Are You Watching Closely?
My friends and I went to Genting Highlands for a 2-day trip on Friday, and I was planning to write about it here… but nothing interesting happened — the weather was cool, the First World hotel room was smaller than the storeroom at home, the food expensive, which meant yet again I had no inspiration to write, until I saw The Prestige in the cinema there… and WOW!
I think I’ve just seen the best movie in a long time, certainly the best movie of 2006 thus far (at least maybe until The Departed arrives, but even then I doubt it can really top this).
The Prestige tells the tale of two magicians set in turn-of-the-century London. They start off as bickering friends and assistants to a magician, but after a magic trick gone horribly wrong, they both decide to call it quits as friends and begin to take separate paths to become the greatest stage magician in England, with each of them trying to out-perform the other, either by pioneering new tricks or stealing professional secrets from each other.
Seems like your typical mildly-intruiging plotline right? But that’s because you are not watching closely. This movie is complicated, dark, twisted, and ingenius.
Typical of director Christopher Nolan (Batman Begins, Memento, Insomnia), the timeline here is messed up. This film is not for everyone, you get flashbacks and flashbacks of flashbacks, which is why you have to watch closely, this film demands your attention. Prepare to immerse yourself for 2 hours.
Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale give powerful performances as the two magicians. Both of them are very convincing and really make the movie all the more brilliant. I can’t for the world imagine if Ben Affleck was in this. Even the supporting cast does a great job, Micheal Caine and David Bowie are exceptional. The only blot is Scarlett Johansson, while she has fine looking… ahem… *cough*assets*cough* for the males to drool, I can’t help but feel she’s underused here.
Visually, the cinematographty is top-notch, the movie is very photographic in the sense that many of the images here are stunning, and the costumes are truly believable, allowing Victorian-era England to come alive.
The score is also mesmerizing, with the end-credits song being Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke’s Analyse. It’s not integrated as well as Fight Club’s Where Is My Mind by Pixies, no film can ever top that, but it’s a brilliant song to cap off a brilliant movie.
But what really makes this film a masterpiece is its script. Helped by the non-linear directing, the plot is very unique and is incredibly twisty, yet all the twists are very integral to the plot and not just some cheap shocks. As Michel Caine narrates early on, “Are you watching closely?“, if you put on your thinking cap and be very observant, you can actually decipher the plot before all is revealed. I managed to figure out the two major plot twists a few moments before they were laid out, yet they are still truly awesome. It’s a moment of “OMGness” when you finally understand it all, and thankfully it is not as complex and incomprehensible as, say, Donnie Darko. And this movie achieves what many movies of this type fail — there are no plotholes. Yes you heard me right. No plotholes (at least no one has seemed to find one yet). What you think is a plothole is most probably just a plot misunderstanding.
The movie even boldly steps into the sciences of the weird but brilliant Nikola Tesla, real-life adversary of Thomas Edison. Some say it is this aspect of the film that it begins to be too far-fetched, but personally I thought it was a very nice touch, and gives the film a unique sci-fi edge.
And when the ending finally comes, you’ll realize The Prestige is a dazzling, intelligent, period piece. It’s completely absorbing. It’s morally very dark, sick, and depraved. It’s a movie that makes you think after you have left the cinema. It’s a movie where you decide who’s the protagonist(s) and antagonist(s). It’s a movie you think about two weeks after watching it. It’s a movie you can debate endlessly with your friends. It’s a movie that demands repeat viewings. It’s a must-see for anyone with a functional brain. It is the best movie of the year.
So, are you watching closely?
10/10
Update: I watched it for a second time, with my family, and this very rarely ever happens. Even good movies I wait for the DVD before rewatching it, but The Prestige is so prestigious that I have to make an exception. My mom was still asking me questions about this movie the next day, which is even rarer!
Complaints and migraines
(1) Streamyx, what a load of turd. I thank TMnet for bringing broadband into our lives, it has done us a great service, but Streamyx has been riddled with inconsistencies over the past years. My basic 512Kbps packages sometimes has a download rate of 10KB or less. This only happens occasionally though, so it’s not much of a worry…. until now.
The following are two letters from TMnet, taken from lowyat.net:
First letter
Tuan/Puan,
Terima kasih kerana mengirim e-mel kepada pihak kami. Kami memohon maaf di atas kelewatan membalas e-mel ini.
