A Floating Cinema

This incredible floating cinema is located off Kudu Island in Thailand, originally built for the Film On The Rocks Festival earlier this year. At nightfall, guests are whisked away by a speedboat to arrive on a glowing raft in the middle of Nai Pi Lae Lagoon. Do you have friends who will be honeymooning in Thailand ? Make sure you suggest them this little get away !!

The Hunger Games

We saw The Hunger Games over the weekend and I can officially say I'm hooked. The hype? I get it. I was on the edge of my seat the entire way through... had a couple of jerks here and there with the over powering sound effects that kept everybody gripping only wanting more. A very caring Kuki held my hand throughout the movie !!!

A complicated but well thought of plot, In a futuristic America, violence and reality television are used as a way of controlling and intimidating the population of a dystopian society. This movie The Hunger Games, is based on the novel of the same name. It's added to my list of To-BE-READ.

Director Gary Ross had the tough task of creating a film about kids killing each other, without glorifying the violence and still retaining the emotional impact of each death. He managed to achieve that task.

The premise of the story is pretty easy to follow in the movie. For the past 73 years, the ruling powers of the 12-district nation of Panem have kept the citizens in line by hosting a nationally televised death match known as the Hunger Games. The rules are simple, a boy and girl between the ages of 12 and 18 from each district will compete in a nationally televised death match. The last one standing wins.

Academy-award-nominated actress Jennifer Lawrence portrays the protagonist Katniss Everdeen. Katniss is a 16-year-old who has been born and raised in the poor, coal mining District 12. When her little sister Prim is chosen as the female tribute of the district for the 74th Hunger Games, Katniss quickly volunteers in her place. Soon, she and her fellow District 12 tribute Peeta Mellark, played by Josh Hutcherson, are whisked away from District 12 and find themselves in Panem’s ruling city, the Capitol.

They are trained alongside their fellow tributes, the most menacing being the Careers, tributes from Districts 1 and 2, who have trained their entire lives for the chance to bring their district glory by winning the Games.

Once in the arena, the deaths come quickly and Katniss struggles to survive.
The death scenes in the Hunger Games, while they may be a little graphic, are quick and aren’t lingered on too long. The important messages from the book, the horror of totalitarian governments, the struggles of the poor to survive in a world ruled by the rich and the bond between family are still in the film, and although these things translate to the screen well, others do not.

Jennifer Lawrence shines as the independent and brave Katniss. She is definitely a character that both men and women can root for. Josh Hutcherson also does well in his role as the kind and naïve Peeta, who realizes that he will have to toughen up if he hopes to survive.

Donald Sutherland does an excellent job at portraying the calmly malevolent President Snow. Sutherland’s facial expressions manage to be foreboding and full of malicious intent. His expression in the final scene of the film foreshadows his plans for Katniss Everdeen, and they aren’t good.

If like me, you like action movies with a bit of science fiction, you’ll enjoy this movie...!

Potter Phobia

Okay - So you can officially call me Harry Potter Phobic ! I havent had the nerve to read any of the harry potter series. Yes since ive already told you this I can also safely tell you, I am also not into Lord of the Rings. Alright - I know they are not the same. The last series that I did was Robert Langdon Series - Da Vinci, Angels and Demons and the likes.

It is on my to do list before I die tho - To sit through a HARRY POTTER BOOK !

The SketchBook Project

Are you an Artist in your own right ? Do you want to be a part of the The Brooklyn Art Library. then here is what you should do. For $25 thou shall get a book. Every artist who completes their sketchbook and returns will have their book included in the tour. Your book will visit galleries and museums across the USA, putting your art in front of thousands of people. (Psst - this is a great way to add some new lines to your résumé.)

Your sketchbook will be given a barcode with a unique number - this allows you to keep track of your book and record who views it at every tour date and while it's in The Brooklyn Art Library. And after they catalog it, artists will be able to log-on and view realtime statistics about their book for years to come.
So if this is for you, log on to http://arthousecoop.com/projects/sketchbookproject/features

Battle of the Sexes

Sure, you thought you already knew the different between a girl and a guy. But now I have conculsive proof! After countless hours of talking with my guy friends ( I have a lot of them I hang out with/ and also a lot of my girl friends) I have come up with the top 20 difference between us and MEN !!

