We’re in Hong Kong!!

Actually, as of right now, I’m in Beijing doing some volunteer camera and editing work for the International Nature-Loving Association‘s Fifth International Youth Dance Festival. We did two shows, one on August 10th and the other on August 11th, and overall it was an unexpectedly awesome experience.

Before I started working, I had the mentality of just getting it done and over with as I was in Hong Kong for only two days before I flew to the North City of China. But once I started working, getting more responsibilities and meeting new people, not only did I start to like being in the Communist Capital (no Facebook, YouTube or Twitter – it sucks, I know) but it renewed my passion for film, television and media productions.

I’ll post more about my Beijing trip once I return to Hong Kong and get actual rest. For now, turn your attention to a great photo I took during the two days I was in Hong Kong:

What is he holding? What is he doing looking down the drain? This was taken after an Anime and Manga convention, more on that later as well.

-phibz.

The Banana Time Productions presents,
Craft Tempura: Prologue

Craft Tempura is a short stop-motion piece that is set in a world where fruits and vegetables are the dominant species of the planet. The story revolves around a teenage boy of Banana descent setting off on a journey to discover his past and himself. This a prologue to a much wider story that will come to fruition during the course of the coming year. Each episode would require a lot of fruits so we’ll take this project a little slower.

Without further ado – Craft Tempura: Prologue:

Enjoy!

-phibz.

Variety reports in next year’s Academy Awards ceremony, there will be 10 Best Picture nominees. That is twice more than the usual five. Sid Ganis of the Academy says that it will give other types of movies a chance at gold, such as documentary, foreign-language, animated feature and “maybe even a comedy”. In this economy it also won’t hurt films to have more credibility and coverage at the box office.

Since the recession I always thought the film industry, especially Hollywood, was one of few still reeling in the big bucks. I mean, I definitely did not stop going to the theaters when Wall Street crashed, and movie tickets aren’t cheap in Canada. After reading the article, I wasn’t sure if I was happy or angry.

First, after reading that a comedy now has a shot at the Best Picture nomination brought much joy to my heart. I was big supporter of Juno two years ago and I look forward to film of similar caliber to join the big drama boys again. Also, having ten nominations gives the good old indie films a chance as well. Although Slumdog Millionaire certainly proved that an independent picture can win without having to double the nomination slots.

On the other hand – why couldn’t this have happened last year! Last year would have been a great year to have ten Best Picture nominations. I really think the Academy made this decision in response to the huge fan criticism one how they omitted The Dark Knight and Wall-E from the Best Picture category. Lets take a look at last year:

2008 Best Picture nominees:
Frost/Nixon
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button
The Reader

In my opinion, these are the five other films I would’ve included if there were ten slots, and with reason:

Gran Torino

Why this movie failed to received a single nomination is beyond me. Clint Eastwood directed himself in another memorable performance. Eastwood plays Korean war veteran with a very racist vernacular and appears as the antagonist at the beginning of the film but shifts to touch your hearts towards the end. What struck me most was Eastwood’s choice of casting genuine Hmong people who have no acting experience to play the supporting cast. When you watch their performance you don’t notice bad acting, but rather their reactions in real life.

The Dark Knight

TDK got snubbed. Big time. The world was not ready for such an epic film, which is why the Academy is now compensating by doubling the Best Picture nominees. For those of you who’ve seen the film, you know why it should have been nominated. For those of you who haven’t, f*** you. Get off your ass and go watch it. Watching Heath Ledger as The Joker leaves you breathless and wondering if the film should have been called The Joker.

The Wrestler

One of the best slice-of-life dramas I have ever seen. Daron Aronofsky used subtle documentary techniques to show a segment of a post-prime wrestler’s life without having to elaborate a vast backstory. All you needed to know is that he’s old, out of work and clearly has issues, but you love him. Mickey Rourke’s comeback is definitely complete.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

The needed comedy to every Best Picture roster. VCB was a sexy romantic comedy that truly stayed away from its sappy, gut-wrenching conventions. There was no ideal happy ending or a scene with an unnecessary long kiss with a sunset in the background. There was foreign, fun, erotic romance to the point where there was a three-person couple. The dynamics of the relationships between characters accompanied with an optimistic narrator made the picture controversial, questionable but over all stimulating. If you know what I mean.