Merujuk kepada perkara di atas, kami memahami masalah yang anda hadapi di dalam menakses sebarang aktiviti P2P. Kepadatan trafik daripada aktiviti P2P sebenarnya akan menyesakkan lagi talian internet di mana 20% pengguna sebenarnya menggunakan 80% daripada jumlah keseluruhan “bandwidth” pengguna yang lain.
Memandangkan jumlah pengguna jalur lebar adalah semakin meningkat, lebih ramai pengguna dijangkakan akan menggunakan perisian P2P seperti Kazaa dan juga Bit Torrent untuk membuat transaksi fail/data secara “online”.
Pada kebiasaannya, perisian/aktiviti ini akan dibiarkan berjalan sepanjang hari bagi tujuan muat turun data/fail dan berikutan dengan itu, lebih banyak “bandwidth” diperlukan berbanding dengan pengguna yang hanya menggunakan internet bagi tujuan “surfing” mahupun “chatting”. Negara-negara maju sekalipun yang mana mempunyai kadar penembusan jalur lebar yang tinggi akan menghadapi masalah yang sama disebabkan pengguna jalur lebar mempunyai keupayaan untuk menyalahgunakan
“bandwidth”.Adalah dimaklumkan bahawa kami bukan tidak memihak kepada pengguna-pengguna yang menggunakan P2P tetapi ia merupakan suatu situasi yang tidak adil bagi kepentingan pihak minoriti memandangkan kami tidak dapat menaiktaraf infrastuktur bagi tujuan tersebut. Disebabkan itu, kami telah mengambil jalan untuk menghadkan penguasaan terhadap aplikasi berkenaan. Objektif utama pengawalan penguasaan pada sesetengah link adalah untuk mengurangkan kapasiti kepadatan dan pada masa yang sama membolehkan manstabilkan kualiti perkhidmatan untuk semua pengguna.
Pengawalan ini dilihat seperti suatu keperluan memandangkan sifat P2P yang mana menggunakan setiap bandwidth yang ada dan sekiranya dibiarkan tanpa kawalan, ianya akan menyesakkan talian dengan lebih teruk dan akan menyebabkan gangguan pada aplikasi/talian yang lain pula. Malangnya,
mekanisma pengawalan ini tidak boleh membezakan jenis talian/aplikasi dan ianya akan mengawal segala-galanya termasuk aktiviti? e-mel, ftp, “web browsing” mahupun “video streaming”.TM Net telah membuang penyekatan terhadap aktiviti “upload” bagi semua link, tetapi kami masih mengekalkan pengawalan untuk aktiviti “download”. Pengawalan ini akan dibuang sejurus selepas kami dapat menambah kapasiti “bandwidth” untuk talian antarabangsa yang dijangkakan sedia beroperasi pada penghujung tahun ini.
Kami berharap penjelasan yang diberikan dapat menghuraikan segala pertanyaan anda. Bagi pihak TM Net, kami memohon maaf di atas segala kesulitan yang timbul. Kami akan sentiasa memperbaiki mutu perkhidmatan yang diberikan kepada pelanggan kami.
Sekiranya terdapat sebarang pertanyaan atau maklum balas, sila layari laman web www.tm.net.my dan klik “Need Help? Contact our Customer Service”.
Kami berharap agar sentiasa dapat memberikan perkhidmatan yang terbaik.
Yang benar,
Narati Samuri
Customer Care Support,
TM Net Sdn. Bhd.(ICOMS#2857612-246085)
Second letter
Dear Sir/Madam,
Thank you once again for your e-mail to TM Net.
Referring to your e-mail, please noted that we do not block or throttle the speed of your connections. The right word to say is we control the usage as it may affect and jeopardize the whole customer’s base connection. We’re still in midst of rectifying the issue and we appreciate all the feedback especially from our respective customers.
Should you require further assistance or would like to submit any enquiry/feedback, kindly visit www.tm.net.my and click “Need Help? Contact our Customer Service”.
We thank you for taking the time to write to us and look forward to serve you better.
Regards,
Muhammad Jamil
Customer Care Support,
TM Net Sdn. Bhd.(ICOMS#2889857-247863)
Yes TMnet have admitted to THROTTLING our bittorrent speeds! This means serious headache to me. I won’t divulge what I download using utorrent ;) but suffice to say that it’s really annoying. My download won’t exceed even 10KBps, and most of the time it’s stuck at 1 or 2KBps. As I’m typing this now it is at 3.9KB. Outrageous stuff by TMnet. I pay for your service, I get what I pay for! To those avid anime downloaders, RIP.