1. RELATIONSHIPS:
First, a man does not call a relationship a relationship - he refers to it as "that time when me and Anita were dating on a semi-regular basis."
When a relationship ends, a woman will cry and pour her heart out to her girlfriends, and she will write a poem titled "All Men Are Idiots." Then she will get on with her life.
A man has a little more trouble letting go. Six months after the breakup -- at 3 am early on a Sunday morning -- he will call and say "I just wanted you to let you know you ruined my life, and I'll never forgive you, and I hate you, and you're a total floozy. But I want you to know there's always a chance for us." This is known as the "I Hate You/I Love You" drunken phone call, that 99% of all men have made at least once. There are community colleges that offer courses to help men get over this need; alas these classes rarely prove effective.

2. MATURITY:
Women mature much faster than men. Most 17-year-old females can function as adults.
Most 17-year-old males are still trading cards and giving each other wedgies after gym class. This is why high school romances rarely work out.

3. COMEDY:
Let's say a small group of men and women are in a room, watching television, and an episode of "The Great Indian Laughter Challenge" comes on. Immediately, the men will get very excited - they will laugh uproariously.
The women will roll their eyes and groan and wait it out.

4. HANDWRITING:
To their credit, men do not decorate their penmanship. They just chicken-scratch.
Women use scented, colored stationery and they dot their "i's" with circles and hearts. Women use ridiculously large loops in their "p's" and "g's." It is a royal pain to read a note from a woman. Even when she's dumping you, she'll put a smiley face at the end of the note.

5. BATHROOMS:
A man has at most six items in his bathroom - a toothbrush, toothpaste, shaving cream, razor, a bar of soap, and a towel from the Holiday Inn.
The average number of items in a typical woman's bathroom is 437. A man would not be able to identify most of these items.

6. GROCERIES:
A woman makes a list of things she needs and then goes to the store and buys these things.
A man waits until the only items left in his fridge are half of a lemon, and something turning green. Then he goes grocery shopping. He buys everything that looks good. Of course, this will not stop him from going to the 10-items-or-less lane.

7. GOING OUT:
When a man says he's ready to go out, it means he's ready to go out.
When a woman says she's ready to go out, it means that she WILL be ready to go out, as soon as she finds her other earring, finishes putting on her makeup...And men will never understand this, but all this pain is only for them.

8. SHOES:
When preparing for work, a woman will put on a Mondi wool suit, and then slip into Reebok sneakers. She will carry her dress shoes in a plastic bag from Saks. When she arrives at work, she will put on her dress shoes. Five minutes later, she will kick them off because her feet are under her desk.
A man wears one pair of shoes for the entire day.

9. CATS:
Women love cats.
Men say they love cats, but when women aren't looking, men kick cats.

10. MIRRORS:
Men are vain; they will check themselves out in the mirror.
Women are ridiculous; they will check out their reflections in any shiny surface: mirrors, spoons, store windows, toasters,

11. JEWELRY:
Women look nice when they wear jewelry.
A man can get away with wearing one ring, and that's it. Any more than that, and he will look like a lounge singer named Vic.

12. MENOPAUSE:
When a woman reaches menopause, she goes through a variety of complicated emotional, psychological, and biological changes. The nature and degree of the changes varies with the individual.
Menopause in a man provokes a uniform reaction. He buys aviator glasses, a snazzy French cap and leather driving gloves, and goes shopping for an expensive foreign sports car.

13. DIRECTIONS:
If a woman is out driving and she finds herself in unfamiliar surroundings, she will stop at a gas station and ask for directions.

Men consider this to be a sign of weakness. A man will never stop and ask for directions. Men will drive in a circle for hours, all the while saying things like, "Looks like I've found a new way to get there," and, "I know I'm in the neighborhood. I recognize that White Hen store."

14. ADMITTING MISTAKES:
Women will sometimes admit making a mistake.
The last man who admitted that he was wrong was General George Custer. And no one knows who he is.

15. DRESSING UP:
A woman will dress up to go shopping, water the plants, empty the garbage, answer the phone, read a book, get the mail...
A man will dress up for: weddings, funerals.

16. NUDITY IN MOVIES:
Every actress in the history of movies has had to do a nude scene. This is because every movie in the history of movies has been produced by men.
The only actor who has ever appeard nude in the movies is Richard Gere. This is another reason why men hate him.

17. POLITICS:
Men love to talk about politics, but they often forget to do political things such as voting.
Women are very happy that another generation of hot Congress leader is growing up and getting into politics, because they will be able to campaign for them and cry on election night.

