2009 - cinema in retrospect

top ten films of 2009 (part one)

yes, it's that time of the year when losers/geeks/fanboys all around the world take time out from waiting in line for avatar or downloading bootleg copies of sherlock holmes to write a top ten films of the year! so, without any further adieu ... let's count down (in no particular order) ben's top films from 2009!!!

1) UP

pixar delivered yet another amazing film with the tale of carl fredrickson and his little asian boy scout companion - russell! the only movie i have ever seen that was able to combine talking dogs with a miscarriage montage! had me crying within the first 10 minutes and pretty much every half hour after that!

incredible animation and a storyline that is tight as a tin drum made up not just a kids movie, instead, a beautiful nod to the ups and downs of life and the experiences we have and the people we become when life perhaps doesn't go the way we planned. there is seriously something for everyone in this film!!!

2) Let The Right One In

this swedish little vampire flick but twilight to shame! but hardly anyone saw it! from it's opening frame i could tell what i was about to watch would be something truly beautiful and haunting! oscar, a 7 yr old boy who is bullied at school meets eli - a new girl in town - who seems to display some strange characteristics! SHE'S A VAMPIRE!!!!

but this story deals with the two falling in love amongst a town terrorised by strange killings and demon cats! the score to this movie by Johan Söderqvist is so moving and sad it gives me chills everytime i listen to it! the two leads are also amazing and their talent is totally on display. i only hope that the american remake from the director of cloverfield turns out to be alright, or at least brings attention to one of the most original takes on the vampire genre in a very very long time!

3) Inglourious Basterds

oh what a movie!!! a 3 hour epic about a plot to kill hitler? yes please!!! quentin delivers his tribute to cinema with this fine film that is about as full of rich dialogue as bruce bogtrotters cake was filled with chocolate! i was not expecting this film to be mostly in subtitles and i was not expecting to see an incredible performance from Christoph Waltz ! the man was unstoppable!

this movie was so much fun and the attention to detail was phenomenal! i can admit the film was a little indulgent but who cares! the finale is soooooo much fun i remember cracking up in laughter when "the shit hits the fan" !!!

4) Avatar

not by any means a well scripted story, the first flaw about this film that some of the dialogue and scenarios are absolutely horrendous.. but i was able to look past this!!! this film is the very reason you go to the movies! what an experience! i haven't seen this film in IMAX 3D but i cannot wait! james cameron created cinema history with this film and i was so happy to sit there for 3 hours! it could've been 30 minutes longer and i wouldn't have cared one bit!!

the technology of this film was so breathtaking i seriously think my jaw was on the floor the whole time! arghhh i don't know how to keep raving about this film.... it truly is unbelievable!

5) The Wrestler

i nearly forgot this film was released in 2009 (jan 15th to be precise) !!! the first heart breaking film of 2009 and a magnificent start to the year! darren aronofsky brought out a truly incredible performance from mickey rourke and in true fashion- made an ultra violent yet very humane story about a wrestler trying to fit into his life and reconnect with his daughter!

a beautiful film with some great 80's rock!!!

hello blogger my old friend

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Recorded on iPhone and posted with VR+ Lite.
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WOW - literally!

i thought that my fits of hunger were bad... but this is nothing compared to the kid that got his world of warcraft subscripton cancelled!!

mmm but it's gotta be a joke right?

people power

talented mofo!

The Lego Ultimatum from Keshen on Vimeo.

mother at the movies

so mum, what movie did you see?

oh, the one with that kid with cancer cameron diaz

deal or no deal or how i learnt to stop worrying about the state of australian cinema and love the bomb

hello dearest readers, how are we all going? well, it seems apparent now that everyone has completely abandoned their blogs as there hasn't been much movement around these here parts for weeks now... or in some cases, months!

i thought maybe the fact that everyone moved further away would make us update the blogs more and keep everyone in touch with what we were all up to! but yeh, doesnt look like it.

well, a little less than 6 weeks until carol goes overseas to europe and already slightly maybe starting to panic. who's going to eat asian food with me in the city, and who am i going to go to the movies with like 3 times a week?

hmmm so much going on.. but yes, the title of this blog post is the what i am here to talk about and if you've been following me on facebook you've probably seen that i had another yes, another audition for australia's favourite game show with everyones favourite drunk host, andrew okeefe!

so attended the audition with a friend of mine, and filled out the usual questions about what you'd do with the money and blah blah and your biggest fears and shit like that! it was about an hour of my life i'll never get back, but fingers crossed that i'll get chosen and win some money. because if you've been having to listen to me complain about the fact that i lent a certain individual money and havent gotten anything back, you'll certainly agree that i need some extra dollars!

