On my long haul Qatar flight last week I was watching some movies on board, one of them was The Bucket List. It immediately got my attention and I watched it until finish (being spoiled with so much movie choices I tend to just preview one movie for few minutes before deciding if it’s worth watching or to continue scanning other movies). Starred by Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman, the story focuses on two terminally ill men, billionaire Edward Cole (Jack Nicholson) and car mechanic Carter Chambers(Morgan Freeman). One of the early scene is Edward sipping a cup of Kopi Luwak, call it as “the rarest beverage in the world”.

Edward and Carter meet each other in the hospital where they share a room in the hospital (it is Edwards’ hospital, all rooms are shared ones. “I run hospitals, not health spas” is Edward’s motto) . After both of them diagnosed with cancer with a year or even less to live, they start to complete a bucket list and plan a journey to fulfill it. The bucket list contains things they want to do most in life before they die. They realize the desire to spend the time they have left doing everything they ever wanted to do in life. Edward promises to finance the trip.

The list contains :

  1. Witness something truly majestic
  2. Help a complete stranger for a common good
  3. Laugh till I cry
  4. Drive a Shelby mustang
  5. Kiss the most beautiful girl in the world
  6. Get a tattoo
  7. Skydiving
  8. See the pyramids
  9. Get back in touch with …(a daughter)
  10. See Rome

Then they check out from the hospitals and hit the road to pursue their long unrecognized dreams. They go to some magnificent places in the world (which I myself will surely have them in my wish list, if I have any) like Pyramid, Serengeti, Taj Mahal and Great Wall of China. The two who have been perfect strangers couple months before now becomes true friends for life.

After one twist that leads to break-up in their journey, Carter and Edward carry on their lives. Carter returned to his family but soon has to be rushed to the hospital. There Edward visits him and Carter reveals the origin of Kopi Luwak. They burst out laughing and Carter cross off “laugh till I cry”. He then gives the list to Edward and insist him to finish the rest of the list alone.

There’s no miracle in the movie. The movie closes with Matthew, Edward’s assistant, place a coffee can containing Edward’s ashes besides Carter’s who passed away earlier inside a small box on the top of Mount Everest. As he does so, he crosses off the last unfinished item on the Bucket List which is “witness something truly majestic”.

By the way, Kopi Luwak is is coffee made from coffee berries which have been eaten by and passed through the digestive tract of the Luwak (kind of civet found in South East Asia). It’s a bit strange that Edward doesn’t know this in the beginning. I live in Java, but Kopi Luwak is like a ghost to me: you hear about it, people talk about it yet you never have it in real life. It could steal a place in my bucket list ….