i don’t have much time to watch movies lately, many DVD in my room and i not yet watch,
this evening i watched “Never Forever”, a film by Gina KIM. Gina KIM is a independent filmmaker, she was born and raised in Korea and later she moved to California to attend film school at CalArts.
“Never Forever” is the first film i watch, and i like it. i look to watch more movie from her,
the movie is very realistic and talking in a frank way how the relationship grow and how much we wanted to make the one we love happy.
the story is about a coup that wants to have a baby but it is not possible. Sophie, the wife, find her own risk to hire another man to make love with her and she pays him 300 dollars every time, if she get pregnant she would pay him an additional thirty thousand.
at the beginning it is a job and real business but then it go more deeply and deeply …
i like the way Gina shoot, it’s closed and show real emotion, i can’t wait to see her next film.
Park Chan-Wook surprised everybody with his great film Old Boy, which everybody cannot forget how you get into prison for 15 years without knowing the reason why.
his late film THIRST, look very interesting, as you can see even the poster is giving us more curiosity to know more about the film.
it’s a vampire film according to aceshowbiz.com, tells the story about a priest named Sang-hyun who participates in a medical experiment to find a cure for a deadly disease with traumatic repercussions.
But, when the experiment goes askew, he becomes a vampire. Tortured and depraved, he falls into an affair with a wife of his childhood friend. As things turn for worse, he struggles to maintain what’s left of his humanity.
the film planned to be released on 30 April 2009 in South Korea. hopefully we can get chance to watch this film soon too.
i hated Rithy Panh when i first saw the poster of “Un soir après la guerre” in Paris. It was completely disturbing me when i saw people buying the ticket and see a sad movie from my country.
since that day, there is no strange for me when i see people crying in the cinema. i saw a Chinese woman, who sat in front of me, crying when she saw the Hong Kong high way in a Wong Kar-wai film. it’s the nostalgy that she couldn’t handle it. i gues she missed Hong Kong, her hometown.
i think i also wrote an email to him, i mentioned that we also have a good story about Cambodia to film about, not only and always the genocide. i am not sure if he read it or not. but one day i got a contact from a French scriptwriter and she said Rithy Panh introduce me to her.
he knows and he understand my intention,
when he finished S-21: the Khmer Rouge Killing Machine, i clearly can understand what he was trying to say. i can feel those crimes hurt him more than anyone else and that’s why he spent all his time to try to understand why people kill people and who will be the responsible for those crimes? beside the movie, he created the Audiovisual Center Bophana, where we could find everything about genocide and people will not forget what happened in Cambodia.
when he finished “S-21: the Khmer Rouge Killing Machine”, i guess he might say to himself he did it. he did the essential work to Cambodian people. if one day you want to understand about genocide, you can watch “S-21: the Khmer Rouge Killing Machine” or go to Bophana Center.
he did what he wanted to do since long time and it’s well done. i could see in “The Burnt Theatre”, which he filmed after he finished the hardest one, he played a lot of comedy
now he moved from Documentary to Fiction, “Un barrage contre le Pacifique”, his latest film is an adaptation from the book on the same name, which tells a story about French family who lived in Indochina in 1930s.
the film was totally shot in Ream, Sihanouville, Cambodia on November and December 2007 and was recently released in France January 2009. it’s good to see the rice field again but with a deep love story. most of the cast was French actors and actress and joined by the famous French actress Isabelle Huppert (The Piano).
“Un barrage contre le Pacifique” or “The Sea Wall” is set in Indochina, 1931. In the Gulf of Siam, a middle-aged mother is struggling to get by with her two children, Joseph and Suzanne, who are 20 and 16 respectively. She has invested her entire fortune in a piece of land which is regularly flooded and therefore impossible to cultivate. Her only hope is to build a sea wall to keep the waters at bay, and she devotes herself to this mad scheme.
There is some trailer and interview that you can find more about the movie from the few links below:
“My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, Commandor of the Northern Armies, faithful and loyal servant to the true emperor Marcus Arelius, husband to a murdered wife, father to a murdered son, and i will have my revenge, in this life or the next.”
it’s the quote from Gladiator. there are many way that make me watch Gladiator many times, even tonight on HBO. Gladiator to me is a Philosophy of life, not just for a soldier or a hero of Rome, but it could applicable to any circumstance.
