Kal El

We have just watched this movie last night - a remake of the Korean The Uninvited: Tale of Two Sisters (well, I haven't watched the Korean original though), this is the kind of movies I like - with a twist at the very end that makes me think of "Oh that's why lah", "Oh no wonder lah" "Patut lah..." until the very next day. I always find writers who are able to twist the ending brilliant! One dissapointment though - I know that this is a psycho-thriller rather than horror - but I was kind of expecting earie looking ghosts or at least some gory scenes that would make me puke or at least want to puke. Well, I am satisfied with the movie - not having watched the original Korean version makes it even more thrilling (ye lah tak tau ending dia macamana kan?).


In short I like movies that make me think especially after it has ended. That way I would remember the movie till the end of my life. My favourite scene? Of course the part where Anna was in her room the night her boyfriend came and crack, his backbone broke... twisted man!

The story is basically and mainly about guilt thus the aparations and storyline. Watch it then you'll know.

Here's the synopsis from imdb.com:

Anna, a beautiful teen girl (Emily Browning) is being released from a mental hospital. A therapist advises Anna to 'finish things that she has started', implying be productive and positive going forward. We learn Anna recently has lost her invalid mother in a fire, causing her breakdown.


She returns to her New England mansion along the shoreline. Her father (David Straitharn) introduces his new girlfriend To Anna's distress it is Rachel (Elizabeth Banks), the former at-home-nurse for her sick mother. Her mother had been housed in the family boathouse, and died when it burned down. It has now been restored, distressing Anna. We meet Anna's older sister Alex, and Matt, who makes out with Anna that night. He has something to tell Anna about the fire, but is stopped by Rachel's arrival. Meanwhile Rachel continues to try to befriend the girls, as they all fake their smiles.


Anna that night has a vision (we dont see her as asleep) of the grotesque burned corpse of her mother warning her about Rachel, by pointing in her direction, with a bell around the wrist she used to summon help when she was alive. Anna tells her sister the next day about the warning. Her sister says it was not a nightmare, "you looked awake". They plan to snoop around about who Rachel really is or wants.


In town Anna has a vision of three ghostly children in a diner (appears to be another vision). She finds Matt, who agrees to tell Anna more about the fire when they are alone that night. Back home, Alex and Anna rummage through Rachel's belongings find different ID cards, call past employers, and google Rachel's name. All of this calls her identity into question. Anna confronts Rachel, implying she is an imposter. Rachel threatens she will just tell her dad she is having mental problems again. The sisters agree more evidence is needed before telling their dad, who announced Rachel is actually his fiancée.


That night in her room Matt is about to tell Anna about the fire. Instead he turns into some kind of creature with a broken back, similar to what Anna saw resembling her mother. He says her mother tried to warn him but he didnt listen. We see that it is actually daylight when Anna leaves her room. Offshore police boats dredge up Matt's body. The Sheriff says Matt broke his back in an accident while coming to see Anna, and he knows how she must feel, so he can talk to him about anything. Later Anna shows Alex claw marks on arms as they talk in front of the bathroom mirror, as proof it was not a dream. They talk in the bathroom in many scenes, presumably to avoid Rachel.


At Matt's funeral, Anna sees the same ghostly children. They lead her to their graves in the woods. She googles the names on the family plot. Their teen nanny, who fell in love with their father, stabbed them to death some years ago. Anna concludes the teen nanny is Rachel, who now repeats the pattern of murdering their mother to be with their father, and they are to die next. A photo mother who was killed by the nanny shows her pearls, like the ones Rachel wears all the time.

Anna confronts Rachel and steals the pearls as her proof of the past murders. Rachel tries to inject Anna from her nursing supplies. Before Anna escapes to town, she sees Alex is injected and sedated on the ground. She goes to the Sheriff with her story about the murdering nanny. He seems to recall the story, and asks her to wait there while he helps Alex. Only he returns with Rachel, who injects her saying "its ok Im a nurse" and she is taken back home. While being put to bed by Rachel, Anna sees Alex sneak up behind Rachel, before Anna passes out.


