J-Drama: My Boss, My Hero / 我的大佬我的英雄

                                         credit: AniJam

Synopsis: 

Sakaki "Tornado" Makio (Nagase Tomoya) is a tough 27-year-old high school drop-out. By academic standards, he's pretty dumb. His father decides to force Makio to return to high school to receive his diploma and he asks an old friend who happens to be the principal (Iwaki Koichi) of a nearby school to admit Makio. If Makio doesn't graduate, the position of boss will be given to his younger brother Mikio (Kikawada Masaya). Furthermore, he must pose as a 17-year-old during school hours and in the presence of any classmates or teachers outside of school. If his cover is blown, it would be the end of his high school career as well as his hopes to become boss. Things start out rough and tough as Makio's violent temper is tested. As the lessons and days go by he learns there is much more to school than just tests and studying.

movie link: http://www.mysoju.com/japanese-drama/my-boss-my-hero/episode-1/part-1/

credit: mysoju.com

My Take: 

Okay, I'm not done watching the drama yet, I'm only on episode 4 but I feel like I needed to write about it already cos i'm afraid the ending might somehow alter how I am feeling about it now. It's really funny, like,palm-in-my-face funny. I am laughing so hard  and so often that I'm afraid I'd wake my housemate up lol. Gaaah! I love it, it's not only funny but it makes me feel all giddy too. I mean, I couldn't ask for more, a romance and a comedy j-drama rolled into one. Okay, on to the next episodes and the next packet of ramen, lol...

update 1: and the movie is all about enjoying the youth too.ahhh memories. 

update 2: second to the last episode: damn! every high school student should watch this movie, or better yet, they make it part of the curriculum or something lol. 

update 3: gawd! i'm bawling my eyes out again! beautiful story, beautiful characters, man! i love this drama. I'm glad i watched this after all. yukatta!

Overall, it's a very satisfying drama, something that never gets old even if you watch it for the second or third time around. :)

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time + Spirited Away

I've long since stopped watching anime and it was also an "it-all-got-too-much-for-me-i-had-to-step-away-from-it-all case since everyday when I switch the TV on, it would all be a mind-numbing series of anime after anime shows. However, it just so happened that as I was surfing the net for a movie to watch, i stumbled into this amazing website that has a great collection of HD quality movies that you can either stream or download. Another great thing about it is they actually provide viewers an option to watch the movies either dubbed or sub-titled. The only catch is, they're all anime films. By this time, I had already watched a trailer for Spirited Away so I decided ok, might as well watch it, it's been a long time anyway. I enjoyed it. So much so that right after that movie, I watched another anime, The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. 

credit: lokasenni


Synopsis: 

When 17-year-old Makoto Konno gains the ability to, quite literally, "leap" backwards through time, she immediately sets about improving her grades and preventing personal mishaps. However, she soon realises that changing the past isn't as simple as it seems, and eventually, will have to rely on her new powers to shape the future of herself and her friends.  -stagevu.com

movie link (subbed) : http://stagevu.com/video/hbxnrfsarocj

My Take:

I like time travel themed movies/books, except when it's badly made, that it wasn't much of a surprise when I ended up enjoying this movie despite it being an anime film. Somehow it reminds me of Butterfly Effect and Dean Koont'z Lightning, but only because it shows how every action, every alteration done in the past, always, always, affects the future. This movie begs the question "if you have the power to go back in time and change something, would you do it? If so, which time? and which event?" I asked myself that and I couldn't really think of any. ah, maybe go back for a day during that time when I saw my crush for the first time in high school, lol, not to change anything but simply to relive the feelings, and maybe freeze time for a bit so i could stare at him unhindered lmao. *.^

credit:  cosmo111687

Synopsis:

Tale of the fanciful adventures of a ten-year-old girl named Chihiro, who discovers a secret world when she and her family get lost and venture through a hillside tunnel. When her parents undergo a mysterious transformation, Chihiro must fend for herself as she encounters strange spirits, assorted creatures and a grumpy sorceress who seeks to prevent her from returning to the human world. - http://movies.yahoo.com

movie link (in Japanese, English subbed) http://stagevu.com/video/ejxbtfppaqvd

My take:

I would have enjoyed this movie more if I was a kid. It's not that I didn't, i did. But had i been a child, this movie will be in an altogether different level, intense. Some scenes would be so much horrifying, so much exciting. It'll be much more thrilling at every turn, and I'd be cheering the heroine on as if I'm her friend. But since I'm a grown woman watching this movie about magical creatures, it toned down things a bit, but I still enjoyed it very much. 

P.S. I can't find a longer english subbed Japanese trailer so I had to use Disney's version (yes, Disney bought the right to show this film but they it had it dubbed in English). However the movie link I posted here is the Japanese one cos personally i don't like watching dubbed movies since I think the movie loses much of it's spirit, spunk, and flavour. :)

K-Movie: Moss

                   credit:  KMDb01


movie links:
http://www.mysoju.com/korean-movie/moss/
http://www.dramastyle.com/movie/Moss-2010/


Synopsis:

Movie remade from a popular internet cartoon. The story of the few people who live in a village, and a man who comes to the village for his father's funeral. He tries to figure out the mystery of his father's death, but the villagers watch his every move.

