鬼戲

頭先沖沖下涼，我又諗起老祖話我細個鍾意周星馳。

蝦，唔通我細個真係鍾意周星馳嘅？我明明係鍾意靚仔㗎，佢又唔靚仔，唔通我鍾意佢搞笑？無理由丫，又唔見我鍾意盧海鵬？！雖然我係近乎咩周星馳都睇過（連《望夫成龍》同《小偷阿星》在內，反而後期有幾套無睇），但係應該係咁啱㗎嗟，又唔係我自己搵嚟睇嘅。

點解我會隨口up拎阿盧海鵬出嚟比較呢。。。實情唔係隨口up，都係因為前排提起。勾起我對《點解阿sir係隻鬼》嘅回憶，當然記得「聖法蘭雅根信馬可勃羅德聖會亞洲至善堂司馬昭昭博士夫人第一紀念中學」。。。唔好意思，我個腦專裝垃圾。

八零年末九零年初，最興鬼戲。林正英道長當道，同期有《鬼新娘》同《倩女幽魂123》，亞視有《鬼做你老婆》、《隔離差館有隻鬼》同《點解阿sir係隻鬼12》等等電視劇，都咪話唔陰氣重。講開先講，《鬼新娘》係非常好戲，不過結局令人太傷心，到而家我仲記得最後一幕，就係定格起字幕嘅一幕（以前興係同電視劇一樣定格起字幕嘅），真係心傷。如果你無睇過，應該搵哩啲鬼戲嚟睇下，都不知幾經典。

蝦，原來我細個都睇幾多無謂野㗎喎。。。

Alexis Dos Santos’ Unmade Beds (2009)

Unmade Beds was the last movie I watched for this  year NZFF. It’s on the last day, while everyone else watching The Gold Rush. Charlie Chaplin with orchestra of course is an attraction, but I have weird taste.

I like the movie. It’s a movie that made me felt really happy when I walk out the theatre. It just enlightened my mood. Vera’s part is romantic, Axl’s part is interesting. And when they finally meet, it’s funny. I usually like movies that are about lives that I can never touch nor understand. It’s like seeing another side of this world, meeting another type of species on this earth we are living.

"Did I miss a chance to fall in love?"

The director appeared after the movie, he dressed and talked funny without telling any joke.

Not going to say more because someone said “those kind of things only happen in movies”, haha. Fine, I can live with false reality. :P

Pedro Almodóvar’s Broken Embraces (2009)

This is one of the kind that if you ask me what is the film about, I cannot tell you what it is about. Basically it’s a story, and nothing much more than a story. You go in, watch it, “ha ha ha”, come out, say it’s good… and that’s it. No touching scene, nothing romantic, nothing dramatic, nothing unexpected, nothing too freaky, nothing very memorable, no brilliant quote… the only thing I would say well made was the colour – though not to a level I would be amazed. It’s funny I am just saying it has nothing in particular, yet a movie that you come out and say it’s kind of a good movie. That’s because from the entertainment point of view, it’s better than Coco avant Chanel and Kisses. So after watching it, I felt that I had a good movie night – though everything was just on the surface, nearly nothing residue in my memory… hmmm, not exactly, except the breasts of the girl in tight jeans and high-heel. :D

Not saying I don’t like the movie though. I still think it’s a good movie – a good entertainment.

P.S. love this dress:

毫無建樹

小王子的媽媽今晚回港，剛才我跟他們飲了個茶，又回到公司。今晚我學畫畫，不能跟他們吃晚飯。

滿心期待。我有太多東西想做，一時間也做不了那麼多，但能做多一樣也是很快樂的。

以前也說過，小學時我是一個文人 - 即一看就是讀文科的人，因為我的長處都在比較文化重的東西，譬如寫作、詩賦、畫畫、演講、講故事、辯論等等。這大概和我老媽脫不了干係。不過我數學和科學一向也不差，或者還是有理科天份的，畢竟我在爸爸的學校玩那些眼睛啊、耳朵啊等等模型也玩得很高興，並很喜歡人體模型（我不是須奈子哦！！）。Software可能是最適合我讀的了。。。又要找到點錢，又不是真的很科學，介於文理之間。

