achilles

One of the best trips for me. The entire country is must see/experience. The latitude variation is interesting and the vibe greatly differs. It is the prettiest, most beautiful, cleanest, safest, kindest, and friendliest place I have experienced. And I have been around. Get ready to walk your a*s off. Also best toilets and landscaping on earth. 1. Tokyo for, well, Tokyo. 5 days minimum if you want to appreciate the city. It's like the city rapidly raced ahead of the world in the 80's, and you'll see a place that was futuristic from an 80's point of view. The neon lit high-rises right next to local streets with one-room bars/eateries with the most delicious food. All the figurines/anime/manga/electronics. Cat café. Owl café. Hedgehog café. Parks. Fashion. Arcades. It is huge. Definitely recommend the Mario kart on Tokyo streets. Also TeamLAB. Definitely TeamLAB. So much shopping. 2. Kyoto for old Japan charm. Romance. Cultural centre. Old, retired capital. B-e-a-utiful.. Ninja classes. Cultural shows. Bamboo forest. Fushimi-Inari Shrine. A traditional Japanese Kaiseki at Higashiyama. 3 days. 3. Osaka: Japan's kitchen. All the food. So much food. So good food. Try everything. Japan is probably the only place on earth that has such a strong sense of general hygiene emanating through every fibre of its being, enough to derive the confidence of serving raw beef. Raw beef! Deelyshious. 🤤 Any ingredient will be the freshest, tastiest ingredient you'll have. It'll feel like a slightly run-down, seedier version of Tokyo. Nightlife. Arcades. More figurines. Kaiseki. Parks. 3-4 days. 4. Plum wine. Daifuku. Mochi ice cream. Kobe beef. Ramen. Sushi. Yuh-mmmy. 5. Watch James May - Our Man in Japan on Prime for more suggestions. Check if they have any festivals around your dates and plan accordingly. An unltd. Shinkansen pass means getting around a 200km radius becomes a day trip. 6. Shinkansen (bullet train) pass to get around between cities. Buy a pre-paid pass from one of the travel agents here. You can't buy the pass at tourist prices from within Japan. They've recently raised prices I believe, so check online. 7. Enjoy. Appreciate the little things. Japanese aesthetics in simply placing natural stones as sculptures. Made Ghost of Tsushima so much more fun for me. And if you thought that game was pretty, wait till you get there. We were there during Cherry Blossom season and the place was lit. It was majestic. Autumn/fall should be pretty too. My next trip would be in this season. Also, I must stop putting off writing a travelogue for this amazing place. We're planning a trip for mom around new years. Is it recommended for (slightly) elderly? How much walking do you need? Would you recommend HK & Macau for her over something like Singapore?

Come down to my place for a viewing.

Khufiya on Netflix was a good watch. Decently well made, with Vishal Bharadwaj touches all over. Recommended.

The hottest, prettiest girls outside of Russia. Enjoy, Mr. Dante

Kantara had an intriguing trailer, praises in forums, and an above average rating. Which made me want to watch it. It is probably the first movie of south make I've consciously watched. The movie has some merits. It is not pretty but has beauty in quite a few shots. The music is catchy, and fits. The setting, like the trailer suggested, was intriguing. The mythical elements are quite well done, and did not seem derivative of other works, at least to my recollection. So there's originality, which is a major plus. However. I couldn't stand the movie. One, I couldn't watch it in its native language because I wasn't able to keep up with subtitles, let alone catch the A/V elements. And I am not a slow reader. The words were just zipping along man. The whole of the movie is like that. Abrupt scene->abrupt scene->abrupt scene ->abruptsong-> vaouuuuuu //. In physiological terms, it felt like there was no facilitative connective tissue, like tendons or ligaments. It was.. jarring. Like a picture collage, an edit that had been spliced together without concern for any kind of flow, or cinematic engagement. Many times there were abrupt changes within the same sequence! Eg: girl hates boy ->boy gets girl job -> girl smiles -> cooks for guy -> guy smiles -> love song ->boy cuts tree ->vaouuuuu //. Things seem to just happen, and keep on happening. Is this ADHD style of movie making a virtue of movies from that region, or was it particular to this one? Otherwise too, most of the screenplay is quite wasteful in terms of progression. The entirety of the script could have been done within 30 mins or less. I won't comment on the performances, as I couldn't follow the native language, but the lead (who is also the writer and director) was exceptional. Overall, it wasn't for me, and I might be an idiot, but the smart people who I watched it with seemed to share my opinion. 5/10

