Photography is one of my hobbies and it is something that I would continue to pursue even if it were not a part of my current profession as a freelance writer and journalist. Indeed, many of the pictures I take are “for fun” and for the sake of experimentation (and enjoyment). The photo above, for instance, comes from a rather interesting picnic table in Byron Bay, Australia. Instead of just taking a straight-on photo of the graphic, I went for a more obtuse angle. I also applied a pinhole filter and dialed up the saturation. The net result, I think, is more intriguing than a more standard photo of the same object.

To some people, “PhotoShop” is a dirty word. I don’t think it is, so long as you’re not really misrepresenting your subject. I don’t “adjust” or “correct” all of my photos, to be sure, but I do try to have fun with it. Most of my photos of Australian wild animals weren’t so dramatically altered, since I wanted the subjects to speak for themselves.

In any case, here are a few highlights from my Flickr photostream from the last couple of months. I’m always open to feedback, since I’m always open to learning and evolving!

Just as some folks have come up with words like “dramedy” to describe their films of choice, using a portmanteau might be the way to go. Here are a few ideas for some alternative movie genres

Docufiction – As a fictional documentary, docufiction can take on two entirely different forms. On the one hand, you can have a documentary that has a fictional narrative laid on top of it. That would be the case with Disney’s African Cats, for example. On the other hand, you can have a fictional movie that is portrayed as if it were a factual documentary. Apollo 18 is a prime example of that.

Fupid – I aim to keep this blog reasonably family friendly, so let’s say that “fupid” is a shortened version of “freaking stupid.” These are typically comedies that make no outward attempt to be intelligent or insightful, relying instead on stupidity, slapstick, and other base material. You have movies like Year One, for instance. However, that’s not to say that all fupid films are without insight. Despite its crassness and immaturity, Idiocracy has a powerful message we should all consider.

Sophistifun – Offering sophisticated fun for a more sophisticated audience, movies of the sophistifun genre may otherwise be thought of as smart comedies. This lends itself to certain British comedies or ones that approach higher society. You could argue that, for some patrons, Jane Austen’s novels (and the movies based on them) could fall under this category.

Self-Aware – I realize this isn’t a portmanteau, but it is an interesting genre of entertainment to consider. These are movies, TV shows, and so on that appear to be aware they are movies, TV shows, and so on. The Office is one such example, with the characters speaking directly to the camera. A sub-genre are the movies that are aware of their own genre conventions. Scott Pilgrim made fun of its own gamer culture, just as the characters in Scream were fully aware of what happens in a “typical” horror movie or slasher flick.

Can you come up with any other unique movie genres or sub-genres? Funimation, perhaps? Mechageek? Or how about foreign hipster?

A tip of the hat to Corbin (and Deb) for the idea for this post!

Apollo 18 (2011)

As a species, we’ve always been fascinated with Space. From Star Trek to Star Wars, we’ve always wondered about what is out there. That’s a big part of how the Apollo missions got off the ground (terrible pun intended), but did you know about the secret 18th expedition to the moon?

That is basically the premise of Apollo 18, a movie that is presented as if it were recovered archival footage. The presentation style gave a good sense of (false) authenticity and the premise of the story held a fair bit of promise too, but the plot development of some sort of evil alien beings on the dark side of the moon didn’t quite pan out as strongly as it could have. We don’t learn enough and we don’t get enough gruesome gore either.

We almost get the same kind of sensation as Paranormal Activity, watching those monitors for the tiniest of movements, but we never get that visceral satisfaction of a genuinely good scare. While this isn’t really a bad movie, I really feel like they could have done a lot more with the basic premise.

Bad Teacher (2011)

She’s a teacher who doesn’t play by the rules, but she’s not as hard-edged as Michelle Pfeiffer in Dangerous Minds either. She’s just there for the money, so that she can buy herself some breast augmentation and woo a wealthy bachelor. Cameron Diaz is the Bad Teacher. That sounds like simple enough a concept for a basic comedy, right?

