From Selma to Montgomery

The Civil Rights Classic

 The movie;Selma, chronicles the civil rights fight of Martin Luther King against the state of Alabama where Blacks were denied the right to register to vote.

Standing between Lyndon B. Johnson the President of America and King is  the racist Governor George Wallace who made it his personal mission to curtail the rights of the Blacks.

David Olewoyo as King and Carmen  Ejogo as Coretta Scott King

A moving docudrama, it is well paced and keeps the audience longing in anticipation for the next thing to happen in this volatile quest by King to secure voting rights for the Blacks from President Johnson through a Bill of Rights.

The walk across the bridge from Selma to Montgomery by King and the protesters as they faced the local police force bent on beating them down is the climax of this movie.

This movie has great stars both in starring roles and in cameos.

Attractive Ejogo

David Olewoyo stars as King while Carmen Ejogo stars as his wife Coretta. Johnson was played by Tom Wilkinson with cameos from Cuba Gooding Jr,Giovanni Ribisi and Wendell Pierce. Oprah Winfrey acted as  Annie Lee Cooper and also co-produced Selma.

Great movie to enjoy if you like witty dialogue.

Shale and Innovation-The Tectonic Shift of Oil

Shale up your alley!

I have edited Guy Bechor’s Opinion Piece on the Shifting of the focal point of  crude oil beginning 2015. 

I do not know how much of this is based on facts and how much on conjecture but it makes interesting reading.

Stones and Rock Flakes?

If you read this piece and believe it so based on one singular fact, then it must be that in 2014 the USA lifted its oil export embargo  technically causing a mayhem in world markets beginning in January 2015 with the phenomenal slump of world crude oil  prices. 

Mountain of Oil

This can be described nothing less than tectonic!

And the conjecture part? 

Minting Oil Money

Bechor tells you that this will be the likely scenario.

I will put them in bullet points.

New Black Gold

• The new innovative technology has flung open the doors to extract shale oil economically which will potentially produce 12 million barrels of oil per day within a year. 
• Minusing domestic consumption, a million barrels a day will be available for the USA to export! In contrast, Iran today only manages to produce 1.5 million barrels a day. Also, as of today, the USA has become the single largest crude oil producer to the world eclipsing even the oil lord, Saudi Arabia.
• Bechor expects oil to keep on dropping in price with little reprieve. 
• His scenario is Arab oil exporting nations will begin to lose their shine. Politically, deprived of the oil largesse they are used to, there will be internal shocks in the form of political and social turbulence and upheavals. The sudden cutbacks will also curb their development and their influence on world politics.
• Non-OPEC nations will also enter the export market along with the USA. These include Canada, Brazil, Mexico, and Nigeria.

Innovation-Driven Process for Shale

2015 is a brand new world powered by a revolution of information, innovation and inventions.

Every USD Spent will bring in USD2

So,if you do not have a creative mind, you will so be relegated to be fossilized!


PS:

Latest figure of oil production in USA from Commerzebank of Germany on 22 January 2015:

" The USA now produces a good 9 million barrels of crude oil per day,the largest volume in 28 years. Never before were crude stocks in the US as ample at this time of year than at present."-Reuters

You Only Live Twice-Tan Hoo Passes On

I guess I can call him a good acquaintance.

Our paths did cross way back in the early 1980's.

Seconded from the Ministry of Health, Tan Hoo was involved in sewage projects in such places like Sungkai and Lunas. We were looking to upgrade the pit latrine systems.

He was an affable guy, telling me about the stories when he was studying overseas. The interesting one was how he dived to harvest abalone in Australia. Or was it New Zealand?

His favourite expletive was, "No Shit!"

He got his Datukship when he became Director-General on the Health Services Department of the Ministry of Housing

You Only Lived Twice?

Yes, when he was renting a house and reading the Sunday papers in Section 17,  a bullet graced his forehead after ricocheting off his wall. It was a shot from a police chasing a robber.

He lived to tell the tale and told me so.

As he passed away on 19th January 2015, I bid him farewell in the high heavens!

Sniper Fire

Bulls-eye precision

If you should compare this movie called American Sniper to the classic, Enemy at the Gates, the former pales in comparison.Nothing beats the cat and mouse fight between sharp-shooters Jude Law and Ed Harris!

However, after a second review of the movie especially with good English subtitles, Clint Eastwood's treatment of this movie chronicling 4 tours of duty of Chris Kyle in Fallujah  has its good moments. Though Eastwood tends to be overtly melodramatic,carrying on from such movies such as The Unforgiven  to Million Dollar Baby, American Sniper does not  differ too much from the Eastwood mould-dry,draggy and tending towards dry realism almost resembling a pseudo documentary. There is still too much details amidst the bloody gore and violence.

Starring in the main role as the protagonist Chris Kyle,  a Navy Seal sharpshooter is Bradly Cooper and Sienna Miller as his lonely wife who enjoyed only 3 days of her honeymoon before Chris was whisked off to Iraq. Sadly, she was 'put on hold' and  had nothing to look for in life except to bear his 3 children and to await his safe return from his missions.

The Speed of a Bullet

Though it is a long movie, it does provide ample excitement especially in the final minutes of the conflict in Fallujah against a background of a raging sandstorm and gun fire.

This movie may appeal to war aficionados, but I feel that American Sniper may be closer to the American audience and may yet garner a fistful of Oscars this time around.

Eye Candy for the movie

In real life, after his heroics in Iraq, Kyle was murdered by a war veteran.

Escapism into the Wild

The Wild Option

One of the current movie making the round at the local circuit is Wild.

It is a depressive movie chronicling the downward spiral of a woman named Cheryl Strayed who almost tipped over due to the death of her mother and the dissolution of her marriage.

To overcome her grief, and with an absolute lack of hiking experience,  she took on a heavy backpack and chose the tortuous Pacific Crest Train ( longest and toughest) as her challenge to overcome the pains of  her plight.

Challenging Depression

Though Witherspoon showed her many sides of what it is to grief, the movie somehow did not hit the high notes.

Characters were not well developed and the story hardly build up to a crescendo especially with its too many flashbacks.

You  can give this movie a miss.

The Big Eye Genre

The Big Eye Wonders

I must say this movie, " Big Eyes" have its share of interest though there are critics that will tell you that without Christoph Waltz and Amy Adams in it, it will be another run-of-the-mill B Grader.

The plot-line is simplistic-a divorced single parent, Margaret (Amy Adams) sought a new life for herself and her daughter, painting portraits  of waifs with saucer-shape eyes. A trickster, Walter Keane (Christoph Waltz) saw her talent and married her to tap on her talents but with a twist. He wanted every painting to bear his name instead of hers. As he basked in his new found fame thanks to his marketing skill, his ego got the better of him and he estranged himself to Amy and her daughter.

When Margaret started her painting business in Hawaii after leaving him, Walter tracked her down and a court case ensued.

Margaret in her studio

Who won should be no mystery.

Watchable fare based on a true story that spans the period 1950's through 1960's.

Chilly Nights with the Nightcrawler

Chilly Nights with Lou

If there is one recent movie that may give you the creeps, it is Nightcrawler.

A movie depicting the lives of free-lance stringers who prowl the nights and compete to scoop on tragic news from violent accidents to murders to sell to  tv stations and the low-down dynamics of their operations is well-documented here.

Jake Gyllenhaal as the chilly-looking Lou that will do anything to succeed in his new found trade and his desperate quest by bargaining to move ahead to the top of the heap is the premise of this exciting dark movie.

By the way, Rene Russo still look voluptuous at her age. Believe me.

Quite a worthy movie to watch.