The Love Guru Is Surprisingly Funny

Even before the movie was released, this movie had bad reviews. I myself thought this was going to be a shitty movie. From the trailer, it looks as if Mike Myers is recycling his old jokes for this movie. The last fairly good movie of his was the first Austin Powers, and every movie after that was terrible. The first Mike Myers movie i saw was Wayne's World 2, and loved it.

So after The Love Guru was released, the critics ripped the movie apart, saying Mike Myers is a "has been" and has lost his magical touch. It currently has a 3.2 rating on IMDB. They complained that he keeps doing the some jokes over and over again in his movies, and they have a point there.

Then yesterday, a screener of the movie appeared on the internets, and being that there has not been any good movies released on the net lately, I figured I'd give this one a shot. So after watching it, I was surprised at how funny I found it. Sure he rehashes some of his old jokes, but the rehashes worked well in the movie. These jokes worked better in this movie than in his Austin Powers movies. In his Austin Powers movies, he kinds of over-do it with his jokes, it's like "yeah, I get the joke already", but he keeps banging the joke on your head until it loses its funniness. It seems that he's learned from his mistakes and the jokes are done very well in this movie. He has learned when to stop.

Plus, compared to his previous movies, this movie is heavier on word-play jokes than physical jokes. And I like it like that.

Definitely, Maybe Is A Recommended Watch

Definitely, Maybe is one of the better romantic comedies in recent times. Just like the poster says, it's from the makers of Love Actually, another recommended romantic comedy. The story is set in the 90s, so there's Nirvana and Bill Clinton references, but they are more than just references, they are an integral part of the story. Instead of a story about one guy with one woman, or 3 guys with 3 women, it's about 1 guy with 3 women.

The story is told through flashbacks, the guy is telling this story to his daughter. The daughter wants to know about how the guy met her mother, so he tells her about the relationships he has had, and the daughter needs to guess which one is her mother. The story is heavier on the romantic side than the comedy side compared to Love Actually, but it's good. A highly recommended watch. And Elizabeth Banks is hot.

Lost Season 4 Finale Is The Best Episode Yet

Off the island they go

Desmond finally reunited with Penny

I've just finished watching the Lost season 4 finale, and it was by far the best episode yet. Every time Penny makes an appearance, the episode is surely going to be good, but this episode is almost perfect. It shows the actual rescue. The season started by implying that they're going to get rescued, but the actual rescue was only shown on the final episode. The so called rescuers that appeared at the start of the season weren't there on a rescue mission, but in the end they played a part in the rescue.

It shows how only 6 of them manage to get off the island. Desmond is finally reunited with Penelope. It was the most satisfying moment of the entire series. After showing them searching for each other for several seasons, to see them finally together was very fulfilling.

These Lost writers really are geniuses. They manage to find the perfect balance between resolving some story lines and to continue with some to make you want more. The show started with flashbacks, then this season, it's mostly flashforwards, but after the events of this season, it's hard to figure out how the format is going to be next season. It may very well be without any "flashes", showing events on and off the island as they occur. But that itself is going to be tricky, because the time on the island is different than time off the island. It's all about this space-time continuum.

So after being rescued and living off the island for 3 years, circumstances have all the 6 rescued to want to go back to island. And how they do that is what season 5 is going to be all about. And going about doing that isn't going to be easy because Ben has moved island.

L.A. & Vegas

Farmers Market

Farmers Market

Hollywood

The Grove, just beside Farmers Market

Hollywood

Filming going on in front Hooters in Hollywood

Walt Disney Hall

The famous & weird statue at Ernst & Young Plaza, downtown L.A.

Downtown L.A. from Getty Center

Getty Center

Getty Center

So I went to the U.S. of a about a month ago, more precisely, I was in Los Angeles and Las Vegas.It was my first time in the U.S., and also first time outside of Asia in more than 20 years. I expected to see white men everywhere, but it was easier to spot Hispanics than white men in L.A. And I blended right in with them. I think I was even mistaken for a gang member at one point, but that's another story. The cashiers there speak to me in Spanish so I have to speak to them in English first to give them a head's up that I'm no Latino.

