A Cure For Wellness - Lonnnnnng creepiness

I'd been looking forward to seeing this since I saw the trailer come out. It's got a funky title, a seemingly interesting premise, and the backdrop looked nice and spooky.

Official movie poster (20th Century Fox)

So, at 2 hours long, this Gore Verbinski (Pirates of the Caribbean film saga, The Ring, and Rango) movie is not an easy one to stay focused throughout, and it's a bit weird. 

*spoilers ahead*

Lockhart

I'll break the plot down as simply as possible.  Lockhart working for some big business, been promoted to the board, they call him up to talk about a merger with another business in order to save the whole business and make the top tier very rich (including Lockhart - played by Dane DeHaan).  Apparently the top dog (Pembroke played by Harry Groener) who needs to sign off on the merger has gone on a spa break to Switzerland, and sent a letter back saying he's not coming back. Lockhart is accused of dodgy dealings on a previous account he worked on, so the other members of the board send him to Switzerland in order to convince the main boss to come back and sign the paperwork.



Seems a little convoluted, but feasible. 

So off DeHaan goes, the typical swagger-filled arrogant young go-getter, engrossed in his career, thinking it will be a nice trip to Switzerland in and out.

There's a few memorable-ish characters along the way, like the driver who takes Lockhart from the airport through the town to the sanitarium on the hill where the spa and ultimately Lockhart's boss is.

Everyone is looking so happy at the sanitarium having "treatments", DeHaan gets told his boss is busy having one of said "treatments", Lockhart gets snarky, then told to come back at 7pm. He heads out tells driver to take him to hotel, car crash on way back to hotel.

Dr Vollmer

Lockhart wakes up in the sanitarium with a cast on his leg, tries to figure where his boss is. Tries to check out the secret looking areas in the sanitarium, talks to random patients, figures things aren't quite right. Meets a young girl called Hannah (Mia Goth - girl in the poster), as well as the Director of the Sanitarium  Dr Vollmer (Jason Isaacs).

I kind of lost the next hour or so as Lockhart tries to figure out exactly what is wrong, involving some eels, the water, some more eels, some more passive looking people, and some more water and some human experimentation.

Turns out the water is used to help filter eels through people's bodies to produce "the cure" and that is what has been keeping a centuries old baron alive (Dr Vollmer - the Director of the Sanitarium) in order to continue his line by having a child with his sister (Hannah - the young girl). (see I told you this was weird).

Lockhart figures this out, also figures out his leg was never broken, goes looking for Hannah. Turns out Hannah got her first period so is ready to have a kiddo. Vollmer has her in the caves beneath the Sanitarium to rape her and get her pregnant to continue his line of pure blood. Lockhart shows up before Vollmer can do the deed, a fight ensues, and just when Vollmer is about to feed Lockhart to some eels, Hannah smashes him with a spade to the head, he falls in and gets chewed up by those eels. Meanwhile, embers have emerged from the fire that was started during the fight and has set the sanitarium on fire.

Lockhart and Hannah escape, and end up crashing into the other members of the board from his job back home who have come to see what the hell is going on. They try to tell him to go back and help get the top dog Pembroke, Lockhart says "nope", and he and Hannah ride off together. The end.  😐

Confusing as hell, wayyyyyyyyyy too long, interesting concept but tried way too hard to make it creepy. Just ended up being convoluted and I left the cinema thinking "what just happened?"Not worth watching in a cinema, and only watch on Netflix if you're fully awake, have time on your hands and a fetish for eels.

4/10

Ola Beach Club - Hello and goodbye

Ola Beach Club's front facing the sea

The latest players on the scene on Sentosa, I was excited to check out Ola Beach Club one afternoon after work. Nice bar area on the front, storage for paddle boards etc out back, pool, funky seating arrangements out on the beach, this place looks the part for sure.

Strolled up to the place with my partner, and saw around 5 staff kind of joking around with each other at the bar area and none really paying attention to any customers (there were only maybe 3 or 4 sat out on the beach seating area in the first place). I grabbed their attention and asked to sit by the pool where there was a bit of shade as we fancied a bit of food. Waitress kind of threw down the menus and then walked off, only to come back and then ask us if we wanted a drink. While we were trying to give our drinks order she interrupted to tell us that about half of the food menu was not available, hmm ok, just the drinks then. Off she went and gave the order to the bar. One staff member frantically juicing fruits on her own, 3 or 4 stood around doing absolutely nothing. One in particular, literally did zero. I kind of felt sorry for her stood there all the time, maybe she could have been helping with the juicing?  

So we figure what we want to eat, but then trying to get a wait staff's attention was impossible, as they were all just joking around with each other and not paying attention. Finally we get someone to come over and take the order and we sit and wait for the drinks.  Before the drinks arrive, the guy comes over with the bill already.  Seriously? What if we wanted more orders later?  The place was dead, it's not as if it's hard to track our bill. Was pretty annoyed by that alongside the lack of menu items available and poor service.

We had the truffle fries and popcorn chicken (nice and spicy). To be fair, the food was ok, kinda pricey though and I resent having to pay a service charge especially when it was so poor.

I guess this place must be better at night time as a bar?  Or some other time when it's busier?  Who knows, I'm not sure I wanna bother with it again. TBC seems to remain the better Sentosa option...

If you're interested to see for yourself:

Ola Beach Club

46 Siloso Beach Walk

Sentosa, S(099005)

Tel: 6250 6978

http://www.olabeachclub.com

Linx 1010b Windows 10 tablet

Whistlestop review of this product that i've had in my possession for months now...

The Linx 1010b has an Intel Atom Z3735F Quad Core processor, 32 GB storage (with SD card reader), 2 GB RAM, and comes with Windows 10 Home preinstalled along with a Keyboard dock. All available for £139.99 (S$275 approx.)

• Comes well packaged

• This thing is heavy as hell, particularly with the keyboard attached.

• Setup is very quick

• Battery life is excellent initially, but charging the device is very very hit or miss with how long it takes to fully charge.

• Keyboard dock trackpad is poor, but gives a little additional battery.

• Sometimes disconnecting the keyboard and connecting it isn't seamless, but reliable mostly

• Product quality is generally good and performance is more than adequate. Not gonna set the world alight, but for a cheap Windows 10 tablet, what more would you expect?