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Moneyisn't Everything

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Moneyisn't Everything 16 發光的城市 A R O U N D T O W N FRIDAY, MAY 8, 2009 • TAIPEI TIMES OTHER RELEASES COMPILED BY MARTIN WILLIAms Trail of the Panda (貓熊團圓路) Here’s another panda movie, this time from isn’t everything China. An orphan (naturally) finds that a Money cute panda cub is his only true friend, and this leads to the pair traipsing alone through the lovely, but dangerous, Sichuan countryside. For the Taiwan release, distributor Buena Vista International, a Disney company, has changed the Chinese title from “panda on the road home” to “panda on the road to reunion” in a pun on the names of the Taipei Zoo pandas. Walt Disney, who was famously anti- communist, would surely have been aghast. Also known as Touch of the Panda — and perhaps Curse of the Panda to independence activists. Kung Fu Chefs (功夫廚神) Legendary Hong Kong writer-director-actor- martial artist Sammo Hung (洪金寶) provides desperately needed backbone to this otherwise derivative action comedy from China. Hung’s disgraced chef takes on a young pup (Vanness Wu, 吳建豪) as an apprentice and the pair battle thugs and rival chefs before a cooking competition brings the episode to a close. But for one extended Hung may acquit himself in this retread, but fans would family it comes pretty really be better off watching an old copy of Pedicab Driver. close. Closer, even, than the ties that bind The Accidental Husband Agony aunt of the New York airwaves Uma BY HO YI Thurman is married — not STAFF REPORTER so happily — to publisher Colin Firth. Enter working en years after Money From left: Henry Thia, Mark Lee and Jack class love interest Jeffrey No Enough, Singapore’s Neo star in Money Not Enough 2, directed by Dean Morgan and we have a problem on our hands. This received rotten reviews on most domestically Jack Neo. PHOTOS COURTESY OF TUNG FILM INTERNATIONAL successful movie of all its British release early last year, which presumably had time, director, actor status and wealth. Kudos goes to Firth’s name to recommend it, but Thurman’s star power Tand entertainer Jack Neo (梁智 錢不夠用 Neo for making an effective and has not been enough to secure screen bookings in the US. MONEY NOT ENOUGH 2 ( 2) 強) and his team return with the sometimes hilarious caricature of Directed by actor Griffin Dunne. sequel Money Not Enough 2, which DIRECTED BY: JACK NEO (梁智強) this money-hungry gang. replaces the original’s comedy with Then comedy gives way to Beloved Clara tear-jerking melodrama. STARRING: JACK NEO (梁智強) AS YANG BAO-QIANG, MARK LEE lachrymose melodrama as the The film revolves around (李國煌) AS YANG BAO-HUANG, HENRY THIA (程旭輝) AS YANG mother’s physical and mental The strange relationship three brothers who live in the BAO-HUI, LAI MING (黎明) AS MRS YANG health deteriorates and she between composers materialistic city-state. Yang Bao-hui becomes a burden to the three Clara Schumann, Robert (Henry Thia, 程旭輝) is the eldest, an LANGUAGE: IN MANDARIN, HOKKIEN AND ENGLISH WITH Yang households. Schumann and Johannes uncomplaining husband, father and CHINESE AND ENGLISH SUBTITLES Money Not Enough 2 neatly Brahms is the focus of a deliveryman who wants to live plays on the tension between the this German-language film. a good life after years of working RUNNING TIME: 125 MINUTES nuclear-family lifestyle and the Like the Beethoven yarn a lowly job. A puffed-up salesman fulfillment of filial piety in Chinese- Immortal Beloved, this biopic prefers to treat its gifted type, youngest brother Yang Bao- TAIWAN RELEASE: TODAY speaking regions, though the film subjects with the utmost respect, which is why it can’t huang (Mark Lee, 李國煌) talks ends up annoying audiences by be as entertaining as Amadeus or any of Ken Russell’s the older sibling into joining his expounding a doctrine about family composer movies. Still, the story is compelling enough, lucrative business that sells health However, the three brothers’ The film opens with a punchy set harbor. Amusing and tackily done, values and loving your mother. This there’s plenty of music and audiences may be inspired to supplements derived from pollen. businesses don’t perform as well piece that ridicules Singaporeans’ the cartoon-like fantasy echoes is a well-timed message, though, as seek the DVD of the stage production of the same name, Neo plays the middle brother, as planned and a series of mishaps ambivalence toward the the youngest brother’s opening the film is released in Taiwan on which contains readings from actual letters between Yang Bao-qiang, a well-heeled lead to financial ruin. Domestic government with all its regulations remarks: “Singaporeans complain, Mother’s Day weekend. Brahms and the