Political Crisis and F&B Marketing…

This morning, as I turn to Facebook, as online social media is where news items are faster than Sonic the Hedgehog and usually are as accurate as lottery number predictions, I noticed this news:

“Tun Dr Siti Hasmah distributing chocolates to members of the media outside the Perdana Putra building in Putrajaya. Just minutes earlier, the interim Prime Minister was seen leaving the office presumably headed towards Istana Negara where he was summoned.”

For non-Malaysians, Tun Dr. Siti Hasmah is the permanent wife of our interim Prime Minister. I think… I don’t know, that’s not what I am going to write about. Rather than detailing deep about the current political turmoil in our country, I am better off mud-wrestling with a porcupine.

These high profile handout, of course, started with the news that His Majesty the King himself was handing out fast food to the hungry pack of media gals and boys roving around the palace for news bites….eww, sorry about that cringe-worthy wordplay.

The Agung’s generosity extended to fast food products from McDonalds, Burger King and Pizza Hut among others. The members of the media are definitely grateful as heck.

Which brings me back to my days as a member of the media, where, apart from juicy news, the best things were sweet booze and tasty food.

I became fat and later went to Rehab.

Of course, being in media has nothing to do with the fact that I did not excel to become a great journalist, but a fat alcoholic instead. It was my attitude that gave me that slip and it is another tale, we’ll chat about it over a pint and greasy chicken wings….kidding. I am kidding. Please.

Now, I find the whole event interesting in a sense because the political turmoil overshadowed that cutesy, frenemival© (friend/Enemy/Rival) gestures that excited the foodies all over Malaysia. You may have been aware of how Pizza Hut “gave its heart to its rival”, where the romance was heating up to the point that one even felt left out.

All these happened recently during the Valentine’s day, an awesome date when my son was born, which also happened to be a day that helped to unite many lovers and massacred bunch of gangsters locked in power struggle, not unlike what’s happening in the country today.

Speaking of massacres, I actually feel for my old media buddies out there. Life is not easy for them now, with a drop of a pin in the palace where most have been hanging around could be news only no one is going to hear it. Though my stint in that thankless industry did not last more than two decades, I had my share of shitty experience. Most unforgettable one was in Karachi, Pakistan (duh!), where I was reprimanded by a military officer for walking into a wrong exhibition tent. I showed my media card, which was more the reason I shouldn’t be there. I don’t know, perhaps the military officers were engaging unnatural reproductive activities with the hoofed kind.

Looking aggressive, the offier pointed out to a rather malnourished looking soldier next to him and said, “see this man?”. I saw him. He could use some protein. “He will break your back”.

Despite the ludicrous notion of me getting beaten up by a Paki Buster Keaton, my valuable pairs did shrink. Then, I opened my eyes (wait, what else did you think got shrunk?), and smiled and allowed the anorexic back-breaker to escort me out.

That is the closest I got to sustaining casualty on duty as a precious member of the media. And so, yes, media life is tough, with all that change of pace and turn of events.  It’s heartening to note that King himself spent the time to take care of the media gals and blokes. That’s Malaysian hospitality folks... when they are not swearing or honking at you on the road, or taking down (registration plate) numbers of cars involved in accidents, creating traffic jams, the usual.

Coming back to the matter in hand, it occurs to me that, well, the whole “food offering” may have started from the time when there was that “friendly” exchanges of courtesies between fast food companies.

Look, things have long been looking bleak for them. Malaysians are becoming more aware of the health and fast-food is becoming the “pariahs” of the F&B industry. Look at this example of an exchange:

Bloke: Where whould we go for lunch?

Gal: McD?

Bloke: What, with all that cholesterol?

Gal: Are you saying I am fat?

Bloke: No, I mean, it’s not healthy.

Gal: Are you saying I am sick?

Bloke: Girl, I am not saying you are Punjabi, But_

So on, so forth. My point is this: fast food industry is heading for a big crisis. This is a quote from that Business Insider news (this was two years ago, I expect things to hit rock bottom crisis-wise):

Outside of fast food, IHOP president Darren Rebelez cautioned that the “highly competitive environment” meant that growing sales required stealing diners from rivals.

See that? Stealing from rivals.

