Edison Quits!!!

Edison faces Hong Kong at press conference.

We just finished watching the press conference and besides his heart-felt apology Edison Chen has decided to leave the Hong Kong entertainment industry.

Here is the full press conference. Edison speaks in English:

Lucky Jeans Opens in IFC

U.S. brand brings jeans to Central.

Lucky Brand Jeans from the U.S., has opened a new outlet in the IFC. They already opened a shop in Elements late last year and one at The Venetian Macao.

Have a look at the types of jeans via their online store and drop by their IFC shop when you can.

Bye Bye, Fei Fei

Hong Kong celebrity icon Lydia Shum passes away.

Hong Kong mourns the loss of Lydia Shum Din-ha (沈殿霞) as she passed away yesterday at the age of 62.

More here and her Wikipedia entry here.

Juicy Couture x Club Monaco Sale

Up to 80% off in Times Square Bazaar.

Get your shopping shoes on again, here’s a big one! Juicy Couture and Club Monaco are closing out last season’s stuff starting today, February 20 till Sunday, February 24 at the Times Square Bazaar which is accessible from the 13th Floor Food Forum.

We shall see you there waiting in line for the lifts.

Is Gillian’s Career Over?

Shocking number of complaints filed at her TV appearance.

How’s that for a tabloid headline?

The Edison Chen scandal continues to rock Hong Kong for a 3rd week. Not only is there the news about the HK$500,000 offer for his hand (not in marriage, but as in removed from his wrist permanently) to the news from SCMP today about the number of complaints towards Gillian Chung’s (鍾欣桐) appearance on a TVB charity show on Sunday!!????

The future career of Canto-pop star Gillian Chung Yan-tung was in doubt yesterday after more than 2,000 complaints were received against a charity programme in which she made her first appearance since being embroiled in the internet sex pictures scandal that is still rocking the entertainment world.

More than 1,900 complaints were made to the broadcasting watchdog and a further 373 to TVB - including seven that demanded Chung be banned from any further shows and six urging the station not to show any more performances by Chung’s singing duo, Twins.

This is the complete opposite of what happened to Paris Hilton. But, then again this is Hong Kong. Poor Gillian, its not like she started this herself. We’re not going to get on a soapbox here, but we think this is actually a good thing for Hong Kong - we read too many stories of young girls getting pregnant and throwing their babies off of roofs, that maybe this kind of open sexuality may get families discussing this, because of the Twins influence on their young fans.

What do you think? Are the Twins over or will everyone forget this in 6 months?

The TVB performance is embedded below. What a terrible and scandalous performance, no wonder there were so many complaints ;-) :

Review: Juno

Teen pregnancy movie hits all the right notes.

“If you’re still in, I’m in” - this handwritten note from Ellen Page’s Juno to Jennifer Garner’s Vanessa pretty much sums up this whole wonderful film about teen pregnancy, love, family and how a life can change in 9-months.

It’s a longtime since a movie as charming as this has come around, and when it does it’s a must see. Juno is coming to Hong Kong this Thursday, February 21st, and it’s a definite pre-book kind of film.

Fast-talking, smart-ass Juno MacGuff (played by X-Men 3 and Hard Candy’s Ellen Page) was bored one day and got herself pregant at 16. She finds a loving couple that wants to adopt her baby and the movie then twists and turns through all the movie cliches but does a 180-turn on each of them, when you think its going one way it totally goes another direction and you get caught up in its fantastic comedy script, brilliant characters and non-sappy ending.

We saw this with zero-expectations, so even though we’ve hyped it up now, it should still be very entertaining for you and a date. And how can you not see a movie where the lead character has a hamburger-phone? Trailer below:

Rain is Looking for Ninja’s in Hong Kong

A casting call has gone out for local kung fu actors.

The Wachowski Brothers are bringing their latest movie production to Hong Kong in an open casting call to find some Asian men and women who can fit numerous parts in their upcoming ninja movie directed by James (V for Vendetta) MacTigue.

Click here to see the full listings of open parts and see if you or your friends fit any of the character roles.

While the webpage notes the movie as the generic Ninja Assassins, we are going to take a big guess and say that is the working title for what they are really filming, which is the live-action version of the Japanese anime Ninja Scroll - a major influence on their Matrix movies. This movie has been in the pipeline since 2002, but no doubt that after seeing what Korean star Rain can do in their upcoming Speed Racer movie they quickly cast him as Jubei, the lead ninja (sans black outfit) in what we believe to be Ninja Scroll.

For our readers, here’s a chance to get up close and personal with Rain:

Pretty Ninja Woman, Female 20s
Dangerous assassin disguised as an attractive woman. Strong fighting skills.

More as it develops.

UPDATE: Variety is reporting that the movie is called Ninja Assassin and that if you do get cast in the movie you’ll be shooting from March to July in Berlin. I guess Berlin is a cheap substitute for feudal Japan? OK, we’ve been wrong before…

U.S. Writer’s Strike Resolved

Writer’s already back to work creating TV for us.

Good news: The Writer’s Strike in the US is over and everyone has gone back to work. Bad News: Some of your favorite shows will have a very short 2007-2008 season, some won’t come back till Fall 2008 and some like our friend Jack Bauer above won’t see his 7th season of 24 back until 2009. How this will affect DVD box set sales remains to be seen.
See the final fates of your favorite TV shows at the TVGuide site, where it lists the status of each show. It’s surprised us that alot of our favorite shows have a few more episodes left and might only have a short break before new ones fill out the season.

It seems that at least part of the reason for the resolve was the upcoming Academy Awards, which would have been empty seeing boycotts from the celebs themselves. You can read the final details of what the WGA came up with here.