For some reason this Irish-French-Belgian animated feature eluded me, even though it was one of the Best Animated Feature nominees in 2010. It definitely deserves such kudos!

Set in the eighth century, this film is a fictionalized account of the creation of the Book of Kells, the illustrated manuscript of the four Gospels. The story follows 12-year-old Brendan (voice of Evan McGuire) as he battles Vikings and confronts an ancient serpent god on a mission to locate a legendary crystal and complete the mythical Book of Kells.

A rare spiritually-tinged animated feature that’s rich in Celtic mythology and folklore. It’s so beautifully-crafted and instantly involving that within seconds I was whisked away into Brendan’s world. I love the flat look of the hand-drawn animation, somehow it adds to its ethereal quality. After having seen the more slick animated features with all the bells and… click here to read whole article and make comments

A young Pakistani man is chasing corporate success on Wall Street. He finds himself embroiled in a conflict between his American Dream, a hostage crisis, and the enduring call of his family’s homeland.

I happen to see the trailer just a week before I saw the MSPfest schedule so I signed up to see it right away. This is the kind of film that will likely raise some eyebrows and some people might have strong feelings about it, whether good or bad. I guess that’s to be expected given the subject matter involves terrorism, though this film is not so much about an extremist attack, but the reaction when such a heinous event occurs. This film also works as a character study of an intriguing character named Changez, who like many immigrants, often is (or feels) torn between two worlds.

The film opens with… click here to read whole article and make comments

The Croods
Director: Chris Sanders
Screenplay: Kirk De Micco, Chris Sanders
The original voices of Nicolas Cage, Ryan Reynolds, Emma Stone, Catherine Keener, Clark Duke, Cloris Leachman

Kicking off a fantastic journey, a fun prehistoric family leaves their cave looking for a new life. Utilizing a simple plot, one largely playing to children, a family of cave-people -- father, mother, three kids and a grandmother -- are the only survivors in this dangerous world. None of their neighbours have made it – they’ve either been eaten by a dinosaur, crushed by a mammoth, or met their deaths in other prehistoric perilous situations. They are the only survivors. How? Thanks to their fear. The father has taught his children that they will only survive by staying away from the dangers of the world…

In this vein, the family keeps… click here to read whole article and make comments

Just want to wish everyone a blessed Easter. This weekend I’m celebrating the resurrection of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ… forever grateful for His atoning sacrifice.

Even those who aren’t believers might opt to watch some Christian-themed films this time of year, such as The Ten Commandments (should be on by now on one of the major network TV), King of Kings, Ben-Hur, The Passion of the Christ,  or the animated feature The Prince of Egypt for the whole family.

I truly respect The Passion despite all the drama surrounding the film and the filmmaker. Obviously the message speaks to me in a profound way, but even if we strip away the spiritual aspect of it for a minute and just see the movie from a film-making piece, it’s tremendous. I like what this guy said in his soulfoodmovies blog: “Simply take a moment to… click here to read whole article and make comments

I had just seen STOKER on Tuesday night, which inspires me to write about this post. Now, a lot of you know I was born in South East Asia but I moved to the US to go to college and has been staying here since. I feel like I need to preface this article by saying that I am actually guilty of not being familiar with Asian cinema even though my brother was into Kung Fu movies at the time (particularly the Sin Tiaw Hiap Lu series). I personally am not a fan of martial arts nor samurai movies, which explains why I have not seen any of Akira Kurosawa films.

Even today, there are only a handful of Asian directors I could name whose work I’m familiar with. I’m focusing primarily on Asian actors born outside of US soil. One of the most successful one is the Taiwanese-born Ang Lee, who’s… click here to read whole article and make comments

Last Friday night we had a chance to check out the documentary we’ve been wanting to see for a while. I posted the trailer a while back, check it out if you haven’t already.

This is an insightful and thoughtful documentary produced and narrated by none other than Keanu Reeves. I’ve always thought that Keanu is one of those actors who are far more intelligent than meets the eye, and despite his stoic style, I quite like him as an actor and enjoyed a lot of his movies. Here he collaborated with Christopher Kenneally who previously worked with him as production manager in Henry’s Crime to direct the film. I think Keanu is the perfect person to… click here to read whole article and make comments

Nearly everyone has heard about the stunning conversion of St Augustine, one of the most famous of all Christian theologians. His wisdom permeates Western Culture and Catholics are familiar with his saying, “You have made us for Thyself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee”. Yet few know the details of Augustine’s life story told in his Confessions.

Born in the fourth century AD to Patricius, a pagan Roman official, and Monica, his Christian wife, Augustine showed great promise and felt that his North African backwater was not able to give him the education he required to develop his gift for rhetoric.  He was disgusted by his father’s drunkenness and womanizing and contemptuous of his mother’s prayerful suffering as she served her family’s needs.

I was meant for better things, he thought, as he watched the famous lawyer Microbius and… click here to read whole article and make comments

The Dark Knight Rises proved to be a suitably emotional end to the most successful franchise reboot in cinema history and is now part of a whole sub-genre of movies keen to get in on the act. Here are my top five Hollywood reboots. What are yours? 

1. Batman Begins (2005) – The quintessential origin story and my favourite character from the comic-book universe. Christopher Nolan gave us a superhero movie that felt real and in taking us back to basics with Bruce Wayne, using Frank Miller’s graphic novels as his source material, made Batman relatable and restored some credibility to the franchise after the Batman and Robin fiasco.

2. Casino Royale (2006) – The Daniel Craig fronted Bond re-launch was a phenomenal success and gave us Bond’s origin story and a new era of Bond movies with a style all… click here to read whole article and make comments

This week I was invited to post my pick for my friend Andina’s My Movie Influence series. Naturally I picked Sense & Sensibility (1995). Before we get to the post, here’s what this series is all about: 

"Many people have their own movies they think highly, praised and probably started seeing things differently after watching them. I’ve shared mine and I always wanted to know what others have. I asked other people which movie they think to have the best influence on them."

If you have to pick one movie that changed your entire/one phase of your life, what would it be?

Sense & Sensibility (1995) – a Jane Austen adaptation by Ang Lee, starring Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, Hugh Grant, Alan Rickman and Greg Wise. I’m forever indebted to my cousin who rented this movie when I visited her… click here to read whole article and make comments

It’s been another vintage year for the kind of overblown super-hero movie we’ve come to expect when summer rolls around. 2012 hasn’t pulled any punches. Joss Whedon’s fan favourite The Avengers ‘Hulk-smashed’ box office records and Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises was a suitably satisfying conclusion to the iconic Batman reboot.

Movies like The Avengers and The Dark Knight Rises are so enjoyable that they set me wondering whether there’s more to the average comic book adaptation than meets the eye.

The Dark Knight Rises and its peers are entertaining spectacles (perpetually re-bootable ones at that) but actor Tom Hiddleston says we shouldn’t write these post-modern mythologies off as over-blown popcorn cinema. They might just have something more nourishing to offer.

In an article for The Guardian’s Film blog Hiddleston appeared to take a refreshingly philosophical view of superhero movies as this generation’s morality… click here to read whole article and make comments