Pathology

This is a freaking scary thriller! I'm still shivering with goosebumps after watching it.

Starring the cute Milo Ventimiglia as Dr Ted Grey, he is a top student, graduating from Harvard Medical School. He joins the most prestigious Pathology in the nation and meets Dr Jake Gallo.

Dr Grey is very brilliant and analytic, as such the elite group of interns in this programme takes an instant dislike for him. However spotting his talent, Dr Gallo invited Dr Grey to their little elite game.

The question Dr Gallo poses is, "If you can kill anyone, who would you kill?". Their little game of fun and thrill soon turns dark and spirals out of control. Turning against each other, who is really the brightest of them all? Who can solve the mystery of death when you know that no body is safe anymore.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 fairy clouds. Not a typical movie I would like to watch. But it is still fascinating. If an option, I prefer CSI over pathology for a simple reason - less dark and less gruesome. Then again how can I resist the charm of Milo. What a piece of ass!

Gia

Gia, or more correctly Gia Marie Carangi, is a young girl from Philadelphia who was talent spotted by a photographer at a tender age of 17. The HBO movie is about her life as a supermodel.

Gia moved from Phili to New York and was signed up by a powerful model agent Wilhelmina Cooper. From a unknown little girl, Gia was thrown into the spotlight to become a supermodel. In fact, she set the standard of the highly profile life of a supermodel.

Life is not a bed of roses for the glamorous one. Her loneliness and constant fear of being abandoned by her loved ones caused to her to heave into the arms of drugs, which eventually led to her downfall. She passed away with AIDS at a young age of 26.

The movie is very well-scripted, tantalising, erotic as well as emotional. You go through the motions of Gia's high and low of her career as a model as she parlays the moment. Angelina Jolie who played Gia has done a darn good job. She has the wild side as well as the feminine side of Gia. The only disappointment I have will be that Angelina look a little too old for the role of a teenager and at the same time, she doesn't have the innocent charm of a young girl which Gia possessed.

Rating: 4 out of 5 fairy clouds. This 1998 HBO movie is still its punch. A pretty decent girl's movie as they will sympathise and empathise with Gia while the guys will probably enjoy the tantalising erotic seduction of Gia.

Charlie Wilson's War

The Charlie Wilson's War, a cunning and yet down right to earth movie of a Texas Congressman in this fight towards the end of the Cold War between Afghanistan and the Soviet Union in the late 70s to 80s.

Allied with the sixth wealthiest woman in Texas, a friend and also romantic partner, Mrs Joanne Herring, Charlie finds himself in the heart of a new covert operation in ending the war between Afghanistan and Soviet Union. From a simple US$5million project, the operation becomes appropriated to US$1billion. He is very lucky to find capable team with the help of Gust Arvakotos who has been fighting the Russians.

His effort is most definitely commendable. Only in the presence of the suffering and seeing with their own eyes will people come to realise the real danger and harm of a war. I salute these people for the effort they have made. As disappointed as Charlie has been portrayed in the movie, I personally share the sentiment that the next generation is most particularly vulnerable and should be given the right education and attitude.

And most importantly, war is not the ultimate solution. Destroying homes, killing innocent people should never be the way to promote a cause. Let's all make love, not war people. Spare the young from further agony and fear of uncertainty. Let them lead a meaningful and peaceful lives.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 fairy clouds. This is an excellent and brilliant movie. Good depth and humour while man-handling the serious issue of war.

Accuracy of Death

The movie is a lovely story of a grim reaper who appears 7 days before the person is to die. He will observe and decide of the appropriate judgement and manner of death. The movie is a great match to my home-made salsa dip and coke with real lemon!

Our good looking Archangel of Death, Azrael is gently introduced into the movie with the death of a 10 year old little girl. To Chiba, death is nothing special, beautiful or spectacular. It is just the way the universe works and functions like the earth's rotation around the sun. In another word, mechanical. The only thing he enjoys most is music.

His next assignment is to a young girl, Fujiki. An ordinary and meek girl who feels that everyone she ever cares about will always depart from her life, from her parents, to her foster parents and lovers. She thinks about death in ending her senseless and pointless existence. Chiba feels she has yet to live her purpose and gave her a chance to find the new purpose in her life.

Next he is tasked to judge a mafia and a young boy whom is desperately trying to protect the mafia from seeking his own death. Oh Takashi look so damn cute here. Ahem! Follow by the next assignment to a grandmother living in beautiful hut near the coast. This granny is one interesting character as she saw through Chiba's real identity as a reaper and requested for him to help her fulfil her last wishes before dying without regrets.