Schumanns. businessman who shows no interest disputes and bickering break out and restrictions that, some say, but they never act to change the Eighty two-year-old ���������Malaysian in anything but money and leaves when their mother, Mrs Yang (Lai safeguard high living standards status quo.” actress �������������������������Lai was nominated for the Family Rules his overbearing, wealth-flaunting Ming, 黎明), begins to show signs for its citizens. The partially Reality sets in as the Yang Best Supporting Actress for her wife Ling Ling (Zhu Lin Lin, 朱玲玲) of dementia and needs the full animated sequence ends with a brothers sit at the dinning table performance at last year’s Golden A German black comedy to deal with everything else. attention of her sons. crowd throwing a tollgate into the discussing their addictions to Horse Awards (金馬獎). from 2007 introduces us to Oliver, whose orphaned upbringing did not lead him to pandas in the wild, sadly. As an adult, he tries to make up for his lack of family by abducting several suitable-looking individuals Bringing the world together (and a dog) and confining them in a derelict building. Now happily “married” and with kids and grandparents in tow, Oliver discovers that families aren’t as ideal as they Gerardo Olivares’ film ‘The Great Match’ shows how the beautiful game is a common thread sound. This won a few minor awards in Germany, though it had little impact elsewhere. Original title: Wir Sagen found throughout the globe, even in the most remote places Du! Schatz. BY IAN BartHOLOmeW STAFF REPORTER Grave of the Fireflies ome people take enormous This is the latest, live- efforts to make sure they are action version of the book S able to watch a big match. by Akiyuki Nosaka about For the soccer fans in The Great two Japanese siblings Match (La Gran Final), who are all THE GREAT MATCH (LA GRAN FINAL) coping with the US eager to catch what will turn out to bombing of Kobe at the end DIRECTED BY: GERARDO OLIVARES be the final between Germany and of World War II and the disorder that followed. There hasn’t been much attention Brazil in the 2002 World Cup, it is STARRING: A NON-PROFESSIONAL CAST OF AMAZONIAN, MONGOLIAN AND not about booking airline tickets TUAREG TRIBESMEN paid to this release outside Japan; it may disappoint those and confirming hotel reservations, enraptured by the celebrated animated version from 1988 or even about picking a sports bar RUNNING TIME: 88 MINUTES (which Roger Ebert called one of the greatest war films). at which to watch the big event. Their issues reach another level LANGUAGES: TUPI, TAMASHEK AND MONGOLIAN, WITH CHINESE SUBTITLES altogether. They need to find Running the Sahara electricity and some means, in their TAIWAN RELEASE: TODAY Taiwanese ultra-marathon very remote locations, to receive star Kevin Lin (林義傑) has television signals. been in the news a fair bit lately. This welcome The Great Match is a bizarre They brake for nobody. PHOTO COURTESY OF FLASH FORWARD ENTERTAINMENT The film then takes viewers to moments, and a little gentle satire. little film sporting a low-budget the Amazon jungle and focuses on The jokes can be a little corny at documentary covers his docu-drama format that somehow Channel. But of course, it is not. “Do about the relative quality of the two Zama, a tribesman who proudly times, but the general good nature attempt with two colleagues manages to leave plenty of room for you think we’ll have time to get back teams. Whether they get to watch the sports a yellow soccer jersey with of the film solicits our tolerance. to cross the Sahara in a comedy. The title might mislead you for the game,” one of the nomads final minutes of the game all depends Ronaldo’s number nine on it. He In celebration of Brazil’s victory, journey of nearly 7,000km. Along the way the men gain into thinking this is a soccer film, shouts. The others answer by picking on an uncertain supply of electricity gives a running soccer commentary the loggers are even willing to insight into themselves and the African predicament, not and certainly, the force that drives up the pace. They have to get back from Russia. as he and his companions, associate with the Amazonian least desertification. Narrated by Matt Damon and directed virtually every character in the film in time to move camp to a location Cut to the Sahara desert and the unsuccessfully, hunt monkeys in tribesmen. “The 2006 World Cup by Oscar winner James Moll (The Last Days). is the desire to watch the final game where they can (illegally) tap into sand-blown and waterless wastes the forest canopy. They are waiting will be in Germany,” the logger on television, but soccer madness is the government electricity supply to of Niger.
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