Saving Mr. Wu - Kidnapping of a Hong Kong Movie Star

I watched this movie while I was in the flight from Jakarta to Bali and return during my vacation trip with my wife @yennymakanmulu (as mentioned in my earlier post of Batman VS Superman: Dawn of Justice). This movie was inspired by actual events of a kidnapping of a major Hong Kong movie star in Beijing, China.

The story started with few people under the lead of Zhang Hua (played by Wang Qian Yuan) who were driving around in a car trying to kidnap wealthy people by impersonating as police officers. While looking for their next victim, they stopped by a karaoke place where they targeted to kidnap the person who drove the car that was parked outside (I think it's because it's luxury car). When the person came out of the karaoke place, apparently it was a famous Hong Kong movie star, called simply as Mr. Wu (played by the famous Andy Lau). While Mr. Wu was being asked to be photographed by fans and encouraged by the movie producer he had meeting with, Zhang Hua's gang insisted that the car Mr. Wu drove has been involved in a hit and run, so he had to be brought in for questioning. After some heated objection from Mr. Wu himself and his friend, the gang took out guns to threaten and ultimately Mr. Wu was driven in their car.

The scene later moved 18 hours after the kidnapping, where Zhang Hua appeared to have some bruises on his face and was being questioned in a police station by 1 of the detective, Xing Feng (played by Liu Ye). We would find out later that the deadline for paying the ransom would be less than 1 hour since that scene, afterwards, Mr. Wu would be executed.

Scene would move back to the time when Mr. Wu was brought to a house in a rather remote area where apparently there was another kidnap victim, Xiao Dou. To ensure Mr. Wu cooperated, Zhang Hua threatened to kill Xiao Dou for not paying his ransom. Mr. Wu could not watch the intended execution so he offered to pay the ransom for both of them which Zhang Hua and the other kidnapping members who consisted of a fan of Mr. Wu and 1 or 2 trigger happy thugs reluctantly accepted.

Since the bank where Mr. Wu kept his money only opened on the following day and to avoid Mr. Wu rescued by the police, Zhang Hua asked Mr. Wu to request 1 of his most trusted friend to collect the money. Hence Mr. Wu called Mr. Su (played by Lam Suet) who was his friend from the army days and requested him to withdraw the money from bank without telling the police.

Meanwhile the policemen tried their best to search for the gang's location since Zhang Hua did not want to inform the police. He felt there would be no point as he would be sentenced to death anyway due to heavy law violations including the purchase of firearms, kidnapping and murder. The police would later use various means such as interrogations of possible suspects, acquaintance, girlfriend, circling possible kidnap areas to acquire the information.

So can the police make it in time to rescue Mr. Wu? How was Zhang Hua captured? What will happen to him and the rest of his gang? Well, as usual, you would have to watch it till finished. 

I had a good moment watching this movie, even if I had to wait for 3 days to watch the remaining 20 minutes of the movie (the flight was too short to watch full movie till finished). I believe Andy Lau has matured in the recent years by taking lesser action films and more dramatic films. He has also matured literally as indicated by my wife (her exact words were: "Andy Lau so old? I am shocked"....).

Anyway, if you are into a quite serious chinese movie with tension and dramatic scenes, you are welcome to watch this movie. There was also a song which was sung by Andy Lau as bonus. Or, if you happen to be going in a flight by Garuda, you can choose to watch this as it is one of the in-flight entertainment for the month of March 2016.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

Batman VS Superman: Dawn of Justice - Battle of 2 Biggest DC Superheroes

Yes! I still managed to see this movie on the 3rd day it premiered in Indonesia. With still so many people in line watching it, I felt quite lucky to be able to buy it last minute in the theater near my home. Reason why I highlighted about the 3rd day was because on the 1st and 2nd day of the premier, I was still in Bali having my vacation with my wife @yennymakanmulu (which she will tell you all about it in her own blog with same name) and I thought I would not have the chance to watch it until the weekend or later.

This movie was 2.5 hours long, so there were plenty to talk about. However, it's going to be challenging to write about this movie without giving spoilers. It's really annoying when people loooove to brag about watching movies earlier than anyone else AND telling about the surprise, the twist, or even worst, the ending. Anyway, I will try my best to do so, to avoid the wrath of people around me.... :)

Movie started with the brief scene of young Bruce Wayne's history and later became Batman and moved on to the older Bruce Wayne (played by Ben Affleck) getting worried and upset about the impact of major fight between Superman and General Zod (from "Man of Steel"). He managed to save a little girl and also helped 1 of his employees, Wallace, whose legs were severed due to heavy concrete dropped on them. We could see that Bruce Wayne was not approving of Superman's method as there were heavy casualties.

18 months later, Lois Lane (played by Amy Adams) went to interview a terrorist in a secretive place, but the interview was sabotaged and Superman (Henry Cavill) had to come and rescue Lois. 

