Chase Scenes

Recently, I was watching The Bourne Identity, after like 8 years or so. I have very fond memories of it, as it really was first good action movie that I had watched. But what really stuck in my mind was the amazing chase sequence, Matt Damon ripping through the streets of Paris, in a Mini (the Mr. Bean car). This movie was also my first look at Parisian streets, buses all that. It came a full circle as I recently visited Paris and was really fun re-watching this scene after that. This made me think about the various nice chase sequences I had seen (or atleast the ones that I can recall), and the places that they were set in, so here goes-
1- The Bourne Identity- Matt Damon zipping around in a MINI, chased by police. Location is Paris.
2- The Bourne Supremacy- Another super chase sequence, this time in Moscow, Damon this time driving a taxicab, chased by police and the russian agent (karl urban).
3- The Bourne Ultimatum- This had a brilliantly tense foot sequence, in Tangier, where Bourne is trying to track a CIA agent, who is in turn tracking Julia Stiles.
4- Inception- A super foot sequence, set in Tangier (said in the movie to be Mombasa), short and sweet. Music is kick ass.
5- Black Friday- This is set in Dharavi, police chase a suspect through the slums of Mumbai, extremely realistic, and with pretty fun dialogues, typical of Indian Police (ai cheerkut, for example). My favorite is the part where the constable is imploring Imtiaz, the suspect to stop, both are tired and are barely walking, when the constable says abe imtiaz ruk jaa, tujhe kuch naheen hoga (imtiaz please stop, nothing will happen, dont worry!!)
6- Slumdog Millionaire- Starts off with a rollicking chase scene, police constable running after a bunch of kids who were playing cricket on the airport runway, shot in Dharavi, the Mumbai superslum, this scene was actually inspired by the Black Friday chase scene.
7- Chaser- This South Korean Movie has a number of great chase scenes, but the best one is the first one. Brilliantly realistic. Set in Seoul. Movie is quite an experience actually.
8- Violent Cop- This is Japanese, Takeshi Kitano's directorial debut, the chase scene is long and straight-forward, with a haunting jazz number playing. Set in Tokyo (?). The slo-mo fight sequence at the start is one of those scenes that remain etched in your mind.
9- Korosiya Ichi- This (in)famous Takashi Miike gorefest staring Tadanobu Asano has a typically nutty chase scene, in which the 2 brothers and Asano track down this one fellow and the 2 brothers chase him, this stops almost as soon as it starts, but what makes it special are the scenes preceding this and just after it, if these scenes doesnt make one say WTF, nothing else will, guaranteed! Set in Tokyo or maybe Osaka, not really sure.
10- Memories of Murder- Set in the (South) Korean countryside, this gem has a pretty chase scene. Once again, the start of this scene is quite something.

Anime Movies

I am not a big sucker for anime, even though I have watched my share of it. 2 of my favorites are Death Note and Trigun. Trigun in particular is one that I am very fond of, its tragi-comic story is really moving, some scenes still vividly etched in my mind, like the death of Legato. It starts off as a funny and sometimes mildly irritating story, of a man who might or might not be the legendary destroyer of cities, Vash the Stampede, who is awesomely voiced by Masaya Onosaka (Shinji in Bleach). But then its turn into a completely serious space western is seamless. The first scene in which Vash really gets serious, somewhere in the fifth or sixth epsiode is quite breathtaking. Most anime boast of some great kick-ass music and Trigun is no exception.
But I haven't watched many anime movies, the few that I have watched though left a mark on me. 3 of my favorites are Princess Mononoke, Akira and Ghost in the Shell.
Princess Mononoke is by legendary anime director Hayao Miyazaki. It was most probably my very first anime movie, saw it way back in 2006, when I was in my (good) movie watching infancy. It was a time that I fondly remember, when I used to watch movies with friends Bikash, Gurab, Mayank, etc. Nowadays I mostly watch movies alone or in a theatre. Anyhow, I saw this one in IMDb top 250 list and got it and watched it with Bikash, in his Emperor Asoka's era PC. The animation simply blew me away, particularly the last scene, and the theme of saving our environment was potent as well. Music composed by Joe Hisaishi was awesome as always. I got as many Studio Ghibli movies as I could after that, but never managed to watch another one till date, although Bikash I guess did watch atleast Nausicaa and Spirited Away.
I watched Akira when I was in UK, borrowed it from my college library. Considering that I really like the cyberpunk genre (movies and books which typify high tech and low life, benchmarks in movies is Blade Runner and books is William Gibson's Neuromancer), Akira was something that instantly appealed to me. The starting bike scene is a post nuclear holocaust Tokyo of huge buildings and neon lights was super cool. The transformation of Tetsuo into a insecure teenager into a menacing villain was managed very nicely. Music as expected was great.
Very recently, I finally managed to watch Ghost in the Shell, which I was meaning to watch for quite some time now. It is famous for inspiring the Matrix, which incorporated many of its elements like the green flow of numbers and characters for the internet, or as it is called in Ghost in the Shell, the net, and well as the plug-in to the nape for logging into the Net (if only we could do it). Ghost in the Shell is probably The best anime movie that I have watched, the story, the animation, the music are just flawless. Set in Hong Kong (somewhat odd, I thought the setting would be Tokyo, but I guess Hong Kong fits the plot pretty amazingly as well), it is about a futuristic group of cyber cops trying to nail a genius hacker called the Puppet Master, who manages to hack into the brains of people and make them do his dirty laundry (so to speak). A 3 minute montage of the main character Major Kusanagi riding a boat across Hong Kong is simply awesome, the music and the amazing scenes of the underbelly of a post modern megalopolis, wow! It gets very philosophical at times, but never tedious and the action, though somewhat muted in comparison to many other anime, is very nicely choreographed as well.
In the end, I would like to say that please watch the movies in Japanese, with subtitles if necessary. Its a crime against humanity to dub movies, in my humble opinion.

