Medical Afflictions of the Cartoon World

I always knew there was something wrong with Olive! Click image to enlarge!



Source: Neatorama

I Lift My Lamp Beside the Golden Door

I love this. That's the only way I know how to describe it.

I Lift My Lamp Beside the Golden Door By Maira Kalman in New York Times: http://kalman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/27/i-lift-my-lamp-beside-the-golden-door/

New Twilight photos: Volturi Family

New photos from Twilight minus the Terrible Trio of RobP, Kristen Stewart and Taylor Wolf Boy Lautner - yay!

The new promo photos are of the Volturi family, the royal vampire family. Dakota Fanning's really pulling off the creepy vamp look with an air of her royal paleness. Dakota plays Jane, a vampire who can create the illusion of pain, at least that's according to the Twilight book series.

Head over to PerezHilton.com for the rest of the pics.

Need a definition for no-talent? Speidi to the rescue!

Anderson Cooper on Heidi "Look-at-me" Montag's "performance" (word used extremely loosely) at the Miss Universe pageant. Heh. You know you're bad when people are asking you to work on your lip-syncing skills.

Chuck kisses Ellis! And Ellis is a guy!

Gasp. Gasp. By now, we all know that the new season of Gossip Girl starts Sept 14 but hold on to your seats, ladies...and boys! Spoilers ahead!

Good ol' Perez Hilton found a call sheet on the set of Gossip Girl which basically tells us that Chuck will kiss a new character, Josh Ellis, NYU’s head of freshman affairs. So the deal-eo is that Queen B wants something from Josh and she pimps her man out to Josh, who happens to be gay. Josh is played by Neal Bledsoe, a 28-year-old Canadian who's played minor roles in CSI: NY and Lipstick Jungle. Not my type, but at least there's Chuck - yums!

Side-tracking, speaking of yums, I love the way Hayden Panatierre says "yums" in I Love You, Beth Cooper. :)

And in other Gossip Girl news - new photos from episode 1 of season 3: Reversal of Fortunes! Yay!

Main photo above - Chuck looking dee-lish in a powder blue pin-stripe suit, perfectly complemented with Blair's romantic mint green dress, perfectly topped off with a raspberry ribbon. Did I say, YUMS!

Serena lip-locks Carter Baizen! Dum dum dum.

Nate spotted with Bree Buckley, played by Joanna Garcia - I'm with you, who?). Do we care? Nope, last time I checked - not interested in Nate.

For more photos, head over to Gossip Girl Insider.

Avatar News Round-Up!

Avatar News Round-Up!

• Over at Total Film, some grainy-looking stills from Avatar - I have to say, I'm not very impressed. The Avatars and Na'vi are starting to look quite cheesy. Like Gumbo feel into a can of blue paint and in Pocahontas garb.


• /Film reports that selected IMAX theaters and AMC theaters in the US have started selling tickets to James Cameron's Avatar through online pre-orders -- 4 months ahead of its release on Dec 18! People were queuing up for weeks to be the first to buy tickets to Star Wars: Episode 1 Phantom Menace


• And finally, some local flavor - a lil' bird told me that selected people (read: media) were invited to the screening of the 16-minute footage of Avatar last week. Jealous!

The 10 biggest Wikipedia hoaxes

I love Wikipedia, can't imagine life without it but like they say - don't believe everything you read!

The 10 biggest Wikipedia hoaxes: http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/the_web/article6809313.ece#cid=OTC-RSS&attr=1515793

Why & how PR should play a leading role in social media

Interesting article on why and how PR should play a leading role in social media and get the digital dollars. The article makes quite a few valid points, ones that may even appear obvious to most PR professionals -- however, the biggest issue I see with PR and social media is that at times, agencies and clients rush into the digital space simply because "everyone's doing it" and completely forgetting the basics of good PR.

Extracts from the article below. I very impressed with the points highlighted by Chris Perry, EVP, digital strategy and operations, Weber Shandwick.

Why PR Excels at Social Media

1. PR owns storytelling and content. That's the heart of what PR does, stresses Jason Mandell, partner and co-founder of Launch Squad. PR professionals understand how to present a story in a compelling, credible, inspiring way...The technology allows the PR professional to tell client stories directly in ways never before possible. But it always comes back to the story," he notes.


2. PR pushes participation. "...Of all the marcom disciplines, PR is the only one that's most about participation rather than disruption," says Charlie Kondek, director of new media relations at MS&L Digital.


3. PR reacts in real time. "...the PR function has always involved real-time improvisation based on opportunities or issues of the day. Being in the moment is in PR's DNA," says Chris Perry, EVP, digital strategy and operations, Weber Shandwick. [Think crisis communication.]

Social Media Best Practices for PR Firms

1. Determine audience and objectives first—not social media channels. [How often have you heard someone say, "Oh, can we use Twitter and Facebook for this campaign?]


2. Focus on building a body of results-driven work—not building your "social media brand." [In other words, do more, talk less.]


