The Mighty Mighty CK

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All the movies that were featured this
year had been nothing but disappointing. Maybe “Iron Man” proved
to be a last gasp saving grace that kept me in the cinema, but the
rest were truly not up to their mark, not even the latest Indiana
Jones adventure. In fact, it was the most disappointing of them all,
so disappointing that I almost gave up on the whole franchise. I
didn’t even bother to write a review on it, or on any other
productions, because it will turn rather nasty, owing to the fact
that I never had anything nice to say, and even if I did, the con’s
would most certainly outweigh the pros. 

All but one.

The Dark Knight was the most
anticipated movie this year, especially when all the other didn’t
live up to their expectations. But unlike all the other movies, The
Dark Knight lived up to it, perhaps even more.

From the very beginning until the end,
the movie didn’t look or even feel like a superhero movie. It was
more like a psychological crime drama, with lots of twists and turn,
which in fact was the movie’s plus point. The artfully crafted
opening scene puts the movie in full motion, and the rest just
follows through. Even though the 2 ½ hours runtime proved to be a
bit too long, I would be disappointed if it was even one minute
short. All the scenes fitted well in that time slot; there were no
misplaced scened or unnecessary shots. Everything was well placed
like the way it should be.

The Joker’s role was the most
applauded, but for me, Heath Ledger did underplay the role a bit.
Sure, he did stole the movie, but if the role was anything that
followed “The Killing Joke” graphic novel like he said in an
interview before his untimely death, then I’d say it wasn’t enough.
Sure he was psychotic in a very funny and sickening way, but I
believe that it could have been done with a much better tone. Still,
despite the minor shortfalls, he did carry the role like it should
have been done, instead of being the comic relief like the disaster
called “Batman and Robin” (remember Bane? I don’t think so-many
would rather forget).

My money was on Christian Bale. Not
only as Batman, but as Bruce Wayne as well. He managed to split the
two personalities in a very balanced manner. Michael Keaton proved to
be too serious as Bruce Wayne; Val Kilmer didn’t fit at all for both,
and George Clooney should have avoided the movie in the first place.
But Bale managed to bring out the playboy persona of Bruce Wayne, who
at times don’t seem to care about anything but himself, like the
Lamborghini crash scene, but at the same time cared enough to believe
in Harvey Dent and his effort to clean up the city. Yet, as Batman,
he was the true warrior, who puts his life on the line before other
as well as their reputation, as he did to protect Dent’s reputation
at the end. The only complaint is that out-of-place voice he was
doing as Batman. AT times like these I wish Kevin Conroy did the
voice over, but that wouldn’t be right, how tempting that could have
been.

Another role who deserves the applause
was Gary Oldman’s Jim Gordon. Playing the rarely casted good guy
role, Oldman’s stellar performance reflects the true persona of
Gordon, a by-the-book cop who trusts The Dark Knight implicitly
without putting the city at risk. Aaron Eckhart undoubtedly gave a
fresh boost to Harvey Dent’s role; a man bent to clean up the city,
at all cost. His transformation to Two-Face was beautifully crafted,
from the emotional aspect right up to the remarkable FX work on his
face.

Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman and
Maggie Gyllenhaal’s role as the support characters proved to be more
than that. Caine and Freeman managed to bring out the most of
Wayne/Batman, and Gyllenhaal managed to pull her character to live
unlike Katie Holmes who literally panned it to dead waters. The rest
of the supporting characters like Eric Roberts were played very well
in the movie, which gave the movie a great crime drama tone.

Setting the movie great was none other
that Christopher Nolan himself. The director managed to cut the
movie’s setting to match the dark and gritting tale of Batman, not as
a superhero, but as a human being that can be hurt, bruised and also
hated. Batman was not the mask; Bruce Wayne was, and he made sure the
audience were clear about it. The dramatic twist that was well
orchestrated by The Joker kept the audience at the edge of their
seat, as each scene were manipulated to it’s fullest but never quite
reach the ending at it’s every turn. Although some would still wonder
why was Two-Face were killed off at the end (or was he), or why
Jonathan Crane/Scarecrow was only given a cameo role, he did it in a
craft fashion that didn’t gave the movie too much villain to juggle
with, at the same time gave a reason why Gotham needs Batman but also
resents him at the same time. Every part was polished, assisted by
classic portrayal of roles by character actors and actresses making
the movie a great and unforgettable watch.

