MAX PAYNE brings Maximum Pain..To my head.

Well, I intend to stick to my promise of updating this thing, and so I shall.

Decided, that with new blog, shall do away with the archaic No Names Mentioned rule that used to dictate the old blog. So yeah, names will be mentioned, unless of course you want to remain anonymous. Of course, the only reasons you would possibly want to do so are if you committed a crime or are a fugitive from some organization, in which case, shame on you and I hope you turn back to the path of light soon.

Been good since the last time I updated. Josh introduced me to this lovely little British series called The IT Crowd, which is simply quite hilarious. The only other British TV shows I watched were Skins and The Mighty Boosh, and heh since it will take some time before they get a new season, shall enjoy this for the time being.

Went jungle-trekking with the church group. Lawrence planned the activity, went to Bukit Gasing for an hour of strenous walking, bad jokes and getting in touch with nature, most of it in the form of mosquitoes and flying insects. A bit amused that the place is called Hutan Pendidikan Bukit Gasing: was half expecting friendly biawaks or scholarly owls with professor hats to pop out every now and then, giving us lectures about the history of trees and so on.

Some of us were more prepared than the others: good old Nigel had even packed insect repellent and brought along 5 bottles of water, I almost expected him to have a fold-up tent and rocket flares of various colours in his backpack. (McGyver theme plays.)

Rained halfway through the walk: should have known better than to plan outdoor activities during this rainy season. Was effectively drenched from head to toe (oddly, most recent activities seem to involve me getting soaked nowadays), made our way to Sri Pandi’s, which may or may not have been (according to urban myth) the infamous restaurant where the staff put used underwear in their curry for extra flavour. (a thought we do not like to think about) Was extra hungry, devoured a plate of banana leaf rice, and discovered that I somehow remember every detail of the many short stories and poems we had to do for English and BM back in high school.

Computer been crashing a lot of late, been hurriedly backing up everything of sentimental value in there, especially the creative works. Been working on a Nanowrimo appendix/outline and a script for a future project, and it would be a shame to lose those after all the effort put into them.

Anyway, I recently happened to catch Max Payne, with my old A-Levels friend Priya, (HAPPY BIRTHDAY!) and my thoughts on it?

Hideous. With a capital H. And what the heck, I’ll capitalise the rest of the word also, just to emphasise how horrible it was: HIDEOUS. Oh wait. I’ll put it in slightly bigger font as well!

HIDEOUS.

And wait, I shall emphasise that further with several pictures!

I’m sorry, but watching Max Payne was just..uggggh. Honestly, soaking my brain in sulphuric acid and then passing it to a group of furious rhinos to play football with would have been a less painful adaptation.

Seriously. As a die-hard fan of the original Max Payne games, I am outraged and horrified, and would be protesting in the streets with banners and placards right now if not for the fact that I am a lazy slacker and the thought of even walking strains me. It was a complete train wreck from beginning to end: turning a wonderful game, filled with non-stop action and memorable characters into a sad, sad waste of celluloid. Everyone who made this film should be gunned down by game-Max Payne, with his constipated grin and all. And his double Uzis. And in BULLET-TIME, so the agony lasts longer.

Ok, I realise that sounded harsh. Sorry. But am just astounded by how badly they messed up the game. Which is weird, because when I was playing the game, a lot of times I felt I was in a gritty, dark action thriller. The game already felt like a movie; was it so hard to translate to the big screen?

And what did they do to Max Payne?? To borrow a joke from South Park, good Frodo, they raped him! They RAPED him! The game Max Payne is seriously badass! He’s cocky, cynical and talks in a stoned mumble that is ultra cool! He shaves with a submachine gun and eats the still-beating hearts of Russian mobsters for breakfast! (Ok, not literally. But you get the idea.)

Max Payne, Game-wise, anyway, is not like us pitiful lesser mortals! For example, take a situation of toast being burnt. You and me, being sad specimens of humanity, would probably say:

“Oh gee whiz, ho no, the toast is burnt! Oh no! It’s all smoking! Better find something else to eat!”

Max Payne, in the game, would say:

“I look upon the charred remains of my toast. Ashy, incinerated. Like the broken body of a martyr, chained to the stake by an unforgiving mob. I am strangely moved. Twenty bullets to the chest yesterday should have taught me to put my faith in no-one, let alone breakfast appliances. My stomach rumbles, but I silence it. There will be no nourishment for me on this cold morning.’

Game Max had attitude! He had personality! And here he is, played by Mark Wahlberg as a whiny, generic cut-out of an action hero.

A LIST OF WHAT I DID LIKE ABOUT MAX PAYNE.

-Some references to the game: the Roscoe street station was a nice touch, as was Gognitti’s Storage, though I would have killed to see the character himself make an appearance.

-Olga Kurylenko is certainly nice to look at, although I do not get why the scriptwriters wanted to change her name to Natasha. While I agree it does have a sexy name (so calling my unfortunate daughter that) Mona’s sister is LISA, damn it! Why did you have to change the name for??

-Cameo appearance by Brea Grant, aka super-speedy Daphne in Heroes, who I am strangely attracted to. She can give me a quickie anyday.

THE LONGER, MORE EXTENSIVE LIST OF WHAT I HATED ABOUT THE FILM

-Long and draggy. Too much talking. Not enough people having their heads blown off by shotguns in slow-motion. And the whole black angel thing was uninspiring and completely unnecessary; they should not have wasted their budget on those effects, and instead spent it on getting a better script or bullet time effects.

-For an action movie, action came only like an hour into the film, and wasn’t that impressive. Compare to game, where the ending is that you shoot a bloody SKYSCRAPER onto a helicopter, a picture of which should be enclosed into a satellite and shot into outer space so that extraterrestrials can appreciate how awesome our planet is.

