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[There are SPOILERS in this. And this is the warning.] Symbolisms Originally from Nick Joaquin's A Portrait of the Artist as Filipino. What is the TLDR version? okay TLDW: It is essentially about two sisters and a painting. Their dad made them a painting either to test them or to leave him alone. Zooming out a bit,  it is about a dysfunctional contemporary Filipino  family around the 1940's. The painting is described as an old man carrying a young man in his back, while the background is a city in flames. One character tells of it as being Troy. 

This was hilarious. Like the style of "The Office" but with flatmates who happens to be vampires.  It maintains the usual elements with Vampires. No reflection, blood suckers etc. It also keeps that "Friends"-like arc with flatmates or room mates where the usual conflicts and hilarity ensues.  They could make a franchise out of this or a trilogy similar to Edgar Wright's Cornetto trilogy.

This was a silent horror film made around 1922 in Germany. This movie helped Bram Stoker's original Dracula gain more popularity. Mostly because the estate didn't want to give its rights, ensuing a legal complication.

It appears Hollywood made a killing of a Frankenstein franchise around the 1930's, the same way superheroes movies are created successively these days. This would be the first Frankenstein film I've seen in the list of sequels written in its Wikipedia  page. I've seen various incarnations from Hotel Transylvania to popular cartoons growing up, and a couple months back, the main source written by Mary Shelley.

It is like if the mouse in Tom & Jerry, met up with the human versions of Jerry, and had a ball with Slapstick and Visual comedy. The Christmas-sy feel and music to it reminds me of Home Alone.  It must have spawned the later art that came after it.   Stuart Little and that Rat from Ratatouille would be happy seeing this movie. I haven't since this film since I was in grade school. I remember watching it via VHS over and over as a kid. It triggered a small trip to memory lane: sitting at the living room with the family eating some kind of corn chips or cheese crackers.  I remember being so fascinated and engrossed over this. Reading some of the "adult's" reviews about it now, it doesn't seem like they have the same sentiments. Sure in the grand archive of cinema, this movie probably makes a minuscule mark compared to some of the giants at the time, but  my experience as that kid some 20 odd years ago remain the same.    Nice to revisit t...

It's easy to box in as a fairly simple story. In the beginning, it seemed like a princess meets a commoner type of story; at the middle, it appeared as a coming of age film; at the end, it's really more an exploration, an adventure movie.  One does not always see a female lead in what Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn could have been riding in.  I guess we're in that time now. It's a good movie to watch with a daughter; or a niece.  Sacha would be a great model for young girls.  

Honey, I Shrunk The Kids The Szalinski's are introduced. Rick Moranis is the nerd dad who's trying build his shrinking machine. The neighbor's are a jock type of a family. They just want to go fishing. The children of the families barely interact. Until, one of the neighbor's kids breaks the Szalinski's glass window. The story evolves on how the kids get shrunk by the machine and the journey from the lawn to the front of the house, to the cheerios bowl. And along the way, they meet a giant ant. Not giant, the kids just happened to be smaller than the actual ant. I remember seeing this a couple times as a kid. Now that I've had some distance to it and with young adult eyes, it does seem different. Mostly because I remember being so impressed by it. Now, It doesnt seem great compared to other movies. It's not bad. I appreciate still the value in it. What it is, is probably that the novelty has worn off. Or it could be that the movie is really for kids. Or ...

This was a great movie. I wonder how much better this must be in the book. It's not often that you get to see an engulfing movie experience. This was time well spent. The structure is built very well. I forgot what filmmakers or storytellers call it, that gradual release of information that heightens the next scene. The movie does that exquisitely. You are on your toes 'till the last. Having never read any of Tom Clancy's work, the association I have of him is more on spy novels. So I figured that this was something close to a James Bond or a Jason Bourne driven protagonist. Now having seen the movie, it seems much more closer to Clive Cussler's Dirk Pitt series. The parallel may just be that it is set mostly at sea. Nevertheless, this is an excellent movie. My curiosity has been piqued. I may have just opened a Tom Clancy rabbit hole.

