Dante's (Fairy Tales) Inferno

I finally tasted the adaptation of the famous Dante's Inferno. I was always amazed by the historical facts and how Dante wove them into nice tortures and torments (Gee, I might be crazy and psycho for saying this out loud). Divine Comedy is the book that made me spend lots of money only to copy it from the library.

When I found that EA Games decided to make a game adaptation of this classic, I was so hyped. 'Twas not until the release that I was disappointed. They chose PS3 and X360, which means I could not play it. I already gave up when I found the trailer of Dante's Inferno : An Animated Epic. Looking from the artwork, I knew that it is a cinematic alternation of the game. At least, Inferno came alive in an accessible media.

After spending some minutes of downloading the rip (yeah, thanks to the high speed internet!!), I began to watch it. The animation was crisp, bleak coloured, somber and grim. The first scene when Dante was wandering in a dark forest with the appearance of panther and wolf resonated with the first part of the composition. But it was an extended prologue of the original. Right after the dark wood, Dante found Beatrice lying with her last breath. Okay, this might be an introduction for people who are not familiar with the epoch. But something went wrong. As Beatrice breathed her last and turned into a spirit, Lucifer came and hold unto her soul.

My memory was hazy for a moment. Is there a scene of this? And it went clearer, that the producer did something in the adaptation effort. They put a fairy-tale like background, fitting everything into stereotype. Dante himself is portrayed as a knight coming from the Holy War. Well, he is a Templar. Meanwhile, Beatrice was changed into a Damsel in Distress, a princess waiting to be saved by the handsome prince.

It's weird, isn't it? In the original plot, Beatrice is the one who saves Dante from the darkness of his soul. Even more, she helps Dante getting through the journey. Is this a market demand to fit this philosophical tale into a fairy tale framework? Into the hegemony of a man, where woman is perceived as weak character to be saved? Interesting case, for in the 21st century like this, hegemonic masculinity still exist within the media and culture, in its subtlest possible way.

Dante himself is not a pure translation of the original Dante Alighieri. Even the fact that he had a pre-marital intercourse with Beatrice, a pure soul, reminded me of Faust. This resemblance is clearly nailed with the scene in which Dante found his unborn son in Limbo, the first circle of hell. Pre-marital intercourse with a pure soul, unborn child from the flawless virgin, this is clearly a mixture of two different classics. The producer might add this fact to spice up the plot, but it resulted in a different Inferno.

The distinction of good and evil is also very clear here. All demons in hell are evil, thus they have to be killed. Therefore, there are scenes in which Dante slain Charon and Minos. He even slaughtered the demon. Well, it is an important point in the game, but do they have to include the slaying here? They must be boss characters in the game...

The modification of the original also ignored the mythological references to certain characters. When Dante and Virgil have to mount Nessus to cross the river, I was very shocked. Nessus is portrayed as a sexualized female centaur with a bare chest and boobs. WHA? Nessus is supposed to be a male and lustful centaur who kidnapped Deianera in Heracles opus. If Nessus is a female, then she would never kidnap Deianera, thus never give Deianera the poisonous robe that killed Heracles.

Geee, I mumbled too much about this. This movie is not that bad, anyway. If you know nothing about Divine Comedy, this is a nice one (but you have to ignore different styles of animation throughout the movies, which can be pretty annoying). But for people who understand Divine Comedy, this is a completely new story. They only have the same name and concept. This is, once again, a fairy tale version of Divine Comedy.

Prince of Persia : When Being Too Faithful Gives Nothing

Game-based movie is always a dilemma. Most of them ended up failing, with the hard protest from the original game players. Those gamers (me included ;p ) protested the depiction of the character and the inconsistent storyline. Final Fantasy, for example. The gamers expected to see Cloud or Squall in the silver screen, but Square Enix gave us unmemorable female cast, and not even summon monster made any single appearance (save for the Leviathan-like monster). Or Death or Alive which was turn into a cheap rip off of crossover between Power Rangers and Sailor Moon, together with Ayane's purple hair. Uh-oh, that is one hell of a living proof that you cannot translate gaming stuff literary to the real world. Well, FF : Advent Children is one exception, though.