Unfortunately, the jokes here just aren’t all that funny. It almost feels like Diaz, along with co-stars Justin Timberlake and Jason Segel, are trying too hard. They’ve all done better work and everything just feels forced here. It got an R rating from the MPAA, but Bad Teacher doesn’t have the same kind of panache as Hangover or Harold and Kumar. Despite a handful of sight gags that almost work, this movie is probably better described simply as “bad.”

The Change-Up (2011)

Freaky Friday is a movie where a mother and daughter unexpectedly swap bodies. The Change-Up is sort of the same idea, except it’s a couple of best friends. One is the married lawyer with a family and the other is the charismatic bachelor with no real direction in life. I’ll let you guess which one is played by Ryan Reynolds.

Yes, the body-swapping is a little weird for a setting that is otherwise quite normal, but I actually found some entertainment here. The situations are highly contrived — Jason Bateman somehow finds himself participating in a “lorno” (light porn) — but they work and they had me laughing. I wouldn’t put this on the same comedic shelf as 40 Year Old Virgin or even Forgetting Sarah Marshall, but this largely forgettable and remarkably corny flick is worth a couple hours of distraction.

The Hangover: Part II (2011)

After the resounding success of the first Hangover movie, you knew they were going to make a sequel. And while it doesn’t quite live up to the magic of the original, The Hangover: Part II is still a wildly hilarious and outrageous jaunt into the world of immature humor.

No, it’s not sophisticated. Yes, Ed Helms gets a Mike Tyson style face tattoo. Yes, there’s plenty of slapstick and bathroom humor, but that’s the point. It’s almost like they took the Vegas plotline, relocated it to Bangkok, and worked to one-up its own depravity. There’s not much in terms of originality, but at least there’s a monkey. Who smokes. And sells drugs.

Super (2010)

I heard about Super in passing from Stephen Fung. In our discussion, I effectively learned that it was like Kick-Ass, but with Dwight Shrute Rainn Wilson as the main crime-fighting masked superhero. And then there’s Ellen Page as his strange sidekick. Go figure.

There are so many moments in this movie where you laugh at “the Crimson Bolt,” but you immediately start to feel bad. His tale is a sad one, but that’s the beauty of the dark humor. The scene involving the movie theatre lineup is a prime example of this, where our so-called superhero tells someone not to butt in line and goes much too far to enforce that rule.

It’s all unnecessarily violent and inexplicably weird. This is low budget and low brow, but Super is beautifully done and I’m confident it’ll become a strange cult classic in the years to come.

A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas (2011)

The first movie in this trilogy, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, went on to become a cult classic. It was irreverent, nonsensical and hilarious. The sequel didn’t capture that same kind of magic, so I was cautiously optimistic at best when I heard that a third entry was in the works, let alone one that would be a Christmas movie. In 3D.

Thankfully, A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas really does deliver in spades. Yes, the two title characters don’t really have the same kind of on-screen chemistry that they once did, but that’s almost the point. After all, Harold has gone to be a successful corporate time with a family and Kumar is still a pothead who was kicked out of medical school. They couldn’t be more different.

The plot couldn’t be more contrived. Kumar receives a package in the mail addressed to Harold, so he goes to deliver it. The dominoes fall, the Christmas tree lights on fire, and they spark a series of events that leads to a coked-up baby, brushes with the Russian mafia, and genitalia being abused. And let’s not forget that this is all in three-dimensions. But somehow… it works.

The 3D effects, particularly with the smoke, are blatantly included as sight gags, but they are very well done. Similarly, the smaller roles played by Bobby Lee (as Harold’s assistant) and Danny Trejo (as Harold’s father-in-law) really add to the precious pothead comedy. This film is clearly not going to win any awards, but if you liked the brand of comedy of the first movie, this holiday flick will have you in stitches.