唯一我真的很討厭的科目是社會，中學時就變成了Civil Education。果然，從小到大，我都是和現實生活脫節的人，難怪聽不明任何經濟理論。。。

還是做多點無謂的事情，沒甚麼建設，比較適合我的脾性，哈哈哈。

我們

過了一星期，是時候說說。

上星期我們送走了一些人。我很傷心，不過也沒辦法，時勢不太好。這是第一次過這樣的事情。

這事之前，有次和某人談些無聊話題，說寧願牙痛還是寧願失戀。他說寧願失戀，我說寧願牙痛。

這件事，我也說我寧願失戀。

結果我也沒有很堅強的不哭。

Zhang Ke Jia’s 24 City (2008)

It wasn’t in my plan to watch this movie, but someone decided to do something big about Love and Death, so I got the ticket. This was my fourth movie of this year NZFF. Unexpectedly Ivy and Ken were there as well – though think about it, it should be expected – it’s a Chinese movie, and Ivy is a Chinese, that loves movies. Apparently she has watched quite a number of films from this director. She mentioned and discussed quite a few to me before we entered the theatre.

The stories were very interesting. The only problem I have with films like this one was: it’s a film, but the idea was to be like… real. So my mind was juggling between the ways I should perceive the stories. One moment my mind says “oh it’s so touching/interesting/sad/funny”, the other moment it says “it’s not true although it sounds true”. At the end of the day it IS a movie, it’s just a movie in the form of a piles of interviews. People minds sometimes stuck with the idea of “interviews”, and struggle to get out of the “received, understand and believe” paradigm.

You know what, that’s kind of saying the movie has done a really good job. Why am I saying that? Watch Atonement. At the end of the movie the old Briony was being interviewed, and I clearly perceiving it as “in a movie” – never feel like “reality out of a movie”. Hey I am not saying Atonement was not a good movie, I am saying “it’s just a movie”.

Believe it or not, the only part in 24 City I dislike, was the last part, ya, the part of 趙濤. I know, I know, she has been in quite a number of films of this director. I know, I know, she’s quite famous. I just don’t like her acting. All other stories are good, really really good.

By the way, Ivy, did this remind you 24 City when we saw it in our first lecture?

萬人迷

Anne Fontaine’s Coco avant Chanel (2009)

This was my third 09 NZFF movie. I am not obsessed with movies, so I have watched  6 only this year, and one of the six I just replace someone who couldn’t go to the movie. I went to Coco avant Chanel on July 19th 2009, i.e. last Sunday.

I like Andrey Tautou, think she’s pretty. Though that wasn’t the reason I went to watch this. It’s one of “the Ivy’s Suggestions”. I did find it better than I expected though (probably I was expecting low enough). The story wasn’t particular dramatic (surely Chanel’s life was not as dramatic as Sagan), but it does bring up some very interesting cultural and social aspects, about class, status, women in society, love, marriage, etc. As a weird one who found these ideas more fascinating,I probably have approached the film in a different way as to those who were disappointed by the film. However, even for the people who didn’t like the film much would have agreed with Ken, that those dresses at the end are very pretty. Actually, all the clothing were nice through out the film – that’s always a plus for audiences like me.

Something related to Chanel that has nothing to do with the film – ZEVS’s liquidated Chanel logo at Armani on July 13th:

 

Have to say, I think it’s a cool piece of art, and it’s cooler because it’s on Armani’s wall, haha.

Intertextuality

We (Ivy and I) have our first FTVMS 101 Film Studies lecture. At the beginning of the lecture, the lecturer said two things that I surely cannot do:

1. Put 7 hours/week on this paper (well, I never spend 7 hours a week for study even I was doing 5 papers…)
2. Work less than 12 hours a week (come on, I work full time)

Anyway. That’s not important.

