Departures - Japanese Movie Review

One of the regular blogs I read - Rads has put up a crisp nice review of Academy Award winning Japanese movie - Departures. Read the review here.

Cheers.........Jam

Related links -
Wikipedia link to the movie
IMDB link

The Man from Earth - Movie Review

Every once in a while you come across these offbeat, relatively unheard of movies which simply take your breath away. The Man from Earth is one such movie which would rank really high in the 'taking breath away' department. The theme with which the movie deals with and the sheer simplicity with which this story has been told is something that will make this movie one of my all time favorite 'talk-about movies'. Going against my usual norm of knowing more about movies before I actually watch them (Courtest IMDB and Wikipedia), this was one movie for which I relied purely on a friend's recommendation to the Missus.

So there we were, the Missus and me having started off with this movie with a completely open mind, without any expectations from the movie itself. And believe me, the kind of discussions we have had about this movie after having watched it is nothing short of strenous exercise to the grey cells. This movie makes you think about life and time in ways that can only be experienced and not talked or written about. That being said, this movie is not for the faint of heart, and if you are someone who wants to stick to his beliefs no matter what, then you will hate this movie, for the sheer courage it displays in questioning the basics of your beliefs.

The movie deals with Prof John Oldman being thrown a surprise farewell party by his colleagues. The group consists of an archaeologist, a biologist, an Arts Prof, an anthropologist and a student. When John's friends force him to disclose the reasons for his sudden departure, he hesitatingly reveals to them that he is in fact a 14,000 yr old man, who has survived from the Upper Paleolithic period till current day. Initially, his friends play along with his 'game' and humor him with questions regarding his origins, his memories, trying to find chinks in his story so that they could call his bluff. But as the conversation goes on, John's steadfastness and forthrightness forces them to believe that there is more to his story than they initially thought.

John narrates how he travelled with Christopher Columbus, how he was friends with Van Gogh, how he was a Sumerian and then a Babylonian under Hammurabi. The final tipping point to this conversation was when John actually claims he was Jesus and how he never actually performed all the miracles as stated in the Bible. In fact, this particular discussion deeply disturbs one of the professors who was a devout Christian.

How the movie ends, and what happens of this conversation is quite interesting and any discussion around that in this post would render this review to a huge spoiler. Suffice to say that this movie is probably one of the best (if not 'the best') science fiction movies that I have ever seen. Yes, it doesn't have little green men, it doesn't even mention a planet other than Earth, and for sure it doesn't have huge multi-storeyed spaceships, but then this movie has so much food for thought that it beats all of these gizmos and gimmicks hands down. Trust me when I say this, if you watch this movie, this will stay with you for a long time to come.

Cheers..........Jam

Related links -

Wikipedia link

Allmovie link

IMDB link

Transformers : Revenge of the Fallen - Movie Review

Transformers : Revenge of the Fallen begins with Optimus Prime narrating how thousands of years ago, a race of ancient Transformers landed on Earth looking for energy sources such as the Sun. Known as the Primes, they used Sun Harvesters to drain stars out of their energy to power Cybertron's AllSpark. However, the Primes had an understanding that they would not drain stars which supported planets with life-forms such as Earth. But one of the Primes, henceforth called "The Fallen" constructed a Sun Harvester on Earth breaking this rule. The other Primes sacrificed their bodies to hide the Matrix - the key that activates the Harvester, from the Fallen.

The movie itself takes off with events immediately after the first movie. The Autobots have teamed with the US Military to form a crack team, NEST, aimed at killing the remaining Decepticons on Earth. While on a mission in Shanghai to destroy Sideways and Demolishor, they are given a warning "The Fallen will rise again". Now this particular action sequence shot in IMAX simply takes your breath away and is a precursor to the action-fest that this movie actually is. The Demolishor in particular is one scary Decepticon and it takes the combined efforts of more than one Autobot to get the better of this monster villain. All in all, a crazy, sexy first action sequence for this movie.

Back home Sam Witwicky is getting ready to go to college, but has to leave Bumblebee behind, which does not necessarily go down too well with the loyal Autobot. While packing his stuff, he finds an AllSpark splinter left behind from his earlier adventures, which he gives to the oh-so-hot Mikaela Jones for safekeeping. Without him realizing it, Sam's touching the splinter triggers in him the power to see the map to the Matrix. When in college, Sam starts seeing symbols (which are later revealed to be Cybertron script) in his head, while the rest of the world thinks he is going crazy. This particular sequence reminded me of the obsessive Richard Dreyfuss who keeps seeing a hill in his head in "Close Encounters of a Third Kind". In any case, Sam calls up Mikaela, who in the meantime has captured Wheelie, a Decepticon who tries to steal the shard from her.

