.: ShaolinTiger - Kung-Fu Geekery :.

"Pan's Labyrinth" is the story of a young girl who travels with her pregnant mother to live with her mother's new husband in a rural area up North in Spain, 1944, after Franco's victory. The girl lives in an imaginary world of her own creation and faces the real world with much chagrin. Fascist repression during the first years of Franco's dictatorship is at its height in rural Spain and the girl must come to terms with that through a fable of her own

As the end of 2007 came to a close, I went through the IMDB top 250 list for 2006 and 2007 to make sure I hadn't missed anything. I found a couple of movies I hadn't seen yet such as Children of Men and Pan's Labyrinth - plus a few more which I haven't watched yet.

Rarely a foreign language movie makes the list, but this one did. In parts it was over-hyped (20 minutes standing ovation at Cannes? Won 3 Oscars. Another 61 wins & 55 nominations) but it was well justified in most parts.

It is a Spanish language movie, but it's not overly dialogue based. It's a very visually rich film with stunning cinematography, it has some kind of dualistic nature too. Some might expect the dualism to be the Fantasy world of the princess and the real world Spanish fight against fascism. The fact is the dualism is the contrast between the two, it's almost like it's a war movie AND a fantasy movie.

Both elements are captured beautifully and they fit together so masterfully, there's not a lot of new subject matter here...but the way in which the movie plays out is seamless.

Ivana Baquero is fantastic as Ofelia and the monsters and the faun are believable. The movie is sometimes wonderful, sometimes terrifying.

There are some moments of extreme violence, which if are you are squeamish you may find hard to stomach. Somehow they don't feel exploitative though.

Sergi López as the Captain is just fantastic, showing his many sides, his psychosis and his flaws. Maribel Verdú is also excellent as Mercedes, the head housekeeper.

If you haven't watched this movie yet, you definitely should!

I give it a well worth it 8.5/10.

After the death of Dr.Doom the Fantastic Four think life is back to normal. Reed Richards and Sue Storm make plans to get married, but are interrupted when the Silver Surfer and Galactus show up, trying to destroy the earth and it's up to the fantastic four to deal with them, as well as with the return of Dr. Doom.

Ah another sequel, at least it's not another lame part 3 like Pirates and Spiderman 3 (I haven't watched Shrek yet, and I'm looking forwards to Bourne Ultimatum).

I was that uninspired by Pirates I didn't even review it.

It got a pretty strong 6.7 at IMDB, which is a fairly good sign.

I have to say it was definitely better than the first, but then that's not really difficult is it? It was equally as lame, loud, brash and stupid. But then it's Fantastic 4!

There was the right amount of bickering and family values in the gang, and the chemistry between Torch and Thing was really nice.

The whole wedding fiasco was an interesting sub-plot too and the romance wasn't over-cookd like most recent movies. Galactus and Silver Surfer were expected to turn up sooner or later, and it was close enough to the story to keep fanboi's happy. Although not perfect, the characters were introduced decently well.

The most surprising thing for me was the inconsistent special effects and CG which in some parts looked quite bad...for such a big budget movie, they seemed to blow everything on the Surfer himself and sometimes forget the rest.

It's not a great movie and it's not a bad movie, but it's very much in the middle somewhere.

What was with Jessica Alba's hair anyway...it looked like nylon. Screaming out for a shampoo sponsorship.

I'd give it a definitely not fantastic *groan* but worth a watch 5.5/10.

Set against the backdrop of civil war and chaos in 1990's Sierra Leone, Danny Archer, a South African mercenary, and Solomon Vandy, a Mende fisherman are joined in a common quest to recover a rare pink diamond that can transform their lives. While in prison for smuggling, Archer learns that Solomon--who was taken from his family and forced to work in the diamond fields--has found and hidden the extraordinary rough stone.

Thankfully had a little time at the weekend and managed to catch up with this movie, I've been wanting to watch it for quite some time and missed it at the cinema.

After winning quite a lot of acclaim and getting a few awards, it sparked my interest, it also scored a very strong 7.8 on IMDB.

I have to say it is a very good movie and Leonardo DiCaprio seems to be winning back a lot of skeptics, especially with back to back performances in this and The Departed.

Once again I've always said he was a good actor since watching What's Eating Gilbert Grape..

Hounsou put in a stunning performance as the fisherman caught in a civil war, at the risk of losing his family but having the chance to escape it all by finding a huge pink diamond.

The movie is a hard hitter dealing with serious issues much like Constant Gardener it also deal with issues in Africa.

This time however it deals with the issue of Blood Diamonds, diamonds exported illegally from conflict zones that support rebel factions in a civil war against the ruling government.

If the movie portrays reality or not isn't an issue for me as afterall it is a movie, a work of fiction, not a documentary. You shouldn't base your judgements or political ideals on what you see in movies. Saying that however, this movie will make you think if you really want to partake in buying diamonds or not as a lot of it true (like the fact the large diamond companies stock-pile diamonds to make them seem rare and keep the price high when stones like Ruby are actually much rarer).

Anyway, if you haven't seen this movie I suggest doing so, it's excellent and well worth a watch. Be prepared to be a little depressed after watching it however

I give it a shiny 9/10.

Syriana is a thriller of corruption and power related to the oil industry that tells four parallel stories: the CIA agent Bob Barnes (George Clooney) with great experience in Middle East that falls in disgrace after an unsuccessful mission dealing missiles in Lebanese Republic; the investigation of the attorney Bennett Holiday (Jeffrey Wright) related to the merge of two American oil companies, Connex and Killen; the traumatic association of the energy analyst Bryan Woodman (Matt Damon) with the son of a powerful emir of Iran; and the social drama of the Pakistani immigrant worker Wasim Khan (Mazhar Munir) that is fired by the oil company.