Winnie the Pooh (2011)

One of my favorite series growing up had to be Winnie the Pooh, both in book and animated form. To this day, I still adore the characters of Eeyore, Piglet, and the other citizens of the Hundred Acre Wood. I was even enthralled by the Tao of Pooh.

So, my initial response to the new Winnie The Pooh movie was a hope that they wouldn’t butcher this childhood treasure. And they didn’t. The irresistibly sickly sweet charm is certainly in place here, including a mostly hand-drawn kind of style that hearkens back to A.A. Milne. There are many sections where the characters physically interact with the text too, giving the kind of feel that someone (the narrator) is reading you (the audience) a bedtime story. It’s all wonderfully done, immediately melting my heart.

The current tale (no pun intended) surrounds the unexpected loss of Eeyore’s tail and a quest to replace it. It’s beautiful in its simplicity. The usual antics ensue with Owl claiming to be smarter than he is and Piglet looking more terrified than timid. The voice acting, with the exception of Pooh, felt a little off and the musical numbers are forgettable. Maybe nostalgia is getting the best of me, but I had a good time with this film. It’s too short at just over an hour (including lengthy credits), but it’s definitely worth watching for any fan of Pooh. Silly old bear.

Disneynature: African Cats (2011)

I thought Disney’s Earth has some fantastic footage (courtesy of the BBC) to go along with a half-decent narrative, but I can’t feel the same about this entry in the expanding Disneynature brand of “documentary” nature films.

To be fair, I understand why they would position Disneynature: African Cats as a movie primarily for the younger set and that’s why they loosely wrapped documentary footage around a Disney-like plotline, but it didn’t really work for me here. The expansive footage of the cheetah and lion families wasn’t as impressive as the first Earth movie either. Yes, the babies are cute, but you’ll get a better nature documentary elsewhere.

Real Steel (2011)

With an absurdly silly premise like this, you can’t help but to feel like the people behind this movie are playing a practical joke on the world. Strangely enough, though, Real Steel is mildly thoughtful, offering depth, humor, and plenty of robot-on-robot action.

Yes, it’s easy to say that Real Steel is the realization of the dream started by Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots, but it’s probably more accurate to say that it’s Rocky for the new generation… even if it stars Wolverine as a has-been boxer barely making ends meet. This is’t to say that Real Steel is going to win any awards, but it is a lot better than you might expect.

This is largely your typical underdog story, but under the wraps of mechanized robot battles. The product placement is rampant and the plot “twists” are incredibly predictable, but I still left the theatre with a smile on my face. The robots are humanized, especially in the scenes with Atom the underdog fighting bot and Max Kenton, the son of Hugh Jackman’s character. They dance, they laugh, they cry, and they fight. And we, as the moviegoer, win.

Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

As we look ahead to The Avengers movie next year, we have to take a look at the movies featuring the individual superheroes. You might remember my brief review of Thor a short while ago, as well as my thoughts on the Iron Man franchise. Captain America falls under the same baddie-battling umbrella, but it is heavily coated in a thick layer of American patriotism. But that’s okay.

I didn’t get the same kind of visceral satisfaction as I get with some other action movies and I don’t think they featured Hugo Weaving as Red Skull nearly enough, however, which ultimately leads to another forgettable addition to the Marvel movie collection. The grandiose presentation of Thor was more entertaining and X-Men: First Class easily outclassed Steve Rogers.

In particular, though I appreciate the efforts of one Chris Evans, I felt his portrayal of the Nazi-fighting patriot to be lacking. I never really connected with the character; the robots in Real Steel had more personality. Even so, if you have any interest in next year’s Avengers, you should watch the origin story of Captain America: The First Avenger, if only to understand any in-jokes and references they may make.

Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)

I had my quibbles about the first of the Michael Bay Transformers movies. I had a few more quibbles about Transformers 2. And they have all culminated to the monstrosity known as Dark of the Moon.

