Yeah I know everybody has been talking about the Susan Boyle hype, I saw the video on youtube and it is certainly amazing, but I sometimes wonder if the world is as perfect as it appears.
I agree she can really sing, but I guess the critical factor for her
success is not merely her talent, but the marketing strategy employed
by the tv producers of the show. These guys really know how to play the
game!
I wouldn't call it a fiction, indeed i see it as a
successful packaging technique that fully utilized the power of the
internet to achieve its goal..
I just read the article below and it sounds quite interesting. See if you agree: http://www.vancouversun.com/Entertainment/Susan+Boyle+Fact+fiction/1521577/story.html
Susan Boyle: Fact or fiction?
By Bart Jackson, Vancouver Sun
Whaddaya mean there's no Santa Claus?!
It's worse than that.
Internet sensation Susan Boyle, who garnered at least 30 million
YouTube views with her Cinderella performance on Britain's Got Talent,
is a player in a giant fraud.
Or is she? She can surely sing, as
evidenced by the tears that flooded the world as the plain Scottish
lass sang the Les Miz hit I Dreamed a Dream.
Suddenly, the
47-year-old self-proclaimed virgin became everybody's sweetheart, the
kind that brings warmth in the middle of a frosty recession.
And
a show did talent curmudgeon Simon Cowell surely put on. Or was it
crusty Cowell's put-on? If the Boyle tour de force was a publicity
ploy, it rocked. From nowhere, she was everywhere: Oprah, Larry King,
newscasts around the globe. Billions of hearts warmed.
Then, out
of New York City, among others, a giant wet blanket was thrown to cool
the planet's ardour. Maureen Callahan in the New York Post noted that
the Boyle event was too perfect: "A dowdy, 47-year-old virgin named
Susan Boyle takes the stage, wearing her low heels and her Sunday best.
"The
crowd laughs at her, and Boyle -- how devastating -- laughs along. She
says she wants to be a professional singer; people laugh harder and
louder. They point. It's grammar school and the Roman Colosseum
combined. Simon Cowell -- panelist and show creator -- rolls his eyes.
And then Susan Boyle sings."
The same conspiracy theories rumbled online. Notes "Rick" on Yahoo:
1)
All of these shows have try-outs to filter out thousands of aspiring
hacks before going on international television. Simon and the other
judges were listening to her for the first time. This is not normal.
2)
The next sign to look for is the clumsy humpty-dumpty music played in
the background at the beginning while she eats a doughnut. . . . The
audience must have the perception of her being totally hopeless before
she sings for maximum affect.
3) The orchestra's music continues
to play in the background even while the judges give their verdicts. As
far as I know, this is the ONLY time this has ever happened in the
history of this show. Simon's vote is saved for last and suspiciously
timed out perfectly before the crescendo of the orchestra. This is
exactly how a movie would plan the same effect to help jerk a few extra
tears from the audience.
Still, if it wasn't the spontaneous
"reality" it pretended to be, the show was staged to perfection. And in
these parlous times, give a fairy tale its due.
I just saw HKFAA on tv, it's showing here on the tvb channel in sf too, first of all, i would certainly like to congratulate all the winners, especially best director, best actor and best actress, somehow i do feel "the way we are" was worth the best picture award more than "ip man", if a film won best director, best actress, best supporting actress and best screenplay, it is hard to believe it couldn't win best picture...
anyway, both are good films and it's more like a subjective choice, so not much to comment.. but then what really pissed me off is the way tvb handled the show... i'm not sure whats wrong with their editing team, the show was heavily butchered and it makes you feel that they had utterly no respect for hk cinema and all the guests...
some of the problems are: - a lot of the winning speeches were cut, the craziest one is probably the lifetime acheivement award, i couldn't believe they would cut josephine siao's speech in the midde.. it shows no respect for siao and the award at all! - some guest's speeches were cut too, e.g. zhou xun and zhang guo-li's part so obvious. even though they dun have any contract with tvb or they are not as popular as those teen idols, did tvb have to really cut their speech which probably just occupied 1 or 2 mins? - the performance was heavily trimmed as well, like the part honoring the deceased, i think i heard the host said there're three singers, including justin lo, but after seeing two in the begnning, it was cut, justin didnt even get a chance to appear, i just wonder if he has done anything wrong and angered tvb? not to mention we couldn't see clearly who actually passed away last year. - the part with jacky cheung and sandy lam's singing was shortened as well, the last part with two songs was gone. - the part with the "seven little fook" was certainly cut as well, i guess one of the attractions for the audience is to see how they look like now, but there is not closeup at all for any of them...
i'm not a tv producer and perhaps commercial and client are the most important for tv production, but still, it is kinda unacceptable for a big show to be butchered like that, especially when it's supposed to be a show that celebrates the 100th year of hk cinema...
tvb's boss mr. run run shaw began his media kingdom making films, and it is hard to believe his staff now dunno how to respect cinema at all...
Do you think those quizzes on facebook are very annoying?
