Microblog: A very long article Wikipedia article on the orientation of toilet paper [Jun 7th, 22:52] [R]

Tuesday, February 5th, 2008

Being John Malkovich

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120601/

© Imdb.com

Craig Schwartz, an unemplyed puppeteer, discovers at his new job place a door leading to John Malkovich's head. With Maxine, his new colleague with whom he just fell in love, he starts a business for people who want to be someone else for 15 minutes. His wife Lottie also tries the door and becomes immediately addicted to being a man. This happened while Maxine was dating Malkovich, and the two women fall in love in a strange fashion, leavin Craig out. But Craig sequestrates his wife at home and forces her to invite Maxine to meet Malkovich more often, while himself being John Malkovich and pretending to be Maxine. Craig soon discovers how not to get expelled out of Malkovich's mind after only 15 minutes, and becomes a permanent resident. Meanwhile, Lottie is adopted by Craig's former boss, who knows about the door, being himself a mind living in someone else's body. Malkovich changes his career from acting to puppeteering, but Maxine, pregnant, drifts away from home. Eventually, Maxine and Lottie meet again, Craig leaves Malkovich's head so that his former boss can continue his quest for immortality through renewed bodies. Craig wants to go back into Malkovich, but it is too late, and his mind goes into Maxine's baby instead, trapped forever.

[ Posted on February 5th, 2008 at 23:59 | no comment | ]

Saturday, January 26th, 2008

La marche de l'empereur

Translation: [ Google | Babelfish ]

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0428803/

© Imdb.com

Le manchot empereur migre tous les automnes vers l'intériieur des terres pour y retrouver sa compagne et pondre un oeuf. La femelle, épuisée, retourne alors pêcher pendant le le mâle couvre l'oeuf, puis elle revient nourrir le petit tandis que le mâle part à son tour se nourrir en mer. Enfin, les petits qui ne sont déjà plus si petits vont à la mer à leur tour pour se nourrir et commencer un nouveau cycle.

[ Posted on January 26th, 2008 at 23:45 | no comment | ]

Monday, January 21st, 2008

Jabberwocky

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabberwocky_%28film%29

© Wikipedia

Dennis Cooper is a cooper's apprentice who, after being disowned by his dying father, seeks a new trade in the city. Since the kingdom is threatened by a terrible monster, the king organises a tournament to find a champion who will go and kill the monster. After many misfortunes, Dennis ends up as the knight's squire and goes with hime after the beast. The knight is killed by another knight, sent in secret by the burgers of the city who considerer the monster as a asset to their business, but the second knight is in turn killed by the monster, and the latter is then killed by Cooper and by accident. Cooper gets half of the kingdom and the princess as his wife, although he'd wanted to marry a peasant girl who didn't even like him.

[ Posted on January 21st, 2008 at 23:17 | no comment | ]

Monty Python and the Holy Grail

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/Monty Python ]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Python_and_the_Holy_Grail

© Wikipedia

From Wikipedia:

King Arthur is recruiting his Knights of the Round Table throughout England. He is frustrated at every turn by anarcho-syndicalist peasants, a Black Knight that refuses to give up despite losing both his arms and legs, and guards that are more concerned with the flight patterns of swallows than their lord and master. Finally he meets up with Sir Bedevere the Wise, Sir Lancelot the Brave, Sir Galahad the Pure (also called "the Chaste"), Sir Robin the Not-Quite-So-Brave-As-Sir-Lancelot, and "the aptly named Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Film", and declares them the Knights of the Round Table. They are given a quest by God to find the Holy Grail.

After they split up, Sir Robin encounters a Three-Headed Giant, Galahad runs across the perils of Castle Anthrax, Sir Lancelot massacres a wedding at Swamp Castle, and Arthur and Bedevere encounter the dreaded Knights who say Ni. They each overcome their individual perils and reunite to face a bleak and terrible winter. Surviving the winter by eating Sir Robin's minstrels, they venture further to a pyromaniac enchanter named “Tim”, who takes them to a cave guarded by a killer rabbit.

After killing the vicious Rabbit of Caerbannog with the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch, the knights face The Legendary Black Beast of Aaargh, and cross the Bridge of Death that is guarded by “the old man from Scene 24”. Arthur and Bedevere survive to arrive at Castle Aaargh, and face the French Taunter once more. The film ends abruptly when a group of police from the 1970s interrupt the climactic battle scene to arrest Bedevere and King Arthur for the murder of Frank, the “famous historian”.

[ Posted on January 21st, 2008 at 23:04 | 1 comment | ]

Wednesday, January 16th, 2008

Les tontons flingueurs

Translation: [ Google | Babelfish ]

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://uk.imdb.com/title/tt0057591/

© Imdb.com

Fernand Naudin est un ex-truand reconverti dans le négoce de machines agricoles à Montauban. Sa petite vie tranquille va basculer lorsque son ami d'enfance, le Mexicain, un gangster notoire, de retour à Paris, l'appelle à son chevet. Celui-ci, mourant, confie à Fernand, avant de s'éteindre, la gestion de ses « affaires » ainsi que l'éducation de sa petite Patricia, au mécontentement de ses troupes et sous la neutralité bienveillante de maître Folace (Francis Blanche) son notaire, qui ne s'émeut pas trop de la querelle de succession à venir. Fernand Naudin doit affronter les frères Volfoni Raoul et Paul qui ont des visées sur les affaires du Mexicain : un tripot clandestin, une distillerie tout aussi clandestine, une maison close, etc. Fernand tente de faire rentrer les Volfono dans le rang, mais les attentats contre sa vie se multiplient malgré la paix signée entre les Volfoni et lui. On découvre rapidement que c'est le responsable de la distillerie clandestine qui tire les ficelles, et Fernand finit par s'en débarasser, en même temps qu'il marie Patricia et confie la gestion des « affaires » au père du marié, vice-président du Fonds Monétaire International.

[ Posted on January 16th, 2008 at 22:17 | no comment | ]

Friday, December 14th, 2007

Clockstoppers

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0157472/

© Imdb.com

A.J., read the end of this post.

Zak Gibbs' father is a physicist who is working on a watch-shaped device, sent to him by Earl Doppler, a former student of his, capable of accelerating the wearer so much that averything else seems immobile. That's called hypertime. Zak takes the watch without knowing what it is, but soon discovers its powers. He then discovers that strange people are searching through his father's papers. He meets Doppler while trying to escape them, and soon learns that since Doppler managed to escape from the bad guys (whose boss is incidentally called Mr Gates), they have kidnapped his father in order to continue the work on a device that prevents people in hypertime to get older at an accelerated rate. With Doppler's help, they enter the secret lab, wreak havoc, free Zak's father and get the bad guys arrested by the F.B.I. who was on its way anyway (the cavalry is always late…)

I watched the movie because it looked like SciFi from the description. And also because it was directed by Jonathan Frakes. But this movie is not something to be proud of, Number One (especially the part where a room full of nitrogen explodes because of a naked flame).

