Nick and me consuming a ton of BBQ. Nick tried to avoid eye contact with the camera all night. I guess he's camera shy.
Monday, March 13, 2006
On Saturday, March 11, 2005, we had dinner at a Korean BBQ restaurant with the Berendo Street Baptist Church (BSBC) Sunday School teachers. I forgot the name of the restaurant, but it was really good. I've been eating salad every day for a couple of weeks and I was craving some good meat. Korean BBQ is the best. If you haven't had some, you've been missing out. I pigged out again as usual, but I paid for it later that night. Oh. . .my bowels.
Troy
This is a great epic spectacle of Homer's legendary Iliad. Although the movie displayed its own version of the Iliad, it was still a magnificent movie to watch. I thought Brad Pitt did a good job of acting as Achilles.
Even though there were thousands of real extras hired to be Trojan and Spartan warriors, there was heavy use of CGI to recreate legendary battles of tens of thousands of killers. You can tell some of the battle scenes looked fake, but it was still visually stunning nonetheless. The movie featured lush scenery also.
The problem with the movie, however, was that it felt emotionally sterile. The story just felt like a visual retelling of Greek mythology rather than a stirring movie about love and war. The movie takes out all the parts about the gods fighting in the war to make the movie more realistic. Otherwise, it could have become another Clash of the Titans.
The Story: The love story of Paris of Troy and Helen of Sparta seemed like another famous forbidden love story, Romeo and Juliet. Paris (played by Orlando Bloom, not Paris Hilton) falls in love with the King of Sparta's gorgeous trophy wife, Helen. They both sail away to Sparta. Paris' big brother, Hector, gets mad at him, but protects his kid brother and his crush. The Greeks wage war upon Troy for this treachory and bring along the legendary warrior, Achilles, to fight for them. Achilles leads the Greeks to a successful first day's battle. Later on, he falls in love with an acolyte of Apollo. He uses his charm as Brad Pitt and beds the virgin temple girl.
The avaricious King of Sparta, Menelaus, challenges Paris to a duel for stealing and humping his wife. Menelaus starts spanking the pretty boy's ass. Paris runs to his big bro for help. Since Paris ran away instead of fighting to death, the Greeks decide to wage full on war against Troy. During another battle, Hector kills Achilles' little cousin. Achilles gets pissed off and challenges Hector to a duel. Achilles kicks Hector's ass. After the Greeks allow fourteen days of mourning for Troy's fallen hero, Hector, Odysseus (from Homer's other famous story, The Odyssey) comes up with a cunning plan to take over Troy with the infamous Trojan Horse. The Greeks sneak into Troy with the giant wooden gift and slaughter all the Trojans. Achilles tries to save his recently deflowered temple girl from the clutches of the evil King of Greece, Agamemnon.
Orland Bloom spots Achilles and somehow, through a magical turn of events, suddenly turns from a wimp into the legendary Elven fighter, Legolas from the Lord of the Rings and shoots an arrow into Achilles' heel. Paris/Legolas shoots some more arrows at him and Achilles kicks the bucket. Achilles will be remembered forever. The End.
Although the acting was good, the actors seemed to be just like characters from an ancient Greek legend instead of appearing to be real people. The characters were complex, but it was hard to develop any strong emotions for any of them. The movie felt lacked any soul. Even though many tears were shed, I felt nothing.
The Highs: Visually spectacular; the movie keeps Achilles immortal by keeping his story alive; a good retelling of Homer's Iliad; Legolas from LOTR is back!
The Lows: Emotionally sterile.
The Verdict: Brad Pitt's Achilles' Heel is women.
My rating: B, 84.
Even though there were thousands of real extras hired to be Trojan and Spartan warriors, there was heavy use of CGI to recreate legendary battles of tens of thousands of killers. You can tell some of the battle scenes looked fake, but it was still visually stunning nonetheless. The movie featured lush scenery also.