after the audition, carol and i headed to nova where we got caught in the freak freakin' rain storm that nearly carried me into the sewers with its severity. no good. anyways, we arrive to see "last ride" the new australian drama with hugo weaving. i had some free tickets and had to use them up, so we rushed into the cinema to discover it pretty much empty except for the cliche oldies and gays... there were a couple of asians in there that i wasnt expecting...

but, 2 hours later!! fuck's sake! yeh, sure it was well acted and semi-beautifully shot, but fucking hell. do we need another depressing aussie drama dealing with father son relations?

omg... i had to get onto my high horse! but seriously.. why cant we make a good romantic comedy or an action movie or a musical or anything else!!!

where are the days of priscilla?? fucking hell, there's an odd movie... a bunch of queers on a bus to central australia! and it was amazing! hmmm i was so enraged and out of my mind that i actually gave up my seat to a senior citizen!

something was definately wrong. anyways, that is all.

p.s - studio execs and producers please get some balls and take some risks!!!!

politics and censorship

it seems the powers that be are trying to bring the man down. and than man is me.

i head into work for what should be another day another dollar and the moment a step into the store i hear over the loud speaker.. "ben to the managers desk.." my immediate thought was.. ohhh maybe my mac has arrived.. and i was wrong! once again it seems my reviews for movies have gotten me into trouble!

horton hears a who

"this anti-abortion film has its message cleverly hidden beneath the brilliant animation and hilarious jokes about an elephant with a mission" 4 1/2 stars

now i thought this was a positive review, and with the trouble i got into last time about bad-mouthing two and a half men, surely this was a glowing review about a product i liked!

NOOOOO

shit no... this was SO unacceptable and totally inappropriate for work! seriously? have a fucking laugh.. i guess putting in the kids section was a bit risky, but i could've just moved it to the a-z wall where all the other dvds are!

then came my review for crash- the 2007 film that beat brokeback mountain and won the oscar.

"this oscar winner delivers drama in tonnes as its all star cast delivers some racially profiling cliches and great performances"

doubt

"any actors wet dream, doubt stars meryl and phillip seymour hoffman as they go head to head in the catholic church. great performances and an ending that will leave you floored"

anyways... basically i had to go around the store and pick up any other reviews that might be considered "risky" or whatever! so, i took a quick trip around the store and took down any reviews that some loser might take offense to. it turns out that there were quite a few, maybe 20 or so that were deemed NSFW.

cut to:

2 months later?

i'm on the floor putting out stock and my software manager approaches me and asks to talk. oh, here we go.. he pulls out a review; twilight

"any young girl or gay guys fantasy, twilight might not have the best story but it does have a hot leading man that will have you glued to your seats." 3 1/2 stars

fucking hell! i cant write anything... i'm being censored at work and it's fucking pathetic.

and what shits me the most is that i was warned that next time it would be a written warning and there are people at work who do shit all and treat other staff members like shit and just fly under the fucking radar!

where is the justice? so apparently i cannot have any sexual references or jokes or anything remotely funny in these reviews! grrr it gets me so angry that in this day and age, and in a store like blah blah hi-fi i am being refused my right to express my opinions and thoughts?

the funny this is, that when i was taking some of my reviews down, a customer actually asked me why i was doing it. i told her why and she expressed her views on how pathetic and sad it was that i had to remove my reviews.

what a world we live in!

posters

touch okay?

this priceless video was on one of my film websites. she is the winner of a competition to meet the harry potter cast. out of 10,000 people who entered, she was chosen because she was the craziest and nuttiest person. and you can see why below!

dinner

meeting carol after work we decided to get some dinner in the city that was NOT asian... yes, it was a difficult mission and we gave up after about 2 minutes of trying!

we ended up at a new asian restaurant that was on la trobe st, above the hobby shop. we walked up the stairs to reveal a massive maroon room packed with asians of all levels of coolness. and carol was the one of 2 white people inside...

anyways the waitress hands us the menus and it wasnt soon after that we learnt that all the pictures on the front door that lured us in were nowhere to be seen!

so we quickly chose something off the menu to keep our stomachs at peace!

we ordered chicken and peanut with some black sauce and a cold dish of garlic cucumbers!

what a mistake! mmm it was very average, i mean, im sure it was good food but we weren't feeling it! in the words of larry david...

waaaaay too saucy! so we quickly finished our waters and beers which were the only thing worthy of completing and got outta there... not before paying a crazy price tag and digging into our bags and pockets to only just cover the cost of the meal...

cut to: hungry jacks to get a whopper meal to make us feel better! fatty fat fat!

what i will say is that i should've known better than to get the m&m storm! it was a horrible evening that not even hungry jacks could fix up! 2 and a half stars!

they're back!

you might remember a little while back steve per chance posted a clip to the prison inmates doing a mass choreography to michael jackson's thriller?

well... they are at it again and this time in a 10 minute tribute to the king of pop.

with only 10 hrs of rehearsal time, 1500 inmates got together and managed to create this amazing video..

how fucking amazing is this? anyways, i looked into things a little further and it turns out that there are heaps of these little performances that would make kim-jong jealous as all hell!

i've posted some links for some of my faves below! i hope you enjoy them... words cannot express how much i LOVE mass choreography!