[ Posted on December 14th, 2007 at 23:38 | no comment | ]

Tuesday, October 23rd, 2007

Topaz

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/Hitchcock ]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topaz_%28movie%29

Wikipedia.org

From Wikipedia:

When an high-ranking Soviet intelligence officer defects to the West with a story of an agreement between the Russians and Cubans and the existence of a “mole” within the French intelligence service, CIA agent Nordstrom enlists the aid of his friend and French agent André Devereaux, encouraging him to accompany his daughter Michèle on her honeymoon with journalist François Picard as a premise to get him to New York. André accepts, but his wife Nicole is worried for him.

After managing to get hold of some seriously damning papers from the visiting Cuban official Rico Parra, in New York to appear at the United Nations and staying in Harlem to show solidarity with “the masses”, sneakily of course, a concerned Devereaux jets off to Cuba and catches up with his mistress Juanita de Cordoba, who is now secretly involved with a local underground movement whilst also being involved in another way with Parra. Parra finds out and kills Juanita. Devereaux then is recalled to Paris, where he attempts to get to the bottom of this whole leak problem. Michèle wants to reconcile her parents.

Nicole cheats on André after his Cuban affair with the man who proves to be the leader of the spy ring, “Topaz”, Jacques Granville, their old friend from their days together in the French Resistance. François goes on to find out who “Topaz” is by interrogating NATO official Henri Jarré. A short time late Michèle finds the murdered Jarré and François is missing. A short time later François arrives at Michèle and her parents and shows her a drawing of Jarré. Nicole knows him and tells André, that Granville is the head of “Topaz”.

[ Posted on October 23rd, 2007 at 18:07 | no comment | ]

Saturday, October 13th, 2007

Yin shi nan nu (Mange Bois Homme Femme)

Translation: [ Google | Babelfish ]

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.prathamam.org/index.php?rGAkn6RyrIlNXtDnJLUGFZYYQvH87XUWcKNY1Q8VstQWv0FVOpxvqSdiHtpfIuPx

© Prathamam.com

Un film d'Ang Lee (1994).

Chu est le meilleur cuisinier de Taipei, mais il souffre d'anosmie depuis longtemps, et c'est son collègue et ami Wen qui lui prête son nez. Chu a trois filles, une qui est prof de chimie, l'autre est cadre dans une compagnie aérienne et la troisième travaille dans un fast food. Les trois filles sont célibataires et vivent chez leur père, mais elles rencontrent toutes les trois un homme : pour la première, il s'agit d'un prof de sport, fraîchement arrivé au lycée où elle travaille, la deuxième (qui a un ex copain qu'elle revoit régulièrement), un collègue qui était auparavant en poste à Amsterdam, et la troisième récupère le copain de sa collègue qui n'avait pas l'air d'y tenir tant que ça. Quant au père, veuf depuis 16 ans, il tombe amoureux de la voisine, mère d'une petite fille à qui il prépare chaque jour un repas somptueux qu'elle emmène à l'école (la mère de la voisine avait bien essayé de lui mettre le grappin dessus, mais elle était vraiment trop insupportable).

[ Posted on October 13th, 2007 at 22:03 | no comment | ]

Thursday, October 11th, 2007

Monty Python s The Meaning of Life

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/Monty Python ]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Python%27s_The_Meaning_of_Life

Wikipedia.org

Too much to summarize. Check the Wikipedia article.

[ Posted on October 11th, 2007 at 18:32 | no comment | ]

Sunday, October 7th, 2007

Gedo Senki

Translation: [ Google | Babelfish ]

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.allocine.fr/film/fichefilm_gen_cfilm=109502.html

© Allocine.fr

« Les contes de Terremer » est un film de Goro Miyazaki, le fils de Hayao Miyazaki, d'après un roman d'Ursula K. Le Guin.

Sans raison apparente, le prince Arren tue le roi son père, s'empare de son épée et s'enfuit à travers le pays. Il rencontre en chemin un magicin, Épervier, qui l'accompagne jusqu'à une grande ville, qui est le royaume des traficants d'esclaves. Arren sauve la vie de Therru, une jeune fille traquée par les trafficants, mais il est lui-même pris un peu plus tard. Épervier le délivre et l'emène se cacher à la ferme de Tenar, une amie de longue date, chez qui habite (comme par hasard) Therru. Cette dernière a peur d'Arren, car elle voit le mal qui l'habite, mais ils finissent par devenir amis après que Therru aide Arren à prendre conscience qu'il a peur de la mort que cette peur est devenue partiellement indépendante du corps d'Arren. Quelques temps plus tard, les traficants d'esclaves arrivent chez Tenar, et prennent cette dernière en otage pour attirer Épervier chez Cob, un autre magicien, de qui il veut se venger. Cob est obsédé par la vie éternelle, et il est persuadé qu'Arren (qu'il a fait prisonnier et soumis à sa volonté) est la clé qui la lui donnera. Finalement, Therru part au chateau de Cob apporter son épée (magique) à Arren, et ensemble ils parviennent à défaire Cob. On apprend aussi que c'est Therru l'immortelle (et qu'elle est aussi un dragon, allez comprendre).

[ Posted on October 7th, 2007 at 23:05 | no comment | ]

Saturday, September 22nd, 2007

Rope

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/Hitchcock ]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rope_(film)

Wikipedia.org

From Wikipedia:

“Two brilliant aesthetes, Brandon Shaw and Phillip Morgan, plan the perfect murder inspired by lectures on the art of murder once made by their erstwhile housemaster, Rupert Cadell. They invite a former classmate, David Kentley, to their apartment for drinks, strangle him, and hide his body in a chest, thus, they believe, demonstrating their superiority. Straight afterwards they throw a party in their apartment. Among the guests are the victims father and aunt, his fiancee and her former boyfriend. Rupert Cadell also attends.

To impress Rupert and to gain his approval, Brandon subtly drops hints throughout the party about the murder of David, and begins a discussion on the art of murder. David, his connection to the guests and his curious absence forms much of the conversation during the evening.

In contrast to Brandon, Phillip gets more and more nervous throughout the party. Rupert quizzes him over Davids absence and some inconsistencies that have been raised: Phillip denied strangling a chicken at the Shaws farm when Rupert knows that he did. Phillip later complains to Brandon that he had a rotten evening (a reference to Ruperts probing, not Davids murder).

At the end of the party Rupert is handed another persons hat by mistake. In it he sees the initials D.K. (as in David Kentley) and becomes rather uneasy. Highly suspicious Rupert returns to the apartment after everyone has departed, claiming he has misplaced his cigarette case. When he arrives back in the apartment, he plants his cigarette case, finds it, but then stays to theorize about the murder of David, encouraged by Brandon who seems eager to have Rupert discover it. When Rupert lifts open the chest to reveal the body still tucked inside and realizes that his two former students have indeed murdered, he is horrified and ashamed of his own rhetoric that had led them to perform the morbid deed. He then takes Brandons gun and fires several shots into the night in order to attract police attention.”