So in the morning I drove to work, parked down my car at work, and went to the University by bus. I went to school early so I can fill in a paper cross credit form at Arts Student Centre. At around 9:36am, Ivy messaged me saying she’s outside the lecture room and bored. So I went to see her. It’s a class of hundreds of people, scary… I haven’t been in a class of this size for so long, you know, Philosophy classes are mostly 10 – 20 people. Actually I do not like big class, but guess it’s not for me to choose.

It’s an interesting lecture, and as usual I was writing all the time.

One surprise came up in this lecture.

Several years ago… hmmm, 6 or 7 years ago I guess? I saw an MV in the University Gym while I was… running? maybe not, who cares. It captured my eyes, I loved it. Sometime later I saw it again in the gym, but I still couldn’t remember who sang the song and what song it is. I just loved the idea of the MV.

Today, I saw it again, but reading it differently after the lecturer showed us this:

At this stage you may already know, the MV I saw was Smashing Pumpkins’ Tonight, Tonight.

 

It’s cool aye!

Painting class

My painting class time has changed! From Thursday to Wednesday, still 6:30pm. That’s cool, that’s cool. All because my original class has not enough number. >_<

Random painting

今天去Stationary Warehouse買Canvas，竟然有半價！於是我買了上課要用的Canvas，還買了些小Canvas來試刀。回到家急不及待把衣服放進洗衣機，吃了個杯麵，便拿一個4"x4"的Canvas來亂試一下。我還買了些便宜的顏料，純粹是用來玩玩而已。礙於我比較奇怪的脾氣（就是若我要去上課就不要自己先嘗試老師要教的東西），所以我沒有畫一幅Abstract的畫（也不見得多寫實。。。），總之只是隨便試一下顏色而已。

許久沒有執過真的畫筆呢。由於我老媽是教美術的，所以小時候我也會畫一點圖畫，都是粉彩和廣告彩的配搭。然而我的畫畫技術只停留在小學階段，而且也不夠我填顏色好（那是因為我缺乏觀察力，不能留心細節並畫下來吧）。所以這次學畫畫，我也選了可能比較適合粗枝大葉的我的Abstract style，還要是Acrylic。Acrylic可以運用很多顏料和畫筆以外的工具去做出不同的效果，大概我這麼貪玩又不定的性格會較適合學這個。

其實都只是我認為的啦。。。

Completely random

 

Bought my Acrylic paints and brushes today, but before my real painting lesson, which commence on the 30th July 2009, let me use digital acrylic to draw a random digital painting.

Actually I have drawn four, but don’t worry about that, hahaha.

鬼佬啟泰哥

頭先睇Public Enemies個trailer，突然間覺得Christian Bale有幾分似陳啟泰喎。。。之前睇Batman Begins、The Dark Knight同The Prestige都唔係咁覺嘅。。。XD

係咪睇熊貓博士啊Jayden？

嘩。。。Kit竟然已經教個仔哩啲野。。。XD

Meat Love

Stephen was talking about “growing beef” during lunch time. The idea is planting beef with normal seed, skip the cow part of the food creation process.

That reminds me this. Better not watch it if you don’t like Jan Švankmajer.

Lance Daly’s Kisses (2008)

Came back from the movie Kisses and dinner with Nixon. It’s a relatively short movie, really like the gradual changes of the colour saturation level – from nearly black & white to nearly 100, then to nearly black & white again, except the moment she give him a fly kiss towards the end of the movie, when in that one second the saturation increased again. A nice symbolic representation for the story. Would be better with subtitle though coz the boy’s Irish-English is a bit hard to understand.

