Movie: Oz, The Great and Powerful

Melur and Arman in front of the poster for Oz, The Great and Powerful We went out to watch "Oz, The Great and Powerful" last weekend. The last time we watched a movie at the theater was in January for "The Hobbit" (I love this movie! Can't wait for the second one in the trilogy to come out). We also decided to try the new movie theater in town - Empire Theaters @ Kingston Something new in town The new Oz is not a re-make of the old classic, "The Wizard of Oz." It has its own storyline. You can think of it as more of a prequel. The movie focuses on how Oz became the ruler of the Emerald City. And a big part of the storyline is on how the Wicked Witch of the West came about. Overall, I thought the movie is OK. I'll give it a 3 (an average on a scale of 1 to 5). The cinematography is great - very colorful. I think they did a great job here. It also has an interesting storyline. It doesn't really have anything extra special that would make it into a classic, but it is something that the whole family could watch together and enjoy. There was one interesting part in the movie, where Oz was going down a waterfall in his hot air balloon. Because of the 3D effect and angle, you could feel as if you are going down the waterfall yourself. I wish they would push for this type of angle/scene even more to make the movie interactive and make full use of the 3D technology. [Note: Roy thinks this idea is too weird ***hrmmmphh***] My own takeaways from this movie are: (1) A bad man could turn a woman into a screeching green witch; (2) Life is unfair, you just give and give and give, and in the end he leaves you for a pretty blonde thang; and (3) If life is fair, the farmhouse and Dorothy would have landed on Oz instead. Here are more reviews: Roy: I was expecting a lighter movie, something more kiddy. The movie is a little bit heavy, especially for kids. I would rate Oz as average, overall. Melur: Just average. I prefer "Rise of the Guardians." Arman: A decent enough movie. They should have made it funnier.

Embracing Winter: Skiing @ Batawa Ski Hills

Melur - the smallish bundle of fuchsia and blue - at the end of the blue-square trail Spring is almost here in Kingston. The weather is getting warmer (we moved from temperature below 0 C, to above 5 C). There's still snow on the ground, remnants of winter. But we now have more water puddles rather than snow. Yes, the snow is finally melting away! I've been meaning to put up this entry for a while. Unfortunately, so many other things to tend to. But today I found the time (by slacking off). Anyway, this is a short entry on what we did on February 10th, 2013 - when winter was still at its peak. The four of us went skiing at the Batawa Ski Hills, which is about an hour away from Kingston. It is not a full-fledged skiing resort, "hill" is definitely an apt description. Batawa only has 6 downhill ski routes, but is the closest to Kingston and offers an affordable one hour skiing lessons. Definitely a great choice for us because we are mostly first-timers - only Roy has experienced skiing since he took lessons while in college. Both of the kids were so excited in the beginning. During the lesson though, we discovered that perhaps skiing is not Arman and my cup of tea (to put it mildly). But Melur is a natural! She went down the bunny hill even before we took the lesson. She quickly graduated to the blue-square (intermediate) trail afterwards. It was exciting to watch her. I think if she had her way, she'll be going down the black-diamond (advance) as well. Some pictures: Roy before taking the skiing lesson - smiling as always! Arman - tried to ski, but I think his knees aren't strong enough. He hates not being good at things. No worries, we'll try snowboarding in the future. Melur and Roy using the handle tow to go up the bunny hill (green/beginner trail).