Well it's a long time since I've done a movie review, so here you are! It's been quite a long time since I watched any movies, so there you go..

I've got a LOT of movies to catch up, so I'll bore you with some of the reviews.

Syriana was one of those big hyped movies from 2005, Oscar nominations, these awards, those awards etc etc. I was expecting a lot from it.

It got a solid 7.2 on IMDB, if not for the boring part it'd easily be a high 8.

Frankly the first 20 mins was a complete yawn-fest, I almost turned it off, I know someone that did fall asleep and someone else that did actually turn if off half way through.

It's a shame as it does get very much better after that.

It's an intricately woven tale showing the picture from the ground level with Pakistani workers being laid off in the oil fields, the political level, and the level of normal people like you and I with George Clooney and Matt Damon getting involved for vastly different reasons.

It's a deeply political film and very nicely linked together but slow in parts, it's definately thinkers film and is closely related to many of the things that have happened in recent times..

I believe it was banned in Malaysia due to some of the sensitive issues it addressed.

The acting was top notch, it's good to see Clooney taking a meaty role and once again Matt Damon showing his versatility.

It's an interesting enough movie, just don't expect any action, chicks, explosions or humour.

Serious and tense it is, light-hearted it is not.

You have to give it some time and get into the plot, the twists, the power struggles and the back-stabbing. It was based on a book which was apparently based on a real conflict, I have yet to look up who the prince was..but it's certainly interesting.

I'd give it a worth watching 6.5/10.

Dragon Tiger Gate is a martial arts academy established by three youngsters, Tiger Huang , Little Dragon Huang and Black Dragon Shi. Adopted as children by kung fu master Huang Jianglong, they aspire to impart the spirit of Chinese martial arts to the world. The final showdown between good and evil is a spectacular battle that makes the walls of Dragon Tiger Gate quake.

Yeah I've managed to catch up with quite a lot of movies lately!

This is a typical hong-kong style action kung-fu movie starring Donnie Yen, Nicholas Tse and Shawn Yu.

The action was also directed by Donnie Yen himself, which shows as he is now experienced and mature in his style, the action elements and choreography was very good through-out the film with some pretty unique and exciting displays of fighting and interesting use of weapons.

Honestly speaking though, he still has a long way to go to catch Yuen Wo Ping.

Apart from that, I love any movie that has nunchukas in it!

The movie itself was adapted from some very famous Hong Kong manga (comic books) so the story and plot is already laid out, even though you don't really need a phd to understand it, it's the same old basic good vs evil thing with very little deviation.

As you can probably guess, the story itself is nothing special...the romantic elements are actually quite pukeworthy and the rest you can guess as it goes along.

Basically I only suggest you watch this movie if you really enjoy good well crafted fight scenes, as I do, so I did enjoy this movie.

Donnie Yen once again manages to appear eternally youthful and carries out his role very well, not that any of the three leads have tough jobs as apart from Shawn Yue they both play fairly silent reflective types.

I found Nicholas Tse was a little soft and girly for the role he was supposed to be playing, I would have preferred someone else.

Shawn Yue was adequate as the more bubbly and confident Turbo.

You don't really feel for the characters and the flashbacks are a bit annoying with upright 'moral' overtones.

The final villain is a bit of a joke too, the fight scene is quite good though.

Overall the movie is a nice piece of comic book escapism which could really use a good producer/director.

I'd say watch it for the fight scenes (especially the first big one) and give it a fairly mediocre head kick of 4.5/10.

A mysterious story of two magicians whose intense rivalry leads them on a life-long battle for supremacy -- full of obsession, deceit and jealousy with dangerous and deadly consequences. From the time that they first met as young magicians on the rise, Robert Angier and Alfred Borden were competitors. However, their friendly competition evolves into a bitter rivalry making them fierce enemies-for-life and consequently jeopardizing the lives of everyone around them. Set against the backdrop of turn-of-the-century London.

I'll say straight up this is probably the best movie of the year so far without much competition, it's been a pretty bad year for movies all in all after 2005 which has a clean sweep of great movies, 2006 performed pretty badly, a good sign before watching this movie was the extremely strong 8.2 at IMDB.

It lived up to expectations! KY even joined us to watch it for the second time.

This is a truly allstar cast mixing new talent with old, pitting Hugh Jackman (Robert Angier) and Christian Bale (Alfred Borden) against each other is a work of genius, both have already proved themselves with movies such as X-men and Batman Begins and even more so for Bale with the haunting The Machinist.

The sparks really fly between them, imagine turn of the century magicians fighting for audiences and fame, Bale (Borden) is the technical expert, the magical genius, but his showmanship lacks the pull to bring audiences..Where as Jackman (Angier) is the opposite, suave, charming and the superior showman, but his tricks are lacking, his technical knowledge and innovation aren't matching Bale.

Michael Caine of course puts in a stirling performance with his strong screen prescence, a lesser actor would have paled in this supporting role.

David Bowie pops up too, did you spot him?

I can't really talk about the story without ruining it, just watch out for the the pledge, the turn and finally the prestige. You do have to suspend belief a bit though, it's not a real story, it has elements of fantasy or sci-fi and stars some great scientists from the same period.

The cinematography, set design, production and direction are top notch, the pacing of the movie is excellent and has multiple narrators, so you see the same things from various views. It's a dark brooding movie showing the nasty side of human nature.

Christopher Nolan is really showing us what he's capable of with Memento, Batman Begins, Insomnia and now this!

Just go and watch this movie now.

I give it a film of the year 9/10.