confused myself to a lot of the things that happened in the movie. I know, it's supposed to be a not-too-smart comedy, but sometimes things feel so surreal. Ronnie is a security guard at a mall where a pervert has been exposing himself to women in the parking lot. After the ditzy slut Brandi at the cosmetics counter (who is the object of Ronnie's affection) suffers an encounter with the pervert, Ronnie feels his calling: to catch this pervert at all costs.

Cast: Seth Rogen is not the most handsome guy. We know that. But there's something charmingly down-to-earth about it. He's your guy-next-door who may not do the smartest things but can be nice to an old lady. Or give her a kick. Depending on if he's stoned or not. But he's sincere no matter what he does. Anna Faris, as Brandi, is a scary portrayal, slightly exaggerated, of what women can be sometimes. All of us know a few Brandies in our lives.

Script: The characters sometimes act irrationally... like, "Why would you do that? That doesn't make any sense." Yet you somehow understand where they are coming from. They are acting out a hyper version of reality, where you can discard common sense and do the things you want to. Well, not murder, only things that come close. The consequences may still be there, but you just don't have to think about them.

And really, can't we live like that in real life? Who's stopping us?

P2

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
3.5/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
4/10

Year released: 2007
Runtime: 98 minutes
IMDB page: here

A puzzling name for a movie, but once you find out it's a label for a level of a parking garage, there's about nothing left to the movie.

Plot: Angela is a workaholic in a large company in NYC. On Christmas Eve, she's the last one to leave from the office, trying to make it on time to her sister's house in Jersey, where her family is waiting. Her car refuses to start in the parking garage, and she asks the attendant for help. But the attendant is definitely NOT the normal, good-natured young man he appears to be...

Cast: Wes Bentley (from American Beauty) is properly psychotic as the attendant and his talent is quite wasted in this movie. Angela (Rachel Nichols, whose cleavage is impressive and whose profile looks a bit like Jodie Foster in the poster) is also a nice mixture of vulnerability and independence. The whole blond, slender pale limb thing really works to the character's advantage. So acting is not exactly the problem, then it must be the...

Script: Yes, that's where the problem lies. It's cliched, it's predictable, and you just know from the first moment on that the beautiful heroine with a fighting spirit is not gonna go down. Ugh.

Production: I would guess it didn't take THAT much money to make this movie. After all, everything happens in a vast parking garage, which did NOT explode in the end (a car does though). There is a nice visceral scene of a man being crushed to death, and that should elicit some ewww's from the audience. Really, I think the eerie, chilly, lonely, desperate feel that could be achieve in a vast dark cavern of a parking garage was not achieved.

Umm, not to be mean, but I want my hour and half back.

Sunshine

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
6.5/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
7/10

Year released: 2007
Runtime: 107 minutes
IMDB page: here

It's a fun sci-fi flick, a psychological thriller, if you want it to be. It's a philosophical outlook on religion and humanity if you want it to be. It's quite a versatile little gem with different facets.

Plot: A group of diverse (read: a lot of Asians) scientists/astronauts are sent on a mission to chuck a nuclear bomb into the sun to re-ignite the dying star and save all life on earth. The mission's chance of success is pretty low, and the crew's chance of survival is even lower. And their discovery of the spaceship from the previous failed attempt, crash-landed on Mercury, does not improve their odds.

Cast: Cillian Murphy has been one of my favourite actors since 28 Days Later. He can pull off the haunted look so well. Here he is suitably cast as the quiet physicist who reluctantly helps make some big decisions for the crew. And I learned that "Cillian" is pronounced with a "k," unlike my previous assumption. The cast has the special chemistry fermented as crew members who have spent the last 2 years (or something like that) on this isolated ship heading to a dangerous destination. They may not all like each other, but they are professional and oh so desperate to maintain order in this chaotic blackness of entropy. The relatively large number of Asian characters (Sanada Hiroyuki from The Last Samurai, Michelle Yeoh from Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Cliff Curtis, Benedict Wong) and the American accent are meant to represent that in the future, China and US are supposed to be the leaders in space exploration.

Script: Despite its sci-fi themes, the film is surprisingly relatable. Fear of death, battle to overcome nature/space, selfishness, guilt, idol-worship, insanity. The sci-fi elements are very much present and important, but the film doesn't get bogged down with esoteric details. It's credibly scientific, but the science is incorporated into the characters' motives and drives the story forward.

