WELCOME ME

I shall call it a sabbatical. An unnecessary sabbatical. But here we are and back on the road.

Whatever prompted me back into the deliciously real world of blogging again? A class assignment. Yes you heard me right. If facts are to be believed then 80% of a 1 credit course dedicated to blogging shall contribute towards my final grade. And the first question is ‘Who am I?’ Easy? But, of course.

About as easy as back when I was preparing for my TOEFL examination, and the voice prompt egged me on to describe my room and dumped a 10 second timer on me for necessary preparation. And so I spluttered “My room is….erm…large. It is bright and colourful. I love my room. Uh…” Nervous laughter punctuated the monstrosity of a meaningless sentence. Describe my room? I can talk how digital technology is revolutionizing the microfinance sector, and how the Global North needs to stop monopolizing. Period. But describe my room? Splutter. And then some.

Since when did I become such a complicated creature that the details in my very own bedroom started escaping me? The deep magenta wall, flanked by light wooden wardrobes with inward ridges. The giant television set that still has cable, covered by frilly peach fabric. Just about worse than Nat Geo in Hindi. But just about. Because, really I watched MTV Splitsvilla all the time.

Therefore, ‘Who am I?’ will be answered. With much aplomb and symmetry. But it really isn’t as simple as I would imagine. For starters, am I a Grad student? A Post-Grad student? Did I just complete my under-graduation? Or those nights I spent away in a desultory daze courtesy copious alcohol, were they not really celebrating my graduation? Sigh. Welcome me to the United States of America.

Love.

'TWAS A GOOD PLAY

The light comes on to reveal a staid, wooden table. One of the legs, seemingly shorter, lulls the staid, wooden table into an inconvenient motion. Until suddenly it jerks her into conversation. She is sitting opposite him. And in their loose, daily attire they start talking about super-heroes.


She: Really?

He: Yes, I am serious. I posses actual superpowers.

She: Uh huh. And what might these superpowers be?

He: I cannot tell you. When I start telling people, they start...(emphatic pause, deliberate stare)...dying.

She: Err....

He: Yes, I kill people with my talk. That is indeed my superpower.

She: What do you mean? (darts a look here, darts another there.)

He: It can be quite gruesome if I so wish. It takes the beginnings of forming my lips into ovals, moistening my lips, and expending the slightest whoooooosh of a word. I can feel the world around me spinning, Yes, I can feel it. There is a sudden energy that suddenly grips me. I feel like my brain is aware of a brand new consciousness. A world with my victims, and a world without. I have the power, the simple power of only talking about this power. And then the schism penetrating my consciouness, vanishes into thin air, taking with it the victims as I so desire. It is devastating my power, in execution and in style. Such ultimate power, all contained in a little, itchy ball dying to escape my throat...

She: (yawns)

He: (looks away, defeated) Well, looks like my superpower is to kill people with my talk.

DEAR FRIEND

Dear friend,

Once upon a time there was her, who promised with fancy. She beheld wistful glimpses into the future resplendent with gaiety and promise. Yet, she rued her failing friendships from the past and nodded solemnly.

‘One day we will leave. And you will be here and I will be there. It won’t be the same you know, and I cannot bear to think about that. I don’t know what I would do without you.’

‘Why? You will be here and I will be there. Once you are used to the difference, the distance won’t matter.’

‘It hasn’t worked in the past. Why would it work now?’

But it would. If only you had remembered me there, flung from a social extravaganza into a life less lively. Adapting to the old family that reared its brand new façade and grunted to enliven conversation. I didn’t laugh the same way, or cry the same way. I didn’t grant the same way, the way I did when you were my family.
What good really is nostalgia? What good, when you have chosen your life. Sometimes you curl up in your bed struggling under the heavy darkness alive with a strange kingdom, and you think of me. Your hand reaches to me amidst doubts and self-pity, but the blackness prevents you from seeing straight and you retract. I call the next day and you half sob. But my heart has become impervious and I strain it. But my heart has become impervious.

What good are these words that will never reach you? Dear friend, I remember you with a touch of mirth. But the pending has assumed the past. It would not work now.

Love,

Dear friend.

KITHS KINS AND THE SHINS

There is an airplane waiting to whisk me away to distant waters. No, the airplane is not a metaphor for my warty frog waiting to receive a double dose of my minty mouth (for I do brush with minty toothpaste that promises to kill my plaque as well. Revolutionary toothpaste! Such a breath of fresh air.) No, the distant waters are not the gingerbread house made of gingerbread in ginger flavour that is cosy and comfortable and homely and fairy taley (and edible!) all at the same time. 'Tisnt.

