Hello folks, welcome to the 5th Five for the Fifth of the year!



As is customary for this monthly feature, I get to post five random news item/observation/poster, etc. and then turn it over to you to share your take on that given topic. You can see the previous five-for-the-fifth posts here.

1. Happy Cinco de Mayo! I’ve made it a tradition of sort to feature a Mexican filmmaker/actor on the May edition of Five for the Fifth. Last year I featured director Alfonso Cuarón, but this year, I turn the spotlight on Guillermo del Toro since Pacific Rim is coming out later in July.

A short bio on the 48-year-old director: Guillermo del Toro was born October 9, 1964 in Guadalajara Jalisco, Mexico. Raised by his Catholic grandmother, del Toro developed an interest in filmmaking in his early teens. Later, he learned about makeup and effects from the legendary Dick Smith (The Exorcist (1973)) and worked on making his own short films.

I quite enjoyed the first Hell Boy movie, though I haven’t seen the sequel, but his film that really made an impression on me was the captivating but often violent fantasy film Pan’s Labyrinth. I’m still not sold on his sci-fi alien adventure Pacific Rim yet, I mean I love Idris Elba and I’m thrilled he got the lead role, but the movie looks like a combo of Independence Day and Transformers to me. As Tim outlined in his trailer review, it does look promising, but I guess it remains to be seen how captivating the movie will be.….

So what’s your thoughts on Mr. del Toro and/or Pacific Rim?



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2. Now, many of you likely have seen Iron Man 3 by now which I happen to enjoy quite a bit. You’ve perhaps also heard about the Chinese version of the movie, which according to this Beijing-based Kotaku site said featured four-minute added content and the Chinese character Dr. Wu had a more prominent part in the film. In the film version, Dr. Wu (played by Chinese movie star Wang Xueqi) only had a few seconds screen time, basically a blink-and-you-missed it type of cameo. I since learned that apparently those footage was NOT filmed by director Shane Black.

Truthfully, when I first heard about the existence of this Chinese version, I shook my head in dismay. I mean, as if we didn’t need more proof that Hollywood honchos only care about the bottom line, this is yet another reason creative integrity is just thrown away by the wayside. I mean, I realize some films have multiple cuts that are released in the DVD/Blu-ray versions that feature alternate scenes and/or ending than the theatrical release. But I feel that this is an entirely different ball game that is purely motivated by profit.

Apparently the Kotaku writer Eric Jou shares my dread, “It literally offends me as an American in China and as an ethnically Chinese person that Hollywood would attempt to sell this to the Chinese audience… It undermines Chinese people’s intelligence and movie savvy.”

I’m curious to hear what you think on this matter folks, so please chime in below.



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3. Well, looks like the negotiation with Tom Hiddleston to play The Crow fell through 😦 I was so thrilled to see him possibly getting cast in that role, especially since the hot Brit seemed keen on playing the role. I really think he’d have rocked the role, though Brandon Lee would perhaps remain as my favorite Eric Draven.

Now it looks like the deal is set with Welsh actor Luke Evans (one of my picks to play 007) has nabbed the role. According to Deadline, Evans was actually director F. Javier Gutierrez’s first choice for the role but scheduling conflict made them consider other actors. But apparently “… they have decided to push the start date to early next year to accommodate his schedule in order to secure Evans.”

Well, I still would rather see Hiddleston but Evans is a thousand times better choice than Alexander Skarsgard, for me anyways. I think he’s got the look as the dark and lean rock star, let’s hope he can bring something fresh and perhaps even iconic in this reboot.

How do you feel about Luke Evans’ casting as The Crow?



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4. Hugh Jackman is really a jack of all trades, the ultimate quadruple threat as he’s not only a ruggedly gorgeous hunk of a man, but he can sing, dance, act, and with a good business sense as he’s also the producer of the film. He’s the kind of actor who could pretty much do any kind of genre believably, you name it, drama, rom-com, comedy, action, mystery, etc. he’s done it all. But his most famous role happens to be the same one that gave him his breakthrough in Hollywood, and that is X-Men’s Wolverine.

Check out the latest International trailer:

This is surely one of my most-anticipated movies of the Summer. The Wolverine reboot will mark his fifth time Jackman will reprise the comic-book character (not counting the cameo in X-Men: First Class). I think that’s the highest number of superhero character portrayal by a single actor to date. It’s notable just on that front alone, but also the fact that somehow Jackman has not overstay its welcome as that character. Far from it in fact, as this James Mangold-directed origin story (yes, again) set in Japan seems to present the character in a whole new light.

Thoughts on Mr. Jackman and/or his upcoming movie The Wolverine?



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5. Now, last but not least, I’d like to make the fifth question be a forum for movie recommendations. I’ll limit the genres to foreign thrillers and/or dramas as I had just been impressed with the Danish thriller The Hunt. As you probably know if you read my blog regularly, it’s my pick for Movie of the Month in April (full review coming later this week), and that’s the second Danish thriller I was VERY impressed with after Headhunters. Interesting that both have the word ‘hunt’ in it though they’re two very different films. As for foreign dramas, I was delighted by Intouchables recently, which I also highly recommend.

Please share your recommendations of foreign thrillers/drama that you think everyone must see!



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For those with a Reddit account, would you be so kind as to submit this post?

I’d sincerely appreciate it folks! 😀



That’s it for the May 2013 edition of Five for the Fifth, folks. I’d love to hear your thoughts on any of these subjects.

