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Posted: 08 Aug 2011 11:44 PM PDT

LOS ANGELES (AP): "Dirty Dancing" is coming back to the big screen. Lionsgate says it is remaking the 1987 film that starred Jennifer Grey as a naive dance student and Patrick Swayze as her teacher and lover.

The studio said Monday that Kenny Ortega, who choreographed the original film, will direct the remake.

Ortega says he is eager to discover and cast "the next breakout triple-threats" to define dancing for a generation, the way Swayze did in the original "Dirty Dancing."

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Social ills a major theme in The Loan Shark

Posted: 08 Aug 2011 04:59 PM PDT

The Loan Shark gives an insight into the underground money-lending business.

MCA Public Service and Complaints Department Head Datuk Michael Chong plays himself in a special cameo appearance in locally-made movie The Loan Shark.

"We've read a lot in the papers on how loan sharks resort to inhumane methods of debt collection, but there are always two sides to a story. I pulled out all my files on loan sharks and money-lending issues amassed over 20 years. So, the movie is actually based on true stories," said Chong, who said his scenes are more or less like how he deals with loan shark-related issues in real life.

"In the movie, we judge neither the borrowers nor the lenders. We tried to present a balanced story. Are the ah long (loan shark in Cantonese) who resort to violence to be blamed, or are the borrowers at fault because they refuse to pay back and thus put their families in danger? This is a social problem that the movie addresses," added Chong, who hopes The Loan Shark will give the public a better picture of the underground money-lending business.

Chong attended a press conference last Wednesday to promote the movie with film director C.L. Hor, and actors Jojo Goh and Shawn Lee. The two play lovers who are also loan sharks.

Also known as Dai Yee Loong (loan shark in Cantonese), the RM1.8mil action thriller is Hor's third movie following the romantic The 3rd Generation and martial arts feature Kinta.

"I will further explore social messages and present Chinese culture and values with my next movie (another actioner, tentatively about piracy)," shared the director who is also looking forward to working with his Thai filmmaking counterparts in his next production.

Apart from Goh and Shawn, the movie also features Hong Kong stars Sam Lee, Eddie Cheung, Irene Wan, Lam Suet, Fong Hak On and Rosanne Lui.

The story is about a pair of siblings (played by Goh and Sam Lee) who go undercover to bring to justice the loan sharks who caused the death of their father. Goh spoke of how Shawn suffered his first injury (a deep cut between his brows) on the first day of shooting.

The two were filming a fight scene in a restaurant kitchen when Shawn emerged from the fracas with blood trickling down his face.

"He was chasing me and I was throwing colanders at him while running away when one of them accidentally hit him on the forehead," Goh shared animatedly.

When asked about the daring love scene he shared with Goh in the movie (a more revealing version of the film, meant for European markets), Shawn said in jest: "These are some of the sacrifices we make in the name of art."

Shawn, who is well known in the local kung fu scene as Malaysia's seven-time national martial arts champion, has also featured in other actioners like the country's first martial arts movie Kinta and action comedy I Love Wing Chun, now playing in cinemas.

■ The Loan Shark is playing in local cinemas.

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When a star wanes

Posted: 08 Aug 2011 04:57 PM PDT

Nicolas Cage is still a marquee name, but for how long?

THESE are hard times for fans of Nicolas Cage, who first grabbed the audience's attention with his strong screen presence in romantic comedies Peggy Sue Got Married in 1986 and Moonstruck in 1987. The strapping twentysomething was able to more than hold his own against veteran actresses Kathleen Turner and Cher, who played his romantic interests in the movies.

For the next eight years, he charmed us with a series of comedies such as It Could Happen To You and art house fare like Wild At Heart, in which he played multi-layered, tortured characters.

In 1995, he capped the early part of his career by winning an Oscar for best actor for his role as a suicidal alcoholic in the low-budget art house film Leaving Las Vegas.

