First experience with iMovie

Well, the occasion to learn movie editing was not a pompous one but nevertheless it did present me with the opportunity. And having a macbook pro at hand proved an incredible blessing! What a breeze it has been to stitch together a video like this! Although people should be warned that owing to the ease which the macbook presents its users with, people might be tempted to think highly of their video editing skills and ponder about an alternate career option!! :)

The Hunting Party

After a week's hiatus from the world wide web, I caught my mind craving for some food. And what better food than movies! Especially ones that can amaze me with more than just an incredible plot. Zany screenplay with witty and pithy dialogues is a welcome bonus. Not to mention incredible performances.

The Hunting Party is all that and then some. Incredible plot - that of the dirty politics and the actual truth behind "war criminals" - CHECK. Zany screenplay with matching dialogues - CHECK. Incredible performances - by Richard Gere, Terence Howard and Jesse Eisenberg - CHECK. I was glad I stumbled across this movie and decided to give it a watch. The rarely ventured into plot and the amazingly humorous treatment given to it by the tongue-in-cheek dialogues did the job for me. It is not very often that a movie impresses me so much especially when I watch it with a set of expectations in my mind.

Just like I love almost anything that goes into my mouth after starving for some good food, maybe this movie impressed me so much because I had been starving for some good cinema. Nevertheless, this, here, is a movie I would recommend to anybody and everybody. If not anything else, at least you can have a good hearty laugh at it.

New Passion?!?!

After excessive gawking, ogling and googling for all these years, I finally did give in to the temptation. I finally got the heart to override the brain's critiques and bought a MacBook Pro! Well, not for myself but as an anniversary gift for Roopa (although I seem to be using it more than her!). So these are my initial reactions I needed to pen down before my honeymoon period with the Mac is over.

An Apple is not just a laptop or just a phone or just a music player. It is the example of what one man's brilliance combined with vision and a pinch of arrogance can accomplish. There already are countless testimonials about the man himself but the creations he has pioneered are worthy of no less praise and servitude. An Apple is a style statement for the onlookers. It is an object of desire for millions. It is the ultimate oomph machine in whatever genre it stands. It is the benchmark against which everyone else builds their machines. It is the pivotal subject of criticism for jealous folks. Whatever it is and wherever it sits, it is the best.

The looks are obviously the main reason for anybody to buy a mac and am no exception. And boy does it look awesome! I may be exaggerating but personally I felt the Pro is better looking than the Air, just a little. And it's build is so sturdy that it can put even business laptops to shame (my way of judging the sturdiness of a laptop is that if you can open it with a single hand without having to hold down the lower portion, it is the best you can get). In short, just imagine a victoria's secret super-model who can jump upside down with an elastic rope tied to her legs with the same grace as she walks the ramp, without breaking a sweat. That is how luscious the MacBook Pro is. 

The trackpad takes some getting used to but once you learn its nuances, it is one of the best innovations in passive input technologies ever. The screen is so good that you forget it is only 1280*800. The Lion OS is fast, not blazing fast but just fast. Am yet to explore all the bundled apps on the laptop but so far, Safari and iPhoto have stood up to my expectations. Well, experience tells me that all the good about things you love usually has a short shelf life and I hope it's not that way with the MacBook Pro.

That Girl in Yellow Boots

IMDB

I confess that I was one of the critics who keep complaining that despite no dearth of money, Indian film "woods" were not churning out meaningful and/or impacting movies. That was till "Eklavya". That movie, I think, in many ways is a fine example for both the reigning and the aspiring film makers in India. A tiny but powerful enough plot made into a masterpiece by fine acting and finer directing. Then I watched "Gulaal". This movie almost blew my mind away with the sinister plot and hauntingly disturbing screenplay. You cannot ignore movies from a talent of such kind and calibre.

Which is why I was very interested in watching "That Girl in Yellow Boots". And it did not disappoint me. If you are the kind of person who admires Quentin Tarantino's movies like me or a person who appreciates movies like "Hostel" (despite the gross content) just for the incredible idea behind the plot, you will admire this movie with the same fervor. Never before on Indian film canvas might there be a movie so bold and disturbing. The climax is so twisted yet so powerful that it haunts your mind for quite some time. That is an incredible feat to achieve and kudos mainly to Kalki who is not only the very impressive protagonist but also the brain behind the plot.

Child abuse, corruption and sexual exploitation are all themes explored and dealt with by indian film makers to the death. But TGIYB incorporates all these in such a disquietingly subtle way that its hard to ignore them. It would be very unfair on my part to divulge anything more on the plot.