[ Posted on September 22nd, 2007 at 22:06 | no comment | ]

Wednesday, July 25th, 2007

Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/Harry Potter ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0373889/

© Imdb.com

Harry is attacked near home by dementors. He protects himself by magic but he's then asked to defend himself in front of a court of wizards. The point is that the Minister of Magic refused to believe him when he claimed that Voldemort is back, and tries to silence him. He also meets the Order of the Phoenix, an organisation founded by Dumbledore to fight Voldemort over a decade ago, which all his adult friends are members of. Back at Hogwarts, Harry and his friends face their new teacher of Defense Against the Dark Arts, Dolores Umbridge, a member of the minister who reforms the teaching in order to prevent the students to learn any useful fighting magic and become “Dumbledore's Army” that would, in the Minister's paranoia, take over the Ministry. Therefore, Harry, Ron and Hermione decide to create a secret association for teaching proper defensive magic to the students, without Umbridge knowing. Harry also has weird dreams, induced by Voldemort, where he see Ron's father being attacked inside the Ministry while patrolling by night. At Hogwarts, the situation has become worse than ever, with Umbridge getting appointed Inquisitor, and then Headmaster. When Harry sees his godfather being killed by Voldermort in the Ministry, he decides to go there, along with his best friends. Umbridge tries to stop them, but they manage to get rid of her and fly to London, to the Ministry. There they fight Deatheaters, who are trying to get their hands on a prophecy on ehalf of their master. Harry manages to listen to it before it gets destroyed. It was about him and Voldemort not being able to be alive both at the same time, one having to kill the other. During the fight, Sirius gets killed. Then VOldemort himself comes and attacks Harry, who is saved just in time by Dumbledore. The Minister arrives on the ground just before Voldemort escapes; he now has to acknowledge his return.

[ Posted on July 25th, 2007 at 17:31 | no comment | ]

Sunday, July 1st, 2007

Solaris

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0307479/

© Imdb.com

Chris Kelvin is a psychiatrist who has been sent to the Solaris space station, located near an mysterious space stellar object called Solaris in order to investigate strange phenomena. When he arrives, the station is empty except for the captain and an engineer, all other crewmembers are dead. He soon discovers that his dreams (about his dead wife) are becoming reality i.e., a creature looking exactly like his wife appears in his cabin overnight. She doesn't know where she is or why she is there, though, but she remembers her husbands memories. The other crewmembers have experienced the same thing. The captain wants to get rid of the creatures, but Kelvin refuses to loose his wife a second time. She tries to commit suicide because she understands she's not real, but she resurrects, as it seems that the creatures cannot die. The captain has however built a device that desintegrate the creatures. The “wife” wants to use it on herself, but Kelvin won't let her leave the cabin, and even stops sleeping in order to keep an eye on her. He however gets eventually sick and she takes advantage of it in order to take her own life for good with the help of the captain. Some time later, they discover that the space station is being attracted towards Solaris and that they must abandon ship. They then discover that the engineer is actually a clone that had killed his human counterpart some time ago. And Kelvin discovers just before take off that he himself is a clone (he probably died when he was sick and dreamt himself alive). He then decides to stay on the station. When it enters Solaris, his mind joins the one of his wife ad they can be together again.

It seems that the director of the movie tried to compete with 2001: A Space Odyssey to make the slowest movie with the smallest amount of action where it is the hardest to understand what happens.

[ Posted on July 1st, 2007 at 12:58 | no comment | ]

Saturday, June 9th, 2007

Around the World in 80 Days

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.impawards.com/2004/around_the_world_in_eighty_days.html

© IMPAwards.com

Lau Xing just stole from the Bank of England a jade Buddha recently stolen from his village in China. Trying to escape the police, he enters at the service of Phileas Fogg under the made-up name of Passepartout. Fogg is an inventor who is ridiculled by Lord Kelvin, the head of the Royal Academy of Science. He then makes a wager with Lord Kelvin where the stakes are Lord Kelvins position against Fogg's giving up tinkering and inventing. The wager is about going around the world in 80 days (the idea being discretely suggested by Passepartout, who needs to bring the buddha back to China). They soon leave for France, where they meet Monique La Roche, a painter who wants to travel across the world to get inspiration. They are also followed by chinese bandits who try to recover the Buddha (it had been stolen by their leader, who is an accomplice of Lord Kelvin, who wants to colonize a part of China). They are also followed by Inspector Fix, a corrupt policeman, paid by Lord Kelvin to stop them, under the pretense that Fogg is the thief. Because of the bandits, they missede the Orient Express, but manage to catch it later using a hot air balloon. In Turkey they are “invited” by a local prince who then wants to keep Monique as his seventh wife. They manage to escape and go to India (whre they fight some Chinese thugs and Fix), then to China where Passepartout returns the Buddha (and fights some thugs). Fogg discovers that he has been cheated by both his valet and Monique, and decides to go on alone. He arrives in San Francisco, but gets robbed of all his money and clothes. He ends up as a beggar, until Passepartout and Monique find hime again. Together, they cross the desert, meet the Wright brothers, then arrive in New York, where they fight the Chinese thugs and their leader again. They defeat them, but miss their boat to England, and hire a small boat to attempt to cross the ocean. Lacking coal, the boat must resort to using sails, but it won't be fast enough. Fogg then builts a flying machine, inspired by the plans the Wright brothers had shown him. They at last arrive in London, crashing their plane in front of the Royal Academy, but Kelvin attempts to prevent them to enter the hall before noon, which was the time and place where they were supposed to end their trip. They are saved by Queen Victoria, who reminds them that because of their traveling east, they actually are one day earlier than they thought. They finally enter the building and Fogg wins the wager and Kelvin's position as Ministry of Science.

[ Posted on June 9th, 2007 at 01:22 | no comment | ]

Les rivières pourpres II – Les anges de l'apocalypse

Translation: [ Google | Babelfish ]

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.allocine.fr/film/fichefilm_gen_cfilm=47703.html

© Allocine.fr

Le mur d'une cellule d'un monastère lorrain se met à saigner lorsqu'un novice y plante un crucifix. Un maçon y est retrouvé emmuré, mur qu'il avait aidé à réparer quelques semaines plus tôt. Le commissaire Niémans mène l'enquêtei aidé du capitaine Reda. Un peu plus tard, un homme ressemblant étrangement à Jesus est retrouvé blessé par balle par la police, et un prêtre à la force surhumaine tente de l'assassiner à l'hôpital où il a été conduit. Puis un douanier et deux joaillers sont assassinés, suivis par l'administrateur d'un supermarché et quatre pêcheurs sont retrouvés noyés. Ces personnes étaient au nombre de douze, portaient les mêmes noms et pratiquaient les mêmes professions que les douze apôtres, et étaient des disciples de Jésus. Ce dernier, dans son délire, parle de l'apocalypse et des septs sceaux qui sont brisés un à un. L'enquête de Niémans le mène à une section de la ligne Maginot, qui a été occupée par les allemands et modifiée par ces derniers pendant la guerre. Avec l'aide d'une spécialiste des religions, Niémans apprend que les mystérieux assassins sont à la recherche du livre écrit des mains de Dieu, qui pourra être lu par celui qui brisera le dernier sceau. Ce livre avait été un trésor du Vatican et volé par Lothaire II puis enfoui dans un tombeau secret. La clé du tombeau, le sceau de Lothaire II, est en possession du douzième « apôtre », un prêtre, qui l'a récemment volé. Niémans tente de récupérer le sceau, mais les prêtres le devancent. Le tombeau avait été découvert par un officier allemand, Heinrich von Garten, pendant la guerre, durant des travaux dans les galeries de la ligne Maginot. Il tente maintenant de prendre possession du livre afin de créer une nouvelle Europe, blanche et chrétienne, en passant par la ligne Maginot. L'entrée originale du tombeau se trouvant dans le monastère, Niémans et Reda y pénètrent et tentent d'arrêter von Garten. Le socle sur lequel repose le livre est piégé, les galeries se remplissent d'eau et seuls Niémans et Reda parviennent à s'échapper. Le livre est détruit par l'eau.