Visually, Transformers 3 certainly has its appeal. The camera work, the big explosions, and the giant combat scenes are stunning to be sure. At the same time, the level of fan service has clearly diminished and Shia Labeouf is more unnerving than ever.

Logical missteps abound, Transformers: Dark of the Moon takes far too long to get started (spoiler: the real action doesn’t really begin until the situation is rebooted about halfway through) and my interest waned as the minutes passed me by. It’s time for Michael Bay to relinquish this treasured franchise.

Thor (2011)

Superhero movies can be very entertaining if they are well done and you are willing to suspend your disbelief. That’s why movies like The Dark Knight and Iron Man worked so well. Even when you start including superpowers, rather than just rich men with their fancy toys, you can still achieve some great things. But what happens when you cross into Norse mythology too?

I can see what they’re doing with Thor. This is a part of a bigger plan for the upcoming Avengers movie, introducing each of the characters through their own individual films. The thing with Thor is the mythology goes a little further, involving multiple realms. Chris Hemsworth is a convincing God of Thunder, complete with an oversized ego and sense of entitlement. There are parts where his portrayal feels flat at times, though, particularly in his interactions with Natalie Portman’s character, and Thor’s Norse god buddies are easily forgettable.

Similarly, Tom Hiddleston’s portrayal of Loki left something to be desired. I didn’t get the sense of him being a sinister trickster, which is how I understood that character. To be fair, I’m not terribly familiar with the Marvel canon. Thor, as a movie, is what it is. The action scenes are mostly predictable and not as satisfying as I had hoped, but the tie-ins back to the Avengers (Sam Jackson appears as Nick Fury) help to propagate the narrative, even at the price of a slight distraction.

Thor is nowhere near the kind of movie that Iron Man was, but it’s certainly better than many of the really bad superhero movies that we have seen.

Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop (2011)

When Conan O’Brien left The Tonight Show, he made headlines. When he embarked on a multi-city stand-up variety show tour, he made headlines again. Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop is a documentary that focuses mostly on the latter, following the comedian as he hit stages across the country and had the first experience in his life where people actually paid money to see him.

The hope, for my part, was to see a little more of the act that toured the country, but the pacing in this documentary was decidedly slower. You get to share more of the behind the scenes moments, particularly where Conan voices his frustration with fans and friends who want yet another photo or yet another autograph. You can see that he is exhausted, but he continues to take pictures and sign autographs. That says something. He loves his craft. He loves the attention. He lives for the applause.

The concept for Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop showed promise, particularly for fans of his brand of comedy. As it stands, the documentary has its moments and I’m glad I watched it, but it wasn’t as entertaining or insightful as it could have been… unless the tour really wasn’t that entertaining or insightful to begin with.

Fast Five (2011)

There’s not much to say about this movie. It gathers together many of the major cast members from earlier entries in the Fast and Furious franchise, possibly because many of them found little success in other films, and puts them back in fast cars driving recklessly. The difference this time around is that they threw in an Ocean’s Eleven like dynamic, since Toretto’s Nine (I think that count is correct) is planning a heist.

The dialogue in Fast Five is just as cheesy as the original, but it doesn’t have the same level of over-the-top ridiculousness that makes me want to remember lines like “I live my life a quarter mile at a time” and “More than you can afford, pal.” Yes, you once again have to suspend your disbelief, but the series doesn’t even carry the same kind of automotive eye candy that it once did. There is virtually no racing at all. Even so, I was mildly entertained and I still view this franchise as a guilty pleasure with no real redeeming value at all.

Yes, it’s a movie review weekend of mediocrity. None of these movies is going to be particularly memorable, but I wouldn’t go so far as to say they are a complete waste of time either.

What happens when you take a pretty typical movie formula, but throw a cultural wrench into the fray? That’s effectively what you get with Breakaway, a movie that was originally titled Speedy Singhs.

