Over

Over the times I write here, I consider this as some sort of personal archive, to keep track of what movies I've seen, or what books I've read or what music I think it's worth mentioning. But... I lost the interest, like everything else I do. There will be no more.


However, if you are a keen music listener and read Chinese, head over to my friends' new website Deep One Perfect Morning, to get your latest music news feed and other stuffs.

Goodbye.

My Wandering Days Are Over

Over.

To Rome With Love

Director/Writer: Woody Allen
Stars: Woody Allen, Penélope Cruz, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Page and Jesse Eisenberg
Year: 2012
IMDb

My Rating: 4/10

This is my own theory: I personally believe Woody Allen secretly made a contract with EU, to produce films based on popular cities in Europe to promote tourism. Due to his obligation, he has to make these films, good or bad. However, these films need to have public appeal, so there you have all the stars, in Barcelona, Paris, and Rome. Woody Allen himself doesn't really give a shit about his films. It's just for a laugh. Mr. Allen said so himself " I’ve never been satisfied or even pleased with a film that I’ve done." That's why he keeps on doing it...

In fact, I was in Rome few days ago. I know almost all those places in the film. There's comfort in knowing those places, but it doesn't necessarily make me like the film better. If there's another European city series... I am not going to see it.

Soundtracks for my journey

This is a perfect album for my trip around southern Europe... summer sun everyday, but still feel quite melancholy because holidays don't last forever. I really love Yo La Tengo's music... gentle voices from Ira and Georgia can really calm my soul.

Europe by Allo Darlin' is the album of the year for me. Not because it's the best album, but it's an album I'll always remember the great time I had in Europe in 2012. Though no doubt the memories will fade someday, but...I'm alive, and I'm living. Life is about living, not traveling, you know.

一個人閒晃在大街上，聽這張EP真的心情會變好。我覺得這張的歌超級陽光，夏日豔陽下，戴著耳機，拎著啤酒，到處亂晃，這世界還有甚麼比讓自己開心更重要的事？

里斯本第一日

飛機穿越雲層，緩慢的降落，轉個彎，長長的一整片沙灘從我地下飛過。在機上俯瞰里斯本，已經令我不由得驚嘆她的美麗（坐飛機時聽得正好是 The Walkmen 上一張專輯 - 里斯本）。因為，習慣旅行不做功課，寫下來的地址在地圖上卻找不到。叫了計程車，司機繞路帶我逛了市區一圈，原來我上計程車的地方離旅社不到三分鐘的走路的路程，司機卻開了快十分鐘。不過我並不抱怨，里斯本城市就像迷宮一樣，高高低低，拐拐彎彎，你根本不知道下一個路口轉彎會遇見甚麼。雖然，我另外一個旅遊習慣是迷失在陌生的城市中，不看地圖，沒有目標，到處亂走。但這次，我有葡萄牙詩人佩索亞所撰寫的里斯本旅遊指南（可免費下載）。跟著他寫的順序，跟著地標一個一個地走，同時還有他還詳細地介紹了每個地標的歷史和背景，第一天完成了四頁，整本有四十頁。亂晃到了一家出版社的書店，買了兩本他寫的詩集（英文和葡萄牙文同步）。走在里斯本，到處都有佩索亞的蹤影。想想，會想要來里斯本的遊客其實不算多（比起哥本哈根和阿姆斯特丹，我實在很不喜歡遊客爆滿的地方），會因為佩索亞來的更少，但我喜歡這感覺，像是一個少人知道的祕密基地。而我在里斯本正執行著一個秘密任務，一個有詳細指示但沒有明確目標的任務。不，我的目標是跟著我的導遊認真當一個遊客。夜深了，是該出去遊蕩了。

Moonrise Kingdom

Director: Wes Anderson
Writers: Wes Anderson, Roman Coppola
Stars: Jared Gilman, Kara Hayward, Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Bill Murray, Tilda Swinton, Jason Schwartzman, Frances McDormand, and Harvey Keitel
Music: Alexandre Desplat
Year: 2012
IMDB

My Rating: 8/10

Lovely. Few reasons: 1) awesome cast; 2) a sweet love story of between two 12-year-old quirky kids; 3) wes-anderson-style humor; 4) beautifully shot and edited. Wes Anderson is actually getting better and better. Go see it.

