Roman Polanski's The Pianist gives jarring and near hallucinatory realism to life within the Ghetto, where captive Jews were held before many of them sent for extermination during the Holocaust. The absolute conviction of its detail, notably the superbly convincing set design certainly adds to the lucid quality of the horrors happening within. Seeing through the eyes of the protanganist, it quickly becomes clear that surivival in such a genocide is strictly a matter of single minded determination and often sheer luck, for death takes on a near arbitrary nature.


Sparing my lacklustre rhetoric, I quote, from the review in Sight and Sound Magazine : " The power of The Pianist derives largely from its dogged adherence to fact as well as it grim humour and restrain. Music is very sparingly applied, so that even a soaring crane shot over the devastated city of Warsaw is denied a swelling John Williams score of Spielbergian dimensions, but simply comes to rest with a plaintive clarinet solo. When Szpilman finally is allowed to play a Chopin ballade in order to prove his identity, music has been such a "lost" sound that the performance has a rare emotional clarity. "


Nicely put.

I completed my National Service today. Oddly enough, I had no rush of excitement, no bursts of elation at this moment of emancipation. The feeling can be best likened to chewing a piece of tasty gum that you've kept for too long in your pocket that when you do start to eat it, realize that it has long lost its flavour.

While visiting my friend's house for CNY today I passed the tempting game of Daidi to watch Stephen Chow's Shaolin Soccer, of which I quickly realized I shouldn't have missed when it was on show at the cinemas. Though still very much laden with trite Stephen Chow slapstick humour, the notable difference here was the impeccable use of CG and sfx which greatly accentuated the value and appeal of the story and action. Think the Avenging Fists or even Tsui Hark's Legend of Zu and it becomes apparent that flashy SFX does not equate to good movies, but this instance proves that it can be done.

My favourite scene in the movie is where Zhao Wei, though sporting a rather dubious headshave, does a coup de grace on an offensive volley shot as she retaliates using a Tai-chi move, spinning the burning soccer ball on her finger. This composited shot is so beautifully done that for a split second I was almost convinced her kungfu skills are for real. Very very neat work.