Dear Sumire,
I thought of purchasing an original DVD if I did not watch it in the cinema. But last Sunday at Times Square, every movie and show time are fully occupied.
Me: Sherlock Holmes?
Cashier: Front row only left.
Me: Urgh.. What about Vampire’s Assistant?
Cashier: Front row left as well. All movies around night time is fully occupied.
Me: Oh.. Ok. Muallaf as well?
Cashier: Oh no. That’s available, AS EXPECTED.
He did emphasize his voice when he said the words which I capitalized. It’s as if Muallaf is a badly made film or such. And he was right, the Cineplex was almost next to empty with only ¼ occupied when I get my tickets.
If any of you haven’t watched this, please do. This is Yasmin Ahmad’s last legacy in our Malaysia’s silver screen. Although Talentime is her real last movie she’d ever made, Muallaf is the controversional movie that could hardly get passed our Malaysian’s censorship board, and thus delaying its showing for months. The reason of the huge censorship controversy is that it’d lots of sensitive issues on religion, and if all those scenes are cut, the audience won’t be able to make any sense out of the whole movie. In the end, they finally decided to mildly cut the film, and muted some of the scenes which they find controversional.
The thing is I didn’t find the movie really religious or something. It sure quotes a lot from the religious books and scriptures, but that’s it. They didn’t really convert anyone in the movie, like the English title might have suggested; “The Convert”.
This is a story of a teacher named Brian whom in some part of his life bumped into these two sisters, Rohani and Rohana whom ran away from home (or in their own words, ran away to safety).
I thought of purchasing an original DVD if I did not watch it in the cinema. But last Sunday at Times Square, every movie and show time are fully occupied.
Me: Sherlock Holmes?
Cashier: Front row only left.
Me: Urgh.. What about Vampire’s Assistant?
Cashier: Front row left as well. All movies around night time is fully occupied.
Me: Oh.. Ok. Muallaf as well?
Cashier: Oh no. That’s available, AS EXPECTED.
He did emphasize his voice when he said the words which I capitalized. It’s as if Muallaf is a badly made film or such. And he was right, the Cineplex was almost next to empty with only ¼ occupied when I get my tickets.
If any of you haven’t watched this, please do. This is Yasmin Ahmad’s last legacy in our Malaysia’s silver screen. Although Talentime is her real last movie she’d ever made, Muallaf is the controversional movie that could hardly get passed our Malaysian’s censorship board, and thus delaying its showing for months. The reason of the huge censorship controversy is that it’d lots of sensitive issues on religion, and if all those scenes are cut, the audience won’t be able to make any sense out of the whole movie. In the end, they finally decided to mildly cut the film, and muted some of the scenes which they find controversional.
The thing is I didn’t find the movie really religious or something. It sure quotes a lot from the religious books and scriptures, but that’s it. They didn’t really convert anyone in the movie, like the English title might have suggested; “The Convert”.
This is a story of a teacher named Brian whom in some part of his life bumped into these two sisters, Rohani and Rohana whom ran away from home (or in their own words, ran away to safety).
Brian reading the Qur'an.This is not a religious movie. To me, it’s more of a movie about a lost lamb. However, I must agree that how they portrayed the religions in the movie is quite close to the reality. People leave faith because of the skeletons in their closet. It’s all about dark past. For example, Brian’s character is a Catholic, and I can relate. About going or not going to church on Sunday, and how people yell “God will never forgive you!” to their sons. I saw the situations before (nop, no personal experience before ;-P) and I tell you, it’s pretty well portrayed in the movie.
Brian trying to understand how people can be so devoted to something so invisible.What’s interesting about this two sisters is that they’re able to quote from the scriptures (the Quran, Holy Bible and even Tao Te Ching) down to the verse and line. What’s more spooky is that they live in a house haunted by “Uncle” the previous owner of the bungalow. And according to them, they’re running away from KL to Singapore, via Ipoh (check your map, lol).
There’s one part in the movie that suggest that people stop you from talking because they’re afraid of the unknown. People stop you from talking because they think you don’t know what you’re talking about. That’s why you shouldn’t quote from a book you don’t truly understand. Yasmin had a point right there. If the people don’t understand, educate them! Or educate us! That’s the correct way of doing stuffs, not simply ban us from speaking!
The sisters are played by Sharifah Amani and Sharifah Aleysha are very caring of one another, although they kept calling names at each other. Brian is unwillingly sucked into their uncommon practice of visiting the sick, and helping others, and discussing about religion almost 24/7. Brian as a man who lost his faith and had found himself might be able to reconnect with God through the sisters. Brian who almost severe his relationship with his mother because of his unwillingness to go to church, tried very hard to understand how and why Ani and Ana cared for strangers so willingly.
oil-paintingYou know what? I won’t bable further. Go and watch this movie. Just pay your last tribute to our late Yasmin Ahmad, and enjoy the show. It’s still showing in TGV the last time I checked. If you’re still worried that this movie is controversional, let me tell you, there’s nothing controversional about a movie which revolves around love interest, family and a black cat.
Signing off,
Jin
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