3. Innovate and experiment internally — practice what you preach. [Besides point #1, this is my favorite - you have to walk the walk, and what better way to encourage everyone in the company to learn about how social media works than by participation? While this is a risky move, at least you learn from your mistakes. Social media is risk.]


4. Instruct and inform—educate clients on social media. A key to remaining top-of-mind with clients and prospects looking for new ways to communicate with stakeholders is to proactively offer trends, best practices, and recommendations for succeeding in social media.


5. Cultivate relationships—not just numbers. "Building a massive but ultimately uninhabited database of bloggers is not as useful as sustaining relationships with a narrower slice of them," says Kondek. But keep in mind that social media PR is "much, much more than blogger relations and other influencer outreach," he adds. It's building and contributing to social media channels in a way that's meaningful to your client and your audience.


6. Remember that while clicks may be queen—content is king. "The core of what we do is find out how to get a company's story out through the media," says Mandell.

Full article: Nine Ways to Star in the Social Media Role: Why and How PR Firms Can Trump Other Disciplines for Digital Dollars

My Multiple Personalities

I doubt anyone's noticed, but I had a bout of obsessive compulsive behavior yesterday and decided to re-organize all the post on my blog. I really like how Pat categorizes her posts on Blankanvas, and like they say, imitation is the highest form of compliment - so I've plonked all my posts since 2005 into 7 categories (for now!).

Each of categories represent a side of me - at one point, I was tempted to add category #8: The Opinionated Loudmouth / The Bitch - but that might include most of my posts, so #8's on hold for now. Here's a run-down of what each Mutiple Personality / category means, so all related posts can be found in its lil' box. The common denominator is of course, moi - whatever amuses, interests or pisses me off will appear on this blog.

• The Film Snob: Everything related to the latest movies, actors, TV series, general celeb gossip, as long as it's a movie/person that I'm digging. I can only wish that this was my life - everyday!


• The Accidental Geek: This includes posts on the latest gadgets that I'm oooh-ing over or interesting new social media tools that are useful or just plain fun. Why "accidental geek?" Well - I never started out wanting to be geeky or technical, but somehow fell into it when I wrote (yes, wrote in HTML) my first web site when I was 15, worked on Yahoo! and VMware for the past few years and tech comes quite easily to me. And I like my toys!


• The Malaysian: Ahh, I think one of the reasons why I'm this random, this confused and this contradictory is because I'm Malaysia. This category answers the big question, "What does it mean to be Malaysia?" At least, most of the time, but always from my perspective.


• The PR Girl: This is a strange label but I guess when your work consumes 12 hours of your day, your work becomes a large part of your life. So, interestingly enough, tech & social media items would fall under this category as well, along with other marketing related items that inspire and made me go, "what didn't I think of that?" I hope to one day The PR Girl will meet The Film Snob and then, I'll live happily ever after.


• The Quirky Fashionista: I love beautiful things, especially clothing & accessories that are lovingly handcrafted. Again, items that I'm ooh-ing over will appear here. While it's unlikely that I'll be checking out the runways of Milan anytime soon, I appreciate people who have their own sense of style as long as they're fierce!


• The Queen of Random: There are days when the weirdest thing will catch my attention - whether I'm complaining about microwaved frozen PB&J sandwiches or an escaped ostrich - this is my blender of random things that cross my mind.


• The Girl: This is where my inner girl lives - she cries, she vents, she swoons, she loves (oops, loved) her boybands. I guess this is my sprinkle of fairy dust section.

PS: I meant to take shots of me for each category but erm, maybe next time!

Star Wars in San Francisco!

I heart San Francisco! Since the Bay is home to Lucasfilm, it's only fair that if Star Wars was real, it'll drop by the city. :)

Check out really cool Star Wars inspired photos of San Francisco created by Mike Horn. Love! I'm using the image on this post as my current desktop wallpaper. There are more, and it's all free for download from Mike Horn's Flickr page.

[Source: /Film]

How to Track Your Twitter ROI

When it comes to PR and social media, measurement is one of the trickiest item to define and almost every agency out there has a different way of measuring success. Interested in using Twitter for your campaign but not sure of how to measure its effectiveness?

Here's a quick and simple listing some useful tools, extracted from an OpenForum article on Tracking Twitter ROI by Jennifer Van Grove:

1. Define Your Goals: Do you want to increase the number of followers? How many are active vs spammers? Some of the Twitter goals you can measure include Twitter giveaways, hashtag campaigns, link sharing, retweets, referrers, total followers, total following, and tweets per day, week, or month.


2. Tracking Tools:
   
   Trendrr: This free tool lets you track Twitter search results over time, as well Twitter user stats for following, followers, and updates per day. You can also get graphs to visually track change over time.
   
   Tweetmeme: If your company has a blog, you can use the Tweetmeme retweet buttons to encourage visitors to retweet your posts, and then track shares via retweets and bit.ly analytics.
   
