Black Swan (2010)

WOWWOWOWOWOWOOWOWOWOWOWOWOWOOWOWWOWOWOW! (literally that's all I have to say! just kidding!)

(Just to warn you guys, this will contain spoiler alerts BUT fear not, I will caution you before you get there) Also, this review is completely my opinion, I didn't read anyone else's reviews or brilliant ideas, although I'm sure they are all great, I just wanted to do it for my sake. Maybe I'll write a Part 2 review after reading what other people think. Real film critics and buffs. I am the furthest from that. I promise you.

Quick and dirty summary:
Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis are in a ballet company performing Swan Lake. Natalie Portman portrayed as the angelic protagonist, and Mila Kunis as the dark antagonist to the story line. It seems clear in the beginning, but the roles in where these characters are boxed into, become increasingly blurred. The Swan Queen, the principle ballet dancer of the production of Swan Lake has to embody both the perfect and innocent White Swan, and the guile and sensual Black Swan drawing parallels to both Portman's and Kunis' characters.

Trailer: 
http://www.hulu.com/watch/172891/movie-trailers-black-swan---trailer

Review:
Black Swan was freaking amazing! It was mind-blowing. I think it was one of the best movies I watched this year, and I'm not kidding you or purposely finding a reason to like it because it was an opener for the Sundance Festival this year (and received a standing ovation, mind you!). But this movie was truly A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. This is a truly fantastic movie because I was so absorbed into the movie that at the end, I just didn't want it to end. I walked out really feeling like I was there in the world of the dark and twisted ballet fantasy that director Darren Aronofsky created. This is the type of movie where you leave the theatre feeling a little mind-fucked, you can't really think straight, and you can't really walk straight, wondering to yourself if you're crazy.  Kind of how I was with Inception, but different. In comparison, Inception was really about making a blockbuster, a crazy movie with a genius idea, but this is not even close. Black Swan isn't made to be a blockbuster, to make money, to win Oscars or anything, but I wouldn't be surprised if it did, actually I am 100% positive that this movie is going to win a shit ton of Oscars, this movie is made to tell a beautiful story of a rendition of a modern Swan Lake. But this is far from the boringness that we usually associate ballet with. There is scary, gross, gruesome parts that left everyone in the movie theatre gasping and shocked (like, you could literally hear everyone sucking in their breath).
The trailer is a mind-fuck as well, you think you're going in knowing exactly what's going to happen, the predictability of it all. You see flashes of Natalie Portman picking out feathers thinking WTF?!!! but it's not that, you'll understand after you watch this. The acting was superb to say the least and Natalie Portman is brilliant. Honestly, she is a great actor, a great dancer, and she really embodies the character of a girl seeking any and every desperation to be perfect.

