Archives For Spanish

Marion wins Best Actress OscarAcademy Awards are over, and here comes a new year waiting. But I must admit that the big winner of the night was Europe. All 4 acting awards went out of the continent:

Daniel Day-Lewis (England) was named Best Actor, while Javier Bardem (Spain) was named Best Supporting Actor. Marion Cotillard (France) was named Best Actress, and Tilda Swinton (England) was named Best Supporting Actress.

Art Direction went to Dante Ferreti and Francesca Lo Schiavo (Italy) for Sweeney Todd, a co-production of the USA with the UK. Makeup went to France with La Vie en Rose, while Costume Design went to Elizabeth: The Golden Age, a UK/Germany/France co-production.

Moreover, the big technical prizes went to Europe as well. Golden Compass got the Visual Effects nod, a UK/USA co-production. While The Bourne Ultimatum, a US/Germany co-production grabbed the awards for Film Editing, Sound Editing and Sound Mixing.

Dario Marianelli (Italy) won Best Score for Atonement, a UK/France co-production. While Ireland won for Best Original Song with Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova (Czechoslovakia).

UK/Poland won Short Film Animated with Peter & the Wolf, and France once again dominated in the Short Film Live Action with Les Mozart des Pickpockets. And Juno, that apparently is a USA/Canada/Hungary co-production. x’D

The biggest happy announcement for me was hearing Marion’s name! I went nuts over it, and had me teary. I first thought Marion had Oscar written all over her face when I got to see La Vie en Rose in Sweden. It was such an amazing experience to have watched it with Julyssa, and it’s even more amazing that we both felt the same. That Marion HAD to win.

During the night, there wasn’t really any upsets. I guessed 18/24 of the categories, and felt that the most bitter surprise during the ceremony was I Met the Walrus loosing Best Animated Short. Because, really, motion graphics rock my world. While, Tilda Swinton and The Golden Compass winning were good surprises.

I will be posting live. I’ve got my predictions, but won’t post or I might jinx them! In the meantime, this is a new whole bunch of films I’ve seen in the past few days… (following this post)

  • Across the Universe
  • Goya’s Ghost (Los Fantasmas de Goya)
  • My Blueberry Nights
  • The Darjeeling Limited
  • I’m a Cyborg, but It’s OK
  • Martian Child
  • Fido
  • Becoming Jane
  • Margot at the Wedding
  • Persepolis
  • Juno
  • Gone Baby Gone
  • Lars and the Real Girl
  • El Orfanato
  • 4 luni, 3 saptamini si 2 zile (4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days)
  • The Jane Austen Book Club
  • Jesus Camp
  • Into the Wild
  • Sicko
  • The Kite Runner
  • 12
  • Tout pour Plaire (Thirty Five Something)
  • 3 Needles
  • Rocket Science
  • Le Scaphandre et le Papillon (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly)
  • The Air I Breathe
  • Run, Fat Boy, Run
  • L’auberge Espagnole (The Spanish Apartment)
  • Les Poupées Russes (Russian Dolls)
  • 10 Items or Less
  • Lucia y el Sexo (Sex and Lucia)
  • Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium

It’s another post of why the 90’s ruled! I was certain I had stuff to post, but now it’s slipped my mind. For the other parts, click on the following links:
My Reasons Why the 90’s Ruled or Not – Part I
My Reasons Why the 90’s Ruled or Not – Part II

When I was little, I had the pleasure to watch a lot of Disney stuff… stuff which my dad got hold of god knows how~ I only remember seeing the logo for something called Videorama. The thing is, he got me loads of tapes… Betamax tapes of old cartoons, and later we transfered them to VHS tapes. I got to watch The Sword in the Stone (1963), The Three Caballeros (1944)… oh man! I used to sing (and still sing) along to Os Quindins de Yaya!!! What other Disney… I mean, other than the classics like Snow White, or Sleeping Beauty… or The Little Mermaid, I got the chance to see Song of the South, Mouse Detective… I got the chance to see loads of Disney shorts, now included in the Walt Disney Treasures – Silly Symphonies and More Silly Symphonies~~ like Little Hiawhatta, Mother Goose Melodies, The Grasshopper and the Ants, The Tortoise and the Hare, and Elmer Elephant. I mean, I grew up with those… and miss them loads!

