Bavaria (part 3)

Didn't had time yet to update the backgroundinformation from the pictures of my previous post. It's coming, but it takes a little more time. Here are some new pictures from our last trip to Bavaria, Germany. For these pics there also will be an update with some more detailed backgroundinformation. What I can tell right now is that these pics were taken at Burghausen and Hohenschwangau Castle. Enjoy!

(Update)
The first three pics are from the old city centre of Burghausen. The first one is just a funny sculpture. The second one is a sign with a kind of abstract devil on it. It says Cabaret des Grauens, which means something like Cabaret of horrors, but it sounds more scary than it is, because it's just a local theatre. The third one is a picture from the "Stadtsaal", another local theatre.

When we we're staying at our friend Frank's place (who lives in Burghausen) he drove us around to some sightseeingplaces. Besides Passau, which was our arrival city by train (see for some pics of Passau part 2 of my Bavaria postings) he took us mostly to places that were related to the Bavarian King Ludwig II, because my wife N. wanted to visit most of these places. She has a more than average interest in this fairytale king who is also known as the "Swan king" or the "Mad king". I'm not sure if he was really mad or was just an oversensitive person whou couldn't deal with the stress that was involved with his kinghood and was also struggling with his homosexuality all of his life. Fact is that he was a tragic figure in my opinion.

The Italian director Luchino Visconti made an interesting movie about the life of King Ludwig II. The fully restored over 4 hour version gives a very good impression about his life and courtlife in 19th century Bavaria. The movie was shot at original "Ludwig"-locations, like Hohenschwangau castle, Neuschwanstein castle, Linderhof palace etc...

Below you can see some pictures that were shot at and around Hohenschwangau castle. Pictures from the other castles and other "Ludwig"-locations you can see in later postings of our Bavarian trip. On the last picture you see a far away shot from Hohenschwangau castle that was taken on the way to Neuschwanstein castle.

Update on my IFFR-post (2)

In my International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) (2)-post about 4 weeks ago I gave a short comment on the movie "Das Leben der Anderen". In my short comment I said that in my opinion this movie would make a good chance on an Oscar for best foreign movie. Obviously my judgement was right, because last night "Das Leben der Anderen" (English title: "The Lives of Others") won the Oscar for best foreign film. Well done! My congratulations to the director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, the excellent cast (among others Ulrich Mühe, Sebastian Koch and Martina Gedeck) and the crew.

International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) (3)

The International Filmfestival Rotterdam (IFFR) is finished. My task is accomplished. I watched 33 films in ten days. I know it's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it. It was a good festival. Most of the movies I watched were worthwhile. Today after I slept in I slowly had to adjust to my regular daily life. I had square eyes after seeing all these movies and I had withdrawal symptoms. But I'm doing okay now. I guess I probably won't see any movie this week. But although some people might see this as a punishment to watch 33 movies in 10 days, it wasn't a big burden for me. I've enjoyed it and saw some nice, gorgeous, funny and interesting movies.

Thursday my girlfriend and I stayed in a hotel for one night, because we had two movies on Thursdaynight and Fridaymorning we also had two movies together and the first one was starting at 9:45 A.M. So to avoid the early train during rush hour we decided to check for a hotel on the internet. We went to Rotterdam in the afternoon to check in at the hotel first. It was a very nice and clean hotel with good facilities and not too expensive. And breakfast was included, which is not so common anymore these days, I found out when I was checking hotels on the internet. Most hotels charge about 17 Euro for one person extra (about 20 Dollar) for breakfast. The hotel was on walkable distance from the trainstation and not too far from the different movietheatres. If you ever visit Rotterdam, this hotel is highly recommended. Our first movie started at 7:00 P.M. we had to take dinner a bit early. Because of our good experiences one week earlier, we went back to Sumo again. Because we entered the restaurant before 5:00 P.M. they charged us the price for a lunchmenu. We had the all you can eat dinner, but this time we only paid 16 Euro 50 each for a menu instead of 19 Euro 50 last time. A very good deal.

Anyway let's go to the rest of my movielist and my ratings. In my former post you can see how the rating works. You can click on the movietitle again to read an English description of the movie. At the end I have posted a few more pictures of Rotterdam on the day- and nighttime and from Sumo.

Betelnut (+)
It doesn't happen very often, but I left this movie after about 50 minutes. If the director's goal was to show boredom he succeeded very well, but the result was not interesting enough to watch for almost two hours.

Still Life (+++1/2)

Paprika (++++)

I don’t want to sleep alone (++++)

Weed (+++1/2)

Aachi & Ssipak (++++)

Nightmare detective (+++1/2)

The Killing of John Lennon (++++)

Lost in Tokyo (+++1/2)

Western Trunk Line (++++)

Day Night Day Night (++1/2)

Retribution (++++)

After This Our Exile (++++)

International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) (2)

Here is a list with the movies from the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) that I've seen so far with my ratings. Those who are interested in the content of the movies can click on the title for an English description.

