Full disclosure #1: I was busy in 2015, hence my last published post was over a year ago... Okay fine, I was being lazy so I didn't write in 2015. That was the bigger contributing factor.

Full disclosure #2: I didn't know what to write, hence my last published post was over a year ago... Okay fine, I knew I wanted to write about movies. I was just not inspired and motivated enough to write full articles so I opted to write shorter status updates on my Facebook instead.

Full disclosure #3: I didn't keep a ledger to properly document each and every movie I watched throughout the year, so the list I am about to lay out bounds to be incomplete with a few movies missing the cut. But I believe if a movie leaves an impression on you one would never need to go deep to recall it, and I had more than a week to do so. Anything beyond this list is probably rightfully does not belong here.

Full disclosure #4: There are still a lot of "presumably prestige" titles yet to open in this region. Most of the Oscar players are mysteries as of this moment (not that they are always my cup of tea, yes I mean you The Big Short). But you give some and you take some. There are a few entries from 2014 on my list which I first watched in 2015 (then again like I said, I didn't keep a ledger so it might have been 2014, in any case it is too time consuming to verify so they are here). I tried to keep the list to movies released in the past 2 years only, so even occasionally I did watch an old movie for the first time and loved it wholeheartedly they won't be featured here.

Full disclosure #5: More than 80% of the films I watched were (still are, and will continued to be) English, so my list is heavily English-oriented with only a few non-English and Asian films in the mix.

Full disclosure #6: The more films I dug out from my memory garden, the more frequent I felt "that was a good one, definitely making my Top 10". Before long I had made a list of... wait for it... 50 films! Yes, that was terrible, I know. It was as if I "loved" every movie I watched. But that was not true. I definitely watched more than 50 films in 2015. You'd realize some high profile snubs (The Force Awakens is not there, so is Spectre; Katniss and Tris are both missing, so are all the Marvel superheroes though Ant-Man almost made it). And to prove that I am not indecisive, I did manage to pick 10 favorites. But since I made all the efforts to come up with that wide 50 shortlist I'd hate for it to go to waste so I'm still laying out all of them before I finally reveal my top 10 at the end of this article.

As I scanned through my list of 50, I realized I could organize them into a few groups so the list appears to be neater. Sorry, one of the hobbies of a Business Analyst is to spot trends. We couldn't let the data just lay around unsorted and unorganized.

Now, if you're ready. Here we go...

Movie Review: The Theory of Everything (电影《万物之理》观后感)

I started writing this review in Chinese before translating it into English, that's how my bi-lingual review came to be.

看改编自真人真事的名人传记片有一个附带缺点，那就是你已经知道故事的发展，以及结局是喜是悲，男女主角有否白头偕老等等。打个比喻，你看《林肯传》免不了要承受主角最终必被暗杀身亡的结局，在你观赏着电影时，你无时无刻就心惊胆跳地等待着那残酷的时刻降临，犹如等待受刑一般。

稍微认识我的朋友都知道我是一个颇为扫兴的电影迷，人家看电影都爱保持神秘感不爱预先知道结局，而我偏偏却爱预先知道故事细节。我会先上维基百科细读电影情节发展，未看电影已知结局。对我而言，这样一来反而减少了因为未知而产生的压迫感，让我更能放松享受电影带来的整体娱乐。本来，这部《万物之理》的维基百科是没有故事情节发展的，只有短短一两句交代这是一个关于斯蒂芬霍金与珍霍金的爱情故事，但偏偏我却阅读了霍金的延伸简介，因此已知道两人最终以离婚收场，童话故事并没有圆满结局。

或许你会问，为何我要花两大段告诉你这一些呢？因为《万物之理》一开场，很明显看得出男女主角演得好有默契，而且两人都郎才女貌，一举手一投足都好有戏味。这样一来就让我有一些困扰，因为我已经知道两人最终会以分手收场，因此他们越爱得浓烈越会让随之而来的结局更为伤感。故事每推进一步，我便忐忑斟酌这场戏是否是分手导火线呢，两人是否因为这情节而渐行渐远呢，会否有大吵一场呢。。。这应该是我在观赏这部拍得真不错的电影时比较大煞风景的一件琐事，只想在这里分享一下，基本上不会影响我对电影本身的评价。

毫无疑问，这部电影是拍来拿奖的。每一年都有许许多多这类影片的出现，我们都已习以为常。只不过有时候野心与成果未必成正比，你想拍一部史诗巨作有时候成了空有大场面毫无精神之作，你想拍部传记片结果为了戏剧效果加入太多虚构成分被人批了一身，终以失败收场。《万物之理》拍得比较平实，一个简单的故事平铺直叙没有太大起伏没有太多转折，让人看得也比较舒服。偶尔几场平淡的感情戏，反而让我感动了。

