Paa

Amitabh Bachchan’s talent seems to have no bounds. R Balki’s second directorial venture Paa stars or rather introduces Amitabh Bachchan as a 12 year old boy Auro, suffering from Progeria, a rare genetic disease augmenting the aging process and reducing the lifespan. Amitabh Bachchan’s get up is commendably well executed and unless you know he is Amitabh Bachchan, you will not get to know he is Amitabh Bachchan. Auro, the 12 year old high spirited boy, is out of the wedlock with a single parent (Vidya Balan). Vidya Balan plays the role of a well to do gynecologist, an independent woman, much similar in ideology to the role of Tabu from Balki’s last film Cheeni Kum. All the actors in the film have done justice to their role with Vida Balan striking out the most, of course with the exception of Amitabh Bachchan, whose performance will most probably fetch him his third Silver Lotus (national award.)

The cinematography of the film is decently poised with extensive use of wide angle lenses to limit Amitabh Bachchan’s height for the character of 12 year old Auro. The storyline keeps switching from tackling the issues of single parenthood and Progeria to corruption, slum dwelling, political power plays and awareness on safe sex, which arguably become a hindrance to main plot of Auro. Balki has touched the surface issues of Progeria, without paying attention to the psychology of the child suffering from it. The film is shot with an overtly optimistic perspective and the unnecessary time given to Abhishek Bachchan’s character of a young politician is definitely a mood breaker. The background score of the film is well paced and synchronized with the story. The film should carry an ‘Above 12’ viewership certificate as the issues of children out of wedlock, condom and the intimate scenes are not ideal for audience below 12 years of age.

Balki is definitely a fine director but both his films have suffered from confused themes, hence Cheeni Kum missed the due recognition for their film craft and the same might be applicable for Paa. Though predictable the film’s ending is emotional none the less. Sticking comparisons can be traced between Paa and Cheeni Kum in terms of portrayal of women, sympathy towards ailing child, social message and well tuned sense of humour. All said and done, Paa as an overall infotainment package is a must watch film and you can walk in the theatre with your hearts locked to your lungs otherwise Auro will steal them with his Auromania!

Redemption

Redemption

The Fortune stood stolen,
the jewels were sold
Legacy was buried,
to be remembered only by the old
My Child, those days were golden,
Is what I was told
.
.

The shine remains but the metal is lost,
lethargic rusty mind covered with frost
why should I shield my breath?
His kindness is fraud
I may not be God,
but I am immortal till death
.
.

The clock ticks, increasing the pain
with every passing hour faith becomes difficult to retain
He is no lion who walks in a circus to entertain,
It is time to reclaim lost glory
rewrite the century old story
The Crownless Shall be The King Again.

Reality Bytes…Worse than a dog

The camera makes everyone a tourist in other people’s reality, and eventually in one’s own.
Susan Sontag


Sitting in your living room after a hectic day of work, browsing through your television for something to refresh your over stressed nerves; all you get is a sneak peek in the life and activities of a dozen of unemployed wanna be celebrities who are caged in an in studio dungeon and aired on national television. On an optimistic note, you might find talent hunt shows, aired every season on almost all General Entertainment Channels (GEC), but the amusement lies in the fact that every show claims to be the biggest thing on Indian television and every winner is claimed to be the next Mohammed Rafi or Kishore Kumar, while reality asserts that most of these singers, winning a show on reality television bubble out by the next season.
It was in the 90’s when AXN was home to programs which had a ‘dare’ or a stunt in them, these days anyone remotely related to media & entertainment can be a Khiladi.

Indian cinema has always been under attack for “cut-copy-paste” from western cinema but cinema’s poor cousin television is following the same trend. Almost all the reality shows on Indian television have an inspirational muse running in Europe or America. One talent hunt show went on to such an extent of idol worshiping the original American show that it shamelessly copied their typography and background score. One reality show imported everything from a show running in another country and replaced the word Brother with Boss.

Gone are the days of Hum Log where our own family values and system were projected on the small screen, The days of Buniyaad talking about the partition of India to a generation which was not a witness to it or the days of Ramyaan and Mahabharat on Indian television when our mythology served as basis for inspiration. Reality television was not a nuisance initially when Mr. Amitabh Bachchan graced the small screen with Kaun Banega Crorepati, even this program was based on a program in America but it had intellectual content to offer to the audience unlike some reality shows which go on to the extent of vulgar skin show and allow unparliamentarily language.
We as educated viewers must question ourselves that what are we feeding our and our children’s mind with?
Is this the content that will lay unconscious building blocks of the personality of the future generation?

Reality television with its cancerous growth, has penetrated 24 hour news channels which are already suffering from lack of content, news channels should ideally to telecast political, world or sports news employs programs with stand up comedians to fill its afternoon slots. As I write this article I can overhear the television in my living room and more than words, beeps are audible; needless to say an abusive BOSS is at work!

