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I watched Pixar's "Ratatouille" last Sunday, it was one of the greatest experience I've ever get from western animation, even though the movie left me speechless... I have to write something about it, so here it is. Cooking Mama, please step aside for a sec 'cuz Remy's in the house!
Storywise/ Writing - I can say that I'm not a big fan of western animation, why? I think it's because of the cultural differences. Western pieces always focus on production issues, like superb animations, nice models/drawings, lightings and renderings more than the actual experience the audience could get from the depth of the story. (For me, lots of Japanese childish-liked animes even have better and deeper storyline than serious western productions) ... Ratatouille is one of the very few western pieces which could break that thought I had in my mind. The story (written by Brad Bird, Jim Capobianco and Jan Pinkava) is very well written, simple but strong, exciting but heart-warming.
It takes you to the heart of Paris where a rat named "Remy" seeks his way to become a great chef following the footsteps of "Gusteau", a legendary french chef as well as Remy's mentor. Normally story about cooking are really difficult to handle and to portray the joy and excitement of making/creating foods is much more difficult, but Ratatouille had proved to me that not only the Japanese and Cantonese could make great cooking movies. It's screenplay (also by Brad Bird) is awesome and this is the first time that I felt a strong "message" being delivered to the audience through a western piece.
Direction/ Art direction - Brad Bird directing is superb and the art directions in this movie are so gorgeous, I couldn't find a word to say about them, you've got to see it for yourself.
Animations - Need to say more about Pixar's quality of animation? Even I'm not a big crazy fanboy/worshiper of Pixar but I could say their animations are one of the best we've got from the world of illusionists.
Musics - "Diverseness" is the word I will give to the music works of Ratatouille, so much variation of styles yet contained the theme, the feeling, unity of atmosphere. Beautiful works which made me wanted to get my hands on western OST for the first time in so many years. They are "Beauties" to your ears!
(My) Conclusion - As I usually say "I'm not a movie critic/reviewer", I'm just one guy who loves movies (but not to the context of "craze") and also a person, "a guy" who loves to cook. I think Ratatouille captured the core of food creating, the love for food and illustrated them onto the screen with superb story writing as well as other quality aspects, making it one of the most memorable experience a western animation has to offer.
Score 
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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I went to see Kon Satoshi's
"Paprika" last weekend. So far I think this is one good movie, as one can expect
from this talented director. Need spice for your imagination?, you may want to try Paprika.
Storywise/ Writing - I think Paprika goes to the
most surrealistic film Satoshi ever made talking about dreams and
people who try to use science and technology to study/manipulate
dreams, so be expecting something very weird. One thing I felt about
the writing of Paprika, it's still light for a moral/psychological play
like this, but it's still good. If you don't like psychological or
surreal stuffs, then this movie isn't for you (because you'd probably
felt like wasting money) , but I still recommend because of following
factors.
Direction/ Art direction - If you've watched most of
his previous pieces, one would knows that his movies aren't only about
stories. It's his artistic directing skill that made them so gorgeous.
Art direction in Paprika is superb! I'd say I put this movie at the
same level as "Sennen Joyu" (Milennium Actress) for art direction.
Animations - Do I have to say anything, ones who
love animation would know that Satoshi's productions are very beautiful
and compelling, these go to Paprika as well.
Musics - Only thing I could say about the music of
Paprika is "Brilliant", Hirasawa Susumu's music works for this movie
just left me speechless, beautiful melodies but strong compositions and
very emotional, inspiring music I'd say. If you love the music from
Sennen Joyu or Moso Dairinin (Paranoia Agent), you'd definitely love
this movie's scores. The track "Nigeru Mono" really helped building up
the opening sequences of this movie like what "Chiyoko (Mode 1)" did to
the opening of Sennen Joyu. (Talking about "Art of introduction", The
combination of Satoshi's vision and Susumu's musics never failed me
even for once!)
(My) Conclusion - I'm not a movie critic/reviewer, I
don't know how would they judge a piece like this. But for me I
always took everything that counts into my consideration before
concluding everything. Paprika still have some way to go compared to
Satoshi's older masterpieces as the story itself seems a bit short (for
me) and may be confusing for a person who's not used to this kind of
surreal style. (It also made us debate about some part of the actings
as I didn't see any problem while my buddies felt some parts didn't
make sense or clear enough) but taking every other factors like
direction, animation and music work into account, Paprika is a movie,
well I'd say an art piece, worth spending your money on.
Score - 
Overall Paprika is better than Tokyo Godfather in many respective
aspects. It's art direction and atmosphere are competitive with Sennen
Joyu, but the whole experience still couldn't make it to the level of
"Sennen Joyu" and "Perfect Blue" (Which I gave 5 stars for each), but
whether or not you like it may have to depend on your own taste and
preference
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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Have you ever wished you have more than 24 hours a day? I do... since I always work as hard and as much as possible to compete with time, but time flown by easily while my body and mind suffered different burn-out effects, and when I took some breaks to regain energy... I've got outrun by time...
Anyway, since I was so busy working on my new project as well as learning new software, I didn't really have time to update my main web site "properly", so I'd just post stuffs here on my blog first...
This is the look of the 3D model from my new design of "Killer Bunny", I put "Prototype" because I still haven't modeled her the helmet with bunny ears (this one was created as a temporary for the time being) as well as given her textures... and I do need to get some animation going so let's leave her like this first. (You can also Click Here to view the full-sized image with different views of hers)
All of your feedbacks and critiques are more than welcome!
Cheers!