The climate is dry. Coming a country where the humidity is high, this became a problem. My lips started to crack, eyes became red, nose started to bleed and my skin became stretched. And at Venice beach, I thought it was spring, the weather isn't that hot as it is in Malaysia, the last thing on my mind was putting on sunscreen. But when I got back, my face was burned.

The cars over there actually stop for pedestrians. The respect that they give to pedestrians is surprising. The freeway surface isn't that good, compared to what we have in Malaysia. So Samy Vellu isn't 100% incompetent as I would like to think he is. And also, you can turn right on a red light. The reason for that is because their roads are all in a grid. So it's very orderly. You can't do that in Malaysia.

The people are friendlier than I thought they would be. Bus and cab drivers always greet you. You don't always get that here. The public transport system is very good in L.A. The Metro rail and buses all publish their routes online, so it's very easy to plan your journey. The only problem is with the non-Metro buses and also on less popular routes where the buses aren't as frequent.

But one thing that bugged me the most is this culture of "tips". They expect tips for the slightest of things. WTF is up with that? Why can't they just do their damn job. Don't extort people out of their money. Even cab fares need tips. This tip thing is needs to go away.

Maybe I wasn't at the right place at the right time, but in L.A. I expected to see a hot chick at every corner but that wasn't the case. But the percentage does increase as you get closer to the coast line. But in Downtown, not so much. And downtown L.A isn't as busy as I thought it would be. And it's quite small. You can explore the whole downtown area on foot, which I did.

Other than Downtown, I also went on a tour that took me around Hollywood and Beverly Hills. I thought I saw Stan Lee, or at least somebody that looked like him at the Farmers Market. The next I visited the Getty Center. Then on the day after that, my plan was to do the beaches. Take the rail down to Long Beach, then go back up a bit and do a triple of Redondo, Manhattan and Hermosa beaches. But by the time I was finished with Redondo, it was already late, so I didn't get to Hermosa or Manhattan beach.

Long Beach

Redondo Beach

Next, I did a double of Venice and Santa Monica. The first thing that I noticed about Venice/Santa Monica beach is how wide it is. The amount of sand you have to wade through just to get to the water, it's like a 3 minute walk in the sand. This is where da girls at.

Venice Beach

Baywatch on Venice Beach.

Venice Beach

Santa Monica Beach

Santa Monica Beach

It's Hot

And in Vegas, there wasn't much travelling to do becsue the hotel was right there on the strip, so I had time to really watch tv there. I switched through the late night talk shows that they have there. There's Leno and Conan on NBC, and there's Letterman and Craig Ferguson on CBS. Of the 4, I actually like Craig Ferguson the best. Craig Ferguson is Drew Carey's boss, Mr. Wick, from the Drew Carey Show. His talk show is actually very funny. He doesn't have a sidekick to pick things up if the shows gets slow, because it doesn't. It's a one man show, and still he manages to beat the others in funniness. When Letterman calls it quits, he should get Letterman's slot.

Vegas reaches it's peak on Fridays and Saturdays. People start coming in droves on Friday afternoon. They do whatever they went there to do, then leave on Sunday, and go to work on Monday. So it's nice to go for a walk on weekdays when its not as crowded.

The dancing fountains at the Bellagio is reason enough to go to Vegas. And the best part is it's free. It is easily one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. It starts at sunset every night, but they turn it off if it's too windy.

And there's quite a big population of Muslims in Vegas. There are even mosques there, but not on the strip. So, halal food in Vegas isn't a problem. There are halal restaurants and even halal grocery stores. My mom bought some chicken and rice to cook. While there, there was this halal restaurant that served Philly Steak. At first I thought it was a steak as in one big piece of meat, but a Philly Steak is actually a sandwich. What?! I expected a steak and they gave me a damn sandwich?! But the sandwich is actually good. It's filled with little slices of meat with melted cheese together with sliced mushroom, and it's really really good. I wish they had it here in Malaysia.