I am of the opinion everyone should grow up watching those to appreciate and understand animation. Anyway, those are Disney of MY 90’s, but here’s a list of Theatrical Animated Disney Releases:

  1. The Little Mermaid (Nov. 1989) – so this is technically almost a 90’s
  2. The Rescuers Down Under (1990) – Bernardo y Bianca!!
  3. Beauty and the Beast (1991) – Modern Classic Disney!
  4. Aladdin (1992) – Prince Ali! Fabulous he! Ali-ah Bah Buah!
  5. The Lion King (1994) – Another Modern Classic Disney!
  6. Pocahontas (1995)
  7. The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
  8. Hercules (1997)
  9. Mulan (1998) – I’ll make a man out of you!!
  10. Tarzan (1999) – This is one of Amy’s faves… the animation is rocking!
  11. Fantasia 2000 – which was also a 1999 release

Another fantastic Disney/Buena Vista animated film, The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), with one of my favorite characters! Jack Skellington! What’s this!! What’s this!!!

The 90’s also saw the BOOM! of animation master house Pixar (which was founded only 2 days before my birth date, on Feb. 3 1986! **snap**), that released Toy Story in 1995, following it with 1998’s release of A Bug’s Life, and ended 1999 with Toy Story 2.

That was back in the day, when all movie studios didn’t cash in on animation, and left animation to those who knew. Now the market is so saturated, we get at least 10 animated releases, instead of 1 or 2 quality ones. And sadly, 99,9% of them are on 3D, and classical animation has been long left to the sidelines, which is why I’m looking forward to some new Disney animation!

Holy Frijole! A whole why the 90’s ruled on Disney. ha! So I guess it’s fair to say Disney rocked in the 90’s/ Login off now, nites!

It’s Christmas Eve y’all!

Happy Holiday Greeting

I like totally forgot to change the Music Player back in Nov… so goodbye Once More with Feeling OST, and bring on the New December Music ’07 list! This time around, the list includes Justice, St. Vincent, Chromeo, Pink Martini, Yael Naim, Los Campesinos!, and Kent – which were a few of the artists I could find on Deezer… Enjoy!

EDIT **December has been the bestest month for blogging, it’s Dec24 and we’ve got 24 posts! Yay! and a few more days to go**

Currently Playing…

December 9, 2007 — Leave a comment

Currently playing Darren Hayes with On the Verge of Something Wonderful.

On my most recent iTunes library, are:

  • Akira Mitake
  • Amel Bent
  • Backstreet Boys
  • Celtic Woman
  • Christophe Mae
  • Christophe Willem
  • Chromeo
  • Eberg
  • Five for Fighting
  • Juanes
  • Justice
  • Kent
  • Los Campesinos!
  • Maria Mena
  • Radiohead
  • Rajaton
  • St. Vincent
  • Tegan and Sara
  • Vanessa Paradis
  • Westlife

This is a follow-up of these posts:

Loads of Music

P2P, Torrents, Legal Downloads, Oh My!

From Sweden to Peru with loads of Love~~

From Peru to Sweden~~

We love you back~~ =D

Forever and ever and always~~

Sassa Brassa Mandelmassa – JURYSSA, JURYSSA, JURYSSA!!!! xD

I did a 2006 Best Songs List from the music I had been listening to on my iPod, Internet, or even CD… no radio for me.  – so I thought I’d post this year’s also. In no particular order:

BEST 2007  SONGS

  • Antigone – Funky Dancers
  • Tegan and Sara – The Con
  • Green Light Go – E Ha’i Ana Wau
  • Shitdisco – OK
  • Quad Riot – Johnny Negro
  • Operator Please – Just a Song about Ping Pong
  • Michael Buble – Everything
  • Los Campesinos! – You! Me! Dancing!
  • Justice – D.A.N.C.E
  • Juanes Feat. Campinos – Bandera de Manos
  • Christophe Mae – Spleen
  • Backstreet Boys – Trouble Is
  • Hanson – Been There Before
  • Elitsa Todorova & Stoyan Yankolov – Water
  • Ayaka & Kobukuro – WINDING ROAD

Uber SPECIAL mention for Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova for the Soundtrack of the film Once. Including all the album in this list xD
BEST 2006 SONGS

  • Dixie Chicks – Ready to Make Nice
  • Corinne Bailey Rae – Put Your Record On
  • KT Tunstall – Black Horse & the Cherry Tree
  • The Raconteurs – Steady as She Goes
  • Arctic Monkeys – I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor
  • Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Phenomena
  • Keith Urban – Once in a Lifetime
  • Rascal Flatts – What Hurts the Most
  • CSS – Lets Make Love and Listen to Death from Above
  • The Sounds – Night After Night
  • Sunset Rubdown – They Took a Vote and Said No

Golden Compass hits Lima!

December 6, 2007 — 3 Comments

Northern Lights - Golden Compass - PosterOh, yeah! And Amy was there for the 4.20pm show~~ Amy needed her fix of Northern Lights. There weren’t many people then, and even though it was a subtitled version, there were a few kids… one of them was annoying! Talking all throughout the film… kinda cute (bordering on ‘I want to kill that kid’), but really bad-looking on the parent there who couldn’t shut him up.

Quick facts about Amy and His Dark Materials Trilogy:

  • Northern Lights (aka Golden Compass) was suggested by a friend who knew I liked Harry Potter.
  • After a while, I finally got the books at the beginning of the year.
  • Couldn’t control myself, and had to read one after the other.
  • Amy’s not a die-hard fan of HDM Trilogy, but it’s become her favorite series overall.
  • Amy liked the series so much, she gave her friend the trilogy as a gift. She liked it too.

Overall, the film was pretty good, except for the Flash pace. It is not as much as an editing fault because the film is not jumping, but many of the scenes don’t really flow… as, let say – Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban artistically flows… or how Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is so choppy it makes you feel there’s a whole scene missing in between.

Now, onto the good stuff. Effects are pretty good. Iorek is great, though I think Ragnar (aka in the book as Iofur) looked better. The bear fight had me gasping, even though there was no blood… if there had been blood, I would’ve been even more so. I loved Eva Green as Serafina Pekkala… and oh! the Witches are so cool!! They flew and fought with such elegance, it left me in awe. I also loved Nicole Kidman as Mrs. Coulter… evil or not, you have to love her. Dakota Blue Richards did pretty great as Lyra, there were times I thought it was not as good, but scenes like the one in Bolsvangar were very dramatic.

I enjoyed the confrontation at Bolsvangar, even though it’s not quite epic… it was quite thrilling. The kids running, about to be attacked then Iorek shows up and BAM! SNAP! The Witches show up, arrows begin flying… golden sparkles, SWOOSH! And the Gypsies SNAP SNAP!

Would love to watch that again… or wouldn’t mind some blood on the bears, uncensored version, non? x’D How about a Director’s Cut?? Because I would’ve love to have 30min more of it… especially since the film didn’t include the OH SO OMG ending chapter (or chapters…) but I guess it would’ve been unfair to have movie-goers wait for The Subtle Knife to hit theaters in 2009… or maybe even forever if GC bombs at the Box Office. Better leave this with no cliff-hanger…

Grade: 3.5/5 – (docked a whole point for fast-pacing)

People have been checking out this space for the reviews of the concert that Bjork gave in Lima on Nov. 13 – I, myself, have been searching the net for pictures and reviews, but I’ve found short to nothing detailed… and I haven’t found photos, like nice kick ass photos, which sucks major donkey butt. However, I’ve found some videos on YouTube, it took me like 1hr on November th 15th to get some videos, and not all are online… or some are but are not on my the playlist I’ve made, but feel free to search for them.

