"Slappin da bass, man!"

Woohoo! What a rolicking two weeks after my job contract ended :X

Watched 3 movies. All were average, or above-average. Shall start-off with Pearlyn's KTV birthday celebration. (Photos courtesy of Pearlyn's HP)

Us singing 听妈妈的话 by Jay Chou.

Happy birthday, Pearlyn! My jacket is not your present! Lol.

Cheryl's contribution. Would you care to clarify what on earth is this!? HAHA.
~

Okay, the first movie review for this post. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.
I give the movie:





Although the above poster rocks, the movie didn't really rock as much as I expected.

Not really a continuation of the first movie, T2 did bring back Megatron, though, but he's more of a sub-character to give way for the bigger, meaner, The Fallen. The titular villain is trying to eradicate the last of the Primes (you know, Optimus Prime) so that he can activate this gigantic machine hidden somewhere on Earth to destroy our Sun to harness some energy power source for the survival of their Decepticons race.

Of course, without our Sun, you know what will happen, and it is up to our hero, Sam (Shia Lebeouf) and his hot girlfriend (Megan Fox, who appears solely to add sex appeal to the picture) to locate the said machine before The Fallen does.

Amidst all these plots, there's the usual cheesy robot humour and metallic action to appease fanboys. Clocking in at two and a half hour (one hour too-long for me), the effects displayed in this movie are what's worth watching. The animators must have a hard-time morphing the robots from sleek cars to lean-mean fighting machines, and for the price of your ticket, the fighting scenes and some of the set pieces are well-worth.

FINAL SAY: Enough robotic action to please the fans, but letdown by bad pacing and plot. But, that's the whole point of some blockbusters anyway.
~


Everybody's 21st! (GYPS)

Yep, I forgot whose idea was it, but it sure is fun having a Primary School get-together to celebrate everybody's 21st birthday!

Kick-started it at SMU's Settlers' Cafe with Liangwei, wenj, val and van, with Shawn 客船-ing for awhile.
(Photos courtesy of Liang Wei and Vanessa)

Me explaining the rules of the 'Hanging Monkey' game.

Careful! Don't let the monkeys fall down!

Vanessa attempting an unglam shot of me again...

...and succeeded.

And our damn-powerful Jenga playing skills... let the pictures speak for themselves...
Relax, girl, it's only the start of the game!

The crazy tower is beginning to show...

I don't think praying helps much...

*Stunned*

"Are you kidding me??"

Attempting the final stunt..

Nearly...

...there.

Playing this iPhone game on wenj's phone. He had to put his hands below in case his precious phone drops :X

Then it was off to my house for steamboat!

Looks absolutely delicioussss...

Don't worry, I washed my hands!

开动了!

Then it was time for Guitar Heroes World Tour!

"Slappin' da bass, man!" You'll know why I keep saying this later.

You can imagine how disastrous it was for some first-timers..

"Ah si wa wu jit ba ban..."

Then it was cake-cutting time. Bringin' out the delicious durian cake from Jalan Kayu!!
I can almost smell the durian now..

Happy birthday to US! =)
~

And here's the next movie review, for I Love You, Man.
I give the movie:





As far as good comedies go, there's actually a new sub-genre for this category, and it's called a bro-mance flick. This movie twicks one of Hollywood's most bankable romantic formulas and I'm glad to say, it absolutely worked.

Peter (the fantastic Paul Rudd) has just proposed to his girlfriend. And during wedding preparations, his fiancee discovers that Peter doesn't have a good man-buddy to accompany him at the aisle. You see, Peter is more of a 'girlfriends' kinda guy - he is perfectly straight - but has failed to secure strong male friendships in the past. After a series of disastrous man-dates (awkward but stupendously hilarious), in comes Sydney (Jason Segel is a hoot), the complete character-opposite of Peter, who shows potential of becoming Peter's best-bud for his wedding task.

I Love You, Man works well with this weird but amusing setting of the anxiety of trying to find a male-buddy even though Peter is decidedly approaching middle-aged. And witnessing the bonding of the awkward and confused Peter with the brash and loud attitude of Sydney through rock jamming sessions is so endearingly funny, these two characters' electrifying chemistry alone carry the show.

Of course, kudos to a bevy of funny supporting casts. And here's presenting to you one of the funniest scenes from the movie, where Peter is trying to get his fiancee to be interested in a rock song he digs. Peter mutters the already-classic line of "Slappin' da bass, man!" with absolute hilarity:



FINAL SAY: Filled with laugh-out-loud situations and side-splitting one-liners, this is where Hollywood comedies should be heading to. Seeing that I watched it with a female friend and she totally enjoyed it, this movie is evidently for both genders.
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And the final movie review is probably apt, since the world is still reeling from the shock of MJ's passing.

But firstly, take a look at this MJ report by AP and try to spot Yee Wen with her Singaporean friends being interviewed outside the Mann's Chinese Theatre in LA. Cool stuff!! :D (at time: 1:00 onwards in the background)



Here's the review of Departures.
I give the movie:





There you go, my second 5-star review of the year besides The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. If you realise by now, I kinda give high ratings to those movies that talk about life and in this instance, death, in particular.

Departures (winner of this year's Oscar for Best Foreign Film) is about a failed cellist who moves back to his hometown with his wife in rural Japan, and taking up a job as an encoffinment (aka nokan) in a company that specialises in cleansing, donning-on make-up and dressing-up the deceased for their final 'journey'.

As morbid and sometimes frightening as it might sound, this profession is part of Japan's rich cultural heritage. Seeing the character painstakingly go through each and every minute detail in dressing up the corpse, and the care and respect taken to dress-up each deceased beautifully is painful but at the same time, heartbreakingly poetic to watch.

Each family has its own story to tell. And the film portrays each funeral in its most honest happiness, or for some, misery, leaving the audience in laughter and simultaneously in tears. When the story finally comes to a wrap with a heart-aching plot surrounding the main character, the audience is already swept up by the meticulously-crafted and moving storyline, only to be touched once again by this masterpiece of a film.

FINAL SAY: Funny and a profoundly moving film at the same time - this tale is an ode to family life, and how each of us copes with the inevitable situation of death. Laugh and cry along with it. Then, contemplate. Highly-recommended.
~

Communication Studies Orientation Camp next week. So fast!

Take care, peeps!