Shitter Island
We knew that D’Survivors would suck. We knew that we would be annoyed, irritated, bored, exasperated, insulted by it. No one can accuse us of having high expectations. There is only one reason we went to see D’Survivors (and generally we shun anything with ‘D, apostrophe’ in the title), and it’s this.
Photo from http://finissimo.com.br/
Daniel Matsunaga. So beautiful. No bad angles. How could he possibly disappoint us? If he just walked around the island reciting the alphabet in Portuguese we would go home happy. Daniel, Daniel, Daniel. Your looks, our brains (not that we’re suggesting we are superior to you in that respect), world domination.
We even tried to find out when Daniel was watching his movie, so we could contrive to be present in the cinema. His manager says he’s in Brazil. Having seen the movie, we adore Daniel even more. Good call, not being around for this.
And now the viewing experience.
Ricky: Turns out Madonna’s Swept Away is an Oscar Best Picture.
Jessica: I don’t think this movie has a script.
Vivien: I feel like I’m in a tenth-rate comedy bar.
Daniel Matsunaga appears, picking fruit with no shirt on.
Everyone: Haaaaaaaaay.
Ricky: It’s got English subtitles?! They actually think this will do the film festival circuit?
Vivien: We’ve sent lots of bad movies to the film festival circuit. Just nothing this bad.
Daniel Matsunaga appears, explaining what he’s cooking. Even his accent is lovely.
Everyone: Aaawwwwwwwww.
Vivien: Ang luma ng avant-garde niya. Lumang bago. Bagong luma. Lumang luma. Ang luma-luma. (His idea of avant-garde is old. New-old. Old-new. Plain old. Very old.)
Jay: Ang pangit-pangit. (Very ugly.)
Vivien: Omigod, Daniel’s abs are in 3D.
Daniel Matsunaga gets a closeup for no reason, because you don’t need a reason to give Daniel a closeup.
Everyone: Oooooooohhhhh.
Jessica: I apologize for calling Adolf Alix the Hell Portes of the 21st century. I owe Gil Portes an apology. I want to find Adolf and slap him.
Ricky: You should review this back-to-back with Shutter Island. Both are set on islands. Both are What The Fuck movies. Except that Shutter Island is brilliant.
Daniel Matsunaga does a silly dance in a talent portion sequence that materializes because they ran out of ideas after the opening credits.
Everyone: Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy.
Jessica: I can’t believe they made a movie with three Brazilian-Japanese models and there’s no sex in it. I can’t believe the director does 30-minute tracking shots of people looking for a goat but he can’t keep the camera on Daniel for 2 minutes.
Vivien: I can’t believe this movie was made, I feel bad for the producers.
Ricky: There is one brilliant thing in this movie. That green long-sleeved shirt Daniel is wearing. You can see every curve.
Jessica: Look at those trapezius muscles, those deltoids.
Daniel Matsunaga has a conversation with Akihiro Sato, who should probably not stand next to Daniel Matsunaga.
Everyone: Oooooooooooooooooohhh.
Ricky: Every time we’re about to flatline we get a glimpse of Daniel and we’re alive again. He’s a defibrillator. He should’ve directed this movie.
The movie limps to its idiotic denoument.
Jay: Tayo pala ang D’Survivors. (It turns out We’re the survivors.)
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
April 29th, 2010 at 07:07
SPOILER ALERT (LIKE YOU CARE)! LAST CHANCE TO STOP READING BEFORE SPOILING YOUR NON-ENJOYMENT OF THE MOVIE. I just want to say, I’ve had weird dreams like Madonna singing Macho Gwapito on top of the walls of Intramuros, but I have yet to have a dream where there are supers (Day 1, Day 2…) introducing the dream.
April 30th, 2010 at 10:07
Daniel told one of his model friends at the gym about this new film (2 months ago) and I happen to be nearby (very nearby). Feigning my distracted attention to these models, Daniel said it was an indie film, something like Lost where they get stranded on bakla island blah blah blah. His model friend asks what’s ‘bakla’ and Daniel says ‘Gay’. Model friend replies ‘Sounds like fun… sounds so gay’ and they chuckle on their joke. Minutes later, we’re at the sauna and I wanted to ask ‘Daniel, uhm, when is it showing?’ Ahihi.
Funny review, as always.