Between then and now, Cage has opted to do many more mainstream movies than the artsy and offbeat films that helped him gain credibility and fans, prompting some critics and fellow actors to label him a sell-out. Still, he gave us multi-dimensional heroes with flaws in several memorable action movies the likes of The Rock, Con Air and National Treasure.

And in the relatively smaller-budget art house movie he made in 2002, Adaptation, he almost snagged the Oscar for Best Actor again.

The ennui for me began last year, when I didn't really know what to make of his supporting role as Big Daddy, the father of Hit-Girl in Kick-Ass, the one where he burned to death at the hands of the baddies.

He then pretty much walked through The Sorcerer's Apprentice, a CGI-laden fantasy movie that featured bad cliché-ridden dialogue and worse acting all round. As Balthazar Blake, an ageless sorcerer, he looked tired and worn out, and was easily upstaged by Alfred Molina as Maxim Horvath, his evil fellow disciple of Merlin.

The disappointment continued this year with yet another foray into the fantasy genre. Season Of The Witch featured just as cheesy dialogue and typical action scenes in films about knights and demons which are able to possess the dead.

His latest, Drive Angry, about a father breaking out of hell to rescue his granddaughter who is going to be sacrificed by a cult leader, is a showcase of another underwhelming performance by the actor who was once regarded as a living great.

Four dud characters in a row is a bit hard to accept for an actor of Cage's calibre. After all, before this horrific streak came along, he had done quite well in 2009 with Knowing and Bad Lieutenant: Port Of Call New Orleans. His competent performances explained why audiences paid to watch him in action, especially in his turn as a coke-snorting detective with a nice streak of luck in Bad Lieutenant.

Fellow actor Robert De Niro recently seemed to be losing his touch, with forgettable supporting roles in Limitless and Meet The Parents franchise.

The Academy Award-winning actor who made Taxi Driver (1976) and Raging Bull (1980) among other classics, has been panned for taking on roles that required little to do apart from indulging in his famous scowl.

But De Niro is already 67 years old, a full 20 years senior to Cage. At 47 in 1990, De Niro was still winning fans over with his role as a mobster in the critically acclaimed hit Goodfellas and as a patient who came out of a catatonic state after decades only to lapse back into it again in the poignant Awakenings.

De Niro also went on to make many more good movies such as playing a psychopath in Cape Fear and as the monster in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. It is way too early for Cage to be strolling onto his movies.

It doesn't help that in his personal life, Cage is also courting controversy. His short-lived marriage to Lisa Marie Presley, the king of rock 'n' roll's daughter, was an interesting snippet in 2002. But his marriage in 2004 at the age of 40 to then-20-year-old Alice Kim smacked of cradle-snatching, although most of us, as with the rest of the Hallyu-wave-smitten world, understand how charming the Koreans can be.

Sometime back in April, a "heavily intoxicated" Cage banged on parked cars and shouted at police officers after getting into an argument with his wife over the location of the house they were renting. He eventually escaped official prosecution, but the court of public opinion is not quite in his favour.

Cage's almost indiscriminate choice of projects has been attributed to some of his financial troubles with the US Inland Revenue Service, to which he still owes millions of dollars. But the problem goes much deeper than that. Cage is no stranger to low-budget movies and offbeat characters. In the past, he had been able to make himself stand out from the rest of the cast with an onscreen intensity that is second to none regardless of the quality of the cinematography or the co-stars.

In his last four outings, however, he looks out of place, especially in Kick-Ass, where Hit-Girl Chloe Moretz was the scene-stealer. I actually felt relieved when Cage's character died.

His next movie is something I am looking forward to with trepidation – I am still a fan, but I am not sure if I would be willing to pay to watch him if he continues to put in lacklustre performances that have me wishing his characters would just die.

Cage's reputation is already assured for posterity with his current body of work, but there are surely many more good years in him. It would be such a shame if the last two years are not just a blip, but an indicator of what to expect from him from here on.

■ In this column, writer Hau Boon Lai ponders the lives, loves and liberties of celebrities.

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Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

Selasa, 9 Ogos 2011

The Star Online: Entertainment: Movies

The Star Online: Entertainment: Movies

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