Nanbenda

Just finished watching A Stranger of Mine (2005), japanese movie, directed by Kenji Uchida (his first feature film, way to go!). Amazing stuff. Must be one of the best or atleast one of the simplest non-linearly told movie. I am pretty big on non-linear movies, some of favorites fall in this category. This is right up there, as Indian cricketers would say!
Camerawork and music are pretty awesome and plot is as non-fussy as it can get, story is about a salaryman, a friend of his who is a detective, 2 girls and a yakuza boss with some underlings! Ingredients sound great and I can attest that the dish is awesome as well (just had a big dinner at Crimson Chakra, hence the culinary allusions, sumimasen)!
Others movies that I watched in recent past are Boss Engira Bhaskaran, a Tamil Movie, comedy and pretty nice, one of the better Indian films! Great acting by Santhanam. And then recently watched Go, which is Japanese. Awesome start, super great chicken race nandayo! It is about Zainichi koreans in Japan, with a love story thrown into the mix, pretty good, though the variation in pace between the first and second half is quite great and is somewhat disconcerting!

O hisashiburi

Its been a while. Maybe I was busy, though I find it hard to believe. I didn't watch many movies in between though. Lets see, a couple of documentaries, notable ones being The Corporation and Kintaro Walks Japan. Movies that I can remember watching are Citizen Dog, which was a fun ride, some beautiful sequences, like the grandmother lizard one. Music was pretty as well. Also, The Hidden Blade. Same director as the more famous Twilight Samurai. IMDb informed me that the lead actor here was the japanese lead in Jim Jarmusch's Mystery Train. Really! Times have changed then I guess.
FAQ-
1- Why only Japanese movies?
A- Not only japanese but korean, chinese (mainland, hong kong, taiwanese), thai, vietnamese, etc
2- OK why only asian?
A- They are making the best movies these days.
3- So no european etc?
A- Shiranai.
4- How to find movies?
A- Very similar to finding research references. Use IMDb (like Mathscinet) judiciously. Blogs, friends, and recently youtube. Check out Backpacking Nepal's channel in youtube.
5- The blog is named Math, Movies, etc. Where is the math?
A- Please Don't be impatient. It will come. For starters, check out the oft mentioned math blogs like Terry Tao's blog and Tim Gowers's blog.
Maybe some more FAQ next time!

Postmen in the mountains (1999)

Havent been watching very many movies recently. Finally watched Postmen in the Mountains, a chinese film. Simple and extraordinarily beautiful, its the story of an aging postman, who for years had been traversing the quite arduous mail routes in Hunan in China, with his faithful dog for company. Finallya age catches up to him and he retires, but his son becomes the new postman. The movie is about the son's first trip, which also becomes father's farewell trip, when the dog refuses to go with his son, and so he decides to tag along to show the route and the people along the way to his son.
Quite an awesome movie, with such a simple plot. Music is pretty nice. But the topping was the scenery. Some of the most stunning scenery to be put in a film, Incidentally, Bird People in China is set in the similar sounding Yunan province, as is Zhang Yimou's Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles. Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress is set in the nearby Sichuan province. All of them boast of extraordinary locales. cant wait to go to China now!)
Werner Herzog has some movies, which also have some spiffing scenery like Aguirre Wrath of Gods, set in some of the most inhospitable terrain in the Andes and also in Rescue Dawn, set in Vietnam.
Photos are a poster of Postmen in the Mountains, of Balzac and Bird People in China. Others are screenshots of Postmen in the Mountains.

