Sunday 25 August 2019

Movie Review: Heathers (1988)

I have many reviews that I could have posted here, but today is not the day. Here, I am going to talk about one of the controversial dark films back in the 1980s, Heathers. Starring Winona Ryder and Christian Slater in this cult classic, the film follows a girl named Veronica whose possesses an intelligence and is unlike her clique peers who are consciously into the popularity and almost every bad quirk in the high school. While in the course of the film, Veronica met a guy named, J.D. and off they go, causing chaos which soon turned into something more sinister. Between the good and bad, the story mainly focuses on Veronica's decision - whether to be like the society or go for something darker like the counterpart.

I thought it was interesting to see such film, showing us the destructiveness of the society. Instead of a whole world, we are shown the characteristics of humans in a high school - colourful background and personalities mingled in one place, in a detrimental system. It pokes fun at how we operate and even till today, such behaviour is common. Looking at how we are living, some people may say that Heathers is a film that glamourises the violence, chaos and bad quirks to the new generation. They are convinced that such film creates an image - wrong depiction of ways that we should not be following and thus, discouraging us from watching. I remembered reading an article titled, I'm 24 and Just Watched 'Heathers' For the First Time - Yikes and I thought to myself, how underrated the core message was raised and misleading the article is saying. In this film, as we followed, we know that all these toxic behaviours are definitely immoral and to say that it is disgusting because of what is today and in the past, is definitely invalid. It is because of films like Heathers that gave us a true representation of a misled society and because of how they brought up on - the diet of following trends, everything that is deemed disturbing, makes these films interesting and be brought up on discussion.

What I am trying to say is that there should be more films like this to tell the new generations about what is wrong and what we should not be following. Films like this are why they are forever remembered because they bring a baggage to our table and let us have a discussion to what we have today. It is like people used to think that smoking is cool and advertisements were commonly placed to promote such culture. Today, it will be different story and Heathers is this story that allows us to know what needs to be done and changed. Aside from the amazing depiction of a fucked up place and people, I really enjoyed the acting from the cast. I could really feel them and relate with them, to the extent that I knew when is to be sympathised and how disappointing people really are (look at Veronica's parents).

In conclusion, I would recommend Heathers to anyone if you are up for any movie at this point of time. To be honest, if 13 Reasons Why is as bold and controversial like this, I doubt anyone who have any issue with the series. Heathers is sure on the right direction when it was released and till today, it is still a film that can be brought up to the table.

Ratings: 7/10

Saturday 24 August 2019

It's a hard day

I haven't been on this blog for nearly half a year and I am sorry for not committing to what I have previously mentioned, that is to deliver more content that I missed out in 2018. I haven't done so for many reasons including I was focusing on my final year project and dealing with school work in my Year 3 Semester 1 of polytechnic.

I know this is not a content that you wished to see, but I feel as the owner of the blog, I need to get this off my chest and be transparent. Firstly, I haven't been feeling well lately. I feel sick in my mind that my overthinking has returned to haunt me and make me feel worthless. Previously, I have already been struggling with my mind. I had this for a long time and it is nearly three years since it all began with just asking a classmate out for a movie at the cinema. I never shared this story but since it is a long time ago, I shall just speak it. I asked my classmate out for a movie because I really liked him and I thought this was a way for me to become closer. However, little did I know, my happiness became a nightmare. I felt that I was belittled, and he was out to make me. I let my worries eat me like worms crawling on my bed that I had to changed this meeting into a friends' gathering. He did not joined, and everything was different after that. I never felt so horrible in my life.

Secondly, I had to deal with people who wanted a piece of me - my work, my knowledge. I had a friend in my class whom I knew since Year 1 and she has been leaching on my work to make herself better. I don't think she will see this blog post and I didn't mind because she has never been honest with my teammates and I. We worked together in this final year project where it is an individually graded work despite the teamwork. She managed to complete her portions of the final year project because she did on her own. If you ever encountered her, she would say that she did it independently but if you asked me in person, I will dismissed this claim. Her work was only completed because I helped her to resolve the bugs found on her codings. Her mistakes she made on the project almost caused us a big time because once a project software does not worked, it will be a chaos and I had to take my effort, my time to fix them. As one of the strongest in programming, I had to bear the responsibilities. I gave away my time to fix others including her portions and she went on overseas to China with her family. Sometimes, she would say that she has 'something on' or her mom does not permit her when in truth, this never occurred. Instead, she was finding excuses so that she could do her own stuff including to complete a marketing project when all of us were also having the same project that needs to be completed. I have always been unhappy about this especially when my friend never knew the struggles that the other teammates gone through, nor did she ever involved in any drama that went down over the course of the final year project between our project supervisor and us. She was never there. She never really helped others. She relied on people's hard work to help herself.

Thirdly, sometimes I wished I had not known too much. This is painful experience for me because I have always thought that as long as you have worked hard and achieved amazing results, you will have doors to open. This is never really the case because there are less passionate people who are also able to achieve same opportunities as me and this is done out of pity. No hard work, no passion and everything that embodies laziness, they can get to go for the same opportunities as me - that I have worked hard for the past three years. Talking to facilitators made it worse and it made me saw the ugly picture of how my school works. They would use the good students to make themselves great and afterwards, if your grades have dropped, they would just moved on and nurture other 'geniuses'. It was never fair to see how others who only started to work hard in Year 3 to achieve the same opportunities as me and it was also not fair to see them received various helps when they give back nothing. I hated it and resent this, to the point that I now viewed people as greed, dishonourable and cunning. I don't know whether is this a sign that my mind is playing tricks on me, or is it really the true colours of what I hate. I couldn't tell what is real anymore.. One of my facilitators even mentioned that maybe this is a sign of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), but whether is it true or not, I know that there is definitely something wrong with my thinking.

I can continue on and on with my thoughts, but I feel that the more I typed, the more it becomes a permanent truth and this is not a correct representation of what the people I know are. I met and talked to them, even see them almost everyday. This cannot be right and I must continue to seek other ways to resolve this issue. If only there is way to correct myself (even my nail tearing and biting habit), I must commit and open to the idea of it. I cannot further go on with this disruptive behaviour that is making me feel isolated and distanced. Worst of all, it is decaying my positive thinking and what values that I was brought up on.