A group of Indo-Canadians in suburban Toronto form a hockey team in a small time league, because they can’t gain any acceptance into the other teams. This rag-tag group has to overcome a series of challenges, like lack of skill, but it’s really a cultural play. The protagonist, Raj Singh, works at his uncle’s trucking company (yes, playing up that stereotype too) and his father disapproves of his hockey-related ambitions.

The rest of the film is very predictable and very formulaic. We’ve seen it before in movies like Whip It and Bend It Like Beckham. Even so, the heartwarming film has some good comedy it, some fun Bollywood-inspired sequences, and a tale that will be familiar to anyone with traditional immigrant parents. The expected “if you live under my roof, you live under my rules” scene is in there, for instance.

I thought that Russell Peters would be a fun addition to the movie, but his acting feels very rigid and uncomfortable. He should stick to stand up. Breakaway is a good popcorn movie; just don’t expect anything to break the formulaic mold aside from some jokes that poke fun at stereotypical East Indian culture.

I had a reasonably good time with the first Kung Fu Panda movie, but I realize that most sequels don’t live up to their originals. As such, I went in with limited expectations for Kung Fu Panda 2 and, well, it did what I expected.

The usual Jack Black style of slapstick humor is in full tow with Po the Panda stumbling and bumbling his way through battles. He is the “Dragon Warrior” now, but he’s as clumsy. In this film, he seeks out his origin story, trying to learn about his parents and how he ended up being raised by a noodle shop-owning bird. This is another one of those movies that will likely be fun for the kids (and the young at heart), but it is also quickly forgettable.

We find ourselves in the middle of 1920s Shanghai for Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen. The Japanese are on the cusp of war with the Chinese, the mob has a stronghold on the city, and we have this lone warrior in a disguise to save it all.

The movie has a somewhat convoluted story that will leave you scratching your head at times, but you’re not really watching this for the story; you’re watching this for the kung fu action. On that front, there is fighting, but there is better fighting in other movies. The heavy-handed Chinese patriotism can get on your nerves too.

The vigilante style will immediately bring comparisons to Batman and Green Hornet, but I left with a very “meh” feeling after watching The Return of Chen Zhen. Both the characters and subplots are left half-developed with no real substance to pull you into the movie’s world. They would have done a lot better with a much simpler and more straightforward approach.

Arthur (2011)

For some reason or another, I’ve become a big fan of the Russell Brand brand of comedy. There’s just something about the way that he carries himself (along with the somewhat peculiar British accent) that lends itself to some great laughs. At the same time, it’s not like I went in expecting an Oscar-worthy performance.

In Arthur (not to be confused with the king who retrieved Excalibur), Russell Brand plays a wealthy playboy and heir to a multi-billion dollar multinational corporation. Not surprisingly, he knows nothing about the business and just goes about wasting the cash. Helen Mirren plays his nanny, trying to keep his exploits as much under control as possible. The humor itself exploits cheap sight gags and over-acting on the part of Brand, but that’s almost the charm of a piece like this.

In the scene above, for instance, Brand’s character is bidding against himself for Abraham Lincoln’s coat and hat. He only does this for his own amusement, throwing away tons of money, only to give the coat and hat to a random passer-by on the street. The story is predictable and Arthur adds nothing to the comedy landscape, but it’s still a mindless diversion that leaves a smile on your face.

March of the Penguins (2005)

Cute beyond words, harsh beyond its years. That’s probably how I would best describe this nature documentary that follows a group of emperor penguins as it marches, single file, to its annual breeding ground. That sounds like such a simple concept, but there’s so much more to it.

In March of the Penguins, we get to see an entire cycle unfold, from the long march to the breeding grounds to the mating rituals to the harsh conditions that they must endure as they protect the fragile eggs. The footage is positively breathtaking and you really start to feel what it would be like to go months without food, huddling together with your fellow penguins for warmth in positively frigid temperatures.