What is amazing and lovely about this movie is that Chiba has probably gone through a decade without understanding the real meaning of life and death, till he meets with granny who helps him realise the beauty. Granny is also none other than Fujiki and the young man is her son. With Chiba finally sees the magic of universe, he also sees the clear blue sunny sky for the first time in his existence. This scene is such a simple and yet power analogy.

Rating: 4 out of 5 fairy clouds. It is a well-done and scripted movie, quite worth my tortilla chips!

Closer

I decided to catch up on my 'to-watch' list of out-dated movies before the list becomes longer. This evening I chose Closer. It is an amazing movie which you love to hate. It fully explores the selfish nature of human emotions of love and lust. When is the moment that you know you must say no to temptation or should you follow your heart before you regret walking away from someone who might possibly be the love of your life?

When Dan meets Alice, it is love at first sight. He is an obituary writer while she is a cute young American girl who has came to London to escape from a bad relationship. A year later, Dan meets Anna, a beautiful American photographer, whom he lusts after. Anna is separated from her husband then, and she doesn't want to get involved with Dan who is in a relationship with Alice.

Later, Dan meets Larry on an online sex chat. He pretends to be Anna, has a steamy conversation with Larry and continues to play a practical joke on him by asking Larry to meet him at the Aquarium. Incidentally the real Anna happened to be there. Anna and Larry hit it off really well. Dan has accidentally played the role of cupid in matchmaking Anna and Larry.

While Dan and Anna leads separate lives, each of them continues to see someone else they fancy. Yet their lives cross and feelings grow deeper. One year later, Dan decides to come clean with Alice with regards to his feelings towards Anna. At the same time, Anna is being grilled by her current husband Larry when she reveals of her relationship with Dan. It isn't a happy ending for all four of them. They are all entangled up in a messy pot of emotions filled up with love, hatred, desire, lust, forgiveness, deception, etc. At the end of the day, they are all cowards of love. Neither has the courage to face love and grab happiness by the neck.

What the four individuals have gone through is such a common everyday event in our lives. We have seen friends, family and even ourselves in similar or exact situations of being messed up when a third party enters into the sacred space between two persons who are supposedly in love with each other and have implicitly and mutually agreed to be exclusive to each other.

Commitment is so rare these days, and this is exactly what the film speaks of. No one understands what love is anymore, yet we all know exactly how the pain feels like. Isn't it interesting to understand how well we remember painful memory?

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 fairy clouds.

The Perfect Storm

The storm is coming and it is coming on strong. This is the story of The Perfect Storm. The movie is based on a true story of what happened in 1991 to a group of Gloucester fishermen.

The fishermen went out for a final fishing trip before the end of the season. Led by Captain Skipper, who seemed to be caught in a streak of bad luck. He and his crew were desperate to get a good harvest.

Lady luck wasn't really smiling at them till they got to the Flemish Cap. They started to get a lot of catch. Sadly ill fate had befallen on them. The ice maker broke down, they had no other choice but to head home instead of wasting their catch. As they headed home, they were caught between to two strong brewing storms which became a hurricane. The boat capsized and along with her, she took all the men.

The movie is rather well filmed with great special effects. You can't help but find yourself grabbing the edge of the seat as the movie rightly timed the treacherous encounters with giant waves! It is amazing and scary at the same time. Deep inside your heart, you wish the fishermen will ride through this storm safely while bearing your teeth as they surfed through the waves in the horrendous storm.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 fairy clouds. A movie worth watching.

Bad Habits

Bad Habits or Malos Hábitos is a movie on faith and love. The story revolves around four related people.

Matilde has strong faith in god and she prays to him for help as a young child. Upon graduation, she gives up her doctor career to pursue her religious goal. In cleansing herself through starvation, she hopes to save lives of people around her. This is a pretty tough challenge when the true demon is inside each of us.

Her uncle Gastavo experiences a different form of life challenge. He is disgusted by his wife wafer-thin physic and seeks solace with a voluptuous student in college. They indulge in wanton behaviour through sex and food. Gastavo's wife, Elena is a stylist but anorexic woman. Her obsession with being thin is displaced upon her daughter, Linda. The chubby young girl has been put on several diet plans, acupuncture and the extreme option of stomach stapling!

Taking delight in the cruelty of real world, it is easy to understand what the film is trying to say. The sad reality is no one truly knows when one has gone too far or done too much damage. How many people can turn back in the nick of time to give life another chance of what it is meant to be? The twisted tales of people's obsession in Bad Habits will make you ponder over what is truly important in your life. So learn to love yourself before it is too late.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 fairy clouds.