I really don't see the point of taking these stupid quizzes. It is perhaps fun to take one or two, but I really don't get it when people are taking these quizzes endlessly every day, even though they all know it is plain pointless. It is just as irritating as the 古惑仔 game before.
I mean, I don't really care if you like these quizzes, and perhaps it is really funny, but I am just so tired of seeing those quiz results of my friends occupying 90% of my fb home page whenever I log on.
I have never taken any of these stupid quizzes, but I heard that you can actually choose not to send your test result to your friends, right? Honestly, I don't give a damn to any of these results and so if you are my friend and you are on facebook taking these quizzes every day, don't post your result up!!
Who do you think are the top 10 directors of Japanese cinema? I just finished reading a chinese book called "Top 10 of Japanse Cinema" (日本電影十大) and the authors picked 20 (yes the book title is top 10 but they actually listed the top 20) directors from the history of japanese cinema.
according to the book, the directors were chosen based on polls by several authoritative japansese cinema journals throughout the years, as well as the criteria set by the two authors. here below is the list with the masterpiece (also selected by the authors) in bracket:
1. Akira Kurosawa 黑澤明 (Seven Samurai) 2a. Yasujiro Ozu 小津安二郎 (Late Spring) 2b. Kenji Mizoguchi 溝口健二 (Chushingura) 4a. Keisuke Kinoshita 木下惠介 (Carmen Comes Home) 4b. Kon Ichikawa 市川昆 (The Makioka Sisters) 4c. Mikio Naruse 成賴己喜男 (When a Woman Ascends the Stairs) 7. Shohei Imamura 今村昌平 (The Insect) 8. Masaki Kobayashi 小林正樹 (Harakiri) 9a. Yoji Yamada 山田洋次 (My Sons) 9b. Kaneto Shindo 新藤兼人 (A Last Note)
11. Tadashi Imai 今井正 (Till We Meet Again) 12. Satsuo Yamamoto 山本薩夫 (The Great White Tower) 13. Tomu Uchida 內田吐夢 (Miyamoto Mushashi Series) 14. Kinji Fukasaku 深作欣二 (Battles Without Honor and Humanity) 15. Kei Kumai 熊井啟 (Brothel 8) 16. Nagisa Oshima 大島者 (The Ceremony) 17a. Shiro Toyoda 豐田四郎 (Senile Person) 17b. Kozaburo Yoshimura 吉村公三郎 (The Ball at the Anjo House) 17c. Masahiro Shinoda 篠田正浩 (MacArthur's Children) 20. Kazuo Kuroki 黑木和雄 (A Boy's Summer in 1945)
About the directors, I guess I generally agree with this list, perhaps with one or two different choices, though i was little surprised that Nagisa Oshima only gotta be 16th...
About the masterpiece, my choices are probably more different. I don't really understand how they distinguish between a "masterpiece" and a "near masteripiece", but anyway, if i choose my own list, i'd probably just choose the films i enjoy most, regardless of their cultural or social significance...so below are my choices:
Akira Kurosawa 黑澤明 (Seven Samurai) - same, Seven samurai is definitely the best of Kurosawa's films, probably with Ikiru and Stray Dog coming close.
Yasujiro Ozu 小津安二郎 (Good Morning) - i just simply love Good Morning, no reason... 2nd runner up is probably Tokyo Story.
Kenji Mizoguchi 溝口健二 - i have to say that i am not really a fan of mizoguchi, out of the films i have seen, ugetsu and late chrysanthemum left a deeper impression, but it's just too difficult for me to choose a favorite..
Keisuke Kinoshita 木下惠介 (24 Eyes) - I like Carmen Comes Home, but if I have to choose, 24 Eyes is definitely a far more enjoyable film...
Kon Ichikawa 市川昆 (Burmese Harp,, 1956) - Honestly, I couldnt finish Makioka Sisters when i first saw it.... On the other hand, Burmese Harp is definitely one original and impressive work by Ichikawa..
Mikio Naruse 成賴己喜男 - Again, never a fan of Naruse.. had a hard time finishing Floating Cloud and When a Woman Ascends the Stairs, though i kinda enjoy his comedies...
Shohei Imamura 今川昌平 - It is a pity that i have only seen very few of Imamura's works, which makes it not that qualified to pick a favorite work
Masaki Kobayashi 小林正樹 (Harakiri) - This one I agree with the book, some of his other works I like are Kwadan, Samurai Rebellion... i have yet to check out the Human Condition trilogy! (when is criterion going to remaster it!!!?)
Yoji Yamada 山田洋次 - Not quite a fan but the latest samurai trilogy is good work without doubt
Kaneto Shindo 新藤兼人 - i haven't got a chance to see his most famous works yet.. but from those i saw, they are definitely good stuff...
So do you guys agree with this list? what films would you choose?
another month has passed and i am still working on this short film. due to the bad weather earlier the month and also some scheduling conflicts, filming was delayed several times.
it's kinda difficult to make an action film... especially with a small crew and hard to control locations, but then it was also a rewarding experience!
