Captain Marvel came out this weekend but I have other engagements and so cannot nerd out intelligently. Instead, please enjoy a curated selection of movies from the past year that I consider exceptional in one way or another. As always, there are nine because there’s always space for one more. 9. Bumblebee Look, I’m as… Continue reading Top Nine Movies of 2018
Tag: Crazy Rich Asians
On Crazy Rich Asians
Crazy Rich Asians is an odd beast for me. It’s a movie based on a book I didn’t really like, but oddly it’s one where I do like the movie over the book. More than that, though, it’s a book set in Singapore, a country I’m not used to seeing on screen. Also where, of… Continue reading On Crazy Rich Asians
Yellow (流星)
I have A Lot of thoughts about the movie adaption of Crazy Rich Asians. Far more thoughts that I’ve had time to write down. Much of that is wrapped up in the fact that it’s set in Singapore and I have a very complicated relationship with that country, owing to it, well, being where I… Continue reading Yellow (流星)
Characters Like Poetry
I talk about characters a lot on this blog. Okay, this blog’s been around long enough that you could say I talk about anything a lot. But that’s not the point. The point is characters. Like how in Crazy Rich Asians there aren’t really characters so much as vague ciphers used to progress a not-really-there… Continue reading Characters Like Poetry
Trusting The Story
I was initially hesitant to watch Dunkirk, given that it seemed like Christopher Nolan being as Nolan-y as possible. Which, after The Dark Knight Rises and Interstellar, wasn't terribly enticing. The Dark Knight Rises was long on ideas and short on smooth implementation. Interstellar too had big ideas but lacked the characterization they needed to… Continue reading Trusting The Story
Hanging Out
Upon having it recommended to me independently by two friends, I’ve finally started reading The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet. And the book’s delightful; it’s a space opera about people on a ship written by a writer who’s clearly seen the same movies, read the same books, and played the same video games… Continue reading Hanging Out
Why Am I Reading This?
There aren’t a lot of books that take place in Singapore. Wikipedia’s category page for Novels Set in Singapore lists only twenty-six. Now, there are books missing from that list (I added one to the list while writing this), but let’s take this as a sample group. A cursory glance shows that many of these… Continue reading Why Am I Reading This?
Essays, Not Rants! 