[ Posted on June 9th, 2007 at 00:41 | no comment | ]

Thursday, May 31st, 2007

Octopussy

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/James Bond ]

http://dvdtoile.com/Film.php?id=808

© DVDToile.com

The MI6 has just obtained a fake Fabergé egg in East-Germany from the hands of a dying 009, and decide to investigate the murder. They discover that the real egg is going to be auctioned soon at Sotheby's, from an unknown origin. Bond goes to the auction and manages to replace the real egg with the copy and notice the buyer, Kamal Khan, who is usually a seller rather than a buyer. Bond follows him to his palace in India, where he meets him and lures him with the real egg, equiped with a transmitter. The egg gets stolen by Khan's girlfriend Magda and Bond is kidnapped and taken to Khan's palace where he remains a prisoner. Khan presents the egg to the mysterious Octopussy, who lives on an island populated only by women and who makes a living from smuggling jewels. Later, in Khan's palace, Bond manages to witness a dialog between Khan and rogue Red Army General Orlov, about making copies of a lot of Russian historical treasures and about an attack that will taking place in Karl-Marx-Stadt. Bond then escapes and pays a visit to Octopussy, where he discovers that she owns a circus that is currently in Karl-Marx-Stadt. Going there, he learns that the circus is going next to West-Germany on a U.S. military base, and that the jewels are hidden on the circus'train. The wagon hiding the jewels is however secretely switched with another one, identical the the first one, except that it holds an nuclear bomb instead of the jewels. Bond discovers that Orlov's plan is to detonate the bomb in the U.S. base, to make it look like an accident and discredit the U.S. presence on German territory. Once the americans would have left, Europe would be vulnerable enough to be invaded by the Soviet Union. Bond manages to disamorce the bomb and to follow Khan back to India where he is preparing to flight. With the help of Octopussy's troops (who have been betrayed by Khan) he attacks Khan's palace, chases him to his airplane, saves Octpussy who had been made prisoner during the attack and get rid of Kahn.

[ Posted on May 31st, 2007 at 00:18 | no comment | ]

Friday, May 18th, 2007

An Inconvenient Truth

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0497116/

© Imdb.com

This documentary features Al Gore (the same ex-next president of the U.S.) lecturing about global warming, interspersed with pictures and clips from different locations and various topics. Gore basically tries to convice americans that global warming is actually hapenning despite the claims of the current government, and shows various scientific proofs (CO2 levels in the atmosphere in the past 650,000 years, temperature levels over the same period…). He also explains the consequences of global warming on the natural disasters such as hurricanes (getting more powerful when passing over warmer sea) and drought (caused by higher evaporation due to higher temperatures), on the desynchronisation of the birth of baby birds and of caterpilars, their usual food, as well as the influence of the melting of ice crusts in Groenland and Antarctica on sea currents (especially the Gulf Stream), which could disappear if the sea gets colder because of more intensive melting of the ice. He also accuses the big corporations to try to hide the scientific results proving the existence of global warming, the same way the tobacco industry tried in the past to deny and hide the existence of a link between smoking and lung cancer. Finally, he gives some hints to the audience about what to do in order to produce less CO2, showing that the technologies are available but the U.S. refuse to use them, putting the country behind most other countries in the world on that matter, including China.

The movie was interesting, well built and easy to understand. I wonder though if Gore has a political agenda, because he's so many times pointing fingers at the current administration and its supporters.

[ Posted on May 18th, 2007 at 16:00 | no comment | ]

Friday, May 4th, 2007

Hauru no ugokushiro (Le château ambulant – Howl's Moving Castle)

Translation: [ Google | Babelfish ]

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0347149/

© Imdb.com

Sophie, une jeune femme, a été victime d'un sort jeté par la sorcière des terres perdues : elle est devenue vieille. Elle décide de quitter la ville et de partir à la recherche de la sorcière pour lui demander d'annuler le sort. Le chemin est ardu, et elle finit par trouver refuge dans le château ambulant de Howl, où elle fait connaisance de Calcifer, le démon de feu qui fait fonctionner le château et l'empêche de s'effondrer, et de Michael, l'apprenti de Howl, et de Howl lui-même, qui est sous l'emprise d'un terrible maléfice. Devant le désordre et la crasse du château, elle se proclame femme de ménage et entreprend de nettoyer le château. Au fil du temps qui passe, elle fait davantage connaisance avec les habitants du château. Un jour, la guerre éclate et le roi fait demander à Howl de se battre pour le royaume. Howl est un couard, et Sophie se propose de se faire passer pour sa mère et d'aller expliquer à la reine qu'il ne peut pas se battre parce qu'il a trop peur. Sur le chemin du palais royal, Sophie rencontre la sorcière des terres perdues et lui demande d'annuler le sort. La sorcière prétend ne plus se souvenir comment l'annuler. Tandis que Sophie explique son cas à la reine, la sorcière est victime d'un sort anti-magie protégeant le palais et perd toute sa magie ; elle devient vieille, montrant son age véritable, et passablement gaga. Sophie la prend en pitié et l'emmène habiter avec elle chez Howl. Howl est tombé amoureux de Sophie (il a d'ailleurs remarque que lorsqu'elle dort ou exprime ses sentiments, elle redevient temporairement jeune) et redécore le château par magie pour donner davantage de place à ses nouveaux habitants. Il se confie aussi à Sophie qui apprend qu'il a perdu son âme, volée par Calcifer, lorsqu'il était enfant, en échange d'une grande puissance magique. Lorsque la guerre se rapproche du château et menace de le détruire, Sophie évacue tout le monde, y compris Calcifer, ce qui provoque la destruction du château. La sorcière tente de s'emparer de l'âme de Howl en prenant Calcifer pour la garder pour elle, mais Sophie réussit à rendre son âme à Howl et à libérer Calcifer du contrat qui le liait au sorcier.