I am expected to board the flying contraption and cross borders to alien countries with contentious space-folk stories and elaborate millitary plans. Oh but the Cold War is past and we are in the grip of a whole new horror. Obesity! Wait. And....anorexia! Well, I am expected to land in the midst of a dichotomy anyway. Excellent.

And one is gripped with an all-too-familiar feeling of the throat constricting, struggling to force our affected greetings while blinking rapidly. Because the new compatriots will not always understand. And will probably not take too kindly to your love affair with Nutella, tequila and the dream back in wonderla. And when you ask them if they know your kith & kin because the chances of knowing them from a billion strong is not entirely negligible, they will rationalize. And sometimes laugh. And then this love affair will dwindle away as a one-night-can't-stand.

Which is why I love The Shins.

Gold teeth and a curse for this town were all in my mouth.
Only, i don't know how they got out, dear.
Turn me back into the pet that i was when we met.
I was happier then with no mind-set.

And if you'd 'a took to me like
A gull takes to the wind.
Well, i'd 'a jumped from my tree
And i'd a danced like the king of the eyesores
And the rest of our lives would 'a fared well.

Wish me luck. Please.

NOSTALGIMMICKS

I know I haven't told you, but I have had rather intimate ties with theatre. While co-directing a play two years ago for the theatre group Dramanon (which incidentally has its reach in Manipal, Bangalore and Hyderabad if you are interested) I had written a heartfelt Director's note. I suddenly found it and am reproducing it here to gain your acceptance a tad bit more. I am kidding.

Here in it's original and undiluted form:

It all began that bright, sunny afternoon when Dramanon converged at our revered rendezvous point; the script was decided upon, some dates finalized, designations nominated…and we were rolling again! And thus, ensued a recycled reaction of regular entertainment, daily jokes, frequent bouts of stress and screaming sessions, intermittent paranoia and the eleventh-hour chaos…

The script impressed me from the start. It was simple, warm and celebrated a wonderful intimacy between characters so real and so exaggerated. The humour catered to every genre-slapstick, cinematic, situational and even the pun patronizing types! The moral was not preaching, yet explained so much. And we had the pleasure of working with some very intelligent actors, who could interpret their characters beautifully and slide into their skins with the utmost ease. Even when we made them repeat their dialogues again and AGAIN, they flitted through with a smile on their faces. And when we would get down and dirty with the tiresome psyche of the characters they would listen patiently and improve tremendously. A truly talented bunch…my heartfelt gratitude.

The production team leaves EVERYTHING for the last minute, and in those last hours ticking away mercilessly, works day and night sacrificing sleep, food and mental sanity to leave no stone unturned. They are the real heroes behind the scenes…my heartfelt gratitude with whipped cream.

And finally my co-director. Dramanon had a bipolar-director-disorder going with Dhruv and me arguing over few things, and agreeing over fewer! But this guy is something! Immensely capable and definitely cooperative…my heartfelt gratitude with whipped cream and cherry on top.

And now presenting to you my swan song…

Sigh. Good ol' days.

JODHAA AKBAR

We expected fantastic stuff from a 40 crore budget and Ashutosh Gowariker. Because we all liked Lagaan and Swadesh, albeit their rather patience-testing durations. The former was a fictitious event based in pre-independence India and hence, Mr. Gowariker had his creative imprimatur to tweak a character here, to tune an emotion there, to finally produce Lagaan as it was. And Swadesh again was heartwarming. Modern when it had to be, rural when it had to be and entirely inspirational. And yes, we did overlook the obvious lack of chemistry between Shah Rukh Khan and Gayatri Joshi. And we lived.

But Mr. Gowaiker why-ever did you get so confused with Jodhaa Akbar? Were you thinking 'I want to direct an epic love story, a union of hearts, a union of minds, a union of skills and a union of religion?' or were you thinking 'I want to direct a period movie, resplendent in all its glory, intrigue and historical accuracy.' Because what you finally did deliver was a perfect pastiche of incongruous ideas.

