Mou gaan dou

C and I were idly watching the Oscars last night. A short portion of them anyway. Things were going along quite well. An Inconvenient Truth won best documentary feature, which, while predictable, was still heartening. The Oscars were also announced as being "green", though just what this means isn't clear. Still, if Al Gore said it and it's about the environment, I'm guessing it's probably right.

And then the award for best adapted screen play was announced and the writer of The Departed's name was called.

All night an annoying voice had been voice overing inane details about winners and/or their films during the long walk from seat to podium.

This had bugged me right from the start, but when they also got their facts wrong I was inordinately annoyed.

Annoying voiceover: "The Departed is based on Infernal Affairs, a Japanese movie".

Me: "Can't any of you stupid people get this right!


This outburst might be contextualised somewhat by a similar incident at the Golden Globes the other week when [insert name of cookie cutter movie star here] was giving The Departed an award of some description and happily announced it was based on Internal Affairs.

Seriously, how hard can it be?

Just for the record:

Infernal Affairs or Mou gaan dou (which, I believe, translates to The Non-Stop Way) is a Chinese film, which, by the way, is rather brilliant. It was written by a couple of Chinese screen writers and is full of Chinese actors,

including the beautiful Tony Leung


and the smooth Andy Lau



(and a few Thai guys).

It's also set in Hong Kong and almost entirely in Cantonese (with a spattering of English and a few scenes in Thai).

Not sure where the Japanese comes in?

The Banquet

Last night, after a day of pure indulgence (I had a massage, drank a decaf latte, got my hair cut, went to the mall and bought shoes and a novel, and then went to the cinema - ah, what you can afford to do when your currency is strong in the country you are visiting...), I went to see The Banquet.

I must admit that one of the main reasons that I chose to see the movie is because it stars Zhang Ziyi and I like her; she is just so watchable. However, there was more to this movie than just a good actor.

Essentially it was a Chinese version of Hamlet - set in the 10th century and skewed somewhat so that a female instead of a man was the central character. Zhang Ziyi plays Little Wan who at the time of the film is the Empress. She had a love affair with the Crown Prince, Wu Luan, but his father chose to marry her and so she is now his step-mother. However, the Emperor is murdered by his brother, Li, who then usurps the thrown and so Wan marries him to protect herself and Prince Wu Luan. In a sense she plays the role of the Queen, Hamlet's mother, in the film. However, she is also Prince Wu Luan's (former) lover, and she is plotting to kill Emperor Li, so she is kind of Ophelia and Hamlet too.

I must say that Hamlet is much easier to relate to when there is a female lead, particularly one as compelling as Zhang Ziyi. The main weakness, in my opinion, is that because the Empress manages to embody the most interesting characteristics of the Queen, Hamlet and Ophelia, she leaves the real Hamlet and Ophelia (Prince Wu Luan and his betrothed, Qing Nu) without much character. To me, they were both fairly weak and ultimately boring characters who were really difficult to care about.

However, despite the weaknesses of these two characters, there is a real complexity to the script and the remaining characters. Empress Wan (Ziyi Zhang) is not wholly good or evil - she is ambitious, arrogant, strong, vulnerable, calculating, emotional and devoted all at once. To me that makes her more human than Ophelia and more sympathetic than Queen Gertrude. Emperor Li is also quite complex; being both the usurper who murdered his brother (and who is trying to murder his nephew) and a man who is utterly besotted with Wan - and thus clearly very vulnerable at the same time.

The Polonius character (Qing Nu's father, the Grand Marshall) is also interesting and, mercifully, nowhere near as annoying as Polonius. Rather than being utterly devoted to the Emperor, he has his own interests at heart - and, particularly, those of his children. And, finally, the Laertes character (Qing Nu's brother, the Marshall's son) manages to bring the same level of devotion to his sister, without the pathetic undertones that I always saw in Laertes. (There is no Horatio equivalent, underscoring the loneliness of all of the main characters).

Added to this complex script is stunning cinematography, spectacular martial arts (House of Hidden Daggers style), Kabuki-style dance, beautiful costumes, and a gorgeous sound track - so all up is was a pretty great film.

Fast Food Nation

I am really looking forward to seeing this film when it comes out. It is a fictional version of Erik Schlosser's brilliant book: Fast Food Nation.

If you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend it.

Walmart: the high cost of low price preview.