"'Cause I, I, I, I, I'm gonna love youGonna hold ya through it allI, I, I, I'm gonna love youGonna never let you fallThrough it all, through it all"
Through It All (2009) by Alicia Keys
The chorus is so catchy and sing-along-able.
On Saturday morning, after about two hours of last-minute whirlwind preparation, I set off northward towards Butterworth with a scheduled day-stop in the Petaling Jaya and Mutiara Damansara area. I had three things on my to-do list.
- Catch the 3:30 pm screening of True Grit at the cineplex in 1Utama.
- Use my RM 15 discount coupon for any RM 100 purchase at the Borders bookstore in The Curve because it's only valid till the end of this month.
- Have either lunch, tea or dinner with Jen.
True Grit, along with Winter's Bone, were the last two 2011 Oscar Best Picture nominees I have not seen and I'll probably have to watch Winter's Bone by crooked means. True Grit also failed to reach theatres in the old hometown, but since it's still playing in many theatres in KL and Selangor, I couldn't in good conscience miss it whilst I'm in the vicinity. If a film I want to see is available, I'd chose to see it in a cinema 10 out of 10 times.
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| Would you believe that I did not know Matt Damon is in this film? |
Anyway, there I was sitting there is a half-full theatre (on a Saturday afternoon in 1Utama, would you believe?) when I noticed that the trailers they play in front of the movie were inappropriate - all romcoms and romantic dramas. Then, when the feature finally started, it suddenly became clear to me; they were playing the wrong reel and I was treated to the first 5 minutes of Beastly, a schlocky Twilight-wannabe retelling of Beauty and the Beast set in modern day New York. I tell you, Twilight is ruining all that is good and wholesome in art and literature. Have you seen the Young Adult section of a bookstore recently? They are completely mired down balls-to-the-wall with rubbishy pubescent wet fantasies of teen girls fucking vampires, werewolves, ghosts, angels, demons - basically any supernatural being that can conceivably have a penis attached to it. All of them have the same pretentious black cover or dust jacket. All of them sport praises from Stephanie Meyer or quotes touting them as the next Twilight. What the effing fuck.
Sorry, had to get that out of my system. Anyway, it didn't take too long for the projectionist to give me back my Academy Award nominated film and it was, I'm happy to report, a wagon load of fun. Hailee Steinfeld, who was only 13 when she acted in True Grit, was as eminent a screen presence as Jeff Bridges and Matt Damon - and considering how much the two veteran actors gave in this old-style Western, that's very high praise for the junior thesp indeed. Should she have won Best Supporting Actress? I don't know, but I was certainly far more impressed by her than I was by Melissa Leo in The Fighter. Just sayin'.
While I was in 1Utama, there was a bit of a kerfuffle in the atrium,
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| There's so much oestrogen in the air that men started growing boobs. |
Some bloke who was clearly in touch with his feminine side was sitting at a table signing autographs. I had no freaking idea who he was. I looked around to see if there were any posters or flyers which could clue me in but all I could see was a multi-storey high banner for Maybank's RCUBED shopping campaign. I would have asked a fangirl, but I didn't want vaginal juice all over me.
Can anyone tell me who he's suppose to be?
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| "I have two vaginas! Two!" |
He's probably not a world famous author or a Nobel laureate who cured AIDS, or something like that. Just a hunch.
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| OMFG HE'S GIVING ME A COME HITHER LOOK. MUST ESCAPE. |
Jen eventually called off our meeting because she had a conflicting dinner plan in the city (and I could not meet her earlier because I must must must watch True Grit). It seems to me that after she got her new job with an airline, she became quite adept at flying aeroplanes.
It was 6:00 pm by the time I made it to the Borders bookstore in The Curve and boy, what they had in stock were really disappointing for a retail store that size. From my book list of twelve titles, I could only locate Jedediah Berry's The Manual of Detection. And it's not just because the books I want are obscure or hard to procure. I did a search for a few staple classics I've been wanting to read like Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World and Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game, but even those were unavailable. Un-fucking-believable. I finally settled for Olympos, the sequel to Dan Simmon's Ilium which I liked, and The Secret History of Moscow by Ekaterina Sedia. I've been looking for another book by Sedia, The Alchemy of Stone, for a couple of years now to no avail, so I thought it's high time I give her other works a go.
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| I really wish the cover for The Secret History of Moscow is less contemptible. It looks like one of those cheap bodice-ripping romance novels. All it lacks is a muscly beefcake for the girl to cling on to. |
In other news, I'll be attending my first ever atheist meet-up in Penang this coming Sunday at 12:00 pm in Gurney Plaza. We are still ironing out the details of the event in Facebook (like exactly where in the mall) but once they solidify, I'll be disclosing them on this site.
P.S. To fly aeroplane is a local colloquialism for failing to keep an appointment or standing someone up. From my stats, I understand that more than half of my readers aren't Malaysians so I'm obligated to explain these things.
On the move,
k0k s3n w4i
4 comments:
I'm so sorry!!!!! (just trying to get into character for my new job? lol). I owe you one!! Will def set aside a whole chunk of the day just for you :D
So have you found out who's the celebrity? I'm always curious when I see supposedly famous people with their retinues of attendants and fans and photographers, though on every occasion, I've failed to identify them...
Borders will never have classics in them, because nobody buys them. They've got to order them specifically for you...at least that was my experience in Borders Mid Valley. They'll probably check out their sister stores throughout the city first, and chances are all of them won't have the book you're looking for. Then they'll have to order the volume from abroad, and chances are they'll tell you after half and hour of fiddling around with their computer that the system isn't working.
Still, I think Borders in KL is one of the best bookstores in the city.
Jen: don't worry, haha. all jibes in jest - the pun was simply too good to let slide. there's a good chance i won't be in your neighborhood for a good long while after this though. there's a really good chance i'll be posted in east malaysia.
nicoletta: the long-suffering girlfriend™ thinks he's anthony neely, who i have never even heard of before this. i had experience ordering through borders and they charge a fee for it (rm5, iirc). i prefer kinokuniya. all they require is a down payment; no extra cost. i think kinokuniya is indubitably the best bookstore in malaysia by far. i have had much better luck hunting through their shelves.
I know who this sissy is.
He's Anthony Neely, a Taiwanese American Mandopop singer.
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