It was a pleasure watching....




I started the week with the romance film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. My friends had been raving about itsince weeks. But I didn't find the movie that good as it was promised to be. It turned out that it is a 'moody-film'. So you should watch only if you are in a romantic mood. The whole concept of running after memories and hiding Clemency in obscure memories seemed too far-fetched to me. What I mean is that why run after a girl who has already got you erased from her memory? The whole exercise was futile in my opinion. Another point is that the director should have focused more on the psychological tangle Joel was in. This should have been dealt with more seriousness. Except during the background song by Beck, there was no instance when I felt sorry for the poor fellow.

I loved Cinema Paradiso. There is no other word I could have used instead of 'loved'. It is a beautiful tale of a child who grows up in a small town in Italy, appreciating cinema and learning how to show cinema to others. After he comes of age, his mentor convinces him to leave the small town in pursuit of a more fruitful career. Many years later,the young boy who has matured into a famous man returns back to his village. Some scenes were beautiful. When he come back and knocks at the door of his house the mother abruptly gets up holding the needles in her hand and walks toward the door crying, "It's Toto!". The camera focuses on the unweaving sweater. It showed how eager she was to meet her child whom she hadn't seen for the past 30 years.

I saw it yesterday. Pulp Fiction was the first Tarantino flick I saw.(I wouldn't recommend you doing that as you may not be that sportsmanlike) It was very bizarre. I had great difficulty understanding the non-linear structure(and was later rescued by Wikipedia). There was just no explanation for half of the things and were added just for fun and lending the movie its characteristic style. Nevertheless, I greatly appreciated this style.

After Reservoir Dogs and Death Proof this is my fourth tryst with Tarantino's eccentricity. I can only say that my admiration for the director has increased. A simplistic plot proceeds smoothly as various sequences pay homage to the great Japanese samurai movies and other great genres. I noticed one little point of interest. Every so often the camera moved to the feet of a person. It seemed strange to suddenly witness the feet of a person(specially women's) as the movie was going on. Is it the director's obsession or just what they call "reading too much between the lines"?

Another day becomes history...

It's quite a common notion that parents burden the young shoulders of their children's with their unfulfilled ambitions. Every parent wants to see a glimpse of Hritik/Aishwarya, Sania/Sachin and who not in their children. As if everyone is an all-rounder. But is it really that iniquitous on part of the parents to expect some of their dreams being achieved? After all, it's due to them that the child is getting to see the world. I know that not everyone can cope up with their parents' expectations. But then I ask where does the fault lie, or then who is to be blamed?

Perhaps, in this mad rush around them they forget that it is their child through which they wish to live up to their dreams. Children are not machines or beasts of burden. They can't be treated like one. But somewhere down the line, I believe a line needs to be drawn. I think that the parents have a say(to some extent) over deciding their child's future. At least they are not wrong in expecting their child to become a good responsible citizen of the country. But they shouldn't over-burden their child with sky-high demand which can be detrimental for all in the long run. They are justified in identifying and nourishing the talent of their child. But just pushing a child in a wrong direction, while slaughtering her/his talent is not the solution. There is one factor which dilutes the efforts in this direction- lack of communication. I feel that there is a need for child to confide in his/her parents up to a certain age. Theirs' should be a reciprocal kind of relationship which is beneficial for both.

In Taare Zameen Par, Aamir Khan does try to convey this message to an extent. First-half is good. Second-half could have been better. Full marks to Darsheel Safary. It seems Aamir Khan did make him work hard! Best part of the movie is that the director focuses on only the key issue. He doesn't indulge much in song-dance sequences or keeping the hero(Aamir himself) above the rest. Perhaps the hero is the child Ishaan Awasthi. The title song has been choreographed heart-renderingly well(in whatever manner it has been shown in the movie).

I realized that I have my own reservations for books. I left Chances Are... after finishing the first chapter. The writing was too disorganized. May be sometime later, I'll have enough courage and patience to rush through it.

Probability is...

Of late I have developed a habit of reading first three-four pages of a book before I decide whether I'll continue with it or not. Not that this method does not help. The only bone of contention is the time I spend in choosing the next book to be read. After much ado(about nothing) I chose this book called Chances Are...:Adventures in Probability by Michael Kaplan and Ellen Kaplan. One of my friend got this book from USA and since then it has become some sort of a rage in the hostel. It is always like that. For instance, some time back A Train to Pakistan became a hit just like a Hollywood blockbuster. More recently The Satanic Verses developed a cult status and could be found circulating from room to room.

One of my friend got so inspired by the probability book that he got it photocopied and has been advising others to read it.

Over the years the study of probability and stochastic processes has gained a lot of momentum. Since the foray of Investment Banks and Consultancies in the placement scenario at our campus, the demand for the courses dealing with these topics has seen a steep rise. People these days are more busy in formulating business plans. There is a mad rush for management and finance related courses.

I did a course dealing with probability this semester and just avoided flunking it. All along I knew that I can score easily in this course. But somehow that notion didn't translate into concrete results. Descartes was not right in his idea of 'I think, therefore I am' over here.

But I must say that I have some interest in economics. I like the way government and RBI deal with the market and sometimes it becomes very challenging to analyze the prevailing bullish/bearish trends. Moreover, every small change can have immediate global-level consequences which can leave you gawking sometimes.

No movies for me until Jan 2. No compulsion or anything like that. It's just that I'm at home and would like to maintain the decorum. Otherwise, in hostel I have the bad habit of starting with the second as soon as the first is over. I can't do that here. So when I saw The Wizard of Oz recently it left me pining for more. But he good news is that soon I'll be going to watch Taare Zameen Par which undoubtedly attracted unwanted attention in Gujarat. Yes, yes the same Narmada dam controversy which hit Fanaa last year, though it seems that situation is not that serious.