With the various actions done by Superman, a lot of people were not really approving the methods. There were scenes where public opinions were divisive. Some adored him like God, while others were worried that Superman could do anything without anyone controlling him. One of such person was the influential Senator June (played by Holly Hunter) who believed in putting restraints on Superman. We were also introduced to Lex Luthor (played by Jesse Eisenberg) who believed that the world must be prepared in the event it must control Superman. It was described that he knew the impact of kryptonite (green rocks from Krypton planet) on Superman. With the help of another senator, Lex managed to get his hand on the largest kryptonite found in Indian ocean imported into US and the access to the ship that General Zod used when he came to earth.

The next various scenes would describe how Batman become more and more disapproving of Superman's activities, while Superman was not too agreeing to Batman's vigilante actions. There were also heated conversation between Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne about each alternate identities' methods of helping people. We were also introduced to Diana Prince (played by Gal Gadot) as the mysterious lady in a fundraiser activity held by Lex Luthor who appeared to have special agenda.

I do not want to give more details after this, as it would ruin the plots in the movie, but suffice to say the first half of the movie would make us understand why later on there had to be the fight between Batman and Superman.

I would say that the wait was really worthwhile coz the fight between these two superheroes were colossal. The fighting was incredible and spectacular as I would hope so. Both really showed their strengths and their weaknesses during this fight.

The main villain of this movie apart from Lex Luthor was Doomsday. People who read Superman comics or know enough from other sources would know who this character was and what he could do. Other noteworthy characters would definitely be Bruce's butler - Alfred (played I think greatly by Jeremy Irons) and Daily Planet's editor, Perry White (played by Laurence Fishburne).

I had enjoyable moment during the 2nd half of the movie as it was full of crazy fighting scenes, very cool special effects, and great sound effects (as I watched it in a theater with Dolby Atmos system). Not to say the 1st half is bad, but I was too much hoping for full action, so when there weren't that many, made me feel that the pace was a little bit slow to my preference. I personally was satisfied with how the film's plots were created. You could say that this movie is a little bit of Man of Steel's sequel, little bit of Batman's reboot, and little bit of prequel to Justice League movies (hence the title "Dawn of Justice").

I have read in some news especially from US that the critics are not liking this movie. For me, I would surely do not care about their opinions cause a lot of times, their opinions are like sh*t. As long as I had a great moment watching the movie, I would say the movie is worthy enough to be given the chance to see. I believe that in Indonesia, most people would want to watch it for the sake of  bragging and curiosity, plus of course to enjoy cool action movie. So there is no need for me to encourage you to watch this movie, as you would surely watch it anyway, or would have watched it by the time this post is published...

Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out 5 stars

Note:
Justice League is the term in DC comic books where some superheroes form an alliance to fight off very deadly & large villain(s). Very famous members of this Justice League are Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, plus some others like Cyborg, Aquaman, Green Arrow, Black Canary and few others. I read somewhere that the Justice League movie is coming in 2017. Well I could not wait for that to come out. It would be a breath of fresh air in the flooding of Marvel's adaptation 2-3 times a year.

The Divergent Series: Allegiant - Part 1 of the Finale

To all of you who have seen the 1st and 2nd part of the "Divergent" movies adapted from the young adult novels written by Veronica Roth, should be able to immediately understand the story from the beginning. I, on the other hand thought that I am one of those people, but unfortunately I got mixed up with another young adult novel adaptation - The Maze Runner. D-oh. 

Anyway, this movie starts from the moment that factions system no longer exist in Chicago and was being led now by Evelyn (played by Naomi Watts) where she hold trials for the people who earlier supported Jeanine (played by Kate Winslet in the previous 2 movies). She would leave the decision to the people of Chicago what they would do to them. Most of them insisted that those people should be executed and Evelyn duly complied despite the strong protest from Johana (played by Octavia Spencer) who was previously the leader of Amity faction.

Caleb (played by Ansel Elgort), request the help from his sister Tris (played by Shailene Woodley) as he would be the next on trial on the following day. However, Tris seem to be more interested in her relationship with her boyfriend Four (played by Theo James). They were discussing about what lies outside the walls of Chicago that have been closed by Evelyn to hold the people from leaving the city. With Caleb almost got executed, he managed to get out of Chicago with the help of none other than his sister Tris assisted by Four, Christina (played by Zoë Kravitz) and also joined by Peter (played by Miles Teller) and Tori (Maggie Q).

After heavy chase from Evelyn's thug - Matthew, Tris and the others managed to escape from the city's wall.  While they were almost caught by Matthew, the "outside" people who earlier sent a message to Chicago about the better world, helped the gang and brought them to this great city which was very clean with no faction. Apparently Tris and Four were considered like legend by those people.

Tris was the only one from Chicago with the perfect successful sample of DNA and Faction experiment done by the David the Director - played by Jeff Daniels (A real surprise for me as my image was very different since he played in Dumb and Dumber movies with Jim Carrey). Tris was described as the "Pure" by David and was asked to give her "perfect" DNA so David can create similar DNA for other people and convince the council that this was the best solution for the chaos outside their perfect cities.

Meanwhile, Four as the "Damaged" people as described by David was given training to be 1 of the soldier with special purpose of saving children from the hardship of living in the world damaged by civil wars. Christina being a Dauntless faction warrior also assigned to be 1 of those soldiers. Peter and Caleb were given the task to watch over the city of Chicago through a sophisticated equipment. Peter was unhappy with such assignment but Caleb was very happy with this task.

