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Tinggal Meninggal (Better Off Dead)- Movie Review@titisnariyah160d
In social situations, we encounter many different types of people, from the familiar to the extraordinary. For example, within the family, neighbourhood, school or even the workplace. Although we may know them in a general sense, such as their name and what department they work in at the office, not everyone is aware of their true nature, what they are going through, or their family circumstances.
This time, I want to discuss a film that highlights a social situation that is very relevant to our daily lives.
Gema (Omara Esteghlal) is an only child who grew up alone. Not because his parents died, but because his parents were never really there for Gema, so that when he grew up, Gema became a man who experienced social awkwardness. Gema shares an office with Kerin (Mawar De Jong), Ilham (Ardit Erwandha), Adriana (Shindy Huang), Danu (Mario Caesar), Naya (Nada Novia) and Mr. Cokro (Muhadkly Acho), who is the head of the division.
Gema is unable to join in and joke around with his colleagues. He is always invisible and feels ignored. While he wants to try to socialise with his colleagues, he is haunted by a great fear that ultimately makes Gema give up and return to sitting at his cubicle.
Until one day, Gema's father passed away and her colleagues were concerned and began to pay attention to Gema. All of her colleagues tried harder to care for and look after Gema. Gema realised this change and concluded one thing: someone had to die to get sympathy from others.
One by one, Gema thought about who she could make up a story about dying? Starting with her cat, her grandparents, her mother, and even herself if possible!
This aroused the suspicion of one of her colleagues, who waited for the big secret to be revealed.
EVALUATION
Just Dying becomes a shared reflection and makes us realise one thing: sometimes we are too insensitive and indifferent. That is ultimately why people like Gema are born. Throughout the film, there are many pieces of the story that are very close to us, or perhaps there are parts of our lives that have been in a phase similar to what Gema feels. There must be tangled threads that are slowly unravelled, there must be courage that is awakened from a deep sleep in a pocket of discomfort.
SUMMARY
Tinggal Meninggal can be watched on Netflix, and all the actors are very cool. Although when it was released in cinemas, this film competed with a massive demo in August last year and got few viewers, but after entering the OTT platform, many people began to realise that it was a shame that this film flopped in cinemas. Audiences hope that the filmmakers behind Tinggal Meninggal will create another equally impressive work like Tinggal Meninggal.
That concludes my review of this film. Thank you for reading and commenting. See you in the next film.
Titis N
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›Better Off Dead Movie Review: Once Underrated, Now a Cult Classic@agmoore339d
Spoiler Alert...Spoiler Alert...Spoiler Alert
Some people take Ambien to help them go to sleep. Some people take Sominex. My technique? Re-watch old movies on my iPad. This past week I finished one of my favorites, Better Off Dead, a vintage comedy from the 1980s. While this movie was panned by many critics when it first came out, over the years the film has achieved cult status among those who appreciate dark, quirky comedy.
One way to create a comic effect is to offer the unexpected. Better Off Dead does this in spades. In the YouTube clip below, for example, the reaction of the class to a geometry lesson is not expected. Anyone who has ever sat in a high school geometry class will not expect to see rapt expressions on the students' faces. The bit where the teacher asks students to take out their homework is especially 'unexpected'.
If the rest of this movie had been unexceptional, I think the classroom scene alone would have justified its cult status. However, the filmmaker keeps delivering.
He creates this comedic gem around the slimmest of plot lines: A teenager is depressed because he has been dumped by his girlfriend. It is the teenager's obsession that drives his actions, and the film.
Lane is the teenager. Beth is the girlfriend. The opening scene in Lane's bedroom sets the dynamic for the story.
Shortly after this scene, Beth breaks up with Lane. Her breakup speech is short, and honest and unlike any I've heard in any movie before this. She states plainly, "I really think it's in my best interest if I went out with someone more popular. Better looking. Drives a nicer car."
Lane is devastated. He doesn't want to live. Hence the title of the film, Better Off Dead. However, this is a comedy, and even suicide is funny. Lane's aborted attempts at suicide become a recurrent theme in the film. As a depressed, low energy teen, Lane goes about suicide much in the way he handled his homework in the YouTube video at the top of this blog. There is not much planning and there is terrible execution.
Here's one attempt that doesn't work out too well (or, rather, it works out very well).
Recurrent themes are an important element in the film--almost like the clash of symbols in a symphony. The filmmaker has us trained to wait for these 'clashes'. There are, for example, the Japanese twins. Only one of these twins can speak English. Unfortunately this twin learned English by listening to Howard Cosell. Check out this clip:
Then there is the recurring 'symbol clash' of Lane's clueless mother, and her dreadful cooking. Here is a scene where she gives new meaning to the term 'boiled pork':
But if there is one thread, one resounding crescendo clash that has the value of crescendo, it is the paperboy. Introduced early in the story, almost as a demonic presence (at one point in the film a character refers to the boy as a 'thing' rather than a person), the paperboy takes us through the highs and lows of the film--even to the very end. Long after I first watched this movie the phrase, "Two Dollars"--representing the boy's unrelenting mission to collect on the paper bill--
would crack me up. Say those words to any confirmed fan of Better Off Dead and you are likely to receive a smile as reward. Here's a compilation of scenes in which the fiendish paper boy appears.