The rating goes from 0/+ to +++++ meaning:

0 = very bad
+ = bad
++ = not so good
+++ = good
++++ = very good
+++++ = excellent

Election (+++)

Election2 (++++)

The bare footed kid (+++)

Justice my foot (+++)

Throw Down (+++)

The last dining table (++1/2)

Hana (++++)

Anxiety (++++)

No Mercy for the Rude (++++)

The story of my son (+++)

PTU (++++)

Strawberry Shortcakes (++++1/2)

Living in Fear (++++)

Summer Palace (++++)

Ex-drummer (++++)

Fourteen (++++)
Unfortunately had to skip Fourteen because the movie before this one got delayed and then I would have missed my last train, so the rating is based on the contents and other reviews I saw. Hopefully I will be able to watch this one some other time.

The Matsugane Potshot Affair (++++)

Freesia (+++)
Due to a headache I decided to skip this one. So the rating for this one is also based on my judgement of the content of the movie and reviews that I read elsewhere.

Das Leben der Anderen (+++++)
This excellent German movie was the most impressive movie that I saw during the festival and that I saw for a long time. It's Oscar nomination for best foreign movie is well deserved. I haven't seen the other candidates for the Oscar, but they must be of an outstanding quality to beat "Das Leben der Anderen (Lives of Others) in my humble opinion.

Driving the lover of my wife (++++)

The 13 remaining movies of my list and my ratings I will post later this weekend.

International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR)

Since Thursdaynight I spend a lot of time at the International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR). The IFFR wil finish on Sunday February 4th. This year I will set a record by watching 33 movies(!!!). When my mother heard that I was going to see 33 movies she said yuck. Actually she said something else, but this is a proper and decent weblog (wink).

I saw 2 movies on Thursday, 5 on Friday and 5 today (Saturday). So 12 down, 21 to go. Here you can check the festivalprogramme. The festival has a wide range of different movies from all over the world. My main focus is Asian cinema, so the most movies I normally watch at the IFFR are from China, Japan and South Korea and sometimes from Taiwan, Malasia, Thailand (this year a lot from Hong Kong) depending on the supply. That doesn't mean that I try to watch all. It also depends on the subject/story of the movie. The IFFR always has a wide and interesting range of movies from the Asian region. But I also watch movies from other countries if I find the reviews/descriptions interesting or appealing. I always have to make a selection. On my first longlist for this year I had 45 movies, so on my final list of 33 movies I had to skip 12 . The agony of choice (me in my ironic mode). Later I might post a list af the movies (with links) and my ratings.

Last Friday my girlfriend joined me with the last movie at night. Before the movie we had to kill almost three hours, so we went out for dinner. I also could use a break after four movies. We went to a place called Sumo, a Japanese (Chinese management) restaurant with three parts, a teppanyaki part where the food is prepared in front of you on a iron plate (teppan in Japanese, yaki means baked/grilled), a set of tables where you can eat à la carte and a part where they offer all you can eat. We reserved a table at the all you can eat part. For just 19 Euro 50 (about 15, 16 Dollars) you could order anyting you like, from all kinds of sushi, dishes like yakitori, tempura, different types of udon and some ricedishes and other small dishes. The sushi wasn't the best we ever eat, but still more than reasonable with an extreme good price/quality ratio related to the all-you-can-eat-concept. The yakitori and beef dishes were nice, but the udon was so so good. The (young) staff was very friendly and helpful. Surely a place to go back. The pictures below were taken by my girlfriend.

Long time no pics

It's a long time since my last post. More than two weeks. I have been quite busy, both with work and in private. So I didn't took any pictures until last Saturday. From January 25th till February 5th the anual International Filmfestval of Rotterdam took place. I think I discovered this festival about 6 years ago. Since then I'm a regular visitor. The festival offers a wide range of international and some national independent movies. I don't know the exact number of films, but I think there were about 250 movies shown during the 12 days of the festival. One of the reasons I like the festival is that Asian movies often are well represented at the festival. My main interest are movies from Japan, China and South-Korea, but I also see movies from other countries occasionally. I have seen some real nice movies the past 6 years.

Last year I visited 17 movies in 9 days. Although there were plenty movies this year I would have liked to watch I took it easy this year. Basically because of my limited available time. I went to the festival on three days seeing a total of 8 movies.

For a short description of the movies I saw you can click on one of the following movie titles:

• The Great Yokai War
• Grain in ear
• Three Times
• Takeshis
• The Enchantment
• The Lost hum
• 9 Dragons
• Linda, Linda, Linda
  

The following pics were taken in Rotterdam last Saturday around the square that forms the centre of the filmfestival. The square is surrounded by two theatres, one movie theatre with 7 or 8 moviescreens and many restaurants. There are also some nightshots.

New links added

Today no new pics. This time I have added some new links at the right sidebar. Some time ago I already announced that I would add some new links. Little by little I will add some new ones.

This time I have added a few newslinks to news(paper) websites. Sites that I visit on a regular basis.

Also added a link to a Dutch weblog that I often visit called Verbal Jam. It's only in Dutch unfortunately, but is is well written and often with a good sense of humour. Recommended for my Dutch visitors.

Finally I have added some movie websites. As everybody can see in my profile I have a more than average interest in Asian movies. I like Japanese cinema for quite some time and since a few years I also discovered Korean cinema. It won't surprise much that I have added some Asian movie websites. Most of them offer reviews and some other backgroundinformation. I'm still looking around for more interesting moviewebsites. If I find I will add them later.

Enjoy!