And I also went to see Ka, a Cirque Du Soleil production. I've always wanted too see a Cirque Du Soleil show ever since I saw a documentary about them on tv. The show was okay, it had it's moments. It was the only Cirque show on discount at the time. Ka is more about the props, stage and special effects and a bit lacking in the actual circus acrobatics stuff, compared to other Cirque shows.

Vegas Strip

Vegas Strip

The newly opened Trump International in Vegas

Encore,Wynn and Palazzo on the Vegas strip

Bellagio Casino

Bellagio dancing fountains.

Protest against income tax in Vegas. It seems that there's no law requiring individuals to pay income tax. It's only for businesses.

Barstow Station. We took the Greyhound to travel between L.A. and Vegas. Barstow Station is somewhere in between.

I can go on writing a lot more about my trip but this is already the longest post on the blog. And it took me a long time to make this post. So it ends here. Plus, nobody reads my blog anyway. The reason I'm late in posting this is because I was waiting to finish editing all the photos that I took on my trip, but there just too many of them. So I'll attach the few good ones that I took, the rest of them will be on Flickr when I've finished editing all of them.

Dhaka, Bangladesh

Traffic

• Lanes are just whites lines on the road to be ignored.
• Instead of using signal lights, just honk.
• It's really hard to spot a car without a dent on it.
• Light bumping between vehicles are normal.
• Hardly any motorcycles.
• Most vehicles run on CNG.
  

Food

• Good briyani. Katchi(mutton) briyani is traditionally served at social functions.
  
• They squeeze lime over their briyani.
• Most of the chicken is the "kampung" kind, though they have multi-storey chicken farms.
  
• Lots of Jack fruit.
• Allegedly has the best mangoes in the world.
• Avoid tap water.

People

• About 90% muslims, a lot of the women wear sari.
• Their perception of Malaysians is that we are a very religious bunch.
• They learn about Tunku Abdul Rahman in their schools.
• They admire Dr. Mahathir.
• 11 million millionaires there, out of 150 million population.
• Very small middle class.
• Canada is a very popular migration destination for the rich.
• Advised by the hotel staff not to go out at night.
• A lot of police officers around. It's like there's one every 100 meters.
• Supermarket entrances have metal detectors.
  

Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull Trailer

First trailer for Indy 4. Looks good.

The only iffy thing about the movie is that Shia LeBeouf is in the movie. I hated him in Transformers, and I'm afraid he will spoil this movie too.

Lost Is Back!

Finally, something that can take them off the island.

Lost returned with it's 4th season last week, but the first episode was underwhelming for me. It didn't start with a bang. Things that happened were expected to happen. Nothing much revealed.

Somebody's carrying this photo of Ben.

But this week's episode really hit the mark. The rescuers finally manage to get on the island, but they aren't really there to rescue the lost bunch. The rescuers, there 4 of them, with their stories (they have their own flashbacks), really sets up what season 4 is going to be about. And it's looking good.

A Perfect End To Rambo

I decided to see this in theaters after hearing that it wasn't butchered by the censors. Overall, it was a very enjoyable movie. Over-the-top violence and gore as expected. But the best thing about it was how it ended. John Rambo finally finds peace with himself and returns home. A great way to end the series. After all that he's been through, I'm happy to see him at peace. Good for him.

Bandoleros Fixed Audio Sync Download Link

Well, I've just finished uploading Bandoleros aka Ladrón que roba a ladrón, a movie I mentioned about in my previous post. The movie, originally released by VoMiT had audio sync problems. I decided to fix it myself, and share it with everyone. I re-encoded the original source, so there's a slight dip in video quality, but not much.

Here's the link:
http://www.yaStorage.com/download.php?id=186014&key=da81aa885gndf676f1gg8aaa6c582ffg

The way to use the yaStorage link is to click on the word "Request" from "Request Download Link". Then after that, click on the letter "F" from "Downloading File".

Here's a sample video of the movie for you to check the quality:
http://rapidshare.com/files/85796986/bandoleros_fixedaudio_sample.avi

Enjoy.

