Control

Easily the best movie I've seen in 2007, Control follows the life of Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division, who developed a new style of music that helped pioneer the post-punk movement in the late 1970s. It also deals with his suffering of depression due to epileptic seizures as well as his rocky relationship, which led to his suicide on the eve of Joy Division's first U.S. tour. Shot in black and white, there is this dark and timeless feel of this film that allows emotions to flow all over the screen. It certainly has a driving energy that takes my breath away. The last scene with "Atmosphere" playing in the background simply sends shiver down my spine. Depressive mood aside, the actor that played the band manager had me laughing throughout the movie with some of his witty wisecracks. Well-written script, solid performance, excellent music, this film really impressed me. A truly great biographical movie. Even with its rather slow of pace, it is still an interesting journey with some great music along the way. Higly recommended.

Joy Division - Atmosphere
Joy Division - She's Lost Control
Joy Division - Transmission

Festival Festival Festival!

Watching the documentary is probably the closest I can get to the Glastonbury festival. It was not an easy watch as random clips from different years were thrown in as oppossed to running in chronological sequence. Also, no names of interviewees or performers, so I had to keep myself very focused throughout the show. Judging from the screening I was in, a number of patrons seemed to struggle. Nevertheless, it was a great discovery on the King of all music festivals, the religious history of Glastonbury, the early years, the Hippie spirit, the locals' reactions, the solid fence and the muddy year. And of course there were the inevitable use of drugs, druken antics, mad dancing, silly costumes, and naked hairy hippies. One of the most memorable characters would be the father and sons who clean the loos in early morning, imagine how much shit and piss hundred thousands of festival goers produced in a day. The documentary gives an overview of every little thing of the festival, other than the people, it is also about the music. It feature performances from the world music (Tinariwen) to electronica (Chemical Brothers, Faithless), from Britpop (Pulp, Blur) to Reggae (Toots & The Maytals). Overall, it was a rather enjoyable watch, especially since it was free. And it triggers my desire to attend a music festival, hopefully the day will come.

Featured music,
Pulp - Common People
David Bowie - Heroes

Lord Don't Slow Me Down

Last Wednesday, I waited for my sisters who left work at seven o'clock, then drove through the heavy traffic to Mid Valley to catch a screening of Oasis's tour documentary "Lord Don't Slow Me Down". The screening was free in conjuction with Junk's Fortnight 2006.

We went straight to the Junk's booth to collect the tickets after grabbing a quick dinner. The screening time was 9pm, we went into the hall and found ourselves amidst the screening of a local movie, no sight of Oasis yet. Well, I guess we just entered the hall a tad too early. I caught a glimpse of the ending, if I was not mistaken, it was a local indie flick called "Ciplak". Anyway, in a short while, after the ending credits finished running, I realized no one was leaving the hall, all the patrons were there for the documentary. Erm, did that mean the aforementioned local film was played to an empty hall before we bumped into it?

Finally, "Lord Don't Slow Me Down" came into the screen. The show was being every worthwhile, especially since the tickets were free. The show featured footages from the band's Don't Believe The Truth world tour. It was fun to follow the band to places like NYC, Dallas, Denver, LA, Japan, Europe, and Australia, see how the one of the world's biggest rock 'n roll bands is like on the road. Noel was being typically snobbish all the way, talking about how cool he is and how everyone else sucks (those mentioned include Scissor Sisters, Bloc Party). There were many memorable scenes and quotes from the documentary, for instance, the conversation on Tom Cruise and Michael Owen, Liam's birthday celebration, the Gallagher brothers' feud for Liam agreed to pose for NME cover, and etc. It was also good to see the unique relationship between the Gallagher brothers where they constantly mocked each other, but claimed they love each other in interviews.

Thanks to Junk for organzing the free screening, and I will definitely go catch the next free show "Glastonbury".

A new track of same title featured on the film,
Oasis - Lord Don't Slow Me Down (not the best quality)

Shed Your Shades

Puff Daddy? P.Diddy? Puffy? Alright I think it's Diddy. Anyway he got a new album out, with a cover that looks like this,

Looks familiar?

What a rip off!

Frontman of Gyspy punk band Gogol Bordello, Eugene Hütz played an interesting character in this brilliant movie. Check out this track contributed by the band for the movie.

Gogol Bordello - Start Wearing Purple

Movie Galore

Holiday is fun, it gives me a ridiculous amount of time to do things I love to do for a long time. I watched three movies yesterday. Three very different movies in a day, the first one being a rock mockumentary, the second one was a thought-provoking science-fiction, and the last one was a offbeat and unusual comedy. Here I like to share with you some of my after-viewing thoughts and some soundtracks.

Brothers of The Head (2005)
Such fresh and unique approach used in this film. If I hadn't knew that this movie is a fake documentary, I might have believed this was actually a true story of Siamese twins who became rock stars. The movie is an adaption of a same-titled novel about conjoined brothers Tom and Barry Howe form a rock band called The Bang Bang playing some energetic punk, doesn't this sound engrossing enough? Like any rock n' roll film, there are inevitable sex, drug and eventually self-destruction. The well crafted 70s footage and the documentary style of storytelling are convincingly authentic. The music is undeniably a vital element to the film, the songs are raw yet catchy, and they really sound like they were from a 70s punk band. The fragile relationship between the pair of twins somewhat reminds me of Carl and Pete from The Libertines, one who just want to write good music and the other is the mischievous, paranoid one. If you like 7os punk, if you like to see how freaks-gone-big, then this cult faux documentary is for you.