   The Archivist: Use this Windows-only tool to export Twitter search results. This is especially handy if you're conducting a Twitter campaign or giveaway using a hashtag or specific tweet criteria. You can then export the results to excel and slice and dice as you please. Note that with regular Twitter Search, yo only go back a certain amount of time and/or number of tweets for a given search.

Read the full article, which contains more Twitter tracking tools: http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/technology/article/how-to-track-your-twitter-roi-jennifer-van-grove

Thanks Belinda for sharing!

OST: Where The Wild Things Are

The first song from Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are' Original Soundtrack (OST) is on its MySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/wherethewildthingsare

I'm not a big music fan, which explains why I was never into MySpace (not to mention the out of control profile pages which are prime examples for bad design - cluttered technicolor backgrounds, drunken photos and loud music) but I love movie soundtracks, coz they set the right mood for movies and if you liked the movie, chances are, you'll be a fan of the tracks. Check out All Is Love by Karen O.

New Trailer: Inception (Teaser)

As previously mentioned, Christopher Nolan's Inception teaser trailer is out!

Catch glimpses of Joseph Gordon-Levitt (@HitRecordJoe if you're on Twitter) in a corridor scene that reminds me of Old Boy minus 100 or so thugs. The boyfriend says the teaser reminds him on The Dark Knight and I can't help but agree. But of course with healthy doses of Dark City and Matrix tossed in. Can't believe we have to wait till July 2010! Wonder if Nolan will play up some cool viral marketing along the way?

On Singapore

Singapore's been more bearable since I moved to the city center, but I was completely taken aback by this article from the Harvard Business Review titled Singapore: A Model of Judgment for the United States?

What do I think of the article? It's a load of BS -- Singapore has its plus points, but the article completely glosses over the many issues that this country faces. Read the comments for much-needed doses of reality.

Read complete article here: http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/davenport/2009/08/singapore_a_model_of_judgment.html

I'm a DC and you're a Marvel!

How will Ryan Reynolds fare as both Green Lantern and Deadpool? Check out the Mac vs PC -inspired video from /Film.

Posted via email from audreytang's posterous

Twitter moves from Geekville to Hollywood

From Mashable: As social media tools become more mainstream, they generally move from technology-focused content to a wide range of general topics. With Twitter though, it's taken on a whole life in the entertainment world, if top trending topics on Twitter (phrases most twittered on) is any indication. Current top trending topics include: Miss Venezuela (who was recently crowned Miss Universe 2009) and two of the most-talked about movies the past week - Neil Blomkamp's underground alien feature District 9 and Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds.

Perhaps this is why I'm a big fan of Twitter - it's my very own social network that lets me connect to friends, favorite film bloggers, tech gurus, gossip & mainstream news outlets and "direct access" to celebs such as Ashton Kutcher, Lindsay Lohan, Miley Cyrus, Lady Gaga and directors such as Jon Favreau - there is no differentiation. At the end of the day, they still get the 140 characters just like the rest of us folks. Names above hyperlink to the celeb's Twitter pages. For more Celeb Twitterati, see Celebritytweet.com

I like where this is going - simply because it's a good sign that I may one day be able to combine my two loves: curiosity for new tech and passion for good films. Yay!

Read full post from Mashable here: Trend Topics Signal Twitter’s Turn Towards Entertainment

Incoming! Fall TV season kick off dates

Good news all round for Singaporean moviegoers - Moon and Coco Avant Chanel is opening on August 27 and Chan-Woon Park's Thirst is coming to cinemas Sept 10!

And on the TV front, if you're starting to worry that there are only 2 more episodes of True Blood to the end of season 2, fret not as the fall TV season is starting soon and here's a round-up of start dates for my favorite returning series:

(Dates stated are for U.S. broadcast)

14 Sept: Gossip Girl
How long can Chuck & Blair stay a couple? Can Hillary Duff leave Lizzie McGuire behind as she joins the Upper East Side crowd as Olivia Burke, a famous movie star who's attending NYU, wants a normal life and may be dating Dan! Tyra Banks will also be guest starring in season 3.


21 Sept: HeroesWhat's a new season without more heroes and villains? Joining season 4 are Robert Knepper (T-Bag from Prison Break) who plays Samuel as a villain and Ray Park (Darth Maul/Snake Eyes). Samuel will join the regular cast as the head of a new mysterious organization which will be battling The Company. Apparently Knepper describes his character as "a reluctant ringleader of a carnival." And how long will Matt be able to keep Sylar as Nathan? I hope we'll get more of Zachary Quinto, I'll take him anytime over Adrian Pasdar.