Now, back to our crisis. Don’t you see what is happening? After the Valentine’s Day exchange, the fast-food mafiosos, err, I mean, marketing people saw that nothing much was happening to spike their sales. No word-of-mouth about how healthy they are actually with paid food scientist reverse-engineering the whole health fad and issuing statement such as Whopper Burger is good for piles, so on so forth. No, it is not, save your ass.

There was an opportunity for these folks. Now is the time. Seize the day, as Robin Williams once said. Grab the opportunity. Feed the media with as much of their product as possible. Who cares about the political struggle? Make use of the King’s benevolent heart and conduct this crisis marketing as indirectly as possible.

In fact, I would even go further as to say that they even made a pact with our Prime Minister to start the whole shebang in the first place for pure marketing purposes. Come on, how much of well-shot, brilliantly-edited, poorly acted commercials can actually get you to drop everything including knickers and rush out to the fast food joint of choice?

Hah! Now you see it, don’t you? Writing this makes me hungry as heck. I feel like having Ramli Burger. I love Ramli Burger. Remember, folks, Ramli Burger is the best for you and your family, satisfaction guaranteed, in addition to being better than Whopper for your biological refuse expulsion issues.

The Gentleman (2020)

Fans of Guy Ritchie must have missed his touch with regards to earlier gangster films as he was drifted off slightly to make bigger flicks. This would be his back to basics film, sort of reminding you the days of  Lock, Stock, Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch.

The stars are bigger this time than the earlier flicks that helped to launch the careers of many who will go on to enjoy tremendous success (especially Jason Statham).

The Gentleman may not offer anything fresh, we have seen it all before. The various regional English accents, as well as an American one courtesy of Matthew McConaughey, the tics and the eccentricities of typical English lads and ladies, and most importantly the British sense of humour.

The plot is not as convoluted as one would hope for something Tarantino-esque that one expects from Ritchie, though you might get lost in the flashbacks. The violence is surprisingly plenty sparse…and this is in comparison to Ritchie’s frequent sharing of bucketloads of blood with us. I don’t know, maybe Alladin mellowed him down a bit.

Here you have it, a slimy tabloid journalist, a quick drug dealer and his very smart and tough wife, his consiglieri, and various competitors wanting to take over a huge and secret marijuana plantation (I wonder what Malaysia’s home ministry think of this “inspiring” plot device).

There’s nothing in here that will set the film apart from his usual oeuvre. Bloodshed? Check. Hilarious repartees? Check. Longwinded but entertaining dialogues? Check. So on, so forth. Still, you get a feeling that Ritchie has used up all his arsenals and is just polishing his same old gardening tools and trying to repurpose them.

The characters are interesting, but you are not going to remember them much after the flick is over. Sure, they were entertaining, but who are they? I even can’t quite place McConaughey as to his redeeming quality is concerned. He is involved, but he can’t involve us.

But the film is entertaining where it need be, I suppose. The cast has fun where they should. The script offers some interesting but not surprising twist and turns, as it is wont with Ritchie’s earlier body of work. Still, I felt something lacked…perhaps the originality. Something fresh.

Maybe Ritchie is completing his first circle, going back to the genre that catapulted himself into the consciousness of the filmgoers all over the world (I was in Singapore in 1999, walking into a theatre that allowed R-rated films and was pleasantly shocked and entertained by the audacity and the surprise after surprise offered by Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, still Ritchie’s best in my book).

If you know what to expect from a Guy Ritchie film, you are not in for a surprise. If you do, it’s routine and you just finish your popcorn and forget about it till you see it in cable or something. Ritchie hopefully will be surprising us in his Phase 2.

In short, I suppose I have fallen into that “overgrown the genre” category. I certainly marvelled at Ritchie’s take on Sherlock Holmes, just like how I enjoyed Tarantino’s take on the western, but I felt that I got nothing else to look forward to as far as Ritchie’s bag of tricks is concerned. Maybe he needs to do a biopic or something. You know, the old “reinventing” trick. It kept Clint Eastwood busy into his ninth decade of life, and seventh decade of career….