要谈《万物之理》的精彩，非要从男主角埃迪-雷德梅尼开始讲起。打从电影在影展开映，雷德梅尼便被人锁定在来临的奥斯卡五强人选之一，甚至有人已看好他势将夺冠。除了因为角色本身集合了模仿真人外加身理缺陷，完全开了得奖条件那扇门，也因为雷德梅尼本身确实也演得万分精彩，连霍金先生都说演得像自己，可见雷德梅尼是下了不少功夫。雷德梅尼的每一个走路姿势，每一个脸部表情，每一次嘴角微动，每一次艰辛的说话，坐在电动轮椅上时如何把头歪向右边等等，都会让你相信他就是霍金。如果两年前丹尼尔-戴-路易斯可以凭着模仿林肯出线，今年我绝对赞成把奖项颁给霍金上身的雷德梅尼。

如果说雷德梅尼靠的多是外露的演技，那他的拍档菲丽希缇-琼斯就完全把演技收敛在内心，两人成了极大对比。琼斯的角色本来就无法依靠身理缺陷来展露演技，又没撒狗血大起大落的激动情绪，因此就必须依靠内心戏来弥补。或许正因为如此，最近便有人开始担心琼斯很可能因为角色太过低调而被挤在女主角五强门栏外。在我看来，琼斯反而是两人中演得比较好的那一位。由一开始对霍金的爱恋慢慢转变为窒息的家庭支柱，看着丈夫辛苦地度过每一日，那一份心理负担琼斯便拿捏得很好。游走于对新认识友人的感情与对丈夫的责任，大部分时间只能以一双眼来表达情绪，其实是很难的。

电影本身就依靠两位主角来推动剧情，你不该期待电影会有如《国王的演讲》般有场激励人心的演说当收场，更不会有《铁达尼号》你跳我跳爱得要生要死的浪漫。我必须要说的是，之前提及的两人最终结局，导演选择了用一两场简单的戏带过，让我觉得很不错。没有哭得抱在一起，没有欲走还留的犹豫，妻子一句简单利落的“我曾经爱过你，我尽了力”反而有感动人的力量。我必须承认，经历了两个小时两人的起起落落，这一句话让我眼睛有一点点湿湿的。曾经相爱的两个人走到了这一步，彼此都知道两人的故事只能如此，也就不必强求继续下去，只能放手了。那一份无奈在这一场戏中，两名主角都演得很好。

这应该是今年奥斯卡强档电影中除了《消失的爱人》外比较早登陆大马的一部，绝对值得你去捧场。不要以为得奖电影都深奥得摸不着头脑，你可以当着去看一部传记片包装的爱情故事，或是爱情故事包装的传记片，当电影结束了，你会带着一份惆怅一份满足感离开。

There is a fact you need to accept when you watch a biopic adapted from the life story of a real person: you already knew where the story goes, will there be a happy or a sad ending, and whether or not the hero and heroine will end up together etc. Take an example, when you watch Lincoln there’s no escaping of the protagonist’s fate of getting assassinated. When you watch the film, you would anticipate nervously the arrival of that grim moment anytime soon, just as you are waiting for your own execution.

Friends who know my habit in watching movies will tell you that I am a buzzkill. Most people like to have a spoiler-free movie experience, but I am the exact opposite. I like to know every itty bitty detail before the movie. I will check out the plotline in Wikipedia, and I want to know how it ends before walking into the Cineplex. To me, any unknown and suspense will make me feel anxious, the elimination of it means I can enjoy the movie and its entertainment value to the maximum without the feeling of anxiety. As it happened, Wikipedia page of The Theory of Everything does not come with a detailed plotline but a two-line introduction that says this is the love story of Stephen Hawking and Jane Wilde. Unfortunately my curiosity led me to click and read further on Hawking’s marriage thus I knew they ended up divorced. No fairy tale ending.

Why on earth did I just spend two paragraphs telling you this, one might ask? I’m getting to my point now. Right from the beginning of The Theory of Everything sparks fly between the two very gorgeous and good looking leads. Their chemistry makes every interaction so easy on the eyes, which ultimately makes a good drama. Which brings us back to the aforementioned divorce I have known about, and this has caused some level of distraught to me knowing that such a lovely and passionate couple would eventually end up going separate ways. With every pushing forward of the story, I would speculate nervously whether this development would be the beginning of the end, is this the reason why they grow apart, or would there be a huge fit etc. This was the only minor buzzkill when I watched this movie, which I found to be very good. It’s a trivial story here for sharing, and not going to change my evaluation of the film.

This film is made with the main purpose of winning awards, undoubtedly. Not that we are stranger to such idea, there are countless of such movies every year taking an aim at the award glory. The success of those movies is measured by how many awards they pick up. The only difference of a good and a bad movie lies on the gap between the ambition and the execution. Sometimes, you aspire to shoot an epic only to end up with a few grand and eye-popping scenes without much of a spirit within the story; other times you try to make a biopic only to be heavily criticized after adding in too much of your own stories in the name of dramatic effects. The Theory of Everything is relatively restrained by telling a simple love story in a straightforward manner. This helps us to watch the film more comfortably and digest it more easily, with some occasional scenes that move us deeply despite its simplicity.

