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Le DVD Mobile

Today on our way back from a work meeting, a friend told me about this new service in Tunisia called “Le DVD Mobile” (The Mobile DVD).

“Le DVD Mobile” is a sort of Tunisian Netflix. It’s a service that delivers rented DVDs to your doorstep.

The process is as follows: You subscribe online to one of their plans, and then order DVDs, from their catalog, either online, by SMS or by phone.
The DVDs are then delivered to your doorstep the following day, and then collected again from your doorstep according to the date you specify when you ordered them.

Another option is that the DVDs get sent to you through the Tunisian post, and then you send them back by post too in the pre-stamped parcel that comes with them.

Their prices are very interesting and competitive, they have movies that were newly released on DVD, and the timing of delivery and flexibility is great.
What else could anyone want?
I’ll sure be checking them out.

I’m really happy to see such services pop up in Tunisia and I truly hope more people will try to use the internet to make their businesses more exciting, more accessible, more flexible and more competitive.

Fantastic Four

Last night, I finally got to watch the “Fantastic Four” movie.

As frequent readers of my blog already know, I’m a big fan of superhero movies, so I just couldn’t let this one pass by me unwatched.

The reviews I read about the movie weren’t that good and so I wasn’t expecting much really, but well it exceeded my expectations, and it didn’t turn out as bad as I expected.

I never read the Fantastic Four comics nor watched the animated series, I was always more of a Spiderman and Superman guy, so it was cool getting to know them for the first time, although I didn’t really find the characters that catchy.

The movie is an ok one I guess, good enough to kill some extra time, but it just lacks the magic of a superhero movie; The discovery of their new forces is just not done well enough, Not enough use of their forces, Not enough confrontation with the villain…etc.
In short, all the coolest elements of any superhero movie weren’t done well enough in this movie.

Anyway, if you’re into movies like this, you should check it out anyway.

My score for it would be: 6/10.

The Gate of the Sun

Today we watched a French produced Arabic movie called Bab El Shams (La Porte du Soleil, The Gate of the Sun). It’s based on the novel by Elias Khoury and directed by Yousry Nasrallah.

The movie tells a number of people’s intertwined stories, and through their stories tells the story of Palestine and the Palestinian people.

The whole story is told pretty objectively and touches on all sides.

It starts when Palestine was under British colonization, when the whole Zionist-state idea started coming into place, and shows how the Palestinian people suffered and were thrown out of their homes and lands under the pretense that Israel was securing its borders (which reminds us of the apartheid wall today).

The movie goes on to show how Arabs didn’t do enough to help Palestinians and that many armies were just sitting around doing nothing while Palestinians were being killed and driven out of their lands, just because they didn’t have any orders from their leaders.

It then follows the journey of Palestinians and how they were thrown in different countries where they were never accepted and were hated. It talks of how some of these Arab countries totally supported the Palestinian cause but hated Palestinians.

It also shows how Palestinians then found themselves having to work for Israelis on their own lands to survive.

The movie isn’t a political one though, it’s a bunch of life stories, through which history is told, but it talks about so much more, it talks about love, hope, traditions, values, women and so much more.
It’s not a movie against Jews, just like one of the characters in the movie says: “Palestinians are not anti-semitic”. In fact it shows how they were better educated, more organized and civilized in their camps.

The movie is very well done; Technically marvelous, great directing, wonderful photography, really nice soundtrack and wonderful acting by the whole cast.

It must be one of the best Arabic movies ever made, and I totally recommend watching it.

My score for it: 8.5/10.

The Upside of Anger

Yesterday, I watched this movie called “The Upside of Anger” featuring Kevin Costner, Joan Allen, Keri Russell and Erika Christensen.

It’s a drama about a woman and her 4 daughters and how their lives go after the father dissapears unexpectedly.

Looking for the IMDB page for this movie, I found that it was actually well rated and that the last review of it was very good, but personally, I didn’t like it and thought it was really boring.
I lost interest from the beginning of the movie, and nothing pulled me back in throughout it all.

The idea is a good one, that Anger paralyzes our emotional outlook and alters our perception of reality and works to destroy us and those around us.

But, the movie just didn’t portray it well enough and it felt like it went on for too long, and lots of stuff just felt like they were thrown in there to fill up the time.
I don’t know, maybe I wasn’t in the mood for this kind of movie yesterday, but to me this movie pretty much sucked.

There’s a twist at the end that is interesting, although Eman guessed it from the very beginning, but they let it just pass slowly, losing it’s taste and effect.

It’s a shame to see a great actor like Kevin Costner in a movie like this, but well it’s his choice after all.

My score for this movie: 1/10.

The Phantom Of The Opera

Yesterday, we watched the movie interpretation of “The Phantom Of The Opera”.
I’ve been wanting to watch it for a long time after all the good reviews I read about it on other blogs.

I’m a big fan of movie musicals, such as “Moulin Rouge”, “Chicago” and well from my childhood days “The Sound Of Music”.
These movies mix two of my favourites arts in a beautiful way: cinema and music.

Back to “The Phantom Of The Opera”, it’s a great movie. But how can it not be with such musical splendor and a great story behind it!
Eman and I have been humming the magnificent tunes constantly ever since yesterday, lol.

It’s a really well done movie, the directing, acting and singing, lived up to the greatness of it and presented it wonderfully.

Gaston Leroux wrote a beautiful story, Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber is a musical genius and Joel Schumacher made it into a great movie.

