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All that discussion on Munshiji in Pavan Jha’s post made me rewind down the memory lane to my plus one class when we had short stories collection for language (both english and Thamizh) non-detailed. The English non-detailed had some regular O Henry stories. The Thamizh non-detailed story had one interesting story by ‘Pudhumai Piththan’. The short story was titled ‘Paalvannam pillai’.

I have forgotten the story as such - what happened to the character etc., However the sketch painted by pudhumai piththan still stays with me. It is an awesome recollection of a typical Indian householder working as a lowly ranked clarke in a government office who speaks only in monosyllables in the office - and that one syllable is usually ‘Yes sir’ to his superiors. At home though he is terror to his wife and children. An absolute monarch who never has heard his wife or children say anything contrasting …

Big Corporations have sold out humanity for Guru Kant Desai’s pet word ‘Munafa’, profit.

Working class toils day and night, live honestly but dont get anywhere. Steel plant workers push hard, while the bosses pushed them out. You believe in American Dream, well it is exported now. Life is so hard, things are so costly that you dont have any hope left, and working hard to stay in status quo is worser than doing nothing and drift away. Your choices are prepaid and your role in your choices is definitely not making them. Law is theirs and order is to OBEY them and they have got life  - They Live.

Offcourse the previous paragraph is not the description of the high inflation, slipping into depression American society. This is the state of America in 1988 that John Carpenter who is know more for slasher flicks like Halloween, showed in the 1988 movie …

It was October 2003 when audiences in Thamizhnadu (Tamil Nadu for uninitiated) were swept away by cinematic brilliance of Pithamagan. Personally it was one movie that made me realize that movies need not be all beginnings, middle and endings, not to say that this movie broke any rules of cinematic grammar. There is more to a movie than scripts and lightings. There is more to a movie than locations and sets. A movie can tell more than what its scripts and dialogues on paper. Pithamagan to me is one movie which manages to elevate itself overcoming its shortcomings and the reasons are not just the usual ‘reasons’ like great acting and fabulous cinematography. It is these reasons that I have always wanted to write about and ‘recount’ as a part of my cinema learning experience.

1. Character is the king:

The Story itself is just an excuse for the audience …

Beginning …..

When you get a chance of a weekend where you get to watch an anticipated movie release on night and an opportunity to meet and reminiscence more on movies with fellow cinephiles, you don’t blink.

So I packed my bags and drove to an undisclosed location that Striker had passed on to me MI style braving the thunderstorm on my way. My hope was on the movie of the night and offcourse the afternoon to follow. Once there I got the glimpse of the striker and that was strike 1. After a Mexican dinner we were off to the theatre to watch Kamal’s 10 avatars.

What followed was something of calamitous proportions as far as movie watching is concerned. After the movie, there were two angry young( taking a bit of liberty) men freaking out at the keyboards. With Catharsis complete, curtains fell on day 1.

Day …

Taste of good cinema is a cultivated one. One sees good cinema and when a bad cinema is shown the choice is easily made.

I have seen bad cinema and my exposure to some gems have cultivated my taste for good cinema.

I am not talking about No Country for Old men or some other foreign language movies.

I am talking about Padhinaaru vayadhinile - the movie where characters came alive with blood, flesh and sweat of a Thamizh Nadu Village.

I saw Sigappu Rojakkal and was amazed at how a psycopathic misogynist can be sketched without using the black and white strokes.

I saw Raja Paarvai and was amazed at the success of a blind man’s love - and that of cinema too.

I saw Moondraam Pirai and was thrilled at how tender moments of life can be shown without burning them in the glare of arclight.

I saw Saagara sangamam and found how “True art …

If there is a trilogy that I have tirelessly watched again and again till my eyes turned all red, it is “Aliens”.

I had the opportunity to catch up with Lieutenant Ripley and her AFB (Acid For Blood) adversaries lock themselves in conflict one more time and like any other great story, found little surprises and newer messages from their epic conflict. This is a non-technical recollection of the glorious Aliens.

Commonly occurring themes in the Alien trilogy (My sensibilities wont allow me to add the ‘Resurrection’ and the recent shams as a part of this glorious franchise) as I inferred are:

1. Feminism: Not just the fact that the chief protagonist is a woman, even the adversary is the most deadly “Queen”. Only difference being that the aliens for their boiling acid temper and “nastiness” acknowledge the power in the hands of the female, while their human adversaries stumble and die before …

Sensationalism of topics apart - Thamizh film director Bala is one who is never tired of chronicling people whom we dont want to notice in our daily life. He takes his audiences into the fringes of our society showing us people who are literally on their fringes. His latest journey is taking him to Kasi and to people whom we never ever care to notice that they exist. He has creatively collaborated for the first time in his career with an author, an eminent thamizh writer Jeyamohan who has written extensively about characters who live in the same street as you and me, but are totally hidden from our ‘normal’ gaze. Sensational aspects of his next project ‘Naan Kadavul’ are detailed in this behindwoods article. Forgive me for the god awful title for this post!!!