Production: Directed by Danny Boyle, before he won the Oscar with Slumdog Millionaire. The shots are distinctly in his style, jerky at times but draws you to connect the dots. The inside of the spaceship looks very serene and immaculately clean, but at the same time you get the sense of imminent doom because the film always reminds you the ship is the only thing keeping you away from the blackness of space, from instant death.

Sunshine shows a lot of details that trace their origins back to Alien and Solaris. And actually, Sunshine is almost a combination of the two: philosophical and dangerous.

In the Loop

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
7/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
8/10

Year released: 2009
Runtime: 106 minutes
IMDB page: here

If you are easily offended by lots of swearing, don't watch this. But then you'll be missing a great deal of fun. Not to mention the political satire and the creative cussin'.

Plot: Simon Foster, a bumbling British Cabinet Minister (Tom Hollander, the Mr. Collins from Pride and Prejudice, the Lord Beckette from Pirates of the Caribbean), accidentally put in a word of dissent on radio when it comes to the war the Americans might be thinking of starting in the Middle East. Malcolm Tucker, the Prime Minister's Director of Communications, immediately starts a foul-mouthed, very un-PC rant as he goes about trying to fix things with the Americans, who are divided into war proponents led by US Assist. Secretary Linton Barwick and opponents led by Assist. Secretary Karen Clark and General George Miller of the Pentagon (oh don't worry, all the names and titles are actually part of the fun that is politics). Leaks, war committees, bathroom sessions, intern sex, fax machine stomping and lots more hilarity ensue.

Cast: Oh God. So perfect. Anyone who can utter those long strings of sensible obscenities at a supercharged machine-gun rate can only be comedy incarnated in human flesh. Every look, every stutter, every awkward silence... bravo.

Script: Er... Things happen at a blazing speed, mostly because people talk really fast. This definitely requires multiple viewings to squeeze out all the flavour, all that British dry humour. It's such piercing satire on the massive machine of politics, how at the end of the day people in suits are much sillier than us the commoners. Except they wield the power on how to start wars with real guns.

Production: Some of the shots have a frantic frenziness to them, as if the whole thing is seen through the eyes of one giddy, overwhelmed intern. I can't wait for the DVD to come out and we can hear about the backstage stories on how this movie was made.

Awesome way to invest your hour and 46 minutes. But you've gotta be super alert to catch all the nastiness that transpires.

We Own the Night

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
5/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
4/10

Year released: 2007
Runtime: 117 minutes
IMDB page: here

A typical The Departed police drama wannabe. All the more tragic for the fact that it gets kind of close, only to fail epically.

Plot: Bobby (Joaquin Phoenix) is managing a hot shady nightclub in NYC for a Russian family. There's a bit of drugs involved, and Bobby is a user, but nothing too major, or so Bobby thought. He is a pretty decent person and has a long-term Puerto Rican girlfriend (Eva Mendes) whom he's genuinely in love with. But Bobby has a bit of dark family history: unknown to his circle of club friends, his father (Robert Duvall) is the police chief and his brother (Mark Wahlberg) is the police captain leading the narcotics team targeting the nightclub for some heavy drug trafficking. Caught between the two, where would Bobby's alliance come down?

Cast: Very respectable group of actors. Which makes this flop of a film even more puzzling. The acting is fine, really not the aspect causing all the problems for the film.

Script: I guess that's where the problem lies. The story is a bit ridiculous. The son of the police chief can end up managing a club for the Russian mafia? Why? You'd think the mafia is a tad bit better informed than that. The script really doesn't dive into the characters the way The Departed does. None of the characters are explored too deeply, and a lot of them are very vague and flat, like the girlfriend with the emphasized Puerto Rican background, a piece of information that just sticks out like a sore thumb because you really don't find out anything else about her. There's basically no history for any of the characters, and therefore you have a hard time caring for them.

Production: um, nothing remarkable. And also, I didn't get to see the special features to get to know the film better. Sorry.

The title is really vague overall. I still don't get what exactly it means, beyond the obvious. Maybe I didn't give the movie enough of a chance, because the whole time I was thinking "ugh, when does this end, cuz I really don't care how it all goes down..." The more terrible kind of gangster movie: boring and bland.

Whisper of the Heart (aka Mimi a Sumaseba)

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
7/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
7.5/10

Year released: 1995
Runtime: 111 minutes
IMDB page: here


Well, animated films will usually get really high ratings from me. I love the genre, the way things are presented. The animators are in TOTAL control of what appears on screen, which is both a good and bad thing. Good for obvious reasons, but also bad because they have to pay attention to every little detail, because there is no surprise, no spontaneity, nothing can possibly appear on the screen without meticulous planning, which makes it all the harder when a good animated film does appear organic and spontaneous and realistic. Japan traditionally does very well in this category, and Studio Ghibli, led by the famed animation master Miyazaki Hayao, can only be said to be the best of the bunch. Almost all films from of Ghibli come with high recommendations.

