Of Swords and Parasols

Tsukihime: Lunar Legend-A short(12 episode) anime about a boy who's eyes somehow give him the ability to slice people into little bits(it's a recent realization for him) who ends up being the bodyguard of a 1000-ish year old vampire.  It was good, but confusing, and so complex that you'd need to watch it several times to really get it.  That said, the music was lovely and it had some of the prettiest anime animation I've seen, and an interesting, if odd, romance.

Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children-Considering that this movie almost completely relies on your having played a game(it's a sequel) that I haven't played and hadn't even heard of before the movie came stateside, I'm still surpised by how much I like this.  With a few exceptions, though, it's pretty accessible.  Mostly though, it's lots of fun, and I adore Vincent(and his cape...it can't hold a cell phone, but it can hide little girls while they rightly chew out their guardians for always taking off and doing their own thing) and Reno(such a dork...I love him every time he shows up) and very much like the Cloud/Tifa pairing(actually, it's rare for me to ship a pairing as much as I do them just from a movie, but hey...if ever a guy needed his friends to whack him over the head and tell him to get over his guilt problems and go make babies with the girl, it's Cloud...heck, Reno and Rude seem to think they're an old married couple anyway)  Tifa is also the kind of heroine I tend to latch on to(well, one of the kinds)  The girl who's more than good enough against your normal opponent, but completely out of her league with the guys she's up against, but still doesn't back down.

Prince Valiant: The Complete Collection: Vol 2-Pretty much the same as I had to say about the first volume.  I really like the take on Arthurian legend(and that they just added their own story to it, instead of rewriting the same old stuff) and the characters.  Though...I did have my one problem with the animation...Aleta looks a LOT like Rowanne...you can really only tell the difference because of their hair at times.

I'm also 5 episodes into the tdrama Meteor Garden, and liking it quite a bit, though I'm still adjusting to the change in pace from Hana Yori Dango.  Dao Ming Si(as well as the Soujiro and Akira equivalents...haven't caught their names yet) is more immediately endearing than Domyouji is(in particular, the scene where the 2 male students harass her...in HYD, we see no reaction to this from him, and when he tells them to harass her, it comes across as what they do is what he's telling them to do.  In contrast, it's made extremely clear that Dao Ming Si did NOT want them to do anything like that and disapproved, a lot.  There's also the fact that the HYD guys seemed to plan to do a lot more than steal a kiss and tear her clothes-which is more than bad enough-which didn't help Domyoji's case)  That said, I don't feel anything resembling the instant love for Lei that I did for Rui, though he's growing on me.

Also started(well, restarted-I watched the first 2 discs back when it first came stateside) Samurai Champloo.  It's clicking better this time around than it did the first.  Don't get me wrong, I liked it, I just didn't connect well with it.  Like Cowboy Bebop, it's still a little too much "Style over substance" to me, but its more in the vein of the style I like, and I do rather like the characters.  Jin is rather my anime type(if saner than what I usually go for) and Mugen/Fuu are quite cute.  If psychotic.

I went on a slight movie binge earlier this week, and likely will fairly soon again(that backlog got large-ish recently)

 (6) Blood Rain: this is a Korean movie set in the 1800s, about the investigation into a serial killer who is killing informers who accused a former town official of being a christian(apparently a crime at the time) and is killingt hem in the same methods, in order, that the official's family was killed, to try to force him to confess.  It was good and pretty interesting, and I wish I'd paid more attention while I watched it, because it also had what is likely the most graphic death I've seen in a movie, and had animals dying on scene...by that, I mean that we actually see chickens' heads getting chopped off.  Good as it was, I don't think I could rewatch it.

(7-9) Breakfast at Tiffany's, Sabrina, and Roman Holiday: No sooner did I get the Audrey Hepburn boxed set than I started watching it.  All the movies more than lived up to their classic status, though each had  several moments where I had the remind myself that these movies are the reason that the cliches exist.  I liked Breakfast at Tiffany's quite a lot, but I hope it never gets remade.  Why?  Because it's a movie about a call girl and a kept man growing up and falling in love with each other.  Here it's great, but modern moviemakers would feel compelled to make it wallow in angst and depression and have them go on about how wretched they are and how they should better themselves and there'd be a kidd given up for adoption or a miscarriage or...*shudders and moves on*  As much as I love the Ford/Ormond/Kinnear version of Sabrina, I happily admit that this one is far superior.  While I think Ford and Ormond are the closest among modern actors who could have pulled off the role, there's really no comparing to Audrey or Bogey.  That said, while I liked Holden just fine, I preferred Kinnear's David to his...Kinnear came across more as immature and in fascinated shock at Sabrina's return, whereas Holden feels more like a cad.  I also missed one of my favorite moments from the remake, when Sabrina first comes home and David is still trying to figure out who she is, and Linus, without even actually stopping to look at her, recognizes her at a glance and blithely goes "Hello Sabrina" and ruins her fun.  I think my favorite of the set, though, was Roman Holiday, though I may change my mind if I rewatch it and Sabrina in a month or two.  It was wonderfully straightforward and refreshing, and not only does Gregory peck get to originate the most reused scene and speech of all big secret/revenge fiction, but it has what's probably one of the best straightforward, don't-tack-on-a-happy-ending-just-to-have-one movie endings this side of Casablanca.

(10) Death Note: The Movie I already talked about the other day.

(11) Brother Beat:  This one is a live action japanese drama about three brothers, now in their early twenties, who were raised by their single mother after their father's death 15 years earlier.  Since their mother,despite trying hard, is effectively useless, theoldest brother, Tatsuya, takes on the role of both mother and father.  The series is excellent, but has the misfortune of being almost completely overlooked by the dorama community, as it aired during the asme season of Nobuta wo Produce(excellent) and 1 Litre of Tears(I'm told it's also excellent, but I have no intentions of everwatching it, even if it does have Fujiki Naohito, whose name I can never spell correctly)

12) Prince Valiant: The Complete Collection: Vol 1: Prince Valiant is one of those properties I've wanted to check out in any form for a long time, but never had the chance to, until now.  It held up quite well, though not quite as well as Gargoyles *shakes fist at the sheer criminality of there being no official DVDs for the second half of season 2* and instead of trying to redo Arthurian mythos, it uses it as a backdrop of young people aspiring to be knights of the round table, and only touches on a few pieces of the actual mythology, which is something a lot of Arthurian tales could learn from. *stares at certain movies that, while very good on their own merits, don't hold up as retellings of King Arthur*  Some of the later episodes(which I believe are early season 2 episodes) are a little too heavy handed in their messages, but I liked it quite a bit and will definately be adding the second set to my collection, when I can.

Currently Watching: Cowboy Bebop(anime, fun but a little too much "style over substance" so far) and Magicians of Love(taiwanese live action series, insnely fun and over the top and I should take a break, but can't seem to)  goal for the week is the rest of those 2(including CB movie) and the oter 2 Audrey Hepburn movies in my backlog.