Blue Gold : World Water Wars

I don't care if you are a global warming/energy crisis skeptic, everyone should watch the documentary, Blue Gold : World Water Wars. It's a pretty disturbing film about the current situation of water around the world.

Watch the trailer here: (and watch the movie soon!)


Learn more about your local watershed and what you can do here:
The Action Plan

BTW, I just looked up our local water supply and it's pretty scary...

Good thing we filter our tap water.

Avoid bottled water whenever possible, and eat locally grown food!

Movies all weekend

We watched four movies over the weekend:

The Man on the Train (L'homme du train) - This one was "ok" for me...

Flags of our Fathers - Good movie, though I thought the companion movie "Letters from Iwo Jima" was a much better film.

Up (in 3D) - Loved this movie!

The Hangover - Hilarious...funniest movie I've seen since "I Love You, Man". Thought it was a tiny bit too long though.

2008 recap

Wanted to get this out before the end of the year...I'll go back in and add more details and links...

Best movie: Slumdog Millionaire

Best Books:
The Billionaire Who Wasn't - How Chuck Feeney Secretly Made and Gave Away A Fortune
Three Cups of Tea
Shantaram
A Thousand Splendid Suns

Best meal:
Sim Ba La (two locations in the Los Angeles area) - Taiwanese foods - fried pork chop, beef noodle soup, shaved ice, etc.

Other notable eats:
Cowboy Ciao (Scottsdale, AZ)
Mi Cocina, Mi Pais (Glendale, AZ) - Ecuadorean restaurant; excellent coconut flan (best dessert I had in '08)
True Food (Phoenix, AZ)
Pizza a Metro (Phoenix, AZ) - pizza, gnocchi
Cibo (Phoenix, AZ) - pizza and crepes
Sweet Republic (Scottsdale, AZ) - artisinal ice cream
juju berri (Peoria, AZ) - the best frozen yogurt in AZ; excellent green tea yogurt
Noca (Phoenix, AZ)
Skye (Peoria, AZ) - steaks, etc.
Tin Angel (Salt Lake City, UT) - braised short rib gnocchi, soup
Settebello (Salt Lake City, UT) - VPN pizza
Tony Caputo's (Salt Lake City) - great market and sandwich
Breadbar (Los Angeles, CA) - the best french toast!
Nanbankan (Los Angeles) - yakitori
Roscoe's (Los Angeles) - my first chicken & waffles experience!
Yogurt World (San Diego, CA) - fantastic green coconut yogurt
Alan Wong's Pineapple Room (Honolulu, HI) - less expensive (and some say even better food) than his flagship restaurant (Alan Wong's); we had a fantastic meal there.
Shirokiya food court (Honolulu, HI) - heaven...
Parallel 59 (Vancouver, BC) - double almond croissant
Go Fish (Vancouver, BC) - fish and chips on the water's edge
Guu (Vancouver, BC) - izakaya; probably my most memorable dining experience of '08
Origins (Las Vegas, NV) - great Indian restaurant located just off the Strip
Jaleo (Washington D.C.) - tapas; chef/owner Jose Andres was standing next to our table for part of the meal (he was talking to other customers)
Bonita (Brooklyn, NY) - fish tacos
Max Brenner (New York, NY) - all things chocolate...
Spice Market (New York, NY)
Peshawari @ the Sheraton Rajputana Hotel (Jaipur, India) - incredible marinated chicken
24/7 @ The Lalit (New Delhi, India) - biryani
Taj President (Bangalore) and Taj Deccan (Hyderabad) - masala dosas (the thing I miss the most from my travels in India)
Thai Pavillion @ the Taj President (Bangalore)


Disappointments:
Ruth's Chris (Phoenix, AZ) - bleh...
Chez Panisse Cafe (Berkeley, CA) - bland, overpriced food
Bistro Bernard (Goodyear, AZ)
Metro (Scottsdale, AZ)
Over Easy (Phoenix, AZ)

Surprises:
blu sushi (Litchfield Park, AZ)

Worst meal of 2008:
McGrath's (Salt Lake City)

Restaurants to try in '09:
Prado
The Mission
Digestif
Racho Pinot Grill
Yasu
Roka Akor
Sens
Amarone
Tapino
Atlas Bistro
Sol y Sombra
Don and Charlie's
Daily Dose
Jug 'N Barrel
Arrowhead Grill
Tutti Santi
Butterfield's
District
Pasta Bar

Slumdog Millionaire

We went to a screening of the movie Slumdog Millionaire tonight. This movie has it all: action, suspense, humor, love, etc. It's a fantastic film!