18. CHANGING ROOMS:
In the locker room, men talk about three things: money, football, and women. They exaggerate about money, they don't know football nearly as well as they think they do, and they fabricate stories about women.
Women talk about one thing in the locker room - sex. Not in abstract terms, either. They're graphic and technical, and they *never* lie.

19. WEDDINGS:
When reminiscing about weddings, women talk about the "ceremony."
Men talk about "the bachelor party."

20. TOYS:
Little girls love to play with toys. Then, when they reach the age of 11 or 12, they lose interest.
Men never grow out of their obsession with toys. As they get older, their toys simply become more expensive and impractical. Examples of mens toys: miniature TV's, car phones, complicated juicers and blenders, graphic equalizers, small robots the serve cocktails on command, video games, and anything that blinks, beeps and requires at least six "D" batteries to operate.

Angels and Demons - Review

There are 10,000 books written every day but only 10,000 movies made in a year. It’s difficult to write books but the task of making that book into a movie is that compared to climbing the mount Everest. First, you have the die-hard fans of reading – like me, who pledge at first that the book is way better and the movie will not do justice, then you have the other kind of people who don’t read the book and end up watching the movie and not understanding it and writing it off, so the risk taken is huge.

After having coaxed my friends into going and watching the film with me, I had mentally prepared myself for some “Are you crazy looks !” But “Angels and Demons” holds a niche position in one kind of movie watching FIESTA. I could not let my mind wander while watching it and still follow the tangled intricacies of Robert Langdon’s fascinating professors tour of Rome and simultaneously, I really wanted my mind to wander to think of all those beautiful real life sets.. Ancient Rome, Vatican City, Sistine Chapel. It was a feast to the eyes to see all these live on screen in a teeth wrenching story line so crisply defined. So “Angels And Demons”, as directed by Ron Howard and starring Tom Hanks definitely has some interesting things to offer. It obviously has Tom Hanks, who is always a pleasure to watch.
Dan Brown is a writer of great success who can really write a synopsis. Dan Brown has to be given credit for bringing together some fascinating real and probably unreal legends and lore. Brown’s plot required that the Director jams in a lot of chatty detail into Angels and Demons. Much of the detail is interesting.

Modern movie goers like my friends who I sat with and maybe even me have lost the ability to listen to a movie these days. So every time I decided to explain the on-goings to my friend someone cried SHHHHHH .... We want to watch but not to concentrate. While Angels and Demons moves along better than the movie adaptation of Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code did, there is a minimum of detail required to understand the history and story. Tom Hanks talks pretty fast but this is not a narrative you can skim through.

Center to the intrigue in Angels is the ancient battle between the Catholic Church and the maybe mythical organization called the Illuminati. The Illuminati was formed from scientists and scholars who were driven underground hundreds of years ago when science wasn’t nearly as cool as it is today. Science and progress is always a threat to institutions that run on ritual and so many scientists, including the astronomer Galileo, were either forced to rethink their views or were outright murdered.

So the Illuminati are pretty unhappy and bring their grudge to modern day Rome where they apparently want to get even quick with a bomb made of really geeky antimater, stolen from the Large Hadron Collider.The Vatican and the city of Rome are really fascinating places. They are jammed packed with unbelievably beautiful churches and castles and also of dark and hidden places, secret passages, skull lined floors and thousands of years of real mystery. Rome and the Vatican are so over the top magnificent and creepy that the secret society of the Illuminati and their ancient beef with the Church seem no less plausible than that man could build a city so full of images and structures of beauty and death.

Robert Langdon has a trail of clues to follow and very little time to follow them. We get to know a ton of Vatican rules and regulations. Latin is thrown around as if by itself it can fill the holes in the plot.

Angels and Demons commits the gross movie sin of having the plot and characters ultimately not honestly landing where they were aimed. There’s twist for twists sake. While watching Angels and Demons, I could feel that there was a twist coming. It was plainly apparent. Because of this, I could not take the characters in the movie at face value as they were portrayed, with the exception of Tom Hank’s Robert Langdon, who must remain a pillar of truth for anything to work. Angels and Demons – THE MOVIE finished telling the more than interesting story that it had set out to tell and joined the league of A Beautiful Mind, The Kite Runner, The Namesake in my list of brilliantly adapted books in modern times.