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Spoilers? I don't know if you can exactly call it this but whatever, I'm going to talk about the movie now...
This movie is a literally a psychological mind-fuck, from the beginning to the end for both us as viewers and Natalie Portman's character. Each character starts off as black and white, the overprotective and overbearing mom, the crazy and brash Mila Kunis' character Lily, the sexually charged choreographer Thomas, played by Vincent Cassel (you might recognize him from Ocean's 12 and 13), and of course, Natalie Portman's innocent, angelic, and hardworking character, Nina. We see her character change in every minute of the 103 minutes that the movie has to offer as we become more and more immersed in this ballet culture.
There is a lot of symbolism portrayed in this movie, in where Natalie Portman starts off as the perfect and idealistic White Swan, you see her character wearing fluffy white scarves and baby pink jackets, and then as the movie progresses, and as she meets Mila Kunis' character, her wardrobe changes as well, this is probably the most obvious part of the movie, especially when she puts on the black lacy top that Lily gives her.
She strives for perfection which leads her to actually get the role of Swan Queen, well actually that cheeky bite gets her the role, but she learns that she has to lose control in order to play the Black Swan, something that she has no intention of ever doing. On the other hand, Lily is already the perfect Black Swan, she has the carefree freedom and talent that Natalie Portman wants and craves, but just doesn't understand how to achieve it. As she explores her sexuality through the help of Thomas and Lily, and finally breaking free from her crazy mother, Nina is becoming more carefree. But the thing is, she also watched Winona Ryder's character, Beth, and her great downfall from the ballet world as she becomes older and less wanted. Once, Nina's idol of perfection, she watches Beth spiral out of control, and we, in turn, which Nina spiral out of control.
She is getting mind-fucked as the movie goes on, eventually becoming quite schizophrenic at the end in which the viewers don't even know who's who anymore. And the movie parallels Swan Lake (the ballet) as well, with the White Swan and Black Swan actually being the same person, the choreographer playing the Prince in the ballet, AND OF COURSE the ending. Lily seems to be the evil one, but in the end, they're both Nina, she's finally the ideal Swan Queen but innocent and evil at the same time. Nina is only personifying Lily to be the antagonist when the only thing that's stopping her perfection is herself. She is creating an outward enemy in order to combat her own fears. Lily is actually quite normal for the most part except she is brilliant in every single one of Nina's insecurities, such as control and sexuality. Nina only wants to believe that Lily is evil, but in all those scenes that Lily is in, Nina's face, for a split second, pops up instead of Nina. It's an interesting way of creating an evil character when in fact Nina herself is dynamic, constantly changing, brilliant, schizophrenic and battling her own fears and desires. The ending is perfect, literally and figuratively.

Favorite scene:
When Nina is on stage as the Black Swan and she's doing her pirouettes and turning into a swan at the same time. We watch her ending pose as literally a Black Swan, feathers, wings, and all of that but panning away, we see that it was Nina all along as a human. Who's who? We don't know!!! AHHH!

Last remarks:
I urge all of you to see it, even if you hate it, hate the storyline, hate the trailer, hate ballet, but you should still definitely see it just to know the struggles that Natalie Portman's character endures.

Mr. J 頻道 (Mr. J Channel): Guests: Lara, 張傑 and 張菲 (12/4)

2 part episode with guests Lara, 張傑 and 張菲!!!!!!

1. 南拳媽媽's Lara & 張傑
1. Both Lara and 張傑 have left their band 南拳媽媽 to start their own solo careers. 南拳媽媽 is a band that Jay founded a couple years ago who have constantly switched band members for the past 3 times.
1. Lara is a Russian-American-Taiwanese who is releasing her new album 12/6 (can't wait) with mainly acoustic guitar sounds. She performed her song "John" which was in all English and it was alright, I want to see what else is on her album before I buy it. The song sounded a little strange because her English sounded fobby despite the fact that she was born and partially raised in LA!? So confused. Anyways, she's really talented and she does a duet with Jay on the song 珊瑚海 (Coral Sea) and sings in Jay's 蛇舞 (Snake dance).
2. 張傑 is super talentedddd and amazing at guitar. His "finger style" guitar show was really good, although, obviously Jay's was better haha. And his jazz-like guitar renditions of Jay's songs like 龍捲風 and 他的睫毛 was nice. And then Jay out shined him once again with his own acoustic version of 雙截棍 was ridiculous! Why did Jay even invite them when he's better than all of them and so when he performs he outshines them by like 100%?!!! Probably because 小豬 (Show) was freaking amazing during the first episode haha. But whatever, it was cool, we found out why they decided to go solo and displayed a bit of their talents. :)
2. 綜藝大哥大's 張菲 aka 菲哥
1. Okay, 菲哥 is like the king of all Taiwanese variety show hosts!! He's been hosting for like more than 20 years!!!! So he rolled up as a guest (my parentals used to rent his VHS tapes every week when they lived in America haha), I had no idea Jay even knew him O_O" or at least even considered him a friend but then again I'm out of the loop on a whole shit ton of Taiwanese entertainment haha. Anyways his freaking intro was RIDICULOUS! He sang ITALIAN OPERA and it was actually freaking good! I had no idea he could even do that??!!!! Anyways, Jay was offering 菲哥 a motorcycle and 菲哥 talked about how OPRAH gave the whole audience cars. WOW. How the hell did she even get into this conversation?!!! Anyways he was super humble which was cool! And he kept praising Jay for his hosting abilities! YAY JAY! <3 And he doesn't like 杜哥 just like me!!! WOOT! REPLACE REPLACE REPLACE!!!! Okay so basically the next 20 minutes of the show was about motorcycles and all that stuff. Lameee....They should've traded celebrity gossip!!! Anyways, it got better towards the end especially when he played the saxophone and showed off his musical abilities bahahhaa.