This reminds me of the the following song.

First step, your last breath
everything's been planned
there's questions, and answers
you'll never understand
I hold on, but let go
I give you room to breath
Remember, the best things
will never mind to change
starting at the ending
It won't break, while your bending
been there, and back again
and when the music ends..
-Ashley Parker Angel

Les Misérables

Ahem. Certainly it doesn't mean that I have read the Victor Hugo masterpiece. It's too big, I must say. But think broader. The title doesn't conceal that much. Does it? Just to make it clear, exams are going on and I couldn't care less. The only problem being that they are too obstinate to leave me in peace.

It is this visit to LSR which turned out to be a disaster(got ousted in the Prelims itself in Lit Quiz) which keeps on hitting my mind. The questions were slightly tricky and unlike the weird(and much more interesting) questions which are offered at quizzes in IIT they could be cracked by raking one's brain a little bit. Me, Mitesh and a second-yearite Anshuman. The last two did the job and the first one was dazed and confused. Otherwise, the trip was worth it considering that it was 'LSR'.

My friend introduced me to this private library called Eloor(just click on it). It was a nice experience and the collection has impressed me to become its member. The greatest advantage is that they charge just 10% of the book's cost and the initial charges are just Rs. 1000 for a lifetime of membership. Besides, they can get you any book you have been looking for without any extra cost. Isn't it amazing?

Zee Studio is doing lots to promote classic Indian cinema. After treating the viewers with Ritwik Ghatak's ground-breaking cinema, it's time for Satyajit Ray's Apu Trilogy. Ajantrik(pictured on left) and Bari Theke Paliye were the two movies of the former director which were shown. I caught up with the first one. Ajantrik depicts a moving relationship of a taxi driver with his cab. The driver looks after his car as if he is tending his son. When the car has a fallacy, he is too adamant to not to replace it with a new car. He buys new parts and indulges himself into the job of fixing the car once and for all. Though the world laughs at him, but it is the inner peace which he gains when in the end he is able to restart the engine. The movie clashed with my opinion that a machine is a machine and should be used like a machine. There is no reason for empathy. If it stops working, then either fix it or just throw it away. Even if it has worked hard and made you feel better then also there is no reason to empathize with it. There a lot of demonic machines out there which can never make you feel better. Instead, they will leave no stone unturned to give you jitterbugs.

...............kho naa jaaye yeh.... taare zameen par.....

I saw Jab We Met. And if you have seen Ahista Ahista then the 2hr. and 22 minutes you spend on the former are a complete waste of precious(due to majors) time. Well, the latter one was a little worth watching. Inspired by White Nights(yes yes the same one which inspired Saawariya)- a story by Fyodor Dostoevsky, it was a slow paced romance. Once again the songs proved to be the big bone of contention. This is the biggest problem with Bollywood movies. The songs completely slacken a movie's flow. But the way songs have been handled in No Smoking, I was very impressed by the approach. The songs were used to highlight certain thematic elements of the movie and in fact didn't seem to break the momentum which had been gathered.

In Ahista Ahista a boy(Abhay Deol) loves a girl(Soha Ali Khan), who has earlier eloped but is then betrayed by her boy-friend(Shayan Munshi(that if you know who he is!), and by the time he proposes her ex-boyfriend appears out of the blue and feeds her a thrilling story which she believes in and ditches the new guy in her life. Jab We Met goes one step further(kahaani mein twist) and the girl, now replaced by Kareena Kapoor, goes back to her new lover(here played by Shahid Kapoor).

So nothing new in fact.

Just to remind the reader, my major exams are going on. We are supposed to study for them. The reason being that the two hours per course which you are supposed to spend writing exam, are completely wasted. I am not denying that you need to sit through the whole exam, or sit at all. But just in case you are unfortunate... So it is better to study a little and then spew a lot. Thus wish me lots of best of luck and bid me farewell for now...

It never has been better.....

In the past two weeks, I have seen over 10 movies. So, I don't have the patience to upload the poster for each one of those. Being Cyrus was the most bizarre film I saw last week. The same goes for the Herzog-Klinski nexus as seen in Aguirre, the wrath of God. Others include a documentary called Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky(On the sets of Offret) which gave profound insight into the direction style of the cinematic poet.

Haasil was the most horrible movie among the ones seen. Apart from a strong(yet cliched) performance by Irrfan Khan, there wasn't much substance in it. By the end, I was completely pissed off. Stupid songs, a silly good old love story and 2 hrs 40 min of pure nonsense. That's what it was! Actually someone had suggested me this movie. May be I do better by myself than listening to others(at least some of them) in matters as grave as cinema.

The others don't merit attention because they were kind of inconsequential. La vita è bella didn't meet my expectations. At least as compared to Schindler's List(which I saw four years back), the director didn't consider Holocaust as serious an event as it should have been. At only some instances, the movie appealed to my taste. But considering the insipid performance delivered by Roberto Benigni(who surprisingly won an Academy Award for it) and others, it failed considerably to satisfy me. Some may argue that the Holocaust was presented from a different perspective, but I believe that in the light of the most degenerate event in history of mankind, there is no scope of laughter and a cock and bull story of people playing game to win a tank.

I like the bizarre. I generally like pitting my wits and senses against something eerily unusual. I can't explain that different sense of satisfaction which is reached after doing this.

But I definitely need to cut down on my movie-watching time. Majors are just round the corner and am already in deep water in a couple of courses.

Very strangely, I haven't been able to read a book since I finished the great odyssey. Though I have started On the Road by Jack Kerouac and The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman, yet I find them boring after reading a few pages. I suppose it is just that cycle which goes on time after time. After a few days, I may regain my tempo.