unhinged yet uplifting

I managed to watch two movies, one after another, in parts. As it happened, at the same time, i was trying to help my sister who is having a little bit of a mental breakdown. I see parallels between reel and real life in all three.

Poor Things is a little Alice in Wonderland, a little Wizard of Oz, a little Marquis de Sade and a whole lot of Frankenstein. It also has a lot in common with some of Yorgos Lanthimos' earlier films, like The Favourite and Dogtooth: transgressive sex, sadistic power games and grisly violence.

But if the movie is brutal, it's also extravagantly beautiful, extremely funny and, by the end, strangely touching, even uplifting. This may be Lanthimos' most unhinged movie, but it also has a joyous exuberance that I haven't felt in much of his earlier work.

The story, loosely adapted from a 1992 novel by the Scottish writer Alasdair Gray, follows a most unusual character named Bella Baxter, played by a mesmerizing Emma Stone. When we first meet Bella in 19th-century London, she looks like an adult woman but has the awkward gait, unformed speech and anarchic spirit of a very young child.

As we learn early on, she's the product of a back-from-the-dead mad science experiment, in which she was implanted with the brain of the child she was carrying at the time of her death. Bella, in other words, is both her mother and her daughter — and, in a weird way, neither.

Inevitably, Bella discovers sex, first exploring her own adult body with childlike curiosity, and then having a passionate fling with a rogue named Duncan Wedderburn — a hilariously over-the-top Mark Ruffalo. When they have sex for the first time, the movie, which until now has mostly been filmed in black-and-white, explodes into wild, rapturous color.

Like an especially bawdy riff on Voltaire's Candide, Poor Things becomes the story of Bella's sexual odyssey. Ever since the movie's Venice Film Festival premiere, much of the reaction has focused on its many frenzied sex scenes, in which the bodies of Stone and Ruffalo, among others, are on abundant display. But the movie is after something more than mere titillation; much of the time, it emphasizes the absurdity rather than the ecstasy of sex.

Before long, Bella grows bored — and disillusioned. She learns that men are mostly horrible, and that the world is full of suffering and poverty. Soon, she begins making new friends, reading Emerson and nourishing her mind. At one point, while they're on a European boat cruise, Duncan becomes jealous, accusing Bella of spending too much time with two other travelers, who are having an engrossing intellectual debate. Bella responds, as she often does, by referring to herself in the third person: "These two are fighting and ideas are banging around in Bella's head and heart like lights in a storm."

Some admirers of Poor Things have argued that it's a feminist work, in which Bella's erotic awakening becomes the key to her liberation. The movie's detractors have dismissed it as just a superficially empowering girlboss narrative. I'm hardly the only one to have noticed that it's basically the un-family-friendly version of Barbie, in which a woman's childlike naiveté becomes a surprisingly effective weapon against the patriarchy. I guess that makes Ruffalo's greasy-haired Duncan a Ken, though you might say the same for the men played by Ramy Youssef, Jerrod Carmichael and Christopher Abbott, all of whom try, in their own ways, to manipulate Bella's destiny.

But Bella won't be controlled, and she's much too brilliant a character to be reduced to a symbol or archetype. Stone gives a great, audacious performance; her Bella can be ignorant, selfish, impulsive and cruel, but also fiercely intelligent, witty, thoughtful and kind. Lanthimos has seldom expressed much affection for his characters, but he clearly loves this one to pieces. He's made a movie that, even at its most outlandish, has its heart in the right place, even if its brains are not.

Justin Chang

“Where are you, Grace?”

“I’m right here. You just can’t see me.”

Lynne Ramsay’s Die My Love is of the most viscerally stressful and deeply upsetting films I have ever seen; it’s also frequently beautiful, at times wryly funny, and always aching with a palpable, compelling humanity. Based on the 2012 Argentinian novel by Ariana Harwicz (Matate, Amor, or Die, My Love – Ramsay removed the comma), the film stars Jennifer Lawrence (also producing through her own company, Excellent Cadaver) as a new mother, Grace, struggling with postpartum depression; though saying it that matter-of-factly sounds overly pat for how Ramsay approaches her subject matter. This isn’t so much a film about postpartum depression as it is a film told of and through this state of mental distress. I would compare it to what Lars Von Trier did for depression in 2011’s Melancholia – forcing the viewer to experience the mindset and sensations of living with the disorder, rather than merely ‘depicting’ it – except that Die My Love is an even more abrasive and forthrightly avant-garde film than Von Trier’s.