(So usually I attach youtube links on my other blog but apparently you can only watch them on youtube because they're copyrighted by Sony Entertainment -_-" so I guess just go find it yourself and copy/paste the title of this entry, sorry guys!)

House: A Pox On Our House (S7E7)

So the intros of House are getting more and more strange...this one looked like a historical slave ship drama??  But instead it's sick people getting thrown overboard and randomly a white girl in current days pops out of the water with a glass bottle with weird shit in it?!! I thought that the sick person was going to be someone on that fake drama they created, it looked so fake, and the music was so fake sounding, I thought it was supposed to be like the actors that was sick or something like that. OKAY. This is getting a little too strange...I'm super confused.

Quick and dirty explanation: A Dutch slave ship filled with small pox laden people was suck and the little girl brought up the virus inside an airtight jar and now she has small pox. But why go through that obviously fake cinematic ship reenactment when it's so lame?!

So Martha spills the beans to the family that they might have small pox because she has no censor for her morals. And of course they freak out. Oh joyous occasion, is she going to tell the CDC and let the hospital get shut down? Okayyyy maybe not because Taub is doing it instead. HAHA. So the CDC kicks everyone of the small pox/not small pox case...the big question is: is it or isn't it small pox??? So here's where our African reenactment comes in: House looks up the records of the sick slaves in 1793 from the Dutch captain??? This show is getting A+ more interesting by the second. So anyways, he gets a Dutch whore online to translates the logs in which hilarity ensues. And then Foreman has to secretly sneak past the CDC to get a TB test but instead discovers that the family is sick too?! Is this small pox or isn't it? Can someone please decide? Whatever, Martha tricks the CDC into letting them do a CT scan by using the TRUTH. WOW. At least we have a new addition to the team with new tricks up her sleeve...all the more to keep us interested and House annoyed aka let's get ready for some damn good comebacks! Anyways, so House jumps into the quarantine room with the family because he SWEARS it isn't small pox and now he's stuck there! HAHA! YAY MORE DRAMA! Anyways, not so sure now because the treatment he's giving the Dad is obviously not working hahaha. Wait, I'm 100% positive it's not small pox because House is the main character and he can't die. Haha. But the other characters can!!!!!!!!!!! OMG! WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?? WHAT IS THIS MYSTERIOUS DISEASE THAT ISN'T SMALL POX BUT PRESENTS SYMPTOMS OF TEXTBOOK SMALL POX?????? So the new diagnosis is a treatable pox that mice had on the ship??? Joyous for House because he's not going to die and props to Martha for solving the case! WOOT! <3

Cuddy/House drama:
So last episode, we found out that Cuddy found out that House lied to her so now she's being an icy bitch and even getting him out of clinic duties, something he begged for the past 6 seasons. It's strangely nice and weird, and obviously passive aggressive, so House should pick up on the hint that his girl is pissed at him...so of course, he calls Wilson for triage. Which is A+ useless because he has no advice. So House just confronts her and they get into a fight. USELESS AS WELL. >:( But why is Cuddy expecting anything out of House? Obviously he's not sorry for doing it...but when his life was in danger Cuddy totally forgot about it, but now that he's not dying, she's mad again. GEEZ! Please make up or break up!

Favorite quote:
"Are you handsome sexiest American man? Whatever, you put in credit card" -- online Dutch whore as said to House

Favorite part: The cancer kid and Wilson (and Sam) -- "THIS ISN'T LAMB-Y!" And then she throws the stuffed animal at Wilson. HAHA. So adorable~! But is this a preview into a new child for the show? AKA a child for Wilson????