The problem with the movie, however, was that it felt emotionally sterile. The story just felt like a visual retelling of Greek mythology rather than a stirring movie about love and war. The movie takes out all the parts about the gods fighting in the war to make the movie more realistic. Otherwise, it could have become another Clash of the Titans.
The Story: The love story of Paris of Troy and Helen of Sparta seemed like another famous forbidden love story, Romeo and Juliet. Paris (played by Orlando Bloom, not Paris Hilton) falls in love with the King of Sparta's gorgeous trophy wife, Helen. They both sail away to Sparta. Paris' big brother, Hector, gets mad at him, but protects his kid brother and his crush. The Greeks wage war upon Troy for this treachory and bring along the legendary warrior, Achilles, to fight for them. Achilles leads the Greeks to a successful first day's battle. Later on, he falls in love with an acolyte of Apollo. He uses his charm as Brad Pitt and beds the virgin temple girl.
The avaricious King of Sparta, Menelaus, challenges Paris to a duel for stealing and humping his wife. Menelaus starts spanking the pretty boy's ass. Paris runs to his big bro for help. Since Paris ran away instead of fighting to death, the Greeks decide to wage full on war against Troy. During another battle, Hector kills Achilles' little cousin. Achilles gets pissed off and challenges Hector to a duel. Achilles kicks Hector's ass. After the Greeks allow fourteen days of mourning for Troy's fallen hero, Hector, Odysseus (from Homer's other famous story, The Odyssey) comes up with a cunning plan to take over Troy with the infamous Trojan Horse. The Greeks sneak into Troy with the giant wooden gift and slaughter all the Trojans. Achilles tries to save his recently deflowered temple girl from the clutches of the evil King of Greece, Agamemnon.
Orland Bloom spots Achilles and somehow, through a magical turn of events, suddenly turns from a wimp into the legendary Elven fighter, Legolas from the Lord of the Rings and shoots an arrow into Achilles' heel. Paris/Legolas shoots some more arrows at him and Achilles kicks the bucket. Achilles will be remembered forever. The End.
Although the acting was good, the actors seemed to be just like characters from an ancient Greek legend instead of appearing to be real people. The characters were complex, but it was hard to develop any strong emotions for any of them. The movie felt lacked any soul. Even though many tears were shed, I felt nothing.
The Highs: Visually spectacular; the movie keeps Achilles immortal by keeping his story alive; a good retelling of Homer's Iliad; Legolas from LOTR is back!
The Lows: Emotionally sterile.
The Verdict: Brad Pitt's Achilles' Heel is women.
My rating: B, 84.
Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Star Wars: The New Jedi Order: Vector Prime
I just finished reading Star Wars: The New Jedi Order: Vector Prime, by R. A. Salvatore. I thought that the book was pretty good. The story involves the original Star Wars cast and, of course, some new people.
The main new Jedi include Han Solo and Princess Leia's kids. They have three teenagers who are strong with the Force. Jaina and Jacen are twins. Jaina is a totally cocky girl Jedi who's the best pilot in the galaxy. Jacen is very philosophical about the meaning of the Force. The youngest, Anakin, is fifteen. He's headstrong like his grandfather.
There's also Luke Skywalker's wife, Mara Jade Skywalker, who is powerful with the Force as well. Unfortunately, she's been poisoned. She uses the Force to hold off the poison from completely killing her right away.
There's also some new Jedi who are roaming the galaxy. They're kind of like wild west heros that do whatever they think is best. Luke is attempting to rebuild the Jedi Council in order to unite and organize the Jedi.
There's a strange new enemy that our heros encounter in this story, the Yuuzhan Vong. They're organic beings that hate technology. They're blindly religious and seem to be a warlike society. They abhor droids because they believe they're a blasphemy against their organic ways of living. These Yuuzhan Vong are not Vietnamese, but they're strange humanoid beings that only use organic things as weapons and ships.