If twas' a love story you were looking to depict, then I can digest that the infamously lascivious Mughals' descendant became a one-woman man for his wife from an evidently political alliance (Of course, his grandson Shah Jehan did reject his ancestors' wanton ways for Mumtaz Mahal. Of course, Mumtaz Mahal also went ahead to die in childbirth, incidentally while giving birth to her 14th child. Our very virile Shah Jahan impregnated her more than once due to the lack of a most effective contraceptive - polygamy). So Mr. Gowariker, you wanted to create the perfect love story that our monogamous minds could accept and cherish. Love that arose from the darkened depths of political interests and religious discontent. That left behind deceit and conspiracy in its virgin wake. Love in the time of mughal-era. Marquez would be proud.
But then why would we have to sit through three and a half hours of historical events, all well-researched I presume? Because it was a love story right?

Oh but you wanted to direct a period film! Aaaaaaah. But then why no mention, however fleeting, of Ruqaiyya Begum or Salima Sultan, Akbar's 2 wives from before his marriae to Jodhaa Bai, and very much a part of his principal queens? Yes we know you included a rather prosaic disclaimer warning us that there are various names for Jodha Bai, but did you have to pander so much to the Indian sensibilities that you just dropped essential facts?

A Mughal epic was attempted at, but the Mughal era can never be created without a consistent portrayal of their stories on the battlefield, and their stories in the bedroom. The Mughal era that saw tolerance under Akbar, but if one version is to be believed, intolerance when it came to Jehnagir entering into wedlock with Anarkali. They saw the golden age under Shah Jehan, yet intense deceitry and conspiracy amongst his progeny. The Mughals just shouldn't be reduced to eye-gazing, coy-smiling lovestruck stars.

Ok, ok but yes we concede that Hrithik Roshan was better than decent. Aishwarya Rai looked pretty, dainty and all those wonderful adjectives. And hell Sonu Sood (do you remember him from Aashiq Banaya Aapne? No? I thought so) was pretty darn good. Give him some good films please, he has some latent talent that boy.

STRANGER THAN FRICTION

Meeting a stranger for the first time can be quite the daunting task. You might hope for stranger person to hold on tightly to a bright conspicuous sunflower, but stranger person might announce a dull, pedestrian sweater for tracking intentions. You might scan the ambient area for one black sweater and wave at quite a few black lovers. Oh, yes there are quite a few of them. Now you know.

Your accent might become more polished and purrry, your intonation deep and purposeful. Yet at the exact moment of ejaculating the purrrr-fect 'Hellooooo...', irritating cab driver might bombard you with calls and castigations because you forgot to inform him that you didn't require his services. Never mind that four other cab drivers called before him. Yes, there are quite a few cab drivers as well. Now you know that too.

You might bare your teeth a lot, with a desire to model your flashing 32. But conversation might dwindle as pearly whitened orifice might scare more than share. Inebriation might evade your tight purse strings, loose cigarettes might evade your very premises, knowledge might evade Ralph Waldo Emerson's transcendentalist works. Conversation threatens to burn an indelible improper impression.

And then you discover that investing in windmills might save you a whole lot of tax, that Bengaluru was crazier than you imagined, and that there are scarier things than two drunk souls driving a car without a license, getting caught by cops in the middle of the night.

Meeting someone for the very first time can be stranger than friction. Because sometimes there just isn't any.

INCREDIBLE INDIA

After a really, really long time I introduced some colour into my drab, corporate-corrupt life. I was contemplating exit routes in my soporific yet stay-put-till-it-is-time-to-go-home environment and fleeting through random sites when suddenly I hit the Incredible India website. Pause.

The site is attractive to say the least. There is colour of every possible hue and tone, all co-existing in a riot of contrast. And it makes such a difference to note that, our country with all its diversity is represented and packaged in a manner completely befitting.

What is certified genius though, is the concept of Microsites. We have entire portals dedicated to such offerings as Indian Heritage, Crafts of India, Come to Paradise…We are routed to striking interfaces complete with extensive facts, figures, fairs and festivals.

Incredible India is a very guided site. The home page itself offers you a composite view of pretty much all that the site has to offer. The photography is exquisite, the colours are vivid and rich, navigation is simple and a pleasure! I therefore recommend – traverse then travel. Incredible India will leave you yearning for more.

BOLLYWOOD MANIA I

No, but I love Bollywood. And recently I have been gorging on 'em so a post on. Yes.

