Speak

Speak is the title of the movie I watched few hours ago while having dinner. It tells the story of Melinda who after being raped (she was 13) she stopped talking altogether. It is a powerful movie. There is no crying or screaming in the aftermath of being raped, but the way the feeling of a person being presented in her drawing of trees is surprising and yet really deep.

Melinda had to draw trees for her art class, and at first the trees are just a normal tree. Somehow, the more she wants to shout to the world that she was raped, and thats the reason why she acts abnormally, the more dark and mysterious her drawing of trees became.

In the end when the truth came out, one thing puzzles me. When Melinda was picked up by her mom from school after she got out alive while she was threatened and beaten by the boy who raped her, her mom said "It's ok if you don't want to talk about it". When in fact, it is not OK.

It's not OK going through something as terrible as rape and being told that it is OK not wanting to talk about it. Especially, when it happened to your own daughter, why would you not want to talk about it? If it were me I'd want to know every detail so I can send that boy who raped my daughter straight to hell. Who wouldn't?

I really enjoy this movie, and one of the major reasons is that it featured Kristen Stewart when she was a really good actress. I haven't watch anything of her beyond Twilight, but this work deserves some awards.

Girl in Progress

In the previous post, I mentioned that I am on a full "downloading things from youtube" mode. Well, one of them is this movie, "Girl in Progress". It is about a girl named Ansiedad, who, in her chaotic flurry moment of being a teenager, decided that she would stage her own "coming to the age" experience herself. And how did she plan to do that? She planned to do all the things rendered as "adult-ish" so that she would get a closure and leap into adulthood. 

Ansiedad and her mom

According to the movie, in America, it seems that these are the things you do to be considered as an adult:

1. Be a nice girl, wear pink coloured clothes so people would regard you as a nice, goody-two-shoes kind of girl.
2. And then, change in the blink of an eye. Steal your mom's money, buy new clothes, hook up with the worst jackass womaniser, get into the popular girl's group. 
3. Go to wild parties, lose your virginity with that jackass womaniser, dump your best friend, and lastly, leave town. 

Penny and Howard's first time meeting

Now where have I heard the story? Oh right. Everywhere. In TBBT, Penny left her hometown so she can "grow" in a new place. (Don't get me wrong, I love Penny. It's just an example)

In that Britney Spear's movie, she left her town as well (wait, doesn't that sound like her life story?)

Britney in Crossroads

In Hick, a 13-year old got into an adventure of a lifetime by picking up some clothes and a gun she received for her birthday and left. What follows was probably the scariest a girl could go through.

If only life is that simple. I believe that things will not be fine, issues will not be resolved if everyone just simply pick up their stuffs and leave. That is not how you grow into adulthood.

Problems come and go, if everyone just leave then how are we going to solve it? Surely, just because a person has not left town and live somewhere else, then the person cannot grow?

I believe that in some point of our lives, we need to move out and go live in a foreign place. It is good for the soul. Some people choose to come back, some people choose not to. But leaving because the previous place is troublesome is not right.

Hick

I have lived in Perak and KL. I spent 4 years doing first degree in Perak and another 2 years (almost 2 yrs and a half actually) in KL. What an experience. Living on your own, no close family (my brother's in Putrajaya but when I lived in my rented apartment I was never there), finding ways to get to one place to another, got lost, went out at the wrong train station and had to find a cab to get to uni, 2 hours bus ride, being stalked, followed by a stranger…oh tell me about it. I've been through it all.

Even back in secondary school, I spent two out of five years in hostel. And then I lived in KUSZA for 3 years during diploma. Well, to sum it up, I have lived more than 11 years of my life away from home. It is refreshing, to try to get out of your comfort zone. If everything is bright and shiny I feel that life itself would turn dull.

You gotta have some rain if you want the rainbow eh?

And now, I am living in a very different environment. I have to keep it a secret until I am in the safe. You'll have to wait til July to hear the story.

Where was I? Oh yes, the movie. In the end, when things took a terrible turn and the girl's life went upside down, that's when she had an epiphany. She finally accepts the fact that not all life's experience can be staged. Some should be experienced naturally. Like growing up. No one know exactly when a person can say "I'm all grown up now". No, it does not happen like that. It would creep slowly into our lives and when we finally realised it, it is as if you have walked down a long road and suddenly you stop for a second and take a look around, and realised how far you've gone.

That's how it should be done. That's how people….progress.

Sugar sugar

When I was in secondary school, I remember watching a video. It was The Archie's Sugar Sugar, but there was a footage of a movie in it. I've always thought of it, since I like the song. But the original video clip that often came out was not the one with the movie in it.

Fast forward to 2013, I was searching for Ezra Miller's movies, and found out that there are tonnes of full movies in Youtube. I know I know. What a noob. Hey, I don't intentionally sit in front of the computer to find movies all day long like I used to back in the days ok?

So, I found this movie with Christina Ricci in it. I knew her from her Casper days. Anyways, downloaded it, and watched it just now. It turned out to be that the movie I saw in the video clip is actually Now and Then (1995).

It is a great watch. It's about four girls and it marked the summer in 1970 where they made a pact to always be there for each other no matter what, due to some circumstances and chalenges they faced that summer.

It's a really good movie. They had a tree house which they bought with their own money. I noticed a lot of scenes which, were it to be a movie in 2013, would've make no sense at all and would probably change this movie into a thriller (especially that part where they met a soldier. They could've been raped, for all we know).

Watching this movie made me remember what a wonderful childhood I had. Sure, with all those "turbulences" in my family, not everything is a walk in the beach. But I had some really good times with friends and family. 

I was left to care for myself from 7 am in the morning til 7pm at night since I was 8 years old until I got into secondary school and stayed at the hostel. My mom had a little taylor shop in town so she left me to my sisters or cousins. I lived with them during the day, and lived with my mother at night.

It wasn't much different from everyone else's life, or so I thought. Of course, I didn't know what it was like to have both parents together in one house. Somehow growing up I learnt along the way that what I had was not the norm, but I guess it made me who I am today.

They say a good movie left you feeling warm hearted and such. Well I think this is one of those movies.