..|02:09|..

..|00:01|..

I didn't realise just how much I've missed Hong Kong until today when I was walking along through TST with Vince. I've spent the past few days out mainly around Admiralty, Causeway, LKF but I guess it never really hit me that I was home. I had left Boston in such a rush that Boston/HK life just blurred together, I suppose. But the moment we stepped out of TST station this evening... BAM! ... it was as if the essence of HK hit us smack in the face. Two days b4 Christmas, it was the typical HK crowd in all it's glory. We walked past Chungking Mansions, Update Mall (oh the memories!), and doubled back again, looking for a book store. We had walked all the way back to the Miramar mall (hotel?) when we decided that we weren't hungry and opted to go hang gai instead. Soooo... off we went re-discovering small shops and alleys and malls which I haven't seen in years! Re-discovered was also the joy of buying scarves at HK$10 each ~ four kick ass scarves for the equvalent of US$5, baby!! Just before heading off to the concert, we stopped by a bakery where I bought a milk tart (xin nai tat)... it's like a dan tat but it's milk instead of egg (so I suppose it's healthier?? :: shrug ::). Eh, who cares... it was oh-so-good.

Following that, off to see Wong Faye in concert it was! By the time we arrived at the convention centre, my poor feet were killing me ~ and poor vince had to put up with my resulting grumpiness. Fortunately, we arrived before things could turn nasty.  

Damn, Wong Faye has an awesome voice! She was great ~ it's good that she hasn't been that active on the scene lately... I haven't been following the music. She also sang quite a few of her 'anthems'. And, as usual, she had craaaazy outfits. My parents had prime seats in the front row, at the front of the stage - not that we could complain tho. I got tix separately and got seats in the 8th row (thx to a good friend and uncle), albeit on the opposite side of the stage, and could see her pretty well most of the time. Unfortunately for us, we were seated right in front of two absolutely insane fans. One has not met fans until you've met these two girls. They howled. They cheered. They sang. And they banged those inflatable sticks as loud as they could right by our ears. AGH!  I seriously started hoping that they would become so overcome with excitement that they'd collapse or something (hypertension, mebbe?? hehe) ~ at least we would be able to hear the concert properly!

I had originally intended on going out afterwards, but -- in the new I'm-getting-old-Denise fashion -- decided that I was too tired. We caught up with my parents instead and dropped Vince off @ his apt. Meanwhile, my sister was still out, partying on. (Jeez... I don't remember being allowed to stay out this late when I was her age!!! pshhh... )

Two days til Xmas and the present I wanted to get for my mom has yet still be tracked down!

..|18:48|..

Did anyone else watch Love Actually and think "Professor Snape!" everytime Alan Rickman opened his mouth?? Gods, how I love that voice.

Anywho, I finally got to see the movie with Dennis this afternoon... Ah! It was soo good! I'm sure 99% of you guys have all seen it already, but if you're in that 1% who has not, GO!! It def shouldn't be missed. How could you possibly pass up Liam Neeson (Qui-Gon), Alan Rickman (Snape), Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean), Hugh Grant, Keira Knightly (Elizabeth in Pirates), Emma Thompson?? Oh, I even recognised that DJ from the Charts show on BBC Radio 1!! haha ~ Honestly, I wonder how much this movie cost to make??

..|00:22|..

:: dances around :: I saw it, I saw it, I saw it!! Haha...

And so the trilogy ends. As excited as I was over ROTK (careful Denise... not rot*J*), it's somewhat disappointing and poignant that it's over. There's nothing more to anticipate, nothing more to keep me hopping about excitedly for a couple months. (I suppose there's SW:ep3, but honestly, those prequels are so disappointing that I wish that they had never been made.) btw... there may be spoilers ahead... you've been warned!