Four felt his relationship with Tris grew apart because of the grouping by David. He also later found out from Caleb that Chicago was on a brink of civil war between Evelyn and Johana. Four wanted to take a direct approach by going back to Chicago to stop the war, but Tris was more interested in convincing the council to intervene the problem in Chicago. 

So can Four convince his mother Evelyn to stop the civil war? Was Tris going to go and convince the council with the help of David or would she follow Four's method? Can Chicago be saved? Find out till the end of this movie. Just remember that this is 1st part of the finale. So there will be 2nd part to complete the novels trilogy.

For 2 hours, I tried to enjoy the movie. It was however, not as good as Insurgent (the 2nd part) and it's way below the 1st part. I felt the pace was too slow. Most likely it was due to the movie made in two films rather than one. I guess it's like a trend nowadays that the final series of books adaption should always be made in 2 parts (The Hobbit, The Hunger Games, Twilight). Despite the above, the movie did have its moments. There were some surprising twists and humor here and there. While the action was not spectacular but I think the special effects were quite good as the great cities, the aircrafts and the weapons used by Four actually looked real and cool. 

So if you already watched 1st and 2nd part, I guess you are screwed and had no choice but to watch this one to complete the trilogy. Of course if you don't really give a d*mn, you can always leave this one out. 

Mike's movie moments rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars

The Mermaid - Another Stephen Chow's Lovable Film

Labeled as the Top Grossing Movie in the history of China's box office has intrigued me to watch this movie. Knowing that it was directed by Stephen Chow whose previous films such as Kungfu Hustle, Shaolin Soccer and various other movies from 1990s and 2000s made me even more excited. I have to admit that I am a fan of Stephen Chow as I can always have a good laugh in most of his movies.

So when it finally came to Indonesia, I had made a decision that this is a must watch movie for me.

Last night, when my wife (@yennymakanmulu) is having a very rare spare time, we watched this together at 7pm after I left from work.

The opening scene shows an old guy who was making a "show" about various weird animals and findings including his ultimate finale, a mermaid. Story later moves to the scene of auction for Green Gulf, a reserve for wildlife such as dolphins and other sea creatures. The property was finally purchased by Liu Xuan (played by Deng Chao) after some serious bidding war competition particularly from Ruo Lan (played by Zhang Yuqi).

Apparently Liu Xuan wanted to do reclamation on the green gulf and made a fortune on it by building theme parks etc. Ruo Lan managed to persuade Liu Xuan to become his business partner in this project as she sees a big profit from this. They later on had a party to celebrate the joint partnership, where a girl with very bad make up insisted that she is a fan of Liu Xuan and gave him her name card. Shan (played by newcomer Lin Yun) is actually a mermaid in disguise who works at a chicken stall in a fun fair.

Shan was living in a wrecked ship located at the side of the green gulf together with other mermaids and an octopus (played by Show Luo). They were taking refuge there due to the very dangerous sonar equipment placed by Liu Xuan's team which can kill any living thing in the sea trying to return to the green gulf after reclamation. Due to this reason, Octopus has arranged Shan to seduce Liu Xuan, and bring him back to a place where the rest of the remaining mermaids can kill him for revenge.

When Shan finally get the chance to kill Liu Xuan in his office, there were lots of hilarious moments where all her efforts fail spectacularly. In fact, later on Shan seem to fall for Liu Xuan. Meanwhile, Ruo Lan still tried to get Liu Xuan's attention and affection.

So can the mermaids have their revenge to Liu Xuan? Will Shan be able to choose between the other mermaids and Liu Xuan? Will Ruo Lan have any impact in their relationship? Can all the mermaids be saved? Find them out when you watch it. It's playing in all the cinema chains in Indonesia (to my surprise).

My wife and I really enjoyed this movie. There were three scenes that all of us in theater were laughing very hard. It's been long time since we had this much laughter until we had teary eyes. Even after the movie finished, we were still laughing from those various epic scenes. However, aside from all the laughs, the movie actually sends a quite heavy message about not messing with the environment. 

So I had a great moment watching this film. I can say that Stephen Chow did it again.

The only flaws that I can think of is the way the cameos were being "forced" to be inserted in the earlier scene, and the special effects were not 1st class.

But overall it is an enjoyable movie. If you have watched Stephen Chow's other films, then you would love this one, even if he is not playing in it. 

Mike's movie moments rating: 4.5 out 5 stars

Kung Fu Panda 3 - Po Return to His Origin

Finally, I got the chance to see this movie after it was somehow delayed playing in Indonesia (not sure the reasoning as usually Hollywood movies that can attract lots of audiences play at the same weekend as in US, some even play earlier). Anyway, on March 12, 2016 I managed to buy the ticket and watched it at the 2.45 PM show. As I already foresee, most of the people who watch are families with kids and couples.

Movie starts with the scene of Kai (voiced by J.K Simmons) fighting with Master Oogway (voiced by Randall Duk Kim) to acquire Oogway's chi. Kai had been collecting the chi of other Kungfu masters and Oogway's chi was the one he required to come back to the mortal world. Kai was able to defeat Oogway who warned him that Kai should be ready to fight with the Dragon Warrior (Po) as it was him who would be the real master of chi. Kai felt that as a ridiculous thing and really underestimated Po.

