I picked this up in the interests of trying out more title in the genre of Chinese RPGs. This one is apparently a classic of the genre, being a modern remake of an older and very famous game. As I understand it, the original game held an official license for using the intellectual property of Jin Yong. This sequel doesn’t possess the license any longer and so does away with the more direct references. But it is still crammed with pretty much every kung fu that ever appeared in every one of his novels, plus much else including that of Gu Long. Basically any famous martial art, clan, trope or item you can think of in wuxia, you will be able to find it here.
I’d always known that this film was a huge cultural phenomenon and remember being puzzled by it as I couldn’t make head or tails of the videogame adaptation back in the day. Now that I’ve finally watched it I can understand why it’s a cult hit, as it features performances by such musical greats as Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin and James Brown. But overall, it’s just too ridiculous and too long of a film for me to like it very much.
The Satanic Temple, a religious group that purports to worship Satan, made international news with their bold statue of Baphomet some years back and this documentary is about the organization itself. As it turns out, the members do not actually worship Satan and do not even believe in the existence of Satan but they do make use of the imagery and Christian mythology to effectively troll Christians and to defend challenges against the separation of state and religion in the United States.
Director Lee Tamahori made his name with the fantastic Once Were Warriors about Maoris in his native New Zealand and now after a long career spent in Hollywood he’s returned to the subject. It even stars the same actor Temuera Morrison, now of course much aged, playing the role of the patriarch of a large Maori family in the 1950s. This one leans a little too heavily on the sentimental side for me but is nevertheless a strong period drama about a setting that is still underexplored.
I had no idea this collection of short stories by Greg Egan existed until it popped up as a Kindle recommendation for me. Needless to say I immediately snapped it up though I had already read two of the eleven stories it includes elsewhere. I was also quite pleased that three of the stories, including Bit Players that I’ve read before and liked a lot, are all part of a larger story and could actually be taken together as a short novel.
I was a big fan of the Deadwood series but it was cancelled after three seasons without reaching any kind of resolution. This movie was made to finally give it a proper ending but it comes very, very late, and the various performers have all aged out of their roles. In fact, a few of them died in the nearly 15 intervening years. Unfortunately while the intent to finally provide closure to fans is laudable, this is simply not a good film and basically amounts to a rehash of the final season.
It’s always a real pleasure to watch cinema of a country to which we’ve had no prior exposure as it involves dipping into an entirely new culture and people. This one is not quite a purely Georgian film as its director Levan Akin and the production company are Swedish. Still the performers are all Georgian and it’s set entirely in the country so it counts. Of course it helps as well that this is a strong film that deserves the widespread acclaim it has received from critics.