Mr. Bob Dylan has been referenced everywhere, haha. :)

總有無聊的地球人

本來想說「香港人」，只是回頭一想，又何止是香港人呢。這次其實是林燕妮小姐的委屈一事的後話。

在林小姐的網誌裡，有些人留下了嘲笑的回應，甚至有人明顯是開馬甲瘋狂轟炸。Facebook有這個Group，真的有人參加，還有人說「今年的書展林燕妮都有參展，不如搵班人到時去林燕妮果個攤檔度抗議」。我心想：林小姐是嘴壞了點，再加上說錯了，但人們倒是空閒時間太多了點，多得要大大花在毫不相干的人身上。「曾蔭權不代表我」屬可以理解的，當然也真的有純是借題發揮的人；「齊來恥笑林燕妮精神」則很明顯是煮多了一舊魚。人家只是寫了篇文，也真的是討人厭的口吻，但針對此人作出網上公開討論及嘲笑，不是更白癡嗎？

其實這只是引子 - 令我思索為甚麼有些人會對這麼小的事有那麼大的反應的引子。大概人們平時壓力太大，一有能顯得superior 的空間，抓著不放。回港時對此有更深的感受。身邊的人們，急步來急步去，有甚麼不滿，立刻罵起來。食物不夠好、東西來得不夠快、在街上被人不小心碰到、上不到巴士或列車、買回去的衣服有點問題要更換。。。甚麼都要罵。侍應們放下食物，客人們卻是連「唔該」也不會說一句。

另外，扯得遠一點，也是反思我會不會也是反應過大的引子。回想一下，我以往大概也是會過於反應，但大多數都是切身的事情，或與我身邊的人相關的事情 - 大概我一開始就是自我中心至極的人。然而倒和生活壓力沒多大關係，只是我慣了被誤會，總是過份努力的保護自己。想來慢慢地我是有改變的，只是對某些事情又變得漠不關心。取一個平衡，總是那麼的難。當然，我還是要自己保護自己，這麼多年，沒有改變，只是我已經發現人們說甚麼、怎麼看，大都不重要。

說回原本的題目。我上次說過若我是林小姐的迷，現在大概對看林燕妮覺得羞愧；同樣，若我喜歡的人在林小姐的網誌無聊謾罵，或參加了這個Facebook group，我也會對喜歡這個人覺得羞愧呢。幸好，兩者皆非。我只是路過的看官，笑一笑而已。

Jane Campion’s Bright Star (2009)

 

Went to see Bright Star last night. Civic theatre was almost full – actually I think it’s full, but for some strange reason, just the one seat next to me was empty. The lady on the other side of this empty seat put all her belongings on the seat, seems to me she already knew it’s empty. So maybe it’s one of her friend not coming.

Which was cool for me.

I have to admit that I didn’t have the right mentality to watch a movie due to something happened earlier the day, unexpectedly. That ruined a little bit of the movie. It would have been better if I was worry-free. Not the movie’s fault. I would love to see it again when it formally release in New Zealand.

So let’s talk about the movie after this overly extended prologue of me.

The only reason I had in mind that made me bought the Bright Star ticket was Jane Campion. I honestly didn’t know what’s the movie is about until a few days before yesterday. Once I knew I looked up a little bit about John Keats, this young, short life, romantic poet. So I have done my minimal preparation before I enter the theatre.

Jane Campion didn’t fail me, it is a very beautiful piece of art.  Colour tone through out the film is perfect for this pre-Victorian period, in conjunction with the beautiful scenes, make me believe everything about romanticism. Whenever Fanny’s mother talk about “reality”, I have a feeling that she’s trying to pull me back to reality as well – but fail, like when she’s trying to pull the girl in love back to reality.

The dynamics between the characters are interesting to watch. The relationships between Brown and Keats, Brown and Fanny, the siblings, Keats and his friends, the Brawne’s family and Keats… and of course, Keats and Fanny, are all well developed and put together. The kids and Brown contribute to a lot of amusing moments, which work very well to support the romantic relationship, and make the movie more lively – well, especially for the fact that we all know Keats’ going to die at the end, really need those pieces to light it up. The kids are just acting great.

Ben Whishaw is the perfect candidate for John Keats (although some people say he’s too tall for being Keats). He look extremely thin (so does and Thomas Sangster), in addition to his eyes, well setup for the effeminate and lack confidence properties of this young romantic poet. You just have to love John Keats after seeing the movie, if not the way Fanny does, then in Mrs Brawn or Mr. Brown ways.