I really recommend this movie if you love both cinema and music. It’s just beautiful.

My score for it: 8.5/10.

“The Last Legion” Filming in Tunisia

Just a few days ago, filming started in Tunisia on The Last Legion, a Dino De Laurentiis movie produced by Martha De Laurentiis and Raffaella De Laurentiis, and directed by Doug Lefler.

The movie stars Colin Firth, Sir Ben Kingsley and Indian beauty Aishwarya Rai.

“The Last Legion” is an independently financed film produced in partnership with Tunisian Tarak Ben Ammar of Quinta Communications and British co-producers Chris Curling and Phil Robertson of Zephyr Films.

Part fact, part legend, “The Last Legion” is an epic adventure based on acclaimed author Valerio Massimo Manfredi’s international best-selling 2003 novel of the same name. The film is set against the fall of the Roman Empire in 470AD and its last emperor, 12-year-old Romulus Augustus (Thomas Sangster).

Over-run with rebellion, Rome is a city on the brink of chaos and destruction. Imprisoned by rebels on the island of Capri, Romulus, aided by the clever strategies of his teacher Ambrosinus (Sir Ben Kingsley) and the heroic skills of his legionnaire Aurelius (Colin Firth), escapes the island.

This small band of Roman soldiers, accompanied by Byzantine warrior Mira (Aishwarya), are determined to continue their mission to restore the Empire.

The movie’s release is set for next year.

Bride & Prejudice

I just finished watching the movie Bride & Prejudice, directed by Gurinder Chadha, the same director behind Bend It Like Beckham.

The movie is inspired by the Jane Austen novel “Pride & Prejudice”, only it’s done in bollywood style.
Yep, it’s just like those Indian movies, with all the singing and dancing and everything, just done in English. It’s totally a Hollywood meets Bollywood movie.

It turned out pretty nice actually, quite an enjoyable couple of hours.
What I liked the most is the mix between hollywood and bollywood cinema styles.
I also love how the director presents India and its people, it totally makes you feel like picking yourself up and going to India right away.
Another great thing is how she handles the issues she’s tackling in this movie and presents them.
I wish Arab directors would learn from her (from both of her movies) and start doing similar things in Hollywood. Anyway that brings me to another post I’ll be writing soon about Arabs, Muslims and Hollywood.

My score for this movie is: 7/10

Lucas Plans Animated ‘Star Wars’ TV Show

Now that George Lucas has the final installment of Star Wars under his belt, sci-fi’s most famous film director plans to adapt the movie series as a 3-D animated TV show.

Lucas’ company is creating an animated program for television called Clone Wars, that will be produced in a new studio it’s building in Singapore.

Lucas said he’s also working on a live-action Star Wars-based TV show that he’ll shoot with a Sony consumer digital camcorder.

Hmmm…
Don’t know what to think about this really. The Star Wars movies are already maybe 85-90% special effects, so what they’ll mainly be doing with this 3D animated series is taking the actors out and replacing them with 3D counterparts, and that’s it.
I don’t think the 2D Clone Wars animations that Lucas ventured into previously were that much of a success, and I’m not too sure these will be either.
I guess that in the end it’ll all boil down to whether the story is going to be an interesting one or not.

As for the live-action Star Wars-based TV show that will be shot with a Sony Camcorder, I’m not too sure what he means by that.
Will he be shooting footage of geeks playing around with light sabers or something? Or will it be about the Star Wars Kid?
What other Star Wars related live-action is there?

[Source: InformationWeek]

Finding Neverland

a href=”http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0007CNXUK/subzeroblue-20?creative=327641&camp=14573&link_code=as1″ target=”_blank”>A couple of days ago, I finally got to watch “Finding Neverland” featuring Johnny Depp, Kate Winslet and Dustin Hoffman.

I remember really liking Peter Pan as a kid; Watching the Disney animation and the “Hook” movie time and again.
“Finding Neverland” gives us some insight into the short period of the life of Sir James Matthew Barrie, the writer, between the release of his last play and his classic masterpiece Peter Pan.

It’s fascinating to see how creative he was, and how the people around him inspired the play. It makes you realize that even though the story of Peter Pan seems simple, it is rich with symbolism and metaphors.
We also find out that he himself is more or less Peter Pan.

It’s a really nice movie; very well done, really well acted, nice soundtrack and beautiful cinematography.
Johnny Depp goes on again to prove he is one of the greatest actors around, doing a magnificent job from the acting, to the Irish accent to completely living the role.
He simply rocks…

I really liked this movie and think it’s truly worth seeing.

My score for it is: 8.5/10

Sin City

I finally got to see “Sin City” today, featuring Bruce Willis, Jessica Alba, Clive Owen, Benicio Del Toro and a bunch of other good actors.

I heard a lot about the movie, but didn’t really know what to expect, especially with comic based movies not always turning out good. But well, I really liked it.

It’s a pretty violent movie, even more than Kill Bill, although it sort of follows the same style of action and violence. Not much of a surprise when you know that Quentin Tarantino was a guest director on it.

It’s really interesting visually, well directed, and has really cool special effects.
It’s not an acting movie really, so the actors just played out the roles and that’s it. The power of the movie is more in its visuals and story.

It seems a sequel is already in production and due for release next year. So that’s cool.

If you liked Kill Bill, make sure you check this out. It’ll be your cup of tea.

My score for it: 7.5/10.