Jurassic Park is one of the best movies ever made. It is just incredible how well it holds up after three (!) decades. The sound design, the immersion, the menace, the feel of a bad day gone worse due to Murphy’s law in full bloom are simply unparalleled in a cinematic work. None of the other monster movies that have come since are in the same universe of quality and attention to detail. Truly a masterpiece.

Or the forum

Yeah. Thanks guys. Read people's experience on Reddit and it's not great for replacing a good screen. Re: blurry in corners. Would like to by one though. Any demo units here?

Guys, quick question, for gaming, and gaming on the PS5 only, would a PSVR2 make a decent replacement for an OLED TV? The question is mostly in terms of visual fidelity and feel.

Yeah, this game is really good. It's got so many little Japanese cultural touches, like the gong sound and title before every mission starts, the lack of music most of the time, the slowness, and of course the super pretty landscape. It's so zen like, just roaming the island, trotting along, plus the sword combat is quite satisfying. I've spent over 10 hours already and I have barely done any story so far. Lord Shimura's been enjoying the Khan's hospitality all this while It genuinely does feel like a Japanese work of art, specially in the slowness and the ease of it. The two things I think should've been better are the voice acting, specially the Japanese voice acting, and the transitions between user control and cutscenes. It's so jarring to experience it like this now. Honestly, I'm having a better time playing this than Ragnarök. GG, Sucker Punch.

Made in Heaven S2 was quite disappointing. The weddings, setting, location, camera-work are better, in some cases a lot better, compared to S1, and overall its a lot prettier. Those are all the good parts. Everything else was mediocre to downright silly. Plus there's so much "rights" issues that you'd think the show was on Netflix. It's also a lot more tame, and I suspect Amazon had some directive for that. All their content is butchered silly. A first disappointment from Zoya, in all her works, for me.

Started it, and genuinely liking it. Game is so pretty, and Japanese landscaping is *chef's kiss*. I've tried Katana classes and the way he "unlocks" the katana from its saya (sheath), the simple, almost covert click is so bang on. Some of the kills feel quite satisfying. On the other hand, The game could've flowed better between sequences. Blacking out before a simple conversation is so PS3. Excited to go further.

(Everyone who has a Magnus) has to pay. We’re good abhi 😁

Let’s do it. Aug 7/8. Someone vouch for a place

That was a good dance off. Unfolding like Spartacus' entrance in the arena, the new boy slaying the unbeatable Theokoles. Neither player sustained a high level at the same time for very long, though from set two to the fifth game of set three were magic. We knew that at his absolute peak, Alcaraz had the tools and skill to best Djokovic. What we saw in the first set is what Djokovic does so well, not let the other player play his game. But he didn't count on Alcaraz bouncing back stronger like that. I believe the tie-break and the following set, specially that brutal fifth game took a lot out of Djokovic. Alcaraz did not let up. The biggest factor then, really was that Djokovic simply didn't expect Alcaraz to play that well. As Uncle Chael says, the toughest time you have is when the fight is harder than you expected it to be. Djokovic would expect the fight now. Don't count him out.

Consider this: first day, IMAX, so you know it's full of fans wanting the movie and the experience of the movie to be great. As the movie progressed, the energy in the hall deflated. The movie is too dull. The Uncharted train thing was the only memorable sequence, but even that has been done. My girl said this was there in Pathan too The series peaked with Ghost Protocol, which I can still watch today. 5 and 6 weren't bad, but didn't capture the energy of 4. My guess is they were surprised with how well 4 did and decided to make a bunch more, trying to out-do themselves. Hopefully they get some feedback with this and make the last one better, though I wouldn't count on it. Cruise remains the biggest movie star on the planet.

