Archives For international

L’Oreal Paris has a bunch of brand ambassadors by region, and they all get invited to Cannes; among them, there’s people like Eva Longoria, Aishwarya and Sonam Kapoor, who all end up walking the festival’s red carpet events, just like last year. This time around, they got them all for this commercial that also credits J.Lo and Blake Lively, even though I don’t really spot them in it.

Those who do make it and aren’t listed, however, include Aishwarya, Sonam Kapoor, and the Bingbings– Fan Bingbing and Li Bingbing. That’s on top of Jane Fonda, and everyone’s faves Julianne Moore and Naomi Watts, who all come together to gather round John Legend.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkN38gSytHk

The idea of them coming together around Legend gave me vibes of that Lux Soap Commercial that Shahrukh Khan did like a decade ago, which featured Hema Malini, Juhi Chawla, Kareena Kapoor, and Sridevi… but then I watched it again, and that one was grosser. xD La Vie en Rose, at least, is a nice soft tune to give you the feeling of floating in the clouds xD

— EDIT 12Aug’16 —

Here’s the L’Oreal India upload.

Australian upload.

 

Last October I reported about Yu-chan returning to the leading-lady gig with Daigo Matsui’s AZUMI HARUKO wa Yukuefumei (アズミ・ハルコは行方不明). Twitter has just shown me a first still. There’s also a music video by Ishizaki Huwie (石崎ひゅーい) titled Flower Vase (花瓶の花, Kabin no Hana) attached to the press release on natalie.mu, but it’s geo-blocked :*(

yu-aoi-azumi-haruko

Farah Khan’s and Shahrukh Khan’s latest Happy New Year [Español] just hit the market officially with VOD… or as they’re calling it DTF (Direct to Fans), which is less technical and much more personal. It’s also way cheaper than regular VOD too, which usually charges $5USD per one-time stream or 4-5-day rental. You basically get to download the movie for that price. I’m just supposing it’s subtitled (being aimed at all markets except India and China), but I could be supposing erroneously [1].

happy-new-year-vod-dtf

No cons, just pros really. It would have been much cooler and much more trailblazing if this had happened on opening week (or the week later), but it’s something. I’m just hoping UTV (EROSNOW had its one moment with the pretty horrible Lekar Hum Deewana Dil) gets their shit together with the distribution of films like Haider and PK, really because those two are my bias at the moment. Imagine if more European and other big Asian movies did the same. Isn’t THAT what they want? Piece of the Hollywood pie? You need to indoctrinate people first, get them on the habit of watching you. Hollywood’s been doing this to us for the past 70 years.

Here’s the link.

kiku-sharda-palak-cnwk

I started watching Comedy Nights with Kapil a couple of months ago, despite the language barrier and the lack of subtitles. I gotta admit that the funniest thing has to be Kiku Sharda’s Palak despite (or maybe because of) the language barrier. It doesn’t matter what’s going on, he generally makes me laugh. Okay, Palak and Ghutthi.

I cackle when I see Madhuri teaching Palak dancing. Laughed so much when doing the acting demonstration for Tabu, KK and Shahid, and even made me NOT hate Kareena Kapoor (oh, look! She actually HAS a sense of humor!). Plus! They’re improving my hindi xD Win-win!

The only thing that pisses me off is that Colors isn’t uploading the episodes on YouTube as quickly anymore, the episodes on their website are region-restricted (FML), and some of the episodes have been having the music edited out, which ruins the mood/joke completely.

 

I’m still not sold on Netflix- never to this date I’ve ran into a film that I wanted to watch on it. At least in terms of this region, which doesn’t count with as much content as the US or Canada one. Similar issues with iTunes… and Amazon is out of the question.

I used to subscribe to MUBI for a long while (at least for a bit over a year), but eventually turned off my subscription because I wasn’t watching anything, while things I had added to my watchlist stopped being available, and the selection of their films eventually was reduced to their now curated content. I’m only subscribed to EROSNOW now, and have seen a few couple of films there, but had to turn to other mediums when found links that were region-restricted or surprisingly without subtitles.

My experience with streaming has been decent- and for as cheap as $5-9 bucks you can watch a lot in a month, and it just makes your life quite easy. Similar flawless experience with my first Vimeo On Demand watch. Thanks Joss Whedon for the heads up, and actually putting the film up there right after its premiere. To top it all off, subtitles in Spanish, German, French, Portuguese and Japanese (plus English CC) were available making it the smoothest watch if you decided to watch it with any bunch of people.

Paying $5 to stream a new movie can seem like the best way possible to make it look as if you’re going to the cinema. It takes me back to those days where I would watch 2 or 3 new movies a weekend. If studios ever decided to really go off their way to online distribute their new movies almost simultaneously, I’d be willing.

Here’s In Your Eyes.