To talk about The Theory of Everything and how good it is, we have to start with Eddie Redmayne. Ever since the movie opened in film festivals, people have been speculating Redmayne to be a lock in the upcoming Academy Award, even going as far as predicting a win for him. Granted, it is a mimicry of a real person with physical disability which is never a bad news for award traction; but in Redmayne’s case he is truly outstanding that even Mr. Hawking himself praising the performance with compliments like “at times, I thought he was me”. Every step he walks, every face expression he shows, the way he moves his lips and speaks every word difficultly, and the way he leans his head slightly to the right side of his wheelchair, all of these make us believe the man we watch on the screen is in fact Stephen Hawking. Daniel-Day Lewis won the Oscars by impersonating Lincoln, there’s no way Eddie Redmayne can’t achieve the same for embodying Stephen Hawking so well.

While Redmayne’s performance highly depends on anything exterior, in contrast his partner Felicity Jones mostly keeps all the emotions inside. Her character is not physically disabled to begin with, and there isn’t much OTT showcase moment for her throughout the film. She has to substitute the disadvantage with showing different layers of emotions. Perhaps this low key performance is the reason why there has been worry lately that she might not make it to the top 5 of Academy Award’s Best Actress race. To me, she is actually the better among the two leads. From her initial admiration of Hawking to the unconditional love and support of a wife who watches her husband suffers greatly, Jones displays a very contained performance. Her dilemma of choosing between the romantic feeling towards her newfound lover and the responsibility of a wife is mostly displayed through her eyes, which is not an easy feat.

The film basically uses the two leads to push the story forward. You should not expect an inspiring speech à la The King’s Speech to end the film, nor should you anticipate the undying love of Titanic’s you jump I jump romance. Good news is, the director chose to do the aforementioned divorce scene in a delicate and simple way. There’s no big tears and long hug between the two, but only a simple but powerful phrase of “I have loved you, I did my best” from the wife. I have to admit that after spending two hours with the two lovers, this scene actually moved me to tears. Once deeply in love, both knew at that moment that their story can only end here so there’s no need to prolong the marriage but to let go. Both Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones act brilliantly in this scene.

Apart from Gone Girl, this film is probably the only Oscar surefire to open in Malaysia so far. I highly recommend it. Not all award-winning films are head-scratching and deep. You may think of it as watching a biopic disguised as a love story, or a love story disguised as a biopic; either way you will be leaving the Cineplex with a sense of satisfaction.

A

Movie Review: Seventh Son

Jeff Bridges has become some sort of expert in playing an experienced man of a certain profession that doesn’t give a shit and is drunk most of the time, with a protégé under his wing. After winning the Oscar (in an alcoholic role, no less), he has since perfected this act in True Grit, R.I.P.D. and The Giver. In Seventh Son, Jeff Bridges plays Master Gregory, the Spook (a demon fighter) who acquires a young man Tom (played by Prince Caspian’s Ben Barnes) as his apprentice to fight Mother Malkin the powerful witch queen (played by Julianne Moore). He’s tough, he’s cranky, and he’s drunk. In another word, it’s a role custom made for him that he basically sleepwalks through the role without a sweat.

That doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy his performance. On the contrary, this is the only Jeff Bridges that I know of and truly enjoy. So though Seventh Son, an adaptation of the fantasy novel The Spook’s Apprentice, is named after the young apprentice, we once again find Jeff Bridges at the center of the film. He’s a true star that you just want to see more of. Though the script is predictable and there’s not much of a character development throughout the film, you can be sure that Jeff Bridges delivers his part perfectly.

The film is a combination of The Seeker: The Dark is Rising and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. It tries to fit as many elements into the 103 minutes of running time as it can: magic, love, action. However, the plot feels a little rush, and we never really see how Tom has progressed into a spook of his own. The film spends too much time building up the love story of Tom and Alice (the niece of Mother Malkin) but too bad the two players of the characters wasted it with zero chemistry. The climactic battle scene is fascinating, but the last battle involving Mother Malkin and Master Gregory basically ended before it began so that’s a buzzkill.

In overall, Seventh Son provides us with the kind of entertainment we need after a tired working day… at home, not necessarily in the cinema. But if you happen to choose watching it in the cinema, I’m sure you’ll still enjoy it though don’t expect to be wowed by it.

B

Movie Review: The Golden Era

When you shoot a film that clocks in at 3 hours, you’d better make sure it is either:

(1)    Grandiosely Epic: Stun your audience with waves of awe-inspiring spectacles i.e. big battle scenes or magnificent ceremony celebrations, visually dazzling sets and costumes, and fascinating CGI effects.