The most recent game-based movie comes from Jordan Merchner's masterpiece, Prince of Persia. A platformer. When I saw the trailer, I was screaming within. Everything was translated literally, with no awkward feeling. The costumes of Dastan are all alike with the game version. The depiction, the action. Well, the movie was adapted from the latest trilogy of Prince of Persia, not the original one.

Watching the movie in its first minute, I felt like playing the game. It shows the platforming action, jumping between roofs, gliding, hanging, and all the stunts. The shape of the houses are faithful to the original game. Hell, Jake Gylenhaal even looked like being prompted directly from the game.

A very faithful adaptation to the game. In fact, it is too faithful. Thus, you will encounter gaming branches and side quest here. Game storyline is made for the sake of exploring various levels and stages, showcasing the beauty of rendering. It's quite normal for a game version to keep losing the sacred dagger, and going to various stages and missions to retrieve it back and lose it again. Gamer will not complain, because they enjoy their involvement. Hell, this is a platformer, not RPG. So, the action speaks first, not the storyline. And this is the point where the movie falls. No storyline adjustment. And due to the fact that Prince of Persia's strength is in the action not the storyline, it became very annoying to watch Dastan kept losing the dagger. Not once, not twice, but many times! Sorry Disney, this time Dreamworks kicked your ass with their How to Train Your Dragon.

Talking about the action itself, I should have not complained. It's quite nice, but too shallow for Prince of Persia. It should be more spectacular! Instead, all the actions here are just too "usual".

Apart of that, the brotherhood thingy is a nice saying. "It takes the strength of brotherhood to keep the kingdom united!"

Iron Man 2 : A Cry of a Fanboy

Iron Man 2 has been out in the movie. Being a fanboy of Marvel comic, as well as being astounded by the first movie, I decided to watch it. The first installment brought a different approach to superhero movie. What made it interesting was the faithful way of retelling the origin of Iron Man. Audience was even presented with the original suit, the yellow tin man. It was also full of humor, made it a fresh movie. The release date of the first movie was also nice for fanboys. At that time, Iron Man was labeled as a jerk, with his bringing about Superhero Registration Act and Civil War. The movie brought him back to his root.

However, the second movie is different. It lacks of humor, unlike the first installment. The superhero action here is also a bit corny. So, you don't get both quality. There are many unimportant destruction. The destruction in the racing was totally redundant. The explosion of various cars also make it a mere eye candy.

In the end of the first movie, most fanboys had already cheered for War Machine and S.H.I.E.L.D. for the second one. Granted! We got War Machine and Nick Fury. But the War Machine is not that spectacular. It seemed to be cramped out. But probably the storyline is not that good.

Pepper Potts fits well in the first movie, but in the second movie, she's nobody. I mean, Natalie Rushman (a.k.a. Natasha Romanoff a.k.a. Black Widow) outshines her. She played well, though sometimes she acts as if she is the amalgamic version of both Natasha Romanoff and Yelena Belova (Black Widow 2).

The plot used here is the Armor Wars. But the execution was too lame. Not that spectacular. In my personal opinion, with Iron Man focused on the character development of Tony Stark, the Devil in the Bottle could be nice. That way, War Machine can be introduced smoother. The enemy here is also not that eye-popping. Whiplash. Errr, first movie's villain was not a well-known one, but it is the first movie, the introduction. I really hope Mandarin would be the villain in the second movie, but Marvel gives us B-class villain, Whiplash.

The interesting thing in every Marvel movie is the cameo. And in this movie, you can see Captain America's Shield, though not in a complete form. Too bad, when I watched it, nobody seemed to recognized it. The cliffhanger in the end of the movie also gives something to cheer about. Nick Fury's proposal, Avengers Initiative. Huray!! Iron Man, Cap, and Avengers! Next turn, we will get Civil War!!!!!!!

Overall, Iron Man 2 is not something to please the fanboys. Those loving explosion and care nothing about the shallow storyline should cheer out loud. But the true believers will just shout, "FIX IRON MAN!"

