Thanks for checking in, because...
… this blog is alive! Not quite with the sound of an adorable Viennese family escaping the Nazis thanks to their singing abilities, but close enough, I guess.
Let's see, over the weekend, I got a new job, moved to Singapore, set up my own apartment, made a lot of new and wonderful friends, got to know old friends much, much better, and watched a lot of movies.
Wait, I'm sorry.
That happened over the last 10 months. Eeek.
I've now decided to end the galaxy's worst case of procrastination and finally tackled the blog demons to write something new here! I don't know why I make blogging so hard on myself. In my mind, it's some epic task, but really… I should not overthink this and keep it short and simple. That way I can do this more often. And Lord help us all, I will!
So here's a nice pocket-sized entry to get me started…
I loved The Wrestler, and was sorely disappointed Mickey Rourke didn't win the Oscar for that role. I think it pretty much trumped every performance last year, except perhaps for Robert Downey's Jr's 5.0 degree of difficulty role in Tropic Thunder (an American playing an Australian playing an African-American who speaks Chinese? Yeah, Downey can do it. No sweat.)
But that's apples to Mickey Rourke's oranges. Mickey was so openhearted and laid himself bare as Randy "The Ram" Robinson: sweet, defeated, charming and powerful. It's a performance to get lost in.
A nice side effect, if you will, of Mickey Rourke's career resurrection and having slew of awards (except for that Oscar, dagnabbit) is that when he's trying to pass along his comeback mojo to his The Pope of Greenwich Village co-star Eric Roberts. Check out Mickey's Independent Spirit Awards acceptance speech where he implored all the film hotshots in the room to give Eric another chance just like he got his - before he made any of his actual thank you's! (The rest of the speech is hysterical too. Just check it out na!)
Eric Roberts is Julia Roberts' older brother, and he was the rising, Jake Gylenhaall/Johnny Depp (eeek, don't like the Johnny, but I'm using the actor who played officer Tom Hanson of 21 Jump Street in terms of automatic, accepted awesomeness. Accepted, except by me of course) actor of his day. Except Eric was prettier and had training with both RADA and the American Academy of Dramatic Art.
I like Julia's acting OK, but Eric was far prettier than his sister Julia ever was, and he could probably portray any role better than Julia ever did (even Eric Brockavich, probably). Eric was nominated for an Oscar in 1986 for Runaway Train. That movie really packed a wallop, and I'm still recovering how sad that movie ended.
Too bad Eric got into major vehicular accident in 1981 that messed up the pretty, and he was never centered emotionally after it. Cue the downward spiral of drugs and bonehead roles. Here's Eric though, in the prime of his beauty:
These caps are from a movie he did in 1981 called Raggedy Man, a sweet romance/small-town mystery starring Sissy Spacek (can you see her in the window above the phone?), Sam Shepherd and Eric Roberts. It's set during World War II in a small Texas town, where Sissy plays a phone operator. Eric is a sailor on his way home for a four-day liberty when he finds out in the scene above that his sweetheart has married someone else. What's a sailor on leave with no place to go to do?
Sissy's character is a single mom of two boys (cute and non-precocious, the elder son played by a pre-ET Henry Thomas) and Eric's character bonds with her fatherless kids, and sweetly romances Sissy. It's a charming and simple movie - and the kind that would never be greenlighted in today's industry. Sayang. The charming and simple part is only 2/3rds of the movie though. The mystery portion happens after the love story.
Eric's typecast as wackos or snivelling villains, but he can easily play affable and tender. I wish he can do a role like that again. Eric's definitely settled, cleaned up his act and reconciled with his superstar sister. (And oh, he's the dad of Emma Roberts too.)
But hey, it turns out though, Eric may have had his "comeback" already, having starred in the second biggest box office movie of all time. Yup, he was in The Dark Knight. Which I haven't seen at all. Was he good in it?
See you soon, friends!
Let's see, over the weekend, I got a new job, moved to Singapore, set up my own apartment, made a lot of new and wonderful friends, got to know old friends much, much better, and watched a lot of movies.
Wait, I'm sorry.
That happened over the last 10 months. Eeek.
I've now decided to end the galaxy's worst case of procrastination and finally tackled the blog demons to write something new here! I don't know why I make blogging so hard on myself. In my mind, it's some epic task, but really… I should not overthink this and keep it short and simple. That way I can do this more often. And Lord help us all, I will!
So here's a nice pocket-sized entry to get me started…
I loved The Wrestler, and was sorely disappointed Mickey Rourke didn't win the Oscar for that role. I think it pretty much trumped every performance last year, except perhaps for Robert Downey's Jr's 5.0 degree of difficulty role in Tropic Thunder (an American playing an Australian playing an African-American who speaks Chinese? Yeah, Downey can do it. No sweat.)
But that's apples to Mickey Rourke's oranges. Mickey was so openhearted and laid himself bare as Randy "The Ram" Robinson: sweet, defeated, charming and powerful. It's a performance to get lost in.
A nice side effect, if you will, of Mickey Rourke's career resurrection and having slew of awards (except for that Oscar, dagnabbit) is that when he's trying to pass along his comeback mojo to his The Pope of Greenwich Village co-star Eric Roberts. Check out Mickey's Independent Spirit Awards acceptance speech where he implored all the film hotshots in the room to give Eric another chance just like he got his - before he made any of his actual thank you's! (The rest of the speech is hysterical too. Just check it out na!)
Eric Roberts is Julia Roberts' older brother, and he was the rising, Jake Gylenhaall/Johnny Depp (eeek, don't like the Johnny, but I'm using the actor who played officer Tom Hanson of 21 Jump Street in terms of automatic, accepted awesomeness. Accepted, except by me of course) actor of his day. Except Eric was prettier and had training with both RADA and the American Academy of Dramatic Art.
I like Julia's acting OK, but Eric was far prettier than his sister Julia ever was, and he could probably portray any role better than Julia ever did (even Eric Brockavich, probably). Eric was nominated for an Oscar in 1986 for Runaway Train. That movie really packed a wallop, and I'm still recovering how sad that movie ended.
Too bad Eric got into major vehicular accident in 1981 that messed up the pretty, and he was never centered emotionally after it. Cue the downward spiral of drugs and bonehead roles. Here's Eric though, in the prime of his beauty:
These caps are from a movie he did in 1981 called Raggedy Man, a sweet romance/small-town mystery starring Sissy Spacek (can you see her in the window above the phone?), Sam Shepherd and Eric Roberts. It's set during World War II in a small Texas town, where Sissy plays a phone operator. Eric is a sailor on his way home for a four-day liberty when he finds out in the scene above that his sweetheart has married someone else. What's a sailor on leave with no place to go to do?
Sissy's character is a single mom of two boys (cute and non-precocious, the elder son played by a pre-ET Henry Thomas) and Eric's character bonds with her fatherless kids, and sweetly romances Sissy. It's a charming and simple movie - and the kind that would never be greenlighted in today's industry. Sayang. The charming and simple part is only 2/3rds of the movie though. The mystery portion happens after the love story.
Eric's typecast as wackos or snivelling villains, but he can easily play affable and tender. I wish he can do a role like that again. Eric's definitely settled, cleaned up his act and reconciled with his superstar sister. (And oh, he's the dad of Emma Roberts too.)
But hey, it turns out though, Eric may have had his "comeback" already, having starred in the second biggest box office movie of all time. Yup, he was in The Dark Knight. Which I haven't seen at all. Was he good in it?
See you soon, friends!