推手

導演／編劇：李安
主演：郎雄，王萊，王伯昭
年份：1991 (Taiwan)
IMDB

評分：7/10

李安首部執導的電影，挺不錯。我很能理解這文化上的差異，所以我覺得這事應該不會發生在我的身上。如果真的發生了，我會先拋棄的絕對是中華傳承千年的家庭傳統。時代已經不一樣了，我們或許很快的適應了新的社會模式，謀生方式，這也代表家庭的概念也要改變。但，我們卻還是被這 "孝" 字給纏住。

Solaris

Director: Andrei Tarkovsky,
Writers: Stanislaw Lem (novel)
Stars: Natalya Bondarchuk, Donatas Banionis and Jüri Järvet
Year: 1972 (Soviet Union)
IMDB

My Rating: 11/10

I mean seriously... this is one of the highest cinematic achievement. Definitely much better than any other sci-fi films I've ever seen. Odyssey 2000? Not even close. What makes human human? What makes human inhuman? What makes inhuman human? The thing about Tarkovsky film is that he doesn't just show you a film, he tries to tell the stories of/for all mankind. Perhaps not all mankind (obviously not everyone likes or gets his films), but man of his kind.

Midnight Jazz

Hello, sons and daughters, heroes and villains. Today is a good day, I've decided to share some music with you. Strictly, jazz music. I want to share it because, they have been good to me, and I want to be good to you too. But, you don't like jazz? Oh, it's okay, you don't have to listen to it, or you can give it a try and you might surprise yourself that you actually like it. As far as the selection goes, it's pretty mild and melancholy, just like whiskey on rocks. That's why I call it midnight jazz. Here, drink it.

The Last Days of Disco

Director/Writer: Whit Stillman
Stars: Chloë Sevigny, Kate Beckinsale and Chris Eigeman
Year: 1998
IMDB

My Rating: 7/10

I love disco.

Barcelona

Director/Writer: Whit Stillman
Stars: Taylor Nichols, Chris Eigeman and Tushka Bergen
Year: 1994
IMDB

My Rating: 7/10

I really enjoy Whit Stillman's trilogy, and the way he approaches film-making. I think he really knows how to make intellectual and entertaining movies. I love how his characters talk and behave. There's something fascinating about modern aristocrats, because frankly there's no such things anymore. I mean there are, people who dress to kill, have money readily to spare on whatever things he/she fancy, talk intellectually interesting stuff, are my ideas of modern aristocrats. It is a way to live, vanity to keep sanity. Oh, I see I mention nothing about the movie...

Man always dies before he is fully born

The estranged man on the other hand tries to solve the issue another way, namely by conforming to his surroundings. He only feels secure and safe if he resembles his fellow man as much as possible. His highest purpose is to achieve approval of others, and his greatest fear is having to live without it. Being different, or belonging to a minority, is a danger that threatens his feeling of security. The consequence is a search for limitless conformism. The feeling of guilt with regard to sin that controlled people's lives some generations back, has now been replaced by a feeling of discomfort and insecurity with respect to being different.

(Erich Fromm)

Zabriskie Point

Director/Writer: Michelangelo Antonioni
Stars: Mark Frechette, Daria Halprin and Paul Fix
Music: Pink Flyod and Jerry Garcia
Year: 1970
IMDB

My Rating: 8/10

A movie about dreamers. I love how Antonioni uses the stark desert landscape, looks incredibly beautiful. Also, the explosions look wonderfully poetic. I would suggest that by blowing up luxury condo and material goods is a way of saying "fuck you" to the right, to the power, to the capitalism. One of Antonioni's most accessible movies, in my opinion. Oh, did I mention the music? killer soundtrack!