24 Sept: Grey's Anatomy
Season 5 finale warranted the six OMGs from me with the possibility of losing both George and Izzie, or either, but by now we all know that George is dead and Izzie survives (boo!!). While T.R. Knight is off to Broadway, it'll be interesting to see how the cast deals with George's death. And guess who's replacing George as permanent cast member? Arizona! Does that mean that we'll get to see more of Torres since she's dating Arizona or will Arizona be involved with one of the other doctors? Which brings up another interesting question - is Arizona bi? Personally I'm hoping to see more of Christina and Owen, which to me, are way more interesting than Meredith & Derek. According to Wikipedia, Martha Plimpton will be appearing in a few episodes in season 6 - I'm not familiar with her but she's played tomboy-ish characters in the past - competition for Torres perhaps?

What else am I excited about? Well, I'm hoping to catch Project Runway season 6 and a new FOX series Glee looks promising - the pilot episode already aired in May 2009 - although its premise sounds a lot like Fame.

Inception: Christopher Nolan fans rejoice!

Since Memento (I saw Memento before The Following), Christopher Nolan has been on my favorite directors list. While some directors have disappointed after a few films (yes you, M. Night Shayamalan!), Nolan continues to impress beyond believe and every time he works on a new project, he renews my faith in great filmmaking.

So it's no surprise that Nolan's new film Inception boasts not only a cast list of the who's who of film lovers - think Leo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Michael Caine, Cillian Murphy, Ellen Page, Marion Cotillard and Ken Watanabe - but /Film also reports that the teaser trailer that's attached to Inglourious Basterds promises to be another excellent Nolan piece where you'll leave the cinema going, "omg, this is the best movie I've seen this year!"

Pulled from a fan's posting on IMDB's message boards - read the complete excerpt at /Film - Inception sounds like The Matrix meets Dark City, but knowing Nolan's history of throwing curveball twists in his movies, we'll never know what to expect until we see the actual movie in 2010. The teaser trailer will be online on Monday, be sure to head over to the official web site for Inception (http://inceptionmovie.warnerbros.com/). For now, there's only an image of a spinning top on the web site.

From Rotten Tomatoes via /Film: Inception is about entering peoples’ minds/dreams. A technology to do so has been developed and is done through an injection. DiCaprio and his team work to enter the minds of other characters in order to retrieve/plant information.

Bowl of Links

Hollywood without Quentin Tarantino? Gasp. [PopWatch]

Neil Blomkamp's District 9, Shane Acker's 9 and Rob Marshall's Nine -- all movies that feature the number 9 this year -- pure coincidence? Likely not. Find out the significance of the number over at LA Times. [LA Times]

Arrrghh! Don't forget your ear plugs if you're planning to watch Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music on Broadway this winter. Can't believe Catherine Zeta-Jones has been offered a role in the play - I mean, doesn't anyone remember Chicago? And hello, there's a reason why the woman moved from UK to US - note to all: she was a failed pop singer. [PerezHilton]

Poor kid. What's worse than having your parents tell you that you were a mistake? Being named a mistake and having to live with it - that's what Boo Boo Stewart, who plays a young werewolf in Twilight's Eclipse. [IMDB]

Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island delayed to 2010

Noooo! Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island release dates will delayed to 19 Feb 2010, from 3 Oct 2009. I was really looking forward to Shutter Island after watching the trailer but according to LA Times:

Paramount has spent heavily already marketing its summer movie hits "Star Trek," "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" and "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra" and didn't want to shell out another $100 million on advertising and prints this year, especially when it has two other releases -- "The Lovely Bones" and "Up in the Air" -- that it will also be pushing for Oscar consideration.

Avatar Trailer: Finally here!

Can't wait to hear more about the IMAX screening of Avatar that's happening today, but for us poor folks not included in the IMAX screening list, we'll have to resort to the Avatar trailer which premiered on Apple trailers last night.

Watch Avatar trailer now!

Bowl of Links

This screams The Sartorialist. Bundle of cute from Bongo Boy Matthew McConaughey's own lil' boy Levi. [BricksandStonesGossip]

For True Blood fans, in case you missed this: Alexander Skarsgård / Vampire Eric was in Lady Gaga's Paparazzi video! [YouTube]

Ever wondered why The Beatles broke up? Pick up the latest issue of Rolling Stone magazine. [Rolling Stone]

Want to link your Twitter updates to your Facebook Page? You can now! Note that this only works for Facebook Page admins, and not on your personal Facebook profile. What's the difference? Read more about Facebook Page. [Mashable]

A child's worst nightmare - Concert Hands straps your child's hands to a mechanical device to force her/him to play the right piano keys. Torture! [Engadget]

Ahhh...TV show intros. Love them or hate them, check out The 100 Most Iconic TV Show Intros. How many do you remember? [Supertremendous]

Exclusive clip: Andre in The September Issue

O.M.G. A vintage Piaget as his tennis watch! Check out the new clip from The September Issue featuring André Leon Talley.

If you're going André who and Piaget what? The September Issue is not for you.

Head over to Apple trailers to watch the exclusive clip from The September Issue.

