Why So Serious?

I was sceptical at first and with murmurings of an Academy Award for Best Actor on the horizon, I thought that perhaps the critics were just trying to stir some sympathy for the tragic death of Heath Ledger.

After watching the aptly titled, The Dark Knight, the darkest of the Batman franchise thus far, all signs of scepticism disappeared as Heath delivered in my opinion the performance of a life time. Playing the crazed, villainous Joker it was sometimes difficult to tell whether he was acting or actually living the part of the psychotic clown.

Seeing as how Heath is a method actor (method acting is a technique of living the character which you play), and seeing as how I have an above avergae fear for clowns (probably because of that damn, clown movie, IT; I can’t imagine that he was the most pleasant person to be around during the shooting of the film.

Whatever the case, Heath’s passing is a massive loss to the film and entertainment industry. I reckon he definitely has the Golden Statue in the bag, and will perhaps be only the second person in history, other than Peter Finch to be awarded a posthumus Oscar.

Be on Your Guard

As far as crazy nights go, last night will go down as one for the record books. I’m not sure how it all started but for as long as I can remember, my brother and I developed this tendency to flank our friends and walk on either side of them…Although we’re not big, a joke started that being Asian we looked like bodyguards - apparently all of us know martial arts…which isn’t true by the way, just in case the stereotype has been that ingrained.

Since last night was Xav’s last weekend in Cape Town before he left for Europe and NYC; he requested that we act as his hired guns for the evening. Just as an aside we’ll be glad to let our bodyguard services to anyone, but be warned; should trouble arise we may turn and run like sissy girls…our services are not refundable.
The M.O. was supposed to be that he was the son of a powerful French ambassador, and that we were to ask anybody who came within 2 feet to politely step back and give him space.

As the night began we rounded up the troops me, Joe, Xav and Action Dan and headed out to craziness. We were to meet up with Michael Fassbender, the guy who played Stelio(“Then we shall fight in the shade.”) in the 300 movie, as he’s working with Action Dan on a British Civil War film. Ernst met up with us a little bit later in the evening as well.When ever a bunch of blokes get together you know a good time is to be had, but It was even more fun last night as we were playing the fool and acting out our roles.

At the end of a big evening in Cape Town, it’s customary to get a pie form the 24 hour Engen in Orange Street. There’s always some interesting folk at the store in the wee hours of the morning; and it always surprises me who you’re going to meet . We starting chatting and made friends with two British girls, one of them, by chance happened to come from the same place Dan is from in Leeds.

The taxi that had dropped them off had told them that it was fine to walk back to their backpackers… in the middle of the night…although I’m sure they would have been fine; it’s perhaps not the best idea to walk alone in the dark, just two girls; and being ever chivalrous we figured we’d drop them off on our way home.

Done like true body guards; at the end of the evening, we did actually get to do our fair share of protecting! For those of you who are not from South Africa, it is a pretty safe place…so long as you use a little common sense and not open yourself up to potentially dangerous situations, just like in any other country that you might happen to be visiting.

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Jackie Chan and Jet Li in a movie? Really? Perhaps I was dreaming but I watched a movie today called Forbidden Kingdom with two of Hong Kongs’s biggest action stars in it. Both of them have been making movies for decades, but much to my dismay they have never been in a film together.

Forbidden Kingdom is based old Chinese folklore, and revolves around the tale of a mischievous character known as the Monkey King (Sun Wu Kong). Parts of the film is quite authentic and takes me back to my childhood, where I’d often beg my grandparents to tell me tales of this great legend. However like most Hollywood produced films Forbidden Kingdom has been commercialized to a point where it’s lost a lot of its true roots.

None the less being a massive Jet Li and Jackie Chan fan, I was quite thrilled to see them starring together; and with the fight scenes choreographed by Woo-Ping the same guy who choreographed the Matrix. There was action abound and plenty of great visual effects.

Wild, Bearded Man of Borneo

Temporary, blindness and migraines gone; I made sure that I set my alarm today. Both of them, the clock on my bedside pedestal and my cell phone as a back up...I was not going to be late like I was yesterday. So with both alarms blaring, giving me the fright of my life, I might add, I was up and off to the gym. The one thing I love about going to the Virgin Active in Wembley Square is that afterwards, if you're feeling sorry for yourself for sadistically, inflicting pain upon your body; you can still reward it with a good ol’ Vida coffee… It makes all the pain worth it. Well, almost.

The bright side (not that the sun is up at 5am) of getting up really early is that you have a lot more time to get ready for work. I figured after 2 weeks of neglect, it was time to haul out my trusty Philishave, electric razor and get rid of my beard. To my dismay the shaver was nowhere to be found, and I guess from the absence of its use, I seem to have misplaced it. I guess fate had decided for me…the bearded look was going to be in.

Now I’ve never grown a beard before, so sporting my new look I reckoned the facial hair would get a lot of attention…but no-one even noticed! I had supper with my good friend Natalie at Rick’s Café, for a catch up session, since I had not seen her in a while. And yet there was no mention of my beard, none at all, although she does also think she’s a squirrel so perhaps her opinion doesn’t count!

Okay, okay so I can’t really grow a proper beard, in fact if I leave it for too long all that happens is that I get a pretty mangy looking, patch-work of whiskers. I remember a few weeks before the filming of Tunnel Rats, they asked me to try grow a beard. But when I arrived on set the make up ladies took one look at me, saw how erratically my facial hair had grown and made me shave it off immediately.

I’m still not sure when Tunnel Rats is going to be released, unfortunately there seems to be some controversy with regards to the director, Uwe Boll's other recent releases and this has caused distributors to keep their distance away from it. However I do know it was shown at the film market section of Cannes Film Festivals, and I have heard that it has gotten some rave reviews. Fingers crossed, I really hope that the film gets a major release; the actors were brilliant and with their raw emotion, really portrayed the Vietnam War and the characters involved realistically, methinks.

Paul and I have decided that no matter what happens with the distributor debacle, we're somehow going to get a hold of it, and hold our very own South African, red carpet premiere at the Labia Theatre! Lets hope by then I would have found my shaver and will be looking neat, cleanly shaven and sharp.