A Knight’s Tale! (Ironically a Heath Ledger movie)

Genius, in cinema, in my small opinion, is not in creating a piece that makes someone think about all that is, was and will be. Genius, in cinema, in my small opinion, is not in seamlessly tying every aspect together so that the end-product is not only appealing to all the senses but also creates the impression of art in motion. Genius, in cinema, in my small opinion, is not in making sure the audiences’ hearts beat with the movie. Genius, in cinema, in my small opinion, is all that.

Now here is a movie that will go down in history as a blockbuster with a brain. Of course there will be the few who really don’t get Cinema. People in the same clique as a colleague who vibrantly proclaimed, quite unabashedly I may add, that Katrina Kaif acted well in Namaste London and that the monstrosity that was the particular movie in discussion was something that was palatable to her senses. I hope the sentence above brings no harm to my chances with Katrina Kaif because I do believe that she is one of the hottest women in Indian cinema, but I have to be honest; After the 10th commandment and the Armageddon and the end that is inevitable, if she was the last human on earth and then the aliens that had obliterated our existence came down to earth with their version of the laser gun and put it to Kat’s head, telling her, “if you act well reading out “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”, earth will survive”; factoring in the fact that the aliens themselves had understood their concept of acting from the only video on YouTube from Gulshan Kumar’s younger brother’s only movie which would put “Acting 101” in any university to shame; she would still be killed and we would all cease to exist. Kat can’t act. My colleagues who called this movie “A Drag”, and “A bore” know Jack about movies; or may be even Jack knows more.

An unhealthy digression but my understandable distaste for fart from farters who believe that just because you seem to have a mind your opinion is warranted, talking as exerts in topics that you know little or nothing about and thinking that raising your voice somehow to express the same fart that is would magically transform it into something written in stone and subscribed to by the high and mighty of the Intelligentsia, has thus been expressed. Opinions are brilliant, especially the one that I don’t subscribe to, but we do need to learn how to put it forth.

This is not a review of the movie if you were looking for one. This is my tribute in my space to a movie that I believe is a modern masterpiece. A modern movie because it takes the genre of the comic book hero (I have my reservations to calling The Batman that) and translates it into a reality so believable, that if Gotham were Chicago and The Batman was a suited detective, the story would appeal to the people who claim that the comic book genre is for kids. A masterpiece not only because of the directors brilliant vision of the screenplay that made the treatment of the movie unique but also the technical brilliance around cinematography, just the right amount of CG and some mind-blowing performances. Here I have to stand up and applaud Heath Ledger’s Joker that makes Jack’s Joker look like a bad caricature. He is brilliant. There is no other way one can describe the pinnacle of drama that he attained with his portrayal, so I repeat it. He was brilliant. Pity he decided to OD for this probably was a sign of a person who could finally be called the successor to Marlon Brando and the Old Pacino. God rest all their souls in peace, for I believe that the actor Pacino is dead and all we see now is an Amitabh bachchanised version of a personality who plays the same character on celluloid every time he anoints it.

And finally to Christopher Nolan I repeat what Dr Watson says “Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself but talent instantly recognizes genius”. You are Genius, which makes me quite talented.

An Elephant's story

Wasn’t too long ago that an elephant was mowed down; literally, because she made her way out of her habitat, the jungle, and found herself in the quintessential concrete jungle that the world is now. Humans had no threat, all they needed to do was pacify the poor confused soul, yet they chose the path of the higher being, owing to their surprising intelligence and shot the animal down. Of course, when the elephant’s infant walked along beside his mother, wailing for her, the tabloids had a field day talking about animal activism while not one of the cameramen or women actually stopped the Human from shooting the elephant down.

“Wake up! Wake up mom!”, I said. No reply! And then I realized that she was gone. I sat by her side hoping that at some point in the night she would return. Why did she not get up and take me home? Had I been bad? Had I walked too far from the jungle? Was it me because of whom mother had gone? And who are these animals beside me walking on two legs? Wake up mom! Wake up! Why did they pull my mother down? Don’t they understand that all we were doing was taking a stroll? Don’t they understand that all my mother wanted to do was to protect me?