WALL-E

Arguably the best Pixar animated feature, and this is includes Up. I’d hate to discredit traditional animated classics such as Aladdin or The Lion King, so I would rank WALL-E as the best 3D animated feature film of all time. I would have never imagined an animated film to even dare to have such vivid documentary characteristics. But the environmental context of the film made it work wonderfully. There was no dialogue in first half hour of the film and I assure you, no one found that boring or unnecessary (I think). Our human race is relentlessly trying to create artificial intelligence to assimilate human characteristics, but we’re still very far from succeeding. After watching WALL-E, I can tell you this – Andrew Stanton, is the first to breathe true life, personality and love into robots.

There’s my make-belief list of the Ten 2008 Best Picture nominees.

Don’t stop watching movies, please.

-phibz.

Oscar-nominated British director Steven Daldry, known for Billy Elliot and The Hours, have considered editing his most recent Academy Award-winning picture, The Reader, for Chinese audiences. The sexually explicit film will not be released in theaters across China, but is currently part of the 12th Shanghai International Film Festival. Full story at Hollywood Reporter.

China lacks a ratings system for different age groups, therefore the government requires censorship and re-edits so that every movie that is released caters to all ages. Daldry states that he would consider editing the film depending on “how much they want to take out”. I have respect for Stephen Daldry’s unstubborn attitude towards China’s uptight censorship laws. For a director to go back to the drawing board and redo a piece of work that is already considered complete, in order for the wider world to experience, gets a lot of respect from me. It also makes sense financially as well. China is a billion-person audience that has not been fully tapped into, I’d say its a smart move.

Imagine if Basic Instinct was re-edited and released across China. How boring would that movie be? No leg spreading scene? But then again, the Chinese and Sharon Stone already have beef (around the 0:22 mark):

I hate to weigh out and put numeric value to human life, I really do. But what could justify a person to say an earthquake that killed 80,000+ people to be equivalent to a political struggle for independence between Tibet and China? Something in the back of my head just keeps screaming “Its a dumb blonde comment! Just leave it be!”. Speaking of dumb blondes, here’s a short film I made a couple years back – enjoy:

-phibz

I’m going to delay my movie review for Pixar’s Up a little more, and show you the colour script/storyboard of the movie. It is simple, beautiful and thoroughly proves that a picture is worth a thousand words.

The last image shows more emphasis on Russell’s Asian-ness. If it was a normal illustration or painting, it might be a little offensive, but its the simplistic portrayal of wider story so I think its alright.

More of the colour script at Lou Romano’s blog.

-phibz.

Philbert Lui from our The Banana Times team recently signed on to work with CineFocus Canada, a veteran documentary production company based in Toronto. Along with the several new productions lined up with The Banana Times Productions and Lemon Meringue Productions, Philbert will be assisting CineFocus with their Green Heroes project.

Green Heroes is a multi-platform media project that collaborates online social networking, documentary styles and television to promote, create and inspire environmental content.

Look out for updates from Philbert about this soon.

-TheBananaTimes

I thought I had published this post, but due to some weird problem it remained as a draft. So here it is, with the date stamped on Saturday June 13th 2009.

On this day of wonders, Lester and Alex from Lemon Meringue Productions and I took a mini-road trip to the outskirts of the Greater Toronto Area to scout locations for the upcoming episodes of The Awkward Compilation. We did most of our scouting in two rural communities called Georgetown and Halton Hills. Our mission was to search for a certain scenic area needed in an important scene in the coming installments of Awkward. The mission was successful, but it was not easy. Natural awesomeness is found in this area, so don’t be surprised future The Banana Times Productions projects to be shot here.