(2)    Poetically Beautiful: Once again, this has got something to do with bombarding the audience with endless beauty visually and audibly that it feels like we are watching a poem unfolding before us.

(3)    Amusingly Entertaining: Enchanting story lines, delightful adventures or entertaining musical numbers to keep the audience hooked and never realize time flies by.

The Golden Era, the latest offering from award-winning director Ann Hui that clocks in at 179 mins, is neither of the above. The pace of the film is so slow and the structure so loose that none of the elements work. It is disappointing that with three hours to develop the characters and love story properly, Ann Hui failed to incorporate any of her usual sensitive touch into the narrative thus unsuccessful in bringing the audience into the heart of the story. What’s left is the audience checking their watch every five minutes waiting for the movie to be over.

The film tells the story of legendary Chinese writer Xiao Hong (played by Lust, Caution’s Tang Wei) during the last 10 or so years of her life in the 1930s through early 1940s. It centers on her relationship with a few men including (arguably) the love of her life Xiao Jun (played by Lan Ling Wang’s Feng Shaofeng) and the only man she ever married Duanmu (played by relatively unknown Zhu Yawen), in addition to her unofficial apprenticeship with Lu Xun (played byveteran Wang Zhiwen). Because the focus is on her love life, the film does not show us how and why she is regarded as one of the most talented female writers in her era. If Ann Hui thought through reading of bits and pieces of her articles we can have a glimpse into her talent, she did not execute it effectively.

The film is structured to be told from the POV of multiple of her friends and comrades in the literary world. It jumps back and forth between years, narrated by different people about different stages of her life. This is perhaps due to the fact that the script was written from information gathered through multiple articles about Xiao Hong from different people, and thus Ann Hui chose to let these characters narrate it themselves. However, this creates confusion among the audience especially early in the film when the characters are yet to be established fully. If the introduction of a film is important in grasping the interest of the audience, The Golden Era fails miserably in this task.

The problem of the film lies greatly in the “narrating” format that Ann Hui chose. Instead of letting the camera doing the work of storytelling, she chose words. In every minute of the film we are disrupted by the voice of someone recounting the event. It is like hearing ten different people telling one endless bedtime story that refuses us the chance to piece together the whole story, not even in our imaginative mind. The words, as spoken by the characters, are inorganic and pretentious. It is a pity that Ann Hui has traded her A Simple Life’s straightforward narrative style for this more complicated yet ineffective way of storytelling. I’m not sure if the director intended the film to be poetic or not, but the film as a whole does not feel so.

Ann Hui has gathered an impressive ensemble cast, yet when they are put together I do not see sparks, not even between Tang Wei and Feng Shaofeng. If I were to describe Tang Wei’s performance with one word I would perhaps choose “lazy”. She cruises along the movie with the same expression and body language, and we can’t tell much difference between her early 20s and her early 30s. True, the sorrow in her eyes catches the spirit of Xiao Hong quite precisely, but you can’t take the same emotion and apply it to the whole life of the legendary lady. The same can be said about Feng Shaofeng, who unfortunately falls victim to an underwritten character (once again, this perhaps has got to do with the fact that much of the script is based on others’ description of their relationship, so there will be parts where third parties will never understand thus leaving unfilled hollow in Xiao Jun’s character development). The only watchable performance comes from Wang Zhiwen, who in every gesture and every line reading captures the spirit of a respected literary icon perfectly.

Ann Hui has three hours to tell a simple story (many will argue that it is never truly simple when the subject matter is a legendary writer, but I feel it’s just a matter of choosing which angle to focus on and in the case of The Golden Era, it is the love story), yet I scratched my head wondering how can it feels so rush in some of the plots when the overall pace of the film is so slow. We barely know what happened in Wuhan and we are not treated enough of Xiao Hong’s struggle in the love triangle and her heartbreak over her eventual breakup with Xiao Jun, yet we spent nearly half an hour with her in her deathbed. At the end of the movie, the audience feel like they know as much about Xiao Hong as before watching the movie. We do not grow to like her or loathe her because we barely know her. The portrayal of her is two-dimensional that we never really throw ourselves whole-heartedly into the movie.

This film is ambitious, there’s no denying that Ann Hui intended to shoot an award-winning epic (though an acclaimed director like her who already won countless accolades before should not shoot movie for the sake of trophy anymore). Yet the misjudgment in execution makes The Golden Era a rare failure in her filmography. It comes to no surprise that the film failed to be shortlisted as one of the nine Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards, but the fact that Ann Hui won a Best Director at the Golden Horse Award puzzles me. That may have something to do with the brand name rather than the quality of the film. I would recommend you use the time to re-watch A Simple Life, then use the remaining one hour to do other more useful things.

C