Blogs made a headstart over main stream media because of the personal voice they had in every single blogpost. In the process of getting wider audience and millions jumping into the blogging badnwagon, if they end up being badly written, poorly gestated trashes of email driven culture, someone has to take note of such blogs and vrooooomm !!
– Thumbi, the MP(D) of lazygeek
[Pic – Frontline]
Reading this quasi-review Matrubhoomi directed by Manish Jha, I’m pushed to look out for the availability of the film in video stores around me. While most science fictions deal with gizmos and fanatasy stuff, here’s a sci-fi with a social sense.
From what’s been written, the movie could also end up as yet another message movie. It’s the premise of the movie excites me for this is what is expected from our folks at woods of India. Also the note that Jha, the director of this movie had already won a Prix du jury at Cannes his feature, for A Very Very Silent Film, makes me have high regard on his abilities as a director.
From Frontline –
Futuristic films are supposed to be an escape into fantasy, even if they do make passing or pointed references to current attitudes and cultural fashions. They are usually not grounded in current social reality – a reality rooted in centuries of accumulated prejudice and burdens of history. Jha’s film is more a doomsday warning – of the approaching apocalypse of moral collapse and sexual depravity caused by selective decimation of women – than a futuristic sci-fi scenario. The film describes the nightmare of what happens to a society that systematically kills girls – after they are born, if they have not been finished off in the womb itself. Our past foretells the future. The past Jha resurrects is from the Mahabharata, of a Draupadi married to five brothers – in this case, not out of the choice of a swayamvar but because there is a dearth of brides in a sex-starved patriarchy. Will this enhance the value of women and the girl child? So the proponents of sex-determination tests would have you believe, as they try to offer a sociological rationale for the morally indefensible practice of selective abortions.
His short A Very Very Silent Film (a pavement dweller is raped through the night by the many passers by till it is discovered to be a corpse the next morning) won the Prix du jury at Cannes in the year our media went gaga over Devdas (ignoring the quickly emptying halls) to the exclusion of everything else – including the arrival of a major new talent.
In the case of new films, the ban would be subject only to some rare situations such as the treatment of historical personalities known to smoke, and period films. Also, it would be allowed as part of social messaging against smoking itself. As for old films, due to technical difficulties, it was agreed that instead of a prominent scroll containing a health warning accompanying smoking/tobacco-using scenes, theatre owners would have to show warning slides.
What else to say of this. I remember a short story which a friend of mine shouted over my shoulder while biking on GST. A greedy disciple wants a boon from his guru while leaving for his hometown, after schooling. The guru understanding the covetousness of his disciple, plans to whack him smoothly. As the disciple asks,” I need a magical power that would give me whatever, when I think of it”. The guru says,” Given. But whenever you are using the power, you shouldn’t think of a monkey”. The disciple thinks,” I need a ton of gold and yeah !! I am not going to think of a monkey”. Whacked !!
Similarly during a smoking scene in the movie, if they are showing the scroll, Cigarette smoking is injurious to health, our friend would get reminded of the single cigarette left in his pocket an walk out of the movie hall, to smoke. Aren’t you LYAO ??
[From Slate]
It’s the summer movies week at Slate and to celebrate the block busters releasing this summer they got their dudes to write some hot gossip. With George Lucas’ Star Wars already taking a box-office by storm, StevenSpielberg‘s sci-fi thriller War of the Worlds is set to rock the theatres by June 29th. To cook some masala here is pretty easy. They do it pretty well in this article named, Lucas vs. Spielberg – The worst best friends in Hollywood.
Not just gossipy but this story seems to have some really interesting trivias on the duo. If you are a fan of atleast one of them, you would read it without taking a breath. If you love both, it is a treasure because the kind of stuff is said seems pretty true. I don’t think Slate can just bluff like this in public space. It talks about the outwardly friendship and the true inside competition that goes on between Steven Spielberg and Lucas during their movie releases. Steve seems to admire Lucas so much from his debut film, THX 1138. And Lucas seems to be extremely aware of the sharp director in Steve right from his first tele-film, Duel.
Spielberg—it was revealed—had lent a helping hand to the climactic light-saber duels in Sith. “George gets stuck sometimes,” said producer Rick McCallum, as if the Star Wars saga were a particularly stubborn patch of lawn. “He never asks for help, but you can feel it when he needs it. With Steven he got encouragement from a directing peer and a good friend.” Meanwhile, Spielberg hired the same pre-viz-effects supervisor sent to him by Lucas to help with his aliens for War of the Worlds, much as you or I might borrow a trowel or Rotavator. “We’ve always helped each other,” said Lucas when approached by the cable network A&E about a documentary detailing the rivalry between the two directors. “[Spielberg] and I have never had an argument in our lives. … I want DreamWorks to succeed. They want me to succeed. And we’re going to help each other succeed.” So, there you have it: just two successful movie titans succeeding, side by side, successfully.
Not just this but a no-harm debate on – Did George Lucas and Steven Spielberg Ruin the Movies?. Don’t miss it.
When Mani Ratnam directs Kamal Haasan, Vikram, Madhavan, Abhishek Bachchan, Vivek, Laila, Sadha, Asin, Pooja among others for an A.R. Rahman musical, with sets created by Sabu Cyril and lit up by Rajiv Menon, on a stage which is 80 feet wide and 40 feet deep, you know it does not get bigger than this, At least, not in this part of the world. With over a hundred dancers around sets such as the train from `Chayya Chayya’ and the ship from `Atho Antha Paravai Pola,’ the latest edition of the `Netru Indru Naalai’ show will be nothing short of a spectacle. On par with what people usually find only in musicals in Broadway and Westend, Mani Ratnam told the media at The Banyan on Tuesday evening. “We have one change to announce. We are positioning it in August to make it a spectacle,” he said.
“We want to make it a special show because it is for a special cause and for special people,” the filmmaker said. “It’s our desire to recreate the magic of the songs over the years. We are looking at the journey of the film industry over the years, from the black and white era to colour to the futuristic sets and sounds of A.R. Rahman. We will hopefully recreate those moments,” Mani Ratnam explained.
“Kamal will do a Sivaji song and a MGR song while Vikram will do a Kamal song and a Rajni song,” Mani Ratnam said, explaining the theme for the musical. “As a part of the audience, I would be more interested in how the stars of today interpret what the stars of yesterday did.’
Adeyappa!! Enjoy Chennaites. Read more of Sudhish Kamat’s article from The Hindu.
I read the same news from New Indian Express too. Is it because of Sudhish or Hindu, the article was more interesting and informative, than New Indian Express, for the kind of filmy news it dealt with. One more reason why I love to read Hindu, anyday.
kirukkal.com 