Plot: The heroine, Tsukishima Shizuku, is a 14-year-old junior high schooler who reads a lot and has a knack for writing. In many of the books she checks out of the library, she finds the name "Amasawa Seiji" (you have to put your name in the books you check out), who is apparently a very fast reader and has similar tastes in novels. Shizuku becomes curious as to who this mysterious Seiji is. One day, she follows a smart stray cat to a scenic neighbourhood on the top of a steep hill, where she discovers a neat little shop showcasing a doll, a cat dressed as a human baron. The shop is run by a friendly old man, and Seiji is apparently his grandson...?

Script: based on the comic series Mimi a Sumaseba by Hiiragi Aoi. It is just so sweet and innocent. The characters are struggling with the feelings that arise with adolescence, crushes for a special someone, uncertainty about what they want to achieve in life, all the good stuff. And these feelings are demonstrated with such details and sensitivity, with slight tastes of nostalgia and melancholy.

Production: You are constantly amazed by Ghibli's attention to details, the beautiful palette that they use to portray the ordinary as something you can relate to, even though it's 2D. If you have seen one Ghibli film, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Though, granted, a bit of the flavour is lost because a lot of the circumstances are strongly cultural so if you are not Japanese and have not lived in Japan, you might not get exactly how closely matched to real life these films are.

Watching Ghibli films is kind of like drinking tea. It's to be savoured, so it takes some patience. If you really just want to quench your thirst with some Mountain Dew (I know, soda just makes you more thirsty), then you are probably not a Ghibli person.

Revolutionary Road

Objective Rating (How much merit I think it deserves):
8/10
Subjective Rating (How much I personally like it):
6.5/10

Year released: 2008
Runtime: 119 minutes
IMDB page: here

Well, if you have heard anything about the movie, you know it's depressing, so you should be mentally ready before you start watching. If you are already having thoughts of suicide, perhaps you should wait till a happier day.

Plot: 1950's, suburbia in Connecticut. Married couple Frank and April used to love each other, but upon hitting 30, things begin to rot as they grow restless of their dead lives, as Frank is stuck at a boring desk job and April is stuck as a failed actress trapped with the duties of a housewife with 2 children. They want to live, to be meaningful, to dream. April makes the crazy suggestion that they sell everything and move to Paris, where they can finally start living. Frank hesitates but then agrees. Things perk up as they make the preparations, but a few unforeseen incidents and inevitable reality get in the way, and...

Cast: The first reunion of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet after the famed Titanic. Things are tragic in a very different nature. Love cannot conquer all, after all. Both have matured a great deal in acting. They are both really fine actors, but they just don't hit me personally, DiCaprio with his usual violent desperation and Winslet with her usual inner righteousness. Especially with Dicaprio... it's just so difficult to see him as anyone but Leonardo DiCaprio, be it in Gangs of New York or The Aviator or Catch Me If You Can (a remarkable exception is The Departed, where you can actually forget who he is). Point of note goes to Michael Shannon, who is brilliant and biting in his Oscar-nominated role as an emotionally honest mathematician sent to the madhouse by his parents.

Script: Based on Richard Yates' novel. Some of the lines are so poignant. The story is also quite universal, basically about the early onset of midlife crisis. Except the couple is only 30 years old, so they actually have real hopes of changing life to the way they want, which makes the crash to reality all the more harsh.

Production: Directed by Sam Mendes (American Beauty), who is also Winslet's husband. It's a period piece, so the set design and the costumes all have the 50's feel, quite authentic. Shooting on location instead of at a soundstage at a studio also makes it more realistic, though there is a cramped feel sometimes (a good thing, since it adds to the claustrophobic nature of the situation).

Like I said, it's a depressing subject matter. I recognize that it's really great material because it really makes you think, makes you feel for the characters and for yourself. To be able to generate that kind of powerful emotion in the audience is no easy feat. But I personally may not welcome that kind of emotion. To someone who has little faith in marriage to start with, this just confirms my worst fears about marriage and life in general. It's pretty much all downhill after the moment you are born. The characters are realistic, their dilemmas and the ways they choose to cope are realistic, and therefore their inevitable failures are realistic and all too uncomfortably close to our lives.