Almost Buddhist - 戲‧論

★★★☆☆ In case you wonder, Tully is a night nanny to help Charlize Theron’s Marlo, a mother of two already including a ‘quirky’ one, to take care of her newborn daughter at nights so that she’d have energy to do things in the daytime. Tully is, like Marlo describes to her husband at the first night she comes to help, kind of weird, because she seems to be able to blend in immediately like no stranger at all. She looks too young to be an experienced nanny, yet she’s amicable, enthusiastic, and passionate for what she’s doing. And guess what, she’s willing to do more than just babysitting. Turns out she’s a game changer that’s much of a surprise to the family! I don’t know, ‘Tully’ feels like a heart-warming, delightful, and healing drama to see though it gets us to experience the hardship of motherhood on a daily basis. There’s always an aspect of optimism when things seem to be about to spin out of control and break down or blow up if you will. So, nope, there’s nothing so over

★★☆☆☆ 別被戲名誤導，〈我想吃掉你的胰臟〉不是甚麼變態恐怖片，相反、是一齣「純愛」戲。甚麼叫「純愛」，就是劇情沒有一絲暴力色情，戲中人沒有丁點邪思歪念，場景多數陽光浪漫，主題絕對正面勵志，而為了增加戲劇性，戲中男女主角某一方預設有絕症或意外，總之有情人終不能成眷屬！也難怪，愛要純，則不能去盡，盡了則不純，因為會慘雜太多的私心計算在其中！如此電視劇般的電影，算不算吸引？不算！有沒存在的必要？絕對有！起碼它提醒我們：做一個好人，永遠都不會太遲！ 如果活著的意義，只是戲中女主角最後所說的那樣，我就覺得未免太過單一狹隘。愛是我們活著的動力，但並非活著的唯一目的。人生的目的到底為何？實在也沒有一個標準答案，因為在人生的不同階段，我們所追求的都不會一樣。很多時候，在還未搞清楚人生到底是怎麼一回事之前，我們就已經被所謂的人生目的累死了！影片拖拖拉拉差不多兩個小時，最後只是為了勸告我們：珍惜眼前人，活在當下。但可悲的是，我們都習慣活在過去或未來，不習慣亦不屑活在當下，所以我們依然憧憬有個人生之目的可以最終完滿，儘管我們可能也知道它是多麼的虛無飄渺！ 原著漫畫在日本大賣，電影票房也大收，動畫版也即將上映。在 IMDB 上，這部電影的評分也算高，證明其實我們都喜歡這類「純愛」電影。作為一個佛子，我堅信：不論我們外在表現出來是何等邪惡，內裡我們壓根兒都是一個天真無邪的小孩，只是這個小孩沉睡了太久，已經不懂得醒來！

Who: Snow Patrol Where: Ireland What: Indie/Alternative Rock When: 2018 Been listening to this album from time to time. And this is not the one you’d have to take just one listen to get hooked up to, since there’s only few catchy tunes but no bulk of catchy songs that Snow Patrol used to come up with in their works like ‘Final Straw’ or ‘Eyes Open’. ‘Wildness’ marks the longest gap since their last studio full-length effort ‘Fallen Empires’ from almost 8 years ago! Well, the longest doesn’t necessarily mean this is the best of theirs of course. There’s one or two songs that I can’t feel connected to no matter how, yet it’s the best album I’ve been listening to so far this year. As I thought they’d probably follow the footsteps of another pop rock band like Coldplay, they’ve proved with ‘Wildness’ that they’re still the Snow Patrol that I used to adore for the sentimentality and sincerity they put into their music!