Last remarks:
Less H/C drama, more patient drama = Old House! It's back! YAY! <333333333

House: Office Politics (S7E6)

WOW. The show started out with a commercial on immigrants and citizenship and I was like wtf, Hulu, why did you give me 2 commercials in a row, and then I realized that it was fake...haha. So cheesy just like real politician's commercials! So as we can guess, the patient job is somewhat related to politics...

MEDICINE IS LIKE POLITICS, AT THE END OF THE DAY, ALL THAT MATTERS IS RESULTS. 

(extra boring) Patient/case:

Rash + liver + kidney damage on a politician's campaign manager, Dugan. Add paralysis, a Blackberry, and maybe a few cocky snide remarks and we have the perfect villain. Reminds me a little of House and his cocky but kind of genius point of views. But his politician fired Dugan because of the little immigration advert he leaked. But damn that sneaky bitch politician is even more genius-er. So storyline aside, House's team wants to give him Hep-A to cure his imaginary yet real Hep-C? But they have no proof to risk his life for a treatment that only works 15% of the time...So instead they got a positive Hep-C test from the Senator himself. Which was not exactly the evidence Cuddy wanted to hear...but she heard it anyways...and so now there's another dilemma with their relationship, he lies. Wow, Cuddy did you honestly not see that one coming??? Shame on you.

WHERE THE HELL IS 13 AT?

HAHA. Martha M. Masters = Amber Tamblyn = 3rd year med student with 2 masters?!!! Haha a Masters with masters! Hired as a replacement for 13? "She's like the internet with breasts!" Ooh, already looks promising with her anal-ness and lots of things to make fun of = fantastic new addition to the team. She seems to have a conscious like Cameron but extra annoying and smart, oh yeah, did I mention extra annoying principles/morals? So House fires her and threatens to throw her out of medical school. But Cuddy is adamant to keep her because she's a "star." So this ongoing battle of hiring and re-hiring her ensues because the rest of the team is in jail. BAHAHA. Love!!! So he says he'll permanently hire her IF she lies to the patient...well it's for a good cause, but this is really a test of her moral ethics. And apparently she has them. She coerced the patient into the treatment by telling him the TRUTH about the fake blood test that House performed and how he can risk losing his MD license. Which is the TRUTH x 1000! And he still consented. Damn. So she's officially on the staff, I already foresee her as the character that we hate because she's so damn annoying though!!!!! Argh. Why can't you hire someone cool like 13?

Favorite part of the show:

Almost watching short, white, Jewish (he said it, not me) Taub win against Foreman at the basketball game. HAHAHAA.

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Last remarks:

I'm glad this show wasn't focused too much on House/Cuddy relationship but instead of focusing more on the patient which is kind of what the show is about, they focused on the new girl. Way less boring than H/C but how long are they going to keep this charade up with boring cases and patients? Can we see something more interesting like the old ones we used to see?

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Favorite quotes:

DAMN IT! This show had so many good snippets and quotes I couldn't even keep up! This is why no other show can compare to House, and always leaves me wondering, why the hell did I stop watching this show for a month??? Anyways on with the quotes:

"What's that I smell? Onions? Peppers? I think it's a sausage fest." Cuddy as said to House.

"Are you a vampire? It's okay we're inviting you in." Taub as said to Martha

"HURRAY! We popped your cherry. Diagnostically speaking." House as said to Martha

FAVORITE: "If I say something inaccurate than assume it's for comic effect. Then laugh because it's funny." House as said to Martha 

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BTW: Has anyone noticed that House is looking a bit chunkier lately?

Glee: Special Education (S2E9)

So catching up on some TV and I just watched Furt yesterday so I'm super excited about this episode. The only real cliffhanger-y thing from yesterday besides the barf-inducing love scenes (WHICH I ABSOLUTELY LOVED!!!! AHHHHHH!! <3<3<3) was the fact that Kurt was transferring to Dalton Academy. Is he really going to do it?? Oh, and I still remember the first thing Rachel said "so does that mean you're going to compete AGAINST us?" THAT'S ALL YOU THINK ABOUT?!!!!!! WTF BITCH!