JAI HO

I NEED A HERO

learning the hardest way

i came across this video for the new presets song "if i know you" and felt strangely emotional during it... not sure why..

i really love the simplicity of it and the way it, mmm, kinda represents this small group of kids in the massive city of L.A dancing and being creative.. loves to get me!

anyways, i'd like to know what you think of this clip and i'll speak to you soon

death and misery and a plasma and my mother and pussycat dolls etc etc

meh, you know it's a shit world when the death of a fucking POP god is the thing that inspires you to wrote on your blog for when it's been so fucking long since you've done a post.

i dont even know where to begin or what to say, because, i have tried writing this post so many times before but have found it really hard to start or find interesting things to talk about. so much has happened... and then again, so much isn't worth talking about.

anyways, today i got the sms from li-kim (who always seems to be the first person to find out) and quickly turned on the tv... i yelled over to mum (who is currently in melbourne- more on that later) and said MICHAEL JACKSON IS DEAD... maybe! she lept out of her semi state of sleep and we watched the tv... it was so weird and strange... and i dunno, it's not that important or interesting hearing me talking about it but i have to say something i guess to someone who was such a MASSIVE part of everyone's lives!

despite his personal life and all that crazy shit we read, there is no denying he was a true musical legend... and although i dont really believe in god, he was basically a musical god... and inspired and gave so much to people...

so i arrived to work today at about 1pm, and i thought maybe we'd be playing some of his albums and stuff, but i didnt expect the amount of people asking for his stuff to be soooo HUGE! we had 1 woman bursting into tears and another guy saying how he was glad he was dead and that he'll rot in hell etc... and within a couple of hours we'd sold out of EVERYTHING! and i think it was the same with most JB stores as well... it was full the fuck on. but, what a strange emotional thing to get over, the last great muscial icon!

and farah fucking fawcett... fucks sake. her battle with cancer was so fucking public and out there... that got me a little too... so much going on.

but looking back at the past month or whatever long it's been... i'm trying to think of all the stuff that's happened.

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maybe i'll start with whats going on at the moment... mother hubbard has decided on her 58th birthday, she'd come down to melbourne and spend some time with her 3 children... (sarah chu had also booked to come down) so last night after work, i managed to get into the city and check out where mum was staying...

now, on my way there i google map the place to find out where it is and i come across some reviews for it... basically people rating it 1 star and saying it was a horrible experience and blah blah how they didnt get their deposit money back.. whatever, i wasnt suprised that the woman that gave birth to me had decided to stay in a cheapy hotel... but, when i arrived i was actually suprised that the place wasnt a total dump, and for the price that she was paying, it was pretty alright... free hot breakfast in the morning was the most promising aspect in my opinion.

that night at work i saw some friends of amber button (a girl from work, who's real name is not actually button, it's because she calls me benjamin button so i call her it back) anyways, these young punks come and say hello and mention that they might be going out in the city... and since i was in the city i thought i might see where they were or what they were doing...

cut to: your old pal hobbling up the streets (due to extreme over exercise due to my new diet-more on that later) to the club... now, i had heard of billboard, but never been.. and probably because it seems that when you go there, you are meant to be underage or just turned 18! no-one told me this!!! so i enter the club and see all the hotties and P.O.W's in the joint and for some strange reason i just started to smile!

it had been so long since i'd been to a club, and despite all the gross yucky hetro's inside, the music was so loud and full on that i couldnt not enjoy myself. so, i spent the next few hours dancing my little legs off to music that i had never heard before and that was so loud i had to text msg any conversation i wanted to have... so, it hit about 2.30-ish AM and i thought i was probably time to call it a night.

walked katie to hungry jacks and she got some chips... (and i showed my AMAZING will power and got nothing) then she got in a taxi and i just walked 10 mins to my hotel room! omg... living in the city has never been more appealing... although... "inner city pressure" did keep coming into mind!

