Monthly Archives: February 2007

so maybe i didn’t make it to any of the indie films, but i’m totally hitting some of the asian american offerings. there’s one about a kick ass cheerleader high schooler fighting demons, an anime movie, and two films starring aishwarya rai!

so i hereby present to you, (my potential film buddies), the 4 films i MOST want to see and then all the other ones i kind of want to see.

march 17, Saturday

Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior, AMC Van Ness, 12:15pm

Wendy is the popular girl in high school and has her heart set on winning the Homecoming Queen title. Her world is turned upside down when a monk from China, Shen, arrives at her front door with news that she is the latest descendant in a line of powerful female warriors. Her mission is to defeat the evil sorcerer Yan Lo, who re-emerges every 90 years with intentions of world domination. Can Wendy put her Homecoming dreams aside long enough to save the world?

amazingly, this is a Disney original movie that they’re playing at the festival. ha ha ha! it’s like my dream come true.

March 17, Saturday

Mistress of Spices, Castro, 3:30pm

From the creative team of BEND IT LIKE BECKHAM (Opening NIght, SFIAAFF ‘03) comes this magical and heart-warming adaptation of Chitra Divakaruni’s celebrated novel, THE MISTRESS OF SPICES. Bollywood superstar Aishwarya Rai is Tilo, a beautiful but lonely “Spice Mistress,” one of a secret group of women trained in the healing powers of herbs and roots. From her fragrant spice shop in Oakland, California, broken hearts, strained relations and runs of bad luck can all be contained within the remedying powers of fenugreek, chilies and cinnamon. Tilo is bound, however, by the rules of her craft: she may only use her powers for others, can never leave the spice shop, and must never touch another’s skin.

film #1 with Aishwarya Rai. she’s so pretty that i’m pretty much willing to see anything she’s in. though the addition of dylan mcdermott to this film does make me suspicious. and it’s setting in oakland

March 18, Sunday

Umrao Jaan, Castro, 8:30pm

Director J.P. Dutta remains largely faithful to the novel and earlier film as he retells the life saga of Ameeran, who is kidnapped from her village at age eight and sold to an upscale kotha (brothel) in Lucknow. There, in the sophisticated cultural capital of North India, Ameeran is renamed Umrao, trained in music, dance and social etiquette, and groomed to become a courtesan. Years later, and now a stunning adult, Umrao debuts with a breathtaking solo performance before a local dignitary, Nawab Sultan (Abhishek Bachchan, now Rai’s real-life husband). Against all the rules, they fall for each other. But before long, Umrao’s life takes some dramatic, unexpected turns; Sultan is forced to leave town, another dignitary pursues Umrao and the British invasion looms.

film #2 with Aishwarya Rai and in this one she’s a prostitute in period clothing! with arm bangles and the head jewelery and oh man, that’s some good shit.

March 22, Thursday

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, PFA, 7:30pm

Makoto (the niece of the original heroine) is a vivacious—if klutzy—17-year old tomboy who spends her days playing catch after school with her guy pals Kosuke and Chiaki. Her carefree summer days are literally thrown for a loop when she discovers a mysterious ability to leap back through time. Her trivial temporal maneuvers—undoing little blunders or finding out exam questions in advance—soon lead to complicated wrinkles that have an inevitable impact on those around her. And when Chiaki confesses his love for her one day, she not only finds their delicate friendship triangle crumbling, but also that there are some things time can never change—or prevent.

Hosoda is a remarkable new talent who, together with a stellar creative team including art director Nizou Yamamoto (PRINCESS MONONOKE) and character designer Yoshiyuki Sadamoto (NEON GENESIS EVANGELION), has crafted a magical and surprisingly affecting film full of humor, warmth and the bittersweet pangs of first love.

wanna see! wanna see! eeee!