I can't seem to find any Mp3s by The Bang Bang, but please do check out their music on Myspace. Pure good. The first song the twins learned to play,
The Kinks - All Day And All Of The Night

Donnie Darko (2001)
Was quite surprised seeing this movie on local TV, since they usually show only B-movies or old blockbusters. After reading so many rave reviews for this movie, I can finally say I have watched it. I have heard a lot about the twisted bunny, so I was not even a little scared or shocked when the bunny appeared on screen, I don't know if this have spoilt my watching experience, but I doubt so instead this movie was mind-blowing. I have never seen a movie like this. The movie is very much thought-provoking, after it ended I can't stop putting the pieces together over and over to get the conclusion for this film. The only other film I watched this year that got me brain-cracking was "Brick". The story follows Donnie Darko who is told by a giant bunny named Frank that the world will end in 28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, and 12 seconds, the next morning he finds that a jet engine has crashed his bedroom. The remains of the movie shows how Donnie's coming to term with the ghoulish bunny and the fact that the world will end. Multiple interpretations exist for this film because it is never fully explained and leaves open many possibilities. There is certain complexity and depth with this film that baffled me, I think I would definitely watch more than once in hoping to catch more out of it.

Gary Jules - Mad World

The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004)
A light-hearted adventure comedy. Well-written script, solid cast, wonderful quirky characters, beautiful yet odd CGI effects, excellent music, this film really impressed me. It follows Steve Zissou, a oceanographer on the shooting of his documentary about an attempt to track down a "Jaguar Shark" which has killed his closest friend cum colleague, Esteban. The story revolves around the happenings to the ship/documentary crew during the voyage. This comedy is silly, but there are no run-of-the-mill slapstick jokes, in fact it is loaded with dry humour which is not for everyone, but if once you get it, it is actually very hilarious. Some of the memorable scenes include the funny and exaggerated action sequences of pirate attack and hostage rescue. After watching the film, I read about a very different approach of watching it and I am certainly amazed. Remember you had a childhood gang with a leader (Steve), when a new boy (Ned) came in, some kid (Klaus) was jealous, and the voyage implies your childhood adventurous dream, all these also explain why an old man asking for signature of child's sci-fi books, why there is a letter from small boy, why Steve said "that's my favorite age" (11 and half), this movie is really a wonderful tribute to childhood. A great movie one should't miss.

The Zombies - The Way I Feel Inside
David Bowie - Queen Bitch

The Shells and The Robots

The movie scene in year 2007 is going to be awesome. I get extremely nostalgic when I watch the teaser trailers of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Transformers. Those cartoons were the best things I remember of my childhood, I am going to be the first in line to catch the movies to reminisce those amazing moments.

Teaser trailer on Youtube:
TMNT
Transformers

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are hands down the coolest quartet of mutant heroes. I remember back then when everyone was still using VHS, my mom recorded TMNT cartoons from TV so I could watch them all day. Those things ran our lives when my sisters and I were little kids, how our daily life revolved the turtles was mania. We've had the turtle action figures, colouring books, cutlery, birthday cake, t-shirts, video games & more.

Me wearing Ninja Turtles singlet with a Ninja Turtles (again!) birthday cake.

Transformers were every boy's favourite heroes in the late early 90s, me and my cousins would enact the scenes of the Autobots battling Decepticons after watching the cartoons on TV. I used to own a toy model of Optimus Prime which can 'transform' into a truck, and my cousins owned a couple more that can turn into other vehicles.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles will be hitting the theaters on March 30 next year while the live action movie Transformers has a projected release date of July 4, 2007. Let's hope another two of my childhood favourites - Thundercats and Babar will make it to big screen one day too.

Cartoon Theme Songs Flashback:
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Transformers
Thundercats
Babar

Crash Into The Mountain

The Oscar's winners were announced few hours ago. Crash won the Best Film. Click here for full winners' list.

I recalled watching this film 2 months back in December, during a flight from Sydney to Kuala Lumpur. The film is about several interweaving stories which revolve around a racially diverse group of people in L.A. All the characters collide into each other in unexpected ways after a crash accident. It focuses on the sensitive racism issues, and some scenes are indeed provocative. The film is strong yet I was kinda suprised that it beat the overhyped Brokeback Mountain in the Oscar. Nevertheless, Crash was the only nominated best film I have seen so far, so I couldn't comment much. For those who haven't seen it, worth checking it out.

Songs from Crash:

Stereophonics - Maybe Tomorrow

Kathleen 'Bird' York - In The Deep

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Everyone is racist. Me and you.

Tribute to Man In Black

Tomorrow is the birthday of the late legendary country music singer, Johnny Cash. He was born in Kingsland, Arkansas on 26th February 1932. The Man in Black was well-known for his foray into the fields of rock, country, folk, blues and even gospel music, which earned him honours in Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Country Music Hall of Fame.

Here are some interesting covers of his classic tracks:

Coldplay - Ring of Fire

Social Distortion - Ring of Fire

My Morning Jacket - I Still Miss Someone

By the way, I just watched Walk The Line, a film based on Mr. Cash's autobiographies titled "Man in Black" and "Cash: The Autobiography". The acting was brilliant. Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon's portrayal of Johnny Cash and June Carter were mesmerizing and so heartbreakingly real. I was even impressed that they did their own singing, and the chemistry between them was totally convincing and made the story of John and June believably realistic. The stunning performances really deserve the honour of Oscar, but it would not be easy with gay cowboys standing on their way.

Soundtracks from the show:

Joaquin Phoenix & Reese Witherspoon - Jackson

Joaquin Phoenix - Folsom Prison Blues

P/S: Was kinda suprised to see few young musicians such as Tyler Hilton, Jonathan Rice and Shooter Jennings (as his father) playing some music legends back in the 50-60s.