This is not a promotion for a website.

This website aboutwhich I am mentioning has no ties to PFC or ots exclusive authors.

But this is where I have decided to sink my teeth into for the first time.

The website is www.zhura.com

They have the Creative Common License for any shared work that you create and let groups of writers collaborate on a story idea or script development.

I needed a solution that would cost me nothing, provide me mobility of accessing my saved work from anywhere in the world, not binding things to my computer.

While I begin this journey, would feel a lot better if we can discuss similar offerings in the market.

If it is a game - come and play.

If it is a challenge - come challenge yourselves.

If it is a creative outlet - Express yourself.

Call it whatever you may, I will call it a creative collaboration of enthusiastic minds.

The experiment is simple. There have been many such experiments done in other platforms - for story writing. Some of you might have played it as a game on a rainy day with your friends at home.

The game is “complete the story”. The only difference is that we do not alter basic characters in the name of introducing twists and we try to write it up more visually (for screen writing purposes) and write it probably one sequence at a time (lets keep it at a healthy 15 minutes screen time). If one can provide a cut to cut (or shot by shot) screen script, it is well and good. For the less …

There is a dilemma.

I am a Thamizhan in Bangalore .

Kannada comes to me fluently  tha my friends think of me as a kannadiga.

I watch Vishnu’s apthamithra and Rajini’s Chadramukhi and enjoy them both in equal measures (not from a critical point though - I have serious disagreements with both and prefer Manichithrathazhu).

I feel at home in Udupi and Dharmasthala as I would in Madurai or Chidambaram.

I enjoy listening to “Naguva Nayana” as much as “Pothi vecha malligai mottu”.

I enjoy Shakar Nag’s Sangliana as much as I enjoy vijaykanth’s “Captain Prabhakaran”.

I love the vidhyarthi bhavan’s “Masala Dosa” as much as I relish the “Ven pongal” from hotel Rajarathnam in Tiruchi Bus Stand.

I enjoy the cool climes of Bangalore as much as I like the blistering heat of Thiruvannamalai.

My problem is - I feel at home in all these places while there are millions who hit the streets in protest and in …

In Anjaadhe Mysskin has proven what film makers, story writers, screenplay writers, creative people in general can DO, if given the liberty by the people with money who think they have figured out what audience want.

In spite of so many masters who have made so many masterpieces, thamizh cinema is still a local fiefdom where the produers and distributors decide what is the movie that is worth seeing the arc light in a dark theatre. So it is a wonder for me that Anjaadhe even got made, let alone distributed and screened. From a distributor’s angle in a multiplex world, the film did not possess a star hero (After Chithiram Pesudhadi, the director could have approached and star and made a movie with him), ‘A’ list music director, commercial heroine, or a hefty villain with 50 henchman. It has only one plus from a distributor -producer angle - the film …

Who is a good actor?

I have had many a heated debate with my friends from school days till now when we argue till we grow tired on internet blogs on this topic.

Always there would be two camps (discounting fans of stars and the “charisma thing”)

Actors who disfugured themselves, hid their original face under obscurity and became the character versus actors who retained their self and transfored themselves only that much to convince the audience that they are seeing someone else.

I always wavered between the two sides. Whenever I would see a “Sethu” or “Pithamagan”, I would be amazed at Vikram’s work in those movies and say that is indeed awesome acting.

On the other and there would be a Mohanlal or Sivakumar or Nasser whowould play their assigned roles with no change in the getup or mannerism, just be temselves and still convince me that I am observing a middle class …

In my boring engineering degree education, that left me proclaiming at the end that I will not set my foot inside and educational institution again for any kind of full time learning in my life, there was a brief period in Engineering management class, when there was a funny teacher who told me about “So What?” theory of Risk Analysis and Threat and opportunity management. I donno for sure if such a theory existed or was it just his invention. I didn’t care as what he told me made sense. The theory is simple. Any threat or an opportunity, the only way to weigh it is not to pur through cost or other complex heuristic calculation, just create a statement of the situation and prefix it with “So What”, you will get your priority for the problem or task. A cool way of estimating impact and weighing opportunity, all verbal …

I am borrowing the phrase that the renowned film maker R.Partheban used to introduce Ilaiyaraja in a function.