Only that thing sells which has a demand, unfortunately GEC’s target our baser passion and tickle our gossip bones. To look at the flip side, the lack of programs with a right balance of information and entertainment is lacking. Media ethics has remained a much debatable topic but we must transcend beyond debate initiate action. If junk food is bad for health, junk information and entertainment can also have its adverse effects on our mental and intellectual well being as well. This article will serve its purpose fully only if the readers attest these views by boycotting these intellectually hollow programs.

Why So Serious?

Bramha made Horses and Donkeys with a difference, unfortunately his other creation- man is disregarding that difference...

India would have been deprived of the magnificent art, architecture, cuisines and literature with which the legendary Mughal emperors calligraphed the history of India if Behram Khan, Humayun’s general, decided to seek opportunities and explore the unexplored rather than grooming Humayun’s orphan Son Jallal-ud-din, who later went on to become Akbar the Great.

Everything around seems anarchic and absurd. Opportunism has suddenly become passive after assessing the futility of my decisions. The myth of Sisyphus is an exemplification of futility... he was punished by the Gods to carry a heavy stone over his shoulder and climb a mountain, only to see the stone fall down from the mountain. He would repeat the monotonous exercise untiringly again and again, knowing that the stone will never be perfectly placed on the paramount. Albert Camus in his essay “The Myth of Sisyphus” professes that the myth of Sisyphus is interpreted as a tragedy only because we assume Sisyphus to be unhappy of what he is doing; one must imagine Sisyphus to be happy, to make meaning out of life.

I further advocate the stance, Let it be assumed that no God punished Sisyphus to climb the mountain and try to place the stone, he did it out of his own free will (on hourly-daily-weekly basis as he obliged to do), knowing in his heart of hearts that the stone will never settle on the paramount. His act of climbing the mountain with the will to climb was neutralised by his pessimism about the stone being placed at the paramount. Time passed by, he dissolved himself physically and mentally into the act of climbing the hill with the stone mounted on his shoulder, making it his second nature. The stone, which he only removed at the pinnacle to be subsequently rolled down and lifted by him again, became an extension to his body.

A snail on the pinnacle observed Sisyphus religiously; matching if not exceeding Sisyphus’ passion to place the stone on the paramount. Sisyphus’ physical strength, honed over years of repetition of the same act was also matched by the Snail with his steel like shell. Slowly, the Snail, without informing Sisyphus, started to push the small stones off the paramount by the force of his shell. He went over to the extent of rubbing his shell against the rough and sharp edges of the pinnacle to smoothen them. The shell did not break, not because Zius/Bramha blessed the snail with an unbreakable shell; the Snail knew his physical limitations, beyond which he tactically pushed and rubbed his shell against equally hard surfaces with an angle which would put bearable pressure on his shell. Watching the Snail, other snails also joined him and started doing the same. Not only did they remove the small stones which disbalanced Sisyphus’ stone, they also buffed the pinnacle to a flat base for the stone to settle on. All this happened in Sisyphus’ ignorance as his mind was focused on his climb and the stone, not on the pinnacle. Subconsciously he observed that Snail and later other snails on hill top.

One fine day, Sisyphus climbed the mountain with the stone over his shoulder, reaching the top, he tried to place the stone on the pinnacle, doing what he did for out of a mechanic reaction, he climbed down the hill to lift the fallen stone again; only to realise that the stone was not there, it was resting on the pinnacle. All of a sudden the jigsaw made sense to him; he could decipher the movement of the Snail on the hill top, slowly followed by other snails. His mammoth achievement after countless attempts did not infuse joy in him, he realised that he could have cleared the pinnacle with one strong brush of his foot for which a Snail had to risk his shell!

As SOMEONE said, everyone is an opportunist, so was the Snail in my story, he worked to clear the pinnacle, not out of a sense of duty but out of the need of the stone to be placed on the pinnacle which would enable him to defy the barrier of height over which the mountain took pride, and use the stone, placed on the mountain, to reach a height, unachieved previously and thereafter.

And So He did!

Its 3:20 a.m and I should sleep or study for my Rise-fall test, but at Night i don’t want a Fall.
I will watch As Good As it Gets for the Nth time.

“Always Look At the Bright Side of Your Life”
Melvin Udall (Jack Nicholson)

Cheeni Kum

Cheeni kum marks a non-conventional Bollywood cinema.

The element of comedy and the chemistry between a 64 year old ‘young’ chef, played by Amithabh Bachchan and a 34 year old Indian tourist, portrayed by Tabbu, bridge the age gap of 30 years between the two.

Amitabh Bachchan’s vigor style and overall appeal which makes him irresistibly sexy justifies his candidature for a lead role at the age of 64 while his contemporaries are battling it out in politics. His overcoat and muffler, glasses, ponytail, jeans and even the tracksuit add heat to his aura.

With London as backdrop, Tabbu’s criticism of the Zafarani Biryani marks the onset of the romance between her and Big B which gets intense by Tabbu’s regular visit to his restaurant, long walks and spending time together for London sightseeing.

Tabbu fits in the role of a matured and daring single woman who consciously falls in love with a guy six years elder to her father!

