D.O.M.

I was getting so carried away listing what made me happy about the movies this morning that I forgot to mention a rather nasty experience during my viewing of Trouble Every Day.

For those not in the know, there are a couple of movie theatres in Singapore that are located in some older housing areas, eg. around Chinatown or Beach Road. Some, or maybe all, examples are Yangtze Cinema (after the river in China) and Golden Theatre. Because of their location, they tend not to draw a young, hip crowd, but rather, a demographic almost exclusively comprised of retirees. Old men, to be more exact. And Dirty Old Men, or D.O.M., to be exact. Because of their proximity to the city centre, they are allowed to screen R21 movies, which theatres in the suburbs aren't allowed to. This has become a draw for these D.O.M., who flock to these theatres in the hopes of catching some nudity to spice up their dreary lives.

Sometimes they're rewarded, because as we all know, many flicks out there are nothing more than glorified porn. But often, they're disappointed by arthouse movies that show nudity almost as an afterthought. Or nudity in such creepy, uncomfortable situations that it's not a turn on at all. Which was the case in the aforementioned French psycho-horror film.

You have to feel sorry for them sometimes, because porn is hard to come by in Singapore if you're old and uneducated and know nothing of the internet. Sure, you could take a trip up to Johor Bahru in good ol' Malaysia where the bootleggers will be more than happy to sell you the entire collector's edition boxed set of Back Door Hussies, but then again, with their (probably) frigid wives at home, they can't really get their rocks off. One might also argue that if they saved the money from a couple of sessions, they might be able to head down to Geylang and have some real sex for a change. And that's entirely valid. Except they probably aren't the type who have the notion of saving for a rainy (or horny) day ingrained in them.

But then again, that doesn't give them the right to jerk off in the theatre and make nuisances of themselves for serious filmgoers. Come to think of it, I was probably a minority there, in that I wasn't there for sex and nudity, and really wanted to watch the movie.

So I went in and sat in the second last row with my friend, and we were probably younger than everyone there by at least 30 years. Not that there was a huge crowd, mind you, probably under ten people. There was this older guy, probably in his fifties or sixties, behind me and to my right. He was OK at first, but then when the titties started appearing onscreen, I began to hear a rhythmic rubbing sound. I identified it as either fabric or skin, and was familiar enough with the art of self-fornication to be able to know what was going on. As can be expected, I was immediately pissed off. Here I am trying to get all I can out of the film, and there you are, also trying to get the damndest you can out of it, but in all the wrong ways.

After a while though, I began to feel mildly sorry for him, and even a little amused. He had picked the wrong movie completely, since there was not a hint of pure eroticism contained in the film. Whatever erotic impulses the characters may have had were completely subsumed in the sheer creep-factor of the framing and the sound design. I took perverse pleasure, even, in listening for his sighs of frustration as the director refused to reward him over and over again with any bit of gratification whatsoever. People would start to have sex, he'd go rubrubrub, and then - whoa! - they'd start getting their necks chewed out and their lips or labia bitten off. I grinned to myself; his frustration and annoyance were palpable (and audible).

It's because of poor people like these that the PAP (a.k.a. Our Lords And Masters) should reconsider their ban on porn. Imagine, D.O.M. would be much happier people if they could have Hongkong Penthouse on their hands. Then they'd be spending a lot more time at home, instead of triapsing all over the place in their old age. We do have to think about respecting the elderly, and providing elderly benefits, after all, and one of them should be free porn.

Free Porn For The Aged!

Now there's a campaign I could stand behind.