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| Don't Look, Gaze.I've been looking around. All around.
But it's nowhere to be found.
The more I seek, the farther it fleets.
Drained, defeated, the heart feels weak.
Looking back in the days, youth fades.
Here today, instead of looking, I gaze. | | |
| Sex and the City: The MovieThe original HBO hit-series is a modern classic.
Like many, I religiously watched the show as if it were the sacred Bible on relationships, the ultimate survival guide for the 21st century singletons, the shining beacon offering not only light, but also heartfelt warmth and comfort, to those who are lost in their search for love in cities that never sleep.
Now, four years after the series finale, the show transcends the TV screen to the silver-screen. Like many, of course, I pilgrimaged to the cinema for the reunion of the year.
As the cinema curtains undrew, the familiar piano-driven theme song began and then suddenly bursted into an upbeat, Fergalicious version, the whole theater gasped and traveled through time and space with the help of a delicate montage reviewing the past six seasons' lost-and-found of love. The movie, aptly put in Carrie Bradshaw's words, talks about what happens when one has found love. Anchoring on this thought, the movie brought us all on a journey to explore the subject of marriage, which spawns a bewildering variety of eternal enigmas no human could ever solve in the capacity of a lifetime - the reasons why people get married, the responsibilities that entail marriage, and the separate subjects of monogamy, infidelity, and forgiveness. Yet, it wasn't the aim of the movie to provide answers; instead, it inspires us to think independently on what we would do as we put ourselves in the characters' Manolo Blahniks.
Best at creating resonating moments in its television predecessor, Sex and the City: The Movie, likewise, plucked a few fragile heartstrings among the audience.
I particularly like the New Year's Eve scene when Carrie ran in the winter cold from her apartment to downtown Manhattan to keep Miranda company. Added to the bittersweetness of watching Carrie run through snow-covered streets in her pajamas with only one destination in mind, the background soundtrack Auld Lang Syne broke my heart. I recall the many New Years Eves in the past I spent curled up in my bed, looking at my bedroom ceiling in the twilight, not knowing what to feel and what to expect in the new year ahead. Your conscious self is fully aware of the fact that a brand new year is coming the next day, but deep inside you know it's still your old self that is going to deal with all the novelty. The stark contrast between your melancholic reminiscence of the old and the festivity to celebrate the new left us feeling helplessly paralyzed and defenselessly vulnerable. Maybe that's why people need the New Year's Kiss to keep themselves from drowning in their powerless thoughts.
Another part of the movie I enjoyed a lot was the infamous sushi scene. It naturally blends Samantha's over-the-top personality with her new found self of being in a long term relationship with Smith. It also brought me to thinking why people do crazy things for their boyfriends/girlfriends - was it simply a reciprocal gesture or was it out of pure, unadulterated love? And if it is indeed out of pure, unadulterated love, why sh-/would we feel hurt when our effort is not appreciated (enough)? And to what extent is 'enough' anyway? Is 'enough' up to the point where you'd feel like you're devoid of personality and the basic respect a normal human being should be entitled to? I couldn't help but wonder. Perhaps at the very end of the day, like Samantha said, we all have been in a relationship with ourselves longer than we would have with anyone else; hence, it's really "I love you, but I love me more."
Apart from resonating moments, the series is also known for its hilarious take on sex and sarcasm. Substituting 'sex' with 'coloring' is totally genius and it absolutely cracked me up when Samantha said there were no Crayon-equivalent for 'come' and that she'd use every Crayon in the box! Another one that made me laugh like I hadn't in a really long time in the middle of a movie was Charlotte's well-rehearsed line "I cursed the day you were born!" she planned on saying to Mr. Big if she sees him, after he jilted Carrie at the New York Library (which, by the way, made me inaudibly scream when Carrie said she and Mr. Big would get married in the place which houses all the great love stories in history). Secretly rehearsing lines and imagining scenarios is widely known to be my thing!
The movie wraps up perfectly with the low-key wedding at the City Hall. Carrie planned the original lavish wedding from her own point of view and disregarded Mr. Big's feelings and then it all backfired. So I guess the message within is, marriage is really about two people sharing the same vision, that is, after all, what happens (supposed to, at least) when two, become one.
If you ask me, I'd say they shouldn't do a sequel. I can't really see any plot lines from further developing except maybe Anthony and Stanford's - didn't they hate each other? And what happened to Marcus, Stanford's hottie boyfriend who's in theater? Despite the record breaking box office figures, a classic can only be a classic if it is preserved well.
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| Confessions on a Dance FloorNot referring to Madonna's last album or Madonna herself. I am talking about the other M - Me.
For the first time in a really long time, I connected with my body. And dancing was the connection. It bluntly reveals my flaws and my awkwardness in motion and unapologetically proves that I have major limb coordination issues most probably related to the underdevelopment of my cerebellum during childhood years, resulting from a lack of exercise.
But I still love it. Dancing, I mean, not my cerebellum.
It's like the mysterious addiction everyone has with karaoke. The majority of people with a teeny weeny bit of self obsession likes to imagine themselves as (super)stars in the shower and flexes their vocal cords with a favorite number. But in karaoke bars, you get to publicly flaunt your singing voice with no hard feelings. Everyone's a civilian, nobody's a star. There's nothing to be shameful about, nothing to feel embarrassed for. Yet, it assuages the vanity within us. We don't need a standing ovation - what we need is an outlet of things we are not very good at but still want to at least be given a chance to showcase in public.
Like I said earlier, I don't really like to engage in activities I am not positively known for. But dancing feels so different. As an amateur dancer, you don't really get anything tangible away from the dance floor, except for a body of painful muscles and a seriously aching lower back, but you walk out with the experience of reacquainting yourself. It almost feels like looking at the mirror for the first time when you were a baby. For once you make a little space in the continuum of time and make it your own, you're doing it for nobody, you're not doing it for money, you're doing it for yourself. We get so lost in our hectic lives sometimes we simply forgot who we are as a person. And we never took the time to figure out what our bodies can do. Looking at myself in the reflection of the studio mirror and seeing myself learn the choreography offered me a different perspective of myself.
As drops of sweat roll down my cheek, I came clean to myself - I look like a complete idiot. But it's okay, once everyone steps out of the studio, we'll continue to live our separate lives... until the next dancing class.
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