The Last Airbender
Quite apart from its seriously silly title, this latest feature by M. Night Shyamalan begs the question of how he manages to obtain funding.
Shyamalan, who burst onto the Hollywood scene as a prodigious and versatile talent in 1999 with The Sixth Sense and Stuart Little, has done much to alienate audiences (both mainstream and art house) over the past decade, and by all appearances he has surpassed himself with his most recent offering. A fantasy tale based on a popular animated series for children, and upgraded to full 3D treatment, Airbender has some good effects. Its cliche-ridden story may still be a hit with the kids, but for anyone who hasn’t been living in movie purdah, you’ve probably seen it all before.
Predators
A new addition to the Predator franchise that first hit cinema screens back in 1987 as one of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s less-successful action film vehicles, Predators does not go much beyond the original concept and now-famous tagline “If it bleeds, we can kill it.” A bunch of elite warriors are mysteriously brought to a planet where they, long accustomed to being predators, now become prey and have to dig deep to survive. A solid cast of tough characters is present and correct with the likes of Laurence Fishburne and Danny Trejo. The biggest surprise is Adrien Brody in the leading role.
Nobody to Watch Over Me
A hard-hitting movie about the relentless Japanese media machine and its power to destroy the lives of those it touches. Released in 2008, the film has picked up a Japanese Academy Award (Best Newcomer) for its young star Mirai Shida this year, and won the Best Screenplay Award at the Montreal World Film Festival in 2008. The story deals with a media feeding frenzy over police protection of a 15-year-old girl whose older brother is accused of the brutal murder of a young child. Innocent and guilty get tarred with the same brush as the massive power of Internet news and blogs gears up to demand “justice.” An edge-of-your-seat thriller that provides a thoughtful take on the 24/7 news cycle.
Chloe
Atom Egoyan is back with another signature work of love, lust and ambiguity. Chloe, a loose remake of a French film titled Natalie, explores the idea of trust, and how a desire for truth can destroy love. This is vintage Egoyan territory, and features veterans Julianne Moore and Liam Neeson as Catherine and David Stewart, a would-be perfect couple. Catherine begins to suspect her husband of infidelity and hires an escort to test his loyalty. This is Chloe, played by Amanda Seyfried, who is well out of her comfort zone and loving it. She also turns out to be much more than the Stewarts ever bargained for.
Paper Castles
Also released under the title 3some, Paper Castles is yet another low-rent European sex comedy so much beloved of local art-house distributors. Featuring principals whose distinguishing qualities are good looks and toned bodies, this Spanish film is being flogged in Taiwan with the suggestion that you will get to see these beautiful young things “fully naked.” With that as the main marketing ploy, it seems hardly necessary to get involved with the story, so suffice to say that it involves two young art students and a model who get caught up in a love triangle, providing plenty of opportunities for seductive titillation.
Detective Conan: The Lost Ship in the Sky
Based on the hugely popular Japanese manga series Meitantei Conan, this is the 14th anime film to chronicle the activities of Jimmy Kudo, a super-intelligent detective who has been transformed into a child because of the effects of a poison. The Lost Ship in the Sky has our young bespectacled detective trying to prevent the theft of a new super airliner. The manga, which began in 1994, continues to be serialized and is hugely popular in Taiwan.
Last week Joseph Nye, the well-known China scholar, wrote on the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s website about how war over Taiwan might be averted. He noted that years ago he was on a team that met with then-president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), “whose previous ‘unofficial’ visit to the US had caused a crisis in which China fired missiles into the sea and the US deployed carriers off the coast of Taiwan.” Yes, that’s right, mighty Chen caused that crisis all by himself. Neither the US nor the People’s Republic of China (PRC) exercised any agency. Nye then nostalgically invoked the comical specter
Relations between Taiwan and the Czech Republic have flourished in recent years. However, not everyone is pleased about the growing friendship between the two countries. Last month, an incident involving a Chinese diplomat tailing the car of vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) in Prague, drew public attention to the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) operations to undermine Taiwan overseas. The trip was not Hsiao’s first visit to the Central European country. It was meant to be low-key, a chance to meet with local academics and politicians, until her police escort noticed a car was tailing her through the Czech capital. The
April 15 to April 21 Yang Kui (楊逵) was horrified as he drove past trucks, oxcarts and trolleys loaded with coffins on his way to Tuntzechiao (屯子腳), which he heard had been completely destroyed. The friend he came to check on was safe, but most residents were suffering in the town hit the hardest by the 7.1-magnitude Hsinchu-Taichung Earthquake on April 21, 1935. It remains the deadliest in Taiwan’s recorded history, claiming around 3,300 lives and injuring nearly 12,000. The disaster completely flattened roughly 18,000 houses and damaged countless more. The social activist and
Over the course of former President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) 11-day trip to China that included a meeting with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping (習近平) a surprising number of people commented that the former president was now “irrelevant.” Upon reflection, it became apparent that these comments were coming from pro-Taiwan, pan-green supporters and they were expressing what they hoped was the case, rather than the reality. Ma’s ideology is so pro-China (read: deep blue) and controversial that many in his own Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) hope he retires quickly, or at least refrains from speaking on some subjects. Regardless