There is a secondary story line in the movie. An exchange student from France is held virtual prisoner by Lane's neighbor. Eventually, Lane and this student form an alliance that is beneficial to both. Of course, this relationship becomes romantic and allows Lane to leave behind his fascination with Beth.
Here is a scene where the neighbor and French student are guests in Lane's home. In this scene, Lane is apparently contemplating doing something unhealthy with paint primer. Absent minded, he carries the primer to the dinner table. The neighbor mistakes the liquid for a beverage.
Many secondary characters add memorably to the film. These include not only his mother and father, but also someone who appears on the screen for just a few moments. Here is the postman delivering mail:
The actor who plays the postman, Taylor Negron, was likely chosen for the role because of another brief but memorable appearance he made in the 80s classic, Fast Times at Ridgemont High. In that movie he plays a pizza delivery man. Watch the scene here:
It took me three nights to finish Better Off Dead. The movie put me to sleep quickly, so I had to pick it up where I left off on the following night.
Comedy is personal, and cultural. Why is something funny to me and not to someone else? Certainly, established movie critic didn't 'get' the film when it was released. Here, for example, are Siskel and Ebert panning Better Off Dead:
I don't see what they see, but I accept it. It's not a generational issue, because both men are of my generation (one is five years older, and the other is one year older).
Another reviewer, writing in the New York Times, offered this assessment:"...the film doesn't seem to have much of a focus. But it doesn't seem to want one, either. It simply piles on the jokes about suburban family life..." This reviewer is correct about one thing, I believe. He describes the humor as 'anarchic'. Maybe that's why I like it.
One of the most positive statements I can make about the film is that the humor has aged well. According to Screen Rant, the film has been "embraced" by contemporary audiences. It hit the top ten among subscribers on HBO this month. Most of the actors in the film are old now. The paper boy, played by Demian Slade, is 53. The postman, Taylor Negron, died some years ago. And yet, this movie is fresh, still surprising audiences.
If you want to catch the movie, it's streaming on HBO/MAX for subscribers. Other streaming services have it for rent or sale.
Teen suicide is a serious subject that many would consider to be completely inappropriate as the plot element of teen comedy. Savage Steve Holland, writer and director of 1985 teen comedy Better Off Dead can, in his defence, say that his work is autobiographical and actually inspired by his own failed attempts to kill himself in teen years.
Holland’s fictional alter ego and protagonist, played by John Cusack, is Lane Myer, high school student in Northern Californian town of Greendale. His life revolves about two obsessions – one is skiing and another is Beth Truss (played by Amanda Wyss), beautiful girl whom he was dating for past six months. When she leaves him for the sake of arrogant and better-looking jock Roy Stalin (played by Aaron Dozier), he is so devastated that he attempts suicide. His efforts are unsuccessful, just as attempts to win over Beth that usually ends in major embarrassment or injury. His unbearable misery, completely ignored by his eccentric family, begins to wane when Monique Junot (played by Diane Franklin), French exchange student housed next door, becomes showing romantic interest in him.
This film in its essence follows the most basic cliches of 1980s teen comedies, including nerdy and in some other way handicapped protagonist who vainly pursues romance with beautiful blonde unaware that real happiness awaits in the form of seemingly plain brunette. However, all those expecting typical 1980s teen comedy will be surprised in different ways. Most obvious is complete absence of sex, swear words and gross out humour. Holland has worked in animation and adds couple of animated scenes in order to provide some sort of Greek chorus or illustrate Lane’s frustrations and fantasies. More unusual is large collection of really quirky characters that includes menacing paper boy (played by Demian Slade); Lane’s 8-year old brother (played by Scooter Stevens) who is genius both at building futuristic gadgets and scoring with women; Lane’s mother (played by Kim Darby) who is completely oblivious to her lack of culinary skills that turns every meal into disaster; and, finally, Lane’s best friend Charles De Mar (played by Curtis Armstrong) whose drugs obsession might explain why he is still going to high school while being close to thirty. This approach, which is closer to Monthy Python than the likes of Porky’s, works best in the first half of the film, when the lack of tight and conventional plots allows many vignettes that depict different ways and different characters that abuse, hamper or humiliate protagonist when he doesn’t do it himself. In the second half, when the conventional narrative takes over and Lane has to defeat his skiing rival and win the girl, Better Off Dead starts to become uncomfortably predictable, quality of humour decreases and lack of proper laughs are compensated with soundtrack which would sound annoying to many of the audiences that don’t feel much nostalgia towards 1980s. With audience unprepared for unconventional teen comedy, Better Off Dead failed at box office and its main star, John Cusack, apparently hated it. Like many such films, passage of time and increase of nostalgia gave it cult status, but even those who care little about past decades would probably be at least a bit entertained that provided something completely different in the real of teen comedy.