Under the direction of R Balakrishnan the title track of the movie, Zohra Sehgal as Big B’s amusing mother and Big B’s affection for the 7 year old girl, ‘Sexy’ who is suffering from blood cancer are the elements apart from the age-gap afflicted love story that keep the viewers in high sprits during the first half of the film.

Paresh Rawal, who plays a Gandhian father, fails to live up to the expiations set by the viewers.

In the second half Delhi is canvassed as the backdrop and viewers can afford to go out of the hall to grab cold drink and pop corn or even attend the not so important calls because the film goes off-track and becomes stretched at times.

The climax is chaotic as Paresh Rawal goes on fast to stop his daughter from marrying a man almost twice her age; this act amuses his neighbors but not the viewers.

The film also acts as an advertisement film since stuff like spices, artificial sugar, glasses and motorcycles are marketed effectively through surrogate advertising.

The editor of the film must have been on a holiday as the latter part of the movie goes offbeat. The first half is unquestionably entertaining and hilarious but after the second half you will feel “movie me Cheeni Kum hai.”

Die Hard 4

It’s Willis all the way!

Bruce Willis hits the silver screen in his most famous portrayal as Detective John McClane in Live Free Or Die Hard a.k.a. Die Hard 4.0, the third installment of the famous film Die Hard which grossed over $100million worldwide and made Bruce Willis a household name.

If vintage action is what you crave for in the contemporary films then Die Hard 4 is the right liquor for you. Well past his prime, buried in debts, divorced and facing aloofness from his children; Detective John McClane safeguards a local hacker Matt Farrell (Justin Long) who is threatened and fights cyber terrorists who plan to halt the cyber and electric operations in the entire country and toy with it. Pistols, automatic Guns, crashing cars, bomb blasts, helicopters, jets; John plays with all of them and still without a broken bone!

It hardly takes time for the electrifying action in the film to bedazzle the viewers; saving Matt from a terrorist attack gives the viewers an idea of what’s in store for the next couple of hours.

Under the direction of Len Wiseman, the film differs in direction from the first three films as there is rap music playing in the backdrop instead of the original “let it snow” used in the first three films. After some encounters with the bad guys and blowing up a couple of cars and a helicopter; which marks action and special effects at its thrilling best; the viewers get a chance to come back to their senses in intermission.

When the local police, the intelligence agency and the F.B.I. fail to teach a lesson to the notorious terrorists, John McClane takes the task himself and escapes some near-death encounters while fighting with his bare hands. Action continues in the second half of the film and the action lovers of the 80’s get old wine in a new bottle.

The morphed President(s) speech and the breakdown of The White House are the two things apart from Bruce Willis which are remarkable on screen.

When the terrorists abduct John’s grouchy daughter things get personal and can only become more Action packed. The encounter between John’s truck and a fighter jet in the climax is the crown jewel of the movie and when all the dust and smoke is cleared the bruised Bruce saves his daughter and saves America yet gain; but this time its not Christmas, its 4^th of July, the American Independence Day. In the end it may appear to be an Amitabh Bachchan Bollywood action film in which the police arrives once the hero has floored the villain.

Bruce’s patent white west is replaced by green body hugging shirt to cover his age but even at 52 Willis looks fit enough to give complex to a 20 year old in a gym and it goes without saying that he was born to do the role of Detective John McClane.

The overpowering action in the film veils your eye to find a technical flaw in the film (if there is any) but over all its well directed, edited and action is used in profusion at the right time

(You can say all the time).

If you haven’t seen the prequels to the film even then you can go for it as there is hardly any link established but once you see this, you will be raring to watch the first three action packed and equally exciting films, but be cautious to leave its after-effects in the multiplex rather than being John McClane yourself while you drive back and yell “Yippee-Ka-Yee!”

Demoncracy

I wonder at a wonderful word called DEMOCRACY. Assuming a total of 70 crore voters this election. It is an amusing calculation i was pondering upon. out of this 70 crore (all figures approx.) reduce atleast 15 crore haughty citizens who will not show up to vote, another 10 crore at least who belong to different political parties, have a relative/friend in a particular party/ whose grandparents have set out a family tradition to blindly vote for one political party because once upon a time.... or who just press the button on the party with the most fancy emblem; I will not be, by any means wrong to say that that a minimum of 25 crore votes will be influenced by the unholy trinity of liquor (the holy spirit), gun (the decisive son) and religion (the father of all man propelled catastrophe). Everything boils down to 50 crore biased votes out of 70 crores.

Its Good to Be a King... watch the Tudors on Fox History, every Friday 9 P.M.

ROULETTE

Prayers sound hollow

I seize poison but I am spineless to swallow

The noon of faith has climaxed into the twilight of agnosticism

Is the night of atheism true wisdom?

Annual cycles have completed a score

Consuming the zeal to live more

All the World’s a Stage

Through Death’s Trapdoor, We can flee from the torturous Cage

Darkness stimulates temporary redemption

An image of life reaching a rewarding junction

The thirst for Nirvana

Is quenched only by Marijuana

To Hell! I will rebel against my fate

Want to spin the helm of life like roulette.