(2) Classes on Saturdays, what on earth??? What I really hate about university life, whenever there’s a public holiday the classes absolutely have to be replaced on another day, mostly almost always on a Saturday. It is equivalent to not having a single day off for 3 straight months. So those Hari Raya and Deepavali holidays… they are really not holidays for me. More like a re-scheduling of classes.
(3) Horrid movies. Sometimes I don’t know why studios can makes such HORRIBLE movies. I just watched The Hunted and Man of the House, two films starring Tommy Lee Jones. What a waste of time, I want my 3 hours back.
Rants and complaints aside, I have to thank Fight Club, The Killers and Supergrass for making my life more bearable. Fight Club is one of the best movies of all time, and everytime I think of it it reminds me that my life is not all about perfection. I need to let go. Materialism is unneeded. Stop being an Ikea boy. Stop trying to be perfect.
“The things you own end up owning you.”
So true.
As for The Killers’ Hot Fuss and Supergrass’ Best Of albums , their music has filled me with (temporary) joy these few days.
Of holidays and DVDs and movies and The Killers and Timberlake and The Departed.
Sigh, so my holidays are fast coming to an end. To be honest I did NOTHING useful during these three weeks, and it made me all the lazier. In fact I think this blog entry is useless as well. I really have no inspiration when it comes to writing in my blog, and my blasted Logitech keyboard makes it worse. The keys are all stiky and stiff as hell, that’s why thre are typos eerywhre.
So what have I been up to for the past 3 weeks? Movies, DVDs, music and… er… that’s all. I watched around 25 DVDs. Most of them I saw before, but a few I watched for the first time. The best movies would probably be The Godfather, which I’ve seen for millions of times, and Sin City, which I’ve also seen before. Very violent and very visceral, Sin City ranks among the best movies of all time IMO.
The worst is most definitely Paycheck. A total “WTF” movie. John Woo has stooped to a new low. I never like Woo (though as I remember his Face/Off was awesome!), but Paycheck is ABOMINABLE! It’s an insult to Philip K. Dick. If you want a brilliant movie adapted from a Dick short story go for Minority Report, directed by Steven Spielberg. Now that is an awesome Sci-Fi film, unlike Paycheck, which strips all the Sci-Fi bits from the short story and the result is a really, really, REALLY stupid action movie. And yes, I hate Ben Affleck. I give it 1/10. Minority Report gets a 9/10.
Miami Vice — Saw it on the big screen. Quite a disappointment, seeing that this is coming from Micheal Mann, director of brilliant movies ala Heat and Collateral. I expected an action movie, instead it turned out to be a Crime/Love/Sex drama. The opening was cool, nightshots of Miami city were beautiful. But after that came boats, an airplane, boats, boats, sex, sex, sex, sex, mushy stuff, and then the thrilling final quarter of the movie when we finally get to see some brilliant (and realistic) gunfights. 6/10.
And what have I been listening, mostly old stuff like Pixies, Muse, The Who, Gnarls Barkley, Weezer, and some new stuff — The Killers, Beck, The Decemberists, and (wait for it…………) Justin Timberlake. Shocking stuff :OSam’s Town, The Killers‘ sophomore album after their stunning debut Hot Fuss. Well this ain’t no Hot Fuss, ‘cuz it’s more American and all. I still like it, but it’s no way in Hot Fuss‘ league. It growing on me though so I’ll have to see.
And now the shocker, Justin Timberlake??? You know how much I hate mainstream radio pop, but forgive me I must admit that quite like Timberlake‘s new album FutureSex/LoveSounds.
I haven’t given it a real listen yet (and by “real” I mean I haven’t listened to it more than 20 times) but its shaping up nicely to be one of the best pop albums this year. I particularly like My Love, LoveStoned, What Goes Around… Comes Around, and Summer Love. Some of the songs reach epic lengths of 7 minutes, but they hold up (very) surprisingly well. Currently I would give this 8/10, which is very very good for a mainstream “hitz.fm” artiste. : )
So there again, me talking about movies and music AGAIN. I have the feeling that this is more a blog for movies and music only. I blame the lack of inspiration >.<
To finish this off I will try to talk about something else — The Departed. Oops… it’s movies again. Blehsorrybye.But anyhow The Departed is The. Best. Movie. for 2006, if the reviews are to be believed. This reimagining of Hong Kong’s Infernal Affairs (itself a brilliant film) is directed by none other tha Martin Scoresese, and I have HIIIIIGH hopes.
