In LA

I took the long route to Minneapolis for a cousin’s wedding, passing through Los Angeles for a few days. Yay, visits with friends, and more airline miles. Along the way I grabbed a few photos of interest with my new Chinese-localized Treo 650.

In LA I saw the movie Cars with my cousins Jerry and Patsy, who had already seen the film once. Cars is amazing looking. Many scenes look like shots in an above-average car advertisement, which is a little eerie since these cars talk and have cartoonish faces. The film is very much worth seeing in a theater (rather than from an alternative-distribution AKA pirate DVD bought in China, at least until the US DVD is near release and the enterprising Chinese DVD distributors get their hands on good source material).

Cars is not as emotionally engaging as other Pixar films such as Toy Story or The Incredibles, but is still really something. Since few foreign blockbusters play in Chinese movie theaters, I’d highly recommend that all Chinese nationals spend six months of their salaries to travel to Hong Kong or the U.S. to see the film on the big screen. In case you’re reading this blog transated into Chinese by machine, the sarcasm may not be evident. Please be aware that I am joking. Few films are worth the trouble of international travel, though a stop after the film at the new Burbank Zankou Chicken might make such a trip more worthwhile. I could not believe it, a Zankou Chicken restaurant that is clean and features polite and helpful servers behind the counter (they even gave one friend who was a Zankou virgin a small taste of each of their meats so that he could make an informed decision when ordering).

It is true that most Hollywood films don’t play, officially, in China. I have heard that only 20 (or some other number, make up your own!) foreign films a year are allowed to be shown in Chinese cinemas, so most films don’t make the cut even if they contain nothing that would bother a Chinese government censor. Perhaps when my future kinder, back home in the US, refuse to watch the latest blockbuster that I feel they must see, I will make them feel guilty by telling them of the sad Chinese children who never get to see many Hollywood films in the theater. It’s the entertainment version of the old “Clean your plate, there are children starving in Ethiopia, who are you to refuse food” routine.

Speaking of films, in Minneapolis I watched the new Superman flick with my cousin Steve. We both found the film a little underwhelming, and he’s generally less of a grump than I about such things. It’s a bad sign when a film casts Kal Penn as a mere heavy and gives him almost no lines. Kal, you may recall, turned in a wonderful performance as Kumar in Harold and Kumar go to White Castle. Other talented actors were similarly wasted in a film that was to me unexpectedly uninteresting.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 30th, 2006 at 7:28 am and is filed under Amusing, China, Geeky, Treo 600. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.