I did not understand this movie;  or that I don't want to.  Maybe it's not meant to be understood . For a  person into the kind of genre the movie tackles, this would probably be a classic. But I'm n ot really familiar with the genre, and this was ultra-violent .  The story structure is impressively woven with a fairly simple backbone. High school kids are set loose on a island. Everyone fight off each other until only one's left. The last student is declared to be the champion. I've never seen Hunger Games, but from trailers and whatever promotion was out back then, they seem similar. Except this one has way too much blood and gore. 

I've never really gone down a Bruce Lee movie rabbit hole. Growing up Jackie Chan was more noticeable to my adolescent eyes; and more recently Donnie Yen's Ip Man film series. I knew that Bruce Lee was a prominent figure in the spread of martial arts in film and in the world. Still  I had little to no expectations about "The Way of the Dragon". It has a fairly simple story, Bruce Lee's character is sent out by an "Uncle" to protect a business being bullied by local gangs in Italy. Things climax when Bruce Lee's character battle with Chuck Norris at the historic Colosseum in Rome. Seems as though this is where all those memes come from. Considering the technology in the 70's, it must have been a blast seeing Bruce Lee do the things he does in the movie. Had he been alive today, there probably would have been rapid cuts, an epic fight scene, maybe even a Jeet Kune Do film trilogy, or a Martial Arts cinematic universe. The significance may esc...

This was heavy. There's a philosophical weight to it.  A line in the movie goes: "War doesn't ennoble men, it eats away at the soul."   One soldier in shock; chills, almost like in a freezing state. A couple others lose it.  A few scenes after we see the same states; only this time in the opposing soldiers.  War does eat away at the soul.  Why engage in the first place? Hence the philosophical part. People can and have debated it for years and years. One story line flashbacks at different times to one soldier's memories with his wife. A lovely couple. Beautiful woman. After battle, the soldier receives a letter from her. She writes she's fallen in love with a different man. The soldier's heart breaks. Deeper than any bullet he could have been hit. The film portrays the dark sides of war, and of human capacities. Even a tiny part of the experience of being in that actual battle, it is a heavy view of the sacrifices people make and the damage that gets...

I came to this film thru a Christoper Nolan mention in one YouTube clip, that it is one of his favorite films. I was expecting this to be some kind of documentary about the environment after early searches. However it doesn't quite fit the documentaries of National Geographic or Discovery. It's also not a straightforward movie. There isn't any dialogue. Or any direct linear story. It leans more into being an art film or an experimental movie.  The landscapes are beautiful. Coupled with an epic film score, one can see and hear the influence this has had on Nolan. It reminds me of Interstellar. The sound also brings me back memories of when Muse released their album, Black Holes and Revelations. There is something incredibly recognizable in the patterns of the silent repetitions, crawling arpeggios, and massive soundscapes.  Though the film seems simple, it is hard to distill. Reading reviews after watching it, there doesn't seem to be one general consensus. Aside fro...

Shaun of the Dead The First, and the Zombie Rom Com in the trilogy.  I'm pretty sure there are a lot of nods to horror/zombie films in the genre. Though I could only spot Night of the Living Dead, due to my limited exposure to the genre.  At its heart is an actual romantic comedy. What gives it character is that the romantic part is believable. Shaun has to navigate this while surviving an increasingly noticeable zombie apocalypse, and similar story arcs about family and friendship.  Hot Fuzz The 2nd one and the Action Comedy in the bunch. This one's probably the best of the three. Again, a lot of homage to action/cop movies; even to old tales of detection. The twist is the bad guys are the old people. It's definitely different seeing a shoot-around at what seems like a quiet park against old people. The premise seemed absurd. Sergeant Angel is sent to the country because he is too good of a cop in the metro. Then when he arrives there ...