Pomme-Genozide
www.GenozytE.com
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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Millenium Actress, when journey of one woman becomes one of the greatest adventure ever.
(I've been busy working on my new project I even forgot about updating my blog, now I'm still busy but I decided to update it with the first review article I've ever written, quite sometime already. Hope you like it)
OVERVIEW
Millenium Actress (Sennen Joyu) is a master piece from Satoshi Kon, the well-known director of Perfect Blue, Tokyo Godfather and Paranoia Agent. The story takes you along with Tachibana Genya, a filmmaker, and Kyoji,
his cameraman on their journey of finding the long disappeared actress,
Fujiwara Chiyoko.
As they met the aged actress and Genya presented a piece of her long
lost precious... the interview,or I might say, the adventure of a girl
named "Chiyoko" began...
For the back story, I would say things that I mentioned above is more
than enough for anybody who haven't seen this movie, no need for you to
get more information or preview or anything since the funs and
impressions of an adventure lie within the adventure itself, right?
For storytelling aspect I'd say this is one of the best already, since
I've watched so many animes (as well as Mangas), this is the first time
(and one of a few times) that I really see the whole character
development, and the story itself is so simple you feel like Chiyoko's
just an ordinary fine lady, so simple you'll be dragged into this
heart-warming film before you ever known.
Thanks to the script written by Satoshi Kon & Sadayuki Murai which
will bring you the magic of Millenium Actress, but the story itself is
just only "a part" of the so called "Magic".
My IMPRESSION
Another part of "Magic" of Millenium Actress is the style and
art-direction, if I say something more than this, I'm afraid it'd ruin
your appetite for this movie, I can only say that from the moment Genya
started Chiyoko's interview session, the magic of art started casting
on the whole movie you're watching.
The style of this movie itself is enough to make Millenium Actress a
worth collecting movie, everything from the acting of characters to
colors to cutting to compositions is brilliant! Either watching it from
a normal audience, art-direction or production perspectives, this is a
very high quality work... and a piece of art.
The music scores by Hirasawa Susumu are nothing but another and the
final part of "magic" which brings Millenium Actress to life. The music
goes along very well with the pictures showing on screen, and the
only words I can use to describe the music of this piece is. Imagining the magic you feel with your ears in the masterpiece "Cinema
Paradiso"
CONCLUSION
I guess this is the end of my review, but it's not the end of
Chiyoko. Usually I'd never give these much positive feedback to any
pieces of movie, manga or anime like Millenium Actress before,
of all those mangas (160+ titles) and animes (50+ titles) I've ever
experienced (including the masterpieces like Monster, 20th Century
Boys, Akira-the comic and Studio Ghibli's movies), it wouldn't be a
over-exaggerated if I say Millenium Actress is my best impression among
all Anime/Manga.
Other than the movie itself, the commentary part of Millenium Actress
is another well-made piece I'd like to talk about, unlike other
commentary feature of most movie, the one for this movie is told by
imaginary Tachibana Genya as we're actually watching the documentary
made by him. Normally I've never feel like giving comments for
commentary parts since they're mostly information pieces, but this 40
minutes comentary is really worth watching.
Pomme-Genozide
www.GenozytE.com
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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After struggling with my character concept for a while, with help and suggestions from some of the cool people at itemStudio (Thai), I've got the final (or almost final) concept for my "Girl" character. Mixing between the old and new designs, I've finally come back to "The Killer Bunny", but this time she's different! This is how she looks like.
Well, I still have to fight my way through another one (or may be two) characters for my next 3D project, but with this momentum I have right now, I guess it shouldn't take too long. 
Pomme-Genozide
www.GenozytE.com
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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| I couldn't get the Nintendo Wii, for the third attempt.
I was so disappointed...
but unable to get the Wii was not the reason for my disappointment at all, there were something more than that! |
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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| Today I've missed the chance to put my hands on Nintendo Wii again, by the time I got to the store, they were all sold out. It's not a big deal but it made me think back about a thing I learned from the faculty of economics back in university.
Could Say's Law's "Supply creates its own demand." be applied to the case of Nintendo Wii's demand and supply situation? |
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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| I had a chance to watch this beautiful piece of animated short called "The Stain" by Sittisak Jiamphotjamarn, a young artist from Thailand. I was so impressed by it so I contacted him to get to know more about him as well as to get the permission to feature his short here on Genozyte: Blog. |
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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| Just tried to change some of the design for this girl's armors and fists, this is the 1st time I put my hands on "Corel Painter", it was fun though. |
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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| Heroes... someone who comes to help when you're in trouble. Do you believe in heroes?
The story of Ping Pong (an adaptation of the original comic by Taiyo Matsumoto, directed by Fumihiko Sori) evolves around 2 high school Ping Pong (Table Tennis) players and childhood friends, "Peco" Hoshino (Yôsuke Kubozuka) and "Smile" Tsukimoto (Arata), who have totally different characters. Peco is a lively and over-confident player who dreams of becoming the world champion, while his best friend, Smile, is somehow an anti-social person (he's got the nickname "Smile" because he does rarely smile) who plays Ping Pong just to kill time.
They seem to lead their usual lifestyles and playing styles normally until the turning point, the Inter-High Tournament, sets in. Competing against skilled players like "Akuma" Sakuma (Koji Ookura) Peco's childhood friend/rival, "China" Kong (Sam Lee) an international student from Shanghai and "Dragon" Kazama (Shido Nakamura) the Inter-High champion of Japan, Peco and Smile have to face their own weaknesses big time.
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Posted by Pomme-Genozide at
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