Category Archives: Entertainment

The Hangover 2 – Movie Review

Have you seen The Hangover? Odds are you have. Did you like it? Odds are you did. After all, it is a witty comedy aimed at an audience above the age of where thinking that sneaking a drink by you parents is the coolest thing to do.

And naturally, The Hangover was a hit at the box office, grossing more than $280 million, which meant that, in the business world of movies today, a sequel is meant to be.

Is the sequel as good as the first one? Definitely not. Is it an enjoyable movie? In some ways yes, in other ways no. Will you enjoy it? It depends.

Take Vegas out of the equation and insert Bangkok, take out the regular prostitute and insert a transsexual, take out the tiger and insert the monkey and keep the amount of f-words used the same and you get the Hangover 2.

Is it a funny movie? Yes. After all, seeing a guy realize that he slept with a “girl who has a penis” is funny – and the jokes that come out of that are spot-on as well. But overall, while watching The Hangover 2, you feel that you’ve seen all of this before – even if you don’t really remember the details of the first one. They keep on reminding you of them, actually.

One of the guys is getting married to a Thai-American girl whose dad wants to have a traditional Thai wedding. There, they have one last celebratory shindig with the bride’s brother. They wake up the next day at a hotel, far away from the resort they’re having the wedding at, not knowing how they got there. The groom has his face tattooed. One of them has his head shaven and, most importantly, the bride’s brother is missing while his cut finger is with them in the room. And they don’t remember anything of what happened the night before.

Then it becomes your turn to fill in the blanks from The Hangover – even up till the final scene (hint: it’s exactly the same as the first movie). The movie features the same actors and actresses as the first one in exactly the same attitude they had in the first movie as well.

So yeah, I did not really fancy The Hangover 2. When it comes to sequels, if the only thing you’re going to offer an audience is an exact rehash of the original movie, just don’t do it – for the sake of the franchise’s name. After all, the only thing The Hangover 2 is offering is a very bad rep for the first movie, which everyone liked. I hope they don’t have a third one in the making since part 2 is making a lot of money as well.

Monster (Single Review) – Paramore

Monster is the new single by Paramore that will serve as the lead single of their upcoming album as well as the single off the new Transformers movie.

It is also the first single by Paramore since the group’s founders, the Faro brothers, decided to leave them due to “irreconcilable differences” with lead vocalist Hayley Williams. And the song is all about that.

The Faro brothers have had many statements issued regarding their departures, portraying Hayley Williams as a person who made the whole band revolve around her and turning their sound into a music label product. Monster is Hayley’s way of firing back. And she is firing with an automatic.

The song opens up: “You were my conscience, so solid, now you’re like water” to set the tone for the dying relationship before she ends the first verse with “I let my heart go…. But I’ll get a new one and come back for the hope that you’ve stolen.”

And then she starts singing the chorus:

“I’ll stop the whole world, I’ll stop the whole world
From turning into a monster and eating us alive
Don’t you ever wonder how we survive?
Well now that you’re gone, the world is ours”

And in case the previous lyrics were not enough, the second verse is only there to let the doubters know that this, in fact, is Hayley’s manifesto against the Faro brothers: “I’m only human, I’ve got a skeleton in me
but I’m not the villain, despite what you’re always preaching.”

I have found the song to be absolutely brilliant. You can’t even discern the fact that Paramore are two members less when you hear the scorching electric guitar on some parts of the song. And since the lyrics are so personal to her, Hayley’s delivery is impeccable. I have always been a fan of her vocals and this song only fortifies that. Monster is the song that you’d expect from Paramore as their lead single: guitars and drums and the rock style they’ve come to be known for. Some people are saying that their isn’t much innovation in their sound with their song. And I agree. But the question is: does an artist constantly need to innovate to stay relevant? Absolutely not. That doesn’t mean that an artist should rehash the same stuff that made him/her popular in the first place, but that doesn’t mean that whenever an artist becomes popular, he’s not allowed to follow the formula of what caused that popularity in the first place. Besides, it’s not like Paramore have singles constantly being overplayed on radio for them to establish a “sound” that becomes glued to listeners’ ear. Yes, I’m looking at you Ke$ha.

Paramore is a band that will have the stigma of being a “teenager” punk-rock band, constantly stuck with it. Why? because that is how it started. Monster is the first step in the direction of them going the more “adult” route because the topic being discussed, while applicable to teenagers and their lives (the song is about love and loss after all), is quite mature. And not only is Monster a great leading single with meaning, but it’s also insanely catchy. Try not to get the line “I’ll stop the whole world from turning into a monster” stuck in your head and then get back to me.

All in all, I absolutely love this. Call it guilty pleasure or simply music that I like, but Paramore is one of those rare bands whose songs just click for me, without being grating on my nerves. And Monster is a good, very good song.

Listen up:

X-Men: First Class – Movie Review

Ever since the first X-Men movie was released more than a decade ago, I was fascinated by the saga and the upcoming sequels did not deter me from still liking it.

X-Men: First Class is both literally and figuratively a return to basics. It is both the prologue to all X-Men movies that were released before it and it is also a return to form of a series that kinda lost its way with trying to build too much history and subplot.

Erik Lehnsherr is a teenage boy, imprisoned in German Nazi concentration camps. When Dr. Schmidt sees him move a metal gate as his parents are taken away from him, he summons Erik and asks him to move a metal coin. Erik fails, with devastating consequences that lead to great anger, launching Erik’s powers of controlling metal and killing two guards on the spot.