2 years after 2015. Back to the future’s timeline of 2015 has passed. It’s still pretty far from what it looked like in the movie.  There’s something about a very well written story that stands the test time. I could only now imagine how big these movies were back in the day they were released. It would have stimulated minds and created interest in science. Heck even literature might have had a push, especially Jules Verne. Suddenly I connected something, I remember being very young. The movie, The Martian was out. The doctor was the same in the Back to the future movies. Interesting. Your future is whatever you make it. So make it a good one. You can do anything if you put your mind into it. And I found this is where these lines came from. It’s amazing how messages permeate over time. And learning where they come from is like a solved puzzle.

Your Name You have to commend the writing of the creator. I had two “what is going on” instances at different times in the movie.  At one point I thought it was going to be a teen romance story, and then when it started to gear towards being what seemed like a coming-of-age story, it forms into a fantasy mirroring real events one would see in a disaster movie. At its core is a romance between these two high school-aged characters, which are very easily relatable. At the end, after having rooted for them, you’d just want for them to resolve. The rules of the created world in “Your Name” are never explained.  How the two lead characters were able to switch to another, and what the limits would be; and how they were able to remember and what caused forgetting the memories? These may have been kept intact so the mystery remains. 5 Centimeters Per Second This movie is split into three acts. All woven through themes of longing, unsaid and missed con...

I binge-watched an Ip Man marathon. Mostly because Donnie Yen was awesome in the Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. His character, Chirrut Imwe was spectacular. I probably should have caught up on the Ip Man series much earlier because he taught Bruce Lee. Also, I saw the Wong Kar Wai take of Ip Man's story already, The Grandmaster. and I still didn't get caught up on the Ip Man series. So in a weird way, I got a deeper appreciation for Ip Man and Wing Chun through Donnie Yen and Star Wars. What's striking was I realized I never see the take from the Asian's side of the war. Even on the early 1920's-1930's war between Japan and China. War affects people on a mass level. From which ever side you may be, it's violent and people suffer enormously. Anyway, back to the series. Having seen it on one straight sitting, It's easy to compare it to one another.  In terms of fighting, the f irst was pitted against Japanese martial arts, Karate. The s econd film wa...

This was a visual treat. With the ongoing drama behind the Metro Manila Film Festival, I'm glad this movie got a shot at being viewed on a national level.  And I hope the trend continues where the quality of films are better and better every year. Without giving too much away, i t's  a typical love story; the geek and the damsel-in-distress. It was easy to empathize with the male character, for the female lead's part not so much.  It is beautifully made. It reminded me of some early Japanese Animation Films. There are a couple of comic book references. I'm sure Filipino comic artists and readers got a bit of a kick. The story built up quite nicely. The last part kind of fizzled. I feel like it could have been stronger. But overall it was very impressive.

It's incredibly absurd; Hilarious.  Some comics say this movie cannot be made today. I got that now. It's basically a dark comedy in a western setting. The story revolves around a newly appointed black Sheriff in an all-white town. The final act was trippy. The movie gets away with a lot of edgy material for it's time.  This would be the first Mel Brooks movie I've ever seen. If it's representative of his comedy filmography. Much respect.

I had been putting off this film for a couple years. Mostly because it seemed long. I had tried watching it twice before on separate occasions but the scenes always seemed to drag. Like the characters in the film, I was busy. Or at least that's what I think I was being. Busy. It's an entirely different story structure of what I've been used to. For the first half I didn't quite figure out what the premise was. Is this a story about these two old couples wandering around Tokyo? Or maybe they reminisce about their life while seeing their children? I like it because there's a subtlety to it. Like Life in general, Often we don't realize that this is it; That our daily lives are often mundane with the big moments happening in phases. The biggest draw I would say is that we have a tendency to become so enamored with our own lives that we forget the very people who raised us. That we drift away. It's hard not to feel sad for the grandmother, and for the gran...

I enjoyed this.  It's a good insight into the backbones of modern Rom-Com's. The story is simple enough. We get to see the staff of Matuschek & Co. It revolves mostly around its shop in Hungary. The two main characters are easily identifiable, as they are both reserved, awkward and hopeful. We see them banter with each other by day. and unknowingly be lovely to each other through their letters. I feel I learned a little about the 1940's. It would seem like a lovely period, before the war set in.