The film was especially cool since I was just in India last month.

Here's the trailer:

Dinner and a movie (Johnny Rockets and The Secret Life of Bees)

I'd been reading quite a bit of positive pre-opening buzz around the movie "The Secret Life of Bees", so we made plans to watch it yesterday.

Before going to the movie, we had planned to eat at Motu's Tahitian Noni Island Grill, but when we got there, it was closed. Bankrupt? I wouldn't be surprised if we see a few other places at Westgate shut down - foot traffic was minimal, given it was a Friday night. Back to the food - we decided to eat some junk food at Johnny Rockets. We shared a grilled chicken club sandwich, half rings and half fries, and a root beer float.

Everything was good. The onion rings were especially tasty. I'm generally not a big fan of onion rings, but these were quite good. My only complaint was that the chicken breast on the sandwich only covered about sixty percent of the area of the bread. Here are some pictures:

After dinner, we headed to the theater (which is right next to Johnny Rockets) to catch the movie. Both of us loved the movie. BTW, neither of us had read the book before, so no comparisons or expectations. Great movie - go see it!

Here's the trailer:

Born Into Brothels

We watched Born Into Brothels tonight. I saw this movie a while ago and loved it and wanted Patty to see it. It is a documentary about a group of kids who live in the red-light district of Kolkata, India. Many of them have mothers (and grandmothers) who are prostitutes. Some of them don't even have parents. They are given cameras and taught how to take pictures.

This is one of my favorite films. It is such a touching movie. The stories of these kids range from inspiring to heart-breaking. If you see this movie (which I highly recommend that you do), you must see the extras (including the "reconnect" and childrens' commentary segments). These additions add so much to the movie.


Related:
Kids with Cameras

Shall We Dansu? (Shall We Dance?)

We watched Shall We Dansu? (Shall We Dance?) yesterday. This is the movie that inspired the 2004 remake w/ Richard Gere and J. Lo.

The movie was so funny. I had a smile on my face nearly the entire movie. The cast is fantastic - I especially liked Mr. Aoki and Mr. Tanaka...these two characters were hilarious).

Loved it. Highly recommended.

American Gangster

We watched the unrated/uncut edition of American Gangster last night. We both loved the movie. Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe both give fantastic performances. The movie was almost three hours long (174 minutes) but it didn't seem that long at all.

Related:
The Return of Superfly (New York Magazine article about Frank Lucas)

The Dark Knight

Went to see The Dark Knight yesterday. Great movie, although I thought it ran a bit long (at 152 minutes). Heath Ledger's performance of the Joker is incredible (and super creepy).

The Kingdom

We watched The Kingdom last night. Loved this movie. It was super intense!

Parts of the movie were filmed in Mesa, AZ, which was cool. There are a bunch of interesting extras, including a "making-of" featurette of an incredible crash sequence from the movie.

Highly recommended.

Motherland Afghanistan

We watched Motherland Afghanistan tonight. It's a documentary about one doctor's efforts to make a difference in Afghanistan (his homeland).

A quote from the box cover:

"You won't remain unmoved."
- LA Weekly

That's very true!

As I recently finished reading A Thousand Splendid Suns, it was helpful to be able to see real images (of Afghanistan) that I could associate with what I had read about. BTW, most of the movie, The Kite Runner, was actually filmed in western China.

Read more about the film via the link above.

Highly recommended.

Here's a preview:

Pizza (Grimaldi's) and a movie (Kung Fu Panda)

I had a craving for pizza so we went to Grimaldi's for dinner. We went to a new location at Park West in Peoria. We ordered the following:

• 12" pizza w/ italian sausage and mushrooms ($9 + $2 + $2)
• small caesar salad $9
• lemonade $2.50
  

The salad was decent. It was a pretty typical caesar salad. The portion was just enough for the two of us to share.