Here is the link to the playlist: Bjork en Lima

I took the liberty to take some captures, that look really crappy… but at least you can see them… Continue Reading…

Gracias… Gracias… or Muchas Gracias!

Bjork was cool. Other than the fact that I was forbidden to take my camera… and I was told it was gonna be restricted… I saw many people with cameras and I was a bit pissed. From my point of view, just a little above 5′ tall… I saw a few heads and a whole bunch of arms from where I was standing… and the seldom view of Bjork. Again, she was cool. My place? Not so much.

While waiting for the concert to begin, we had some electro beats mixed with something reminiscing of Japanese or Chinese opera. Prensa Nikkei would surely have enjoyed that bit, though I don’t know if people realized this… I was expecting someone to come out wearing a kabuki mask at any minute! When finally, it stopped. Lights went out, except for the dark lights, and a brief intro that sounded like It’s Oh So Quiet began, soon it faded as the stage was getting filled up with the members of the band, the choir… I don’t think there’s ever been as many Icelandic people in Lima – and finally, Bjork herself.

Earth Intruders began playing.

The lights were pretty nice, and the sound was better than what I was expecting, for sure… but still I wished they had used a couple of screens, just so you could see her in there, even if you couldn’t see her because of all the heads and arms with cameras…

Since I had no camera, I will have to trust my memory… which more often than not, sucks ass. After Earth Intruders, she sang Hunter – I’m pretty sure – or was it Hyperballad? LOL’ I was trying to take a look at her, and enjoy the music… but I was often taken out of my reverie by people pushing me, or trying to steal my place… and flashes in my face.

The tracklist was good and varied… the more rocking Army of Me, and I Miss You were there~~ actually, the concert really became more powerful right after Bjork grabbed the microphone and said something like;

Stop taking photographs, we are almost at the end. Enjoy the music, we are in a live concert not  documenting this.

The more sensitive people kept their cameras down after that, although some retards began taking a few more. You could tell Bjork really cared about it, and thus you learn to respect her opinion. At the beginning she wasn’t really there… in fact, I noticed she approached the side of the stage I was more closed to less than the opposite side, because there were many people with their cameras up! She must have thought, if you keep doing this… I will not stay on this side for too long.

After people began enjoying the concert for what it was, Bjork exploded with energy and started bouncing up and down and shaking her head as if trying to tell us she’s seen Gloria Trevi perform “Pelo Suelto” – LOL’ – The singing became superb, and in some numbers I could feel my eyes water a bit because she was here… lol. Bjork was in Lima, but better than her acknowledging Peru or Lima, it was exciting because I was there hearing her sing, talk and seeing her bounce and shake. It was quite emotional actually, haha.

Bjork looks in person, just as you could imagine… short, peculiar… radiant, and glowing creativity! She talked twice, once saying that about the cameras… and the other to say that her Spanish wasn’t very good, but that she was happy to be in Peru. And, of course, the usual Gracias, or Muchas Gracias after each song hahaha. I think most people were getting like “well, duh!” – She also yelled Viva La Revolucion right before the full encore, Declare Independence.

Overall, the concert was good… you can tell, though I missed some of my fave songs like Venus as a Boy, or Big Time Sensuality, or Oceania… and I wished I had my spikes on so I could poke people around me. LOL’

Rate: 4/5

Top5 Amy Live Concerts:
The Futureheads (Vancouver – 2006)
Bjork (Lima – 2007)
La Ley (Lima – 2001)
The Killers (Vancouver 2005)
John Mayer / Maroon 5 (Vancouver – 2004)