Spiderman meet Obama!!! It's for real!

Yeah, I downloaded Amazing Spiderman #583 already. Though it has no big arc, or special contribution towards the continuity, it is considered special though. How often do you see the president-elect of United States make it to the cover of the comics? Sure, in 1970's, Captain America was elected as a president, but being despised by US foreign policy, he decided to change his name into Nomad. But this time, Barrack Hussein Obama really make it to the cover!

Yes, Amazing Spiderman #583 was named as Special Inauguration Day Edition. As far as I know, Marvel didn't publish special inauguration day for other presidents. Dude, did that mean that Obama really is special?? Well, couldn't say anything though.

Well, the story was actually just a fragment. In the end of the comics, when Peter Parker was assigned to go to the inauguration day, he saw Obama's doppleganger. One of them is Chameleon. And in order to test both Obama, he asked them the nick name of Obama's nickname on his high school's varsity basketball team. The real Obama answered Barry O'Bomber, while the impostor said it was Barasket Oballma! Wuahahahahaha!!!

Another joke would come from Spidey's quote in dealing with the impostor. "Hey, I've got a little experience with imposters, be they clones, robots, or TOBEY MAGUIRE. I can help!" Tobey Maguire, dudes! ROTFL!!

Furthermore, Spidey pointed out that Biden saved grudge for him, since once Spidey mistaken him as Vulture! Bwahahahahahaha!!!! Omidog, Marvel!

Review : Resident Evil Degeneration

Yep, I just purchased this movie three hours ago, and finished watching it half an hour ago. I was mesmerized and stunned. This is what Resident Evil movie should be. By releasing this, Capcom has redeemed their sin for the Resident Evil trilogy with Alice. I mean, who the hell is Alice?? She never appeared in any RE games. They tried to put Jill Valentine in the second movie, but she looked like a crappy cosplayer. The third movie featured Claire Redfield, and ended up creating an over-innocent Claire.

For more than years, I've craved for a 'real' RE movie. The real one, with the similar ambiance to the game. Shock and surprised here and there. Not some sort of action and explosion movie. Milla Jovovich was hot enough, but she brought RE to a completely new direction. Dammit, there were never any superhero in the Resident Evil saga.

When I heard the information of Resident Evil Degeneration months ago in the forum, I was jumping on my seat. A full CG movie of Resident Evil. And yeah, they could make spectacular things happened then. The glory of Final Fantasy Advent Children and its success in redeeming FF : Spirit Within aroused my optimism.

And today, while I'm browsing for new DVD movies in movie stack, I stumbled unto this heckuva title. Brought it back home, turned my parents' TV on (umm, they have this HD LCD TV, so I decided to go there instead of watching it in my home! :D), turned my DVD player on, put the DVD, and played it.

I watched the trailer first. Wow, who's that red haired cute girl? She's the main character in the movie. And I almost screamed happily. Claire Redfield! And who was that man? "I'm Leon Kennedy!" I felt like hopping around my house. They met again, 7 years after Resident Evil 2. After their solo action, Claire in RE: Code Veronica and Leon in RE 4.

I checked the plot. And yea, they recognized one another. It's in the continuity! They didn't make an alternate timeline, like when they screwed the trilogy. A reference to the events in the game. G-Virus, anybody??? Well yeah, they made Claire an NGO official, but in 7 years, it is possible. She still maintained her fighting capability.

Capcom did put a new character there, Angela Miller. Some of my friends are impressed with this character, but I think they put her there only for Leon. I kinda hope that they put Elza, the original character intended for RE 2, which was finally replaced by Claire. Her impressive and memorable scene was in the ending, when she wore 'that clothes' which showed her IMPRESSIVE cleavage! Kekekekeke!

However, IMO, Capcom played safe by not relating this arc into Umbrella corporation. I'm pretty sure they don't want to ruin the continuity in the game. And oh, I want Ada Wong in the movie too.... Make them meet! Jill Valentine (in the first costume, please! You're fighting, not going to the club!), Ada Wong, and Claire Redfield. Yummy!