Other films I kind of want to see:

thursday, 3/15: finishing the game (comedy spoof about casting for bruce lee’s last role after he died)

friday, 3/16: big trouble in little china (on the big screen. tempting)

saturday, 3/17: shanghai kiss (oddly, it’s got the cheerleader from ‘heros’, and then kelly hu and the kareoke salesman from ‘keeping the faith’.), the end of the world as we know it (shorts, some of which look hilarious)

sunday, 3/18: american pastime (baseball in concentration camps! who doesn’t see the fun in that?), pavement butterfly (silent film from 1929), footy legends (australian rugby has-beens and a dream), king and the clown (south korean homosexuality and court jesters), Third I South Asian Shorts 2007 (mostly i’m interested in the animated scenes from the ‘Ramayama’).

wednesday, 3/21: exiled (big names from hong kong but it’s a thriller/drama about hit-men)

it looks as if my invitation to fight did not actually drum up interest in the CH birthday party. it did lose me kim as a friend though. in hopes of rectifying my banning from sushi zone, i’ve taken some photos.

my brother gave me a plastic model sushi set (since he knows how much i really love sushi) and kim, here’s puppy eye begging at you, kid. look how sad i am eating only rice! let me have some delicious raw salmon!

in one final, (truthful), attempt to gain party-goers, i also present you with a photo of my brilliant (and disgusting) CH-themed jell-O shots. i tried one of the pink ones and almost puked. though i could see the alcohol fumes wafting out of my mouth. i might be drunk. all right, i’m not drunk. but if i ate like…4, i might be tipsy. the yellow ones do smell worse, but maybe they taste better. here’s hoping.

so come celebrate the 5th birthday of cementhorizon. rsvp at cementhorizon.com for the address if you don’t have it already. 8pm tonight.

and no punching!

today i bought the jello with which to make jello shots. flavors: strawberry kiwi and island pineapple. this is going to be revolting. i’m no longer sure why i volunteered to make these. i don’t plan on really eating/drinking/oh come on, just slurping, many of them. AND i realized they’ll be full of horse hooves thus negating their appeal to the vegetarians of the group. but people, do you not remember the oreo cookie cheesecake fiasco of 1998? can you really afford to pass up anything i make with gelatin in it? that cheesecake was a taste sensation, all right? i can still remember the looks on your faces when you bit into it and it tried to wiggle away from your bicuspids. good times, good times.

(maybe we could just have a jello food fight? shh, keep it on the downlow, if the hosts find out they might disinvite us)

why am i pre-emptively trying to cause a riot? why?

and so the sand in the hourglass of our life pours pornographic gold into my lap.

i’m perusing the high school newspaper/magazine thing today when a story about a visiting exchange student catches my eye. in it he is describing a traditional easter ritual from his home country.

he says,

“Easter is a very fun holiday in the Czech Republic. All the girls stay home and decorate the eggs while the men put together twigs to make decent whipping sticks [already you can see this story going somewhere beautiful, can’t you?].

“The guys then go around like trick-or-treating [!!!] and gently [!] hit the girls on their bottom and ask for eggs.”

boys, we’re instituting a little czech this easter. who’s with me?

…………………………………………………………………..when’s easter?

in preparation for the knock-down, drag-out fight i know is coming this saturday at the CH birthday bash, i’ve been taking instruction from some of the punk high school girls i work with. yesterday at the library, they showed me the many, many scars on their knuckles from punching other girls in the face who had braces. now, former friends, aren’t you glad none of us has metal teeth straighteners? no one has to get permanently marked here. let’s all remember that when the fists start flying.

for five years now i’ve been lying. for i am an evil care bear deciever (which you would understand if you too had endured the ridiculous ghost rider movie). the thing is that i don’t even like sushi. raw fish? that’s disgusting.

in retribution for this five year long deception, come to the CH 5 year birthday party and punch me in the face. see you there.

WHEN: Saturday, February 24, starting 8pm

WHERE: the Castro, San Francisco. email rsvp at cementhorizon.com for the exact address.

more info in previous post here.

the whales may have been going to mate in baja, but some of the dolphins mated right in front of us.

pictures of me, sean, gene, kristen, and nuala whale watching (for free!) in santa barbara here.