There you go. A new semester awaits me, and I’m pretty sure it’s gonna be a looooooong boring one.
The Machinist
Sometimes when I see stars like Brad Pitt (soon to be a US$ 40 million-per-film actor if he accepts the Mission Impossible 4 offer to replace Tom Cruise) on screen, I will think:
“Hey you’re dedicated, but only because they are paying you 10 million bucks for it.”
Then comes along Christian Bale, you should remember him as Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins, all muscular and looking playboyish. But before he became the Caped Crusader, he did a role in a brilliant low-budget psychological thriller – The Machinist. And his dedication and determination shows throughout – he supposedly ate only a can of tuna and an apple everyday for a year to starve himself so that he could play the film lead character – an extremely thin insomniac.
And yes he is absolutely skeletal in the movie. So much so that characters in the film quip to him “If you were any thinner, you wouldn’t exist”.
This is what they call a mindfuck movie, a movie which has a plot that is hard to understand at first but later unravels (partially or completely) later on, and the viewer is hit with a bang “OMG!”.
The movie starts with Trevor Reznik (sounds similar to Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor? heh), played by Bale, getting involved in a machine factory accident where a co-worker’s hand gets severed. He admits to being negligent but claims to be distracted by a new co-worker, whom no one thinks exists. He thinks his co-workers are conspiring to get him fired.
Slowly, he begins to doubt his sanity and bizarre things begin to unfold everywhere he goes, and his only solace lies in being together with an airport waitress. But things start to go completely out of hand when he takes the waitress’s son on a amusement park ride that is, to both Reznik and us viewers, horrific.
Yes that’s how thin Bale was.
The entire film is shot with a blue-greyish tinge to it, allowing a really very grim, dark, and depressing atmosphere. Viewers are constantly left guessing if what is unfolding on screen really is happening in reality, or just Reznik’s hallucinations. This plays on right until the end, when the finally the jigsaw puzzle is solved.
Brave, atmospherically bleak and visually dark and stunning, the film takes Reznik on a journey of self-awareness, and the final resolution of his life sent chills down my spine. The final scene was beautiful. When the credits start to roll, I was left contemplating one of the best movies I’ve seen this year. Even now 4 days after I finished seeing it, I think about this movie before I sleep. I could even consider this to be a psychological horror movie.
This may not appeal to the Hollywood movie fans. There are no actions sequences, no complex CGI, but I was left scared, goose-bumped, and thrilled.
9/10.
End of the Reign
For the past two weeks, some unimaginably evil entity was enslaving thousands of students. By heck it was no ordinary being. This entity had the power of infinite magnitude. And it was abusing its power, torturing helpless students, the abominable tyrant had limitless ruling power. Mercy was not in its vocabulary. We students suffered.
Yet after a period that seemed like eternity, the revolution began. It was over in a few hours. The tyrant defeated. Students rejoicing everywhere.
Yes I’ve always had a penchant for starting essays in dramatic (and incomprehensible, and nonsensical) fashion. But I don’t care. My 2 weeks of final exams are finally OVER. Let it burn in hell! Exams – the damned forbidden son of Pressure and Suffering!
First thing I gotta do is to burn the exam slip. The little piece of paper you bring into and take out of the exam hall. The sight of it makes me sick. It stinks of exam-aroma.
Burn bitch burn!
Then the books. It’ll be a lot harder and longer to burn these though, look how thick they are!
Chemistry huh? Let’s see how fire reacts with paper.
So anyway 2 weeks of holidays for me now. Kind of feeling bored already. After a gruelling battle with an abstract tyrant made of books and paper and the Ministry of Education, I guess I need my time off. To recap my battle:
Day 1: English
It was ok. I have nothing to complain, except the fact that HOW THE HELL DO YOU EXPECT STUDENTS TO PRODUCE QUALITY ESSAYS WHEN YOU IMPOSE A 350-WORD LIMIT??? I just wrote a quarter-hearted essay, and even then it was almost 450 words. >.< All the same, I’d be pissed if I don’t get an A for this.