In stark contrast to a toned down documentary like Disney’s Earth, March of the Penguins does much less to shelter you from these harsh realities. We see cracked eggs. We see baby penguins frozen in ice. And I appreciate the presentation of that full story. Life isn’t easy in the Antarctic.

The pacing can be a little slow and the singular nature of the narrative may lose the interest of some, but this film is certainly worth watching for any fan of a good nature documentary.

I just need to get away.

It’s a feeling that is very common among, well, pretty much everyone. We’ve grown so accustomed to our daily routines, going through the same kinds of motions each and every day, and this can make life a tad on the boring side. At the same time, most of us are pretty averse to potentially harmful or fatal situations. It’s also rather challenging to do some of the things that we’d really like to do.

And that, at its crux, is why so many of us seek escapism. There’s nothing wrong with that whatsoever. It doesn’t mean that we don’t appreciate the lives that we currently enjoy. It doesn’t mean that we don’t appreciate our steady jobs, the roofs over our heads, and the delicious foods on our tables. It just means that sometimes, we want something different.

Escapism can take on many forms, but they all have the same common element: vicarious experience. Whether you’re watching a movie, reading a book, or playing a video game, you’re living vicariously through the characters. When you watch X-Men, you feel the same struggles as Professor X. When you play Portal 2, you see yourself as Chell.

The key difference is that you are not in any real mortal danger when you are sitting in that movie theatre or when you are slouched back on your beanbag chair in the living room. You get to experience the same thrills and sense of accomplishment without really changing who you really are. If only for a moment, you are a grizzled war hero in the 1940s, a hopeless romantic in Paris, or an intergalactic pilot in search of brave new worlds.

Don’t let the naysayers steer you astray. Escapist fiction (or even escapist non-fiction, for that matter) need not be a mindless diversion for the harsh, mundane, or boring realities of real life. You can engage with escapist fiction the same way you can engage with thoughtful and profound works of fiction. They are not mutually exclusive. Escapist fiction may be catered to the masses, but you can always take it to another level.

One of my favorite examples of this is the X-Men universe. You can’t deny that there are parallels between the persecution of mutants in that fictional world and the persecution of certain groups of people in the real world. You may escape to something that really doesn’t exist, but also recognize that art tends to imitate life.

I am Canadian. It is very much a part of who I am and how I choose interact with the world. This blog post might have been more appropriate for Canada Day, but the idea didn’t really dawn on me at the time. Oh well.

Growing up, I watched a lot of television. A good deal of it was American, but I was also exposed to a lot of Canadian content too. My Asian heritage certainly influenced by childhood too, but Canadian TV may have had an even bigger impact. And here are five of the most important pieces of Canadian heritage that I can remember.

The Cat Came Back

I’m not entirely sure what makes this distinctly Canadian, but it was certainly memorable. A tip of my hat to Russ for reminding me about this classic on Facebook.

Log Driver’s Waltz

This is another fantastic animated short that every Canadian kid will remember. It plays up on the stereotypes of plaid and moose, but that’s okay. That’s part of what makes us Canadian, even if I never chopped down a tree in my life or rode a log down the river. It may not be one of my all-time favorite cartoons, but I still look back at it with fond memories.

The Littlest Hobo

Speaking of fond memories, The Littlest Hobo had to be one of the greatest. The stories were very formulaic and ultimately predictable, but we just couldn’t help but to fall in love with the wandering pooch who had a knack for helping everyone. I even had this theme song as my cell phone ringtone for a while.

Mr. Dressup

If nothing else, Ernie “Mr. Dressup” Coombs taught me about the power and value of the imagination. From the Tickle Trunk to his time at the drawing board, he reminded us that we can be anyone we want and do anything we want if we set our minds to it.

The Sweater

And what list would be complete without this classic. Maurice “Rocket” Richard was before my time, but I still agree that I’d never want a Leafs jersey.