Maximums is a General, a commandor that knows how to take care of his armies and won many battles. he got a wife, he has a son. he love and be faithful to his wife. when they was murdered, i could feel how much he lost in his life. the movie shows us how important that a family mean to a man. and how we can take a deep breath and stand up when we lost or when we got any problem. any problem need to be solved, no matter how hard it is, no matter how long it will take. it need to be solved and ended or closed. that’s what i usually use when i got any trouble.
that’s the reason why i call Gladiator is a Philosophy of life, not just a story or a movie.
you might not yet forget Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet when they both played as the lovers in Titanic,
a film that woke you up in the middle of the night and kept you awake due to last romantic scene that it is hard to forget,
after 11 years, since 1997 where the Titanic was made, now they back again in Revolutionary Road, based on the novel of the same name by Richard Yates and directed by her husband, Sam Mendes.
For me, when i watched Holy lola, the movie reminds me of the scenes and music from Taxi Driver, the masterpiece of Martin Scorsese.
In Holy lola movie, most of the scenes were filmed outdoor of Phnom Penh city, on the streets, people with different kinds of automobile driving in the rain, children playing at the sidewalk …. the magnificent landscape of the rice field and the countryside road will let you enjoy this movie pictures and I love all outdoor scenes. The movie will allow you to make a collection of panorama pictures of Phnom Penh city with a very good original music composed.
It’s a movie from Cambodia that talked about something else than just the genocide. It’s talks about a French couple that came to adopt a child from Cambodia. All along the movie is the problems of the paperwork and corruption system of Cambodian administration officers and some systematical error in French administration as well. Just before the premiere of movie on the screen in Phnom Penh, about ten blocked cases was released and finalized due to the movie. At this point, we should know, sometime a movie could change the situation.
But the story, due to the great talent and experiences of well-known director Bertrand Tavernier, was told in a humor way and nothing much from the corruption system will disturb you. The director, beside to try his best to capture every images he found in the city, try to focus on the problem of the couple, rather than being stuck in a corruption system. I got a feeling that he understand why there’s corruption in such poor country.
At the end, even with many issues, Holy lola, the child, have been successfully adopted by the French couple. Most of the cast are French actors and actress that came from France and there are some Cambodians not really professional actors or actress jointed the cast also. When watching the movie, you will feel how the actors and actress have been changed their performance due to being stay on the set, in the real location, they are changed by the Cambodian environment and all of them I believe they love this country.
Synopsis:
A French couple travels to Cambodia, hoping to adopt a child there. Geraldine and Pierre, who have exhausted the adoption procedures in their own country, realize that they’ll have to undergo even more paperwork and procedures in this country haunted by war and torn by misery.
Between the crammed orphanages full of “already adopted” children, the civil servants who offer hope in exchange for cash and the hotel where they meet other couples undergoing the same process, Geraldine is about to give up, while Pierre sours on the whole ordeal. At the end of two months, just as they are on the point of going home empty handed, an eight-month-old baby is finally put into their arms. Only one more test must be faced: obtaining an exit visa for the child…
BUY DVD
Director: Bertrand Tavernier Music: Henri Texier Cast: Jacques Gamblin, Isabelle Carre, Lara Guirao, Bruno Putzulu Title: Holy Lola Running Time: 125 Minutes Status: Released Country: France Genre: Drama, Foreign
Park Chan-Wook surprised everybody with his great film Old Boy, which everybody cannot forget how you get into prison for 15 years without knowing the reason why. 
It’s a movie from Cambodia that talked about something else than just the genocide. It’s talks about a French couple that came to adopt a child from Cambodia. All along the movie is the problems of the paperwork and corruption system of Cambodian administration officers and some systematical error in French administration as well. Just before the premiere of movie on the screen in Phnom Penh, about ten blocked cases was released and finalized due to the movie. At this point, we should know, sometime a movie could change the situation.
At the end, even with many issues, Holy lola, the child, have been successfully adopted by the French couple. Most of the cast are French actors and actress that came from France and there are some Cambodians not really professional actors or actress jointed the cast also. When watching the movie, you will feel how the actors and actress have been changed their performance due to being stay on the set, in the real location, they are changed by the Cambodian environment and all of them I believe they love this country.
