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A Touch of Zen
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Film
- Hits: 221
A 70's masterpiece of Japanese Martial Arts. A scholar finds himself caught up in a courtly intrigue. The best are the fluttering martial-arts scenes, which are all very well and fine until you realize that all these wonderful arial movements are facilitated by out of sight trampolines...
Still, charming. And the characters - of the Abbot, the General, the Princess, the Scholar, well...it creates the template for a lot of the movies to follow.
Baahubali - (2015, Hindii)
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Film
- Hits: 239
And, because I am still sick and not capable of anything greater, watching this. Cheesy, silly, but at the same time remniscent of those old Saturday Matinee movies of old, like the original intent of "Indiana Jones" or "Star Wars", or the "7th Voyage of Sinbad: before they became "cult classics". Merely a good escape from reality done via cinema. To even attempt to review it is to miss the point.
Watching it online here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4l2jLR7Y8Q&t=3453s
13 Assassins - 2010 - Takashi Miike
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Film
- Hits: 227
An "homage" (?) to the classic Samurai movies of old. 12 Samurai and a hunter come together to assassinate Lord Matsudaira Naritsugu, the murderous leader of the Akashi clan, and to thwart his appointment to the Shogunate Council.
Perfectly balanced, with half an hour giving Samurai Motives, another half to assembling the assassins, half to skirmishes and readying the place of battle, and the last half hour to the battle. Standard "7-Samurai" sort of stuff, where the character of the players is assembled to play against overwhelming odds and through heroic self-sacrifice save the day.
Very little that's new, but - an old format well revisited.
Duck a'laOrange, Eggs Tragedy, and sick all f***ing week!
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Blog
- Hits: 191
Friday, last week. Started the day poorly, and it only got worse, by the time I let off work I knew I was in trouble. Thought I could sleep it off, no, it was hunkered in.
All week, fever, chills, exhaustion, cough, runny nose, phlegm, yellow, green, white, sleeping 16, 18 hours a day....
Wake up, dizzy, exhausted, by the time I finish my first cup of coffee. Then back to bed.
All week. I'd bought a treat at the Co-Op, sausages, Duck ala'Orange, I Iove duck, what could go wrong?
Whatever could, did, these met no expectations.
For the rest of the week, nothing but soup and lots of juice and tea. I call in sick to work for a day. It's been 40 years since I've called in sick, anywhere, and this isn't the worst I've been, but damn, I just can't do it.
Those shifts I show up for, still exhausted, way too tired.
Yesterday, morning, I go for breakfast. I have to eat, at least once this week. At the old hotel, their breakfast restaurant, the Hotel that promises to deliver a much better experience than in fact it ever does. Eggs Benny. And they arrive, only, they're like some 8th grader on his way to shop class got lost in a home-economics class and turned this in as his day-end project. are these eggs? really? push them around with your fork...maybe, scrambled? boiled? from a paste? powder? and where's the hollandaise sauce? round-cut hams peeled right from the plastic, crunchy-plastic english muffin (rinse and reuse?), hashbrowns overcooked and salted, more an inedible garnish than a side. I rarely enjoyed breakfast before, this fuckery confirms why.
I say nothing, push it around my plate, annoyed that this fuckery is allowed to pass for cooking, then home, nap, work.
***
Today, off to get some groceries. A few. Then back home, then out to eat a big lunch. And I eat it, then a long nap, and then up - now up, and I'm suspecting, given my appetite, that I may be on the mend, but no overdoing it now, watch a movie, relax, and we'll see on the morrow...
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