Indeed, despite the presence of two major movie stars (Lawrence and Robert Pattinson, playing Grace’s husband Jackson), Die My Love has much less in common with anything moviegoers will see in a commercial multiplex than it does the experimental films of Stan Brakhage, which feel like an immense influence here. Scenes of the central couple negotiating the intangible space between them across their new home reminded me of Wedlock House; images of and within the forest – and the images and sensations that forest brings out in Grace – recall the sylvan odyssey of Dog Star Man; and one of the film’s most distressing subplots, about a dog neither Grace nor Jackson will take responsibility for, ultimately felt in communion with Sirius Remembered, where Brakhage photographed the decomposition of a deceased pet in his yard over many months. In short, Die My Love feels like something of a stylistic or spiritual descendent to any film where Brakhage weaved his camera through a home, a yard, or the woods, and/or where he turned bodies into spectral dancers on screen. Director of Photography Seamus McGarvey (a great and deeply underrated cinematographer) moves his camera in similar ways, capturing spaces in similarly ethereal, liminal fashion, and allowing light to bounce off his lens in similarly striking, ghostly patterns. And Ramsay directs and blocks her actors much more like interpretive dancers than traditional movie performances. It’s a little like Terrence Malick, but with less twirling; the ‘dances’ here are more visceral, less symbolic, and confrontationally vulnerable.

This is not an “enjoyable” film, except in the sense that it is always enjoyable to watch great artists do great work and push at perceived boundaries. It is a harrowing watch, and one I can’t imagine myself coming back to often. There is nothing even approaching catharsis waiting for viewers at the end, let alone ‘answers.’ And my only nagging worry throughout was that the film might try for that, out of a feeling the audience was owed a ‘neater’ takeaway after two hours of challenge. But Ramsay is smarter and more uncompromising than that. This is a film about subjective experience, and specifically the subjective experience of feeling lost, adrift, angry, and confused, at war with one’s body, mind, and surroundings. Humans can work through all that and come out on the other side intact, of course; but sometimes they don’t. And either way, the story of recovery is a separate one to what is being chronicled here. Ramsay is right to leave us where she does, on the edge of a knife balanced precariously between hope and despair. The film stands as a remarkable testament to cinema’s power of expression: how the camera can take indescribable internal realities and externalize them on a giant screen.

Jonathan Lack

As for my sister, I...

Advised her if she can bring herself to accept his flaws. Advised her to think of the good in her life and not just the bad.

 

Advised her to think a few steps ahead if indeed she is divorcing him (and not go from frying pan into the fire).

Advised her to understand his poor health situation. 

And finally, advised her to take up meditation or other calming therapies.

If she cannot accept her husband's flaws, everytime he does that, she will get upset

If she cannot break her mind out of negativity especially when there is so much positivity around her, she will always be feeling low

If she leaves him now as he is dying, and when he dies soon all alone, the guilt may eat at her for the rest of her life

It is sad. In many ways, her situation is like mother's.... and of women of previous generation where husbands treat their wives as second class. 

I wish her well.

Easter in a time of fear and fracture

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We gather at Easter not in a perfect world, but in a wounded one.

The first Easter was not peaceful or certain. It unfolded in confusion, grief, and fear. The disciples were hiding. They had lost hope. The world, as they knew it, had collapsed.

And it is precisely there—in that darkness—that the Resurrection happened.

Not as an escape from reality, but as a transformation within it.

Today, we too live in turbulent times. There is war, division, anxiety about the future, and a quiet exhaustion many carry inside. It can feel as though hope is fragile—or even naïve.

But Easter tells us something radical:

Hope is not the absence of suffering.

Hope is the defiance of it.

[Photo Credit: Onkamon Buasorn, Getty Images]

The Resurrection of Christ is not just a past event; it is a present possibility. It is the insistence that:

 • Life can emerge from loss

 • Meaning can rise from confusion

 • Love is stronger than fear

When Jesus Christ rose from the dead, He did not return with vengeance or power. He came with peace: “Do not be afraid.”

That message is not soft—it is revolutionary.

In a world that profits from outrage and division, choosing peace is resistance.

In a culture of despair, choosing hope is courage.

In times of uncertainty, choosing love is strength.

Good Friday 2026

On Thursday, I had a late call with some colleagues from Europe and US and since it was the last working day of the week before the Paschal Triduum weekend break, I had the meeting with a glass of red wine. 