It's amazing how all the Star Wars books are so cohesive. All the writers seem to know the history of all the characters from all the other Star Wars novels. This really makes the Star Wars universe seem real. I guess they don't want to piss off any nerdy fans who point out every single error at those dorky Star Wars Celebration conventions.
Personally, I liked the Timothy Zahn novels, The Thrawn Trilogy, better. It included the books, Heir to the Throne, Dark Force Rising, and The Last Command. That series takes place about 9 years after Episode IV: A New Hope. I really relived my Star Wars moments with those books since it had all my favorite characters.
Even though the books are amazing, I still love the Star Wars movies more. Star Wars is meant to be a cinematic experience. The special effects are supposed to blow you away. With the books, you have to use your imagination and memories from the past movies to make the books fun.
Nevertheless, it was cool to see my favorite characters again and read about their other adventures. Han, Leia, and Luke seem to be getting old now though.
What I don't like about Star Wars books and science fiction and fantasy books, in general, is reading all those strange names. It's almost like learning a new fake language.
The biggest surprise in this book is that our beloved Chewbacca dies. A lot of nerds were outraged by this and actually sent death threat letters to R. A. Salvatore.
What I didn't like about the book was reading about teenage Jedi angst.
I love Star Wars. I think it's my favorite movie series. I wish I didn't chop off my Star Wars action figures' heads when I was a kid though. After I had battles with my action figures, I chopped their heads off. I pretended that Darth Vader killed Yoda and chopped off his head. Then I pretended that Luke chopped off Vader's head. I kept doing it one day, until I chopped all their heads off. In the end, everyone died. I buried them in my backyard in La Canada. I wonder if the new owners found all my buried Star Wars action figures with missing heads. No wonder my parents never bought me any toys. I always had to make my own paper action figures and ships after that.
I recommend reading Vector Prime to all you Star Wars fans. If you want to read it, let me know. I'll send you a copy.
The main new Jedi include Han Solo and Princess Leia's kids. They have three teenagers who are strong with the Force. Jaina and Jacen are twins. Jaina is a totally cocky girl Jedi who's the best pilot in the galaxy. Jacen is very philosophical about the meaning of the Force. The youngest, Anakin, is fifteen. He's headstrong like his grandfather.
There's also Luke Skywalker's wife, Mara Jade Skywalker, who is powerful with the Force as well. Unfortunately, she's been poisoned. She uses the Force to hold off the poison from completely killing her right away.
There's also some new Jedi who are roaming the galaxy. They're kind of like wild west heros that do whatever they think is best. Luke is attempting to rebuild the Jedi Council in order to unite and organize the Jedi.
There's a strange new enemy that our heros encounter in this story, the Yuuzhan Vong. They're organic beings that hate technology. They're blindly religious and seem to be a warlike society. They abhor droids because they believe they're a blasphemy against their organic ways of living. These Yuuzhan Vong are not Vietnamese, but they're strange humanoid beings that only use organic things as weapons and ships.
It's amazing how all the Star Wars books are so cohesive. All the writers seem to know the history of all the characters from all the other Star Wars novels. This really makes the Star Wars universe seem real. I guess they don't want to piss off any nerdy fans who point out every single error at those dorky Star Wars Celebration conventions.
Personally, I liked the Timothy Zahn novels, The Thrawn Trilogy, better. It included the books, Heir to the Throne, Dark Force Rising, and The Last Command. That series takes place about 9 years after Episode IV: A New Hope. I really relived my Star Wars moments with those books since it had all my favorite characters.
Even though the books are amazing, I still love the Star Wars movies more. Star Wars is meant to be a cinematic experience. The special effects are supposed to blow you away. With the books, you have to use your imagination and memories from the past movies to make the books fun.
Nevertheless, it was cool to see my favorite characters again and read about their other adventures. Han, Leia, and Luke seem to be getting old now though.
What I don't like about Star Wars books and science fiction and fantasy books, in general, is reading all those strange names. It's almost like learning a new fake language.
