Black Swan

Directed by Darren Aronofsky, starring Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis and Vincent Cassel.

The inner yearning to excel in one's own craft feeds so deeply that it hurts right down to the core of the heart and soul of an artist. The burning desire to BE the part fuels her to do whatever it takes to achieve such high quality of performance and showmanship. Such intensely psychological reflection of her and her split personality buries dark revelations of hopes, disappointments, expectations and commitments and reveals the best and worst of a human being. Is she being wrong for searching for perfection in her craft and attainment to be the impeccable White Swan, Princess Odette? Or is she being right for dwelling deeper and deeper into the dark soul of her evil character, Odille, Black Swan and eventually brings the show to the ultimate pinnacle of success? Fashionably stylised, brutally real yet intimately voyeuristic, we fall hard and fast into the magnetic and poignant life of a ballad dancer. flawlessly played by the talented Oscar winner actor, Natalie Portman. I love her in most of the roles she played, from the overly adult kid role in THE PROFESSIONAL, to an intensely free-spirited-lover in CLOSER. She exudes such grace and emotions that not many female lead is capable of, at her age. I can't help but feel helpless for Nina, we rejoice with her for getting the lead role in Swan Lake, yet my heart aches to see her fall more and more into the abyss of her own created illusion of perfection. Such powerful performance that the film left me speechless and breathless at the same time. The only time I felt such great suffocation, pain and heaviness from a film was when I watched Swedish director, Ingmar Bergman's PERSONA. It left me with such a big hole in my heart that it can't seem to heal itself after a few days. Intoxicated, intense, psychological and brave - these are some words that I could think of for such an amazing film.

The King's Speech

Long long long pauses, silence fills the air, sips through the spaces between those rambling thoughts of not worthiness of a position bestowed upon him, it must have been deafening and alarming at the same time. Sometimes, we don't really have the best in life, but things can always be changed and improved upon, as long as we have the will to do so. Watching Colin Firth playing this part is utterly empathetic and excruciatingly painful, yet, it yields the most fulfilling feeling that one can triumph over physical predicament after all. I believe the bigger obstacle that Colin's character has to overcome was never his stutter, but of meeting the expectation which was put upon him from the very beginning, of living up to that standard required of him, as a public figure. It must have been tremendously mortifying. I felt all these feelings while watching the film. Such great acting of his, and not forgetting, Geoffrey Rush! The sparring between the two was extremely amazing, such fine acting from both of them. I absolutely adore the art direction, the set design (the peeled wall in Geoffreys' clinic) and the whole look and feel of the entire film - such romantically hopeless in its colour palate, yet so warm in its element of humanity. Definitely worthy of an Oscar Best Actor Award and Best Director! I guess we all need to find our own place in this world, and in this life time ultimately, be it you are the king or just mere mortals like you and me:)

Fallen

Was working on a trailer last Sunday night, not realizing it was way pass sleeping time, but I don't like to stop when I know I can finish it in one session as it was quite short a video. Ended up having sore throat the next day...am still having it, hope to recover soon. Creative work is indeed exciting, as well as exhausting at the same time...but all is well, I love the outcome of it, and I am glad that my client feels the same way too...maybe what I need now is a nice cup of warm tea to soothe my itching throat and ease my stress of working on preparing proposals and planning for our next move in the very near future...moving place is never a fun thing for me, but moving into a new space could be something good for a change...instead of looking over the city skyline and shopping malls, will be facing the greenery's of the hills instead, a nice refreshing change, maybe?