Showing posts with label Action Film. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Action Film. Show all posts

Sunday, August 31, 2008

Breaking news is an Anglo Saxon concept of presenting news.


Daai si gin (2004) directed by Johnnie To

Those who have seen action films made in Hong Kong will surely say that real life and life on a reel are the two basic fundamental notions of this film.This is because we often hear that whatever that happens in real life does not happen in films.We are also used to hear that whatever that happens in films does not happen in real lives. Whatever one says,a thing that remains clear is that "Breaking News" is a film which will challenge our notions of real life and life on reel as it presents both these concepts with amazing honesty.This film boasts of wonderful action scenes which help in mocking both media and police forces.Hong Kong director Johnnie To shows that the influence of media is enormous in our daily lives.This is the reason why distasteful material is being shown on television to poor audiences in order to increase daily ratings of TV shows.One must appreciate this film keeping in mind that "Breaking News" is a purely an Anglosaxon/ Angloamerican concept of looking at media which does not have any equivalent in many cultures such as European culture,Asian culture and African culture.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Hard to digest : John Travolta as a villain beating Slater to pulp !!!


Broken Arrow (1996) directed by John Woo

My admiration for John Woo grew leaps and bounds with this particular film.To my mind,Broken Arrow has set a trend of taking lead players as villains.No one could have imagined even in wildest dreams that a professional airline Pilot that is John Travolta would be playing the part of a recalcitrant baddie hell bent on achieving universal destruction.He is the only one who steals the show gradually and it is towards the end of the film that his wickedness is at the summit of its annihilating powers.The success of this film is also due to
tightly controlled actions scenes.After Broken Arrow,there were hardly any good action films whose intensity matched those of this elegant action thriller.There is no doubt that Travolta steals the show.Sad but true other actors appear as
dimwits whether it is Christian Slater or Samantha Mathis.It would be nice if a sequel of this film is made by John Woo.If Die hard can be a big grosser than Broken Arrow is equally capable of replicating its previous success.