There’s probably a reason why everything has an age limit. You shouldn’t be doing too many of anything. You shouldn’t be outlasting your age. Unfortunately most of us don’t realise in time. There’s TV shows that were great but stretched it on for one-too-many seasons. F&F has been doing the same with movies for about the last five. MI: Dead Reckoning suffers from the one-too-many syndrome. It’s the weakest of the series. It’s the slowest of the series. It’s also the most uninspired, and that’s considering MI:5 and 6. It’s not that pretty, though it’s not bad looking. It’s got some nice in-your-face perspective action and that’s the whole good. Needlessly complex-pretend, it is not fun. There’s nothing new. You’ve seen the chases, the falls, the fights, the blasts. It’s repetitive not just with other movies, it’s repetitive within itself. There’s no feeling. No soul. It feels like the makers entire spark came about by a singular thought: let’s make one more, go out with a bang. This one’s phuss. Avoid. 5/10

Bram Stoker's Dracula The idea that movies used to be more "cinematic" is not new. Home video is still quite young in its total lifetime, compared to movies at the cinema. In that sense, there used to be a sort of underscored bargain struck between the people, viewers, and the creators thus: the people would pay money and make effort to get their asses to the cinema, and the makers would offer them an experience. A cinematic experience. A mini trip to fantasy land. A vibe. And few makers have done that better than Coppola. The colours, the projections, the dresses, the theatricality of the actors, the ham-ish dialogs, the 1897 setting, and the score, all brought in to create this magical vibe that truly transported me into Transylvania and London of that time, into the count's castle, and onto the streets. I chanced upon this movie in an airplane, and even though I watched most of it because I was engrossed, I knew I wanted to watch it again in a setting that could do justice to the potential experience the movie offers. It did not disappoint. The movie has a very young Reeves, Winona Ryder in a goddam performance, Gary Youngman as the namesake and Coppola's mind working on the words of the original 1897 book to make it come to life. It is smoky, steamy, sexual, weird, dark, gory, posh, and majestic all the same. Dracula. Watch it in the best a/v set-up you have. Enjoy.

John Wick 4 is a goddamn masterpiece of spliced cinematography, visual design, sets, setting, camerawork, and trippy music. It is a tad bit long, with seemingly endless violence, and Wick going more than a little bit super human. It is also super comical, in that it watches like a comic book movie come to life. The choice of locations is spot on, and they have captured the vibe of each location insanely well, especially Osaka, my absolute favourite. Japan is the most beautiful country on earth. "How you do anything is how you do everything." 8/10

I'm digging the music and the vibe

Yeah I got that email. Yeah I’ve already crossed the non-existent threshold. Yeah it’s idiotic and it sucks. Still, if it made any sense for any reason. Can someone shine this light? I can’t really.. see the reason.

“That’s the most impressive thing I’ve ever seen a man do”. What. A. Scene. I rewatched it a couple of times. The meta-reverse fanboy-ism was so well done. Kind of like MKTA The way they zoom into Plaza’s lips when she exclaims those action words, 🤤 and she’s so fun in the movie. “…. minus the tail” The movie arrests you right from the first marching scene. The only two things I didn’t like were the censored idiocy, and the movie was in stereo sound (!), on both Apple TV and Prime.

Just finished this. It’s not a very game-y game, is it? With average boss battles. I liked the combat though. That was fun.

Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre on Lionsgate play. What a fun ride from Guy Ritchie, after a long time. It’s Guy-Ritchie-stylish, with Guy Ritchie character names, spot fkn on music, it’s funny, bad-a*s, sexy and has peak Jason Statham, peak Aubrey Plaza, and peak Hugh goddamn Grant. Some of the sequences are so, so good. Watch it. 8/10.

The Flash is running here. In Hindi.