Editing XviD Video In Sony Vegas 8

I downloaded a movie the other day called Bandoleros. It's an American made Spanish movie. Haven't seen it yet, but the audio was out of sync by a few hundred miliseconds. A few hundred miliseconds is enough of a difference to make the viewer notice it and spoils the movie. Most pirated movies are released in XviD format. I've tried to edit Xvid video previously using Sony Vegas but for some reason Vegas doesn't recognize XviD format video. The last version I tried it on was version 6 of Vegas. Now the latest version is version 8, and and I've got a new laptop with some serious power in it, so I decided to give it another try.

After installing it, to my dismay Vegas still doesn't support XviD editing. So googled around for some solutions to this problem. I encountered 2 YouTube videos that have 2 different solutions to this problem. The first one is here:



I tried the method showed in first one, but it didn't work for me. In some of the comments for the YouTube video, it is said the the trick only works on XP. My laptop runs Vista so that may be the reason it didn't work.
So on to the second video:



This trick did it for me. This method tricked Vegas into seeing the XviD video as a DivX video. I managed to fix the audio sync problem. But since I re-encoded the XviD to XviD again, there is a slight deterioration in video quality, but barely noticeable. I basically used the same video setting as the original file.

I have decided to share this fixed version of the movie with the world. So in a way, I am now a true pirate. It's still in the process of being uploaded. It's quite slow. As of right now, I still have about 8 hours to go before the upload is completed. I'll post and spread the links when it's done.

Cloverfield Sucks For Others Too

Click image for larger version

An updated version is below. The jump goes higher than I thought it would be.

Click image for larger version

It seems that I'm not the only one who thinks Cloverfield sucks, and I've got the stats to prove it. After my previous post titled "Cloverfield Sucks", my blog got a big jump in the number of visits. Most of it is referred from Google with the search term "cloverfield sucks". Apparently I am not alone with this sentiment.

Click image for larger version

After further analysis of the movie, I think the problem was the movie didn't make me want to care enough about those yuppie characters. There are a lot of other movies that made me feel very attached to its characters, but this one didn't do it well enough. Maybe it's the unconvincing acting, or the maybe it's the script itself that didn't make me believe these characters were real enough to invest my emotions in them.

But the it's not like I didn't enjoy it at all. My main disappointment was with the ending. It ended at a point where I felt that things were only starting to get good and looked forward for it to get better. I wanted to see more of the monster.

I expected a different kind of movie. But my expectations are from the promotions and hype that the movie itself has generated. If I didn't know anything about the movie, if I didn't know that it's about a monster, and my only knowledge of the movie is from the movie poster only, then, maybe I'll truly enjoy it. But after so much focus on the monster from the media hype, I expect it to be monster-centric, not yuppie-centric.

Cloverfield Sucks

Cloverfield doesn't live up to the hype. They clearly had a sequel in mind when they made this movie. At the end of the movie, I went "That's it?".

It's a love story with the monster as a sideshow. Yes you get to see the monster, but it doesn't even touch on what the monster is, where did it come from, why is it attacking Manhattan, etc. I didn't go to see the movie just to see a monster being hit by missiles, but that's what the movie really is. Who gives a shit about the love story, I want the monster to be the star of the movie, not a bunch of yuppies with relationship problems. I have nothing against sequels but at least make the first movie a complete movie, and not just a jumping point for the real movie. And the camcorder style thing, was okay, it didn't bother me that much, but I prefer normal traditional camera style.

A real disappointment. Not worth my 10 bucks. I hope the movie doesn't do well, so they won't have to make a lame sequel.

American Gangster

American Gangster is a true story about Frank Lucas, a black gangster honcho who was bigger than the mafia during his peak. It's a really good movie.

Enough about the movie, while looking around for pictures of Lymari Nadal, who the lady plays Frank's wife in the movie, another person always crops up beside her in her pictures. That person is Edward James Olmos, the guy who plays Admiral Adama on BattleStar Galactica, and Lt. Martin Castillo (the boss cop) on Miami Vice. It turns out that this old guy is the babes' husband. WTF! Nice.

Lymari Nadal

Edward James Olmos

Married

Other than that, American Gangster is a very good movie, it was really easy for me to "get into" it. It feels long, but in good way. There's hardly a boring moment in the movie. Good editing.