Tag Archive: movie review

The great downtown chase

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Sat. September 13, 2008

Last night I hung out with Hui downtown. After eating we went to the theatre to catch Tropic Thunder. Heh, that was a fun movie. It’s easy to see how the movie can be offensive to a lot of people, but the satire all makes sense in the context of the movie. Robert Downey Jr. was the standout for me. Tom Cruise also surprised me. Overall, I enjoyed it.

It was late when the movie ended. As we were exiting the Scotiabank Theatre I asked Hui what time his train was leaving. He checked his watch and said 11:42. I checked my watch and thought, “oh shit.” We had about 13 minutes to cover a 20 minute leisurely walking distance. If he missed the train, he’d be stuck there for an hour for the next one to come. I told him “all right, we’ll get you there” and started walking fast. About 5 minutes in I decided that it was unlikely that we’d make it and suggested that we do a light jog. He agreed so we started picking up the pace. I still had my work bag with me and that was shaking all over the place, so I grabbed it and tucked it under my arm. My shoes weren’t meant for running, but I felt like I was going at a good pace. As we ran we had to weave in and out of crowds of clubbers. Every time we hit a stop light we changed direction; as long as we were moving, we were making progress.

When we got close to Union Station, he suggested that we were close enough so we slowed to a normal walk. I checked my watch again and said that we had to keep going. We were almost at the station, but I figured that 2 to 3 minutes wouldn’t be enough for him to make it to the platform. When we got inside, I slowed down and just told him to run for it. I mean, I wasn’t under the gun–so I didn’t want to stress out too much about making it. So, he went off. I checked my watch and it was the scheduled departure time for his train. I figured he had a 50/50 shot of getting on, but even at those odds I couldn’t help but feel a little bit guilty for leaving him.

As I headed into the subway area, I started sweating profusely. I hadn’t allowed myself sufficient time to cool down from the downtown chase so as soon as I stopped that’s when it all caught up to me. My face was absolutely drenched. I took a few papers from outside my bag and started fanning myself. A few people around me moved away. I kind of laughed at it–I don’t blame them at all. I mean, here’s this guy that’s sweating profusely–maybe he’s got some sort of weird contagious virus? When I got on the train, the subway car was heavily air conditioned so I just sat there letting my temperature head back down to normal levels.

About an hour ago I called Hui and found out that he missed his train. You mean to say that I could have prevented sweating like a hooker in church? Chee.

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In honour of Fats…

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Sat. March 8, 2008

First I want to say something about the PATH: Toronto’s underground is pretty darn confusing. I haven’t really had a need to go wandering around there because I’ve never had a job in one of the tall buildings in the area, however, after meeting with Hui at Union Station I thought it would be a bit of fun to try to wander from the station all the way to the Eaton Centre. How hard could it be? HA! At first it was an adventure. Seriously. When Hui stopped to ask a stranger for a bit of direction I kind of expressed some displeasure. Where was the spirit of discovery, you know? Well, after doubling back through the same bloody building three times I got frustrated–not at him or myself, but more at the labyrinth we were in. We overshot where we want to go several times increasing the distance we travelled by a good chunk. We did eventually find our way and made it to the mall, but damn, that was crazy. Prior to meeting with my friend, I’d already spent an hour wandering the city killing time. So, after wandering the path I think I’d been walking around for two hours straight. My flat feet killed!

Anyway, ultimately we decided to watch a movie. We settled on Be Kind Rewind. I saw posters for the flick illegally plastered on some buildings along Spadina. It looked mildly brainless, really, so I was sort of prepping to turn off my brain for 2 hours. I was bamboozled!

Let’s see. I could say that the movie can be divided into three parts. The first part was plainly silly with things like Jack Black’s character becoming mysteriously magnetized by a freak power plant accident involving a grappling hook. Yeeeeah. I thought my initial gut feelings toward the movie were justified. By the second part where the video store plot really started coming into play, the movie suddenly morphed into something a lot more joyful. It was all still silly, but I think my brain had gotten to the point where it was deliberately suspending disbelief, and just revelling in the awesomeness of the improbabilities of it all. By the third part, the movie morphed once more into something that actually had a great deal of heart. I wasn’t anticipating it at all, but wow, bravo.

So yeah, I came out of the theatre utterly confused–not at the movie itself but rather about what I actually felt vs. what I was anticipating that I should have felt. Maybe being confused in such a way is a good thing once in a while.

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The other bowling girl…

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Sat. March 1, 2008

Last evening I met with Henrick for dinner. He introduced me to his friend Kitty. It turns out that she started computer engineering at UW at the same time we did. We just hadn’t seen her before because she was on a different schedule so we didn’t share any of the same classes. It’s interesting how connections like this sort of pop up out of nowhere. I mean, I was one of 130 or so first-year comp. students when I started out. Everyone’s pretty much gone their separate ways so it’s interesting when something like this comes up.

Anyway, after dinner she announced that she wanted to go see a movie. She said the title was something like ‘The Other Bowling Girl.” I think I must have gave one my WTF 8-O looks because really…that’s just a really silly title for a movie, isn’t it? It’s only when she started talking about British royalty that I realized, oh…”The Other Boleyn Girl.” I hadn’t heard of it before, but it sounded interesting–especially with Natalie and Scarlett playing the main characters.

By the end of the movie, I was kind of indifferent about it. It was baaad but it wasn’t all that great either. It’s like it was all presented as just a sequence of events without anything really grabbing me. There was nothing that overtly made me want to know what was going to happen next, so as the movie went on and things just “happened” I wasn’t really left wanting anything else. I don’t know, it’s hard to describe. I wonder tough if this is a result of using a (semi-)historical story. I mean, the events are pretty much set, right? In terms of screenplay though, I’m sure more could have been done with pacing (which was consistently…plodding) and picking out intrigues that can be stretched out for the sake of a good movie. Is it the fault of the script though? Directing? I really don’t know. I’m sure there are some historical flicks out there that won’t leave me this cold–I don’t know of any, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist!

ETA: When I think about it, the only characters I enjoyed in the movie were Catherine of Aragon and to a lesser extent Lady Elizabeth. 

So yeah, all I felt was a whole lot of “meh.” Too bad. Should have been more interesting.

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Thoroughly tenderized

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Sat. December 8, 2007

Last night I hung out with Hui downtown. We grabbed something quick to eat, then saw a movie in IMAX 3D. After, it seemed he had a lot to get off his chest about his new job so we went to Chinatown, found a tea house and chatted for a good while. Overall, it was a decent night. I haven’t found time to unwind like that in a while. The night did involve a lot of walking though. My the end of the night my heels felt like they were bruised or thoroughly tenderized. I’m still feeling it tonight, so I’m a bit concerned: how will I manage during tomorrow morning’s run?

The movie we saw was Beowulf. It seemed like the type of movie just made for the IMAX atmosphere. Overall though, I think the movie was just average. Something about the pacing just seemed uneven. As well, there were times when I couldn’t take the movie almost seemed a bit comical. Angelina was…wow. She really is something else. Although…doesn’t it seem like someone of her star power is a bit out of place in a role like that that doesn’t get much air time? In any case, I was satisfied with the experience. The IMAX 3D made it worthwhile, but if I saw that in a normal theatre I think I would have come out a little indifferent.

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