The biggest surprise in this book is that our beloved Chewbacca dies. A lot of nerds were outraged by this and actually sent death threat letters to R. A. Salvatore.
What I didn't like about the book was reading about teenage Jedi angst.
I love Star Wars. I think it's my favorite movie series. I wish I didn't chop off my Star Wars action figures' heads when I was a kid though. After I had battles with my action figures, I chopped their heads off. I pretended that Darth Vader killed Yoda and chopped off his head. Then I pretended that Luke chopped off Vader's head. I kept doing it one day, until I chopped all their heads off. In the end, everyone died. I buried them in my backyard in La Canada. I wonder if the new owners found all my buried Star Wars action figures with missing heads. No wonder my parents never bought me any toys. I always had to make my own paper action figures and ships after that.
I recommend reading Vector Prime to all you Star Wars fans. If you want to read it, let me know. I'll send you a copy.
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
Bride and Prejudice
This is a modern Indian musical comedy version of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. If this sounds intriguing, then go ahead and see it. If it sounds scary, then run away.
The first dance and musical number is like an Indian "You Got Served" routine. A bunch of guys do a mix of traditional Indian dancing and hip hop.
The movie is very colorful. It almost looks technicolor with all the bright colors.
The story's just like the Pride and Prejudice storyline. Even the main guy's name, Darcy, is the same. This movie sticks pretty closely to the original script, but it does have its obvious differences.
This is a more humorous light-hearted version of Pride and Prejudice. Since I saw Keira Knightley in Pride and Prejudice recently, I can compare and contrast pretty easily.
This movie is like an Indian English musical. It's full of song and dance. It's basically a total chick flick. I can't imagine any straight guy wanting to see this. I just watched this because I thought my wife would like it since she likes romance comedies.
The movie is pretty comical, goofy, and cheesey. I thought the corny jokes pretty much saved this movie from being a total disaster.
The traditional whiny high-pitched Indian music was really irritating like laughter from that nerdy Steve Erkel from the old tv show, Family Matters.
And what was up with the cross-dressing Indian singers in one dance number?
All the Indians sounded like Apu from The Simpsons.
The funniest guy in the movie is the sleazy Indian guy, Kholi. At first, the mother tried to set up Lalita up with him. He had a lot of corny lines. At dinner, he says he came back to India from America to find companionship. While he smilingly says, "No life without wife," he sticks up his middle finger that has a ring on it.
What's up with all these songs? Did they try to make an Indian version of Grease?
I thought some of the quirkiest scenes gave it some charm. The movie is worth watching if only to compare it to other versions of Pride and Prejudice.
When the third sister did her cobra dance, she cracked me up. She started doing an Indian belly dance and pretended to "cobra strike" everyone who was watching. After the movie ended, I started doing the cobra dance for Sarah. That was fun.
The movie had good scenery of India, England, and America.
I thought it was funny when the mother was looking up Indianmatchmaking.com to set her daughters up.
The four daughters were always home. Didn't they have schools or jobs in these modern times?
The movie was a good lesson in Indian culture too.
The acting was not very good at all. I thought it was very contrived. Darcy and Lolita acted like they were pretending to hate each other in the beginning. It was obvious that the conversations were unnatural and scripted. The conversations didn't flow very well. They got angry over conversations that clearly wasn't theirs. As they tried to stick as closely to a 200 year old script as possible, it didn't work well, especially in terms of their conversations. Their conversations made it seem like they were fighting, but they didn't act that way at all. The acting was okay once they started acting like they cared for each other.
The Indian women in the movie were very attractive. They were fair and light-skinned. Thankfully, most of the girls were hot and didn't look like their mother.
For some reason, I could understand what they were saying with their Indian accents better than in Pride and Prejudice with their thick British accents. When people talk too fast, I can't understand what they're saying in movies, especially when the sound editing is poorly done.
The movie isn't too bad after you get through the painfully bad first half of the film.
The good: Light-hearted fun, beautiful Indian girls, goofy comedy, very colorful.