Once in a while, I get rather peckish late at night. It happened to me on around midnight and I headed to the kitchen and made myself peanut butter kaya sandwiches. I couldn't sleep well because my Synovitis (Runners' Toe) condition has recurred... after consecutive (and happy) days of 2hr long walking with D followed by a full day of wearing pointy leather shoes at the office. My body is clearly signalling something to me and it reads, "handle with care". 

So there you have it: bread and wine and feet that has been through much. I have not merely celebrated Maundy Thursday but made the themes a lived experience. And with pain in my foot and bread and wine in my belly, I attended the Good Friday service with Dawn. 

The service was preceded by Stations of the Cross where we parishioners recall 14 significant stations from the point He was sentenced by Pilate to the moment He was laid in the tomb. At each station, the priest would describe the circumstance, we would all then consider our involvement in the moment with a short pause for a personal silent reflection.

Three stations were most significant for me:

Station 1: Jesus is condemned. How many times have I (whether out of convenience, fear or self interest) ignored the evil wrought by others. 

Station 8: the women of Jerusalem weep for Jesus. Caught up in my own cycles of ups and downs, how have I picked myself up, and yet be interested in the condition of others and of the future

Station 12: Jesus dies. There is no crown without thorns, no healing without wounds and no resurrection without death. Its a profound truth of life that ups and downs are inevitable and in fact, the rock bottom in one's life would become he place to launch us firmly back up. 

As we prepare for a jubilant Easter Sunday, I wanted to share the thoughts above. 

About men and megalomania

“The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must” 

Thucydides

In the Chinese language the number 4 phonetically sounds like death. It has been now 4 weeks since Israel & US waged war against Iran and 4 years since Russian invaded Ukraine. Seems like a good time to comment on the selfish nature of man and his base instinct to wage wars.

So often in this media wrapped world we live in, someone somewhere has an interpretation that resonates with us, so even if we lack original thought, there is a good chance we will find our voice.

In my case, I had called out the similarities of the megalomaniacs today especially the one in US to the one who from Austria who terrorised Europe nearly a century ago. I said it without fear at a business leadership meeting, much to the discomfort of colleagues there but bad events are not mea see nt to be easy. 

As it happened, on my way to Hanoi, the capital of a country that has risen well from the ashes of war half a century ago, I watched Nuremberg Trails. In this case, I didn’t need the movie to think for me. I would just channel the words of the brave men who lived through the horrors of World War 2.

In particular, we must all pay heed to the views of Justice Jackson at Nuremberg trails and of Dr Douglas Kelley, the psychiatrist assigned to assess the mental health of the 22 prisoners there facing trial and judgment. 

"The real complaining party at your bar is Civilization. It asks whether law is so laggard as to be utterly helpless to deal with crimes of this magnitude—committed by men who possessed great power and used it deliberately to destroy peace, to enslave peoples, and to exterminate millions.

We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well.

If these crimes are not punished, they will be repeated. If they are not condemned, then the law itself will be brought into contempt.

This trial is part of the great effort to make the law—not war—the governing force among nations.

And so, the question before this Tribunal is not merely the guilt of these men. It is whether the rule of law can prevail over the rule of force."

Justice Robert Jackson

Photo from IMDB

"I had in my charge the purest known Nazi “virus cultures”—twenty-two men. These men were not insane. They were not psychotic. They were, for the most part, within the normal range of intelligence. Nor were they, in any simple sense, abnormal personalities. They were not radically different from the average individual. Insanity is no explanation for their behavior.

The fact is that these men were able to commit their crimes not because they were mad, but because they were human.

Their acts were the product of a situation in which moral controls were weakened, authority was absolute, and responsibility was diffused. Under such conditions, many men can be led to commit acts which, in other circumstances, they would regard as unthinkable.

The danger is not that such men exist, but that they are ordinary. What happened in Germany could happen elsewhere, if similar conditions were to arise."

Dr Douglas Kelley

All these unnecessary deaths could be prevented. We need good humans to speak up and stop the evil ones.

“The only clue to what man can do is what he has done” 

Collingwood

About Time

 Imagine if you will, three buckets. One is called Time, the second Health and the last one Wealth. Everyone is born with all three, with the first bucket at its fullest, the second half full and the final one empty. At the start of all our lives we are given the choice how to optimise the filling/emptying of these buckets... the combination thereof would deliver happiness and often also sadness.