We followed digital leads given by Google Maps only to find empty spaces of green. Our first move was to ask the residents of the towns. The cashier from a convenience store didn’t know a thing. But the florist from the nearby grocery store directed us to another florist who lead us to a ‘fragrant’ fertilizer farm who told us the address of another family who gave us our last clue and lead us to a historic farm. That was where we found our natural prop. Success.

Overall it was like we were in a real-life RPG game. Discovering different leads and clues to complete our mission. The rural adventure was great but what struck me most was the lack of Asians, and it was enlightening. Those who see Canada in a non-stereotypical way recognizes us as a hub of multiculturalism and a melting pot of ethnicities. However, this is only prominent in big cities such as Toronto and Vancouver for the most part.

On the outskirts of Toronto, we did not see a single ‘yellow’ person. So I presumed that we would stand out of the predominantly white community, and we did. But no one gave us judgmental glares or leers of surprise. We were generally accepted and every person we talked to were more than helpful. Certainly the multiculturalism has not spread to the rural regions of Canada, but the understanding and acceptance of non-Caucasian people is positively present.

Growing your own livelihood is rooted deeply in many Asian cultures but it did not immigrate to Canada with the population, which is not a bad thing. Canada has a gift of natural tranquility and what seems to be an abundance of green, only if we strive to protect it. As members of the Canadian society we are lucky to have this flourishing environment, and within this, far away from the metropolis lies acceptance of other cultures and races. Another gift we should definitely not take for granted.

-phibz.

The Banana Times Productions presents,
INTER: Uninstall – Behind The Scenes: Goku VS Cell

The following video is a behind-the-scenes clip on the set of INTER: Uninstall. We took a break from serious technological video art to do a classic homage to one of the greatest anime of all time, DragonBall.
INTER: Uninstall can be viewed below this video, or visit us at our YouTube channel – youtube.com/thebananatimes

INTER: Uninstall:

Our previous behind-the-scenes clip shown below, is from the set of INTER: Installation, the prequel to INTER: Uninstall, which is also shown below:

A lot of videos, so check them out

-phibz.

I might be the only one who failed to notice that boy from Pixar’s latest film, Up, is Asian. Like any animation fan, I look forward to Pixar’s annual grandeur. After watching the Up trailer several times, I still failed to identify the little wilderness-exploring chubby kid to be of Asian descent. I only noticed after watching the film in the cinema.

Props to Pixar for not only designing an Asian character but also have a Japanese kid, Jordan Nagai, provide the voice acting. Jordan’s older brother was the one who was scheduled to audition for the role but his non-stop talkative nature caught the attention of the directors. More at Movie Hole’s interview with the creators.

The big screen and 3D goodness made me see the Asian part of the character. It was not obvious, which is great. The eyes are very Asian-like but not blatantly shown to be considered racial stereotyping. And the way they animated the typical thin, spiky, soft Asian hair was also a big hint.

That’s all for now. A movie review on Up coming soon as well as the short film Partly Cloudy shown before the feature. It was very awesomesauce.

-phibz.

Another highly anticipated topic that almost made me explode in my pants, much like Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes. At the recent E3 roundtable press conference, the father of video games Shigeru Miyamoto flirted with the audience by passing around Zelda artwork as a sneak peek into the next Legend Of Zelda game on the Nintendo Wii. More at The Wiire and below.

After having slight suspicions that the girl in the foreground resembled the Master Sword and how Link’s back is missing the scabbard and sword, my mind went on overdrive imagining the possibilities of what could happen in the next Zelda game. Before I could calm down I came across World Zelda Music Radio‘s site and their awesome visual depiction:

Holy awesome-copter! Now I’m thinking could all the classic Zelda weapons morph into spirits as Link’s magical attacking arsenal? The Guardian Forces of Final Fantasy 8 come to mind. Imagine your clawshot transforming into someone like Kurapica from Hunter X Hunter!

Mind is going on crazy creative mode. Gotta write this down to see if I hit anything when the game comes out. They say Nintendo’s going to showcase the game in next year’s E3. Can-Not-Wait.

-phibz.