First I must, must talk about Johnny Gaddar. Two factors drove me to watch a movie on a hot, weekday morning.
1. Neil Nitin Mukesh (Very good, very good guess. One golden star.)
2. A close family friend who looks god-o-god-o-why steaming hot in the item number Dhoka. (Can I have my golden star back please??)
A 'suspense thriller' say most critics. But I beg to differ. The movie was slow really, I was eating my popcorn (buttered yes, which is why I am NOT in Dhoka. Hmph.) faster then the story was advancing. And our praaji Dharmendra ji was tightening every muscle in his jaded body and struggling to deliver. Poor man. Not that he is a mediocre actor ordinarily, but his golden days are past. And his diction? Goodness! Disappointing choice. Really.
But have I given you the impression that I did not enjoy the movie? Oh, but I did I did! It deserved every star part of the 3 and a half rating that TOI awarded it. The casting (barring our bigamous praaji) was great, almost comparable to Chak De's actually. The performances were energetic, never once over the top. Yes, that includes Neil Nitin Mukesh. So what if I am being a tad generous, it's his first movie (and must I mention the weak-knee-me-be pink shirt and grey sweater combination? Yes? Fiiiine.)
More than being a thriller, the movie was all about how somewhere, sometimes things just don't work out the way you envisioned. It could have paced up, included some ambient OST to set your pulse racing, brought out the flashy cars, flashier women, showcased some tightballed fists and slick arms, oozed some blood and lots of tension. It could have tried to be plain, boring racy. But slow and steady sure does win the race, especially when you stick to some good ol' Vijay Anand and James Hadley Chase inspirations. I must mention Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy's awesome soundtrack. A-W-E-some. There :)
Worth a watch for a pleasant surprise. I vote!


I also caught Laaga Chunari Mein Daag recently. I am a sorry sucker for colour and some impressive cinematography (I looooove Sanjay Leela Bhansali movies. Sigh.) So I trotted along to catch the movie. But there was sooooooooooo much potential!! A Banarasi setting could have exploded the big, bad screen into a riot of clashing colours. But why were there jazzy, fake-y sets most of the time? Huh? Why? Too much light, too less capturing of true colour.
But what I loved about the movie?

1. Choosing two of the tallest, cockiest men in Bollywood to play the parts of blood-brothers? Perfect.
(Doesn't hurt that they are yummy-dummy-delicious too. When Kunal Kapoor kisses Konkona Sen, I swear my heart let out an inadvertent banshee wail. Woe please be me. )
2. Jaya Bachchan. Perfecter.
She is positively brilliant! After watching Dharmendra's exhausted act, Jaya Bachchan's indefatigable and near-perfect performance was wow! An established actress she is, part of the Bachchan we-are-perfect-actors-now-that-aishwarya-also-joined-us too. But watching her efforts translate into a natural ease on the screen was refreshing.
Especially when compared with Rani Mukherjee's performance. Whatever has happened to her? Brilliant often, but I cannot fathom how her effortless acting just did not rear it's pretty little head in this movie? Oh well I still have faith in her.
Konkona Sen wsn't bad. Acting wise. Her whole dancing-around-the-trees routine? The less said the better.
On the whole, the movie was a disappointment. It tries hard but just crosses the line over into too-melodramatic-to-digest land. The title OST was the clincher. The song, the picturisation, the trying portrayal of newfound pain - awful. And a pity too, because it really did have so much potential.

Well at least the buttered popcorn never lets me down :)

LA BELLE ÉPOQUE AND OUR CHRISTA KIEFFER

Came across this. Actually long, long ago but decided quite suddenly to let you know. Stunning and sublime really, Christa Kieffer's oil on canvas captures a world of rich, glittering colours and a golden glow of the quaint streetlights in the pinkish hue the retreating sun leaves behind. She does it deliberately too, 'To me, the transition of light is espeically appealing.' Christa Kieffer does it with a rare finesse. Even to my untrained eye, her work assaults with such a stark longing, that I immediately want to click my golden shoes together and find myself back in 'The Beautiful Era'.

The beautiful era - La Belle Époque. An era before the world was ravaged by the great wars and went on to achieve the distant dream of Socialism to kill all traces of privilege by birth. The more profound reflections apart, I think what suffered the most was the style of dressing.

Edwardian wide-brimmed hats and Victorian waist-squeezing corsets, donned with Etonian jackets to complement that hour glass figure - a thing of the past. Kieffer's work although captures the earlier dressing styles of this era. The mega sleeves, the rich gowns - a true indicator of your social standing and pedigree. And now pedigree determines only the price of the next dog I wish to own. And righ gowns are donned by anyone and everyone on their wedding day. Socialism retaliates with free and fair personal identity.

Not much of a post, but some of vicarious nostalgia.