The Call of The Wild (2020)

Let us not kid ourselves, Harrison Ford is not a stranger to partnering with a dog on screen. Look, I am not insulting Chewbacca…he was inspired by George Lucas’ Alaskan Mameluke, which was called Indiana, which was Ford’s name in The Raiders of The Ark.

To summarise that, Ford has now been paired again with a furry canine which was based on a dog that has the same name as Ford in Raiders Of The Lost Ark and the sequels. Get it? Are we clear? Can we move on? Wait…ah, fudge it!

That’s right, based on my curse word, you can safely assume that this is a very safe flick. It was produced by Disney and you are assured of the best cute, heart-warming, fuzzy, hot cocoa during cold night moments in this film. If you like a movie about a man and his relationship with a dog, in this case, a St Bernard collie.

There is no excessive violence, no curse words, no strong tension….and what will intrigue you if you haven’t been watching CGI creatures the last three decades is that the dog is entirely computer-generated.

Speaking of the three decades, if you are like me, there is a tendency for you to notice the slight unnatural movement or the overtly natural facial expressions on the big dog. You might be finicky, anal in the beginning, but like me, I hope, you will get along with the story and will love the big doggy.

I am not a dog lover by any chance, I am a cat person, which means I am evil naturally. But that’s a story for another day, and I tell you this: Ford works well with furry creatures. I mean, working with a “walking carpet”, reacting to it as humanely as possible is one thing, but spending shitload of time being intimate with a tennis ball at the end of the stick is another entirely.

There was easy chemistry between Ford and the doggy as it developed over time…as the furry one slowly melts the crusty old man’s heart. The dog itself starts to develop its character in front of us and manages to sit in well in our consciousness as a lovable creature that was lost in the beginning and was leading in the end.

I admit that being a non-dog lover (no, not a hater), I took some time to warm up to Buck, the dog. But the team behind its pixelated creation managed to pull off the most unbelievable thing, they actually made it have strong chemistry with Ford’s character so much so that you will get emotional at crucial moments.

I have not read Jack London’s novel, so I can’t quite talk about how faithful it is…that is beside the point. The film was lovingly shot, in a gold rush era winter, and is about how this dog, starting out meek like and later err…mans up to the point that it was able to lead a team of sledge-pulling fellow CGI dogs. You may form an attachment to the CGI dog as Ford has, but I couldn’t help but remind me that it was not real…that is not helpful information, or it would have made the experience much more fun and emotional as it was supposed to as the movie started to close in on Ford’s relationship with it.

And so, I have a mixed feeling about this film. It is a wonderfully warm film about the relationship between man and dog if you haven’t seen other wonderfully warm firm about the relationship between man and dog. And as a fan of Ford’s…. I felt he was okay but too iconic in our eyes to see him especially in vulnerable spots. But that’s my fault.

And so, the heart-warming aspect will tickle your fancy, especially kids though they may find some part boring. Otherwise, this is not an award-bait film, and neither is it going to be remembered when Ford gets his Lifetime Achievement Award…oh, he got it already. Damn.

Sonic The Hedgehog (2019)

The only reason why I wanted to watch this movie was to see Jim Carrey hamming it up. I wanted to see whatever improv that came through that finally shone the light again on his manic sense of humour that has been missing for a long time. Also, I didn’t give a rat's ass on the goddam hedgehog (are they rodents?).

I ended up disappointed big time with Jim. And I still didn’t give a rodent’s ass on the goddam Hedgehog. What is it, anyway? From what I understand, it’s a video game that is perhaps not as old as Mario Bros but certainly not really as popular as the pixelated Mexican siblings - enough to convince the studio to make a big budget flick out of this when they did that with the earlier game, the movie sank like....oh man, I can't think of anything other than that big boat.

I am not sure where exactly the promise was. After years of being in the dark, with his off-screen antics and Hagrid beard, Jim was finally strutting his stuff on big screen …. Big time. This could have been a delicious role, remember how he stole the show from heavyweights like Tommy Lee Jones and George goddam Clooney in the franchise leaking Batman and Robin. I loved him in it, alongside Arnold…the only reason to ever revisit the film (no, don’t…I was just saying, okay. Don’t).

As with most of the reviews, I do not spell out the plot as I assume that the very few who are emotionally blackmailed into reading my reviews would not care anyway. In any case, stop reading now. I…I…don't really have anything nice to say about this flick.