McCabe & Mrs. Miller

Director: Robert Altman
Writers: Edmund Naughton (novel), Robert Altman, and Brian McKay(screenplay)
Stars: Warren Beatty, Julie Christie and Rene Auberjonois
Music: Leonard Cohen
Year: 1971
IMDB

My Rating: 7/10

Robert Altman's take on the wild west. Refreshing. Western is not really my type of genre, but this is a good one. Beautiful, great music, Julie Christie.

The Fire Within

Director: Louis Malle
Writer: Pierre Drieu La Rochelle (novel)
Stars: Maurice Ronet, Léna Skerla, Jeanne Moreau and Yvonne Clech
Music: Erik Satie 
Year: 1963 (France)
IMDB

My Rating: 9.5/10

Based on the same novel as Oslo, August 31, I prefer this version. The impossibility to touch, to love, to understand the very life I'm living in. Suicide is not an option for me, but I understand his agony and devastation very well. We're all struggling to get through life, aren't we?

The Story of Jazz

I'm seriously into Jazz now... and this documentary is a good start point. While being a rock and roll fan for some time, now I understand why Jazz will always be an important inspiration. Good jazz is about good musicianship. A good jazz musician is often a real artist, who has proficiency/creativity with their instruments and ability to compose rhythm and harmony that conveys a certain feeling or emotion, whether it's for dancing (swing), or late night drinking (mellow jazz) or tripping (free jazz). The story of Jazz itself is quite amazing. Within its golden era, between 1920s to 1950s, it has evolved itself so much, and produced so many good artists and good music. Whereas rock and roll... it's much too complicated to compare. Well, there's no need to compare anyway, good music is good music.

Great Jones Street

I was reading William S. Burroughs before I got my hands on this book. The book by Burroughs was called Exterminator! For the most parts, I did enjoy his wild imaginations. As I read on, the lack of links between stories lost my interests in finishing the book. So there I was, walking aimlessly into a bookstore in Helsinki, and found this book. The back cover mentioned something about "fame, rock star, withdraw, privacy"...

At reading the first few chapters, I knew I'd love this book... as it begins with a rock star growing tired of fame and fortune, and decided to leave the band in the middle of busy touring. Somehow after the rock star began his retreat, DeLillo got Burroughrized, wild imaginations flying everywhere, weird conversations sprouting out of nowhere... it seems as everyone is on drugs, probably DeLillo himself as well. However, I did manage to finish the book. Yes, it's kind of like parody, to music industry, to our obsessions with drugs and fame, to all the noise everyone is making (and complaining) around us. Though it's written in 1973, it couldn't be any more accurate to describe our society today... particularly here, in the cybersphere.

I Trawl The Megahertz

My favourite audiobook. I think everyone should listen to this incredible 20-mins track with hauntingly beautiful music and poetic words. It's like a lullaby, a dream, a movie script, a transitional conscious state between reality and fiction that exists only in the soundscape of "I Trawl The Megahertz".

'Your daddy loves you,' I said
'Your daddy loves you very much,
He doesn't want to live with us anymore.'
I am telling myself the story of my life

Lord you gave me nothing, then you took it all away


Repeat after me: happiness is only a habit
I'm listening to the face in the mirror
but I don't think I believe what she's telling me

And these are the footsteps you follow
The tracks of impossible love

They may help us make sense of who we are and where we came from
And, as a compassionate side effect
Teach us that nothing is ever lost

The Sacrifice (Offret)

Director/Writer: Andrei Tarkovsky
Stars: Erland Josephson, Susan Fleetwood and Allan Edwall
Cinematography: Sven Nykvist
Year: 1986 (Sweden)
IMDB

My Rating: 10/10

Like always, Andrei Tarkovsky's final film leaves me speechless... Erland Josephson, who passed away earlier this year, will always be remembered for his terrific performance in this one, as well as in other films by Ingmar Bergman.

Amores Perros

Director: Alejandro González Iñárritu
Writer: Guillermo Arriaga
Stars: Emilio Echevarría, Gael García Bernal and Goya Toledo
Year: 2000 (Mexico)
IMDB

My Rating: 8/10

Love's a bitch. Indeed. Unrequited love... especially.