RIFLE RANGE BOY

Falling Down (1993) Thanks, Danny, for showing the existence of this film. We are constantly bombarded with the notion that we should follow the weather-beaten path, and everything will be alright. Do as I say, not as I do. Follow the dotted lines, and you will be taken care of. We are expected to act in a particular manner as it is how a civil society behaves. Keeping your emotions under check denotes maturity, and everybody will play their part. We do our share of our bargain diligently but then, we realise that we had been taken for a ride. The promise turned out to be an empty one—a dream not, but a nightmare. And we flip. The system to whom we had been loyal all these while turns around and say that we are the evil one. The significant others whom we saw as the scourge is now the protected one. Foster must have found himself in the same kind of predicament. Working diligently as a faithful servant in a defence facility, he realised one day that he had neither a job nor her family ...

Sometimes (Sila Samayanggil, Tamil, சில சமயங்கில்; 2018) Netflix We consider ourselves one step better than a stranger standing beside us. We gaze at them through our rose-tinted glasses when they are unaware and draw our own conclusions on their moral standards and codify them either 'good' or 'bad'. All these changes immediately the moment there is an imminent danger or a potentially life-consuming event in the near future. Imagine a group of passengers in a cruise who are stranded in a terrible storm, have lost all radio contacts and just waiting for time to sink if help does not arrive in time. In that scenario, everybody put their prejudices aside, treat each other as equal and try to face the common enemy. This is the scenario that the filmmakers are trying to create. Seven patients are waiting anxiously in a sparsely populated lobby for their HIV results. Each patient has their own story that brought them to get their blood tested - an ex-girlfriend dying...

Credit: stress.org You think you have it bad, working your butt day in and day out, dancing to the tunes of the loved ones around you and clowning to the antics of your potential clients. You were made to think that you are responsible for your mess. It is not proper for one to absolve himself of his misdeeds. It does not matter if the mistakes were made in the prime of youth when the heart control the mind and the sacral plexus were more dominant than the pre-frontal cortex. You reap what you sow, they say. The demands of the modern world get too overwhelming. The pressure cooker lifestyle that you lead needed decompression. Your friends tell you to de-stress your life. Their mantra sings, "Lose your wife and reduce your stress by 50%; lose your Wi-fi for the remaining 50%!" On top of the world, not looking, without a care in the world!  ©   EsKay SK Then you tell yourself that you have to unleash from the chains of this proverbial dog's life; shooe...

http://www.thestar.com.my/opinion/letters/2017/09/12/in-defence-of-irate-people/ In defence of irate people LETTERS Tuesday, 12 Sep 2017 I DON’T personally know the woman who has been made an Internet sensation by someone posting an unflattering video of her berating a city council officer who clamped her car that was parked in an OKU parking lot but I sure know how it feels to be “irate”. While the cyber world watches that video and condemns her, no one really knows the war she’s been through or constantly goes through as a caregiver for an OKU (assuming it’s true). By the way, I’ve been there. As the father of a 23-year-old special needs person, or OKU as they are unceremoniously called here, I know for a fact that the daily stress level of a caregiver is beyond most people’s comprehension. Hence, a video footage shows only the consequence of her meltdown and not the reason. While I’m not making excuses for her behaviour at the time, I can t...

An error of judgement  Pamela Hansford Johnson This is one book that I had deferred reading for a long time. I bought a long time ago but decided giving it a miss umpteen times over other books with more alluring covers! I should read it earlier. The book gives a dark description of human behaviours; in marital, medical, theological and social lives. It goes on to show how difficult it is for one to carry on living a modern life. Unlike a conservative society where gender roles, parental duties and offspring expectations are cast in stone, the rules in modern living are quite fluid. Everybody feels his needs has to be met. He lives for himself, not for the society, not for family. Every man is for himself. It is the generation of self. Above all, it is all about self-liberation, self-expression, self-fulfillment and self-satisfaction. In the good old days, the same actions could constitute self-indulgence, self-gratification and selfishness. This obscure book tells the story...