Apparently Vimeo streaming is not as smooth (or at all) if you don’t have a Vimeo account, though. Take it as a good chance to get one, or don’t complain. I really don’t know any other streaming (paying) website that would let you use their content without an account. You need one in iTunes, in Amazon, in Netflix, HBO, et all. So please, people, stop complaining about THAT.

Spanish (more serious) related note.

xiami-subscription

If you’ve (for some reason) been following this blog a while, you’d know that I’m a big fan of Xiami, the Mainland China-based music site that has never flashed me with a “this content is not available in your region” message. I’ve actually bought some tracks off of them, started way before iTunes became available in my country, and have continued with tracks that aren’t available in my iTunes store, or with overpriced albums/singles.

It’s particularly useful for Chinese-based artists.

In general, all tracks are priced at 0.8米 (Mi) and 1 Mi is 1 Yuan, which is about 0.16USD, which is like 1/10 of what iTunes charges. They accept Paypal as one of their paying options, which seems way simpler than paying with your credit card (I tried). And since Xiami is a community-based site, they give you points for activities. Every time you log in, you get points and once you log in for a whole uninterrupted week, they give you a red envelope which also serves to download tracks. If you log in every day for a month or a whole year, you’ll get even more for free downloads.

Downloading tracks, adding albums, adding information (photos, lyrics, etc), participating in community discussions, and joining groups also gives you points to raise your Xiami level. Though, I still don’t know what’s that for, other than showing off and user respectability.

Continue Reading…

Dear Sony Japan,

I really want to love you, but I understand our complicated relationship. Every time I pull closer to you, you pull away, retreating to your closed existence where there is only fans of your music in Japan and you forget about me, who just like a person who can’t get enough of this mistreatment keeps coming back to you.

I know I need therapy for this one-sided relationship we got going on.

I am hoping that one day (soon, rather than later) you allow me to love you the way I want to. I don’t want ALL of you, I’d be just happy with short PVs… the one or two-minute clips other companies upload. I can deal with that, but not being able to even BROWSE your content while being able to see it uploaded on my timeline seems like an awfully unfair affair.

Yours faithfully,

your unwilling mistress.

Hi, VEVO… and Sony Music Entertainment – like I’ve said time and time again… You Suck.

What’s the point of a “video premiere” online if you’re gonna be blocking content by region? And it’s not like we can’t view the video from Pink’s official website, right? I mean, to put it in words~~~

Pretty much anyone outside the US, can’t see Pink’s Raise Your Glass video. Not helping with view counts, let me tell you. And it’s not like it’s Pink’s fault. I’ts not the artists fault… it’s the record company… and VEVO for teasing — making us belief that when clicking the link, we will be able to see, but giving us that “blocked content” message instead.

Sony, stop sucking the fun of the internet.

Anyway… about the video? I like Dave Meyers, he’s fun. He works fun times with Pink, but I don’t love the video. Sure, I’ve replayed it more than five times already since it premiered, but that’s mainly because I want to sing along to the song.

Continue Reading…

Hi, guys!

YAM011 is almost done. The Lima Film Fest ends tonight, so I’ll be closing the issue — hopefully on time, for a release on the 15th at 00.00hr. My timezone, not yours. GMT -5, FYI.

While I was writing the editor’s note — and addressing everyone on the Facebook group — I wondered what to call YAM readers. I thought YAMMIES would be nice, but then the Urban Dictionary told me those are tits/knockers. But then again, Penn & Teller said that pretty much any noun in plural can mean knockers. LOL Watermelons, lemons, air bags. There you go, wouldn’t be much of a difference.

So… then I thought about YAMMERS, but that can’t be good, right? So maybe YAMMIES is fine. Sounds a bit like “jammies” because you know… I’m a Spanish speaker. To me, the sound of a Y with a vowel, and the sound of a J with a vowel is the same. When I first moved to Canada, Yellow and Jello were the same to me. Well, I still can’t get it right. Frak.

Anyway, it’s getting late. I just wanted to post the streams to some of the albums we are reviewing and rating in the new edition of YAM. Not all, but most of them~ Thank you, Xiami ;P

* denotes that they have a written review.

Anyway, happy listening! Off to zzzz. Busy day today.

Frak You, Sony BMG

July 12, 2010 — 2 Comments

I’m tired of you, and your region restriction.

It’s not only in your channel, but also any channel with artists you signed on? Or any video that has music of your artists? And then you fraking wonder why I get my stuff somewhere else…

Well, FRAK YOU.

It’s not only that you monopolize Michael Jackson… Christina Aguilera, and even Pink, I think and all the other pop acts because… let’s face it, all the record companies have merged into one big butt family with the likes of Arista, LaFace, Jive, J Records, etc etc. You also monopolize Wang Lee Hom’s videos. So Sony BMG, YOU SUCK.