There is little one can do with time. It keeps emptying from the moment we are born and will run out sometimes between our 80th and 90th year (based on the national average life expectancy). The other two buckets require deliberate, intentional efforts. At home, first our parents then ourselves take care of our health and our abilities to grow wealth. In school, the balance tilts more to knowledge acquisition for work. At work, careers are structured to help us grow wealth. 

So, there comes a point in all our lives when we need to make a decision how much of each bucket we will continue to grow and which ones we must focus on before it empties out. 

I captioned to a photo in our family album: "There is a season for everything, all with good reason. Because we are looking forward to 2026 being a pivot year for gliding into our next act. J & N got wedded last year. My parents celebrate their 60th anniversary and M & J will wed next year - in a dream location too! "

Indeed, this year marks the optimising point. It's the year D retires from her executive role and I retire from three non-executives boards & committees. Its also going to be my final year in full time employment... as I will take a 2-month sabbatical next year to celebrate a dream wedding and take a dream European trip with my parents. All four parents are in their eighties and clearly every moment spent with them will be worthwhile, especially on a momentous occasion like a granddaughter's wedding!

Truth be told my health bucket is emptying a little faster nowadays... the last being a case of runners' toe or synovitis. Plus I do feel sensation along my re-attached humerus every so often. That said, I was happy to know that the cardiologist and urologist gave me a cleaner bill of health than reports the last few years. 

Yes, we can always have more wealth... in the immortal words of a greedy investment banker immortalised by Hollywood. We have set aside some for the next generation including helping them with properties and cars - the two most priciest assets in Singapore. 

So, I guess the time for optimising is indeed here. About time too. :-) 

On Colonisation

The Venezuelans I am most acquainted with are the Miss Universe winners. I dont know any personally. No, I am not some dirty old man leering at beauty queens. But like it or not, Ms Universe winners make front page news, complete with photos, in colour. Venezuela, I recall have produced more winners of this pageant that most other countries.

So, they have outwardly beautiful people. I have met only one Venezuelan and she struck me as someone with a beautiful soul inside too for she was mostly talking about her family especially her young daughter even though we were trying to crack the case.

Their land is also blessed with resources and I just learned that they have the largest reserves of oil in the world.

Beautiful people, rich resources… must be really attractive to the greedy. It’s a story as old as time. The greedy needs to be sated. But they dress their ugly desire in high faulting themes: Gold, Glory, God! 

The most honest description is Gold. They want more. More valuable things. For this, they wage wars. From ancient days to megalomaniac warriors like Alexander, Caesar and Temujin, the greedy conquered new lands. Then the game became more sophisticated. It is not necessary to spill blood. Just ink. Cunning agreements, often made to flatter the vain, meant lands are exchanged for puppet roles. 

So, with the stroke of a pen, within half a millennia, the greedy evolved from military colonisation to administrative colonisation. Under the guise of merchants, it was companies, not countries who did the deed of colonisation... persuading local ignorant chieftains to sign away their rights in exchange for puppet thrones.

A quarter of a millennia later, another form emerged. So sophisticated, it even had a tinge of good: economic development. Investors from rich and powerful countries would put up cash and in return own valuable assets in resource rich countries and extract them. All legally and all in the name of enriching the locals. This was the era I had grown up in: a time of economic colonisation. 

So for thousands of years, we have been colonising each other… but in ever more peaceful ways, until recently when the President of Venezuela (not a good man himself) was removed by another country who was lusting after Venezuela’s resources. That same country had earlier last year tore up the playbook on economic colonisation and launched trade wars against the rest of the world. This new year, barely a few days old, it has ventured into a more hostile form of colonisation.

I had always wondered about the people who were in power in the world barely a century ago... why didnt they stop a bad hateful man like Hitler. How did his own countrymen found it right to follow him. 

Then I think of the US today. And I think of the over 70million Americans who voted him into office and even more now who (outwardly) not approve of his tactics but (inwardly) dont mind making their country rich again (from resources of another). Indeed, while their previous mistakes, like Vietnam are still recovering and this is one of the better stories.

What a wicked web we weave. History repeats itself and may we learn from it.

Portugal Perspectives

It’s our first trip together to Portugal. I was here before for meetings but not with D. Those are hurried trips where i see the insides of meeting and hotel rooms largely.

So, I was keen to learn more of the country that more than half a millennia ago conquered Malacca (my hometown, though in truth my ancestors were still in Dabu then or perhaps even in northern China yet to migrate). Indeed they had conquered the most important ports of the world from Brazil to Africa to India and even Nagasaki in Japan. They are world’s first global empire, for gold, glory and God - in the words of my History teacher. 