Scene moved to the time when Master Shifu (voiced by Dustin Hoffman) told Po (voiced by Jack Black) that he would retire from teaching and passing the title of master to Po. Po was very surprised and he really felt that he was not worthy of being a good teacher and believed that Tigress would be better suited. However, Shifu was very persistent and insisted that Dragon Warrior should be the next master. Hence all five of Po's friends who were all kungfu masters, Tigress (voiced by Angelina Jolie), Mantis (voiced by Seth Rogen), Viper (voiced by Lucy Liu), Crane (voiced by David Cross) & Monkey (voiced by Jackie Chan) greeted Po as their master. As we would have guessed, Po's training to the other 5 masters was terrible. Everyone got injured during this training and Po became frustrated. When Po was feeling down, he met with Master Shifu who advised him that he should become the better him and not trying to become Shifu. He should be the master of chi (which of course Po was not able to understand).

Po later went back to his hometown, where his father Mr. Ping (voiced by James Hong) eventually convinced Po that it was a good step up to become master and perhaps later can be promoted to higher level so Mr. Ping can sell more noodles in the palace. While Po was taking bath, they were informed that someone almost broke Po's record of dumpling eating so they immediately went out and see. Apparently it was another Panda named Li Shan (voiced by Bryan Cranston) who was looking for his son separated from child. After few conversations, they both realized that Li Shan's son was Po, while he was Po's father. Mr. Ping was very skeptic about this and really jealous of Po's affection to Li Shan.

Po was so excited and he showed Li Shan the place where there were lots of artifacts. They had lots of fun by playing using those artifacts. Master Shifu and the rest of the 5 masters suddenly appeared when they were playing and finally were introduced to Li Shan. As Po was about to be asked by Shifu to show his father his training, there was a bell sounded from far which was to alarm there was danger in the valley. So Po and the rest went back to the village and fight with the enemies. Li Shan seem to be worried during this fight. After the fighting with the jade warriors who were assigned by Kai after he arrived at the mortal world, it was found out that Kai was a very dangerous and strong enemy. He has a direct relationship with Oogway and the only way to defeat him was by mastering chi. Po as the dragon warrior was the one that everyone count on, and Li Shan promise that he would be able to make Po learn to become the master of chi in the Panda village.

In short, Po, Li Shan and Mr. Ping arrived at the secret panda village where Po would be introduced to his long lost family. There were his cousins, a grandma, a baby, a dancer and many others. Po had to learn how to be himself (a panda) in order to learn mastering his chi.

Meanwhile, Kai had acquired more and more chi from various kungfu masters. but his ultimate goal had always been the Dragon Warrior's chi. In order to do that, he had to fight his way to the valley against Po's friends and Master Shifu, and later to fight Po.

Is it possible for Po to become the master of chi? Can he fight Kai who is becoming superior every time he defeated the other kungfu masters and made them his personal jade warriors? Can Po become a really good teacher & master as what Shifu and Oogway foresees? You can find it all once you watch it till the end. 

I had a good moment watching this movie. I feel that after 3 movies, the film finally has come to its full circle. There were a lot of funny moments and 1 or 2 touching scenes. But I personally feel that there were more funnier moments in the 1st and 2nd part (I laughed a lot harder and more frequently then). And I really feel that the trailer shown in the theaters are too much. Almost all the supposed funny moments have been shown in this trailer. Perhaps it's also due to the short length of the movie so the funny moments were too few? 

The movie also has got some nice songs like "Kungfu fighting" which was from the original movie and another song I think it's called "Try" in the end credit. There were some raps in that song which was sung by the popular Taiwanese singer Jay Chou.

Anyway, if you have watched Kung Fu Panda 1 and 2, you definitely should watch this one to complete the trilogy. If you have not, I recommend you watch them first before watching part 3. This movie is quite light and should be easily understood by children. Even though it's also a story of martial arts, the fight scenes are very light and no bloody or death scene. It's a family friendly movie where everyone can watch and have fun for 1.5 hours. Ooh btw, I saw it in 2D, but I am pretty sure it would have been better in 3D as I saw various scenes where I believe it could be felt clearer and greater in 3D. So perhaps it would be better if you could see it in 3D.

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

LONDON HAS FALLEN - Terrifying Terror in London

Well this is one of the sequel I was waiting for. I know, I know, another one of those full action movies that I am writing again, so typical. Anyway, I realize that some people do not like even the original movie (Olympus Has Fallen). I guess it's too stereotype for some. Again I am not against people who think that movies must always be very heavy one, filled with great acting, story line, musical score and a bunch of those stuff. As I already said in my special note about my blog, I am not going to write about those but only the moments that I experienced when watching the movies.

So if the title of this movie is not to your liking, I welcome you to read the moments I experienced on other movies.

Without further ado, here goes. Movie starts with the scene of various terror attacks in South East Asia and continues to the scene of a wedding ceremony of the daughter of an arms dealer named Aamir Barkawi (who happens to be in the Middle East) and was having a discussion with his son Karman about their latest "success" in some terror attack. An agent has informed to the US Army confirming Barkawi is in the house, where later a drone was shot to this house, supposedly killing Aamir.