As I mentioned, it has been a long time since I saw Carrey and saw him well. He has been making headlines for the wrong reason, and it sort of reminded me of Joaquin Phoenix who was hanging around with chin Afro… only to reveal that he did it for a documentary. I can’t remember that documentary. Do you? Sheesh.

Yes, as mentioned Carrey looked like he was landing a role possibly to play Hagrid in the remake of Harry Potter, and have no two human-reproduction-actions to image and whatnots. And then, it was announced that he will play the bad guy in the big-screen adaptation of this video game. Sure...I was game.

In all fairness, there was plenty of Carrey-ism in the flick. He sure looked like he was having a time of his life…maybe for a while. Then, it all seemed as laboured as a typical day’s work voicing cartoon villains. Just ask Mark Hamill… only Carrey seemed to have run out of stuff from his bag of tricks. All used up. In some comedian’s hand, like Robin Williams, even an empty bag might contain some remaining gold dust. Carrey’s treasure chest was just filled with….dust.

It’s tough to mask my disappointment, having first been rejoiced to see him playing Ace Ventura… “Hey,” I told my brothers, “that’s the guy from In Living Colour”… an all-black reworking of Saturday Night Live with Jim and another gal playing the token white.  

But what a fall…my favourite Hollywood comedian of all time after Groucho Marx, Robin Williams made a successful transition from TV to the big screen, from comedy to playing dramatic roles, winning honours and that golden bald guy. It is a very tough act to follow for any comedians.

Carrey had his own share of accolades for sure, but it seems he has…oh, I hate to say this and I hope I am wrong, burnt out! I do hope he makes a full recovery soon.

As to this film, I would recommend you guys to give it a miss. The superfast, speedy Gonzales hedgehog is fun to a certain level. But lack of creative input from Carrey made me sad. The actions scenes in the film look about as recycled as politicians speeches. The animation meshing with live action is nothing much to shout about. The action is mundane even if the hedgehog is purportedly lightning fast. The shticks like Sonic playing baseball with itself is…no, guys, I’m not interested.

I am expecting this to be a big-time flop and Jim is gonna go mourning as he seemed to have been considering that…it’s a mighty fall from the 90s and the early 00s when he was in that 20/20 club remember? Find the pub where John Travolta goes to, Jim….do some soul searching and come back. We lost Robin…some of us are looking up to you now…

In any case, I have a nagging feeling that kids will like it…or at least the first half an hour. Otherwise, they are going to be faster than the bloody hedgehog wanting to rush out when the film is not even finished yet.

Vanam Kottatum (2020)

No, bro, listen to the kids...they don't want you to go back to Nattamai job...

It is hard to point the genre Vanam Kottatum belongs to, if at all there are genres in Tamil films, considering most directors would want to cram as much as they can…it has been the culture.

So, this will fit firmly into “family” film, considering the core of this film is the relationship between the quartet of father, mother, elder brother and a little sister. And then there are others, of course.

What happens is, in the flashback - which is like raisins in any Tamil film fruitcakes - we get to see Sarath Kumar making a supposedly righteous kill and his wife Radhika, to avoid the marauding villagers who do not take kindly to those without shame (hypocrisy is the biggest village harvest according to my lifetime knowledge of Tamil films). Sarath surrenders himself and goes to jail and Radhika moves to town to eke a living a bring up their son (Vikram Prabhu) and daughter (Aishwarya Rajesh).

When the film thankfully moves to the city and takes place years later when the boy grows up to be quite a maverick, finding his way around the market wholesale business, things start picking up. As expected, Sarath finishes his jail sentence and returns, and the kids do not take to his comeback kindly. He was not around when they slogged and made it where they are. Basically, the absent daddy issue that the Western society would blame on anything including termite problem at home.

But what makes this film work is that there was nary a dull moment. I attribute this to, not exactly the script which feels a bit too familiar, but to wonderful performances all around. Sarath and Radhika are like day and night when it comes to acting. The former goes from decent Scotch to watered-down juice, while Radhika can go from okay to apeshit insane crazy performance (watch her cry the entire flick in Pasum Ponn, that may have depleted the glycerine supply that year).

