Sunday, November 13, 2005

tWistEd OliVeR

Went to watch Oliver Twist last Saturday. It was kinda a sudden decision. I was actually almost late for it, but I thought I just go and watched it. Bad me, I supposed to watch Io Non Ho Paura and yet I skidded my way out of it to watch Oliver.

The choice of Oliver Twist was because it was one of Charles Dickens' famous work, it was directed by Roman Polanski (still haven't watched The Pianist, I think Felis was the one suggested it) and also because Ben Kingsley was in it. No introduction on Dickens, I guess people have heard of him. Polanski is a controversial director. His crime kinda make me lose interest in him but still he was supposed to be good, so I thought I give this movie a try. Know Sir Ben Kingsley from Gandhi and I also know that he garnered an Oscar nomination in House of Sand and Fog though I haven't watched it either.

I have never read Oliver Twist before but I'm sure that I had watched movies based on it on TV when I was younger. I remembered that they liked to steal handkerchief. Being the young me, I didn't understand why. Now, I think it was just an English thing. I also remembered that when they boys were trained, they were trained using a dummy with lots of bell in it. The boys must be able to take the things out the dummy without ringing any bell. I also remembered Oliver being revealed rich in the end of the story. My memory may fail me.

Anyway, I felt the movie was kinda long, well that maybe me trying to say that it was kinda boring. It was not that captivating. Ben Kingsley looked so different as Fagin. But I think it was more because of the make-up rather than the way he acted. Didn't find him that amusing either, though he was pretty interesting playing Fagin, just not too amusing. Oliver was weak, didn't really made much impact, didn't manage to arouse enough compassion in me. The story is a bit different. I didn't remember Fagin being so nice and after some googling, I was right, Oliver did find his relative in the story. All of these details was not mentioned in the movie. See, I suppose you can't really rely on movies if you are too lazy to read the books. Overall, the movie was dark. Polanski himself may have too much dark side in him. Really felt it's not really for children consumption and if it was intended for adult, then I think it's pretty boring. I wasn't that entertained, that's all.

Unexpectedly saw a few people on Saturday. Saw Vero, stupid me, I needed to think hard to remember her name (which I did in the end). Then Orlando. All these people actually saw me and called me first, instead of me seeing them. I guess, I just wanted to be invisible and carry on with my things. Saw another person in the bus, but this one is not worth mentioning. I was just glad that I wasn't seen.

Well, that's all peeps. Just felt that I should post about Oliver Twist, a really twisted Oliver.

:) eKa @ 8:03:00 PM •