2 years later, Mike Banning (played by Gerard Butler), the super Secret Service agent who saved the president's son earlier in "Olympus has Fallen" and Benjamin Asher the president (still played by Aaron Eckhart - The Dark Knight etc) were having their morning run. It was mentioned that Mike's wife is pregnant and will be having the baby in 2 weeks time.

After Mike return to his home and met his wife (played by Radha Mitchell - Pitch Black, Phone Booth etc), he was talking about being there for his family and was considering to resign from his position as Secret Service agent.

Later, when Asher was informed about his day's schedule, he got a phone call apparently to inform the Prime Minister of England has died during a normal operation a day earlier and there would be a royal funeral in London where it is expected that majority of world leaders would come to attend.

Mike had to postpone his intention of resigning and arranging for the president's trip to London. During discussion with Lynne Jacobs, director of Secret Service (played by Angela Basset - Malcom X) they both are very worried about this trip as it was so sudden and they did not have anything properly prepared.

On the day the various leaders such as the Prime Minister of Canada, the German chancellor, the Italian PM, French president were on the way to the funeral, the US president went 1 hour ahead of schedule without telling any of the people at London for safety reason. 

Now I am not going into the detail scenes later, but in short, the terror would begin. And I really mean it as a terror coz believe me when I said that it's terrifying looking at all those killings.

Oooh did I forget to tell you that this film is having R rating? So please expect lots of gunshot to the heads, stabbing, bomb throwing, small and heavy explosions, etc. And you will also see some of the landmarks in London being blown away. 

The US president, accompanied by Mike Banning will be hunted all across London. To avoid being captured, they had to seek the aid of an MI6 agent in a safe house.

Meanwhile, the vice president Allan Trumbull (played by Morgan Freeman) were having a discussion at the white house together with various high ranked US officials like secretary of defence, NSA deputy director and others. All of them horrifyingly looking through the satellite images of London since the electricity & telecommunication system were broken down by the terrorists.

They all tried to assist the president & Mike to be saved from the terrorists.

So can Mike really save the president? Can the persons behind this terror be captured or brought to justice? How was it possible to arrange this kind of large attacks without them being noticed? Find out all the answers and enjoy all those countless shootings and explosions.

I enjoyed the moment watching this movie from the 15th minute until almost the end, where the terrified feeling, the suspense and the mind blowing action (short hand combat, shooting etc) were almost in the entire film. There is also bonus of looking at the special effect of blowing out London's landmarks. However, it's not all just action, as there are some small touches of drama, and humor here and there. Little bit cheesy on the humor, but still ok. I personally love the fighting sequence near the abandon power plant between Mike Banning & the Delta team against the terrorists.

Now, is this movie worth to watch? You're d*mn right if you are an action fanatic. But if you don't like this type of movie, or if you cannot bear this kind of bloody, violent film, then please skip this one. There is 1 thing though that I find a little bit bothering is the almost-ending part. Other than that, the film is good enough for my taste. So get yourselves ready and PREPARE FOR BLOODY HELL!

Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars

GODS OF EGYPT - Battle of 2 Gods

This was the first time that I watched a movie without knowing what the story was. I only know from my wife that this is the type of movie that I would like. Well she is right in the sense that I always like movies that are having lots of action, special effects, great sound system. I like to be "wowed" when watching movie.

Maybe people will think that's too shallow, but hey, that's what I want to feel when I go to see a movie in the cinema. I am very sure a lot of you would also love to be entertained just like me. A movie does not have to be Oscar nominated in order to entertain people (see how many people loved to watch Fast & Furious, Jurassic World, Marvel movies, Transformers, etc). Ok, enough rambling from my side. If you are still interested in finding out about this movie, feel free to continue.

I have mentioned in my earlier post about "Zootopia", that it was the first of my personal "movie marathon". This was the 2nd movie that I watched on that day. Movie starts with intro about Gods and their creation, humans, all live side by side in the Egypt. Gods can be easily differentiated as they are much taller and bigger than human, and their blood is of gold while humans are red. These Gods can also transform themselves into some different animal shape. It was told there are 2 Gods, Osiris a great God worshipped and loved by human and his brother Set (played by Gerard Butler - 300, Olympus Has Fallen etc) who is more like War God. Osiris wants to resign from the throne and pass it to his son Horus (played by Nicolai Coster-Waldau - Game of Thrones).

The story is being told from the point of view of Bek (played by Brenton Thwaites), a small time thief who is very much in love with Zaya (played by Courtney Eaton - Mad Max: Fury Road).

During the celebration of Horus' initiation to become king, Set suddenly came and provide a special gift to Horus. When Horus blew the horn given by Set, many soldiers came at once. Set then forced Osiris to fight him to become the ruler of Egypt which Osiris refused. As we all would have guessed, Set then killed Osiris, making Horus very angry and vengeful. Horus tried to fight Set but he was easily defeated as Set is a much better fighter & have more experience than him. Set took both Horus' eyes which are Horus' source of power. As Set was about to kill him, Hathor the goddes of love (played by Elodie Yung) who is in love with Horus, begged Set to spare his life. All other gods there obeyed Set and did not dare to fight, including Thoth, God of knowledge.