Ok, so on with the show after that rant! :)

SECTIONALS! = DRAMA DRAMA DRAMA!

Kurt at Dalton Academy

He joined the Warblers! Should be good, but drama rama, wonder the Warblers are going to scare him into running back to McKinley High! Some of the Warblers seem like douchebags....Well anyways Kurt's getting a chance to audition for a solo and he asks Rachel to help so they sing "Don't Cry For Me Argentina" from Evita. Anyways, Kurt doesn't get the solo because he tried too hard...But Warblers are all about being uniform and Kurt can't stand out of the crowd. This seems weird because they're limiting his individualism! More reasons to go back to McKinley High! And Rachel is being disgustingly nice to you???

Finn & Rachel problems...

Going to couples counseling because Finn slept with Santana...Rachel is making such a big deal out of this and I love Emma's advice about storming out bahahaha. But it's weird that Puck is helping her cheat on him?! YES! Wonder couple is broken up YAY! <3 More reason to hate Rachel!

Recruiting a new member?

Puck has the job of recruiting a new member hahaha. I wonder who it's going to be?? Haha and ended up getting trapped in the portapotty! HAHA and he recruited a weird girl named Lauren. Hope she can sing!!! But she's so freaking weird...she hates show choir, wonder if she's going to stay? Probably just a stand-in because Kurt is coming back *crosses fingers*

The competition:

The Hipsters...lol "The Living Years" BAHAHAAHAHA I love old people!!! Lol they're so funny and cute! Especially when they're struggling down the steps lol! But they're boring though so whatevers.

Warblers: "Hey, Soul Sister" --> absolutely LOVE this song! And I love acapella! <3 YAY! They were so good! Can Blaine transfer to McKinley please?? Damn, the Warblers are extremely amazing, I think I'm in love! They should totally win! <33333

Underdogs at sectionals = New Directions: HOLD UP! HOW COME THEY GET TO SING 2 SONGS WHILE NO ONE ELSE GETS TO???

Sam & Quinn's duet: "I've Had the Time of My Life" --> They're so cute it's gross!! HAHA! Their singing wasn't great, not gonna lie. But whatevers, their chemistry is ridiculous! And the song is really cute!

Santana: "Valerie" --> YES! I LOVEEEE WHEN SANTANA SINGS! :) I feel like she's one the best singers in the group!! And when Brittany and Mike dance it's pretty good! AHH! Cuties <3 The song is super random though! And the magic comb thing that Artie did for Brittany was ridiculously sweet! <3  

Mercedes and Tina -- "Dog Days Are Over" by Florence and the Machines! I really don't like Tina's voice...ugh. But dog days are over ---they're not the underdogs anymore! Because...


THEY'RE GOING TO REGIONALS BECAUSE THEY TIED WITH WARBLERS! YAY!

oh yeah, and wtf, Emma got married to Carl?!

Glee: Furt (S2E8)

LOVE LOVE LOVE! This should be an episode for Valentine's day or something...but Glee is officially back! Out of their hump thanks to Gwen in the last episode, the storyline is good and of course, love is all it takes~! <3 


Finn's Mom + Kurt's Dad:

They're getting married~! <3 And they're having a Glee wedding~! :) Of course, Kurt is the wedding planner. HAHA. When Finn sang "Marry You" along with the rest of the Glee Club as they all walked down the aisle, it was so cute! Esp Sam and Quinn's part! The streamers were a bit much though haha. I think I watched it like 50 times and when Burt came dancing down the aisle, I was like AWWW <333333

Finn's speech about FURT <3 So cute~! :) Finn & Kurt, brothers from another mother! <33333 And then he serenades Kurt with Just the Way You Are! HAHAHAHAHAHAH. <3333333 And then they dance together, granted it was just the box step but it's still really cute! <33333

Sue <3:

And Sue's ex BF/anchor Rod is getting married as well??? WTF. Love is in the air for reals...erm so Sue tries online dating in order to salvage her reputation...bahahahahha "extreme taxidermy, tantric yelling and poking the elderly with hidden pins" bahahhahaha <3 SO Sue Sylvester realizes the only one for her is Sue so basically she's marrying herself bahaha. <33333333333 And her tracksuit gown is freaking hilarious!