The September Issue goes behind the scenes of Vogue magazine, and all the work that goes into creating the September issue by the venerable Anna Wintour and her team. The September issue is the most important issue of the year -- imagine an issue that weighs over four pounds and sells thirteen million copies.

True Blood Twitterverse

True Blood is turning out to be juicier than expected! Check out the True Blood Twitterverse created by fans of the HBO series and of Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire Mysteries. The group is not affiliated to HBO but they basically "role play" the True Blood characters on Twitter, responding to their followers and gives other fans background based on Harris' novels and the HBO series. It's quite neat, and some carry the "voices" of their characters quite well - with @VampireGodric taking on a softer, philosophical tone (2,000 years of being a vampire probably does that to you) and @SookieBonTemps sounding confused and Southern as ever! I do wish that @EricNorthman would start being the older soul than he is - now he's mostly "licks fangs and bites" on Twitter.

The best way to describe it is to imagine that you were Sookie and you can hear what everyone in the True Blood universe is thinking - and that's exactly what you get with the this fan-created True Blood Twitter (www.truebloodtwitter.net).

The official HBO True Blood Twitter accounts is @TrueBloodHBO.


On a side note, the writers on True Blood are doing an amazing job creating cliffhangers episode after episode. My boyfriend thinks it's hilarious that I'm screaming in exasperation at the TV screen ever Sunday night, as an episode of True Blood ends and the screen fades to black. Kast week's True Blood episode (S0209 I Will Rise Up) had some of the best lines of the season - I won't spoil it for anyone who hasn't started watching Season 2, but here's a sneak into a conversation between Sookie and Jason:

Jason: I'm a dumbass and a fuck up.

Sookie: But you wouldn't be if you used your brain instead of letting it take up space in your skull. That's not dumb, it's lazy.

I've always wondered why vampire Godric looked really familiar - and then someone tweeted that Godric looks like American Idol David Archuleta! Now I can't get the image out of my mind. Arrggh.

Avatar: 6 new photos! 8 hours to trailer premiere!

New photos from Avatar, stills from the movie and production shots. Head over to FirstShowing.net for all six photos.

James Cameron's Avatar trailer premiering on Apple trailers in 8 hours!

Related Avatar posts:
Aug 16: Trailer news and official photo
Aug 13: If you make it, they will watch
July 22: Coffee Clicks! Comic Con Edition

Coffee Clicks!

• 15 awkward celebrity childhood hairstyles. Aww, isn't baby Brad Pitt cute? [RetroComedy]


• Empire magazine's 50 Greatest Movie Sequels. [Empire]


• A wedding toast made for musical lovers! [YouTubeYouTube]


• History Lesson: The Story of Beer. Great illustration! [@Patlaw's Twitter]


• 50 Extraordinary and Attractive Billboards [10Steps.sg]

Coffee Clicks! is a compilation of random items on the web that catches my attention as I have my morning cuppa.

Coffee Clicks!

• Unique design always inspires! Word of the day: Recycleart. Products recycled into functional art. Old tables as shelves! [TreeHugger]


• 3 reasons to break news on Twitter first! [Mashable]


• Why are scientists so obsessed with zombies? Maybe because it's an extreme view on what would happen if a biological threat / virus was unleashed in today's world - can the human kind survive a zombie attack? [TreeHugger]


• Why won't the Saw franchise die? Can't believe they're making a Saw VI! [Joblo]

Coffee Clicks! is a compilation of random items on the web that catches my attention as I have my morning cuppa.

20 Things You Didn't Know About Movies

Did you know  that an IMAX projector weighs as much as a male hippo? Neither did I! Check out Discover magazine's 20 Things You Didn't Know About...Movies

Posted via email from audreytang's posterous

Poster: Antichrist

Check out the new poster for Lars Von Trier's Antichrist (click image to enlarge) - straightforward and unapologetic, but if you ask me, probably too text heavy for a lot of moviegoers. Then again, I doubt Antichrist was made for your everyday moviegoers. A picture of a steady stream of people leaving the cinema, and depending on where you are in the world, probably some shouting at the screen, just came to mind - a scene that's likely to happen if they went with the slightly more R-rated, NSFW version of the previous poster.

I guess the distributors needed to make a new poster that was tamer so as not to offend. But honestly, if you're offended by the original poster, the movie's not for you. I loved Von Trier's Mandalay and Dogville -- two films that will definitely make it to my Top 100 but from what I've read, Antichrist is nothing like the two.

Antichrist is about a grieving couple who retreats to their cabin in the woods, hoping to repair their troubled marriage but nature takes its course and things go from bad to worse - throwing in some mental issues, possible hallucinations and gulp, genital mutilation/abuse.

I'm still undecided about whether or not I want to watch Antichrist, because no way in hell is the movie coming to this part of the world, so I would have to proactively resort to other means. I have a weak stomach and don't like unnecessary violence. At this point, I'm leaning towards a no -- I doubt it'll be a huge loss for me personally to give Antichrist a miss, just as I did Irreversible because of the violent rape scene. Or, I might watch it but resort to closing my eyes if I can't stand certain scenes.

