Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 2!

Watched 2D version (thank God) at Broadway Mongkok. April 2017.

So good!

Okay. I didn’t enjoy the first one as much as the whole entire planet Earth seemed to. I mean, yeah I loved Groot as much as everyone else did, but the rest of the film… was good but it wasn’t mind-blowing… not to me anyway. I’m not sure if it was actually because I was just sick of superhero movies. I hadn’t seen anything else remotely worth seeing in a while, and it was just too much. Anyway. That was then. This is now. And volume 2 is pretty awesome.

So I should mention here: SPOILER ALERT.

SPOILER ALERT. No kidding.

SPOILER ALERT. For real.

Okay. One last time: Spoiler. Alert.

In particular, I love Baby Groot. He’s so darned cute. And smart. And cute. I can’t even. I wasn’t quite sure about the whole Kurt Russell I-am-god-with-a-small-g storyline (although the entire film is pivoted around this), but I suppose it does its job in moving the story forward, moving the characters forward (Star Lord, in particular, gets to deal with finally resolving the dad issue), and bringing more people into play (Sylvester Stallone, Michelle Yeoh, teenage Groot).

But yeah, it was an entertaining, enjoyable, popcorn ride of a movie. Yup. Good stuff :D

Star Trek.

I LOVED this film when it came out – it was probably my favouritest movie of 2009, and cemented the genius that is J.J. Abrams forever.

The alternate timeline that is presented in the film makes total sense within the whole Star Trek galaxy, and the casting is just perfect, from Chris Pine to Zachary Quinto to Karl Urban to Zoe Saldana to the amazing John Cho (“fencing“) and Simon Pegg and the late, great Anton Yelchin. And of course, the late, great and simply marvellous Leonard Nimoy.

The film is action packed (love it!) and the camera work is so much fun, and the flare, oh man, all that flare. I love it. Watching it again eight years later, the film still holds its own, and I’m more excited than ever for the Star Trek series that’s coming out soon.

One of my favourite reboots ever.

Transformers: Dark of the Moon.

Okay. This was MUCH BETTER. That last one was so awful, and while this one wasn’t quite as good as the first, it was still much better.

The standout for me was Leonard Nimoy as Sentinel – his voice is so recognisable, it gave me chills, especially since I had forgotten he played this role, and he has since passed away. So good. And John Turturro is just hilarious and awesome. Yeah.

So… the newest Transformers film is not on Netflix, so I don’t know when I’ll get to watch it. We shall see.

Tales by Light – season one.

Hm. Tales by Light is a documentary series about photographers and how and why they capture what they capture, their inspirations, and the lengths they will go to in order to get that great shot.

From a series point of view, perhaps it would be interesting to non- or amateur photographers, and I’m not professional, but in a way, it wasn’t as appealing as I wanted it to be perhaps because I work with photographers so much.

On the other hand though, from an I-want-to-create-a-show point of view, this series was very interesting because of the format. 24 minutes, six episodes, and a repeat photographer within the first six. At the very beginning, when I was looking at the background of the series, the fact that the episode names were not names of photographers struck me as slightly odd. I would have thought, if you’re capturing a photographer’s journey, you might as well name the episode after them, like Chef’s Table. But then as I watched the last episode (I watched all six in one sitting), and a photographer I’d seen in a previous ep came on, I was like, ohhhh, that’s why….. 

I think season two just came out. I wonder if there are any changes… and what the stories are going to be like in this one. To be continued, I guess :)

Frantzén’s Kitchen.

It’s been a while since I’ve been to a new restaurant, it’s also been a while since I’ve been anywhere that’s fine dining in Hong Kong (even though they say that the restaurant has a “casual and relaxed environment” haha), and this one was as good as I had hoped.

Frantzén’s Kitchen opened late 2016 in Hong Kong in Sheung Wan, and since my birthday is end of the year, q and I decided to go then, except I ended up in Shanghai for three weeks in December, and by the time I got back, the earliest reservation for the darned restaurant was two weeks away. So we kinda gave up, until her birthday rolled around in February, and we decided to try again except now the earliest reservation was a month away… and both of us were flying out during that time… so we gave up again. And then a few days ago, she texted and said, “oh hey, I got a reservation on Tuesday” and I was like “Frantzén’s?!”

All of that set up is to explain how high our expectations were for the food. And can I just say, most of it was really as good as if not better than expected. She chose a great wine (Riesling) (which I took only one sip because I can’t drink, but damn it was good), and then we each chose a “snack”, and then two “dishes”. The snack is a bite-sized appetiser – it’s bite-sized, which means we couldn’t share it. It was so good that we were like okay um, we need another ahahaha. So we had two snacks each (the oyster thing which was… interesting but couldn’t taste the oyster at all, and the nordic sushi, which was amazeballs), then we had two dishes (which are like small mains) – she had the asparagus and the fish, I had the dairy tartare and the veal cheeks. And then we shared a pork belly, just because we had to. And then we ordered all the desserts on the menu (there were only three – two ice creams and a plate of cookies). Hahaha.

