Aku tak kira, aku nak pergi jugak tengok Boy A kat Quad Cinema tuh. Biasanya aku tak kisah pun pergi tengok wayang sorang-sorang kan, memang selama ini pun aku tengok wayang, tengok konsert, pergi Broadway shows, semuanya sorang-sorang pun. Mungkin semalam tuh sebab malam kot, itu yang aku rasa down aje nak tengok tuh, sebab aku sorang-sorang. So harinih, aku nekad akan pergi tengok.
So, pukul 12 aku bertolak ke 14th Street, sampai aje, wayang dah nak start pun. Tak ada pulak aku rasa macam tak best, aku selamba aje pergi sorang-sorang. Mungkin sebab siang kot, jadi tak lah terasa sangat ketakbestannya pergi sengsorang tengok wayang.
Ini sinopsis/review film Boy A tuh, yang aku copy paste aje:
Eric was a pre-adolescent with a violent streak and the wrong kind of friend in Phillip. Together, they murdered a girl about their age, and were put on trial as Boy A and Boy B. They were essentially evil, the prosecutor argued, and deserved the maximum legal sentence. Phillip died in prison. Now Eric, at 24, has been paroled and given a new identity: Jack Burridge.
"Boy A" is based on a novel by Jonathan Trigell, possibly inspired by the real-life British case of two youths seen on a shopping mall's security video as they led away a child who was found dead. Such cases raise the question: Are children who murder indeed essentially evil, or can they heal and change over a period of years? Should society give them a second chance?
That is the fervent belief of Terry (Peter Mullen), the rehabilitation counselor for the renamed Jack (Andrew Garfield). He lectures Jack that he must never, ever reveal his secret. He believes Jack has changed, but society doesn't believe it and will crucify him. So warned, Jack takes a delivery job with a Manchester firm, and begins his new life.
Mullen and Garfield anchor the film. Mullen, that splendid Scottish actor ("My Name Is Joe") and Garfield, 24, with his boyish face and friendly grin. When Jack is rebuilding his existence, Terry is his lifeline, who encourages him almost daily. At first the new job goes well. He makes a friend of his job partner, Chris (Shaun Evans). And Michelle (Katie Lyons), the secretary at the office, boldly asks, "Aren't you going to ask me out for a drink, then?"
He does, and they fall sweetly in love. He urgently wants to tell her his secret, but Terry forbids it. One day when Jack and Chris are driving a country road, they come upon a car crash and rescue a young girl from the wreckage. They're hailed as heroes, and get their photo on the front page of the Manchester Evening News -- Jack with his hat brim pulled low over his eyes.
A series of events eventually leads to Jack's exposure by a shameless London tabloid, which runs the photo and breathlessly boasts that they've found Boy A, the embodiment of evil, now free to walk the streets. Jack's life collapses, and he goes on the run. These scenes are the movie's most desperate, ending at Brighton, where he has a fairly improbable chance encounter with Michelle.
By now we have seen, in a pub brawl, that Jack is still capable of violence. In flashbacks, we see boyhood behavior leading up to the tragic murder. And Terry's own son, a layabout, resents his father's clear preference for Boy A. The whole alternative identity falls apart, and Jack/Eric is left homeless and wandering.
Well, should he be forgive? Eric looks 9 or 10 when he commits his crime. Mistreated at home by a drunken father, raped by his brother, bullied at school, he has much to resent, much cruelty to absorb. When we see him at 24, we are inclined to believe he deserves a new chance.
The film, directed by John Crowley and written by Mark O'Rowe, paints an accurate portrait of working-class life in the north of England, the grimness of the streets contrasting with the beauty of the countryside. It is spoken with accents, Mullen's Scottish the hardest to understand. He can speak standard English, but the accent is one of his tools.