Fast forward twenty years and Erik (Michael Fassbender) is on a mission to find Dr. Schmidt and kill him in revenge. On the other hand, Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) is seeking a PhD in Genetics with his research about the upcoming mutations in the human species. Charles, along with shape-shifter Raven (later known as Mystique and played by the awesome Jennifer Lawrence *insert fanboy hearts*) are trying to find other people of their kind and help them accept their condition. That’s when they are recruited by the CIA in order to prevent a nuclear war between the US and Russia, a war that is spearheaded by the present form of Dr. Schmidt, Sebastian Shaw (Kevin Bacon), a mutant whose power is deadly and his group of mutants who will do their best to bring destruction.

James McAvoy, as young Dr. Charles Xavier, is in a role he was born to play. I couldn’t imagine a better actor in this role simply because McAvoy embodies the serenity that Xavier has in the previous movies, set in the future compared to this one, perfectly. He is wise, calm and intelligent, exactly as the future Dr. X is.

On the other hand, Fassbender is as great in portraying Erik, later known as Magneto. He sets the tone for the character we all know later on amazingly well: the many layers that shape this man and his beliefs. And he does so perfectly.

Jennifer Lawrence, who portrays a younger Mystique, is absolutely stunning both literally and figuratively in that portrayal. Mystique (or as she is known in this movie: Raven) controls her powers really well. But her weakness is acceptance. She hates her blue-scaled look and seeks out a much more “acceptable” form as a human. Her path in the movie is first and foremost one towards self-acceptance, with which she will also help Henry McCoy (later known as Beast) to accept his mutation as well.

X-Men: First Class is fueled by the directing chops of Matthew Vaughn, whose latest offering was Kick Ass, a very interesting movie if you haven’t seen it. And you need to give lots of props to this director for taking what was, according to many (I still enjoyed the movies), a sagging franchise and breathed new life into it by reinvigorating its past and reminding everyone how it all started.

Why is it that Dr. Xavier is paralyzed? How did Magneto get that weird helmet he wears to prevent Dr. X from accessing his mind? How did the term X-Men originate? How did both sides of the battle (call them good and evil) originate? X-Men: First Class answers all these questions and more. It is a movie that doesn’t pretend to be something it isn’t. X-Men has always been a saga about the fine line between good and evil and how that line gets blurred often. This one is no different. You feel that both sides of the equation have things going for them. It doesn’t show one side in a good light and the other in a bad light. Both have strong and true convictions. You get to choose the side you want to be on.

2011 is shaping up to be a great movie for superhero movies. After the highly entertaining Thor (my review), X-Men: First Class steps it up. And with more superhero movies to come, it will take a mighty effort for them to overtake the caliber that this movie presents. Go watch it now. You will be absorbed for over two hours. Your move, Captain America.

Lady Gaga Unbanned in Lebanon

It looks like our lovely General Security peeps have put their paws up because they were born this way – and that is bipolar.

Mere days after they banned the release of Lady Gaga’s new album, Born This Way, they have revoked their decision and released the album at various Virgin Megastore outlets, the country’s leading music retailer.

While I am all for the decision since I’m against banning the album in the first place, regardless of content, I have to wonder what changed their minds. Could it be the overwhelming pressure from bloggers and social media users? I hardly think so. It might have simply been a case of them looking at the tracklist, seeing the words: Bloody Mary, Black Jesus, Judas and deciding that this is offensive – which is exactly how Lebanese censorship works, by the looks of it: scan the outside, it if doesn’t pass, cut it.

Well, I, for one, am not buying the album simply because I’m not willing to cough up a ridiculous amount of money for it – money that I’d rather spend elsewhere. But for Gaga’s Lebanese “little monsters” as they call themselves, they are already flocking down to Virgin Megastore to buy the singer’s album, as reported by twitter user BilalWH.

And as Lady Gaga would tell her little monsters: just put your paws up, because round one goes to you.

The Rihanna “Man Down” Controversy

Prior to this weekend, I was about as knowledgeable about a song and video for Rihanna titled Man Down as I am about quantum physics.

Which basically means: I have no clue.

But soon enough, I get many of my followers on Twitter retweeting Rihanna’s charged tweets:

“I’m a 23 year old rockstar with NO KIDS! What’s up with everybody wantin me to be a parent? I’m just a girl, I can only be your/our voice! Cuz we all know how difficult/embarrassing it is to communicate touchy subject matters to anyone especially our parents! And this is why! Cuz we turn the other cheek! U can’t hide your kids from society, or they’ll never learn how to adapt! This is the REAL WORLD!”

Those leading the campaign against the Man Down video are the Parent’s Television Council for the video’s portrayal of murder and rape. And honestly, this is overly melodramatic.

1) There are many TV shows with full length episodes about murder and rape. Did they call out to get them banned?

2) The song is about shooting a man down. What would the video be about? Rihanna dancing in a field of corns?

3) As Rihanna said, she is only 23, and as a person who has already been the victim of domestic abuse, she is allowed to speak up more than anyone else, especially that she hasn’t tackled the issue, at least to my knowledge, in depth.

4) If parents are worried their children would act out on the video, then maybe they’re not doing a good enough job of raising them? If a child or teenager thinks they need to imitate every single pop music video out there, then we’re in serious trouble. Have you seen what goes on in some of those videos? Why haven’t that council spoken about the near orgies going on in pop music nowadays?

5) Again with controversies, the only thing they do is shed light on something that most people would be unaware of. I would have gladly resumed my life without “Man Down” and would have remained clueless about the song hadn’t it been for the Parent’s Television Council. And for that matter, blowing this way out of proportion is definitely not the way to handle it.

Check out the Man Down video here: