Earth

"....Medhini Devi Vasundhara Syadh Vasudha Devi Vasavi..."

Harry Potter 7 - Marana Kadi

I am not a fan of the series. It is not my intention to piss on the party of people who like this movie. But I have to get this out of my system. If not I may just burst. After abandoning the first book after 2-3 weeks of trying, I had seriously thought that Rowling's Potter series was probably similar to Arundhati Roy's "God of Smaller Things" - in that it adorned the mantelpieces of Delhi-chic type people who want to be 'cool' but nobody ever read them. After seeing the first two movies, I also thought this material was probably appropriate for children between ages 7 - 16. I later found out that I was very wrong. About Rowling's book that is (I am correct about Roy's book). Like Valmeeki's Ramayana, Rowling has written Saptha-Kandams of Harry Potter. Many, though not all, apparently read the book. I also found that some even read it all the way to the last chapter. And that's just fantastic.

Now back to this movie, I was under the impression that I had watched them all. That is until I learned recently that 6 Potter movies are out already. So I have no recollection of what Harry Potter movies I have watched so and what I haven't. They have sorted of merged together as they all bored me in a similar fashion. With that context I went into the IMAX version of HP - Deathly Hallows. This 'Pei pisaasu' kadhai was not nearly as boring as I thought it would be. So that was a pleasant surprise. But it kept throwing character after character and showed scenes that resembled a poor man's version of LOTR. I was sure I saw 5 seconds of Ian Mckellen fall down a pit like the way he fell in LOTR. I didn't know Ian Mckellen acted in HP. So maybe instead of having Michael Gambon fall again, they did some quick cut and paste from LOTR to fill in for budget problems (yes. yes. I am kidding).

Similar to the way it has (not) happened in every Harry Potter movie I have seen - nothing ever happens in this movie. It is like you are waiting and waiting. And they are talking about one thing after another. Things, people, animals, animations, ghosts, creatures appear and disappear. I totally felt that they had these 273 items from the novel that they had to check off and they went about doing it in a mechanical fashion. There wasn't an involving plot that you could sink your teeth into. The humor/timing was absent. The pace was a badly off. The basic plot looked like there was a bit of good Vs evil in a magic setting. They bandied about the 'chosen one' concept - yes same one that has been around since Star Wars, Matrix, LOTR etc. There was no 'magic' to this movie. It just wasn't exciting.

P.S: My obvious lack of literary appreciation apart, I used to wonder why I just didn't get this damn movie. Maybe this movie came too close on the heels of LOTR that I found the book and movie inferior in comparison. Only other explanation I can think of.

Va Quarter Cutting

I hope Gayathri+Pushkar don't get discouraged by the fate of this movie. Their ambition alone makes up for some of the not-so-great execution elements of the movie. I guess I am saying this for quite a few movies nowadays - there were enough eccentricities in this movie for me to like it. Actually love it. And at the same time I get why some negative word-of-mouth biased viewers against this movie as well. Would I recommend this movie? Yes - to bachelor guys who love noire variety of movies mixed with some American Pie type masala. No - not a good movie for women and family audience. Which is why I think this movie won't do well. Despite of having a women director (who could be what Kramer described Elaine as - a man's woman ) I can't imagine a guy admitting to his other half that he liked this movie and walk away with his reputation intact. I usually don't care about commercial fate of movies and dislike box office discussions on movies but here I digress because I genuinely fear that failure may dissuade these exceptional movie makers from giving us a few more movies.

Here is why I liked the movie. (a) Some of the jokes were out of the world. I ROFL'ed till my stomach hurt. The stylistic aspect of this movie was simply too awesome. It is Quarter Cutting edge variety. (b) The creativity on show - be it naming of characters (it had two henchmen called vettu/kuthu I was instantly impressed), (c) the characters themselves (the 'arasiyalvaadhi'), (d) the dialogs, (e) the narration style, (f) the sarcasm ("saar neenga ungalye singam'nu koopdareengale ungalukku konjam kooda vekkama illai") - was admirable. (g) John Vijay - I think he is the best comedian in thamizh cinema today. I would pay the price of admission to just watch his scenes alone. The comic timing and amazing amazing style of dialog delivery alone was worth several ROFLs. I am his huge fan. (h) The picturization of" saarpu saarpuji". My God - I the stand up and the bayangra applaud.

Here is what I think didn't work at all. About 70% of the jokes were mokkai. Didn't land very well. The movie did not have a racy element to it. The movie was paced in a slowish Coen brothers sort of way to make it appear 'cool'. But it doesn't land that way. It just looks slow and a bit draggy at times. Lastly, this is a movie about a hero who goes in search of 250 ml of Rum in the middle of the night. Imagine that. A story based on such a noble search. The appreciative audience is segmented down to a few dozen people right there. Plus the entire movie is taken in the dark. The characters look a bit seedy. And I think this significantly influenced the mindset while watching the movie. The good-feeling I got with "Oram Po" was absent. The story is Wodehouse'ian but setting/lighting is more 'Nightmare on Elm Street'.

Overall, I can't bring myself to dislike the movie or not recommended it. I enjoyed it. Not many will.

post script: BTW who is this 'girl-in-uniform-fantasy' S.I. Singaari? Semma hot macchi.

Manmadha Ambu Trailer

Happy Deepavali

I wish I found the BPL Phone Advt that has an old thaatha say "Happy.... Happy deepavali" But the best I could get is the 10000 wala we burst last year.

(Canon AVHCD HG21 Camera converted to lower pixel quality using Pixella s/w)

Happiness

Her bi-weekly paycheck showed an increase of $18.31. She had removed a dependent from her medical insurance last week.