Anna awakens and finds Alex standing outside covered in blood with a knife, saying, "There was no other way". We see Rachel's bloody corpse in a trash bin. When her dad returns, he yells at Anna "what did you do!" Anna says it was Alex had to do it, as the sisters hold hands. Her dad says, "Anna, you know Alex is dead. She died in the fire." This is the flashpoint of the movie. We now see Anna alone covered in blood, holding the knife, not her sister's hand.

Several prior scenes now replay, but now show Anna always alone, talking to herself, implying a psychotic hallucination. This was hinted when Anna talks to her sister as they face the bathroom mirror. When people do this, it looks like they are talking to their reflection. Also, no one addressed Alex directly, but the direction is incoherent anyway.


Now by flashback we see what happened in the fire. Anna saw her dad having sex with Rachel while her mom was bedridden in the boathouse. She seemed to be carting kerosene from the boathouse to burn the main house down with her dad/Rachel inside. She accidentally spilled kerosene, killing her mom and sister instead. Then she was put in the mental ward.

As Anna is being driven away in the squad car, she looks placidly back at her dad. The sheriff mentions the name in Anna's murdering nanny story to her dad. He says it was never Rachel's name, but Rachel did change her name to avoid a stalking ex boyfriend. Neither mentions anything about a murdering nanny story.


Some time later at the mental ward, a contented looking Anna colors and tells her therapist "I did what you said. I finished what I started." We see that Anna's cellmate has the teen nanny's name and carries pearls. This implies the nanny story was also a delusion, since the Sheriff never repeated it when he asked her dad about Rachel's name change.

An American Werewolf in Paris is not a sequel to the classic An American Werewolf in London movie. Although they may fall in the same An American Werewolf Series but this rather 'modern' werewolf was not well accepted by fans in general. In this movie werewolves had the choice of turning into one at any point of time with help from a serum - so there goes the trademark for werewolf movies - the moon - the full moon.

Unlike in An American Werewolf in London, the Paris counterpart did not have that umph in it - the scene where werewolf lovers get their kick from - the transformation scene. I think this is because a different technology was used in making the transformation in this movie compared to the real hard work the guys had to go through in An American Werewolf in London. I do feel that computerised horror flicks or CGI created horror characters, whatever you may call it are just unrealistic and it limits the creativity of the film maker, unlike when they had to physically put make up on actors to make them look scary.

Having said all that I still enjoyed the movie (and yes, I've watched it a million times!)

The following is from Wikipedia:

An American Werewolf in Paris is a1997 horror/comedy about werewolves . It was directed by Anthony Waller and starred Tom Everett Scott and Julie Delpy. It follows the general concept of the1981 film An American Werewolf in London .

The title of this film has a bit of history; when production of the original London film ran into trouble with British Equity, director John Landis, having scouted locations in Paris, considered moving the production to France and changing the title of his film to An American Werewolf in Paris.

The Plot

In the opening scene, a man is seen under attack, almost managing an escape from the Parisian sewers before an unseen creature pulls him back. Meanwhile, tourist Andy McDermott is seeing the sights of Paris with his friends Brad and Chris. When Serafine Pigot leaps off the Eiffel Tower just before Andy is about to do a bungee-jump, he executes a mid-air rescue. She vanishes into the night, leaving Andy intrigued — and also unaware that she is the offspring of the couple seen 16 years ago in the earlier film.

Andy tracks her down and asks her for a date. They attend a night club called "Club de la Lune" (literally translating to "Club of the Moon"). It was called like that, because that night was a full moon in the sky. The owners of the club were actually members of a werewolves's society, which wanted to kill and eat all the guests. Serafine told Andy to run away (in that scene, Serafine is seen transforming into a werewolf). When Andy is running it is seen a werewolf chasing him and when Andy is about to escape, it bites him and Andy faints. The next day, he wakes up in Serafine's bed . When he awakens, he has toothmarks on his leg and is informed that he's making a transformation into a werewolf, confirmed by his sudden taste for raw steaks. Serafine explains that her stepfather (seen in the film's opening scene) has been working on a drug to control her werewolf transformations. The real cure lay in killing and eating the heart of the werewolf that bit him.