Check out the Antichrist trailer and let me know if you'll watch Antichrist? Why?

Chocolate by Yasmin Ahmad

Another beautiful short by Yasmin Ahmad as part of 15Malaysia, a short films project that consists of 15 short films about Malaysia directed by young Malaysian filmmakers. Chocolate has many layers, and all under 3 minutes. What really hit home is how Chocolate showed the differentiating views that my generation has on race in Malaysia, and that of a generation before.

To me, Malaysians are Malaysians. Growing up, I never saw my friends as Malay, Chinese, Indian. I never saw them as different - as far as I was concerned, they were kids just like me. It's the same today - strong characters and shared ideals were more important than the color of our skin or our "mother-tongue."

It's strange how our ancestors chose to come to Malaysia to seek a better life yet we're constantly encouraged to leave the country for "better opportunities."

Sharifah Amani's awesome, playing the subtlety to a key - I would be uncomfortable too (not to mention trying hard to stifle a laugh) if I had to buy batteries & chocolates from a half-naked guy who's wearing a food cover as headwear.

Be sure to check out the rest of the shorts from 15Malaysia, including ones by Amir Muhammad, James Lee, Ho Yuhang and more, at http://15malaysia.com/

Avatar: Trailer news and official photo

UPDATE: Disappointing! So much for "screening at 100 IMAX theaters worldwide!" The list of IMAX theaters playing the 16-minute preview of Avatar is out and they are all cinemas in the US and Canada. Sucks. Screens in major cities are sold out, but if you're in North America and willing to take a drive, head over to Avatar web site (www.avatarmovie.com/ticketing) to get your tickets. What's interesting is there's also a link for international release dates. In Singapore and Malaysia, Avatar are scheduled to open on December 17!


Previously, I mentioned that the trailer for James Cameron's futuristic Avatar will premiere on Friday, August 21, also known as Avatar Day. Interestingly, Apple has launched a countdown clock announcing that a teaser trailer for Avatar will launch a day earlier, on Thursday, August 20. Does this mean we're getting two trailers - a teaser on Thur and a full trailer on Fri? We'll just have to wait and see!


There's also the first official photo of Avatar (all past photos were production shots and concept art), showing Sam Worthington's character Jake in front of a chamber containing what I'm assuming is an Avatar, a genetically engineered human/Na’vi hybrid.

Coffee Clicks!

• Is it just me or does Legion look like Terminator with guns and Skynet was God? Check out the red-band Legion trailer for the new what-happens-when-God-loses-faith-in-mankind movie. Head over to Apple for the non red band Legion trailer. [TrailerAddict]


• Robert Downey Jr. possibly the next Lestat? News is that RDJ is in talks to play vampire Lestat -- yes, the same vampire played by Tom Cruise in Interview with the Vampire. I like RDJ, but he seems to be have taken on a more comedic persona in his last few films and I can't shake it off. I like my vampires dark, brooding and slightly depressed, especially if the Anne Rice vampires. So I'm not convinced. [Bloody-Disgusting]


• Seriously? First she ruins So You Think You Can Dance's 100th episode, now she plans to rob poor housewives and their baby daughters of their cash. Mrs. Tom Cruise aka Katie "Droopy Eyes" Holmes is launching a new line of clothes that she co-designed with her stylist Jeanne Yang, "creatively" named Holmes & Yang. *rolls eyes* Not sure who gave Holmes the idea that she can design - her previous Holmes & Yang outfits looked like someone got too scissors-happy with silk, lace, leather and dark-blue duct tape, and loves to be matchy-matchy. [IMDB]

Coffee Clicks! is a compilation of random items on the web that catches my attention as I have my morning cuppa.

True Blood: Your sparkly underwear's blinding me!

Way before Barbie, little girls used to have hours of fun with paper cut-out dolls. But who says it's only for the tots?

Check out these super cool paper cut-out figures of True Blood characters, Lafayette and Pam. Would probably keep these away from the kids, unless you want your 4-year-old asking why Lafayette is rocking sparkly thongs and purple lipstick.

The graphics are designed by artist Andy Swist, who will be releasing more characters until the end of season 2. Yay, can't wait to get my hands on Eric. Yummy.

Download the True Blood characters here.

Coolest wedding invites ever!

Randomly came across the Offbeat Bride web site and wow, talk about unconventional weddings! Say goodbye to boring white wedding dresses, store-bought wedding invites and multi-tiered wedding cakes that look like the florist attacked it. Some of my favorites here!

Talk about creative - when two graphic designers decided to tie the knot, they made 3-D Viewmaster invites (yes, 3-D!) and sent them out to their friends and family. Isn't DJ Domo the cutest?





I love this late-night B-grade movie invite!