A serious movie for serious fans and
moviegoers alike.

The moment that everyone’s been looking forward to is finally here. The
third movie of everyone’s favourite friendly neighbourhood Spiderman is
here and it’s hard to resist the theaters to catch the web slinger in
real action. Wikipedia and IMDB had probably registered big hits to
“spiderman3” and we all know that the big knowledge box that is The
Internet had provided us with almost limitless knowledge on almost
anything that circles this globe.

Great powers, great responsibilities.

Unfortunately it wasn’t so with the cast and crews of this third Spidey
project. Of course, for some of the ever faithful fans and moviegoers,
they would proclaim this to be the best of three, but I’d doubt the
hardcore fans would really appreciate the way Venom was pictured or the
unusual alliance between Spidey and his greatest nemesis. Let us not
forget the big change in Goblin Jr.’s costume and role.

Story wise, it looks and feels (feel free to add anything else) like as
if the whole story is rushed, crushed and compacted to a single entity
to give it a glorious finale (I hope) for the movie franchise. The
plots are too thick: three villains and Spiderman, Parker’s emotional
distress dealing with the news Mary Jane delivered and coherently
allowing the alien symbiote take total control of him, Marko Flint’s
escape and his side of the story, and then there’s Harry, Gwen and Aunt
May. Oh wait, the list goes on.

It’s just too much for one single movie to portray all these. But of
course, you can’t make a comic or a book into a full fledged movie true
to its original story so tinkering must be done. Die hard fans are not
going to be happy but it’s a fact that can’t be refuted. A comic is a
comic and a movie is, well, you get the picture, but cramping the whole
story in two plus hours just doesn’t justify it. Still, Sam Raimi did a
commendable job of telling us the whole story and gave it a fitting
finish, although I must say that the whole product looks like it’s been
rushed to production.

The CG is impressive with Sandman and the vertigo inducing action
scenes, but downright disappointing with Venom. The most anticipated
villain (and certainly one of the strongest and feared most by
Spiderman) has not lived up to the expectation. One would expect more
spotlight on the infamous possessed Eddie Brock, but most of the scenes
were reduced to a suited Brock showing his real face (with fangs) most
of the time instead of that feared lizard like appearance. Even when
the symbiote was fully suited, the CG resemblance is rather
disappointing.

Green Goblin Jr. dons a different suit and a snowboard like glider for
more maneuverability, plus more firepower complementing with the
chemical that gives him the extra strength and agility. Sadly, the
alter ego plays second fiddle to Harry Osborn and his drama portrayal
by James Franco, while the turn-of-the-tide from baddie to goodie is
simply not acceptable.

What was supposed to be Peter’s first romantic relationship was turned
to a crush that was elevated to a short lived relationship-like
attachment geared towards jealousy inducement. Mary Jane didn’t fit,
but oh of course we’re talking about Gwen Stacy. Her role in being
Peter’s best friend and an object to MJ’s increasing jealousy towards
her was the only part she played. Sorry guys, no death for her in this
one, but oh wait, is this Ultimate Spider Man? No it can’t be, but
then…..(ring-ring Carnage!)

The supporting cast of Jonah Jameson (J.K Simmons), John Stacy (played
by the talented James Cromwell – not so talented in this one though
since the character is reduced to a supporting role), Dr. Conners
(Dylan Baker) and of course Aunt May, has either more involvement or
none whatsoever in this edition. The twist with Harry’s butler
revealing the secret of Norman’s killer was unexpected though, almost
resembling the Bruce-Alfred connection with the two of them towards the
build-up.

The storyline is pretty boring. Comic adaptation are supposed to be
full of action, and although the final stand off in the construction
site didn’t disappoint, the movie was riddles with too much emotional
content, and although it’s a Spidey movie, in which emotion is a huge
part of it, combining with Raimi’s effort to make it true the comic, a
large part of the movie should have been more fast paced (not to
suggest more action scenes), but to just “get on with it”. That being
said, Parker’s rejection on the symbiote at the church was classic, as
well as the transformation of Brock to Venom, but 20 minutes of Venom
is just not enough. The narration of the story through various
characters can somewhat be annoying, but it’s a sureshot way to deliver
the story to the masses.

No doubt it was a good watch, but a lot of improvement should have been
made. The first two movies were great, and everyone expects the third
to be the greatest (some does anyway). Still, we are lucky that this
wasn’t the disaster known as X-Men 3 or as mediocre as Superman
Returns, and senseless like Ghost Rider. There is nothing left to be
salvaged from this part though, so we won’t be expecting another part
for a very long time.