OF THE LAST MUGHAL AND GREATNESS

There are times when you encounter art, artisans, arti-ness and a subjugating feeling of acute dwarfness overpowers you?
Like when you are sitting a bloating, gloating Indian for all purposes on paper, and along comes a William Dalrymple, a Scottish enamoured by the great city of Delhi (he compares the history, the culture and the aura with that of Constantinople and Cairo) and more so, by the little remembered (No, the Taj Mahal doesn't count as Mughal-only memory) House of Timur and it's descendants.

The Last Mughal who Suraj thought was Aurangzeb, who you might not remember either, who my grandmum remembered as 'The Great Bahadur Shah'. Bahadur Shah Zafar - The Last Mughal. Great? As the ripe and feeble octagenerian, greatness of strategy and strenght of conviction and mind was the last thing that could be attributed to the old and fragile man. He remains buried with a less-than-monumental architectural excuse remembering his death and inhaling his forgotten, decaying life in Burma.

Of the greatness of the 1857 Mutiny that many remember as the first armed assault against the East India Company for freedom from colonisation and an implicit incarceration. But which for all its misconstrued greatness remained a religious revolt. An initial pre-dominant Hindu army making its way to the great city of Delhi, seeking the hollow blessings of a puppet Mohameddan king (Bahadur Shah Zafar), and rising in revolt to protest against the cartridges rubbed with cow and pig fat. The revolution that killed every British man, woman and child in sight, that resisted the British army for 4 months, that starved and strived and put up a worthy fight, that plundered the city of its riches and its dignity, that disrespected the very idea of a great Mughal king. The revolution that started swaying dangerously towards becoming an out-and-out Jihadi revolution.

But the one thing that was great about the Last Mughal was his ability to recognise and regard the Hindu-Muslim unity, and to persevere to retain that very unity to stand up against the kafirs - the British. An eighty year old man lost in the chaos about him, increasingly aware of the dying line of Timur, seeking solace in his poetry, his beautiful verse, struggling but only so feebly to restore the dynasty that ruled Hindoostan for more than three centuries.

But he failed. He could not stem the depradation, the plundering, the carnage about him. Great then? Broken and weak when the British finally conquered the city and reversed the tables. The depradation, plundering and carnage continued. But under a different army, a different colour. No, there was nothing great about the Last Mughal, the 1857 Mutiny or its rapacious and rambunctious armies.

The only greatness is displayed by Dalrymple himself. For falling in love with the city of Delhi, the story of the Mughals and their white counterparts. For investing time and effort, blood and sweat to go through dying accounts of the 1857 Mutiny and to reconstruct the horrors, the helplessness and the history. For being not an Indian and feeling like one, for being but a Scottish and proud as one, for being a true Sufi artist and only loving. Greatness? That is William Dalrymple.

TAGGING-A-LING

Joy says I can considered myself tagged. So here goes.

1. Pick out a scar you have, and explain how you got it.

Scar on my right leg. Interesting shape, mottled with fairness and positively ghastly! Got it from the scalding silencer of someone's bike. No, I don't remember.

2. What is on the walls in your room?

Oh, Buddha inspired figures on dark blue, within golden frames. I wish I had the Renoirs. I do too. Sibling beat me to it. Hmph. I bet she can't even pronounce Renoir. Of course, they are impressions. Of course :)
Mother Martinet does not allow posters and such atrocities on the pristine walls. Sheesh.

3. What does your phone look like?

May I answer this question in a year? You know, when I actually possess a contraption that can be termed a real, live, functional phone.

4. What music do you listen to?

Oh rock, retro, jazz....a lot actually. A LOT. Right now I am listening to The Dandy Warhols, The Shins, Rare Earth, Link Wray and Howard Shore.

5. What is your current desktop picture?

A black lab. I share computer with sibling and parent.

6. What do you want more than anything right now?

To move down south where my entire social fraternity resides. Preferably with a cushy job. Jesus Saves?

7. Do you believe in gay marriage?

Hmmm...I suppose so. Haven't dedicated much though to it since, you know, it isn't exactly pertinent *cough cough*.

8. Are your parents still together?

Yes. Still. How?

9. What are you listening to?

Refer 4 up and above.

10. Do you get scared of the dark?

Oooh yes. I sometimes sleep with the lights glaring down on my face (and yes the aliens will kill me!)
The aliens are vanquished by light. Duh.

11. The last person to make you cry?

Scotch, my adorable cocker spaniel. He has assumed the family name so yes, he is a person.

12. What kind of hair/eye type do you like on the opposite sex?

Oh there are more important things. Like a broad chest and nice legs. No, I am NOT gay (refer 7).