An American Werewolf in Paris was poorly received by most critics. The review aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes lists the film as "rotten", with only 10% of reviews positive based on nation and worldwide ratings. Unlike An American Werewolf in London, which had Oscar-winning special make-up effects by Rick Baker, Paris relied heavily on CGI for its transformation effects and chase sequences, a common point of derision from most critics. According to box-office sales and online reviews, this sequel proved to be much less successful than the first film.

This movie is an ultimate Werewolf classic - I've watched it a million times and I am still amazed at the technology back then. My favourite part vote goes to the transformation scene where David (the main actor) turned into a werewolf - I'd say there isn't any werewolf movies so far that could match the transformation as it was shown in An American Werewolf in London. It was so life-like that until now I wish I could turn into a werewolf myself. Silly me... See the transformation sequence in the photos below and look at David's facial expressions - it looked as if he was really in great pain - very realistic indeed! A masterpiece! (Warning - some people might get offended due to the obscene nature of some of the photos)

Err just pretend you didn't see what you think you saw - 18SX kejap!

I was in standard 1 when this movie was released and this was one of the first horror flicks that I fell in love with - of course an influence from my late mother - Thank you mummy! An American Werewolf in London is the kind of horror movie/thriller that you could watch over and over again without getting bored, believe me. After more than 20 years, I still love this movie.

The following is from Wikipedia -

An American Werewolf in London is a 1981 American-British comedy/horror film, written and directed by John Landis. It starsDavid Naughton, Griffin Dunne, and Jenny Agutter. This movie won the 1981 Saturn Award for Best Horror Film and an Academy Award for Outstanding Achievement in Makeup. The film was one of three high-profile werewolf films released in 1981, alongside The Howling and Wolfen . Over the years, the film has accumulated a cult following and has been referred to as a cult classic.

The film was followed by a 1997 sequel, An American Werewolf in Paris, which featured a completely different cast and none of the original crew.

The Plot

Two American college students, David Kessler (David Naughton) and Jack Goodman (Griffin Dunne) , are backpacking across the Yorkshire moors when they are attacked by a large, unknown animal. Jack is killed, but David survives the mauling and is taken to a hospital in London. When he wakes up three weeks later, he does not remember what happened and is told of his friend's death. Things get stranger when he is visited by Jack's ghost , which takes the distressing form of a reanimated corpse, who explains that they had been attacked by a werewolf , suggesting that David himself is now a werewolf. Jack urges David to kill himself before the next full moon, not only because Jack is cursed to exist in a state of living death for as long as the bloodline of the werewolf that attacked them survives, but also to prevent David from inflicting the same fate on his eventual victims.

Upon his release from the hospital, David moves in with the pretty young nurse , Alex Price (Jenner Agutter) , who grew infatuated with him in the hospital. He then stays in Alex's London apartment. When the full moon rises, as Jack had warned, he turns into a werewolf. In this form, David prowls the street and subways of the city, and slaughters six innocent Londoners. When he wakes in the morning, he is naked on the floor of the wolf cage at th zoo , with no memory of his nocturnal lupine adventures, and not at all attacked by the resident wolves.

David eventually realizes that Jack was right about everything and that he is responsible for the murders of the night before. Despite being in an advanced stage of decay, Jack returns for another visit, this time accompanied by David's victims from the previous night. They all insist that he commit suicide before turning into a werewolf again. David fails to do so, and consequently, he turns into a werewolf again and goes on another killing spree. Following a chase through London, he is cornered in an alley by the police when Alex arrives to calm him down by telling him that she loves him. Though apparently temporarily softened, he is shot and killed when he lunges forward, returning to human form in front of a grieving Alex as he dies.

Here's a video of the transformation from YouTube - mind the French dubbing ya!

Last Sunday for the first time in more than 6 months KN and I pi tengok wayang - ye lah before this Kal El sakit so tak berkesempatan pi ke panggung. And we're glad that our first movie in 6 months was a Yasmin Ahmad's - memang we never miss Yasmin's movie - mesti pi panggung punya.


Kalau korang belum tengok filem ni - go! Like all other Yasmin's movie - this movie memang original, has high literature value and what's best - it relates to our everyday Malaysian life. The actors chosen by Yasmin seperti biasa - mengancam dan mantap - they were very expressive and their acting memang superb! Macam pro!