Entertaining, but not exceptional as some anticipated it to be.

Someday I just wish I could
go on a killing rampage.

Annoyance is something that
can be closely defined as that little itch in a place you can’t reach to
scratch. It sucks the life force out of you, making yourself the subject to
more hate and in worse cases, temperamental senses heighten to a level
incomprehensible to normal human being. Of course normal here being the average
Joe and Jane you often see wandering around your local shopping mall and
grocery store, but in some definitions, normal is just as good as any basket
case from the not so neighbor friendly loony bin.

Before I reach to the
juicier subject, bear in mind that I am aware of my own shortfalls. I am a jerk
to people (all the time), unfriendly, skeptical, an outspoken, temperamental
candidate and I just never listen. These are my flaws; my faults, and I live by
it, trying to make the best out of it and resemble very little percentage of it
to the masses. In short I’ll be a jerk to jerks and be nice to those who are
nice.

With all that been said,
let’s move on to the general annoyance that has also been agreed by some of my
friends, but among all of them, I’m one of the only few (very few-extremely
very few: I have no idea how to bring the number even lower with words) who
“has the balls” to write and publish about it. Maybe the fact that not so many
people read my blogs could be the reason some of you may have something to say
about my bravery (which will be another point of discussion later on), but hey,
just because I don’t get reviews for my blogs doesn’t mean that people don’t
read it. Some just choose to ignore. One day I will be famous and then shit
will start to hit the spinning fan. Let’s hope that the fan is on the highest
speed and the shit is fresh.

1. I am an expert of so many things!

The
major annoyance is not of the things the person knows, but how they boast about
it every now and then, as if they are the only person in the entire planet
having access of that knowledge and all around them should worship their
statue. It becomes a major annoyance when it’s something that is very common,
like the ability to bake a cake, play guitar, write HTML codes and so on. One
could not imagine the reaction if these people possess skills that are limited
to certain chosen ones, given to the fact that they are a major show-off with
skills that are known by so many. I’m not saying these skills are not
exceptional, but unless you have achieved something that propels you to the
status as high as where Bill Gates or Jackie Chan are then there’s no reason
for you to openly boast about your mighty back flips and that
not-so-exceptional coding procedure you have written oh-so-many times. The
opening lines of “back in 1804 I have gone around the entire 42 states and
kissed everybody’s asses” or “I have been floor licking since the birth of
computers and know everything about floor licking, so in my opinion…” can be a
pain in the ass when you see them once too many.

2. Same joke, every day

Jokes
are great. I love jokes. Sometimes it makes my otherwise terrible day, and
jokes of different variety are often welcomed by me. I even have this one Tamil
movie that I rate as funny, not because of the jokes, but the action and
dialogue scenes that often ends me up in roars of laughter. Imagine the hero
being electrocuted by the cops and all he said was “Only mere human can get
electrocuted, but I am Narasimma. When electricity comes in contact with me,
electricity itself gets electrocuted”. The first time I heard these words
uttered, I fell off my chair and tripped on my own ice-cream.

But
jokes can only be used only for a certain times for a certain period, in which
after that it becomes stale and boring. Nevertheless there are certain idiots
who use the same jokes over and over again it brings tears to my ears all for the
wrong reasons.

I
know of this guy who “mutilates” (I refuse to use the word “photoshop”, as one
of my friends described “photoshopping” as having a certain degree of
professionalism) his headshot and attaches it to another body of a woman and
often posts it on discussion forums as a means of laughter to the masses. This
process gets repeated again and again even when trivial or serious subjects are
discussed. The reasons given were that it is a form of relaxation from the
hectic schedule of real life and to relieve tensions caused by real life. Yes,
pretty lame, but such explanations can only be given by those people who really
“needs some” in their real life. Hey I don’t mind photoshopping works, my other
friend from the same discussion board does it too but he don’t overdo it, and
he does it to a certain degree of professionalism, because after all, he is a
graphic artist, but when a two bit wannabe artist wants to do it, it becomes
totally messy and utterly degrading. His art of mutilating his own head and
placing it on a girl’s body often raises question of his own sexual identity,
even though he vehemently claims that it was “all for fun”.

When
you do a certain thing for fun all too often, it means something else.

