vishwas-verma

Amazon - This show is great, but why are showing censored version in India? What's the point of your platform if you are conforming to the same self censorship which usual TV shows impose on themselves? And to think of it, in addition to the nudity you are blurring the cigarettes too! I would still continue watching the show, because as I said it's great, but you have lost the respect!

In the last couple of decades Pixar has raised the bar so high for animated movies, that even if a perfectly fine animated movie comes along, we end up feeling underwhelmed by it. That's precisely the case with Hotel Transylvania.

Hotel Transylvania tells the story of modern day Dracula, voiced by Adam Sandler, who runs a hotel away from human world meant only for monsters. When the whole monster world – including all type of zombies, werewolfs, mummies, and Frankenstein, comes to his hotel to celebrate the birthday of Dracula's daughter's 118th birthday, a human boy discovers the hotel and falls in love with his daughter.

Though it was fun to watch the whole monster world assemble under one room, but soon the proceedings get reduced to silly jokes which would make only 12 year olds laugh. I kept thinking about The Cabin in the Woods throughout the movie, where all different kind of monsters are assembled and thought even if some part of that innovation was applied in this movie, this would have been eminently watchable.

The only person who could make some kind of an impact through his voice was Adam Sandler, who did a nice impersonation of Dracula's voice. But even that was unfunny after some time. But looking at his standards, I guess this was the best movie Adam Sandler would have done after Punch Drunk Love. Andy Samberg as Jonathan, the boy who discovers the hotel, is irritating, and Selena Gomez as Dracula's daughter is nothing to write about.

It's a shame to see that there is already a sequel planned for this lame movie. I just hope that the sequel goes the Madagascar way and not the Ice Age and Shrek way.

http://vishwas8317.blogspot.in/2012/12/hotel-transylvania-2012.html

Nominated for Palme d'Or at Cannes Film Festival in 2005, Hsiao-hsien Hou's Three Times is a moody exploration of love, freedom and youth. The movie unfolds in three separate stories which take place in three different time zones over a century in Taiwan, with the main roles in each story played by same two actors – Qi Shu and Chen Chang.

In the first story – A Time for Love – set in 1966, Chen meets May in a bar while playing pool. They stay in touch when he joins the army, but when he comes back May doesn't work in the same bar anymore. So he seeks her to different places. In the second – A Time for Freedom – set in 1911, Mr. Chang is frequent visitor to a brothel where he keeps interacting with a singer. When he frees one of the other girls by providing financial help, the singer asks if he would help her too. The last story – A Time for Youth – set in 2005, shows a relationship of girl with a photographer and a bisexual singer.

This is one movie where actually "nothing happens". There are long shots without any dialogue at all, camera just pondering on characters when they do trite stuff, where everything depends on whether you will get sucked into the day to day lives of these people. But even then when you find yourself hooked to the screen, and admire each shot for its perfection and at the same time you connect with the characters all of them being from radically different eras.

The music plays a huge part in the movie and sets the gloomy mood of the movie throughout – especially in the second and third stories. In fact, in the second story, there is no spoken dialogue at all. Though you can see people speaking, all you hear is a long musical piece in the background, and you get to see what is spoken written on the screen like in a silent movie. The first story is played on the background of two soulful songs – Smoke Gets in Your Eyes by The Platters and Rain and Tears by Aphrodite's Child. I became an instant fan of these two songs. I would love to go back to watch this movie again just to listen to these songs with great visuals and atmosphere of love and longing.

Qi Shu gives electrifying performances as May in the first story, the singer in the second, and as the girl torn between the loves of his boyfriend and a girl. Chen Chang is also brilliant – particularly in the first and last story. The best part of the movie is the direction, where Hou keeps you riveted for nearly two hours without much of any story. Overall, this is one of the best movies I have seen in recent which I would love to watch again and again.

http://vishwas8317.blogspot.in/2012/12/threetimes.html