loud movies, brave new world

today i accompanied my mum to johor bahru.

she wanted me to watch 'bourne ultimatum' with her
but i refused. :/
i have this strange aversion to action movies.
i think this started after watching the 'infernal affairs' triology a few yrs back.
(those of you who have no idea what 'infernal affairs' is about
can go google it...it's this blockbuster chi movie with big names
like andy lau, tony leung, leon lai, shawn yue and edison chen etc..)
'infernal affairs 2' must be one of the most violent movies i've watched.
the dead bodies just kept piling up.
the worse thing was that i was seated in the very first row,
and thanks to the marvelous technology known as DTS surround sound,
every gunshot was amplified,
which meant that the violence was magnified manifold.
i wonder what the heck DTS's for?
its main purpose seems to be to amplify
screams, (from the horror flicks)
gunshots,
and other assorted sounds of battles.
tsk tsk such things make me very nervous.

i've friends who tell me that if they are to go to a movie,
it must be something spectacular, like
epic battles,
virtuosic fight sequences,
eye-boggling computer effects,
exhilarating and heart-stopping car chases.

but for me, i'm not impressed by
grand stories of one man trying to save the world
from the slimy paws of some terrorists by jumping from planes,
or emerging unscathed from a ferocious gun fight
after singlehandedly shooting all the enemies,
and doing other superhuman stunts.

i'm not thrilled to watch helicopters exploding in balls of fire,
or how people could fight suspended in air.

i don't care for a film that is set in the sahara desert or the himalayas,
with plenty of superhuman adventures,
and grand gestures.

i would rather watch a quiet little film
that is set entirely on a sofa in a living room,
but with meaningful dialogue
and wonderful human sentiment.

on another note,
i most unexpectedly bumped into a student and her family
at JB.
i think she was initially quite shocked
that she completely did not acknowledge me.

so for a full 5 seconds,
i was there waving at her and nodding at her family,
and they looked positively surprised.
they must've been thinking
'who's this strange person gawking and waving at us?'
until a few secs later,
when i identified myself and things became clear.

quite amusing.

on yet another note,
i've given up trying to read haruki murakami's 'a wild sheep chase'.
i've read about 80 pages of it...
deep stuff, very philosophical...
and it's so full of malaise--
the characters are all living such
meaningless and depressing existences.
what's more, the plot gets increasingly confusing,
so i've decided to put it aside for now.
i'm certainly not in the mood for meandering narratives right now.

and i've started on 'brave new world'.
can you believe someone could write
about genetic engineering as early as 1932?!
that's what this book's about.
cool stuff.