I love the songs in this movie (sung by Aizat and Atilia) and even the Tamil song O Re Priyaa tu pun catchy habis. The boy Maheesh walaupun takde script in his acting memang pandai with his expressions. Syabas! Melur (Pamela) was good too walaupun she's a bit pelat but this is what Yasmin's movie is all abouy - being Malaysian and tak kisah la bangsa apa sekalipun, they're able to speak Malay (and English) well. Apa yang made me proud, Syafie pun banyak English dialogue in his part this time.


I have to admit I cried many times masa tengok movie ni. I am just able to relate to this movie well, especially scenes Hafiz dengan mak dia Embun (Azean Irdawaty) - remnded me of masa arwah mummy sakit dulu. Another part air mata Kal El berjurai bila Maheesh melutut depan mak dia tu... uwaaaaaaa expressivenye dia and I was touched to the max!

To Yasmin, buat lah lagi cerita-cerita Malaysia sebegini. Your movies banyak maksud yang tersirat dan tersurat yang Kal El rasa many of us yang appreciate - bukan setakat cerita-cerita cinta basi macam yang dah selalu kita tengok di layar perak - you're different. I hope you will win more awards in the time to come and I vote you my favourite writer/movie director of all time...

Here's the synopsis from Talentime Official Website:

A talent search competition has matched two hearts - that of Melur, a Malay-mixed girl and an Indian male student, Mahesh. Melur, with her melodious voice, singing whilst playing the piano is one of the seven finalists of the Talentime competition of her school organised by Cikgu Adibah. Likewise Hafiz, enthralling with his vocalist talent while playing the guitar, dividing his time between school and mother, who is hospitalised for brain tumor.


It all started after Mahesh, amongst the students assigned to get the finalists to school for practice, delivered the notice of successful audition to Melur's house. His handsome looks attracted the girl. Early on of their relationship, tragedy struck Mahesh's family when his uncle Ganesh who had been the care-taker of the family since the loss of Mahesh's father, was stabbed to death on his wedding day. Melur thinking that Mahesh's silence was due to his grief over the tragedy became furious when she was continuously ignored. She regretted it however after Hafez revealed Mahesh's situation.


That changed Melur's perception of Mahesh. Likewise Mahesh, who grew comfortable with the presence of the girl who often quotes beautiful poetry. Mahesh, realizing that the relationship will be opposed, kept it hidden from his mother,still grieving over the death of Ganesh. Alas, the secret was exposed and Mahesh was assaulted before Melur's very eyes. Just a day before the competition, is Melur resilient enough to sing the poetic lyrics of her song when her heart is tormented by the thoughts of Mahesh? What about Mahesh who has found his first love? On Talentime night, everything unfolds.



All photos from Blog Hanz

Filem susuk tahun 2006 akhirnya masuk panggung pada 7 Ogos 2008 namun Kal El dan KN tak berkesempatan menonton sebab kami sedang sibuk bersiap untuk menunaikan ibadah umrah. Sebenarnya kami tak perasan pun cerita ini yang agak dinantikan oleh Kal El ditayangkan di pawagam, mungkin kerana publisiti yang sedikit atau mungkin ketidakperihatinan Kal El sendiri.


KN terjumpa DVD Susuk ini (original tau) di Ampang Park semasa kami menikmati dinner di Cozy Corner. Tertulis dicover DVD tersebut bahawa filem ini meraih box office RM2.6 juta namun setelah menontonnya ternyata Kal El tak mengerti betapa ramainya umat manusia di Malaysia ini yang mungkin sama rasa tertipu dengan filem yang mempunyai tajuk yang sungguh menarik dan unik ini.


Tidak pernah Kal El tertidur dikala menonton filem bergenre seram tapi berlaku apabila Kal El menonton filem ini. It was just plain boring dan para pelakonnya walaupun nama-nama mereka gah dan popular, alamak... kesian lah! They were stiff and lifeless. Sorry to say this to a Malaysian movie but things could've been better. I suppose banyak yang telah diubah suai menjadikan filem ini tidak menarik langsung untuk Kal El tonton.