After 1 year passed, Egypt has become very bad for both humans (mostly become slaves) and the gods that cannot accept Set becoming king. Horus was banished to a temple. Hathor has been married to Set and Zaya became slave for Urshu, the architect who was assigned by Set to build a very high tower for worshipping Ra - God of the Sun (played by Geoffrey Rush). 

Bek was convinced by Zaya to steal the eyes of Horus by going inside the temple built by Urshu using the map stolen from Urshu's library since Zaya believes that only Horus can save all of Egypt. With the experience of being a thief, Bek was able to go through the various obstacles and stole the eye. Unfortunately when Bek returned to Zaya, Urshu found out about their plan and tried to capture them.

Bek finally arrived at the temple where Horus was banished and give the eye to Horus. After some fighting and convincing to do, Horus finally agreed that Horus will fight Set and return the order to Egypt. 

Before they start on their journey to revenge Set, both of them worshipped Ra so Horus can meet and request the help from Ra to make him able to transform again to his animal shape, the falcon. However, Ra disagrees as he believes Horus must learn and try to find the solution himself. Ra also said that he has to fight the shadow demon every day and thus cannot leave his post.

So now both Bek and Horus embarked on a journey to locate Set's shrine where they would be able to reduce Set's power using the "magical" waters from Ra's vessel. This journey would include fighting with Set's armies, and going through the temple of ashes and solving the riddle by sphinx.

All this while Set was trying to capture all the powers from other gods to make him invincible. 

So will Horus be able to avenge Set when he is becoming nearly impossible to defeat? Will Bek ever got his mission accomplished? Is Hathor going to be together again with Horus? Can Horus finally become the king? Find out through their adventures and journey.

I had some excited moments watching the fights and the adventures. Fighting scenes are good. But, as my wife has pointed out to me, I also feel the CGI especially for background pictures are not good. You can really see they are computerized pictures (I even feel like watching scenes from computer games that I play) which is odd considering it has a very big budget > USD 100 million. Anyway, despite all that, I think the movie's length is just nice as we get enough time to complete the whole story. Personally I always think that an adventure or action movie should always have 3 parts, i.e. opening part where usually we get to see the main character's capabilities, love interest etc. 2nd part is the part where they would be given all the "trials", difficulties etc and must be able to overcome them. Finally the 3rd part would be the ultimate fight scene. I believe this movie is having all of those in sufficient amount of time.

In conclusion, if you are interested in watching an adventure, fantasy movie combined with sword fighting and creature slaying scenes, you should watch this one. But do not expect brutal type of fighting as this is PG 13 and I think Exodus: Gods and Kings would suit you better. This is more like Prince of Persia. So if you do not like this kind of movie, or you are really into an Academy Award quality movie, please do not watch this. 

Mike's movie moments rating: 3 out of 5 stars 

ZOOTOPIA - A Rabbit's Dream of Making the World a Better Place

I heard people talked about this movie for many days and they all say that it is a very good film. When I saw the synopsis and noticed this was a Disney movie, I thought to myself that it definitely should be a good movie. Anyway, after playing for like less than 2 weeks, it's getting difficult to look for cinemas that are playing this movie as somehow in the 1st week of march we were flooded by 3 or 4 new movies.

On Saturday, 5 March 2016, as part of my personal "movie marathon", I chose to watch this movie first. It started with a scene where Judy Hopps, a cute 9 year old rabbit playing in a school drama about all animals can be whoever they want to be, especially in Zootopia, a metropolis town. Judy's parents, Stu and Bonnie seem to be worried watching the show as Judy wants to be a police. One of Judy's friend, Gideon Grey the fox, mocked Judy for wanting to be a police when she is just a rabbit (no rabbit ever become a police before). Judy's parents did not quite agree to Judy being a police for the same reason as well, but Judy is very insistent and she even said that if no rabbit has ever been a police before, then she will be the first one.

While talking to her parents, Judy saw Gideon and his friend bullying a bunch of sheep to give them their prize tickets. Judy tried to save them, but instead Gideon hurt Judy on her face to remind her not being a hero. She managed to get the prize tickets for the sheep though, and Judy made her mind up that she will not stop becoming a police even with such threat from Gideon.

15 years later, after all the hard difficult training, Judy really graduated from police academy and becoming the first ever rabbit to become a police. The mayor Lionheart (a lion) accompanied by his assistant Dawn Bellweather (a sheep) announce this big occasion. 

Judy finally was assigned to Zootopia, just as her dream. She stayed in a tiny little apartment where the wall was very thin and voices from the neighbor can be heard. On her first day at work, Judy was assigned to parking duty by his captain Bogo (a buffalo) despite there is a case of 14 missing mammals. Judy was upset but since she is not a quitter, she decided that she will give 200 parking tickets by lunch time. 

During this assignment she met a fox, Nick Wilde who she helped to buy ice cream for his "son" but he turned out to be a con-artist.

