Archives For Celebrity

galaxy-silk-chauffeur-audrey-hepburn

A while back a GORGEOUS Dior commercial featuring Grace Kelly, Dietrich and Monroe, alongside a slinky Charlize Theron was invading my TV and doing rotations on my YouTube ads. That was one of the only commercials I didn’t mind breaking my viewing.

Alongside with visual effects magicians, they managed to bring back classic on-screen beauties… and now, they’re latest project has been bringing back Audrey Hepburn. From the still up there, it looks PRETTY uncanny. Apparently they found the perfect Hepburn double, and did their magic twitching details to make her look IT. Sadly, we can’t watch the commercial for Galaxy Chocolate, which has only been licensed within the UK and Ireland territories.

I guess Audrey Hepburn’s image is THAT expensive.

You can check the info on Framestore.

— EDIT —

Ad has made it’s appearance on YouTube.

I just began listening (truly listen) to Mayday’s discography pre the Born to Love days, finishing off titles/pinyin/title translations, when I ran into this song titled Masquerade (Male, Female, One Body) from their 2003 album, Time Machine (時光機). The thing is, the title of the song is Ci Xiong Tong Ti (雌雄同體), which is the term used to refer to “hermaphrodites” (which, by the way, isn’t longer a term accepted for people, who are now referred to as “intersex”). Perplexed, thinking that Google Translate was giving me a wonky translation, I checked the dictionary to double check.

On a quick google search, I found a pretty terrific (singable) translation of the song.

Rather than you understand me—I’d rather be a mystery
A puzzle you just cannot solve, of what’s false and real, it’ll play at your heartstrings
I’ll play you, or play your opposite form; partake in this game of love that you’ve borne.

via NoStarWords @ LJ + starriheavens

My mind was melted. I mean, it’s not VERY often you get playful duality in music, playing on gender-role conventions and completely avoiding the titillation that seethes from… well, everywhere now.

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I remember when I was in fifth grade I saw my grandfather die. There he was, lying motionless on the bed. I was close to my grandfather. He taught me how to write. I remember thinking, “If this is the end of life, that means we don’t have to take everything too seriously.” Children who grow up without seeing death don’t have that realization.

Zhou Xun Looks Beyond Borders

Zhou Xun on Life, Death, and its Impact on Children

Yu-chan, how am I supposed to know you have a new miniseries, if you don’t even update your blog? Like, I was blind. COMPLETELY BLIND about this two-episode series you did for TV Asahi, airing on February 2nd and 3rd. Titled Mottomo Toi Ginga (最も遠い銀河) — translated as The Most Distant Galaxy — the series has nothing to do with space. Instead, it seems to be a detective story, but the AsianWiki Plot/Synopsis sucks.

Still… it doesn’t mean that I don’t want to check it out.

I wouldn’t have heard about it, if it wasn’t for Weibo. I’m supposed to be subscribed to the Yu Aoi/Aoi Yuu and other variations of her name from Tokyohive, but whatever. It seems she has very few English-speaker fans who don’t even bother.

At the moment, this screencaps will do.

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mika-ninagawa-sakuran

I ran into two really cool posts on Mika Ninagawa- one sort of talking about her work — mentioning her style and her work with the likes of Shiina Ringo, Bjork and- of course, Anna Tsuchiya — and the other a quite rare (and insightful) interview in English.

I’ve been kind of dying to see Helter Skelter. I haven’t even checked if there are subtitles available yet.

I guess people can’t stand true stars because they are so different, they’d rather watch some stupid proxies they can sympathize with.

I guess we do live in the era of the dying movie star. :\

I’m finally done with the latest version of Anna Karenina, which I’m sorry to say didn’t enjoy much. I generally have a love/hate relationship with Keira, but I just couldn’t stand Aaron Taylor. Mind you, I didn’t like him in Kick-Ass either, and it was meh on Albert Nobbs. During the whole movie, I kept thinking how Olivia Williams would’ve been as Anna Karenina.

olivia-williams

Especially considering this photo, and how awesome that last scene could have been.

I think I was posting a Mavis Fan track on Weibo when I ended up finding Vegetarian Fish, a site that was put up for Mavis Fan’s project with her mother, Miss D.D. Mavis produced the self-titled album for her mother, and sang a version of Doris Day’s Everybody Loves a Lover [1] with a nice mother/daughter moment in their music video.

It’s hard to come by official links when looking in English, so I’m ecstatic that Mavis uses the channel for uploads of her group Mavis Fan & 100%, even if it’s just to wish us all Happy Chinese New Year with a short track/clip of The God of Wealth Has Arrived (財神到, Cai Shen Dao). And the doodles of the video are pretty funny, especially the one featuring Tony Leung because Mavis and Tony were on The Silent War last year. xD

I have often questioned Beyonce’s IT factor [1][2]. Whether her choice of choreography always left me cold, what she chose to belt, and how her music seems to be only dance club friendly having changed very little throughout the past decade. However, even I have to admit she broke down the Super Bowl Halftime show this year.

[iframe src=”https://player.yinyuetai.com/video/player/601468/v_0.swf” width=”480″ height=”334″ /]

via YinYueTai.

I mildly regret she missed her first floor-screen mark there and the black silhouette was all empty when she was a mere step away from it. BUT, she did rock that multiple-screen Beyonce performance quite flawlessly. And then Kelly and Michelle (could handle it~). It was Destiny’s Child’s first ever performance in like- FOREVER. And I’m shocked how little Michelle has changed, while Kelly and Beyonce had put on some- errr~ years on them. They all looked so kick-ass with their toned arms, and it was like high school all over again.

My only wish for the performance was that it could’ve ended before Beyonce played Halo, which seemed quite out of place in the show. But I guess she has to fill those 15 minutes? Maybe that’s why there was a power outage afterwards?

My respect, Beyonce. You’ve earned it.

TINY-G’s concept is funny. Short girls, who don’t fit he Korean girl group standard of being 1.60m in height at least, are put together. They’re all 18 except for the member who is 15 (the short-haired one). And it doesn’t hurt that they’re all super cute in a non-lolita way. They wear super baggy clothing and look more like they can pull a prank on you than put a move on a guy.

As far as Korean pop music concepts, it doesn’t hurt.

Their latest single, MINIMANIMO [MV], is quite catchy. However, I’m most taken aback by the non-speaking member Mint, from Thailand. So she’s still learning to speak Korean (very well a commendable choice), I wouldn’t even mind at all if TINY-G ever decided to drop a whole verse in Thai just for kicks in one of their future singles.

Having said that, I’m crazy for Mint’s hair. It looks flawless. And she seems to be the shortest one. She’s already become my bias in a group I don’t really have a bias for.

I never thought I would see the day when Nicole Kidman would USAGI [1]. On a red carpet… posing for hundreds of red carpet photographers and for all of us to see. I LOVE IT.

Nicole Kidman + Tom Hooper at SAG Awards 2013