The pizza was pretty good. The tomato sauce had a nice spice and the toppings were good. I especially liked the mozzarella cheese - they use larger pieces of cheese, not shredded.

After dinner, we went to see Kung Fu Panda. This is only the second movie we've been to in the last 6 months or so. While we were in LA last weekend, we went to see (more like I got dragged to) Sex and the City. If I ever get around to a posting for that trip, I'll write about it then. In any case, we've mainly been renting movies from work (Thunderbird's library has a pretty good DVD collection) and redbox.

Back to Kung Fu Panda...this is an animated movie that just came out yesterday. The main character, Po, is voiced by Jack Black. There are lots of big name actors voicing characters (Dustin Hoffman, Angelina Jolie, Seth Rogan, Lucy Liu, Jackie Chan, etc.). I thought the use of Jackie Chan (voicing the character of Master Monkey), was a waste. He only had a few lines (maybe less than twenty words total).

The movie was very funny. I can very much relate to Po - he loves to eat! If you like animated movies, check this one out.


Places mentioned:

Grimaldi's (various locations)
9788 W. Northern Ave.
Peoria, AZ 85345

The Namesake

Last weekend we watched the movie, The Namesake. The movie is based on a book of the same name. The main story is about a son's relationship w/ his parents and the issues he has with his name, Gogol.

Both of us loved the movie. Check it out!

God Grew Tired of Us

We watched God Grew Tired of Us last night. It is a documentary about the Lost Boys of Sudan. The first part of the film gives an overview of Lost Boys story and the second part follows three of the boys as they adjust to life in the U.S.

It a great movie - very sad but inspiring. The sad thing is that the violence still continues today (after 25+ years).

A side note - the guest speaker at this month's Washington Street Foundation (a youth mentoring organization) meeting will be a Lost Boy! I'm looking forward to hearing his story...

Learning about the Dalai Lama

We recently watched two movies about the 14th Dalai Lama.

The first movie was called Kundun. This film was directed by Martin Scorsese and released back in 1997. It focuses on the early years of the Dalai Lama.

The second movie was a documentary called 10 Questions for the Dalai Lama. The documentary is mainly about the filmmaker's (Rick Ray) interview w/ the Dalai Lama. It also gives an overview of the Dalai Lama's life (from being selected as a child to present day).

Both are great movies - highly recommended!

I guess this blog may now be banned in China. =)

The Kite Runner

We watched The Kite Runner last night. We thought it was a great movie. The scenes of the kites flying were really beautiful (although they are actually computer generated). Both of us also have read the book, but it's been too long to compare the book to the film. Both are excellent. Read the book and see the movie!

Music and Lyrics

Watched Music and Lyrics today on recommendations from both of Patty's sisters. Patty liked it. I thought it was barely watchable. We both agreed it was too long. It's only 96 minutes long but it seemed much longer...

If you are a guy: pass
If you are a girl: watch it (based on the opinions of 3 women)
If you are a guy watching with your S.O.: you better suffer through it

`Killing Fields' survivor Dith Pran dies (from Yahoo/AP)

Dith Pran, the main subject of the movie, The Killing Fields, passed away today.

The Killing Fields is one of my favorite movies. If you haven't seen it before, DO IT!

Part of the movie that I'll never forget:

[at their reunion, with warm smiles]

Sydney Schanberg: You forgive me?

Dith Pran: Nothing to forgive Sydney. Nothing.

It's the final scene of the movie with John's Lennon's Imagine playing in the background. Incredibly moving...

Read more here:
`Killing Fields' survivor Dith Pran dies (from Yahoo/AP)

Related:
The Dith Pran Holocaust Awareness Project

Touching the Void

We watched Touching the Void a few weeks ago. The movie is about the true story of Joe Simpson and Simon Yates attempt to climb Siula Grande (a mountain in the Peruvian Andes) in 1985. The string of events is unbelievable.

Highly recommended. Watch it!

Letters from Iwo Jima

We watched Letters from Iwo Jima a few days ago. LFIJ is an incredible movie about the Battle of Iwo Jima from the perspective of the Japanese soldiers. It's hard to believe that an American director (Clint Eastwood) made such a fantastic Japanese movie. The DVD also includes about an hour of interesting extras. Can't wait to see Flags of our Fathers (a companion movie told from the American perspective).