Sunday, May 28, 2017

Resident Evil: Vendetta - A Very Cool CG Animated Movie Based on the Popular Video Game

I was intrigued about this movie when I saw the poster in the coming soon section of 2 cinema websites in Indonesia. At first I thought it was another sequel to Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, but when I read it a bit more, I realized it had got nothing to do with that movie. Anyway the movie premiered in some Indonesian cinemas starting from Saturday. As I was having another weekend staycation with my wife on Saturday, I only went to the cinema today after we checked out from the hotel. My wife was having various things to do at the time, and hence I watched this movie by myself in Plaza FX. Ok, I will proceed to the movie now.

Brief Story Line

Chris Redfield (voiced by Kevin Dorman) was a member of BSAA, an elite unit specializing in killing the undead/zombies. He was given the task along with special forces from another unit to capture the notorious weapons dealer named Glenn Arias (voiced by Alexander Polinsky - Charles in Charge TV series). Though the mission was not successful, Chris did manage to find out that Arias was working on a new kind of virus to create the undeads.

Thursday, May 25, 2017

Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar's Revenge - 5th Installment of Our Favorite Pirate Jack Sparrow

So, another public holiday on a Thursday which translated to movie date with my wife. This was one of my anticipated movie for the summer period, as Pirates of the Caribbean series were also my favorite. It actually premiered in Indonesian cinemas yesterday but we believed it would be exciting to see it at noon in the nearest cinema from our home with the Dolby Atmos sound system, i.e. Epicentrum Mall. After trying new menus in a restaurant nearby the location, we went to the cinema and watch it at 1.15PM show. Well let us get on to the movie now.

Brief Story Line

Henry (Brenton Thwaites - Maleficent, Gods of Egypt etc) was a young man looking for ways to break curse of the sea. He read all the possible literature to help him achieve his mission. While working in a British war ship, he became caught up in the war with a pirate ship. After some incident, he was later found by the British army in an island. He was suspected of treason and was going to be punished by hanging. He claimed that the ship was attacked by army of the dead, led by captain Salazar (Javier Bardem - No Country for Old Men, Skyfall etc) which the Royal army did not believe.

Wednesday, May 24, 2017

Stratton - A Rather Standard British Spy Movie

It was a rare Tuesday night with premiere of a new movie, in Indonesia. According to the synopsis from the cinema 21 website, it was categorized as action thriller movie which seemed interesting. I was a bit doubtful whether I could make it to the theater on time as I was having an outside office meeting at 3.30 PM and still needed some time to return back to office. After having to endure 45 minutes of jam in the taxi, I decided to walk back to office for around 10 minutes, as if I had continued with the taxi, it would probably have taken me another 30 minutes. I reached the cinema location at 10 minutes to 7PM and was able to see the 7.15PM show. It was also quite lucky that my wife could reach there on time by riding on an "ojek" after her food tasting event. Well let us move on to the story then, shall we?

Brief Story Line

A British Special Boat Service unit led by John Stratton (Dominic Cooper - Warcraft: The Beginning, Captain America: The First Avenger etc) was deployed to a facility in Iran to do some mission to obtain a biological substance that could be made into weapon. To support their mission in the field, there were some tech team as well that consist of Aggy (Gemma Chan - Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them), Spinks (Jake Fairbrother) and Cummings (Tom Felton - Draco Malfoy in Harry Potter series). Stratton was accompanied by a US Navy Seal Sgt Marty (Tyler Hoechlin - Teen Wolf TV series and as Superman in Supergirl TV series).

Saturday, May 20, 2017

Unforgettable - A Regrettably Forgettable Drama Thriller Movie

The premiere to this movie in Indonesia was actually 3 days ago but my wife and I finally decided to watch this one only today. After her food tasting event, we had some free time in the afternoon and I have also finished up my morning meeting with our client. We went to Plaza Semanggi to enjoy the bank promotion of free 1 ticket for purchase of 1 ticket. It had been quite sometime since we do this since the promotion was only available again after 2 months discontinued. Anyway, we reached the location few minutes before the start of the show at 2.15PM. 

Brief Story Line

Julia Banks (Rosario Dawson - Daredevil TV series, The Lego Batman Movie and many more) was a writer working for a website managed by her very best friend Ali (Whitney Cummings - The Wedding Ringer). After getting engaged with her boyfriend David Connover (Geoff Stults - Wedding Crashers, 7th Heaven TV series etc), Julia decided to resign from her work and moved outside of San Francisco to David's house. David was divorced from his ex-wife Tessa (Katherine Heigl - 27 Dresses, Knocked Up, Grey's Anatomy TV series etc) and had a young daughter named Lily (Isabella Rice).

Friday, May 19, 2017

A Silent Voice (Koe no Katachi) - A Unique Story Adapted from Japanese Manga

This Anime movie had been playing for quite some time in Indonesian theaters. I was intrigued after reading the synopsis and was hoping for another beautiful anime movie that I loved so much titled Your Name (Kimi No Na Wa). When I finally had the chance yesterday after my work, I rather "forced" myself to see the movie in Pacific Place, as it happened to be the only remaining cinema in Jakarta still playing the film. It was also the last show of the day. So how was the movie itself? Let us find out more.

Brief Story Line

Story started with Shōya Ishida (Mayu Matsuoka) in his elementary school years where he was quite popular and had lots of friends. One day, a new girl named Shōko Nishimiya (Saori Hayami) enrolled at the school. All the students were surprised to find out that she was deaf. At first they were able to accept her, but after a while, it was clear that she was having difficulty fitting in. One girl in particular named Naoka Ueno (Yūki Kaneko) was very unhappy with her. And with her influence being a popular girl, her best friend Kawai Miki (Megumi Han) was also doing the same thing. Only one girl named Miyoko Sahara (Yui Ishikawa) who was kind to Shōko.

