他們在畢業的前一天爆炸 (Days We Stared at the Sun) is an upcoming movie out of Taiwan set for release on Friday, May 6, 2011 in Taipei. The movie seems to be either a continuation of the tv drama from 2010 or the condensed version of that tv drama. My Chinese isn't good enough to decipher it.
What it looks like is a few high school students that are bad news for society and make a mess of their lives. Not very interesting to me to see a bunch of high school punks think they own the world while others around them suffer. I am going to take a pass on this and the tv drama.
走出五月 (Goodbye May) is an upcoming film being released in Taipei in a couple of days on Friday, May 6, 2011. The movie stars Alan Kuo and Serina Fang.
Seems to be a love story between Alan Kuo and Serina Fang that includes a love story of Alan's grandparents. Influenced by music and the potential to be what you're suppose to be. The movie does look very interesting. I am in mainly because of Serina, but hey, the story looks good to.
Fast Five (玩命關頭5) took the box office crown this past weekend with an impressive $86,198,765 take. This is the second straight The Fast and the Furious movie to take number one.
This movie jump starts the summer movie season with a bang. The film stars two action movie icons in Vin Diesel and The Rock, Dwayne Johnson. Both have had success at the box office, but not very consistently. Whereas the fourth installment looked to get spring business, the fifth film was looking for the summer business. The reviews for the movie has been generally more positive than the previous two Justin Lin helmed movies in this franchise. This installment was also estimated at $125-$170 million to make. If the worldwide take is double that, it'll be very good for all those involved with the movie.
Major props to Justin Lin, the Taiwanese-American director at the helm. This is the third The Fast and the Furious movie for Justin and he's done an awesome job so far. I really enjoyed Tokyo Drift as well as Fast & Furious. I am guessing that after this film, Justin will be a legitimate A list director in Hollywood. A first for a Taiwanese guy. Here's to hoping he gets to make the kind of movies he wants to from now on. Indie or mainstream, I will watch his stuff.
The Chaser (追擊者) is a 2008 film out of Korea. The movie stars Kim Yoon-seok, Seo Yeong-hee, and Ha Jeong-woo. This movie was the third highest grossing domestic film in Korea in 2008. The rights to this movie have been sold to an US production company and Leonardo DiCaprio have been linked to it.
Eom Joong-ho, played by Kim, is a former police officier that is now a pimp. 2 of his girls have disappeared recently and he's trying to fulfill orders for the night with less staff. Kim Mi-jin, played by Seo, calls in sick. Eom isn't convinced and goes to her house to force her into work. Sick and not in the best shape, Mi-jin takes an order. Eom's right hand man, Oh-jot delivers the goods. While driving around, Eom finds the car of one his missing girls. This starts him on a mouse chase that leads to Je Yeong-min, played by Ha. From there, you'll have to watch the movie as the twist and turns are many.
This was a very dark film as are many Korean films of this past decade. In this movie, we're presented with evil and with the ability to stop it, but you can't without breaking the law. With Eom, he 's no longer the law and will break it for the sake of cracking the case. Throw in good ol' politics and things get tricky. The story is pretty unique in that the bad guy is found, but the victim is still alive and could be saved. Can good triumph over evil? Are there casualties of evil?
I highly recommend this film as it was a unique story and presented good, evil, and a whole lot of darkness.
Liar Game: The Final Stage (飾演 神崎直) is a 2010 film out of Japan. The film stars Toda Erika and Shota Matsuda. Although the two leads do have the most screen time, its an ensemble cast that is quite large. So large that I had trouble keeping up with who was who. The movie is a conclusion to a long running TV drama in Japan called the Liar Game.
The story is based on winning a game of golden or red apples. The film is about who can all get the golden apples. Its a game of money, manipulation, and finding the mole. Erika plays the gal trying to get everyone to do the right thing. However, greed, power and general mistrust will not allow that to happen.
The film was a trip. It was heard to follow as the characters were a little hard to follow towards the end. The main reason I stayed around was really for the lovely Toda Erika.