The bad: Whiny Indian music, annoying songs, chick flick, abhorrent acting in the first half of the movie.
The verdict: Watch this with your Indian lover tonight.
My rating: C, 71.
The first dance and musical number is like an Indian "You Got Served" routine. A bunch of guys do a mix of traditional Indian dancing and hip hop.
The movie is very colorful. It almost looks technicolor with all the bright colors.
The story's just like the Pride and Prejudice storyline. Even the main guy's name, Darcy, is the same. This movie sticks pretty closely to the original script, but it does have its obvious differences.
This is a more humorous light-hearted version of Pride and Prejudice. Since I saw Keira Knightley in Pride and Prejudice recently, I can compare and contrast pretty easily.
This movie is like an Indian English musical. It's full of song and dance. It's basically a total chick flick. I can't imagine any straight guy wanting to see this. I just watched this because I thought my wife would like it since she likes romance comedies.
The movie is pretty comical, goofy, and cheesey. I thought the corny jokes pretty much saved this movie from being a total disaster.
The traditional whiny high-pitched Indian music was really irritating like laughter from that nerdy Steve Erkel from the old tv show, Family Matters.
And what was up with the cross-dressing Indian singers in one dance number?
All the Indians sounded like Apu from The Simpsons.
The funniest guy in the movie is the sleazy Indian guy, Kholi. At first, the mother tried to set up Lalita up with him. He had a lot of corny lines. At dinner, he says he came back to India from America to find companionship. While he smilingly says, "No life without wife," he sticks up his middle finger that has a ring on it.
What's up with all these songs? Did they try to make an Indian version of Grease?
I thought some of the quirkiest scenes gave it some charm. The movie is worth watching if only to compare it to other versions of Pride and Prejudice.
When the third sister did her cobra dance, she cracked me up. She started doing an Indian belly dance and pretended to "cobra strike" everyone who was watching. After the movie ended, I started doing the cobra dance for Sarah. That was fun.
The movie had good scenery of India, England, and America.
I thought it was funny when the mother was looking up Indianmatchmaking.com to set her daughters up.
The four daughters were always home. Didn't they have schools or jobs in these modern times?
The movie was a good lesson in Indian culture too.
The acting was not very good at all. I thought it was very contrived. Darcy and Lolita acted like they were pretending to hate each other in the beginning. It was obvious that the conversations were unnatural and scripted. The conversations didn't flow very well. They got angry over conversations that clearly wasn't theirs. As they tried to stick as closely to a 200 year old script as possible, it didn't work well, especially in terms of their conversations. Their conversations made it seem like they were fighting, but they didn't act that way at all. The acting was okay once they started acting like they cared for each other.
The Indian women in the movie were very attractive. They were fair and light-skinned. Thankfully, most of the girls were hot and didn't look like their mother.
For some reason, I could understand what they were saying with their Indian accents better than in Pride and Prejudice with their thick British accents. When people talk too fast, I can't understand what they're saying in movies, especially when the sound editing is poorly done.
The movie isn't too bad after you get through the painfully bad first half of the film.
The good: Light-hearted fun, beautiful Indian girls, goofy comedy, very colorful.
The bad: Whiny Indian music, annoying songs, chick flick, abhorrent acting in the first half of the movie.
The verdict: Watch this with your Indian lover tonight.
My rating: C, 71.
Monday, March 06, 2006
Sarah and Mikey Running with the Dogs
Here's a short and boring clip of Sarah and Mikey running with the dogs on their way to the top of the prayer mountain. We went up there on Saturday, March 4, 2006.
I had a hard time keeping up with them.
Mikey meets some dogs at the christian retreat center. On Saturday, Sarah, Mikey, and Sarah's mom went to the prayer mountain (Kidowon) in Riverside County off Indian Truck Trail on the I-15 near Corona. We went there to pray, but I got super tired afterwards. Perhaps, it was because I carried Mikey on my shoulders all the way to the top of the mountain.
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