What follows in the rest of the movie is pretty much this, Decepticons get the shard, bring back Megatron to life, who kills Optimus Prime, gets in touch with the Fallen to activate the Sun Harvester, while Sam and friends try to locate the Matrix to destroy it, to ultimate save the world. Suffice to say, good guys on the run, bad guys trying to destroy the world, some awesome action sequences thrown in, a pyramid almost razed to the ground. Now if that doesn't make for a good action movie, what does.

One sequence which I just have to mention when talking about this movie is the one in which the Decepticon Devastator is formed. Now this damn big monster of a Transformer is seen to be believed. And trust me when I say this, this had to be one of the best IMAX sequences ever. The sheer scale of this scene is something which I cannot forget for a long long time.
This is one movie which any action buff who also likes a bit of sci-fi in movies will absolutely love. However, this has to be seen in IMAX for the complete experience. I would surely give this movie at least one viewing, especially if you liked the first movie.






Related links -
Wikipedia link
IMDB link
Allmovie link
Metacritic link
Box Office Mojo link
Rotten Tomatoes link

Transformers - Movie Review

The earliest memories I have of the Transformers, and more specifically of Optimus Prime was a shiny little toy that my cousin used to have when he was younger. He used to guard this particular toy more carefully than the others as this was the only one which have elbows and knees that could bend, a neck that could turn, and a hip that could actually bend. This made Optimus Prime (or Red and Blue robot, as we used to call him back in those days) extra special and extra powerful. So when I first heard of the Transformers movie and read about it, my memories were taken back to those special innocent days. However, me being the jackass that I am, I missed out on watching this movie at the IMAX theatre in Hyderabad in late 2007.

The movie begins with Optimus Prime, the leader of the Autobots narrating how his home world, Cybertron was destroyed due to lack of energy to sustain it. In the war for the All Spark, the Decepticons led by Megatron manage to destroy most of the Autobots and almost all of Cybertron. However, in his quest for the All Spark, Megatron crash lands on earth and is frozen in ice in the Arctic Circle. Captain Archibald Witwicky stumbles upon his exo-skeleton and accidentally activates Megatron's navigational system which imprints his co-ordinates in his eyeglasses. Sector 7, of the US Govt locates Megatron and the All Spark and moves both of them to the site of the Hoover Dam and builds the dam on top of them to mask the energy emissions.

In the present day, a group of Decepticons land on earth and assume disguises of various earch vehicles and attack a US base in Qatar to hack into the US Military network to locate the All Spark. This forms the first action sequence of the movie in which viewers are shown the actual capabilities of the Transfomers. An awesome desert action sequence involving a lot of great military vehicles, CGI generated robots and battle sequences pepper this great sequence. This battle also leads to the discovery of probably the only chink in the armor of the Decepticons, the high-heat sabot weapons.

One of the Decepticons finds the original eyeglasses up for auction at e-bay, put up there by Sam Witwicky, the great grandson of Archibald. This puts Sam in the middle of the battle between the Autobots and the Decepticons, with the bad robots pursuing him and the good ones trying to protect him. Sam's first car, Bumblebee turns out to be an Autobot disguised as a Chevrolet Camaro. What follows in the rest of the movie is how Optimus Prime and the Autobots thwart every attempt by the Decepticons to get the co-ordinates of the All Spark.
Almost near the end of the movie, the Decepticons manage to revive Megatron, and the action sequence that follows is nothing short of amazing. The fight between Megatron and Optimus Prime, without doubt the two best Transformers in this movie, is quite breath-taking and must be seen to be believed. Whether the Autobots manage to protect Sam and the All Spark forms the climax of the movie.

For anybody who likes action movies and likes nicely crafted sci-fi stories, this movie came as a breath of fresh air. Anybody who has liked the 'Giant Robot' TV series which played in Doordarshan in the 80s will absolutly love this movie. And the fact that somebody like Steven Spielberg has produced this movie speaks volumes for the Production Quality of this movie. All in all, an awesome movie, which is good fun for action lovers of any age and race.

Cheers.......Jam

Related links -
Transformers - The movie - Wikipedia link
IMDB link
Allmovie link
Rotten Tomatoes link
Metacritic link
Box Office Mojo link