13. Do you like pain killers?

Next.

14. Are you too shy to ask someone out?

No. But I shall hope that neither are they :)

15. Favourite pizza topping?

Meat and cheese. No wait. Cheese and meat.

16. If you could eat anything right now, what would it be?

Porridge. And fruity-tooty cakes.


**Oh and I tag Suraj (yes do it on your poetry blog, yes?) and anyone else I might not know as well as I want to. That means YOU.

BOOKWORMING

It's been long time post coming. And all relevance of movie-reviewing (refer last post) having been lost, I shall continue with opinionating (yes, yes I invent words) on the plethora of books I have read of late.

First I finished Cat and Mouse by Gunter Grass. He is an artist of detail, with something as seemingly inconsequential as a vulgar Adam's apple being likened to a sly, stealthy game of....Cat and Mouse! Unfocussed on the story-telling, Grass recounts events. And whether or not one is supposed to read between the lines can be removed to discretion because reading this work is all about translating. From powerful words to vivid pictures.

Then I started and finished not one, but two Harry Potters (I remain an unabashed fan). Yes, The Deathly Hallows and The Half-Blood Prince (again). In fact I have read those two so many times over the past month that my sibling and I have been reduced to discussing the loopholes (oh and they are a few!!) in the plot in excruciating detail. For one, why do the ruddy wizards mess up when donning muggle clothes when clearly that's what you are wearing often enough throughout your school life in Hogwarts? Or maybe I have succumbed to the bad habit of mixing books with movies. Maybe.
For two (SPOILER ALERT) why o why does Narcissa Malfoy lie to Voldemort that Harry is dead. I mean if it was the victory celebration that would have taken her to the Hogwarts grounds, that would have happened anyway had she betrayed his thumping heartbeat. Voldemort wouldn't have waited long to kill poor, defenseless Harry. Unless Narcissa knew the curse would rebound. Did she?

Ramblings apart, I continued with Snow by Orhan Pamuk. Before this I had read My Name is Red by the same author and the deviation from the ornate style that he adopts in that is strikingly obvious. But I liked Snow very, very much. They geometry the protagonist discovers in every unique snowflake is confirmed almost immediately to an emotion, a phase he himself is experiencing with a sensitive (yet often aggressive) description. And the story telling is convincing; based in Kars, Turkey inhabited by the much glamourised religious fanatics, the staunch liberals who disavow all such impulses, and the ones stuck in between.

Then the following week I completed The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan and The Squabble by Nikolai Gogol. The Bonesetter's Daughter was a decent read. Compelling and swift. I found the descriptions weak, yet the story of Chinese immigrants in The U.S. was again, cogent.

However, my favourite was Gogol. He is an indiscriminate artist of description. Vivid detailing that infuses electric life into the most inanimate objects. Lovely. Although I was detached from my enthusiastic attraction for a moment when Gogol (like Kundera and Pamuk) insisted on connecting the story to his self , by introducing networks with the characters or some such (Kundera does it in The Unbearable Lightness of Being and justifies it (most implicitly) by announcing kitsch as the foundation of any and every art.) But I grew to understand the cardinal nature of story-telling. Oh well, I suppose I will live.

But seriously, Gogol comes with a golden star and three smiley faces.
:):):)

I LOVE GIVING GRE...

...especially when I click on that fear-inducing, minatory monster of a button ['Click this and you CANNOT cancel your score'], inhale-exhale in quick, efficient burts and peer through my narrowed eyes trying desperately NOT to see...
But, wait...hang on...noooo...I did well?? Eeeep. [My latest Calvin inspired ejaculation]

Inhale.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Exhale.

And its true. I managed to whip some pretty ass. And I tell you this, it feels mighty good :)
Life looks good. Beloved friend is flying up north to induce some frolic into my post-GRE life. And beloved parents are flying me up norther [and mostly wester] to lovely, lovely exotic lands. Beloved hair from the hirsute-y body has been removed amidst much cringing. And beloved dresses can be donned again!
And the Osian film festival comes to Delhi on the 20th! Last year I sat beside pretty-miss-perfect Raima Sen and watched The Bong Connection [yes! An entire year before it was commercially released]. It was great fun, as I sat there in the dim auditorium ensconsed most comfortably in a palpable environment of bongness. Not as much from the movie [no, it was not as bong as expected...what a pity], as from the excited Bongs all around me. Talkative maashis (aunties), somber kakus (uncles) and big-eyed baccha log (youth junta). I remember myself smiling a lot.