Judy started to feel that her dream is not as good as the reality because of what Nick told her and she was always assigned the parking duty. On one day at work, she was able to capture a weasel who stole something which I thought was vegetables but instead of getting the credit, she was complained by Captain Bogo. While she was being scolded, Mrs. Otterton (an otter) came to Bogo's room requesting help to find her husband who has been missing. Judy immediately offered to help since Bogo was not willing to assign anyone to assist. Even though Bogo was very upset, but since Assistant mayor Dawn informed the mayor about this, he has no choice but to allow Judy to proceed. Bogo forced Judy to solve the case in 48 hours and she should resign if she is unable to do so.

Judy did the investigation with the help from Nick Wilde (by way of conning him into admitting a crime). They both nicely combined into a good pair of investigator, although Judy is always very careful about Nick since he is a fox who has a habit of always conning. The investigation itself lead them to a lot of twists which I think if you are looking closely enough, you will be able to guess.

There are also various characters that even though are very few scenes, but they were all having some sort of relation or providing clues to the investigation.

Notable characters are Yax the Yak in the naturalist club, Flash the sloth, Mr. Big the mafia, Gazelle the singer (maybe some of you can guess the person behind her voice). 

So will Judy be able to complete the task on time to keep her job as police officer? Is there any relation between the missing Mr. Otterton and the other 14 missing mammals? What will happen to Nick who is only helping Judy because he is being "forced" to?  Can Judy and Nick become real friends or their relationship become worse because of a fox's nature to always con? Find out by your self.

I would recommend that you start to watch it soon, as I think by the time Kungfu Panda 3 hits the theaters next week, it will be even harder to locate a cinema still showing this one.

I had a wonderful moment watching this movie. All Disney values are there like in all the other classic Disney movies. There are some funny moments where you can laugh, touching moments where you can feel sorry and happy for Judy, even to Nick. However, I do get the feeling that this movie is a little bit mature and the messages might be difficult to absorb for children of younger age. Especially since the movie itself evolving around missing animals investigation which is usually seen in detective movies or TV series. But then again, that's just me. A lot of people say this is good movie for kids. Anyway, if you are really into a good Disney family movie, please watch it. I am very sure you will find it worth your while.

Ooo, 1 more thing. This is not a musical film like Frozen. The only song that you can see will be Gazelle singing in the end credit. This movie is good for whole family, for couples and even good enough as dating movie. 

Mike's movie moments rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Groundhog Day - Story of A Guy Having to Repeat His Day

After many years of hearing about this title referenced in some other movies or TV series, I finally got the chance to watch this film. I was browsing through the TV channels after long day work and stumbled into 1 showing this movie.

Since it already started like 5 minutes, I can only tell it from my point of view starting from the scene where Phil Connors (played by Bill Murray - Ghostbusters, Lost in Translation and others), a weather broadcaster coming to a small town called Punxsutawney in Pennsylvania together with the camera man Larry (played by Chris Elliot) and their show producer Rita Hanson (played by Andie Mac Dowell - Four Weddings and a Funeral, Michael etc). Phil seem to be not interested in this assignment and he was also very arrogant, the opposite of the very calm, patient and sophisticated Rita.

Phil was dropped by at the inn where he will stay for the night, as the news coverage that he has to do is on the following day. After spending the night, Phil was waked up by the song "I got you babe" by Sony and Cher at exactly 6 AM playing on the radio. It's the Groundhog Day (see below for more on this day, only if you're interested to know) and people were informed to get ready for the festivity. When Phil finished taking his bath, he went out of the room and met a person at the hallway and had a short chat with him about the start of spring date. Then he went down stairs and met the waitress at the breakfast place in the inn who offered him for coffee or bread but Phil rejected and really looked down on her when replying. He went out to walk to the location where he was supposed to show the weather news and he was called by a person who knew him from high school and now sells insurance (Ned-played by Stephen Tobolowsky). Phil strongly avoided him and accidentally stepped on mud.

When Phil finally reached the location for his news broadcast, he read the news without interest and after finished, all three of them went to their car to leave the town. Unfortunately due to the blizzard, they were stuck and had to return back to the town which made Phil very upset. He took bath which was very cold as there was no hot water and went to sleep immediately.

The following day finally came, and Phil was waked up at exactly 6 AM with the song "I got you babe" and the radio broadcaster told it's the Groundhog Day which Phil felt very strange and thought probably the holiday was for 2 days in that town. He went out and met the same person in the hallway whom he met earlier and had same conversation, met the same waitress offering the same thing and went out of the inn also found Ned calling him again. Phil felt very strange and went to the location of the news where everything happened exactly the same before.

Phil thought he was going crazy, so he tried to see brain doctor who said he was fine, then went to psychiatrist who could not diagnoze him. He then go to the bar, having drinks with 2 guys he just met and both of them recommended if it's the final day of his life, he should take advantage of it. So he went on to drive car recklessly, got arrested. But again on the following day it's same day again.

Phil then use this knowledge to do all crazy stunts, like getting a woman for 1 night stand, steal money, etc. Finally he decided to try to seduce Rita by getting all information of her likes and dislikes. At 1 day he was doing everything perfectly but at the last minute, Rita rejected Phil's attempt to sleep with her and the following days repeated without Phil ever getting Rita.