To an average Thamizh film music lover, Ilaiyaraja is one name that is synonymous with music. His name is taken with awe and great respect by singers, peers, critics and film makers. He redefined film music in very many ways, ways that are hard to explain, even figure out. The impact of a Ilaiyaraja BGM or song is instantaneous and everlasting, catchy and yet soulful, funny yet melancholic. He works on the basic premise that all forms of music are the same and the treatment and usage brings out the difference and impact. One reason why you could have a bachish violing interlude to a “pure ganada” compositiion in “Poomalai vaangi vandhaan” in the memorable KB masterpiece “Sindhu Bhairavi”. He literally made a whole generation of fans go and learn guitar with that …

This is not much of a detailed post.  Just a brainstorm on how some small amount of experimentation is carried out before done on a full blown scale in cinema.

Prototyping : Wikipedia explains it thus:

“Prototyping is the process of quickly putting together a working model (a prototype) in order to test various aspects of a design, illustrate ideas or features and gather early user feedback. Prototyping is often treated as an integral part of the system design process, where it is believed to reduce project risk and cost. Often one or more prototypes are made in a process of iterative and incremental development where each prototype is influenced by the performance of previous designs, in this way problems or deficiencies in design can be corrected. When the prototype is sufficiently refined and meets the functionality, robustness, manufacturability and other design …

There was a time when as a child I could imagine myself to be anything.

I could be a pilot flying a plane. but not too high. just high enough to see my mother drying clothes on the open roof of my house.

I could be a fish swimming in the pond with gold skin and transparent fins.

I could be a rickshaw puller who can pull a rickshaw with 3 fat men with ease.

I could become anything that amazed me.

I saw a movie with Sivaji ganesan and really believed that he was a police inspector and learnt what “duty” means. It means you can gun down your son even if he is your only son a son about to sell his soul, his country.

I saw another Sivaji movie and truly believed he is Lord Shiva sitting on the icy ranges of Kailash wearing just a rug made out of tiger skin and …

I have a love-hate relationship with mob movies. At a level they are cool, but some kind of uncmfortable feel is always there when a mob movie ends. The connection is always not made like I would at the end of a movie like say Parenthood for example. The reason being a constant feeling of separation from the layer of society at which these movies are based on. Me being a typical middle class “good guy” always shunning away contacts with anyone even remotely tied to “politics” or “police”(my father who was in state judiciary always imploring me to stay away from both) - India’s answer to “American mob” (Offcourse the mafia is all but silent now in US while our mob is always active and always controlling). This disconnection meant I was always cold to mob movies and if at all I appreciated them, it was purely for their …

So much of discussion on no-Smoking on the PFC . I haven’t seen the movie and would love to see it in a theatre, for it reminds me of an erstwhile experience of having watched a movie that merged the real and the surreal together. This was the Thamizh movie, “Kudaikkul Mazhai” directed by R.Parthiban. It released in the year 2004 and I was in Bangalore watching it in a small theatre.

In the promos of the movie and trailers, there was no scene from the movie that was shown. It was just a talk by the director saying that this movie is a commercial poem. I thought, you can never scare the audience better than by saying such nonsense. I thought that this guy simply has gone crazy again(usually he does go crazy and makes nonsense movies while coming up with some absolute gems inbetween).Thamizh press started floating news as …

The year was 1991

Kamal hassan had gone on to give Thamizh film world two gems, “Nayagan” in 1987 and “Apoorva Sagodharargal” in 1989. 80’s were gone and 90’s needed a new look and new performances. With the above mentioned movies, he had effortlessly moved into 1990’s like a skilled driver changing to the 5th gear in a desolate highway.  89 also had witnessed the hugely successful “Indhrudu Chandrudu” where he played dual role with totally different shades as only he could do. In a state like Thamizh Nadu where actors are absolutely adored, his string of brilliant performances raised the curiousity levels to dizzying heights.

Sure of himself that makkal is ready to lap up something different from him, Kamal decided to take the biggest gamble as an actor - playing quadarplets separated at birth looking alike and coming together in hilarious circumstances. For this he has inspirations from his guru …

Guys,

Was watching the finishing scenes of Cheeni Kum on cable yesterday.

To start with,

Ghaasbus as the Chef buddhadeb, a 64 year old bachelor is identified is all happy that his lover Naina’s daddy gave consent to make the affair official and that makes his mother all too happy and they both have a look at the iron pillar at the Qutb which ghasbus has been able to embrace with his back to it (offcourse with the help of his mother). Seems like he has prayed for the success of his love.

Ghas bus’s cell rings and it carries a bad news of bereavement. his soulmate 9 yr old sexy has breathed her last and ghas bus is emotional - now running to the pillar to make one more wish. - A wish that has expired and offcourse we all know that it is not a Manmohan desai movie. Enter the scene - …