I have been a regular at the Osian film festival for the past two years. I have watched all kinds of movies; Iranian, Chinese, Indian; silent, colourful, vulgar; and I am so glad it comes now into my wonderfully free life. There is a God.

So I shall be posting my reviews soon. But never judge a book by its cover, or a movie by missquoted's blog entry. Maybe I will see you at the film festival then :)

WHEN PEOPLE CAN SUPERSONIC-SPEAK

My GRE date is looming large and without much largess unfortunately, and therefore I have little time and inclination to blog comprehensively.
Oh but something very interesting happened yesterday. I heard some mutual funds advertisement over the radio. And co-incidentally watched a mutual funds advertisement on the television the same day. Has anyone noticed the crazed speed at which the guy is speaking at the end of the advertisement, relating the perfunctory precautions? No, seriously. That speed is worth a blog entry!
And then I settled down in bed with some sumptuous viand (yessss!!! Actually a synonym for food. Help!) to get my diurnal (don't ask) dose of Seinfeld. And master Jerry speaks at the same loony speed to tell his mom off over the phone because he is expecting an important call! Talented guys these...
And here I thought I was a fast speaker. So much for divine delusions.

Oh and just as an afterthought, I stumbled upon Christophe Beck recently. The songs have been on repeat ever since. Remembering Jenny and Drink me I strongly recommend. I have not been able to listen to a very versatile collection. For that matter, I am not even sure if Beck is versatile, but it's lovely nonetheless; mellow, mellifluous instrumental (mostly piano) and I quote 'it makes you feel like you are in Europe'. Very OST-ish, the piano has a habit of doing that. Start searching :)

Also discovered The Dandy Warhols. Woo hoo hoo! Fast, frivolous and funnnnnn. I recommend the overplayed Bohemian like you, the Good Will Hunting OST track 12 Boys better and the funky We used to be friends. Thank you Suraj.

And that's all folks! Wish me luck!

NOLANISMS

Managed to squueze in 'Following' by Christopher Nolan recently. That brings my Nolan grand total to 3 - Memento, The Prestige and yus yus, the afore mentioned. So I have assumed the role of a despairing dilettante and proceed to spew forth my observations.

Nolan has a signature style. Obsessed protagonists who are battling their demons, and all the while Chritopher Nolan is exultantly disregarding chronology. Oh, chronology! Nolan paces back and forth in time, builds up a crescendo of confused events and conflicting appearances, only to end with those precious moments of clarity (although I DID have to watch Memento twice. Erm.)

Nolan's movies have to be watched and regarded with concentration. Else you will miss a beautiful line here, an ostensibly insignificant glance there that will strike you later once the jigsaw pieces fit.

Take for instance, The Prestige ( spoiler beckons so proceed ONLY at your own risk). When Hugh Jackman is reading Christian Bale's journal he cannot for the life of him understand why Bale does not claim responsibilty for his wife's death. Only when Jackman realises that Bale had had him the entire time, are you transported back to that seemingly inconspicuous line. Lovely lovely.

For the record I liked The Prestige the most. It was racy. The concluding minutes were fanatstic with the characters and the audience alike revelling in sudden realisation. And the moment of 'abracadabra' was phenomenal. No, seriously.

Following was interesting. The beginning of the movie very discreetly gives away the apparent similarities of the protagonists, revealing its significance in the conclusion. And then onwards begins the story of obsessive stalking. I would have enjoyed it more thoroughly though had I not already watched a cheap Bollywood imitation starring Kareena Kapoor, Shahid Kapur and Fardeen Khan (but the scene of the bullet knocking off Kareena Kapoor's hair bun was killer!! Every pun intended :))

And there you have it. My Nolanisms.

POWER PREP

A casual caveat if you bothered to read the previous post: DO NOT BOTHER!

Bother however about this:

1. Proclivity
2. Propensity
3. Predilection
4. Penchant

All mean more or less the same. GRE pandora's pox anyone?

OOOH OH OH!

With moments to collect and preserve...
and insipid goodbyes to deflect before the bus crawls along grudgingly...
the lachrymals will reinstate my faith in the interminable, solitary hours that succeed...
so will my dull and heavy memory...

I want to write...
about The Great Big Donor Show...
and Garden State...
and how I am not quite sure if I enjoyed cheeni kum...


...And the reflections not quite adequate...
....And the words hanging lifeless between you and me...
.....stun the epicurean I pretend, stifle the ostentation I project...