I want these! Vintage-inspired clutches

Someone stop me! I have a ahem, healthy obsession with cute bags, especially clutches and things are not looking good for my Orla Kiely wallet when I saw these luxurious handmade clutches from Red Ruby Rose over at Etsy.

Aren't they gorgeous? Swoon. Nothing like vintage-inspired prints and silk lining! My favorite clutches - vintage Playgirl, whiskey-flask inspired box and button-frenzy clutches - are starting to get lonely.

Explaining social media

Came across this presentation on social media by marketing agency Espresso on Ben's blog. It's a long slideshow, but the meat's from slide 57 onwards.

One of my biggest pet peeve is that organizations and businesses don't understand that social media is more than another marketing channel, it's an entire universe that lets you build your brand, speak directly to consumers, get unfiltered feedback and reach out to an unimaginable number of people, worldwide. My favorite line from the presentation: If your product sucks, social media won't fix it.

What the F**K is Social Media: One Year Later

View more documents from Marta Kagan.

If you make it, they will watch...

At Comic-Con, 20th Century Fox and Cameron announced that August 21 will be Avatar Day, taking the concept of a movie trailer to a whole new level. On August 21, 16 minutes of footage from Avatar will screen in more than 100 IMAX 3-D theaters around the world, for free. According to LA Times, of the 100 theaters, 30 of them would be IMAX 3-D screens overseas. Since there's only 30 to go around, I have a feeling Singapore and Malaysia are too small a market for this investment, so I'm guessing for this region, the lucky folks in Australia, and Japan will probably get a sneak peek.

The tickets will be given away on a first-come, first-served basis through the Avatar web site (www.avatarmovie.com) starting next Monday, August 17, 12noon PST (that's Tues, August 16, 3am in Singapore). According to a press release on the web site, details on locations will be announced soon, so maybe they'll release the locations before Monday.

The 16-minute preview will also include an introduction from Cameron. This is the first time that a blockbuster movie is previewed to such a huge international audience four months before Avatar will be released in cinemas (opens Dec 18 in US) - talk about building buzz! It's not a surprise though, considering that many film magazines, bloggers and critics are already labeling Avatar a breakthrough in 3D filmmaking and touting it as the taking the next step in the movie-going experience. Fox seems to be backing up Avatar in full force, with US$240 million in production costs and besides screenings in non IMAX screens -- which includes Digital 3D, Digital 2D and 35mm 2D -- Avatar will be playing at more than 225 IMAX theaters worldwide. That's 70% of all IMAX theaters worldwide. There are 320 IMAX theaters in 42 countries, with about 51% of these are located in the US. To put this into context, The Dark Knight, rated 4th worldwide in terms of all-time box-office sales on IMDB, only screened in 94 IMAX theaters. On a side note, I saw The Dark Knight at Sydney's Darling Harbour IMAX theater and it was breath-taking! When the movie was over, I wished the entire movie was shot in IMAX. Christopher Nolan had only shot 20-minutes of The Dark Knight in IMAX.

So keep your fingers crossed until Monday in hopes that Singapore might be so lucky to get the 16-minute Avatar preview, although I highly doubt that will happen, because if it does, the Science Center will probably see its biggest crowd yet. So for the folks who will be missing out on the 16-minute footage, you'll still get a chance to see the Avatar trailer starting August 21, in cinemas and online.

Never heard of Avatar? Sam Worthington (Terminator Salvation) plays Jake, a soldier who volunteers to travel to planet Pandora for a mining operation. Jake "travels" to Pandora as an Avatar, a genetically engineered human/Na’vi hybrid since humans cannot survive in Pandora's harsh environment. Na'vi are Pandora natives, tall, blue humanoids. On Pandora, Jake meets female Na'vi played by Zoe Saldana, and begins to learn more about the Na'vi, and is later forced to takes sides in a war between humans and Na'vi. If this sounds a lot like Pocahontas, I don't blame you. That's the first thought that came to mind when I read the summary, but I'm excited to see the world that Cameron's created. Want more details on Avatar? A good place to catch up on it: /Film.

My peeve with Singapore's public libraries

After procrastinating for two years, I've finally applied for a library card in Singapore. Now you would think that this means I can finally catch up on all my reading and not have to worry about buying books that I'll only read once, right? I wish.

One of the main reasons why it took me two years to decide on getting a library card is because as a non-Singaporean citizen / permanent resident, I have to pay $10.50 for registration and an annual membership fee of $42.80 -- which to me, is not an issue. I believe that citizens and PRs should have certain privileges. For citizens and PR, basic membership is free, premium membership (which allows the user to borrow more items) ranges from $21 - $42 a year.

