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SHOT IN BOMBAY -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1118078/

A documentary waiting to be made. For last 20 years. The director of this film happens to be a returning filmmaker of IFFLA & one of our favourites- Liz Mermin.
She had directed last years OFFICE TIGERS, which I missed. I been told its hilarious. Her most famous film so far is The Beauty Academy of Kabul which you can get from Netflix.

Its a film I have heard about a lot. And everytime someone tells Liz, “Oh I have heard of that film, but I couldnt get to watch it. ” Liz shots back immediately “You can watch it online on Netflix.” She said that to me & in the next 30 mintes were were hanging out I saw the same thing repeat 3 times. So all you readers with broadband …Watch this film. She is a terrific filmmaker. I …

NOTE: This post was typed on April 23rd during the Indian Film Festival of LA. Because of server issues I couldn’t post it on time.

I watched my 1st Adoor Gopalkrishnan film last night at IFFLA - FOUR WOMEN. There are two ways about it. One way would be that I would be very objective to just this film without any baggage of his reputation . Another way to look at things would be that I have no idea about his journey as a filmmaker which has lead him to make this film FOUR WOMEN(Naalu Pennungal).
The movie is based on 4 short stories by Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai-the Jnanpith award winning Malayalam writer. As the name of the film suggests, the stories deal with differents aspects of four different women’s lives. They are - The Prostitue, …

My 1st year at IFFLA was 2005 and TEJ GILL was spinning his eclectic mixes at the opening & closing nights. The opening night also featured Shankaar & Gingger. This year Gingger is back on Wednesday when she is going to jam with Gurinder Chana. Yes its the same dude who inspired Richie to shoot his music video. That year I also became friends with a really nice filmmaker from UK - Rene Mohandas. He made a very moving film ELEPHANT BOY. He made me his liason for sending Elephant Boy for all the Film Festivals in US. It went on to win the Best Short Film at the LA Short Film Festival. 2005 was also the year I met the man whos work inspired me to be a filmmaker. Anurag Kashyap. And he has become the darling of IFFLA since then. He is the Amitabh Bachchan …

It would be apt to say that IFFLA is probably the most reputed Indian Film Festival outside of India. Its growing at a phenomenal rate. I remember when I had moved to LA around 3 years back & I met this Indian Guy Gautam Mishra in my Cinema class. He suggested that I should volunteer at IFFLA as I was new to the city/country, it would be a great opportunity to make some friends. And I did. Since then the 3rd week of April has been the best week of the year in LA for me.
Gautam also gave me his gyan from having volunteered before. He suggested that we volunteer in transportation. That was the second best advise he gave me. 2005 was much smaller in scale compared to this year. Madhur Bhandarkar was probably the only famous guy …

Last week Warner Brothers anounced the final curtains on the prolific run of NEW LINE CINEMA. It marks an end of an era. Started in his appartment in New York by Bob Shaye 40 years back. Bob hit the bullseye with the distribution of the hilarious 1936 anti-cannabis film REEFER MADNESS. Over the years it became one of the biggest American studios. The list of films is very impressive -
Boogie Nights, Austin Power, Lord of the Rings, The Mask, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th, Blade, The Player, Glenngery Glen Ross, American History X. And many more.
Its also a studio known to have supported directors like PT Anderson, Altman, Wes Craven over the years.

According to Variety -

Time Warner said New Line would continue to have development, marketing, business affairs and some distribution operations but those will …

BEST DIRECTOR

Julian Schnabel - DIVING BELL & THE BUTTERFLY
He has been nominated for this award at almost every big Film Festival in 2007.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401383/awards

The IMDB link shows 26 Award wins & 30 nomination. I have seen this film twice. It deserves every award it has won & even more. Schnabel is a genius filmmaker. This film made me feel so many different emotions. It is the best example of how art should move us, inspire us. It is one of my all time fav film these days. It will be amazing if he gets the oscar. But I doubt it.

JUNO- Jason Reitman
Jason is having a dream run. Life cannot get better than this for him. A really good movie, but not deserving of this award in such a great year at the cinemas.

Tony Gilroy - MICHAEL CLAYTON
I …

CINEMATOGRAPHY

Roger Deakins - THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD

If there was one great film that most cine-fans missed out in 2007 it would be this one. I say Cine-Fans with emphasis because if you are not it, this film is not for you. Its too long, too slow, too philosophical for a regular movie goer. And the cinematography was simply mindblowing. Roger Deakins must win the OSCAR for this film. He is nominated in 2 films, & has been nominated 5 times before without winning. Which makes him the most likely winner if we know anything about how OSCARS are awarded.

Seamus McGarvey - ATONEMENT
I refuse to watch another ENGLISH PATIENT type film.

Janusz Kaminski - THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY
Now to me this was the film of 2007. Without any doubt in …

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

1)Cassey Affleck - THE ASSASINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD
A superb performance by one of the 3 actors who ruled 2007. Its hard to imagine anyone else in that role after you have seen Cassey’s performance. But its not enough to win. Winners of this category usually are Characters that are very loud & flamboyant & who steal the movie from their Lead Characters.

2) Javier Bardem - NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN
The winner.
An Amazing performance by His Highness. Will his highness win the OScar? I think he will. Its a very powerful character. And Javier does a terrific job of it. Javier has also entered Hollywood in a big way. He has a woody allen film on the way apart from many other projects. American audiences got introduced …

Its OSCAR time in Hollywood. With the writer’s Strike coming to an end yesterday, this town will be gripped with Oscar Buzz now. This year has been an exceptionally great year for films in hollywood. It was a year when the Speciality Divisions of all the Studios did exceptionally well.

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Best Actor in Leading Role -

George Clooney - MICHAEL CLAYTON
I watched this film before any of the other films that is heavily nominated this year. It has to be George Clooney’ s best & most mature performance till date. He is sutble, his face has the pain his character carries like scars from the battles of life. George Clooney is perhaps one of the best actors in Hollywood to play such a character. Kevin Spacey is another guy, but he is doing theater now(which is fuckin awesome). The scene with his son in the car is so deep …

Since Its that time of the year when everyone looks back & gives their list of things. I’m gonna do a do a series on them. I’ll start with the best things I discovered this year but which may not necessarily belong to this year. These are books i loved, movies I discovered, music I loved, youtube videos that entertained me.

Books -

1) Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq’s Green Zone - Rajiv Chandrasekaran
http://tinyurl.com/2as35t
This is a must read for anyone who wants to know what & how things went wrong in the 1st 3 years of the war. Chandrasekaran was the Baghdad bureau chief for the Washington Post. The reason this book tops my list is because its a very objective account of what happened. Its not a leftist journalists rants against the stupidity of this administration. Infact Paul Greengrass(Bourne Ultimatum, United 93) is going to make …

So Anurag smokes Classic Milds. So Anurag things Khalid is a chutiya. So Anurag doesn’t give a fuck. So Anurag IS K. So Anurag is our god(Acc. to KhalidJI). Big Deal! We all knew that already. Why all this fuss? Are we THAT surprised with NO SMOKING? Didn’t we expect him to mindfuck with us anyways? In all this hooplahoo we forgot to thank two people who deserve to be hailed for making NO SMOKING happen. Two unlikely people who backed Anurag the most. Kumar Mangat & John Abraham.
John not only backed this project. He infact refused a regular masala script that Anurag narrated to him & told Anurag that he expected something more intelligent than that crap from Anurag. Thats something that doesn’t happen in Bollywood. Its usually the other way around. I wonder how Anurag’s face reacted …

I have to say, of all the people/stars in Hollywood right now I admire George Clooney the most. The kind of work he is doing as an actor/producer/director is unlike anyone else. His gang includes Steven Soderbergh, Brad Pitt among others, are all doing a fantastic job of trading their blockbuster films with serious indie movies which have very relevent issues in today’s world. I think it all started with OCEAN’s 11. For a Ocean’s 11, Soderbergh goes and makes a BUBBLE. Brad Pitt’s production house PLAN B shops at Sundance regularly. George Clooney not only acts in the films he believes in, he infact directed one of the most anti-establishment film Good Night, and Good Luck. He also starred in the only anti Gulf War film financed by a major studio THREE KINGS(The credit for that must go to the madman director David O Russel).
…

Hail Navdeep Singh everyone. We have another warrior who has joined the ranks of Indie Filmmakers. For this one is a Real one. He has made cinema. Good cinema. No pseudo-pretentious Indie bullshit, no stylish mumbo-jumbo. Straightforward good film. Where every shot is there because the story needs it & not because it will look cool (& hence get me a bigger gig next time). No “look at my direction” stuff. I remember last week when PFC was filled with Manorama. I never thought I would myself write a post on it. But after sitting in a empty hall to watch such a good indian film I feel its my duty to write what I felt. Do whatever I can to send one more guy to drive to the theater.
When was …

