KUNG FU PANDA

Po is a chubby panda who works in the noodle restaurant owned by his goose father Mr. Ping. He is also a kung fu fanatic with secret dreams of becoming a great master in the discipline, but Po's defining characteristic appears to be that he is the clumsiest of all the animals in ancient China. Mr. Ping hopes that Po will one day take over the restaurant.

The tortoise Master Oogway has a premonition that the evil snow leopard warrior Tai Lung, the former student of his own protégé Master Shifu, will escape from prison and return to threaten the Valley of Peace. While Shifu sends Zeng, a messenger goose, to Chorh-Gom Prison to have the security increased, Oogway orders a formal ceremony to choose the mighty Dragon Warrior who can defeat Tai Lung. Everyone assumes that one of the Furious Five — Tigress, Monkey, Mantis, Viper, and Crane — a quintet of supremely skilled martial artists trained by Shifu, will be chosen for this honor.

While the Five demonstrate their skills at the ceremony, Po finds himself locked outside the walled palace square. He attempts desperately to gain entry through a series of increasingly foolhardy methods. He finally does get over the wall by making a chair out of fireworks, lighting them and waiting for Oogway to choose the Dragon Warrior. Suddenly the chair zooms into the air with Po and burns up, leaving the charred panda to crash into the center of the arena. Inspired by this sudden appearance, the old master designates Po the Dragon Warrior to everyone's shock.

Despite Po's protests and Shifu's pleas to reconsider, Oogway stands by his decision.
Revolted at having this slovenly and obese noodle vendor with no martial arts training whatsoever under his tutelage, Shifu attempts to discourage Po by berating and humiliating him into leaving, including threatening to use the apparently deadly "Wuxi Finger Hold" on him. The Five, profoundly disappointed at being upstaged by the panda, similarly dismiss Po as a worthless interloper.

Although he becomes aware of Shifu's true intentions and is deeply hurt by his heroes' disdain for him, Po endures their abuse willingly for the growing dream to become something better than the failure he thinks he is, gradually earning some sympathy from them. In addition, Master Oogway, still certain that the clumsy panda is the right choice, strengthens Po with sage advice to encourage the panda to believe in himself. Eventually, the affable Po endears himself to the Five (except for the extremely disdainful Tigress) with his tireless tenacity, good cooking, and sense of humor.

Meanwhile, Zeng's errand backfires disastrously when a tour of the prison given to him by the overly confident head of security, Commander Vachir

, inadvertently enables Tai Lung to escape. Tai Lung orders Zeng to send word of his arrival. In the Valley of Peace, Oogway passes on, his final wish that Shifu train Po. However, upon learning of Tai Lung's return, the death of the tortoise who is the only one to have defeated him, and realizing that he has to face such a villain without any skill in fighting, Po attempts to flee, only to be stopped by Shifu who realizes that the panda must be trained. Unfortunately, when Po confesses his deep self loathing due to his obesity and the fact that he will never be a match for Tai Lung, Shifu is at a loss for a solution.

Overhearing the argument between Po and Shifu, the Five take it upon themselves to intercept Tai Lung, especially Tigress, who is confident in her training. After a long night of pondering, Shifu discovers the following morning that Po is capable of impressive physical feats when motivated by food. Realizing that he has found the right focus for the panda, Shifu leads Po to the countryside for an intensive training regime in which Po is offered food as a reward for learning his lessons properly. Thus motivated, Po learns swiftly and finally becomes a talented martial artist in his own right.

The Five battle Tai Lung but are eventually beaten and paralyzed with a specialized nerve-striking technique. When they return defeated, Shifu finally decides Po is ready to take the villain on and gives him the sacred Dragon Scroll, which promises great power to the possessor. When Po opens it, he finds nothing but a blank reflective surface. Stricken with despair at the scroll's apparent worthlessness, Shifu orders his students to evacuate the village while he stays to delay Tai Lung from pursuing them for as long as he can.