Je croyais que Chihiro était passablement délirant, mais ce film là est encore pire. Le seul vrai reproche que je lui ferai c'est le scénario trop touffu et le manque d'explications par endroit, qui fait nettement ressentir qu'il s'agit d'une adaptation d'une œuvre beaucoup plus complexe (un roman de Diana Wynne Jones). Le pire est probablement l'épouvantail qui, d'un baiser de Sophie, se transforme en Prince Charmant et annonce qu'il est justement le Prince du pays voisin et qu'il va rentrer chez lui pour arrêter la guerre. Ça tombe vraiment comme un cheveu sur la soupe.

[ Posted on May 4th, 2007 at 00:31 | 2 comments | ]

Tuesday, May 1st, 2007

Cowboy Bebop: The Movie

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0275277/

© Imdb.com

A truck containing an unknown toxic explodes on the motorway, killing numerous people from an unknown disease. Faye, hunting another pery, manages to catch a glimpse from the driver of the truck, who then disapears mysteriously. Later, her and Spike learn that the driver is worth a huge bounty. Spike and Fay investigate separately. Spike discovers that the mysterious disease is actually caused by a bioweapon made of nanomachines hidden in lymphocyts. The bioweapon is secretely manufactured by a pharmaceutical lab which tries to hide the existence of the weapon and its vaccine. Meanwhile, Faye manages to find the lair of the mysterious truck driver, but she's made prisoner by him. Helped by Electra, a security agent from the pharmaceutical laboratory who has learned too much about it employer and has been disavowed. They are thrown in a cell, but manage to escape and take with them numerous doses of vaccine that they are going to spread over the city on Halloween night, which is the time and place chosen by the truck driver to contaminate all the inhabitants. His plan fails, and he is confronted by Spike. He then tells Spike that he was a soldier sent to Titan as a guinea pig to test the bioweapon. He was the only survivor, and he's very angry about the whole world. Spike defeats him, and everything ends well, more or less.

[ Posted on May 1st, 2007 at 11:25 | no comment | ]

Thursday, March 15th, 2007

The World is not Enough

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/James Bond ]

http://eu.movieposter.com/poster/A70-8302/World_Is_Not_Enough.html

© MoviePoster.com

Bond recovered a large sum of money belonging to Sir Robert King, a personal friend of “M”. When getting close to his money at MI6 headquarters, King gets killed by an explosion; the bank notes have been covered with an explosive triggered by King's lapel pin, which had been replaced by a fake. While investigating about King, Bond notices that the money he retrieved is exactly the sum that had been paid as a ransom to free King's daughter Elektra some time ago. M had helped King to retrieve his daughter, but had refused to pay the ransom, rather using the daughter as a bait. The kidnapper was Renard the Anarchist, who took a bullet in the brain when MI6 was trying to kill him, after Elektra managed to escape. The bullet is moving towards the center of the brain, making him progressively loose his sense of touch and smell and insensitive to pain. M sends Bond to protect Elektra. He meets her at a pipeline construction site inherited from her father in Azerbaidjan but she refuses his help, not trusting MI6 anymore. Bond later saves her life from an attack; he also tears a piece of cloth bearing a russian marking from one attacker. He then meets Valentin Zukowski, an acquaintance of his in his casino in Baku. Zukowski recognizes the marking as that of an antiterrorist unit of the Russian ministry of energy. He tells Bond that Elektra's pipeline has several competitors who may be willing to get rid of her. Later, while snooping around Elektra Bond notices that her chief of security is somehow related to the former attackers. He follows him and takes his place at some meeting with who were waiting for him. They trust him and take him to a facility in Kazakhstan where nuclear weapon are being disabled and destroyed. He meets there Dr. Christmas Jones, the nuclear scientist in charge of the process and pretends to be a Russian scientist. Bond notices that Renard is also working at the facility and is trying to steal plutonium. Renard manages to escape with a nuclear head, blowing up everything, and Bond and Jones barely escape themselves. Bond then suspects that Eletktra and Renard are actually working together because of something they both said in different occasions, but Elektra convices him otherwise. Elektra then lures M to Baku and kidnapps her, while Bond is sent with Jones to investigate a possible terrorist attack in the pipeline. Instead of defusing the bomb (which appears not to be nuclear), he lets it explode in order to make Elektra believe that he is dead. They then go meet Zukowsky again on the Caspian Sea, because Bond made a connection between him and Elektra. Zukowsky admits providing her with material with the help of a nephew of his who is the captain of a russian submarine. He also tells Bond that they are currently in Istanbul, and takes them there. They then discover that Renard has taken over the submarine and plans to put the plutonium into its nuclear reactor in order to provoke a meltdown that would look as an accident. This would destroy all the pipeline of King's competitors. Bond and Jones get then caught by Renard because of Zukowsky's assistant being an accomplice of him. Jones is taken to the submarine while Bond is left with Elektra who tries to torture him, but he is saved by Zukowsky who died just after. Bond kills Elektra and manages to enter the submarine. There is then an big fight between Bond and Renard; Bond wins and saves the world.

[ Posted on March 15th, 2007 at 01:27 | no comment | ]

Friday, February 16th, 2007

The Bourne Identity

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0258463/

© Imdb.com

A fishing boat saves a man from the sea. The man has two bullets in his back, a small device under his skin which shows a Swiss bank name and account number and no clue about who he is. After reaching the shore, the man spends the night in a public park where he's awoken in the middle of the night by two policemen. Without even thinking about it, he fights them barehanded and flees. The next morning, he goes to the bank in Zürich and finds in his safe a collection of passports, loads of money in various currencies and a gun. He learns that his name is (probably) Jason Bourne. He leaves the gun and goes to the US embassy, just in time to escape the Swiss police. There he is about the be arrested again but manages to escape, with the help of Marie, a girl who had trouble at the embassy. They go to Paris, where Bourne has an appartment. There, they get attacked by an unknown man crashing through the window, but the man dies before Bourne is able to interrogate him. Before the attack, Bourne manages to find a trace of his past: he has spent time in a hotel under another identity, and he is supposed to be dead. Marie manages to get a list of the phone numbers he called when he resided at the hotel, which gives him a clue about what he did in the past: getting interested in a boat owned by a former African dictator, buying diving equipments… During the night, the ex-dictator is assassinated, and Bourne understands that he had been sent by the CIA to kill him (because the man threatened to expose the CIA actions in Africa if they didn't help him to get back to power) but failed. Bourne and Marie then go the morgue to see the body, but it has been taken away already. They then flee together barely escaping the French police. Marie manages to reach a former boyfriend who lives in the countryside, where they find shelter for one night. The next morning, Bourne notices that someone is watching them and will probably try to kill them. He finds and neutralizes the killer, from whom he learns nothing except the name “Threadstone”. He sends Marie to hide with her friend, then uses the mobile phone of the killer, to contacts whoever had ordered him killed and gives him an appointment in Paris. Bourne doesn't show at the appointment, but uses the event to follow the man (his former boss) to a CIA hideout where he almost got killed again. He however learns that he has been specifically trained to be the perfect invisible killer (the Threadstone project), and his memory comes back to him: he was supposed to kill the ex-dictator and put the blame to one of the man's collaborators, but didn't complete his mission because children were present on the scene. Bourne's boss is then eliminated in a CIA attempt to conceal the failure of the Threadstone project. At the end, Bourne finds Marie again somewhere on the Mediterranean coast.