She later told me that because the asparagus and the fish were both creamy, it was a bit much, which I hadn’t thought about at all. I thought the asparagus was similar to other asparagus dishes I’ve had, but that the fish dish was great. I really enjoyed both the dishes I ordered, and the pork belly was super tender and juicy and the top perfectly crispy. So my top three are the tartare, the sushi, and the fish. Her top three are the sushi, the asparagus and the tartare.

When we ordered the desserts, I also ordered some tea – they only have Chinese teas (except for one lavender infusion, but I’m not a big lavender fan) which was very interesting actually, so I had the iron buddha, which was the perfect ending drink for me. And I asked the sommelier (who has the cutest moustache) to recommend something for q, and he recommended a really delicious sparkling, which was light and fruity and not too sweet. Perfection.

So in conclusion, I can’t wait to go back :D Just a side note though – it was 1000 HKD per head. Yeah. And that was with a couple of comps too… But yeah, totally worth it. Really awesome dinner. Yay!

Minimalism: A Documentary about the Important Things.

As I sit in the living room watching this film, I’m surrounded by all my stuff that has been in boxes for a year. And I find it quite pathetic and incredibly ironic, and while I’m watching these two guys talk about stuff (physical, material stuff), my mind is wandering and I’m like… I need to get rid of all this… stuff.

On the other hand, I do think these thoughts often. I just don’t act upon them. And then in a couple of days (or hours), I’ll have managed to compartmentalise and put it away in some room in my brain and not feel guilty about all the effing stuff.

It’s interesting, their philosophy that less stuff = less stress = happier life. It’s probably true. It’s also true that a lot of people buy things to fill a certain void, but that that void can never actually be filled with material goods. I suppose I learnt that young, because I was brought up Christian (God fills the void, nothing else) and so I’ve pretty much known it all my life. Doesn’t stop me from being a hoarder though. It’s not the fact that I want more, it’s just that when I have to get rid of things, it’s not a nice feeling. I suppose it’s partly why, as a child, I never used to like to share – it’s mine, don’t touch it.

But also the thought that less stuff = less distractions = more time to spend on relationships, with people, that’s a good one. Community has often been left behind in the chase for success, but more often than not, community is the thing that provides contentment and peace over the new fashion trend or gadget or whatever it is.

It’s currently 5:30am. I’m very curious to know after I shower and sleep and wake up, whether I’ll actually make any real change to my life now…

To be continued, then… I guess…

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

Ugh.

Okay, I don’t think I watched this one at the cinema, but I could be wrong. I could’ve just wiped it from my memory because it was that bad. Seriously. I can’t even…. No wonder Megan Fox wouldn’t come back for the third one… Bah.

Iron Man.

The film that gave Marvel Studios credibility. The film that started the whole Marvel Cinematic Universe saga. The little film that could.

Rewatching this film made me happy. I’d forgotten how awesome Pepper Potts was (“I do anything and everything Mr. Stark requires, including occasionally taking out the trash.“), and how hilarious it was when Tony Stark trained himself to be Ironman, and how much I’d enjoyed Terrence Howard as Rhodey (although Don Cheadle more than handled the role in the rest of the films).

So much fun happened in this film. Major kudos to Jon Favreau and Robert Downey Jr, but also to Marvel Studios for having the foresight to trust Favreau & RDJ with this outing. After 9 years of MCU films, this one is still in the top 5.

Transformers.

I don’t remember when I watched the first Transformers film. I don’t even remember which cinema I was in, but I do remember I was sitting on the right side of the cinema… I don’t know why I remember that.

So because it’s on Netflix, I decided I should revisit this old franchise, and it really was a pretty fun film. First of all, I didn’t even remember that Josh Duhamel was it in, so when his face showed up two minutes in, I was like… what?! And then Shia Laboeuf’s character was actually pretty fun – and cheeky, which is always great. And when the shiny silver blue and red lorry head showed up, I yelled out loud (thank God I live alone), “Yay! Optimus Prime!”

So yeah. I enjoyed it. Now I’m going to watch the next one, and the next one, and see where it all fell flat…. Hahaha.

 

Watermark.

Watched at HKU, hosted by the Hong Kong Documentary Initiative. April 2017.

I had never watched Watermark the film, although I have been through the book numerous times, and have stood in front the photos in Ed Burtynsky’s Watermark exhibition for hours on end. It is incredibly humbling to think that I know this great artist who produces these fucking fantastic photos. Just mind boggling.

The film is reflective, and jarring, inspiring, and tragic. Just the opening – water gushing across the frame, lots and lots of it, the sound of water hitting water, and then silence as the camera looks directly at cracked earth, scorched dry – hits hard as you contemplate how water is the source of life and without it, we’re just doomed.

It’s a film that is more beautiful the larger the screen you watch it on, and carries such weight as you watch stories about the loss of water, the building of dams, the sacredness of cleansing, and of course, pollution caused by human activities… Burtynsky produces incredible beauty from devastation and death. It’s just fantastic.