Movie Junction

Ever since writer-director Quentin Tarantino shot to fame with “Reservoir Dogs” (1992) and “Pulp Fiction” (1993), fans have eagerly awaited his films. The reason Tarantino stands out from the rest is because of his talent to continuously push the boundaries of the film medium in his own distinctive way. Considering his two decades of filmmaking experience, it is not difficult to anticipate what Tarantino might have in store for his audience in his latest film, 2012’s “Django Unchained.”  From the opening shot, it is obvious Tarantino has reinvented himself yet again. This time around, he dabbles with the spaghetti-Western action flick, and the results are superb. “Django Unchained” mixes satire, comedy, action, drama, and violence with the most important of Tarantino’s filmmaking characteristics, his handiness to introduce “unexpected” elements into the narrative. Set in the pre-Civil War era, the film’s opening, warm-looking shot representing a barren mountai...

Toward its memorable climax, Pi Patel (Irfan Khan), the lead protagonist and narrator of director Ang Lee’s 2012 film “Life of Pi,” explains the meaning of his journey at sea by saying, “Without Richard Parker, I wouldn’t be alive today to tell you my story.” A sixteen-year old Pi (Suraj Sharma) and a 500-pound tiger named Richard Parker end up being on the same lifeboat, after a rough sea sinks the ship Pi was traveling on with his family, killing almost everyone on board. One can initially perceive the picture as the tale of a young man surviving and taming a tiger. But Pi’s momentous journey is more than a survival story. Based on author Yan Martel’s Man Booker Prize-winning novel of the same name, “Life of Pi” is a profound story of one man’s survival that centers on asking philosophical and religious questions about the value of things in life.    At the start, we get a detailed narration about Pi’s childhood and family, learning that his f...