Loads of car chases, fight scenes, stereotypical camera movements, and a disappointing plot. But I really liked the Richard Chamberlain version TV movie when I was a kid.

[ Posted on February 16th, 2007 at 01:19 | no comment | ]

Tuesday, December 12th, 2006

Mission Impossible Versus the Mob

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.movieart.se/s_posterdetails.asp?s_ID=433

© Moviearts.se

Frank Wayne, the big boss of the mafia, is movig all his money to Switzerland, costing much to the State. The IMF attempts to stop him. Jim Phelps plays an investigator from the Senate who harrases Wayne and finally arrests him. Wayne is switched with Rollin Hand, disguised as Wayne. Rollin is then gettin his real face back under the cover of instant aesthetic surgery performed by Cinnamon Carter, who is actually only removing his makeup. Againts the will of the Organisation's council, Wayne/Hand orders his henchman to kill the investigator by exploding his car. Phelps escapes the attack thanks to a trapdoor in the bottom of the car, leading to a sewer opening on top of which the car was parked. Meanwhile, Hand manages to open the safe of Wayne's office in which all the Organisation's ledgers are hidden. Wayne's is then sentence to death by a full council, but Wayne/Hand manages to escape through one elevator. Barney Collier had previously fixed the elevator so that it is synchronized with the one just next to it. Hand crawls into the second elevator while both are descending, rejoining his associates, and the real Wayne (sedated until then) is put back into the first one and reanimated. When the elevator reaches the underground parking lot, Wayne wakes up just in time to be killed by his henchman. The IMF members leave the place unnoticed just as the police arrives, called earlier by Cinnamon.

[ Posted on December 12th, 2006 at 00:30 | no comment | ]

Sunday, December 3rd, 2006

Casino Royale

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/James Bond ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0381061/

© Imdb.com

James Bond's first mission as a 00 agent. A mission in Uganda fails lamely when Bond wrecks havoc in an embassy while supposed to spy on a terrorist. Asked by MI6 to take some time off, he continues his investigation which leads him to the Bahamas, and from there to the Miami's Airport, where a new prototype plane, scheduled for test flight is the target of another hired terrorist. The attacks are ordered by Le Chiffre, the banker of the world's terrorist organizations, who invests his customer's money in hasardous financial gambles. Because of Bond's intervention, he just lost all the money of an Ugandan rebel chief. In order to regain money, Le Chiffre organizes a high stakes game of poker in a casino in Montenegro. MI6 sends Bond there, since he's the best card player of the service and Le Chiffre's loss would destroy his organization, accompanied with Vesper Lynd, from the Treasury, who is assigned to keep an eye on Bond's spendings. The game is interrupted by pauses, during which Bond is almost killed by the Ugandan rebel wanting his money back from Le Chiffre and poisoned by Le Chiffre who doesn't want Bond to win the game. Bond barely escapes the latter attent to his life, and finally wins (thanks to Felix Leiter, a CIA agent who extended Bond's credits after Lynd refused). Vesper Lynd gets then kidnapped by Le Chiffre and Bond rushes to save her, but he gets caught and tortured by Le Chiffre who wants the password that would give him access to Bond's bank account that was setup for the poker game. Bond's life is saved just in time by an unknown third party. He then leaves to Venice with Vesper (with whom he desperatly fell in love). She however betrays him, withdrawing all Bond's (and Her Majesty's) money and brings it to an unknown character. Bond follows her, but is attacked by the henchmen of the unknown one. He doesn't get the money back, and fails to save Vesper's life who commited suicide rather than facing Bond. He then learned that she was trying to save the life of her fiancee, who was kidnapped by terrorists (the same ones she made a deal with that saved Bond's life when tortured by Le Chiffre). Vesper however had left Bond a note before leaving to the bank, setting him on the trail of Mr. White, the one who took the money in Venice. Bond tracks White down, gets the money back and his takes hie revenge on him.

The script is quite similar to Ian Fleming's Casino Royale novel (although terrorists, poker and Montenegro replace respectively the russian spies, baccara and the french riviera, not mentioning the abusive usage made of mobile phones, the Internet and electronic gadgets). The movie is quite different from the others by its structure (the poker game is central to the story although there is no action, except during the breaks) and the fact that Bond fells in love. Also, it is definitely a prequel to the series, but at the same time, it is clearly set in time after the previous episodes…

[ Posted on December 3rd, 2006 at 23:39 | 1 comment | ]

Friday, October 20th, 2006

Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0325703/

© IMDB.com

The Cradle of Life is the second Tomb Raider movie. An earthquake in Santorini reveals an ancient temple built by Alexander the Great. Lara Croft goes there and discovers a strange, luminous orb. As soon as she manages to pick it up, she is attacked and the orb is stolen while an after shock destroys the temple. The thief is a Chinese gangster who is acting on behalf of the real bad guy, a bio-weapon manufacturer: the orb is a map leading to the cradle of life, where Pandora's box is located. Lara then gets a former boyfriend of her out of prison who will help her to get to the gangster. She manages to learn that the orb is en route to Shanghai where it is going to be sold. Lara can't get the orb back, but a tracer she managed to put on the orb's crate leads her and her friend to Hong Kong. There she steals the orb from the bad guy's secret lab (located in the middle of a shopping center). There she dumps her friend, because he's too unreliable. Decoding the map on the orb leads her to the foot of Kilimanjaro, where she is soon followed by the bad guy and his army. The army is wiped out in a valley full of strange monsters, but Lara and the bad guy manage to enter the cradle of life (a maze of caves where gravity is not following the usual rules). The bad guy forces her to get the cradle out of a lake of black acid (supposedly Pandora's tears after she opened the box), but Lara's friend arrives just in time to save her. Alas! He wants the box for himself (ain't he stupid!), so Lara kills him. She puts the box back to the lake. End of story.

The first Tomb Raider movie was nicely bad, this one is just plain bad. It looks like a video game, with completely useless shooting scenes which looks just like a “shoot all the targets” sequence in a video game.

[ Posted on October 20th, 2006 at 00:34 | no comment | ]

Monday, October 16th, 2006

Doctor Who and the Daleks

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0059126/

© IMDB.com

Doctor Who and the Daleks is the first Doctor Who movie. The Doctor has invented the TARDIS, a machine for travelling across time and space. The fiancee of the Doctor's niece accidentally triggers a journey to a random place and time. The travellers arrive to a planet where the vegetation has been fossilized. All but the Doctor want to go back where they come from, but the Doctor simulates a failure in the TARDIS to convice them to go and explore the city, pretending to go there and look for tools. They are made prisoners by the inhabitants of the city, the Daleks. A nuclear war has made the life on the planet almost impossible. The Daleks have then build individual, mobile protective suits that look like conical robots on invisible wheels (with an insufferable voice). They send the Doctor's grand-daughter to go and meet the Thals, the other people on the planet, who have an antidote to radiation poisoning. Their goal is to get a sample of the medicine, synthetize it themselves and get rid of their suits. The Thals, in need for food, are willing to help the Daleks and give the medicine. In return, the Daleks lure them into a trap (pretending to give them food), but the Doctor manages to warn them before they all get exterminated. Since a vital component of the TARDIS is still in the hands of the Daleks, the Doctor manages to convince them to attack the city. The fiance and a couple of Thals are entering from behind (following the pipes that bring water into the city) while the others show themselves in the front. They finally manage to enter the city and destroy the Daleks (but I don't remember how) before the latter can launch the bomb they intended to exterminate the Thals with.

