For Colored Girls

Just watched “For Colored Girls” last night. An adaption of Ntozake Shange’s play "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf." written in 70s. The film collected 20 poems, and how women dealing with love, abandonment, rape, abortion and more told by seven different women who are represent colors of the rainbow individually and come together and talk about their spirituality, violence, female sexuality, music and the discovery of one’s heritage. i.e. The lady in Red (Janet Jackson), a mega-rich fashion magazine editor who caught HIV from his homosexual husband; The lady in Brown (Kimberly Elise) who has an alcoholic veteran boyfriend beats on her and their two young children…

Because of the color, the cinematography, the drama and the feminist theology, this movie reminds me of Pedro Almodovar's films. I found they are very similar. Overalls, For Color Girls is a stunning hybrid of poetry, drama, and feminist theology. It is both tragic and sensuous, with the healing power of ritual. I will highly recommend you to watch this film if you are interested in African American literature or women’s studies.

Funny Face

Funny face is a musical romance comedy it's nice to set the part of the story in Paris. Thought this 1957 musical is a little odd, corny romance story with Audrey Hepburn and Kay Thompson's bizzarra dance but the smart fashion costumes and cinematography make this film a hot. Overalls, as long as you don't take the characters and the plots too seriously, it's still an enjoyable musical. Oh yeah, I have to mention Audrey Hepburn's costumes in this film are all by Givenchy and the way she carries herself in them is one of the assets about "Funny Face" ^u^

My Favorite Top 10 Movies

The fallow movies none of them are Hollywood movies. I mean I watch Hollywood movies, but I just think that it's time for people to be wise awake to enjoy the "Real Movie" instead of "the Hollywood spoon feeding".
 ..

1) In the mood for love
Who: Maggie Cheung, Tony Leung
When: 2000
Why: The winner of numerous awards including Best Actor at the 2000 Cannes film festival.

This is the most magnificent elegant forbidden love story set in 60s Hong Kong. But trust me about this! It's more than just Romance. Skillfully does the director bring us to state of breathless exception- Subtle but not boring. Spell bounding color and breathtaking movement make every scene's art directed to perfection. There's also an alternate ending that seems very plain, but at the same time very heartbreaking.

2) Lackawanna Blues
 
Who: Terrance Howard, S. Epatha Merkerson, Macy Gray
When: 2005
Why: Winner of 2 Emmy Awards including Best Actress.
 
This is a heat-warming elegant presentation of African-American life movie. It base on the true story of Ruben Santiago Jr. and his relationship with Nanny Crosby and how he grow up influenced by Blue music, take place in 1950s and 1960s Lackawanna, New York. I especially proud of the obvious care and attention to detail to produce a feel and look of another era in African-American culture.

3) Xiu Xiu

Who: Lu Lu, Lopsany
When: 1999
Why: Awards 12 wins and 7 nominations
 
This is a story of the abused and abuser of system in communist China. During that days, Idealists teenagers were sent down to the country side by Mao to learn how to appreciate peasants who neither need nor wanted them there. One of the teenagers Xiu Xiu realized that she¡¦s unlikely to over see her home again then her world becomes a horrifying cage where patrons help her escape in exchange for her sexual compromise them but end up with using her with empty promise. It¡¦s a movie encourages you to think and it will be good if you understand some of the tumult that was China after the culture revolution.

4) Cube
 
Who: Nicole de Boer, Nicky Guagagni, David Hewlett¡K
When: 1997
Why: 13wins and 6 nominations
 
It is one of the strangest movies ever. Watching this movie's absolutely like being in a trip, a trip you will never forget. It¡¦s about 6 of strangers wake up in a modernist nightmare cube without any idea how they got in there. It containing with thousands of rooms, all perfectly cuboids and full of booby traps. It will helps to watch it if you are into math or engineering.

5) Buffalo 66

Who: Vincent Gallo, Christina Ricci
When: 1998
Why: 4 wins and 9 nominations
 
A truly wonderful movie and strange one made for small amount money. Cinema graphical. This is the one and only love story that actually portrayed the true power and beauty of two people making an emotional connection. Like even just a seed of love can grow on the most infertile soil.

6) Jules and Jim

Who: Jeanna moreau, Oskar Werner
When: 1961
Directors: Francois Truffaut
 
One of the New Wave filmmaker Francois Truffaut's a very popular art house movie in the early 60s. It's about a girl selfishly enjoyed both men's love, but trusts me it's not just a tragedy romance. You will enjoy the flow of scenes, the gradual change in mood from youthful exuberance to subdued acceptance then the stark and tragic, yet inevitable. This movie definitely fascinating to watch even it's almost half a decade.

7) Amelie

Who: Audrey Tautou, Mathieu Kassouitz
When: 2000
Directors: Jean-Pierre Jeunet
 
It is a movie just makes you love life, and it does it in the simplest way. This movie can be told through the imaginative and captivating colors and impressions captured visually about an adorable girl- Amelie goes on a quest of sorts trying to heal the hearts of people around her, all the while living in a fantastical daydream. Along the way, she falls in love and struggles with how to reveal her feelings. The music, cinematography, story, everything just makes you love life and fall in love.

8) May
 
Who: Angela Bettis, Jeremy Sisto
When: 2001
Director: Lucky Mckee

As American horror movies become increasingly derivative and lame here's the one real surprise and set something is fresh and innovational. May is the movie affords the viewer a bizarre, yet sympathetic trip inside the life of a hopeless social handicapper. May also shows us how society is so transfixed on perfection that we lose sight of what makes everyone unique. May, the character, becomes so transfixed on this idea of perfection, that she goes insane in trying to replicate the perfect human. And it ends up the tragic and dark path down some of the worst of human.

9) Talk to her

Who: Javier Camara, Dario Grandinett
When: 2001
Director: Pedro Almodovar
 

It is a movie suitably reflects the dilemmas evoked in the film and the relationships of men with their women. Almodovar (the director) gives us the perfect ending to the tale, one not entirely unexpected, but perfect nonetheless, the movie also shows the human relationship and the twists and turns they go through along the road of life. It also changes your mind and knows for sure that not everything in any situation is simply black and white.

10) The very long engagement
 
 Who: Audrey Tautou, Gaspard Ulliel
When: 2003
Director: Jean-Pierre Jeunet
 

What can I say? This is a movie you will regret if you didn't watch it. A gorgeous, far-reaching movie is set in France near the end of WWI in the deadly trenches of the Somme, in the modest home of an indomitable provincial woman named Mathide separated from her lover by WWI refuses to believe he's been killed and launches an investigation into his fate. This movie is lush and beautiful with its fabulous color in the country scenes to it dramatic sephia effect during the war scenes. The music, cinematography, story, everything just makes you never could forget.