So what did I think? All in all, PJ did  wonderful job. I definately caught myself with my jaw dropped open several times, hehe ~ Although I personally, I dislike the cold, stone feeling that PJ is associated with Gondor, Minas Tirith still looked amazing and I definately was holding my breath as the seige on the city started. I was awestruck by the sight of the Battle of Pelennor Fields. Legolas has another elf-stunt that overshadows both his hourse-mounting and shield-surfing stunts in TT.  Shelob makes her appearance, we get more of Faramir & Denethor, and Elijah Wood does surpringly (to me) well, giving a truly eerie performance on Mt. Doom. I think the Frodo-Sam-Gollum/Sméagol sequences were the best developed of the movie ~ the degeneration of Sméagol, the developing suspicion of Frodo, the betrayal that Sam felt was portrayed soooo well! The incorporation of the Déagol/Sméagol scene and the Eagles from The Hobbit was a pleasant surprise as well.

Yet all the same, I feel kinda let down by the film. (What?! Denise not blindly love the movie?! :: gasp :: Yes, it's true.) Despite being a 3hr + movie, things still seemed much, much too rushed. There was just SO much left to tell in this last movie that everything seemed so rushed, nothing seemed to get the attn it deserved. Of course, this can be said of the last two movies as well, but I feel like it was much more apparent in this one than the others.

(1) The part about Pippin and the palantir were so short that it might as well not have been included ~ actually, it was probably only there bc there needed to be a reason why Gandalf would take Pippin with him to Gondor. I also disliked how PJ distorted the entire steward family.

(2) I wanted to see Denethor's progression into madness! We understood that Théoden had been possessed by Saurman, but there was no mention of all how Denethor was being slowly corrupted by his own palantir! So movie!Denethor was simply a bad guy, whereas book!Denethor was someone Pippin laughed and was quite fond of in the beginning. Admittedly, including the palantir here would have taken up more screen time and I understand why it was cut. However, the omission of this element is what fuels my suspicion of (1).

(3) I had looked forward to seeing Pippin go around Minas Tirith with Bergil (son of Beregond). Too much to hope for, I suppose. I didn't honestly think that the kid would be in there, but it would have been cute to see Pippin go around with a child. hehe

(4) I expected much more from the showdown between the Éowyn ~ where was the sparring? what happened to the poison? The whole "...but I am not a man" revelation was good and all (predictable) but I wanted to see the Shield Maiden of Rohan kick ass!!!

(5) The Battle of Pelennor Fields (outside Minas Tirith) started oh-so-well but then ended much too abruptly once Aragorn & co. arrived with the army of the dead. It looked too much like a hive of green bees swarming the city. There ought to have been some scenes of human, orc, undead all fighting together before the entire battle ended so quickly.

(6) Wait, what, Cirith Ungol... that was IT?! Certainly doesn't look like Frodo suffered too much in there! And it didn't look as if the area was too dangerous ~ I didn't feel worried that worried for Sam as he made his way up to find Frodo. (Though it was nice to see included that one scene in which Sam rounds a corner pretending to be a huge monster, scaring three orcs.) And it would have been so much nicer if Sam had found Frodo the way he had in the book: with Sam hearing and following Frodo's voice when Frodo completes a song that Sam hums while searching.

Yeap, six main gripes. And notice I mention main. I figure that all the other minor ones are those which are expected when any book is made into a movie, so I didn't really want to bother whining about those.

So what saved the movie and leaves me glowing, relatively content despite these six gripes?

It's the sheer emotion that shines through which redeems the movie in my eyes  ~ of all the movies of the trilogy, Return of the King was the most heart-wrenching: Éowyn's & Merry's frustration at being left behind from battle (tho the lack of development there is minor-gripe #1); the unresolved tension behind Éowyn's love for Aragorn; Aragorn's heartache which stems from his belief that Arewn has left on the ships to the West; the parting of Merry & Pippin; the sheer pitifulness of Gollum; and of course, the deterioration and reforging of the Frodo-Sam relationship. "Don't go to sleep, don't go where I can't follow...."

I look forward to the EE dvd. Hopefully the additional scenes will resolve all the problems that stemmed from rushing thru the story!! Meanwhile, I'm most definately going to see this a second time over the weekend w my family. hehe...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On another note, I have a phone once more!! After going for what felt like weeks without a phone, it's a nice feeling to know that I'm connected to the world once more. I have no idea how people can stand NOT having cell phones... (but then again, I'm assuming these people do have land lines available to them )

:: chanting :: "two days two days two days..."