Phil finally felt very frustrated and bored and tried to commit suicides but he could not even get himself killed.

So does Phil ever get to go through this particular day? Can Phil make Rita fell for him? Can he keep his sanity? Find out by watching this film till the conclusion. I promise that it will be refreshing and fun watching it till the end.

I had a nice moment watching the movie as I get to see Bill Murray's performance. You can feel his excitement when he realized he could do anything that he want without bearing the consequence but you can also understand his frustration and later felt sorry & happy for him. 

This is a 1993 drama and comedy movie, but not the kind where you will laugh out loud. The time loop is not a mystery to be solved, but only serves as the background. It would also be fun trying to calculate how many days actually was repeated. Can you guess?
And finally, the film I think is supposed to make us think what we would or should do if we are able to go back to repeat 1 day in our lives.

Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Note:

Groundhog day is traditional holiday celebrated on the 2nd February where groundhog (some kind of marmot) is supposedly able to predict whether the winter is taking longer or the spring will arrive earlier by setting it free from its hole. The whole story of Groundhog Day is available in internet.

PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ZOMBIES - Zombies in 19th century England

Yes, you read the title right. There is the word "Zombies" behind "Pride and Prejudice". At first I thought that it is genuinely adapted from the novel "Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austin with zombies the additional item movie maker made up, but apparently it is adapted from a parody novel of the same name.

Anyway, let's just go through the story a bit.

The film starts with the visit of Colonel Darcy (played by Sam Riley) to the home of a family and see if the rumor is true about possible zombie (undead) infection. He has a specific method in finding out if there was a real zombie and as you can probably guessed it, there indeed was and he has to kill it.

After the opening credit scenes, the story goes to the Bennet family where they have 5 daughters who are not married yet and having the special abilities & capabilities of martial arts for zombie killing purpose learned from China.

The mother of Bennet family, wants her children to get married as soon as possible to avoid having their house & inheritance go to some other person/family. When she heard the wealthy Bingley family whose son is very handsome has moved to their neighborhood and having a dance (ball) , she immediately arrange for them to go. During this dance, Mr. Bingley (played by Douglas Booth) is attracted to Jane Bennet (1st daughter, played by Bella Heathcote). Meanwhile Darcy who came together with Mr Bingley is shown to be a very proud person and seem interested a bit with Lizzy Bennet (2nd daughter, played by Lily James). But she overheard Darcy spoke the other way around and she became upset and went out of the ball where the zombie from family in opening scene came back and shot by Darcy. We finally see the 5 daughters in action to fight the zombies.

When Jane was invited to go to Bingley family and had to fight zombie along the way, she caught flu due to the pouring rain and has to stay in Bingley house for a while where Lizzy accompanies her. During this stay, Lizzy seem to be growing even hate to Darcy. When the Bennet family came to visit, Lizzy immediately brings Jane along to go home.

In the 2nd ball that was held by Bingley family, Lizzy met with a soldier, Mr. Wickham (played by Jack Huston) who is quite charming and Darcy seem to detest but Lizzy seem to be interested. There were also some zombies killing action during this ball.

Jane's relationship with Mr. Bingley was halted abruptly with the moving of Bingley family from the neighborhood.

Meanwhile, Mr. Wickham also want to propose that zombies who are "civilized" as they do not eat human brains can live together with human, so the war between human and zombies can stop. This idea is brought upon Darcy's aunt Lady Catherine (played by Lena Headey - Game of Thrones, Terminator series) but was rejected by Lady Catherine and Darcy.

Ultimately, zombies growth is too fast and they start to attack London which is the safe haven under a very coordinated attack to occupy the rest of England. There seem to be no other way to save the humans from being harmed by undead, unless the only bridge that separates the land inhabited by undead and the humans are destroyed. But it became complicated when Lizzy is across the bridge fighting off the undead for a special mission.

Can the zombies be defeated? Can Lizzy be saved and returned before the bridge is destroyed? Can Jane and Mr. Bingley's relationship continue? Will Lizzy choose Darcy or Mr. Wickham? You can find out everything when you watch the whole movie.

In this movie, there are some other notable characters such as Mr. Collins (cousin of Bennet daughters who will own their estate once he is married to one of the daughter) and interested in Lizzy. Also the Bennet father who is witty and very loving to his daughters.

I had so-so movie moments watching this film. The zombie killing scenes are not spectacular for such genre. The relationship between Jane and Mr. bingley is sweet but not giving the "oooooooh" feeling. While Lizzy, Darcy and Mr. Wickham relationship is so-so. The only one particular scene that was quite memorable to me was when Darcy and Lizzy had a "fight" in Mr. Collins' house in the middle part of the movie. Other than that, it was just not memorable enough.

So if you are looking for zombie killing movies, it's better to watch "Shaun of the Dead", "Dawn of the Dead", or even watch "The Walking Dead" TV series.

If you are looking for romantic film, I think this one's not for you. 

Andddd, if you are looking for a good combination of this 2, I suggest you look elsewhere.

Mike's movie moments rating: 2 out of 5 stars