He and Garfield fit well together -- both have faces you like on first sight, both have charm, both have warmth. Garfield, just now emerging as a talent to watch ("The Other Boleyn Girl" and "Lions for Lambs"), inhabits Jack effortlessly, showing his hope, his fears, his nightmares, his doubt that he deserves his new life. And the movie poses the age-old question of forgiveness. At this moment in New York City, children with handguns kill people. Can we say, father, forgive them, for they know not what they do?
------------------------
Tak dan seminit dua filem tuh mula, air mata aku dah jatuh ke perut. Tak ada apa sangat pun, masa Jack peluk Terry sebab macam nak berterima kasih kat Terry yang kasi dia kasut trainers, sebelum dia dibebaskan dari penjara. Yang masuk sangat kat otak aku tuh pasal masa tuh aku teringat waktu MamatGQ cerita kat aku kisah dia ada HIV+ dulu tu lah. Sebijik macam tuh aku rasa nak buat dulu tuh, nak hug dia. So aku macam boleh faham perasaan Jack tuh. Itu yang aku terkeluar airmata tuh, faham dak? Ekkekekekeke
Ada lah tiga empat kali lagi aku termengalir air mata, again, bukan apa sangat pun tapi bila dengar dialog, even bila masa tak ada dialog pun, takat tengok mimik muka pun, aku boleh terkeluar airmata jugak tuh. Sampaikan aku rasa bodoh sangat aku nih, apa pasal wayang pun nak ambik serious sangat, it's only a movie lah for God's sake!
Yang paling lawaknya, masa Jack nak kongkek Michelle tu pun aku boleh terkeluar airmata. Sampai kan lepas tuh aku terberfikir, apa kena nya dengan aku nih, patutnya aku stim lah kan tengok adegan kongkek. Ini tidak, aku yang terkeluar airmata.
Gini, masa Jack nak kongkek Michelle tuh, tengah romen-romen, Jack tanya Michelle, "Do you love me, Michelle?", lepas tuh dia macam tergamam, then dia menangis. Yang buat aku terkeluar airmata sama tuh pasal aku tahu apa yang Jack tuh fikir. Iyalah kan, dia baru keluar penjara, masyarakat bully dia, dan dalam keadaan dia yang tak ada belaian kasih sayang tuh, dia macam tak percaya aje yang ada jugak orang nak kat dia.
Ala, korang pergi tengok sendirilah film tuh, tak reti aku nak kasi ulasan. Kang aku tulis lebih-lebih korang kata aku nih DQ sangat orangnya ekekekeke. Korang tak kan tak tahu, aku nih nampak aje rock dan brutal, tapi hati aku nih lembut sangat sebenarnya, hati aku mudah tersentuh, aku mudah terkesian dengan orang, aku mudah terfaham apa masalah orang.
So, Boy A nih, definitely lah one of the best films yang aku pernah tengok in recent years. Sampaikan masa dalam train, on the way pergi kerja, aku asyik terfikir pasal film tuh. Aku fikir, kalaulah masa Jack nak bunuh diri tuh diaorang pasang lagu Don"t Give Up (Peter Gabriel & Kate Bush), sure jadi lagi best, lagi real.
Got to walk out of here
I can't take anymore
Going to stand on that bridge
Keep my eyes down below
Whatever may come and whatever may go
That river's flowing
That river's flowing
Dan aku fikir jugak, apa yang buat aku suka film tuh. Aku ada jawapan, dan semuanya related dengan aku, itu pasal aku suka film tuh.
1. British film - aku memang suka filem British, nama tempat, semuanya tuh all too familiar to me.
2. Jalan cerita - aku suka jalan cerita film tuh, kisah Jack yang dikasi second chance in life, macamana dia handle, macamana dia cope semuanya tuh.
3. Jack banyak kali menangis - jarang filem yang tunjuk lelaki menangis kan? Tapi dalam film nih banyak kali ada adegan Jack menangis. Itu yang buat aku suka tuh, nampak real. Men do cry kan?
------------------------------
p.s Andrew Garfield nih later terkenal dengan film The Social Network & The Amazing Spider Man