One additional thing to note, the clothing. I love pretty and stylish clothing, and that’s what you can see throughout the movie. Seems to me Fanny never wear the same piece for more than five minutes, which is a funny comparison to Mr. Keats, who’s always wearing the same thing from beginning to end. The difference between “a stylish minx” and “an unimpressive poet”, ha.

So, recommended. Not sure when will it hit NZ though, but definitely will.

Bright Star

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art--
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors--
No--yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,
Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever--or else swoon to death.

-- John Keats (31 October 1795 – 23 February 1821)

Gnome

說起Amélie，我很喜歡她把爸爸的Gnome 送到世界各地去拍照，然後把照片寄回來這一段。（其實我整套戲沒有哪個地方是不喜歡的。。。）

傳統的惡作劇。

據Wikipedia 說，起源是一九八六年九月廿四日， Sydney Morning Herald 刊登了以下這一段：

'An Eastern suburbs gnome-owner was distressed when she discovered her gnome had been stolen at the weekend. A note was found in its place: "Dear mum, couldn't stand the solitude any longer. Gone off to see the world. Don't be worried, I'll be back soon. Love Bilbo xxx."'

一向認為Garden Gnome 是一種很奇怪的物件，奇怪的地方在於它的「用途」。要知其實它原本只是裝飾品，然而慢慢有了謎一樣的地位。玩過Sims 2 的人就會知道，它其中一個「用途」是給一些較無聊和頑劣的鄰居或朋友踢倒並恥笑，甚至被偷去。據說Sims 3 它會隨機在某些狀況下出現，無奈我至今未曾遇上，有待發現。（說著說著，我在Sims 3 的community site 哪兒下載了幾個Gnome 回來，哈哈哈。。。）

對我這個經常說「妖精拿了我的東西」的人來說，Gnome 四處走，實在沒甚麼難接受的呢。。。

幸福寶貝

最近重看了乙一的《幸福寶貝（形似小貓的幸福）》。主角是一個陰沉的大學生，一個討厭陽光、討厭與人交流、被人戲弄了也只是說「習慣了」的人。住進了一所房子，人去樓不空，所有傢俱擺設還在，前主人的白色小貓也住在那裡。

還有剛被刺死的雪村的靈魂。

雪村是陰霾的相反詞：正面、陽光、喜歡人。她生前總是拿著相機到處拍攝，留下四周的人開心的時刻。沒有一人不喜歡她。主角把窗簾關上，把擺設移走，雪村就在沒人看見的情況下拉開窗簾，拿出可愛的擺設，甚至看她喜歡的電視節目，聽她喜歡的收音機頻道。雪野有點像Amélie。

這是一個有關陰沉的大學生與陽光的靈魂共同生活的故事。最後雪村離開前，寫了一封信給主角。有點苦澀的味道，卻淡出曙色，細膩動人。

我沒有主角般黑暗，卻欠缺雪村對人對事的正面感情。帶著欣賞和喜悅去看世界，那是一種。。。多麼美好的感覺。

海倫小姐與她的新豎琴

近乎完美的海倫小姐最近置了一座豎琴，Camac Athena Harp，從法國運來，非常漂亮。也真的要海倫小姐的氣質才襯得起。蔣小姐和我這般粗魯的人還是看看好了。。。XD

六月三十和七月一

昨天是阿寧、醫生和月野兔的生日。這兩個人的生日，是屬於「Facebook有沒有提示我也會記得」的類別。這個類別和「親戚」、「不能分類的人」、「好朋友」、「舊朋友」、「朋友」及「完全不認識的人」也有intersection。所以若我記不起一個人的生日，那不等如我不夠喜歡他；就算我記得一個人的生日，也未必有甚麼特別。

呵，不是說你們不特別啦。。。

六月三十是好日子，一年的一半完成了。今天是下一半的開始。還沒有習慣現在是二零零九不是二零零八的我，快要開始說二零一零了。