Reed’s Bargain Bin is a recurring column where Reed Farrington tells us about a movie he bought for under $5, and whether or not he regrets the purchase.

Despite the clever title and participation of Al Pacino, S1m0ne did not receive much attention from critics or movie theatre audiences when it came out in 2002. The director, Andrew Niccol, had some acclaim as a result of having directed Gattaca (a smart science fiction film about a physically defective human in a genetically manipulated world) and having written The Truman Show (a smart allegorical film about a man who’s oblivious to the fact that his life has been manufactured for the purposes of a television show). S1m0ne also has a high concept idea behind it: a movie director creates a computer generated actor who becomes a star while only he knows that the actor is computer generated.

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Killer Imports is a regular feature on Film Junk where we explore foreign-language films from around the world that haven’t yet had their chance to shine.

I think I once loved a girl. The reason I bring this up is that I recently watched a Korean movie called My Sassy Girl and the woman referenced in the title reminded me of her. I wouldn’t normally review a romantic comedy, but I had read about this movie after having seen one of the director’s previous movies, Cyborg She, which I favorably reviewed recently. Both these movies are a part of a trilogy by the writer and director, Jae-young Kwak, although the science fiction element in My Sassy Girl is not the basis of the reality in the movie. I’ll get to that soon enough.

Since this movie was released in 2001, I’ll admit that I’m late to the party of supporters for this movie. In Korea, this film was the second highest grossing film in that year. And at the time, it was Korea’s highest grossing comedy ever. Its success even caught the attention of Hollywood. Dreamworks got the rights for a remake for $750,000 plus 4 percent of the worldwide gross. More on this in a couple of minutes or so (depending on how fast you read). A Japanese television series was even created based on the original source material.

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Killer Imports is a regular feature on Film Junk where we explore foreign-language films from around the world that haven’t yet had their chance to shine.

There’s a scene in Fatal Move that made me appreciate this film. The camera is shooting from a relatively high angle, looking down at the aftermath of a shooting in which Chinese Triad members are laying on the pavement beside a car. We see another car enter the scene quickly. And the car runs over one of the men lying on the road! Normally, in the movies, you would expect a car to swerve around a body on the road, because you would be expecting a stuntman to be lying on the road. I didn’t rewind to see if the film-makers used a dummy or a CGI facsimile, but this subversion of expectation is the visual sleight of hand that I love.

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Killer Imports is a regular feature on Film Junk where we explore foreign-language films from around the world that haven’t yet had their chance to shine.

I wish I had made this movie. I think that’s one of the highest endorsements I can give. (If I had made it, I would have subtitled it “The Reed Farrington Story.” (Just kidding.) I’ll explain this a little during this review.) If you don’t want the movie spoiled, then I suggest you force yourself to forget the title of the movie, that is, Cyborg She. Oh, sorry about reminding you about the title. Well, I suppose it doesn’t have to be a secret, but the fact that the love interest is a robot, I mean cyborg, isn’t revealed in the movie until about a half an hour or so into the movie. But I think revealing that she is a robot in the title of this movie is meant to help this movie find its audience. I suppose if this movie was called “Love Eternal”, some female audience members expecting a straight-forward romance would be upset.

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Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington leading up to and following the release of J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

“Don’t let them promote you. Don’t let them transfer you. Don’t let anything take you off the bridge of that ship. Because while you’re there, you can make a difference.”
- Kirk to Picard before Picard convinces Kirk to help him, resulting in Kirk’s “death”.

Hopefully, when you try to make a difference, you won’t end up dying like Kirk. But that’s the risk I suppose that’s worth taking. I guess it’s the same message that’s in the latest movie when Pike dares Kirk to do better than Kirk’s father. And in a famous Kirk soliloquy from an Original Series’ episode, “Return to Tomorrow,” Kirk passionately says, “Risk is our business.”

I’ve been in semi-retirement for six months now. And I can’t seem to relax. My mind keeps thinking that I should do something with my life. The best years have passed me by; however, if my health remains well, I still have half my life with which to accomplish something. Being in a state of inertia, I think I’ll most likely not do anything with my life. Even knowing that on my death bed that I’ll regret not having done anything, I still can’t motivate myself to do anything.

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Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington leading up to and following the release of J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

Don’t worry. I’m not about to defend my hatred of the latest Star Trek movie for the umpteenth time. And I’m exaggerating because I didn’t hate the movie. I was disappointed by it. No, this Treknobabble is an editorial generally concerning how people react to movie reviews. So I’ll be talking about things like people’s tendency to judge other people based on the movies they like, and how movie reviews are perceived. Of course, this discussion can apply to other artistic endeavors like music and books, but since this is a film site, I’ll try to focus on films whenever I can.

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Reed’s Bargain Bin is a recurring column where Reed Farrington tells us about a movie he bought for under $5, and whether or not he regrets the purchase.

