Chantek (2012)

Love is blind... so fall in love with your Indonesian maid.

Pierre Andre keepin up appearances
with Henri Gundah Gulana (!!!)

At a glance:

I couldn't get enough of the shockin non-chemistry in Gerimis Mengundang (2012) the other day, so I thought I'd endure another awkward Indonesian-Malaysian pairin that has the Malaysian half out-acted by leaps and bounds. Chantek (2012) is a resurgent Pierre Andre's vanity project that is fatally flawed (by his own admission) about a Malaysian actor who falls in love with his Indonesian help under bizarre, comical and frankly, quite outrageous circumstances. Don't we all wish we were someone's son, eh? Movie came and went, to the tune of just RM 100,000 at the Malaysian cinemas, accordin to the FINAS jokers. It played for just 12 days. Yikes.

Bad news on the doorstep:

Wannabe moody movie star.
Twisted genius ooo...

Not content with his real life speech impediment, Pierre Andre plays a blind actor who develops a ridiculous sense of misogyny after an odd openin where he catches his lover (the nymphomaniac Zarina Anjoulie Lavocah) in bed with a cigar-chompin old man. His portrayal of a moody movie star is too self-absorbed and demandin for the audience, even before the introduction of his annoyin pondan manager (Chew Kin Wah in a cheesy gay role that must have Chinese homosexuals everywhere in disgust) or his titular Indonesian house servant Chantek (a resplendent Nurul Ekasari Rosihan Anwar). From there, it's Planet Plot Hole. Tell me if you actually make it to the twist.
Perennial wonderment:

This movie blinds me.
Really.

Funny how the director, scriptwriter and actor Pierre Andre apparently went to Indonesia to cast Nurul out of some 700 hopefuls but she ends up trumpin him in the movie. The winsome 24-year-old newcomer has reportedly received more actin offers in Jakarta after showin producers this Malaysian movie. Bet it was just the trailer!

Reminds me of:

Watchin Pierre Andre and Fasha Sandha in the rom-com 9 September (2007).

Most memorable line:

Abon & Chew Kin Wah

"Nasi goreng gila? Kenapa nama makanan korang pelik-pelik? Tak boleh ke letak nama yang elok-elok? Nasi goreng sopan santun ke, nasi goreng Siti Nurhaliza ke?"

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

Obviously the film was badly edited to the point of story suicide.You feel sorry for movies like these. Sincerely hope Pierre Andre will eventually make a good movie one day. ★1/2
Bonus material:

Who makes movie posters this ugly?

Nurul Ekasari: A blindin beauty, if you'd pardon the pun.

The day the music died:

R.I.P.  singer Arie Wibowo (5 April 1952 - 14 April 2011)
who immortalised the 1984 Bill and Brod hit Madu Dan Racun,
a number that Pierre Andre confidently bastardised for Chantek.

The Help (2011)

At a glance:

You is kind, you is smart and you is the fool who watched this craptacular con job on the back of its Oscars hype. If you're the type of tosser who thinks Slumdog Millionaire (2008) and Precious: Based On The Novel Push By Sapphire (2009) are wonderful eye-openin films, chances are you'll have heaps of praises for The Help (2011), yet another glossy melodrama that White America Hollywood endorses to feel better about itself, just like The Blind Side (2009). Do not be part of this cocksuckin collective. Give "magical negro" a Google today. This movie is about helpless black people who are empowered by white people - that's why they're tellin you it's the dog's bollocks.

Bad news on the doorstep:

Film director Tate Taylor's The Help (2011) isn't based on a true story and the neither is the eponymous 2009 Kathryn Stockett novel it's based on, although some maid tried to sue her for it. Both Taylor and Stockett are actually childhood friends - coprophiliacs, if bizarre plot elements are anythin to go by. Both book and movie are objectionable materials with outrageous or extraneous characters that trivialise race relations and human dignity. Make no mistake, it is fiction. Story is about a well-meanin white journo (Emma Stone) who published tell-all stories from maligned African-American home servants (hence the title) in 60s Jackson, Mississippi. It's the kind of prepackaged socio-political content that drags you through deplorable aspects of the human condition and then leave you with absolutely no room to draw your own conclusions. If not because of the admittedly all-round solid performances (especially Octavia Spencer, pic, from TV's Ugly Betty, playin a motor-mouthed maid), this movie wouldn't get half the attention it's been gettin.
Perennial wonderment:
Jessica Chastain (pic) reportedly put on 15 pounds for her role as ditzy, alabaster housewife Celia Foote, thanks to soymilk and ice-cream. How did it all go to just her boobs? It was apparently upped two cup sizes if you saw her in that red dress, unrecognisable from the girl we saw in The Debt (2010).

Reminds me of:

Stephen King horror movie Thinner (1996), the last time so much fuss is kicked up over a piece of pie.

Amacam joker, berapa bintang lu mau kasi?

Overrated, overlong, overdone. If it were more like Forrest Gump (1994) and didn't take itself so seriously, then perhaps not many would've opposed it so badly. Reverse racism is so borin. Go and fry yourself some chicken instead to feel better about life.★★1/2