Malaysian Movie: Sepet

Celebrated my friend’s birthday last night, went to Phin’s Steak (I think that’s the name) at the ground level of Cineleisure. While waiting for him to arrive, went to Heeren’s HMV to browse the DVD section… I got so many DVDs I wanna get but too bad they are out of budget due to my expenditure on my GNC supplements. :(

Proceeded down to Centrepoint’s Royal Sporting House, oh no! They had a pair of shoes in my size (US13) and on sale. And got a cool Adidas T which I wanted to get but no no no, cannot cannot… non essentials are off the list.

Dinner was ok, not as good as the Toa Payoh steak place that I frequent but each got their own style I guess. Was kinda looking forward to dinner because I told myself I will cheat and have my forbidden carbohydrates, but my rational self got the better of me, I took about a half inch cube of my baked potato and gave the rest to birthday boy who thinks he is underweight and trying to bulk up. Actually I don’t think he is underweight, and neither does he think I’m overweight so I not going to argue with him on that.

After dinner, went to Sembawang Music Centre, wanted to get a couple of CDs but again, non essential :( Proceeded to catch a movie upstairs which I found to be quite entertaining.

The movie is called Sepet, which is the Malay word for slit as in mata sepet meaning slit-eyes, a somewhat derogatory reference used to refer to Chinese. Set in Malaysia, or Ipoh to be precise, the movie was a poignant tale of a Chinese boy and Malay girl, of their forbidden love and social pressures. Littered with touching moments of intensive parental love and the hilarious antics of the girl’s quirky family makes this movie a worthwhile flick to catch. Set in modern Malaysia, the lifestyle and settings reminded me of 70’s and 80’s Singapore, where cane furniture and shophouses with unfinished cement flooring were common.

I felt that the movie tried to communicate too many messages to the viewer thereby losing a bit of its effectiveness. However, I empathize with the writer’s reason for doing so as this would have reached out to touch a wider audience base. Filmed in a mixture of English, Malay, Cantonese and Hokkien, the subtitles were a necessity but I guess a small price to pay for trying to preserve the authenticity of language diversity in Malaysia. The ending was disappointingly predictable and lacks the oomph of a tear-jerker which I believe the movie was originally intended to be, but I’ll still recommend it.

As a bonus, the male lead, Ng Choo Seong is rather cute in a goofy kind of way… and has a great bod as well :p~~~ My favourite quote of the movie would be “What is the problem with loving someone from another race? It is when you hate someone due to race that’s the problem.”