The Jungle Book
All right, a remake is probably warranted when it has been 49 years since the original. Director John Favreau (Iron Man, Cowboys & Aliens), says this new 3D live-action version is not a musical — but really, it would be a crime to do a Jungle Book movie without the classic tunes a la Trust in Me and Bear Necessities. Fortunately, Favreau delivers — with renditions by cast members Scarlett Johannson, Christopher Walken, Bill Murray and newcomer Neel Sethi, who plays Mowgli. There are some pretty big shoes to fill here, as the original was the last film that Walt Disney personally worked on before his death, which was in turn based on Rudyard Kipling’s popular 1894 novel. The CGI is pretty cool, but many films who try to mix real actors with animated characters just end up feeling unnatural. Judging from the trailer, though, that will not be a problem with this film.
Criminal
Let us take a moment of silence for screenwriter Douglas Cook, who worked on this film with writing partner David Weisburg (the duo is best known for 1996’s The Rock) for eight years but died before it premiered. Reuniting on screen for the first time since 1991’s JFK are the geriatric (okay, maybe not that old yet) heroes of Tommy Lee Jones, Gary Oldman and Kevin Costner — but their usual roles here are jumbled a bit, with Oldman playing a CIA chief who orders a neuroscientist, played by Jones, to transplant a dead CIA operative’s memories into the brain of a dangerously violent criminal — this is the weirdest part — played by Costner. The premise sounds rather weak, but Costner in a buzz cut starts out pretty convincing as a psychopathic killer who feels no human emotions — but not for long as he just has to play the good guy.
The Brand New Testament
God is an abusive jerk who tortures humans via his computer in an apartment in Brussels that he shares with his much-maligned wife and daughter (and son JC, who has inexplicably turned into a statute). In this world, he is directly responsible when buildings burn, trains crash ... and when whatever line you stand in moves the slowest. Tired of her father’s ways, the daughter releases the date of everyone’s death to the world, and chaos ensues — or does it? Belgium’s entry to this year’s Oscar’s is the brainchild of Jaco Van Dormael, who brought us the critically acclaimed Mr Nobody in 2009. This sounds like wacky, satirical goodness that is sure to piss off certain people — but who cares. A movie that dares to go this far must be awesome.
White Lies, Black Lies (失控謊言)
Finally, a Taiwanese movie that is not overtly cute or sappy — well, it is by Lou Yi-an (樓一安), who brought us the dark and absurd Losers (廢物). This film is based on a widely-publicized murder case that took place in Wanhua District (萬華) in the 1960s, where a mannequin factory owner kills his wife and apprentice and encases the bodies in the cement floor. The strangest part about the case is that the wife of one of the factory’s clients abandoned her five children and ran off with the killer — which became a main focus of the case as the media published letters from her children pleading for her to come home. The film stays roughly true to the case — with the addition of a reporter following the case and digging up more than she was looking for — but it focuses on the psychological rather than the murder itself as the three are dragged deeper into a tangled web.
Dheepan
After a number of Cannes winners over the past few months, we finally get to see the film that took the highest honor — the Palme d’Or. This French production, partially based on Montesquieu’s The Persian Letters detailing the experience of two Persian noblemen in France, follows a Tamil Tiger soldier-turned-refugee who decides to leave Sri Lanka to start a new life in Paris. He soon finds that life is not that much easier in the French housing projects. What is cool is that the lead actor, Antonythasan Jesuthasan really fought for the Tamil Tigers as a teenager in the 1980s before fleeing to Hong Kong, living as a refugee for five years before illegally landing in Paris, where he eventually became an acclaimed writer and actor. According to Jesuthasan, the film is “50 percent biographical.”
On a hillside overlooking Taichung are the remains of a village that never was. Half-formed houses abandoned by investors are slowly succumbing to the elements. Empty, save for the occasional explorer. Taiwan is full of these places. Factories, malls, hospitals, amusement parks, breweries, housing — all facing an unplanned but inevitable obsolescence. Urbex, short for urban exploration, is the practice of exploring and often photographing abandoned and derelict buildings. Many urban explorers choose not to disclose the locations of the sites, as a way of preserving the structures and preventing vandalism or looting. For artist and professor at NTNU and Taipei
March 10 to March 16 Although it failed to become popular, March of the Black Cats (烏貓進行曲) was the first Taiwanese record to have “pop song” printed on the label. Released in March 1929 under Eagle Records, a subsidiary of the Japanese-owned Columbia Records, the Hoklo (commonly known as Taiwanese) lyrics followed the traditional seven characters per verse of Taiwanese opera, but the instrumentation was Western, performed by Eagle’s in-house orchestra. The singer was entertainer Chiu-chan (秋蟾). In fact, a cover of a Xiamen folk song by Chiu-chan released around the same time, Plum Widow Missing Her Husband (雪梅思君), enjoyed more
Last week Elbridge Colby, US President Donald Trump’s nominee for under secretary of defense for policy, a key advisory position, said in his Senate confirmation hearing that Taiwan defense spending should be 10 percent of GDP “at least something in that ballpark, really focused on their defense.” He added: “So we need to properly incentivize them.” Much commentary focused on the 10 percent figure, and rightly so. Colby is not wrong in one respect — Taiwan does need to spend more. But the steady escalation in the proportion of GDP from 3 percent to 5 percent to 10 percent that advocates
From insomniacs to party-goers, doting couples, tired paramedics and Johannesburg’s golden youth, The Pantry, a petrol station doubling as a gourmet deli, has become unmissable on the nightlife scene of South Africa’s biggest city. Open 24 hours a day, the establishment which opened three years ago is a haven for revelers looking for a midnight snack to sober up after the bars and nightclubs close at 2am or 5am. “Believe me, we see it all here,” sighs a cashier. Before the curtains open on Johannesburg’s infamous party scene, the evening gets off to a gentle start. On a Friday at around 6pm,
RSS