Random

I was sick for a couple of weeks so managed to watch a lot of movies, best way to recover trust me! i have been going through a documentary phase, so caught a couple of them (abnormal as I usually watch movies and not documentaries). One was on the Tank Man, was quite fascinating, and the other was also on China, a discovery feature on the rapid rise of China. Some really amazing photography, particularly in the second one, like the terrace fields of Long Shen, the vast pastures in Inner Mongolia, a totally awesome shot of women washing their hair in was it Tibet?, and some complimentary shots of Shanghai skyline, which apparently was all paddy fields like 15 odd years ago.
Movies that I caught were Takeshi Miike's Big Bang Love, set in the future, in a secluded penitentiary, murder mystery, but being a Miike movie, so hard to club so trivially. As usual, the direction was spiffing, with delightfully hued photography, quite a miracle how he manages to churn out movie after movie of such variety with his legendary pace. Stars Masanobu Ando (Kids Return, Battle Royale) with some spectacular body-art, and Ryuhei Matsuda (Gohatto), looking his usual angelic self.
Also watched Johnnie To's Fulltime Killer, Andy Lau giving a delightful turn as a movie maniac hired assassin, competing with a much quieter Japanese assassin for the position of asia's top killer (inspired by the sylvester stallone antonio banderas starring Assassins (my first hired killer movie btw), as mentioned by Lau in the movie). Action was over the top, whenever Lau was in the frame, sometimes when wasnt as well. Numerous famous action movies are referenced, Lau being a big fan of them in the movie, including Point Break, Le Samourai, El Mariachi, Leon, Cheung Fo, etc etc was so much fun trying to catch which movie were being referenced. Must mention that everything about the movie is extremely over the top, probably deliberately so. But To is capable of some very nuanced movies like Election and Mad Detective, and some really awesome action movies like Exiled and Cheung Fo. This one was all fun.
Video is Lonely Planet's Tokyo Moods, a beautiful short on Tokyo, music is pretty.
Photos are poster of big bang love, a couple of shots from it, and poster of Fulltime Killer.

Sabu

One fine day, in ISI or maybe in home in bbsr, I turned on the TV to see this new channel, UTV World Movies. I don't depend much on TV for movies, so had no idea about this channel, but this was a welcome surprise to see a japanese movie on TV. The movie, I later was to learn, was Hiroyuki Tanaka or as he is better known, Sabu's Monday. The story was about a sarariman, waking up in a hotel room on Monday, with no recollection of the weekend that had just passed. The story starts then absolutely rockets, with some absolutely spiffing music and awesome dance scenes, featuring a morose yakuza, his delectable girlfriend, and many more similarly zany characters. There are plenty of implied commentary on the contemporary japanese society, apparently. But the comedy is pretty universal.

Later, I watched Postman Blues, which also stars the director, and very recently (ie in the last hour, ahem) watched Drive. Both star Shinichi Tsutsumi, who also starred in Monday. If anything made Monday leave such a mark on me, it was his superlative acting. Besides he has given the most convincing potrayal of a mathematician, that I have seen, in Suspect X, one of the best battle of wits movie that I have seen, alongwith Death Note.

The tragi-comic aspects of his movies are just too special. For example, Drive features a scene in which the Tsutsumi uses a samurai sword to slice his aunt, done in a way, which forces you to laugh out. Similarly, Postman Blues is amazing cocktail of pessimism and optimism.


Sabu is also an actor and was in Ichi the killer, Takeshi Miike's gorefest. Miike regularly casts directors in his movies, as he says that they bring a very unique perspective, being intimately connected with movies, but are not professional actors. For more gems from Miike, do check out his interviews in youtube.

Let me end with this funny anecdote about Sabu. Apparently, after one of his movie showings, someone asked him, is it true that making movies in Japan is getting more difficult, due to lack of funds. Sabu cocked his head and said totally matter of factly, probably yeah, most people find it difficult to find money for movies, but I am amazing, so I don't have any problems!!

Photos are from top to bottom, poster of Monday, a scene from Postman Blues, and a poster of Suspect X.