Boxer From Shantung

Had a fun Friday night today. The wife of a colleague of mine happens to work with the Arts House - which is kinda like an multi-disciplinary arts space setup by the Singapore government. It plays host to quite a few events, and I got invited to the opening for 100 Years of Chinese Films.

So after huffing and puffing from the bus stop to the venue (Singapore's old parliment house, renovated) I got there towards the end of the opening reception. After a bit of white wine, random dim sum and Celestial Movies promo presentation, they introduce the day's guests of honour - Gordon Liu and Chen Kuan Tai.

Hmm.. Gordon Liu.. the name sounds familiar. Then my friend reminded me that he played Pai Mei in Kill Bill Vol. 2! Of course the old master with the white beard who did some kick-ass eye goughing!

He gave us a short speech in Mandarin then professionally posed for us in the martial arts stance (he's on the left below):

I didn't know too much about Chen Kuan Tai, but just that he's the star of the opening film of the festival - Boxer from Shantung. So I went not expecting too much and as a result was blown away by the movie!

I think if you are a kid growing up in Asia, there was probably a few periods in your life when you are really into kungfu martial arts (kum lung pai nai in Thai) serials. I had quite a few fights with toy swords with my brother while making swishing (sword cutting through air) sound effects.

Seeing this movie made me realize how derivative of those serials and the Kill Bill movies are - here I was seeing the source and inspiration of kungfu on the screen! And no wonder Quentin Tarantino supposedly got hooked on this stuff when he was a video store clerk.

The movie is sorta 'The Godfather' meets kungfu. Chen plays Ma Yongzhen, the boxer of the title, to starts of humble beginnings to become gangster boss of Shanghai (think Godfather, Part II - the rise of Vito Corleone - a lot less subtle) and then his fall from grace. The director made the effort to inject some big themes on the corruption of power and sacrifice in between some incredible action sequences.

And the coolest one has to be the finale fight in at a teahouse (rong tiam) at the end. By the end of the fight, our hero has taken down 4 of the rival gangboss's henchmen (the "Four Champions"), fallen down the balcony 3 times and fought about 101 underlings armed with axes and daggers - all while bleeding with a hachet stuck in his side!

And the blood, oh the blood! I reminds me of an espisode of Fear Factor I just saw in which they had to bob for rings in a vat full of cow blood.

Phew... that was fun! I'm thinking of catching more shows soon. They told me there's an open air screening of "The Kingdom and The Beauty" - maybe some classic period drama for a change. My friend told me the star, Linda Lin Dai, was the It-girl of her day or something like that. Hmm... thinking of going with some mooncakes to the screening and having a mini picnic.

This Flight Tonight

Today I took a flight to Singapore and Wit took his flight to the US... feeling a bit sad and in the mood for Joni Mitchell.

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This Flight Tonight
Joni Mitchell from the album "Blue"

You got the touch so gentle and sweet
But you've got that look so critical
Now I can't talk to you baby
I get so weak
Sometimes I think love is just mythical
Up there's a heaven
Down there's a town
Blackness everywhere and little lights shine
Oh, blackness, blackness dragging me down
Come on light the candle in this poor heart of mine

Oh starbright, starbright
You've got the lovin' that I like, all right
Turn this crazy bird around
I shouldn't have got on this flight tonight

Singapore Writers Festival

Had quite a activity-packed weekend in Singapore this time:
- More chili crab Friday night. That makes it three crab dinner in two weeks!
- Shopping at Sim Lim Sqaure
- Pigged out at the Ritz-Carlton Sunday Champange Brunch - three hours of posh food! (Moet et Chandon + the biggest chesse spread I've ever seen in my life + lobster + oysters + crab claws + foie gras = choresterol shock!)


And last but not least, I went to three events at the Singapore Writers Festival - too tired to write about them now but I have to say that all of them were really thought-provoking for entirely different reasons.

Rewind a bit and tell you a bit more about the fest. Maybe this quote from the website does a good job of conveying the spirit of it all -

"The Singapore Writers Festival celebrates the power of the written word!"

The formula for doing this is not so hard it seems - grab some thought-provoking authors and let them roam around giving readings, signing autographs, put them into panels and other weird situations. Give the wannabe writers workshops on how to write genre bestsellers, biographies, blogs, graphic novels, etc.

Also host them in a great venue like Singapore's new National Library.

And I guess for readers like me it's a chance to connect back to the writers and their thoughts - reading (like writing) is essentially such a solitary activity that one can feel so isolated from the rest of the world. No wonder people say 'You got to read this book!' so much... they just want some company in the reading journey.

I attend three sessions so far (write more about them in later posts):

1. A reading by up-and-coming Thai-American writer, Rattawut Lapcharoensap. He writes in English and just publish his first collection of short stories, "Sightseeing".

2. A talk by cyberpunk author Bruce Sterling.

3. Another talk on Australian food with chef Kylie Kwong and food writer (among other things) R.W. Apple.