Day 2: D-Day of Physics
Ahh, Physics, my old arch-enemy. I’ve never liked this fellow, nor have I really beaten it. This time there were 4 questions, and guess what I knew how to do all of them, except for question 1, 2, 3, and 4. It didn’t just gravity-pull me into the earth’s core, it was more like a Supermassive Black Hole.
Oh baby dont you know I suffer?
Oh baby can you hear me moan?
You caught me under false pretences
How long before you let me go?Oooh… You set my soul alight (yeap physics incinerated my heart and soul)
Oooh… You set my soul alight
(You set my soul alight)
Glaciers melting in the dead of night
And shitty Kevin sucked into the supermassive…
I love Muse. I love that song. I HATE PHYSICS!!! I’m 100% certain this is a non-A.
Day 3: Maths
Apart from a deductive geometry sub-question, this was quite easy. Breezy even.
Day 4: Economics
All was going well until the first essay question. It demended me to calculate some stuff I dunno, namely Gross National Product, Gross Domestic Product, National Income, Personal Income, Investments, etc all crap I don’t know. This stuff is just plain gross (and pun much intended). 59.87% chance of an A.
Day 5: Computer Studies
Easier than I expected. There was an auntie invigilator though, she kept standing beside me, peeking at my answers. Auntie, in case you didn’t know, looking at people when they are answering questions is damn annoying. She had me in a pressure cooker. And when I turned to look at her she just smiled at me. @.@ She did this to others as well. Thankfully this was Computer Studies and not Maths/Physics/Chemistry, or else I’d have told her to beat it. But anyhow: A in the bag for this, hopefully.
Day 6: Chemistry
Similar to day 5. Except there were no peeking aunties. Oh and towards the end Weezer’s Tired of Sex started playing in my head, only with a little play of lyrics. ;P
I’m tired, so tired
I’m tired of having tests (So tired)
I’m spread so thin
I don’t know who I am (who I am)Monday night I’m doing english
Tuesday night I’m doing physics
Wednesday night I’m doing maths
Oh, why can’t I be home watching football?
So there you go I had to type this quickly, I have yet to have my dinner and I’M HUNRGY AS HELL!
Muse – Knights of Cydonia
Aboslutely awesome. Awesome song. Awesome video. Muse=sex.
Make sure you listen to the song too. It’s one of the best songs of the year.
Because WordPress Is Lucky
I decided to switch to WordPress. It looks much nicer. Everything is so neat and simple and elegant.
Boo to Blogger! I had to edit my themes myself to make it semi-nice.
WordPress themes > (Blogger themes x 8)^457
Anyway my old blog can still be found at http://13kev.blogspot.com/.
So what do you think of this?
R.I.P. Crocodile Hunter
He was the most recognizable face on Animal Planet. We all know him.
“CRIKEY!”
“Beeeeeeuuuutiful!”
We all have heard those words.
We all liked him.
Loved him.
All the animals feared him.
Except for one rogue stingray who punctured his heart.
Steve Irwin – the one and only Croc Hunter. May he rest in peace.
Full story:
CNN
Semester is over, but…
… but as always there is the Final Boss waiting for you at the end of the tunnel. The one thing students dread more than going to school itself. The horror-inducing freakshow that happens at the end of every year/semester – the much-maligned Final Examination.
And it starts tomorrow.
O.
M.
F.
G.
English Language. At least it’s easy(ish). Personally I find the level of essay-writing in the university level quite derogaroty. I mean, which 18-year-old still writes 350-word essays?? They actually limit you to only 350 words. That’s like making a 10-minute movie of The Lord Of The Rings trilogy.
But anyhow I’m not afraid of English. Come Thursday gravity will suck me into some shithole. Physics ARHHHHH I haven’t even touched it omg I’m gonna fail it I’m sure. And no tips from Mr. HS Ch’ng this time! Ohhhh damn! Plus that guy hates me. He thinks I talk too much in class. It’s probably why he gave me such low marks for my tests and practical reports.
Economics is another headache. I got good marks for my first 2 tests (combined: 36.6/40 I think) but this is the final and I don’t think I can memorize everything. With some luck hopefully its an A for me.
The other subjects – Maths, Computer Studies and Chemistry, with just a bit of luck I should get A’s for them all. Should.
So may the force be with me. (I know it’s cliched)