On a recent foray to a local video store for bargain bin videos, I picked up a movie called The Good Night, written and directed by Jake Paltrow, Gwyneth’s brother. I’m not sure how obscure this movie is (Sean had heard of it and correctly named one of the stars, Martin Freeman), but it had a limited theatrical release in 2007 after premiering at the Sundance Film Festival. Besides Freeman, it also stars Penelope Cruz, Gwyneth, Simon Pegg, and Danny DeVito. (One of the photos on the DVD cover is of Martin Freeman, but I initially thought the photo was of Ewan McGregor.) Now if you know your actors and also that I have an unusual penchant for collecting anything obscurely related to Star Trek, then you’ll have realized why I bought this movie. In case you’re puzzled, I’ll tell you why. Simon Pegg played Scotty in the recent Star Trek movie.

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Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington leading up to and following the release of J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

Attention: Due to the sensitive nature of suicide, I feel I should clarify that the accompanying photograph is intended to be humorous. Besides, the phaser was set on stun, although at that range, if it had accidentally fired, I would have been out for a day.

I’ve been reading opinions about the Star Trek movie since it opened over two weeks ago. And I’ve been hoping for inspiration for the topic of this Treknobabble. I was going to let Treknobabble rest for a while and continue to write Killer Import reviews, but I haven’t seen any recent foreign movies worth writing about. So I’m trying something different with this Treknobabble in that I’m not going to edit what I write. It’s getting late so I don’t really want to start researching anything or compiling any notes. I thought I would ramble conversationally, giving myself a time limit of 60 minutes.

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Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington in anticipation of the upcoming J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

“Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”
- Maria Robinson.

It has been over a week since the future began. Disappointment. In a word, that’s what I felt by the time the ending credits started to play for the new Star Trek film. Despite the probable irrelevance of my opinions and the superfluous nature of another Star Trek review, I feel obligated to review the film given that this column, Treknobabble, was started in anticipation of the film. I have been ruminating and trying to put some perspective on my disappointment before committing my opinions into words. Was it the heavy anticipation that created unrealistic expectations, especially after the ecstatic reactions from preview audiences? I did enjoy Star Trek to some extent, but if it wasn’t a film set in the Star Trek milieu, I would have enjoyed it less. So I am sort of wondering why other people are raving about the film and wondering why the majority of reviewers have been effusive with their praise as well.

I had read that some news outlets were looking to film some reactions from Trekkies who dislike the film, because a sensationalistic headline could easily be applied to this newsworthy type of story. I feel as though some Trekkies are even expected to have a strong negative reaction opposite to popular opinion. The Onion hilariously made a false news story with this expectation. It feels like my opinion is reactionary and without any validity. Knowing that I have this Promethean task ahead of me, I must credibly argue why the majority of people have this mass delusion of thinking that Star Trek is wonderful. And then I realized the futility of rationalizing my opinion. I cannot deny that people enjoyed Star Trek. I wish I could be flippant and cite Talosian interference.

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Killer Imports is a regular feature on Film Junk where we explore foreign-language films from around the world that haven’t yet had their chance to shine.

After listening to the Macho Movie Review of Ong Bak 2, I was prepared to enjoy an awesome action flick when I inserted my DVD of the movie into my player. To be honest, I had purchased the DVD prior to listening to the review, and I had sampled some of the action scenes. Like Wintle and I imagine other movie lovers, I have a backlog of unwatched DVDs that is growing rather than shrinking. So the acclaim given and enthusiasm shown by Wintle, Nagy, and Billy in their review moved Ong Bak 2 to the top of my stack. Yet, their review came out weeks ago, and I have finally written my review. Why the delay? Because I was disappointed. I guess I should have been skeptical after Billy said that Ong Bak 2 was now his most favorite action flick, supplanting Conan the Barbarian.

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Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington in anticipation of the upcoming J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

That’s not a typo in the title of this Treknobabble. For Burger King’s current Star Trek promotion, “Kingons” is the clever name given to the Burger King characters dressed in Klingon garb. There’s a rumor that a scene with Klingons was cut from J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek. I wasn’t aware that there would be Klingons in the latest film. Perhaps there aren’t, but I suppose Klingons have a high recognition factor among the general populace. And I suppose the opportunity to meld the names of Burger King and Klingons was too obvious to pass on.

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Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington in anticipation of the upcoming J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

As the new Star Trek movie is a week away from being unveiled to the general public, I thought I would drop my Vulcan-like demeanor and talk about my feelings. I’ve mentioned before how as a school kid, a teacher labeled me as the “epitome of self-discipline.” I think this is part of my personality. To say that I am really excited would not be accurate even though I don’t have much of anything happening in my life. Maybe not shielding myself from spoilers has ruined the excitement, but I see two benefits: I avoid the stress of avoiding spoilers, and I relieve the physical turmoil of anticipation.

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