Animals are rational and everything they do has a rationale behind it. If they chase you while you walk down a dark alley it should be because past experiences taught them that someone walking in a dark alley in the wee hours of the night is not always good news. Fearing an animal heightens their sense of apprehension and as most sports persons will have you believe; offense is the best form of defense. The fear that they smell makes them fear you. Respect; that’s something they need; respect for the animal kingdom, not fear.

Wake up! Wake up Mom! Now they take me away. Take me away to somewhere they want to take me. Who the hell are they to decide where I want to live? O animal with two feet! Why can’t you let me be? Let me exist! Our law shall now take over. O Sun, the judge of all, allow me to fell this being for he has sinned. He has stolen all you ever gave me!

And we wonder why the elephant killed man?

Through the Looking Glass

It wasn’t too long back that I harbored the ambition of following the footsteps of WKW or Satyajit Ray only to be stopped by the hunger of the stomach and the influx of cerebral matter. Which brings us to the question that has haunted me from the time I first though I could go behind the lens; what is Cinema? Is it the slow yet captivating story that makes you weal up in the eyes until it crescendos in the cavalcade of salty tears that trickle down your cheeks as the credits roll? Is it the awe of a silence when an audience cannot react to a visual stimulus as that stimulus is so captivating that the rest of his senses abandon him? Is it the silent red that pops up above their heads when they dream of running in slow-motion or dance in the rain with the umbrella they were carrying having been blown away by the gust of wind that threatened to take the saree with it, but he intervened to lead to another eye stopping moment when everything around them seem to be moving slowly? What is Cinema?

The answer, in my small opinion, is that and a lot more. Cinema is expression. It lends you the movement of a stage and the brilliance of a million still photographs all rolling past one another to make poetry on screen. Cinema is an extrapolation of art; the summit of the cycloid of the sphere that rolls which is life? At this point I shall mouth certain obscenities that are synonymous to a cow’s fecal matter. Cinema is just a point of view. You may love it, hate it, sully it, ignore it, spit on it, yet it exists, in spite of you and your views.

Next time you go to watch a movie, whether it be the canvas painted by Aamir as he did in Taare Zameen Par or the absolute farce that is Mike Myer’s escapades or for that matter Shah Rukh Khan’s six pack abs in Om Shanti Om; sit back and enjoy it. Love it, hate it, sully it, ignore it, spit on it, but enjoy it because even the worst film maker is better than you. He made a movie. What the fuck did you do?

The Reason

In lieu of the recent events that transpired in Delhi where a girl, only in her school, was found dead, murdered or otherwise, on her way back from a school outing, has brought to light the need for an understanding of what the young ones today are looking for. There is speculation that there was a lewd MMS that was made of her and the trend of these MMS clips being uploaded is shocking. There is the matter of choice but at that age is choice merely a word that the dictionary professes exists. Is there then a black and white or is there a murky Grey that covers all that occurs with the young and the restless today.

It is the age of exploration, and anyone who tries to convince them otherwise, is what literature terms a quixotic tilt at the windmills. Truth be told, I have to date, not really sympathized with the metaphor I used for the turmoil that every individual undergoes in their late teens, but it is a gargantuan waste of time for any individual to counsel a child at that stage of their lives about companionship, sex, right and wrong! However, can we influence the choices that they make? Can society play it’s part in ensuring such incidents do not reoccur? My take. Yes! Though whether it will occur is as one turbaned individual who professes his love for cricket as Brad did for Jen a second before Jolie called on the secret BradJolie phone would say, umm … Sorry Sidhuisms were never my forte! It would be fair to say that in the year 3020, if earth still exists, and if Humans have not become extinct due to the lack of oxygen, or the ozone or commodes that can wash themselves clean, India would still be governed by a aged set of ethics that are as two faced as Two Face himself. Batman unfortunately is a comic book character and though I have at times looked upon him as a career option, there are specific economical requirements that I do not fulfill for the application.