Of course, this was never the job of one person but Portugal in the 15th century had the right ingredients: a megalomaniac leader, an astute planner that not just master planned the conquest but also raised funds for it, a fearless navigator who nearly circumnavigated the world and a ruthless military commander who subjugated the colonies easily. But that was over 500 years ago.

The Portugal today is less about the 3Gs but the 3Fs: Fado, Fatima and Football. I guess the God part is still important, though Fatima today is as much a tourist attraction as it is a pilgrimage destination. 

The football part is obvious. Christiano Ronaldo (yes, who blossomed in Man U under Sir Alex Ferguson) is a phenomenal athlete, a generational talent in the world of sports. They are rightly proud of him and he has put the country on the highest echelons of achievements. 

The part that truly tells the story of Portugal is Fado, their version of blues, where singers often without microphones belt out their tunes of longing accompanied by the multi-string Fado Guitar. Soldade is the local word for it and it’s perhaps best understood from the perspective of a nation that once ruled the world and is now just a lagging European state. 

I also started reading again on this trip, thanks to the lack of inflight entertainment on our flight from Zurich to Lisbon. And its apt that there is another F in Portugal: Fernando Pessoa, a prolific writer who carried the soul of soldade in his words and expressed through his characters… whom our guide describe as cages of our lives. It is a wonderfully game changing perspective to have, to help us reframe what we could be: even towards a master planner, an explorer, a conqueror or a shepherd perhaps.  

We started this trip with a double treat, a birthday gift for D and pampering on board from SQ. She must be inspired because her wordsmithing skills took on a level of precision: correcting me for mistaking a pontoon for a jetty or a shrub for a bush. In such company, not forgetting the innate navigation skills, D is the perfect companion to be in Portugal with. 

Speaking of navigation, over 7 days, we stopped at 7+ places: lovely Lisbon, faithful Fatima, cheerful Obidos, natural Nazare, canal Aveido, colourful Nova Costa, vintage Duoro and playful Porto. We traversed northwards on the well built A1 and the no speed limit (enforcement, that is) A8! 

A week into her 55th year, we visited Fatima. We are there to pray and hopefully not be preyed upon by some tourist traps. At its peak (on May 13th - the anniversary of the first apparition of Mother Mary to the three children), there can be up to 2 or 3 million pilgrims. There were far less when we were there and it added to the serenity of the place. 

Fatima has such a special feel to it, I must say. Maybe it’s the cool morning air that is full of calm. It is not just about being serene, Fatima demands serenity from the visitors. Even a group of Catholics from China were not their usual boisterous selves. So peaceful indeed that D was overcome with emotions. We were just chatting with our guide H a couple of days ago about how humans have gone too far with outward explorations (as a Portuguese he would know that well) and it’s time, in the philosophy of Carl Jung, for inner explorations.

I learnt about Nuno Alvares Pereira: the Constable, founder of the House of Bragança, excellent general, blessed monk, who during his life on earth so ardently desired the Kingdom of Heaven that after his death, he merited the eternal company of the Saints. His worldly honors were countless, but he turned his back on them. He was a great Prince, but he made himself a humble monk. Saint Nuno (yes, he was beatified) even founded, built and endowed a church, the Carmo Convent, in which his body rests.

The Portuguese has that rile model to look forward to... far more than Henry, Vasco ot Alfonso. For the rest of the world,  in fact, the loss of religiosity in humankind also coincided with the rise of wars and mental health issues. We need purpose in our lives. I said to him, the more we look for purpose, the more we find it. That’s so true in the case of D. What a blessing indeed. 

As for me, I did feel the call to be at peace (inside) but did not feel the release of anxieties and the faith of hope as D did. I explained to her that it may be because I still feel the responsibility to provide for the family. It reminded me of what J once told me as he firmed up his decision to study Environment in Duke when my preference was for him to do Finance in Chicago U. His response was profound, “dad, you did what you had to do because you needed the economic security. That security has now allowed us to do what we want to do!”. I guess in my next act, having now provided responsibly, I would like to also to do some inner exploration and find my peace.

And so, on my 58th birthday, I first went on to find spirits of a different kind, the sort that wine lovers would approve: we visited valley vineyards, the valley being Duoro, a place as scenic as Fatima is spiritual. Its wines are bold, in the style of the elixir that provided liquid courage to the sailors 500 years ago when they asked for blessings at the Church of Santa Maria and sailed out from the mouth of Rio Tagus.