Saturday, May 13, 2017

Unlocked - An Interesting Crime Thriller Spy Drama Full of Twists

After watching 2 movies back to back on Wednesday and Thursday, I noticed that there was another movie which had actually played in theaters since last week but I have not seen it. At first my wife and I were doubtful whether we should see the film or not, considering that it did not seem to garner a lot of attention. Furthermore, I was having a lot of meetings on Friday and was not sure if I could make it to the 7 PM show. But when it became clear I would be able to leave the office at 5.30 PM, and since I really wanted to have some stress relief entertainment, I requested my wife's help to buy the tickets. So off we go to see this film in Lotte Avenue.

Brief Story Line

A CIA desk agent named Alice Racine (Noomi Rapace - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Prometheus etc) was content with her current work in London, identifying possible terrorists cell/people from the surrounding environment. During her work, she was also liaising with an MI5 British Intelligent agent named Emily Knowles (Toni Collette - Hitchcock, xXx: Return of Xander Cage etc) who was also very supportive of Alice. Using her cover, Alice also managed to turn Amjad (Tosin Cole) from an ordinary taxi driver to an asset.

Friday, May 12, 2017

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword - An Entertaining Adaptation of King Arthur & Excalibur Sword

As mentioned in my previous post about Alien: Covenant, I planned to see this movie during the public holiday on Thursday. After our family lunch gathering and trying out new coffee shop that my wife was interested in, we went to one of my favorite cinemas that we had not gone for a while, i.e. at Epicentrum mall. It was only having 2 studios but both were very large ones having Dolby Atmos sound effect. We saw this one at the 4PM show. Ok, let's move along to the film now.

Brief Story Line

Arthur (Charlie Hunnam - Pacific Rim, Sons of Anarchy TV series etc) was a direct descendant of Uther Pendragon (Eric Bana - Black Hawk Down, Hulk, Troy etc) the king of England. However, he had to escape from the palace since his childhood days and lived in a brothel house till his adult years. During those years, he had built his own rapport as a "protector" of the female workers and he had always thought himself as a bastard son of one of them. He also befriended with Wetstick (Kingsley Ben-Adir) and Backlack (Neil Maskell) and kept close with the authority.

Thursday, May 11, 2017

Alien: Covenant - Another Sci Fi Horror Thriller Movie in Alien Franchise

It was a rather odd week of movie premieres in Indonesia this time, when 2 major movies premiered back to back on Tuesday and Wednesday. I was not able to see the movie King Arthur on Tuesday due to some work matters and would only do it today on public holiday. So yesterday we watched this movie which would only play in US cinemas sometime next week. As usual, we saw it in Lotte Avenue at 7.15 PM which was quite near my office. Now how was this 6th movie in Alien franchise fare? Let us move on to the juicy stuff.

Brief Story Line

The story was set around 10 years after the events of Prometheus, with the focus of the colonization space ship named Covenant which was travelling to the new habitable planet called Origae 6. Inside the space ship, there were 15 crews and some 2000 colonists who were put on cryogenics to sleep, due to the many years of travel to the intended location. Including in the crew was the very humanlike android named Walter (Michael Fassbender - X-Men first class trilogy, Assassin's Creed etc) who was also looking after the overall condition of the ship.

Monday, May 8, 2017

Before I Wake - An Unusual Supernatural Horror Drama Movie

It was another weekend staycation in Bandung that I was enjoying with my wife in the past 2 days (More on that on my wife's blog). And as usual, if I got the chance to enjoy a Saturday night movie premiere in one of the cable TV channels, I would definitely allocate my time to see it. Of course it could happen only when the hotel was providing such channels. Lucky for me that the hotel we stayed in was having Fox Movies Premium channel that showed a film that I had not seen before. Though it was a horror movie, but I still wanted to give it a try. Now how scary was the movie? I will go straight to it now.

Brief Story Line

Jessie (Kate Bosworth - 21, Superman Returns etc) and Mark (Thomas Jane - Deep Blue Sea, The Punisher, Standoff etc) were a couple who had just suffered a very traumatic incident with the loss of their very young boy Shawn. Jessie had to go to a psychiatric group to share her loss, while Mark was not really keen to it and preferred to mourn in his own way.

Thursday, May 4, 2017

The Circle - A Techno Thriller Adapted from Novel

It was a rare evening yesterday when no huge movie premiered on a Wednesday. There were actually few movies started to premiere but nothing that really caught my attention. And since I was supposed to have a meeting which would last till late night, I did not really aim to see any film. But as it happened, the meeting was cancelled and I was able to leave the office at around 6PM, and with my wife having no plans for the night, we decided at the very last minute to watch this movie that started at 7.15PM (other movies premiered in far locations). Still, it was rather tight, but we were able to make it. What was the movie all about? Let's find out.

Brief Story Line

Mae Holland (Emma Watson - Beauty and the Beast, Harry Potter series etc) was working for a small company as a customers relation. She was still living with her mother Bonnie (Glenne Headly - Dirty Rotten Scoundrels etc) and her father Vinnie who was having Multiple Sclerosis (played by the late Bill Paxton - Twister, Edge of Tomorrow and so on). Mae also had a close friend since childhood named Mercer (Ellar Coltrane) who was a very simple minded person and seemed to be having a history with her.