As a society, India thinks that people under the age of 20 are not going to explore possibilities of companionship. Whether this is India’s version of, literally put, the Bulls Fecal matter, or whether it has forgotten how to metamorphose with the sands of time, is something yet to be studied and acknowledged. Along with a catastrophic lack of education there is, for the woman in India, a surprising lack of freedom. This in a country where the ‘Devi’ is worshipped and the woman is looked upon as a symbol of power and love all rolled into one. The lack of freedom coupled with a patriarchal society that scrutinizes every move of the virgin woman, rapping her on her fingers when she makes a move outside of the box now drawn for them and admonishing their needs into a locker we now call ‘Feminism’. Freedom is a point of view, something that emerges as the second’s hand moves slowly from the 10^th to the 11^th second. And when freedom strikes, the uninformed, suppressed woman of today takes a dive into the acid pool of either erroneous companionship or fallacious carnal fulfillment. If the Indian woman is capable of coming to terms with her disappointments, the situation would have been under control. But alas! Society re-intervenes, making certain she is neither at rest nor is given the respect that is due to her kind! This, of course, by a society that hides from their children and watches debasing clips through the revolution that is internet or switches on to their local channels to watch voluptuous incarnations of their sullied minds. What does that uninformed, suppressed woman do then? She finds refuge in the unwashed tracks of the Indian Railway System or finds a way of earning a life with her final benefactor, the non-existent lord of the nether worlds!

Who do we blame then? The non-existent lord of the nether worlds? The Society that has a chameleon fabric? Rather than pass the baton, look in the mirror! That’s the reason for it all. Now go and find abode in the non-existent lord of the Nether worlds!

The Last Fight

Of retirements plans and time crawling, of soppy forwards and the number 40, of forwarded trips and the spelling of kemmengundi, my thought for the day.

Last evening, while I was having an altercation with my girl friend, I decided it was time for news. What the connection is with news and violence (verbal though it may be), I have no idea (a colloquial sentence for the purist)! Yet, I happened to stumble upon an argument that individuals were having on a show which is probably as doctored as Oprah’s tears, Dr’Phil’s ‘tough love’, Judge Judy’s fake hair and The Jerry Springer show all rolled into one, called “The Big Fight”. The topic for discussion was the Gujrat violence and how some individuals had been punished. Was it justice served late? Was it too little because 29 others accused had been acquitted? Was it that those who burnt Gujarat should burn because they were forming a divide in the otherwise ostensibly secular country, separating people on the basis of the way they cut meat whether human or God?

Scene 2: A few months back: Some time of the day: Some hospital: A colleague had been admitted to the center because some dumper truck thought his bike looked like tar with stripes on it and decided to take a hike on his bike, the only problem being, he was in the truck when he did. During the many nights that I spent in the medical center, I was accompanied by one Mr. Kashif Baig and Mr. Romesh Kostka. Kashif is one of those people who the whole of IBM looks up to, a leader in the true sense of the word; One of those paradigms that can be followed because though he walked the path less tread, the path was always right. Romesh is a brother from another mother (borrowing the now very oft repeated African American term). I notice though that at no point did we in our conversations have any qualms about discussing religion. It was a debate of religions so to speak; Kashif; the surprisingly devout Muslim, Romesh; the understandably lethargic Christian and me, the vocally impious Hindu.

Cut Back: Scene 1: Last night: The show: Gujarat burns. NDTV dramatically puts in filmed clippings from a movie to make sure the viewer sympathizes and empathizes with every victim, as if the stories were not enough. And people on a podium argue about whether Narendra Modi is making the right moves politically and whether the Tehelka tehelka would be politically a strong hold and a USP for Narendra Modi’s government.

The disparate and the opposite poles are the flavor of a secular nation, but how can these co-exist. How can Me and Narendra Modi be the part of the same constitution? Is it criminal then on my part to be disillusioned by the political set up of our religion or the religious underlines in our politics.

Fact: Gujarat was a shame to every Indian alive, whether Hindu or Muslim, where resident or non-resident. Fact: We are a part of corporate India where GDP and Turn-over rules the grey cells. Fact: We are a secular country where individuals can co-exist without thought to religion or caste. Fact: Last night I was ashamed to be Indian!