Here, both underplay where there are requirements and invites us to share their pain when it was necessary. I hate to say this, but Radhika was the key point of this entire flick, she held the whole film which could be shaky here and there without asking desperately for our sympathy. We naturally feel for her. There is this unnecessary plot involving love triangle or something, concerning Santhanu Bagyaraj who is well on his way to playing supporting roles (and did well here), but that will not weigh heavy in this film. It shouldn’t.

Of course, the purported main dude is Vikram Prabhu, who somewhat inherited his dad’s likeability factor…but not yet his granddaddy’s versatility. Soon, I hope because he really seems to shine in anything he touches. To me at least. Yes, I could be biased being a Nadigar Thilagam Sivaji Ganesan and Prabhu Ganesa fan…but when Vikram Prabhu first appeared, I was armed up to my teeth to attack even the lightest register of ineptness in Prabhu’s junior.

But…but…dammit, he slipped between my punishing fingers. He IS good,  and as the Tamilians would say, I paraphrase, one that is born to a tiger will not become a cat. Well, actually, If Sivaji Ganesan was a goddam African Lion (majestic and doesn’t have to do much hunting, but when it roars…!), Prabhu would be a Bengal Tiger (fierce, imposing)  and I have a nagging feeling that Vikram Prabhu is a goddam Jaguar, which can give the tiger massive bruises, at least.

Enough “feline-esque” comparison, what matters the cast kept the film compelling to watch. The mood swings amiably, from tense to fun, especially the usual “Hero/Heroine” banter, to dead serious issues concerning the second heroine and her dad.

My grouse? Naturally, fast becoming my bad guy of most current films, the music. Someone should stop overpaying these composers who just want to impose their presence all over the place and God knows what bargaining chip they were using to subtly threaten the director to not to drop the background scores. Guys, we like Tamil film music just like the next guy (if the next guy loves MSV, Ilaiayaraja and A. R. Rahman), but please, please, don’t drop it like a glob of butter and toast the slices.

Vanam Kottatum (I have no clue why they sort of adapted the title from a Bond film…Skyfall, remember?) will neither surprise nor shock you. There are emotional moments but nothing that will push you to the extreme, say, like Bharathiraja’s Karuthama. It’s fun in places, dramatic where it should be, and the cast manages to make a somewhat simple plot get our attention.

And yes, for Vikram Prabhu this is another one of those steps for his ascension in this field. I believe I have said it before…with good projects and by further pushing himself, considering that he made an impressive debut just like his grandfather, he can do what his own father admittedly and unsurprisingly couldn’t…be better than daddy. Sorry, Prabhu, I love you, but fact is fact.

Chronic Corona…

Oh...the damage to the makeup industry....

Alright, I am back from my sabbatical of writing half-assed, quarter boiled satire pieces as I was busy recovering from err…dipsomania…I was mostly writing film reviews as you can see. They are about as interesting as watching a caterpillar turning into another caterpillar.

Look at this: “The last time China was hit by a deadly illness like the Wuhan virus, it covered it up and 774 people died. There are fears it could happen again.”

   That’s not part of news content, folks, that is a goddam headline.

  It is because the entire world is plugging its orifices fearing insurgence of a virus that was not named after a Mexican beer (That’s Corona Beer…this is Coronavirus Beer…oh, I am kidding. It is just Novel Coronavirus with a scientific name of 2019-nCoV…to commemorate the glorious piece of shit year we had endured. How appropriate).

   Here’s what the newspaper that helped to bring down Nixon  recently has to say:

• ·    There are almost 14,400 confirmed cases of coronavirus in China, including 10 on the self-governing island of Taiwan, with more than 300 dead. A new study says as many as 75,815 people in Wuhan may have been infected.
• ·   The World Health Organization reports roughly 130 confirmed cases of the virus in more than 20 countries outside of China and Taiwan. The Philippines reported the first death attributable to the virus outside of China. New cases confirmed in South Korea and India.

   Following that, as you guys might know some countries are already pulling down and tying the checkpoint gate preventing tourists from China, specifically from the Wuhan district where the virus came from and there might be more where the latest came from.

