Wednesday 12 Sept 2007

Managed to squeeze in a movie preview amid buzy work, courtesy of MixFM, at Mid Valley last night. I’ve never been a fan of musical movie. Once in a while, they come good with a decent story line, memorable songs and actors who could actually sing e.g Chicago, the Oscar winning movie starring Richard Gere, Renee Zelwegger and Catherine Zeta Jones. So, I was pleasantly surprised when I found myself actually wanting to sing and dance with Zac Efron (the teen heartthrob from High School Musical), James Marsden (Cyclops from XMen) and John Travolta in drags! What, what was that? Yeap, Travolta provides most of the laughs in an aunty role with a possible size 40E bra size. It’s amazing how she he can still shake those hips together with the ever reliable Christopher Walken. They do indeed make an effective albeit odd couple.

In a nutshell, this movie is set in the 60s in Baltimore, where black and white still can’t be seen together and well, the fat and not so ugly are considered the outcast. It follows the adventure of Tracy Turblad (Nikki Blonsky) , a big size girl with even bigger hair who dreams of joining a popular TV dance show ‘The Corny Collins show’. The movie is littered with wonderful songs and great dance routines by the cast. Each of them gets enough screen time to show off their vocal talents and moves.

This movie gets a 3.5 out of 5 stars for me. Go see this movie if you liked Grease, Saturday Night Fever and Chicago. Incidentally, both Travolta and Michelle Pfeiffer had appeared in the Grease 1 and 2 respectively.

With Heroes fever about to start again with the US Season 2 premier on Sept 24, I couldn’t help but to compare this with the reality show Who Wants to be a superhero, created by Stan Lee himself. This show features a bunch of people who come up with their own alter ego’s name, complete with costumes and what abilities they would want to have. Among the weird names that stick to mind are Creature, Cell phone girl, Lemuria, Monkey Woman(?) and Fat Momma. Every episode, they have to go through challenges and the least deserving one will be eliminated and turn in their costumes. Hmm, these Americans can really create a reality show on just about anything. ‘Who Wants To Be A Superhero’ is aired on Star World channel 70 every Thursday at 10 pm.

Heroes, on the other hand, are a group of initially confused people with special abilities. Led by Peter Petrelli (arguably the most powerful one because he can absorb anyone’s power), they learn to accept their fate in saving the world from a deadly nuclear explosion. Can’t wait to see what will happen to Hiro Nakamura, that tele-porting Jap.

If ever there was an ability that I would like to have is being able to read minds (I’ll know what my boss wants me to do and what my frens REALLY think of me) AND the ability to fly (saves travelling cost and time!) Yeah, yeah.. sue me for being greedy