I was finally able to watch Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence. After failed attempts to watch it during the CineManga preview and the actual CineManga festival, I finally succeeded over the looong weekend. The movie is about robots going berserk and killing people. Batou, the main character, has to find out who is behind all these killings. This seems to be a rather common theme in robot movies. The movie actually reminded me of Blade Runner and I, Robot (which I would guess is based more on Blade Runner than on Asimov’s work). But why does it always go like that? Why not about people killing robots? Is it because robots are non-living? But what if robots also think and feel? Or if humans can be replicated into robots? Wouldn’t that blur the fine line? These questions are pose to you during the movie as it delves into the uncanny valley and other robotics issues. It’s a bit heavy. More so than Ghost in the Shell and it would help if you have seen the first movie and have an idea of robotics, cyberpunk, and other common anime themes. In the end, there really were no answers. But I suppose those are questions we don’t need to answer at least until several more decades. Thankfully.

Rating: 4/5

Have you had a bad day? Don’t you just wish you can do it all over again? In this movie, Lola (Franka Potente) did just that, in fact she was able to do it three times. It started with Lola receiving a phone call. Manni, her boyfriend, had lost a bag containing 100,000 marks (it’s a german film) that he was transporting for a crime boss. If he does not deliver the money he is as good as dead. His solution is robbing a store to get replacement money. Lola has only 20 minutes to get replacement money to Manni before he proceeds with his plan. So she had to run and run and run. This is like three short movies rolled into one and the whole thing is exciting and hilarious at the same time.

Oh, and it’s got way cool techno soundtrack:

I wish I was a stranger who wanders down the sky
I wish I was a starship in silence flying by
I wish I was a princess with armies at her hand
I wish I was a ruler who’d make them understand

I wish I was writer who sees what’s yet unseen
I wish I was a prayer expressing what I mean
I wish I was a forest of trees that do not hide
I wish I was a clearing no secrets left inside

I wish I was a hunter in search of different food
I wish I was the animal which fits into that mood
I wish I was a person with unlimited breath
I wish I was a heartbeat that never comes to rest

Rating: 4/5

I’ll have to admit that I was leery of Infernal Affairs when my sister handed me the VCD. Coming from Hong Kong, I thought it is just another one of those gunfire blazing unlimited ammo action flicks. And the title didn’t help: It actually got me expecting some demonic horror twist. But haven’t watched a movie for so long that I actually popped it into the CD drive and played it. Fortunately, I was oh so wrong. The movie turned out to be pretty good. It is essentially a cat-and-mouse game between a police mole in a triad gang and a triad mole in the police force. There were no guns blazing. During the whole movie there were probably just over a dozen pistol shots. And there was absolutely no demonic horror twist. Instead, there was intense palpable drama full of twists and turns as the two moles hunt each other out while at the same trying striving to protect their identities and maintain a grasp on the false life (or is it their real life?) they both live. The game culminated in a tragic ending though not without a few more twists.

Rating: 4/5