But considering that I now have time on my hands, lazy coffee afternoons, and the Central Public Library was only a few bus stops away, I ponied up $53.30 and couldn't wait to check out a ton of books, afterall, my library membership entitled me to borrow 4 books and 4 magazines/AV materials for up to 21 days, which is a good number of reading materials. I headed over to the online library catalogue to search for "The Time Traveler's Wife" by Audrey Niffenegger, as I've wanted to read this for quite some time and friends were telling me it was a must-read. And to my annoyance, all 6 copies (yes, you read right - only 6 copies, all editions, in the Central Library) were either On Loan or Reserved (more on this later). And here's the kicker, this was the same for all 22 branches throughout the island! Note, that "The Time Traveler's Wife" was published in 2003, we're talking about a book that's been out for 6 years, and they're all out on loan! Jesus.

So I figured, fine - I'll just put a reservation on it, no qualms about waiting a tad longer. And to my surprise, I had $1.55 once the book is in my hands and I check it out. Ridiculous! It's $1.55 per book! So not only do I have to pay an annual fee, I have to pay per book in order to wait for it to arrive to read it. What's the point of a public library if that's the case?

But you know, I was feeling generous, and decided to give Singapore another chance. I decided to check if they had other books; since starting my job in PR, I've accumulated a healthy list of books to read when I find the time - which included Gregory Maguire's Wicked, Christopher Moore's A Dirty Job, Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse Series. Don't judge my selection of books - I'm looking for easy reads. And surprise, surprise -- either I have a really common taste in books or Singapore needs to re-think and re-stock their library shelves. Seriously! Some of the older books were available, but only at the library branches in the suburbs. It's annoying that the libraries don't have a system of moving the books between branches, so that way, if you want a book but it's not available at the library closest to you, you can put in a request (for free) and tadaa, you'll have your book. What this means is that if you're willing to pay aimlessly for a public service that's meant to be free, then sure, you'll have your book!

Sigh. From looks of things, if this keeps up, I might have wasted my $53.30 and resort to buying books again from Borders. So much for trying to use local community facilities.

Trailer: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Woohoo! International trailer for The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. This looks sooo good. Lots of Heath Ledger and finally we get to see Johnny Depp, Colin Farrell and Jude Law in incarnations of Ledger's character.

I'm literally jumping in my seat! The movie brings back memories of watching Labyrinth, The NeverEnding Story and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen as a kid and falling in love with the magic and quirkiness of fairy tales and wonderlands that only lived in head now unfurling on the big screen.

New Trailer: New York, I Love You

Paris, Je T'aime is one of my all-time favorite films - I may not like all the shorts but I love the concept. I remember declaring that it was the best film I've seen in the entire year when it came out. So I was super excited to hear that a New York version, New York, I Love You was in the works a few years back. And lo and behold, finally - a trailer!

Head over to Apple Trailers to check out the trailer for New York, I Love You. There are more stars in the movie than in the Milky Way (ok, maybe I'm exaggerating). Similar to Paris, Je T'aime, it's a compilation of short films by various directors but what's interesting is that besides Mira Nair (Monsoon Wedding, Vanity Fair, The Namesake) and Brett Ratner (X-Men: The Last Stand, Red Dragon, The Family Man), I don't know any of the other directors and a quick check on IMDB shows that most of them are international filmmakers/actors and New York, I Love You is probably their first foray into the Hollywood big screen. Besides starring in Mira Nair's segment, Natalie Portman is also directing a short. Pity that Scarlett Johansson directorial debut segment didn't make it to the final cut, at least that's what I've read, but that's why DVD/Blu-ray extras are for! So New York, I Love You is different from its French counterpart in the sense that Paris, Je T'aime had a who's who list of directors from Alfonso Cuaron, Wes Craven, Gus Van Sant to Gurinder Chadha -- although one could argue that most of the directors in the Paris list aren't big names either.


Anyway, back to New York, I Love You. The cast list is loooong although I have no clue why Shu Qi or Maggie Q is in the movie, except to give it a more "international" feel. The cast list reads as a catch-all to attract audiences of all ages. If you're older, James Caan, Andy Garcia and Robin Wright-Penn would probably be familiar faces. And if you're like me and in my late twenties (can't believe I'm in my LATE twenties), there's Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson, Christina Ricci and Ethan Hawke. Bradley Cooper's not really in my late twenties category even though he's a fogey because no one knew who he was until The Hangover and the rumor of him dating Jennifer Aniston. And then there are the "faces" to appeal to the fangirls - Orlando Bloom, Shia LeBouf, Hayden Christensen, Blake Lively, Rachel Bilson.

People I wish were in the film - Dustin Hoffman, Edward Norton, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Zooey Deschanel, James Franco, Emile Hirsch, Rachel McAdams. People I'm sure glad aren't in the movie - the entire Twilight cast and Paris Hilton.

I don't know - just from the trailer alone, I don't think New York, I Love You will be as good as Paris, Je T'aime even though I really want New York, I Love You to be good. Check out the trailer and let me know. In US theaters October 16, 2009. No word on release dates outside of North/South America and Europe.

On a side note, I've seen three posters for the movie - not sure why the ugliest one (in red) is used on Apple trailers but I like the one with the Statue of Liberty the most. The horizontal poster looks too much like a film festival graphic.