As Po participates in the evacuation, he comes across his father, who tries to cheer him up by telling him the secret ingredient of the family's popular noodle soup: nothing whatsoever. Things become special, he explains, because people believe them to be special. Realizing that this truth is the very point of the Dragon Scroll, that the power promised is already inside him, Po rushes off to help Shifu. At this time, Tai Lung confronts Shifu and savagely fights and berates him for his perceived betrayal of not arguing with Master Oogway's rejection of Tai Lung as Dragon Warrior.

To remedy that, Tai Lung wants the Dragon Scroll for himself to complete his training. While fighting, he expresses that he gave in to his aggression and anger so he could make Shifu proud of him. For his part, Shifu is crippled by his profound feelings of guilt and responsibility for his former protégé, whom he loved like a son, turning to darkness.

Tai Lung angrily discovers the Scroll is gone, and before he can kill his former mentor, Po arrives to challenge him as he had already believed in himself. Although the snow leopard scoffs at the fat panda being the Dragon Warrior, the ensuing fight proves Po to be an extremely formidable opponent. Despite Po's skill, Tai Lung temporarily stuns him and gains the Dragon Scroll, but is horrified when he examines it, unable to understand its symbolism. As he recovers, Po delivers some words of wisdom to strengthen Tai Lung's spirit when he reveals his comprehension of the deeper wisdom of the scroll. Deeply frustrated with an apparently useless prize and having worked so hard for the "Powerful" Dragon Scroll, Tai Lung tries to subdue Po with his nerve strikes.

However, the attack proves useless on the panda, as his nerves are "hard to find" due to his body fat. Emboldened, Po effectively counter-attacks with a unique improvised combat style that takes advantage of his girth to absorb and deflect the force from Tai Lung's attacks back at him. In the end, Po uses the Wuxi Finger Hold on Tai Lung (which he claims to have "figured out" on his own) and uses his catchphrase, "Skadoosh!", defeating him with a devastating explosion that ripples through the valley.

The Five return to the valley to investigate the cause of the explosion and find a slightly dazed but triumphant Po. Deeply impressed at Po's victory, Tigress leads the Five to acknowledge the panda as a Kung Fu master. The villagers, including Po's father, follow suit and hail Po as a hero. Po remembers his teacher is wounded, and rushes back to Shifu, who is now finally at peace, though he is not dead ("I'm not dying, you idiot!...er, Dragon Warrior. I am simply at peace.") — he is only resting after such a trying battle. Po lays on the floor with him for a few seconds, then finally asks if he would like to go and get something to eat; Shifu takes him up on the offer.

MOVIE I RECENTLY WATCHED

THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA PRINCE CASPIAN

In Narnia, Caspian, a Telmarine Prince, is woken up by his professor, Doctor Cornelius, who informs him that his aunt has just given birth to a son and that his life is now in danger. Doctor Cornelius gives him Queen Susan's ancient magical horn and instructs him to use it if he is in dire need of help. Knowing that his Uncle Miraz would kill him in order to be king, Caspian flees.
Chased by several Telmarine soldiers, Caspian falls off his horse and encounters two Narnian dwarfs and a talking badger in the woods. One of the dwarfs, Trumpkin, is captured by the soldiers after sacrificing himself to save Caspian, while the other dwarf, Nikabrik, and the badger, Trufflehunter, save Caspian. Not knowing that they are trying to save him, Caspian blows the magical horn, trying to summon help.

In

England, the four Pevensie children wait at the Strand tube station for the train to arrive. One year has passed in their world after they left Narnia. Just as the train pulls into the station, the walls start sucking in, and the whole station tears apart to leave the Pevensies in Narnia. There, they discover that Cair Paravel, their castle, had turned into ruins while they were gone.
Meanwhile, Nikabrik and Trufflehunter lead Caspian to the Dancing Lawn, where all the old Narnians have assembled, including the swashbuckling mouse, Reepicheep, and a large number of centaurs and minotaurs. There, Caspian convinces them to help him win his throne back so that he can give them back their land.