[ Posted on October 16th, 2006 at 22:06 | no comment | ]

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/Harry Potter ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0330373/

© IMDB.com

Fourth Harry Potter movie, The Goblet of Fire starts with a scene showing Voldemort growing strong again. It then continues with the usual heroes going to the Quidditch worldcup (without actually showing any part of the game) followed by an attack of Death Eaters on the encampment where the spectators have spent the night. The heroes then go back to Hogwarts, where the usual new teacher of Defence Againts the Dark Arts (Alastor Moody) is presented, along with the visiting students from Durmstrang and Beauxbatons. Soon after, Dumbledore announces the Triwizard Tournament, which will oppose one champion from the previous schools plus Hogwarts and presents the Goblet of Fire where the candidats must put a paper with their names. The Goblet will later choose the three champions. Unexpectedly, the Goblet spits out four names, the last one being Harry Potter's. All his friends think he has been cheating and start to loath him. Soon after, Harry is shown by Hagrid that the first task of the tournament will be to fight dragons. Harry gets the nastiest of the four, but manages to get the golden egg it was protecting, supposedly giving him a clue about the next task. When he opens the egg, however, all that comes out is a shrieking noise. Meanwhile, their new teacher of Defence Againts the Dark Arts introduces the heroes to the three unforgivable curses (which allow torture, mind control and killing). During the Yule Bal, Ron manages to get Hermione even angrier at him. Harry later gets a tip from Cedric, his co-champion from Hogwarts, that the egg must be opened under water. The next task involves the lake and mermaids: he must dive in the lake during one hour to save his friend Ron, prisoner of the mermaids. Instead of getting immediately to the surface, he checks that all the other victims are taken up, and finally saves the sister of Fleur Delacour (the Beauxbatons' champion) who had to give up soon after the beginning of the task. He finishes last, but is still granted second place for “high morale fiber”. Meanwhile, the creative articles of the Daily Prophet about Harry increase Ron's hate towards his friend, and Harry discovers that Barty Crouch, an official from the Ministry of Magic who is supervising the tournament and has mysteriously been killed just after the second task, had sent his son to prison for being a Death Eater. Finally, it is time for the third task: the champions have to enter a labyrinth and get to the Triwizard Cup located at its center. Harry and Cedric get to the cup at the same time and find themselves transported to a cemetary where Cedric is killed by a sycophant of Voldemort, while Harry is made prisoner and a drop of his blood is used to give Voldemort back his strength. Voldemort forces Harry into a duel with him, but Harry manages to escape thanks to the help of the fantoms of his father, his mother and Cedric. When he is back in Hogwarts, he is taken away by the teacher of Defence Againts the Dark Arts, who actually is Barty Crouch Junior who had escaped form Azkaban and was drinking Polyjuice potion all the year long to look like the real Moody. Thankfully, Dumbledore and other teachers arrive just in time to save Harry. At the end of the movie, Dumbledore warns the students that Voldemort is back (although the Ministry refuses to acknoledge it), and Ron, Hermione and Harry are friends again.

The movie is mostly an action movie, jumping from one task to another, like the second movie did. One barely feels the time flowing through the school year, and the background details about Voldermort and his history are barely mentioned. In the Star Trek movie series, the odd-numbered episodes are bad while the even-numbered ones are good; in Harry Potter, it seems to be the opposite.

[ Posted on October 16th, 2006 at 22:02 | no comment | ]

Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0312004/

© IMDB.com

Fourth Wallace and Gromit movie, The Curse of the Were-Rabbit is about Wallace and Gromit working as pest control specialist who protect a small town from all the rabbits that want to eat the vegetables grown by the inhabitants for the coming vegetable competition. But instead of killing all these cute, fluffy little bunnies, they store them in their cellar, and the lack of space becomes a problem after they “de-rabbit” the gardens of the local Lady, organizer of the competition. Wallace then decides to brainwash the rabbits (with his latest invention) in order to make them forget their love for vegetables. The experiment fails, and Wallace creates a monster. Soon a giant rabbit, identified by the local priest as a were-rabbit, wrecks havoc in the town, eating all the vegetables. Wallace and Gromit try to catch it, but it manages to elude them. During the chase, another local noble, a hunting maniac who promised to kill the were-rabbit, discovers that the were-rabbit is actually Wallace, something that Gromit learns a bit later, just after discovering that the rabbit that was turned into a monster actually resembles Wallace in his love for cheese. During the competition, the were-rabbit reappears, the hunter tries to kill it while Gromit tries to protect it. Gromit finally wins, but Wallace seems to be dead. He is revived thanks to the smell of a very strong cheese, which also cures him from being the were-rabbit. Finally, the Lady turns her gardens into a rabbit sanctuary, for all the rabbits that Wallace and Gromit had caught.

[ Posted on October 16th, 2006 at 21:57 | 1 comment | ]

Daleks' Invasion Earth: 2150 A.D.

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060278/

© IMDB.com

Second Doctor Who movie, Daleks' Invasion Earth: 2150 A.D. starts with a robbery in London. A policeman is knocked out before he could have done something and fails to stop the thieves. He then enters a police public call box that happens to be the TARDIS and finds himself in London 2150 A.D. The city is destroyed, the Daleks have invaded Earth and are enslaving people to dig a well in an old mine somewhere not too far from London. Some humans are turned into robomen that serve the Daleks. Doctor Who and the policeman are taken prisoner while his niece and grand-daughter are taken by the rebels. The latter try to raid the Dalek's mothership, disguised as robomen, but the attack fails. The Doctor is free, but the niece and the policeman are still in the ship as it takes off. The rebels then flee London, while the Doctor goes on foot to the mine. The grand-daughter and another rebel try to join the other rebels, but are arrested by the Dakeks on the way and taken to the mine. Meanwhile, the niece and the policeman manage to leave the mothership unconspicuously and join the Doctor who is hiding in a toolshed on the mine's grounds. The goal of the Daleks is to explode a bomb in Earth's center to eject its metallic core, responsible for its magnetic field which is harmful to the Daleks, hence the need for human labour working deep inside the mine close to the point of convergence of the magnetic south and north poles. The Doctor then devises a plan to defeat the Daleks: if the bomb can be deflected to the old mine shaft that happens to go straight the convergence point and be connected to the Dalek's shaft with a secondary tunnel, the magnetic energy that would erupt from the ground would destroy the Daleks. While the policeman takes care of modifying the shaft to direct the bomb the tunnel, the Doctor gets himself caught on purpose by the Daleks in order to use their device transmitting orders to the robomen and turning them agains their masters. The following confusion allows the humans to escape the mine while the bomb goes exploding just where the Doctor wanted it to. The Daleks finally get eliminated. The Doctor and his friends come back to their present with the TARDIS, just in time for the policeman to arrest the robbers.