RYU Mok-hyeong, a member of a small prayer house located in a remote mountain village, is well-respected for his leadership and gift of speech. In order to build a new prayer house Mok- hyeong leaves the mountains to build a new village with the help of his friend, Yong-duk. Many years pass and Mok-hyeong is discovered dead after sharing a bottle of rice wine with Yong-duk. Mok-hyeong’s good for nothing son, RYU Hae-guk, arrives from Seoul to attend his father’s funeral. Hae-guk soon realizes that the villagers are trying to hide something from him leading him to seek the help of PARK Min-uk, the public prosecutor responsible for his demotion to a local branch during his more reckless past. Hae-guk plans to conduct his father’s autopsy himself, but arrives at his father’s grave only to find his corpse missing. Hae-guk suspects that Yong-duk is responsible.

Cast:
Park Hae-il 박해일 As Ryoo Hae-gook (류해국)
Jeong Jae-yeong 정재영 As Cheon Yong-deok (천용덕)
Yoo--Seon 유선 As Lee Yeong-ji (이영지)
Yoo Joon-sang 유준상 As Public prosecutor Park (박 검사)
Yoo Hae-jin 유해진 As Kim Deok-cheon, villager (김덕천, 마을 주민)
Kim Sang-ho 김상호 As Jeon Seok-man, villager (전석만, 마을 주민)


Credits: http://www.koreanmovie.com


My Take:

Almost 3 hours long, though I hardly noticed. Grabe! I love this movie, it'll keep you guessing til the end. So did the guy just died, or someone killed him? If the latter, who did? Why? So much so that at one point I even thought, ok, so is it possible this woman was just imagining things after all? I was with the protagonist the whole time, in his every suspenseful moves. I couldn't even help myself but warn him like "Mok, be careful!". Very, very edge of you seat film and just when you thought you had it all figured out, the ending just grabs ahold of you and never lets go, even long after the movie ended.

Hollywood Film> X-Men: First Class

I don't think I have to include a synopsis or a cast listing or what-not with this entry. The movie pretty much speaks for itself and i'm sure almost everyone has seen it already.

I walked in into the theater not expecting anything since I haven't even seen the trailer beforehand, but I just really wanted to see it cos I've always wondered about Professor X and Magneto's "past". Gosh, I can hardly eat while watching the movie ( i had KFC's hotshots,lol, i like to eat while I watch, i don't like just chips or popcorns, i prefer real food, not that you can call fastfood fares "real" but you know what i mean ^.^ ) So anyway, i grew up with X-Men, it was one of those cartoon series we used to watch every night as a child, I even fought with my siblings as to who's who, I was Jean Grey haha, i chose her cos then I'll have two hot guys pining for me, Cyclops and Wolverine lol, even then I was crazy lmao! but why do i keep wavering off topic. The movie explained so much for me, and it was touching knowing that Magneto was actually a Holocaust victim, had I known this before, I would have looked at him differently during the subsequent X-Men films, maybe with more understanding, more sympathy. It's also amazing to find out that Charles had always been the same, such strong character, such unwavering devotion to the human race. Beast. Mystique. It was so nice knowing how their characters started off as well. I loved everything about the movie, it was tight. I surprisingly even cried towards the end of the movie, it was just so touching. I thought I was gonna be disappointed but I ended up wanting to stay seated for another 2 hours to watch it again but I couldn't cos i have some grocery shopping to do, which I couldn't do on any other days because of work schedule. bummer. In the meantime, I'm gonna watch the other x-men movies again, this time, through a more "informed" glasses. :)

Hollywood Film (tv movie) The Memory Keeper's Daughter

                                              credit:quer17iron

Cast:  Emily Watson

              Dermot Mulroney

              Gretchen Mol

Plot: On a snowy winter night in 1964, Dr. David Henry rushes his pregnant wife Norah to the hospital, where, with help from her husband and nurse Caroline Gill, she delivers their son Paul. However, Dr. Henry discovers that his wife was carrying twins, and helps her deliver the second child, a baby girl named Phoebe. Shortly after Phoebe's birth, he finds that she has Down Syndrome, and hands her over to Nurse Caroline, explaining that the death of his ill sister nearly destroyed their mother and he doesn't want Norah to go through that. Instead, he instructs Caroline to take Phoebe to a nearby institution for the mentally ill, figuring the child won't live much longer, and tells Norah that Phoebe was a stillborn. However, after visiting the institution and seeing the state of the other patients, Caroline takes the baby home with her, stopping along the way to buy formula and diapers. With help from a truck driver named Al, Caroline begins to raise the baby as her own, while Dr. Henry develops an obsession for photography after his wife gives him the gift of a Memory Keeper camera.  Written by scorpionqueenofhearts  

credits: http://www.imdb.com

My Take: 

This movie is all about making the wrong choice and how you pay for it for the rest of your life. And it's something that everyone can relate to, considering we make choices everyday. Sometime's we're not even aware that we are, but we do. And it's sad cos when the time came to realize that it was the wrong choice, there's nothing we can do to correct it, we can't undo what's been done, and we have to live with the consequences of our action. I admit, there were times when I'd also look back and think I wish i chose the other way. But then I tell myself, it's been laid out for me. I was meant to make that choice. I could be wrong. but somehow it's comforting. Of course, it wasn't as grave as what the character had to decide upon on this movie but it's the same thing. You make a choice,you live with the outcome. This movie is really touching, and it certainly touched a chord inside of me. Ahhhh if only life is less complicated, but then again, that would be like asking for life to be boring... i don't know what to say anymore. What I can assure you is it's not a 90 minute wasted.