   Anyway, in this region, the Philippines is the latest to temporarily ban travellers from China, including Hong Kong and Macao…owing to the first death outside of China in Manila due to that damned virus. So, instead of shooting any incoming diseased tourists, the country’s President holstered his weapon and just issued ban order instead. Dueterte has started embracing subtlety.

   And it doesn’t stop there,  a Chinese media noted that the United States, the European Union, Russia, Australia and Singapore have banned or restricted the entry of Chinese citizens, and any foreigners that have recently visited China.

The star itself....one ugly mother____

   Other countries that have placed travel restrictions on visitors from China include Mongolia, and  Malaysia and Japan are resisting residents from Hubei. In fact, at home, it was East Malaysia that imposed restrictions, much to its Chinese ambassador’s chagrin.

   “… I hope in a difficult situation like this, the normal flow of people and including the trade, commercial activities, should not be affected between China and Malaysia, including Sabah of course,” the ambassador noted in the report which is definitely not a thinly veiled threat over the future of the two countries’ trade growth. Of course, he's a nice guy.

   But we are aware that this is not fresh from the bakery item. In fact, China has been aware, as, according to another report, the knowledge of the virus had already been circulating somewhere at the end of last year.

   “From the same report, we learned that Wuhan health authorities were having overnight meetings about the new “SARS” at end of December,” an official was quoted as saying in that article.  “Earlier today. the Wuhan mayor said he was not ‘authorised’ to publicise the epidemic until Jan. 20.”

   Not “authorised” folks.

  The article also noted that the spread was also helped by China’s Lunar New Year holiday this month. 

   “Wuhan mayor Zhou Xianwang said 5 million people had left the city before travel restrictions were imposed ahead of the Chinese New Year. Ma Xiaowei, the director of China’s National Health Commission, said that the virus had an incubation period of 10 to 14 days.”

   Furthermore, it noted that while some people are cancelling travel plans in China and opting to stay home over the holiday period, others may not yet have experienced the worst of the symptoms, believe themselves to be well enough to travel and/or could be reluctant to pay up to US$400 to change a flight — especially if they believe they merely have a common cold.

   What screws things up is that period, during which the virus can be contagious but the patients do not display symptoms. And that makes it easy for it to be passed along like a goddam joint at a Hollywood party.

  Speaking of which, while writing this article, a buddy of mind pointed out the supposed premonition, the 2011 film "Contagion" as per this article which noted that “…buried within the film….is a stark warning that feels even timelier today, subtly conveying how one misguided policy decision or thoughtless action can have a devastating domino effect, sowing the seeds of destruction in a vast, interconnected world.”

Some comparison ...be afraid, be very afraid....

   And, we don’t and never learn. Especially China as this is not the first time it has been faced with such pandemic. Thanks to SARS, suspicion that more would come has took root back several years ago. This article questions  “Is China Ground Zero for a Future Pandemic?”

   It noted that the H7N9 (bird flu) first spread from birds to humans in 2013. Since then, there have been five waves of the virus. And this involved lessons not learned from the SARS outbreak, as per another article that quoted the Western experts as saying that Chinese officials have come a long way since their wobbly handling of the 2002 outbreak of SARS, the severe respiratory disease caused by a previously unknown coronavirus;

   “Chinese apparatchiks initially tried to cover up the epidemic, creating a worldwide scandal” But after the first H7N9 outbreak in 2013, the expert quoted in the article observes, Chinese authorities did “exactly what should have been done. You need to get the word out as fast as possible, with transparency and urgency, so the world can respond.”

   Which then, happened this time. They did get the word out fast…but why is this happening again? For a country that is spending thrillions of Yuans on military, what are they doing in stopping these sort of epidemics, pandemics, whatever that’s killing innocent folks who are NOT Chinese citizens and causing shitload of losses in investment?

   Most nation are not going hard on China simply they don’t want to lose out on the monetary gain, the tourism dollars especially and the relationship with the cash-rich country that has knocked off Russia from the throne of being US’s frenemy.

   Sure, China has temporarily banned the trade of wild animals but that is all it was, a goddam knee-jerk reaction. What is it going to do to stop the whole shit hitting the fan when they have wiped it clean many time…whether they wiped the faces that got effected is something else entirely? But can it get its shit together this time?