The Pevensies save a bound and gagged Trumpkin as they spot two Telmarine soldiers who are about to drown him in the ocean. After the dwarf realizes that the four of them are the kings and queens of old, they set off together. On the way, Lucy glimpses Aslan and tries to convince the others that she's seen him, but only Edmund believes her. After many twists and turns, they eventually encounter Caspian and his troops, who take them to Aslan's How, a huge underground hall built over the Stone Table. From there, Peter suggests that they attack Miraz's castle. Lucy suggests waiting for Aslan to give instructions, but Peter decides they have waited for Aslan long enough.

The Narnians succeed in raiding Miraz’s castle, but Peter calls for a retreat when he realizes that if they keep fighting, all will be killed. Peter, Edmund, Susan, Caspian, and half of the Narnians manage to escape before the gate closes, but the rest are trapped and brutally slaughtered.
When they get back to Aslan's How, Peter and Caspian, who are both guilty and upset over the loss of half their soldiers, have an argument about the attack on the castle, which almost culminates in a swordfight. Later, Nikabrik, along with a hag and a werewolf, draw Caspian aside and tell him that they can help him claim his throne and guarantee Miraz's death. After Caspian agrees, the hag uses black sorcery to summon the White Witch. From inside a wall of ice, the Witch tries to convince Caspian, who had not realized what Nikabrik's true intentions were, to give her a drop of his blood in order to set her free. Peter, Edmund, and Trumpkin arrive and quickly incapacitate Nikabrik, the wolf, and the hag, and Edmund shatters the wall of ice before the Witch can be freed.

As Miraz and his army arrive at Aslan's How, Caspian suggests that Peter and Miraz duel one-on-one under the condition of surrender, in order to buy Lucy and Susan more time to find Aslan. Miraz is forced to accept, as it would look cowardly to refuse to fight a boy half his age. Susan and Lucy, who are searching for Aslan in the woods, are chased by Telmarine soldiers along the way; Susan sends Lucy off and remains behind to deal with the soldiers, but she is soon rescued by Caspian and the two of them return to the battlesite. Peter and Miraz battle, and Peter eventually is able to wound Miraz, but gives his sword to Caspian to finish him off. Caspian, who cannot bring himself to do it, lets Miraz keep his life, but says that he intends to give Narnia back to its people.

Lord Sopesian suddenly stabs and kills Miraz with one of Susan's red-feathered arrows and blames the Narnians for shooting Miraz. Sopesian calls the Telmarine army, which is waiting just outside the How, to advance so that they can obliterate the Narnians. The Telmarines unfurl nasty trebuchets which fire a continuous stream of boulders at Aslan's How and the Narnian army. In an effort to fight back, the Narnians try several tactics, including collapsing underground tunnels underneath the army, and sending griffins overhead with archers in their claws. In one final hope, they charge head on to fight with the Telmarines.

Lucy, meanwhile, has found Aslan in the woods; he awakens the trees that have been in a deep sleep. With the whole forest suddenly against them, Lord Sopesian orders the Telmarines to retreat to the bridge of Beruna, where they are confronted by Lucy and Aslan. Aslan summons the

river god, who destroys the bridge and wipes out the majority of the Telmarine army as well as Lord Sopesian; all of the surviving Telmarine soldiers are forced to surrender and hand over their weapons, while the Narnians are honored for fighting well.

Before the Pevensies depart, Peter and Susan declare, much to Caspian, Edmund, and Lucy's dismay, that Aslan has told them they will never return to Narnia. Aslan explains that Susan and Peter have gained everything they could possibly gain from their experiences in Narnia and are no longer needed there. Susan and Caspian share a kiss, knowing they will never meet again. The Pevensies then go back to England, leaving Caspian as King of Narnia.