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in other news the plasma finally arrived! it probably has been in the house for about a month! and it's amazing! although, and this is a BIG BIG set back... the dvd player/blu ray recorder doesnt play DIVX!!!! and the tv doesnt have a USB input! anyways, here i am bitching and complaining... but yeh, because they took so long to actually deliver the TV, they had no choice but to upgrade me to the next model up because the other one had actually run out of stock!

so it was the day of stocktake at work, the 1 day where i couldnt take it off because my jerk of a manager would be all GRR GRR and make me cry ... (more on that probably never, although he didnt make me cry... more i cried while talking to him) and yeh, lucky gen was here and also jesse who offered to come over before he went to university.

the weekend before, phoebe, carl (phoebe's BF), gen and i all went to IKEA in search of swedish meatballs and some dvd shelves for the 15 plus boxes i had piled up in our temporary lounge room. to cut a long trip short, i picked up 2 dvd shelves, ran into my sister in the food court where i busted her getting lunch and found a slightly "damaged" entertainment unit that someone had returned.. the beauty of that was that it had already been assembled and it was about $80 cheaper than the brand new one! soooo grateful to all the kids and their cars for managing to get that back home! pretty much set that up straight away and within days we were watching everything on amazing plasma goodness!

i've also become pretty addicted to amazon.co.uk as i've discovered that australia and europe are the same region or zone for blu ray movies. sometimes it works out being cheaper online than buying them at work with my discount! who would've thought! so, i've already done some double dipping, but im very very keen not keep it up! as amazing as blu ray is, unless it's something incredible that i must have, im not going to! but, the collection is slowly buidling up, hopefully for anyone that cares or is interested, i might put some pictures up!

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continuing on my "chu-luck" (as carol calls it, because apparently all the chuahs have good luck, this is proven by li-kim winning a phone a week via the age newspaper) i entered a competition on my mobile to win tickets to a concert at rod laver arena. now, the woman rings up and says i have scored a double pass to the presets! and i was like, AWESOME... i was already thinking of all the fabulous and amazing people that were going.. until i told bessie and she informed me that they were not playing at rod laver and definately not playing on the 26th! fuck! i immediately thought what if i misheard and i had won tickets to the priests! the muscial trio of catholic tenors not the 2 hot cool gay guys with electro funk!

so the day comes, and i collect my tickets from the post office... i open the parcel and ta daaah!

PUSSYCAT DOLLS WITH LADY GAGA!

omg, it just got better... or worse.. depending who you ask... but it went from like, a gay rating of like 17 to like 88.32930230278!!!

incredible... fast forward to the concert, carol and i are sitting amongst the strangest collection of people... it was pretty amazing.. we had some really good seats and jesse let me borrow his camera which had an incredible zoom so it felt like we were really close! and this girl behind us was such a fan of both the gags and the dolls, she was screaming every word of every song... and when they went off the stage, she'd bust out with something random like...

"I FUCKING LOVE YOU GAGA! YOU'RE A MOTHER FUCKER... FUUUUCK.. OMG!!!"

priceless... needless to say i got a shitload of photos and about 5 minutes into lady gaga i had already filled the 4GB memory card with video of the concert.. i cant be bothered putting up photos from the event, but i will at some stage when i get my new computer and this old hunk'o'chunk doesnt crash every second. the mere fact that i've managed to write a post this long is truly a miracle!

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you might have heard that apple has launched their new macbook range and guess which nerd/apple obsessive has finally bitten the bullet and ordered one??? MEEE! i'm so excited to get one, and join the club of fellow mac users, i know every time i see likim and sarah, part of me is a little excited to see sarah's mac. but, yeh, jesse and i went into work and got the old 20 months interest free and presto. i'm approved for more money than i can poke an iPod at. also picked up final cut HD express so now i really have no fucking excuse for not being able to be creative!

i kinda got the mac also to keep me occupied for when carol goes on her own little euro-trip in september... so fingers crossed it shall fill the void of human love and companionship she provides!

which leads me to my segue...

carol has moved out of 4 henry st, which concludes that chapter of our lives! it's pretty cool that we all lived there at some stage and had some great memories and not so great memories... $100 a week for a room the size of my new backyard and city views? brilliant.. but, meh... the place is falling apart and is surely very slowly sinking into the ground thanks to next doors renovations... (YES, THEY ARE STILL GOING)

li-kim is also in the process of moving out too... man i'm going to miss the local bakery, fish'n'chips shop, fruit shop, top shop, the bottom shop... the chicken shop... kensington pizza... but certainly not the smelly pub! omg that place is shiiiiit!



hmmmm it's getting kinda late now, i might give it a rest... hopefully this is enough of an update to keep you all happy... and hopefully it wont be too long between posts in the future..

love and peace and be safe and dont fall off any cliffs (ie jeff goldblum rumour!)