[ Posted on October 16th, 2006 at 21:54 | no comment | ]

Saturday, October 14th, 2006

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0383574/

© IMDB.com

I saw the movie some time ago and I completely forgot to post a summary, so the following is probably inaccurate.

Dead Man's Chest is the second episode of the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy. The story starts with a soon-to-be-married young couple who is arrested for having helped a pirate captain in the previous episode. They escape (or are released under condition?) and try to find the pirate captain. The latter is trying to put his hands on the Dead Man's chest, which contains the heart of the captain of the Flying Dutchman. They have a map, but need a key to open the chest. The key is around the neck of the captain of the Flying Dutchman, and they manage to steal it. They finally find the pirate captain and together with the captain and a third person also looking for the heart, they finally find it. Then come the crew of the Flying Dutchman, they all flee in different directions, and the heart is taken by we-don't-know-who.

[ Posted on October 14th, 2006 at 18:13 | no comment | ]

Wednesday, September 13th, 2006

The Medallion

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0288045/

© IMDB.com

Eddie Yang is a Hong Kong police detective cooperating with Interpol to capture Snakehead, a dangerous criminal. They almost manage to catch him in an underground temple, where a young boy was performing a ceremony with a medallion. Snakehead and his henchmen manage to escape, kidnapping the boy and taking the medallion. Later, Eddie follows Snakehead to Ireland and learns that the boy is about to arrive on a boat. They find him on a container carrier, but get attacked by Snakehead's men. Eddie and the boy get trapped in a container that fells into the sea. Eddie manages to secure the boy in a bubble of air, but when the container is taken out of the water, Eddie is dead. The boy secretely presses the medallion into Eddie's hand before being taken to the hospital. There, Eddie resurrects and barely manages to repell an attack of Snakehead's men with the help of his partner, Watson. Eddie discovers that he is immortal and has superpowers, thanks to the medallion. Claire, another Interpol agent and former girlfriend of Eddie, takes the boy with her to her place, but Snakehead's men manage to take him away from her. They suspect that the next attack would be on Watson's family, and get there just in time to repell another attack. They learn that the boy is detaiend in Raven's Keep, go there, beat the bad guy and free the boy. The End.

Watson is supposed to be the funny sidekick, but he behaves like an idiot and the jokes are plain stupid. The script is bad, the storyline is thin like paper, and Jackie Chan is visibly getting old: the action scenes lack the dynamism of his earlier movies.

[ Posted on September 13th, 2006 at 23:54 | no comment | ]

Monday, September 11th, 2006

Farenheit 451

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060390/

© IMDB.com

François Truffaut's adaptation of Ray Bradbury's classic S.F. novel Farenheit 451.

The story takes place in an oppressive future, where written text is banned and people spend their free time watching TV, taking part in silly TV games and taking drugs. Firemen don't put out fires anymore (since everything is fireproof), but burn books instead. One day Montag, a fireman, meets Clarisse in the monorail, a girl who looks strangely like his wife, the dullness removed. She asks him if he ever reads the books before burning them. Montag then starts stealing books when he and his crew are in action and reading them. One day, the firemen are searching the house of an old lady that contains a huge amount of books. Montag's boss describes it as one of the hidden libraries used by rebels. The firemen are prepared to burn the heap of books in the house, but the lady refuses to leave and sets herself to fire. Later, as Montag wants to visit Clarisse at her house (of the same kind as the old lady's), he sees that the doors and windows have been barred. A neighbour informs him that the police has taken the inhabitants the previous night. Montag then searches his boss's office, hoping to find where Clarisse has been taken, but discovers that she was not taken. He later meets her, hiding near her house, and he helps her enter the cellar and retrieve and destroy a list of illegal libraries. She tells him about the book-people, who live far away in the forest, away from the oppression of the city, and tells him she's leaving to join them. Later, Montag and other firemen are sent to burn books to a place which turns out to be his own home, just in time to see his wife leaving him (she was the one giving him away). Montag then fights and kills his boss, and flees. He's followed for a time by the police, but he manages to escape them (the police will afterwards kill someone at random and claim it was Montag) and rejoins the book-people in the forest.

[ Posted on September 11th, 2006 at 22:12 | no comment | ]

Wednesday, August 23rd, 2006

Marnie

Categories: [ TV/Cinema/Hitchcock ]

Spoiler: do not read if you don't want to know!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0058329/

© IMDB.com

Marnie makes her living by getting hired as a secretary in places dealing with money. She then steals the money and disapears, changing her identity and her city of residence. One day her scheme is discovered by the boss of the firm where she works, who gives her the choice to be sent to jail or to marry him. She goes for the latter, but the husband discovers that his wife has psychological troubles (fear of thunderstorms, of red color, of being touched by men, recuring nightmares). He wants to help her, and gets information on her past. He then drives her to her mother's place to face the truth about the trauma she had lived during her childhood: her mother was a prostitute, and one night of thunderstorm Marnie was being abused by a client. Her mother tries to protect her, hits the client with a poker, and gets injured in the process. In order to help her, Marnie kills the client who ends up in a pool of blood. Due to the shock, she kept no memory of the event, and her mother raised her to despise men.

[ Posted on August 23rd, 2006 at 01:03 | no comment | ]

A Perfect Murder

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

Spoiler: do not read if you don't want to know!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120787/

© IMDB.com

A remake of Hitchcock's Dial M for Murder. A rich (but soon to be ruined) husband wants to kill his wife in order to inherit her fortune. He pays his wife's lover (who has seduced her only to take her money) to murder her. The lover hires a former prison mate of his to kill the woman. The killer fails and gets killed in self-defense by the woman. The woman then discovers several clues that her husband is actually the one who tries to get rid of her, while the lover tries to blackmail the husband. The husband kills the lover while he tries to flee with the blackmail money, and the wife eventually kills her husband in self-defense when he discovers that she knows about his plot.

[ Posted on August 23rd, 2006 at 00:49 | no comment | ]

Tuesday, August 22nd, 2006

Dr. Strangelove

Categories: [ TV/Cinema ]

Spoiler: do not read if you don't want to know!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057012/

© IMDB.com

I just watched Dr. Strangelove (Docteur Folamour in French), by Stanley Kubrick. The movie is a dark comedy about a crazy general launching a nuclear attack on the Soviet Union. They manage to call off the attack, except for one bomber the radio of which got destroyed and could not be contacted. The bomber destroys its target and triggers the Doomsday Device that the Soviets just finished to build, provoking a nuclear holocaust all over the Earth.

[ Posted on August 22nd, 2006 at 14:22 | no comment | ]