The Jungle Book
All right, a remake is probably warranted when it has been 49 years since the original. Director John Favreau (Iron Man, Cowboys & Aliens), says this new 3D live-action version is not a musical — but really, it would be a crime to do a Jungle Book movie without the classic tunes a la Trust in Me and Bear Necessities. Fortunately, Favreau delivers — with renditions by cast members Scarlett Johannson, Christopher Walken, Bill Murray and newcomer Neel Sethi, who plays Mowgli. There are some pretty big shoes to fill here, as the original was the last film that Walt Disney personally worked on before his death, which was in turn based on Rudyard Kipling’s popular 1894 novel. The CGI is pretty cool, but many films who try to mix real actors with animated characters just end up feeling unnatural. Judging from the trailer, though, that will not be a problem with this film.
Criminal
Let us take a moment of silence for screenwriter Douglas Cook, who worked on this film with writing partner David Weisburg (the duo is best known for 1996’s The Rock) for eight years but died before it premiered. Reuniting on screen for the first time since 1991’s JFK are the geriatric (okay, maybe not that old yet) heroes of Tommy Lee Jones, Gary Oldman and Kevin Costner — but their usual roles here are jumbled a bit, with Oldman playing a CIA chief who orders a neuroscientist, played by Jones, to transplant a dead CIA operative’s memories into the brain of a dangerously violent criminal — this is the weirdest part — played by Costner. The premise sounds rather weak, but Costner in a buzz cut starts out pretty convincing as a psychopathic killer who feels no human emotions — but not for long as he just has to play the good guy.
The Brand New Testament
God is an abusive jerk who tortures humans via his computer in an apartment in Brussels that he shares with his much-maligned wife and daughter (and son JC, who has inexplicably turned into a statute). In this world, he is directly responsible when buildings burn, trains crash ... and when whatever line you stand in moves the slowest. Tired of her father’s ways, the daughter releases the date of everyone’s death to the world, and chaos ensues — or does it? Belgium’s entry to this year’s Oscar’s is the brainchild of Jaco Van Dormael, who brought us the critically acclaimed Mr Nobody in 2009. This sounds like wacky, satirical goodness that is sure to piss off certain people — but who cares. A movie that dares to go this far must be awesome.
White Lies, Black Lies (失控謊言)
Finally, a Taiwanese movie that is not overtly cute or sappy — well, it is by Lou Yi-an (樓一安), who brought us the dark and absurd Losers (廢物). This film is based on a widely-publicized murder case that took place in Wanhua District (萬華) in the 1960s, where a mannequin factory owner kills his wife and apprentice and encases the bodies in the cement floor. The strangest part about the case is that the wife of one of the factory’s clients abandoned her five children and ran off with the killer — which became a main focus of the case as the media published letters from her children pleading for her to come home. The film stays roughly true to the case — with the addition of a reporter following the case and digging up more than she was looking for — but it focuses on the psychological rather than the murder itself as the three are dragged deeper into a tangled web.
Dheepan
After a number of Cannes winners over the past few months, we finally get to see the film that took the highest honor — the Palme d’Or. This French production, partially based on Montesquieu’s The Persian Letters detailing the experience of two Persian noblemen in France, follows a Tamil Tiger soldier-turned-refugee who decides to leave Sri Lanka to start a new life in Paris. He soon finds that life is not that much easier in the French housing projects. What is cool is that the lead actor, Antonythasan Jesuthasan really fought for the Tamil Tigers as a teenager in the 1980s before fleeing to Hong Kong, living as a refugee for five years before illegally landing in Paris, where he eventually became an acclaimed writer and actor. According to Jesuthasan, the film is “50 percent biographical.”
Taiwan can often feel woefully behind on global trends, from fashion to food, and influences can sometimes feel like the last on the metaphorical bandwagon. In the West, suddenly every burger is being smashed and honey has become “hot” and we’re all drinking orange wine. But it took a good while for a smash burger in Taipei to come across my radar. For the uninitiated, a smash burger is, well, a normal burger patty but smashed flat. Originally, I didn’t understand. Surely the best part of a burger is the thick patty with all the juiciness of the beef, the
The ultimate goal of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is the total and overwhelming domination of everything within the sphere of what it considers China and deems as theirs. All decision-making by the CCP must be understood through that lens. Any decision made is to entrench — or ideally expand that power. They are fiercely hostile to anything that weakens or compromises their control of “China.” By design, they will stop at nothing to ensure that there is no distinction between the CCP and the Chinese nation, people, culture, civilization, religion, economy, property, military or government — they are all subsidiary
This year’s Miss Universe in Thailand has been marred by ugly drama, with allegations of an insult to a beauty queen’s intellect, a walkout by pageant contestants and a tearful tantrum by the host. More than 120 women from across the world have gathered in Thailand, vying to be crowned Miss Universe in a contest considered one of the “big four” of global beauty pageants. But the runup has been dominated by the off-stage antics of the coiffed contestants and their Thai hosts, escalating into a feminist firestorm drawing the attention of Mexico’s president. On Tuesday, Mexican delegate Fatima Bosch staged a
Would you eat lab-grown chocolate? I requested a sample from California Cultured, a Sacramento-based company. Its chocolate, not yet commercially available, is made with techniques that have previously been used to synthesize other bioactive products like certain plant-derived pharmaceuticals for commercial sale. A few days later, it arrives. The morsel, barely bigger than a coffee bean, is supposed to be the flavor equivalent of a 70 percent to 80 percent dark chocolate. I tear open its sealed packet and a chocolatey aroma escapes — so far, so good. I pop it in my mouth. Slightly waxy and distinctly bitter, it boasts those bright,
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