3. Follow the leader

Why
do people in (1) and (2) gets away with it (at least to my observation)? Why do
they keep repeating the same offence over and over again, trying hard at
excelling in their own stupidity? Why do they keep getting lamer and lamer,
sometimes in exponential rate?

Monkey
see, monkey do.

They
have supports of people who “worship” them of course. There are the people who
had fallen deep in their lives that they look into lameness as a Godly thing. I
don’t want to go further on the psychological aspects of them but for reasons that
sometimes baffles me; they always swoon to the repetitive greatness of the
person mentioned in (1) and (2). I know it’s still hard to understand why some
people choose to support and worship these offenders of social skills but I’m
sorry that I can’t offer you any further explanation on this. I have exhausted
all the research I can do and lay my hands on, on this subject but I have
failed. I really couldn’t find the real reasons why there are some of us who
loves lameness, and maybe I’ll never find the answer.

More
power to me.

4. I can do it! (but I’m blonde)

A
friend of mine befriends a “pretty” girl, and since she claims that she can do
the things he needs for his projects, he hires her. To cut the story short she
failed him by not doing the things that she claimed have extensive knowledge
on, and he ended up losing the deal.

This
is the typical blonde trying to be smart and ending up chewing her own gums.
The reason I put pretty in quotation marks is that she was nowhere near that
stature, but the correct ambience of light, the skimpiness of her clothes and
that layers of thick powders on her face and lips makes her so, giving birth to
the proverbial wannabe Internet soft-porn star.

I’m
not saying all those who are prone to do the “pretty” scene are not smart, but
there is a distinguished difference of being not smart and being not smart BUT
trying to act smart. When you can’t do half the things you claim you can then
don’t do it. Say sorry and walk on, people won’t get offended or worse yet get
angry, but when you went on to the point of spoiling their business deals that
pisses off almost everybody involved.

There’s
nothing wrong in being a blonde, but there is always something wrong in being
an idiot.

5. You are so sexy, ergo you are very smart, ergo you
        are very intellectual

These
are the people who worship (4), just because they are “pretty” and “sexy”. The
explanation is pretty simple: Broad appears. The idiots gasp in awe. Broad
sits, utters a few words and the idiots immediately regards it as the most
brilliant quote of the century. What they fail to hear is the countless
cut-phrases and grammatical errors that are very obvious even to a seven year
old.

I’m
not the greatest writer on the planet. I don’t come close as being great and it
doesn’t really matter to me, for I enjoy writing. I enjoy sharing ideas and
thoughts to the masses. How they accept it is up to them. Some are critical,
some praises. I do know that my works are good, and I’m very happy with them.

I
like reading works by others, especially if it’s thought provoking, creative
and funny. When the comments are due I will give it. But when someone says or
writes something that does not come close to readable, and then these hordes of
saliva drenched mouths of lusting hyenas comes with praises which are not due,
that shows how uncivilized and dumb people can be. As my friend quoted once,
“these are pussy lovers; they will go behind any girl with revealing boobs and
sluttish looks. Thoughts and mind does not matter. In fact they should not matter.
Boobs, it’s all about boobs”

I
fear for the race of men. Some of them are reduced to sex hungry idiots who
regards the less than mediocre works of these wannabe soft porn stars as the
greatest piece of writings and art of all times.

6. The common hypocrites

Oh
I love these guys. Here we have the “say one thing, do another” character, the
same people who would shamelessly quote “Say what you mean, mean what you say”
on their Yahoo and MSN chat captions and does the opposite whole accusing other
of not living up to their captions.

Example?
My ex girlfriend (which one? Let me see, oh! It’s the most stupid one) once
said to me that she will never date anybody from her workplace, but after she
left me, she ended up dating two guys from her workplace anyway. That is
hypocrisy. These are the kinds who have no goals in life, who looks for
temporary pleasures and just hangs on another group of people like parasites.
These are the kinds that the world is talking about and loathes, but they still
roam freely without us knowing. The world is their proverbial playground, and
the people around them exist as their personal toys. The leech from one place
to another, acting as if they are the innocent babies while they hatch up their
devious plan for domination of the lesser species behind everybody’s back. They
are full of conniving plans, with their innocence serving as their perfect
cover.

The world will never be rid
of these annoyances, but as long as we keep our senses to its optimum level, we
will be able to stay clear off them. Otherwise, we will be serving them like
zombies, and it’s up to those few resistance fighters to bring balance to the
order.