Namun begitu, tontonlah sendiri dan nilailaj sendiri filem Susuk ini. Jangan hanya percaya pada penilaian Kal El yang mungkin berat sebelah tapi ini adalah pandangan ikhlas dari Kal El sebagai penonton.

Sinopsis from Glamstarz!

Pengarah: Amir Muhammad, Naeim Ghalili

Pelakon: Ida Nerina, Adlin Aman Ramlie, Diana Rafar, Sofea Jane, Hairie Othman, Noorkhiriah, Aleeza Kassim, Anne Abdullah.

Setiap yang gemilang pasti ada harganya. Soraya ialah seorang pelatih jururawat yang mula resah dengan kehidupannya yang rutin. Dia ingin mengejar cita-citanya untuk menjadi bintang.

Usahanya menghadapi jalan buntu, hingga dia diperkenalkan kepada amalan susuk yang mungkin dapat meningkatkan serinya. Dia harus membuat keputusan samada terus begini atau melintasi garisan ke alam lain.

Sementara itu Suzana ialah seorang diva yang penuh misteri. Dia telah lama mengamalkan ilmu hitam akibat penggunaan susuk keramat yang amat merbahaya. Setiap kali Suzana melanggar pantang, korban manusia diperlukan.

Kita ikuti hidup cemas kedua-dua wanita ini hingga tersingkap rahsia sebenar amalan terlarang itu.

The tagline - There is Evil on the Other Side attracted KN and I to download this movie; The Mirrors by Kiefer Sutherland- yet to be released in Malaysia. A Horror/thriller aimed at increasing the testosterone level of the viewers but I think failed to do so (in my case) - I just couldn't find anything good enough to scare my wits off off me anymore.


Only towards the end the movie became more interesting otherwise dull and boring but we kept watching as some scenes were worth watching - the gory ways some of the characters had been killed by the evil mirror - a rather nice concept but the storyline was a little slow and dragging.


The plot goes around an ex-cop who was targeted by the evil mirrors in an old posh departmental store that was burnt down - this ex cop was the night shift guard at this torn down place and soon became obsessed with the mirrors in the store (which had not been destroyed somehow in the fire - dah namanya evil kan)


I rate the movie Good but it could have been better. Mirrors is actually the U.S. remake of 2003 Korean horror movie Geoul Sokeuro, which was better and scarier (from what I read in the Internet - haven't seen the original yet).

Here's the trailer:

Since Kal El is on long MC maka banyak lah movies yang Kal El dan KN tengok lately ni. Dan apa lagi Kal El's favourite cerita hantu/seram/thriller. One of those yang Kal El sempat tengok was Thai's Souls's Code. This 2007 movie is showing soon kat Malaysian cinemas I think - nampak gazzette dia shown kat TGV KLCC recently.

The Soul's Code is about a call girl being murdered by her ex-boyfriend's current girlfriend. Even though I could guess who the murderer was from the middle of the movie, Soul's Code was fun to watch. Unfortunately the focus was not really on the ghost but more on the CSI like investigation. The ghost (Ning - huhuh bukan Ning Baizura ha...a.k.a the call girl) was trying to help the Hero, a DSI (Department of Special Investigation Thailand to solve the case, leading him from one answer to another sampailah tertangkapnya the actual killer. Hantu dia boleh la tahan menakutkan ropanya tapi like I said dia tak banyak buat appearance. So sad but that's the truth.

The movie wasn't so directly pointing towards the murderer but Prae (the current girlfriend to singer Cee had framed Cee and he got killed (by Prae also) in the end. I wish the movie was a little more scarry (as the trailer focused on the ghost) but the storyline wasn't at all that bad. Having bought a pirated copy (again heheheh) the Malay subtitles was just intolerable but fortunately the English subtitle was comprehendable. Not perfect but goog enough to understand.

The hero (Detective Khan) like KN said was cacat looking - perhaps because of his small, macam tak boleh bukak punya mata huhuh I don't know why he was called the Thai Brad Pitt here. Definitely not for his looks la hehehe jahatnya Kal El ni kan?

Here's the trailer: