As Suanie Sees It

Gol & Gincu: Adakah cinta satu permainan? Translated it means “Goal & Lipstick : Is love a game?”, which doesn’t really come out as catchy and dreamy as it does in the current Malay title. I mean, not like my translation power is very the keng but that should give you an idea that the movie in general is pretty much light-hearted teen fun. Overall, a feel good chick-flick.

Putri (Nur Fazura), a mad-about-fashion college kid is dumped by her futsal-crazy boyfriend Eddy (Ashraf Sinclair) for a more independant and self-reliant girl. She decides to win back Eddy by proving to him that she too can embrace futsal like Madonna to Kabbalah. Along the way she meets Shasha (Sazzy Falak) the obligatory biatch, Zie (Rafidah Abdullah) the kind-hearted doesn’t-hold-a-grudge nice gal who offers to coach Putri in futsal, and a host of other chicks who would later be part of the ‘Bukan Team Biasa’ futsal team, captained by Putri. Somewhere along the plot Putri grows up, which means a whole journey of self-discovery that I do not really need to spell out.

Halfway through typing the above paragraph, I realised that the main storyline is uncannily similar to that of ‘Legally Blonde’. Turns out that I’m not the only one who thinks so.

Predictable as it is, there are a couple of side stories regarding issues that I feel are good exposures, such as illegal family lovin’ and boyfriends who treat their girlfriends so crap that they should be shot then thoroughly mutilated beyond the point of recognition. But overall I thought the movie casts a positive light on our youth - sometimes we can really think for ourselves! And while I am not a major futsal fan, I sympathise with the all too familiar difficulties faced by females who truly love the sport.

Goodies: Good soundtrack, Ida Nerina, Rafidah Abdullah, Sazzy Falak, female empowerment, good cinematography (I’m not an expert but I can appreciate good angles), certain realistic diversification of characters, the message of the movie.

Overkill: Sponsored products plugging, lengthy unnecessary scenes mostly brought upon by sponsored products plugging and massive MTV culture influence if you know what I mean.

(By the way I was more than shocked to see two familiar faces in the movie, Dominique and Shee Teng! Hehehe even though they are ka lei fei, no one NO ONE can miss Dom’s blonde hair!!! …. and Shee Teng just told me that Danial and Tong Teck were also in the movie, though I couldn’t recognise them. OMGWTF!!! Batu Pahat taking over the world issit?!?)

For a first feature film, it’s definitely more than a commendable effort by director Bernard Chauly. Actually I do not know who he or she is, but good job and I MEAN IT!!! Hehehe… I am not very ‘in’, you see… and am still trying to recover from the shock and utter happiness from standing within 1 metre vicinity of my long-time idol, Datin Paduka Marina Mahathir. RAWRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!

Would I recommend this movie? YEAP! It opens tomorrow so go watch it at a cinema - don’t be too kiam siap and look for Uncle Ho because Uncle Ho will turn around and slap you silly for not supporting our growing film industry.

Many thanks to Daniel Tang of Addaudio Studios for the tix and TV Smith for the invite.

Related links:
Official site for “Gol & Gincu”
Review by Jeff Ooi
Review by Midnight Lily
Review by Jaime

As you may know, I hail from Batu Pahat, Johor which is about 1.5 hours from Singapore (by car).

I was a TV addict, but believe it or not, I never seldom watch Malaysian TV until I was around 20 years old (I watched old P. Ramlee movies on M’sian TV). And that was because I had no choice - once you go past Muar, it’s highly difficult to receive Singapore channels on TV. My family, friends and I grew up on Channel 8’s 7-8 pm and 9 - 10 pm series and when I could understand English a little better, I was hooked on Channel 5. Until today I still miss it for the variety of programmes, but 8TV is doing a good job filling the void.

Zoe Tay, 8 Days, Vernetta Lopez, the rise-halt-rise of Fann Wong, Jack Neo and Moses Lim, Liang Popo, Ang Mo Kio, Sentosa, Kumar, Najip Ali and his talk show, 3-room HDB flats with a small playground at every other block, Russell Lee, too underage to enter a pub at Boat Quay, too underaged to visit my grandmother in the hospital ward, Yakult (it was only recently brought into Malaysia), Ah Meng, my first circus experience are among those little things that I remember.

Heck, I can even sing the Singapore’s national anthem better than some Singaporeans

Then I grew up, moved to KL and lost touch with Singapore. In 2003 I re-visited this tiny island that is reaping all of Malaysia’s good qi from our Titiwangsa Range, only to be…

I mean, WTF!!!

But that visit in 2003 was also my first time seeing the famous merlion. I told my Singaporean friend and guide Pinky that I wanted to do the tourist things and she delivered.

I had a few firsts in Singapore as well. My first Hoegaarden, and my first Paulaner.

When I said before that Singaporeans queue up and wait for their turn, I was referring to a gay club somewhere in Tanjung Pagar, which was opposite a place where Jaime and I were having supper.

The queue went ALL THE WAY to the other side of the building! It looked really fun, but we were too tired to go clubbing that night, plus the idea of waiting in THAT line was exhausting enough.

There is a lot of bad blood between Malaysians and Singaporeans for a variety of reasons. They say this, we say that, they do that, we do this… politics, leaders, water, culture, media, education, exposure, history influence etc etc etc. There won’t be an end to this love-hate relationship of ours anytime soon. When all is said and done, I personally believe that there is a lot they can learn from us, and a lot that we can learn from them. Oh well (Edit: that sounds a bit offhand, doesn’t it? We’ll leave the point-to-point differences for later.)

Happy birthday, Singapore

Yo, wassup?

Today I ate McDonalds chicken burger
Today I drank lots of Coke and water
Today I have a lot of work to do.
Today I still see a cloud of haze.

Today I cannot write many many things because I am all blogged out. On Saturday I woke up at 8 a.m., went to work, rushed to Amcorp Mall with Jaime, came back, started the blogathon, bla bla bla and finally couldn’t take it anymore and fell asleep at 6 p.m. on Sunday. Keng or not?

By the way if you think you are having a bad Monday, check this out.

What’s wrong with it, you ask? After all it’s free publicity for our blogathon effort at Bloggersaremorons.com and I am STILL complaining? Bloody hell, I should be bloody thankful, count my blessings, thank my lucky stars etc etc that we have it ‘easy’ bla bla yadda la di da la (well, some people do think so, sorry to disappoint y’all but organising/management etc was way far from easy )

Shut it, I AM thankful for the free publicity. But when you are a single girl looking for a date, it doesn’t help that the whole nation now thinks you have teeth like these:

I think it’s fated that I die lonely, ugly, desperate, single and fat. Goodbye cruel world.

As for the blogathon, you can still sign up as a sponsor and pledge to our campaign. Of course, now you would have to really donate the amount you pledged, seeing we successfully completed the blogathon. Sponsorships remain open until Tuesday - that is tomorrow, so as Gwen Stefani would say, WAT’CHA WAITING FOR?!?

Go check out our archives at Bloggersaremorons.com kthxbai.