-Mila Kunis is NOT Mona Sax, who is a seductive, femme fatale. Her acting is not good: every time I saw her I kept on imagining her as her character from That 70s Show: kept expecting her to yell stuff like “FEEZZZZ!!!” or “Groovy!” all throught the show.

-What is with the MTV actors? Seriously, was genuinely afraid that there would suddenly be a musical number out of nowhere; something like Valkyr is Like A Bird (It Blows Your Head Away). Nelly Furtado as Christa WHO?

Are you trying to tell me you cut out awesome characters like the one-eyed sinister Alfred Woden, the cocky Russian mobster Vladimir Lem, the comic book-loving Frankie ‘The Bat’Niagara, and the laughably pathetic Vinnie Gognitti to give us this character who appears for one scene and then vanishes? And don’t talk to me about Ludacris playing Jim Bravura, who was white, balding and middle-aged in the film. That’s like getting Chow Yun-Fatt as Harry Potter or Rihanna as Sailormoon (which is an interesting thought though, I have to say.)

-Why why why did they change Jack Lupino from a creepy drug-addicted madman constantly spouting demonic ramblings (“The flesh of FALLEN ANGELS!”) into a ninja Kratos from God of War?? This movie is Norse mythology, hello, not Greek!

-And the climax of the film: Max overdoses on Valkyr and successfully blows away entire SWAT teams, believing them to be black angels. Seriously, what is the message this film is expressing?? Kids, do drugs and you become super-strong and see cool dark angels everywhere?

Then again, perhaps the message is appropriate: maybe the only way to enjoy this nightmare of a film is when addled-up and completely stoned, after all.

(DISCLAIMER: Sanctuary of the Weird 2.0 does not advocate drug use. Take alcohol instead..its more fun!)

RETURN.

Haven’t done this in a while, so it feels a little odd, coming back to the blog.

Why did I go on hiatus? Several reasons: firstly, I think the blogging was becoming too much of a routine, it was becoming for me more of an obligation than something I did for fun and to express myself. Second, a bad case of writer’s block: the words didn’t seem to come, and I tired of telling the stories of my life in the same way every week. And considering that same way was ‘in a style completely nonsensical and devoid of sense whatsoever’, I think I just needed a sabbathical, the creative genes were drying up.

Also, felt the need to withdraw myself from the world, keep a low profile for a while. Part of the weakness of a blog is that sometimes you tend to reveal too much of yourself to the world, something which I am not always fond of. I think people who know me well will realise this: while I adore my friends and try to be open as much as possible, there are parts of me I prefer to keep hidden, sides of my soul I prefer to keep guarded. Some people long for a friend who they can tell everything to and who knows them inside out; this is well and good, but for me that is the ultimate nightmare.

While I do enjoy social gatherings and stuff, deep down I am quite a private person, and I felt that previous entries in the old Sanctuary were giving people impressions about me that I was not too happy of. And so this contributed to my vanishing.

So why do I come back to it now? Maybe I miss it. The creative surge has come back, in part thanks to Nanowrimo coming up. These past few days, the urge to express myself has been overwhelming; perhaps that is why I feel the call back to the old Sanctuary.

So, an update of most that has happened over the past few months:

-Back from the UK, for good. Feel good to be home, yet I miss Reading and London. Especially since Halloween is coming up, a celebration that was celebrated in huge scale over there: I want to dress up in a stupid costume and make a fool of myself damnit. I also miss several people, the abundance of musicals, and of all things, the Oracle shopping mall.

-Doing my certificate of Legal Practice, which is headachey and no fun at all. Lecturers are a fatter, balder Indian version of Steve Carell and a droning old man in a turban whose lessons have subtle pro-euthanasia messages (eg. So BORING you want to just be shot and put out of your misery.) Classes are 5 hours on weekends, thus destroying my social and religious life. Am wishing I became a prawn farmer or a wandering hobo instead.

-On the bright side, doing freelance writing for The Star, doing book and theatre reviews, which I really enjoy. Nothing better that getting paid for doing what you love. Granted, had to sit through a truly atrocious play, and a totally dry book, but overall, experience has been really cool.

-Have learned that I apparently have a good bass voice, which surprised me as I thought the only thing my voice was good for was for scaring away wild beasts and bringing forth rain.

-Weight has ballooned incredibly since time in the UK. I can no longer describe myself as ‘skinny’, or ‘scrawny’. My so-called friends, wonderful as they are, have all taken to calling me ‘çhubby’ and ‘round-faced’, and my own dear father has taken to calling me ‘Fatboy’. Yet I continue being a lazy slacker and eating all the most wonderful foods possible.

-Have met quite a lot of new people recently, from church activities, camps, excursions and so on; and a lot of old people have left, from my juniors all going to Reading, and a good friend moving to Australia; to a town called Townsville, hopefully not to don a short dress and a hair-ribbon and go fight crime.

-Have read Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book. Not his best work, (nothing beats Sandman or American Gods) but pretty awesome. Dark and well-imagined, I think it would have been my favorite book had I first read it when I was 9 or 10.

-In the past month, attended a friend’s birthday which involved much pool-pushing and obscene photographs, was morbidly fascinated by ladyboys and red-light districts in Bangkok, enjoyed Malaccan durian cendol despite being a 500W figurative lamppost, discovered I really suck at Counterstrike, organised a potluck dinner, attended a funeral, and many other things, some of which deserved entries of their own, but am too lazy to recall everything. These few months have been the busiest of my life. Going jungle trekking after this, hope I survive.

Heh, will update about my life more the next time I blog. Till then, ciao.