Monday, September 27, 2010

Casablanca

Casablanca in Legend of Fist

 

actually I am halfway blogging about 

《Legend of Fist》

this word “Casablanca”

realized I went off topic so much

that I decided to open a new post

and anyway

this post has to be in English

Kiki @ Casablanca

 

came across it a couple of times

first from the movie

《Hiroshima Mon Amour》

oh damn

I thought I have blogged about this movie

but the search result returned nil

how come??

it is one of my all-time favorite

the café the protagonists and the French lady

hanged out till morning

it was called….. too

Casablanca in Hiroshima Mon Amour

 

and bumped into the word last Friday

during my walk

I should go back and take a photo

that time there were too many cars

I wouldn’t wanna take the risk

of die for Casablanca

house for sales

one of the model is named

Casablanca

what a grand name,

for a semi-detached house

 

and lastly the Youtube user who uploaded

Eason Chan singing YogaLin’s 說謊

her name is Casablanca too.. lol

I think it’s a she

because half way through the video

when the music of the song started

she was saying,

“hey he is singing Yoga Lin”

maybe I should just PM her

and ask, why Casablanca

 

at first I thought it means some secret heaven

you know Utopia, sort of like that

and what’s that place in Alaska, Arcadia

erm.. hint if you can’t remember Arcadia

it’s here

 

did google the word before

Casablanca

it' is an Arabic word

the largest city in Morocco

woot.. it gives me that

Empire State of Mind feeling again

when am I going here, seriously?

Casablanca

 

similarly

just like after  watching

《Legend of The Fist》

and a documentary about Yang-tze river

I really feel like going to see the

the old HSBC HQ at Shanghai…

arrgh

 

the building of Pudong Development Bank

was constructed in 1923

formerly known as the HSBC  Building.

in classic style with the stone arched gate

and a Greek dome in the top.

The ceiling of the octagonal lobby

with 8 mural paintings

made of thousands of small colorful mosaics

and the paintings demonstrate

the typical 20th century architecture styles of

8 cities of

Shanghai, Hong Kong, London, Paris,

New York, Tokyo, Bangkok, Calcutta.

Pudong Development Bank building, Shanghai

 

I guess well the greater motivation

for these movies naming their café and nightclub

as Casablanca

is this…

a movie about war, love, identity

just like 《Legend of Fist》

and 《Hiroshima Mon Amour》

Casablanca the movie

 

here’s some synopsis from IMDB

In the early years of World War II,

the Moroccan city of Casablanca attracts people from all over.

Many are transients trying to get out of Europe;

a few are just trying to make a buck.

Most of them -- gamblers and refugees,

Nazis, resistance fighters, and plain old crooks --

find their way to Rick's Café Américain,

a swank nightclub owned by American expatriate Rick Blaine

Though we learn later that Rick once

harbored enough idealism to put himself

at risk to fight fascism,

he's now embittered and cynical,

professing to be neutral and detached

: "I stick my neck out for nobody."

 

wow

it really attracted me

to go look for the movie

I am really attracted by war movie based on these themes

to die with pride or to live with shame

to love your enemy or to hate his(her) identity

to discover places or to reminiscent the place called home

(I spelt reminiscent without spell-check!!)

 

don’t you think these posters are great

one of these days I gonna go dig

if ever I can find

the posters and OSTs

those vinyl discs

at flee markets or curio stores

tsk…tsk..tsk

 

《Hiroshima Mon Amour》

Hiroshima Mon Amour

Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence

Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence

and hurray new on the list

《Casablanca》

CasablancaCasablanca

 

and after all

back to the main topic of the day

《Legend of the First》 to a certain extend

share the themes too

so that’s why we got Casablanca dancehall

 

do you love your enemy?

cheers

 

or maybe I was wrong after all

Casablanca did exist in Shanghai

it has nothing to do with

 

all the Casablanca as above

Once upon a time in Shanghai

hey, this sounds familiar

Hoi-man-keong & Teng-lek

1980’s TVB classic

Once upon a time in China

Huang-fei-Hong, isn’t it..

off topic, again… and again

 

conclusion of the day

I have marked down Casablanca and Shanghai

on my ESOM, Empire State of Map

you hear me,

are you going with me?

yeah, I mean YOU!!

not look around…

there’s no one else beside you..