Last Night I watched Julian Schnabel’s latest film “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” at a preview screening for SAG at Raleigh Studios. And I was mesmerized by the film. Since its a film that will not get a very wide distribution, I wanted to do my part to spread the word for everyone to watch this amazing piece of film. Before I get into the film I must introduce you Julian Schnabel, who is slowly becoming a very imp filmmaker of our generation.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0773603/

A very good article about him came out in THE INDEPENDENT during Cannes which will give you a very good glimpse of the man
http://arts.independent.co.uk/film/features/article2591477.ece
…

It must be the the most exciting “1st experience” after “losing your virginity”. Like sex there are all these anxieties & hopes. Am I any good? Lot of times people can’t get past this question. Ashish’s 1st fiction effort Is really amazing. And that is what made me write this post.
In my evening Cinema Class we are supposed to make a chase film. Which I think is a norm in a lot of film schools here in LA. It was almost 3 years back. I was still trying to figure out LA, USA. I was still walking towards the wrong door when trying to get into my friends cars. Anyways fortunately that class also happened to have 2 more Indians. A 1st in that college’s history. 1 was Amit Sadanah from Delhi & Saurabh Kothari from Hong Kong/Jaipur/Bangkok/NY. Saurabh had a car which became our …

Its Summertime. Time to hit the bitches…oh I mean beaches in the day & hit the bars at night. Its the Testosterone Frenzy Time. In that spirit I showcase my 2nd article in my series of ‘Listomania’ – The Best Sex scenes on Cinema. Sex on screen has a special meaning to many of us. That was my sex education. No one told me about the bird & the bees. It was in a kungfu movie in my neighbors house with his family that I encountered my first sex scene. Because it was a kungfu movie it was even more confusing. It was hard to figure out who was the guy & who was the girl, and most importantly “what the fuck is happening”. I remember when I saw the 1st porn I would remember it in the middle of a class or while having dinner & start laughing uncontrollably. …

Now these are some of the films I loved watching stoned when I used to do that. Now this is not what you would call stoner movies. Like Cheech & Chong or Harold & Kumar type of movies about stoners. Its just a random list of films I have loved while under the influence of Marijuana. Some movies are here because they were visually stunning, some are here because of the style of filmmaking, some are here because they are funny, some are here because they are mindfucks, some are here because they were conceptually groundbreaking at that time.
I would love for everyone to make their own list & post it in the comments section.

Trainspotting - This has to be in anybodies list of stoner movies. Its a masterpiece in my opinion just as a piece of art. Who can forget that trip …

I must start this article with what Anurag said in behalf of the filmmakers before the screening. He said that the movie was made with “just” 38 Lacs. That they kept running out of money while making this film. Now why did they need 38 lakhs? When your protagonist is shooting everything on DV isn’t that the greatest excuse to shoot the movie in DV. Now I know that if you shoot Digital it costs a bomb to print it in film. But that is after you have shot the film. If your film is good like Lets Talk it will be picked up. And doesn’t a lot of Indian theaters gone Digital? What bothered me was that the essence of Missed Call was Digital. It was a personal film. I believe that some films must be shot on Digital & some on Films irrespective …

It must be a irony that after bitching about too many reviews on PFC I’m writing a review. But then i thought WTF lemme just write reviews how i would like them to be for me. Brief & to the point. I’m here to share my feelings about certain films & not show off my vocabulary(OZ is an exception to this rule…his reviews are fun to read). So I’m gonna write 3 film reviews in one go. there by using the same space for 3 movies instead of one.

THE WEATHERMAN Director - Gore Verbinski
I had this DVD for past 6 months lying around but never got around to watching it. Finally saw it last night & really liked it. This must be the best Nicolas Cage movie I have seen in last 5 years. Honestly I don’t …

This is my 1st article for PFC. I must start with an ode to the man who created it. Yeah i’m licking his balls for letting me this opportunity ….but his balls are so cool right now. This article is a result of my 1st phone conversation with OZ last night. For those of you who don’t know the man just quit his job to pursue his dreams of film making. So all our good wishes to him. And the best thing about him is he doesn’t dream of directing(atleast not right now) like most of us. He wants to produce. And honestly man i was so happy to hear that.

Now one thing (of the many other problems) that is a big problem in Bollywood is lack of sensitive, creative & well read producers. Who wants to …