Sue's mom is so cute, but they kind of look the same! :) But she's pretty evil...a Nazi hunter...making Sue look sad and pathetic! She says the meanest shit passive aggressively... Boo! Go away! And she promises to sing at her wedding and her duet of Ohio with Sue was pretty good and they aired out all their tension during the song...and then totally became a bitch right afterwards... Well she left, so whatever. Pretty useless character unless she comes back. But it gives insight on Sue's past and why she's such a huge bully at the school

Sam + Quinn~! 

Sam says that he and Quinn are the stars of McKinley so he proposes to her! BAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHA. OMG. Promise ring~! So cute!!! Omgoshhh so cute, I want Sam as a boyfriend too!!! All the things that he promises her are so sweet~!!!!! :)

Kurt's harassment issues with Karofsky:

Principal Sue at least for now...bc Figgins is coming back!!! But she was actually a pretty good principal, not going to lie! And I love how she calls her sister "handi-capable!" Nice! Seriously! And she's so nice to Kurt about the harassment issue with Kurt, except for the part where she calls him lady. Anyways, but such a great principal! She expelled Karofsky but I smell a payback............damn it, I knew he was going to come back...And now he's going to Dalton Academy?!!! WTF!

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So many good quotes this episode!!!!

Sam as said to Quinn: "If you accept this ring will symbolize my promise to you to be true...to listen to your problems, to tell you when you have food in your teeth or eye gunk, to come over to your house whenever you need something super heavy moved around. I promise to make you feel proud when you point down the hall and say 'That dude's my boyfriend.' I promise to do all those things without trying to sound like Matthew McConaughey!" Omg. Throw up and barf, but yet super jealous that he's that adorable~!

Kurt as said to Finn: "I've been planning weddings since I was 2. My Power Rangers have been married and divorced so many combinations they're like Fleetwood Mac"

Mr. J: 頻道 (Mr. J Channel): Guest 林俊傑 (11/20)

Guest: 林俊傑 aka JJ Lin~! <3 OMGOSH, totally love him and own all his albums!!!!


Anyways, he's super freaking talented as you can see in the show, and his cover of Jay Chou's 安靜 was ridiculously good! So he can sing, dance, beat box...damn! Jay sucks at beat boxing for reals, but JJ is so good~! 


Background on JJ: He's 29, so 2 years younger than Jay, but doesn't he look like he's only 20?! His face is still so baby cute. Anyways, he was born in Singapore which explains why he's good at English haha. And he's a singer-songwriter, composer and actor~! Cool yeah? Anyways, for the intro of the show, they call JJ: 情歌王子 (love song prince) bc his songs are super cute and romantic~! YAY! <3 But no, I'm a true Jay fan, so obviously I think Jay is better lol, but JJ has some really good songs and his beat boxing skills are not bad, and of course he can DANCE! Definitely better than Jay's in those 2 categories! Haha, and his MJ moves are pretty good too! I feel Jay getting jealous...haha JK!


Anyways, so happy that 杜哥 (the makeup artist guy) talked so much less in this episode! YAY! But this show was honestly just a back and forth between Jay, JJ, and 雪糕 (ice cream --> the choreographer guy) so it was a little too inclusive for me.


Wow, seriously after watching Mr. J Channel, I'm in so much in awe of how talented these celebrities actually are!


And for the latter half of the episode, they exercised lol?! Diablo yoyo thing, basketball, and ping pong! AHHH! Jay is so cute! Esp when he wore those 2 red cheek thingys~! <3


Check out the show at: http://heyitsabell.wordpress.com/2010/11/23/talk-to-me/~! Enjoy!