Oh oh oh. Vacuous, vain, verily dispensing horse-excreta?? Give me some time. I am leaving forever and ever and ever for god's sake!

PRE-RAPHALITED!!

Just when I was settling down into a comfortable relationship with the great Impressionist movement; declaring my favourites, recognising the Renoir reproductions at my place, differentiating a Monet from a Manet, a Vang Gogh from a Duncan, understanding how the sun shimmers in the painting that started it all, and staring down from the elongated sides of my olfactory nemesis at anything vaguely Dali [although Escher sits pretty on my blog].....I discovered the Pre-Raphaelites. And so lord, bless us all.
Love at first sight happened when I picked up a copy of Pre-Raphaelite reproductions for my ol' man. I liked the reproductions and 'twas inexpensive to procure it [as is the case with most of 'em men hooking up with 'em ladies. Hmph.] and if truth be told, I did not give it much thought. But then I was destined to return to the bookstore in my usual I-have-the-time-but-little-money-to-spare-to-buy-books mode and I was browsing through a catalogue of Pre-Raphaelite art. And I discovered this [please do click on it for a mind-numbing moment of raw helplessness].



Ophelia! Ophelia! Sweet, frail, glorious Opehlia! I rushed to pick up a copy of Hamlet [actually I picked up ALL of the four great tragedies] and returned home to devote my new I-have-the-time-but-NO-MONEY-to-spare-whatoever mode to Googl-ing. And I present you with this.
Turns out the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood were a group of seven English painters, poets and crtitcs who sought fit to reject the affectations of the Mannerists [Raphael and Michaelangelo followers] and 'reproduced on canvas what they saw in nature'.
This was their only discriminating feature. Albeit the principles of the brotherhood were laid down in four declarations:

1. To have genuine ideas to express;
2. To study Nature attentively, so as to know how to express them;
3. To sympathise with what is direct and serious and heartfelt in previous art, to the exclusion of what is conventional and self-parading and learned by rote;
4. And, most indispensable of all, to produce thoroughly good pictures and statues.

These declarations however, were far from stringent, as the Pre-Raphaelites were generous to the individual idea and flair. And although the 'study of nature' lent a very real element to their work, the brotherhood was to eventually split into two; the Realists and the Medievalists who incorporated a spritual perspective in their work. The split, it is claimed, was never absolute but the difference in the work is glaringly obvious.

So, right now I am also hooked onto Hamlet. The moon is the 'moist star' since it governs the tidal waves. Loverlieeeeeeeeeee.

Double whammy did I hear you say??

MOVIE MANIA II

I managed to edge in two movies last weekend into my raucously busy schedule of imbibing, imploring and immaculate lethargy.

First I caught The Namesake in Bangalore. I did not like it in the least. The book was authored with a slower pace that unravels the story of Gogol Ganguly over the years with certain details stretched thin to leave behind that indelible impression; for instance his first trip to India was important in the sense that it made for academic comparisons to the next trip on the death of his father. But the movie progressed at breakneck speed leaving little room for me to grasp and understand. It disappointed albeit the Bongness put a smile on my face. Annaprashun, and the traditional Bong wedding with the odd white makeup on the bride's and groom's faces made me yearn for papta maach, goopi gayan and erm....Oh! Calcutta.



Didn't do the book justice. Although Irfan Khan was tremendous, Tabu was fine, Kal Penn cute ;-). And was that Moshumi chick steaming hotttttttt, killer legs! Ahem.




I followed it up with 12 Angry Men. And boy, was that some watch. A movie that starts in the courtroom, continues in the jury room and ends on the steps of the courthouse. With 12 (yes angry!) men who divulge not names, not occupations, not any other details that begin to define us as who we are. Nothing except stark and strident reactions. The camera focuses on an individual from time to time for 5-7 seconds, which is absolutely fatal in theatre (focussing the audience's attention on one actor that is), but which just beautifully describes the jury. And we feel an intimate connection with each, trying to understand and defend their actions.
And Joseph Sweeney was much the adorable ol' fella with a piercing glare and larger than life countenance. Provided with some (un)intentional comic relief. Me liked very , very much.
The movie incidentally is adapted from a play and was nominated for 3 Oscars. And it depicts that how often we see just the grime on the glass, and forget to wipe it and see through. Comes highly recommended.




And speaking of recommendations Yann Tiersen has captured my imagination. Google for more details. Watch Amelie for further. And succumb to melodious sin. Sigh.