I agree this might not be a movie you may want to watch to cheer yourself up because of the brazenly frank and frighteningly honest portrayal of characters. But I do stress that it is a movie that SHOULD be watched for the sheer genius and boldness of Anurag Kashyap and Kalki. I honestly thank them for heralding a new age movie genre in India. So go ahead and watch it. It is absolutely fine if it disturbs you because that only means it is capable of stirring up something deep inside you that is normally and almost always dormant.

Super 8

Super 8 is nothing more than just an honest tribute by JJ Abrams to the likes of Steven Spielberg. 

Nothing brilliant to impress you, nothing eye-popping to amaze you and nothing emotionally new to touch you. But that is not to downplay the director's efforts in portraying a very simple story in a non-boring way. There are a few instances which make you anticipate similar genius in the coming reels but sadly there aren't many.

But the pubertal dialogues of the central characters are often quite witty and humorous and keep the otherwise sinister plot and happenings on a lighter note. This in turn makes the movie a bit different from the "been there seen that" kind of sci-fi movies and good enough to sit through.

I, unfortunately, had the privilege of the company of a very idiotic and inconsiderate couple who had only come to the movie to giggle through and prove to all others that they were too "grown-up and mature" to enjoy this movie. They did spoil many a moments in the movie for me and had to be told to shut up. Such kind of shit does spoil one's mood, which I think is the only reason I did not like the movie. But I will remember to watch the movie at some later time to give it a fair chance to impress me.

Real Steel

IMDB

The finest works of art are seldom truly understood by the masses. Which is why there are movies like Real Steel for all the mediocre folks to gawk at, and the remaining “more evolved” people to admire and/or dismiss the particular craft of making awesome sci-fi flicks.

You are either a fan of this genre or someone who winces at the fans of this genre. Obviously the latter are just imbeciles though they are adept at arguing they are not. But anyway, the fact is that even such people are sure to be absorbed into the beautiful vortex of expertly done SFX backed by a sensible plot if only they let themselves be open enough to take in something new, something different. And Real Steel is a damn fine starting point for all such people.

Real Steel will not blow you away with its brilliance in the SFX or subtlety in the plot. But it will surely make you want to shout out supporting the hero in the final battle. It will make you want to applaud the son for his childish but very relevant outlook towards life. It will make you want to duck and throw a punch with the hero like any good boxing movie would (which is quite incredible since it is not humans who are boxing here). It will make you want to feel the triumph of the hero at the end. It will make you want to be a part of the story happening on the screen.

Establishing the central character is done without wasting much time. The hero is, well, the ideal filmy loser who doesn’t want to believe he deserves better. The son is the ideal filmy believer who thinks his father can still do things he is capable of even though he is scared to. And bridging these two is the fighter robot “ATOM” whom they find by a freak accident. Now, with all these inputs, it is not hard to imagine the rest of the story. But the journey of the father-son-robot trio absorbs you into the happenings and makes you really believe in the seemingly impossible undertaking of the son. Although there is nothing “Avatar-like” fantastic happening and it is just a plain story of a father finding love and attachment to his son and life, there are plenty of moments that tug at your heart and moments that pump some serious adrenaline. The job done by the director in punctuating the story with these moments is commendable.

Many of my colleagues/friends ridicule me for going to some movies alone. I neither argue with them nor present any justification for these lonely crusades. Some movies are best enjoyed alone. And Real Steel is the first sci-fi movie that I have enjoyed watching alone. Forgiving his past duds, I will be looking forward to Shawn Levy’s next directorial.

Rise Of the Planet Of the Apes

IMDB

Caesar is home and wow, what a home-coming!

If a sci-fi movie is able to give me goose-bumps even a couple of times, I rate it as “achieved expectations” and recommend it to all my friends. And ROPOA did that to me four times at the least! Last movie that gave me such an experience was Avatar (which by the way was not from the plot or the performances but from the sheer brilliance of the visuals). ROPOA is a very worthy successor to the filming technology of Avatar – though technically not as flawless as Avatar, but emotionally very exuberant.

The buildup of the plot is time-consuming and is not something that’s awe inspiring but it’s also not boring. There might be a time when you may think when the “rise” is really going to start. The premise, although not entirely new, is promising. The whole episode of rearing of Caesar does force you to draw analogy to the parenting of the teenager in your home, complete with the sweet memories and the unpredictable mood swings!

When the rise of the apes does start, it takes the pace of the movie to a whole new peak. Caesar takes the stage by storm and his each and every move in gathering the apes for the rising is just awesome. I don’t know of an instance in the movie history when the uttering of a single word (“NO!”) on the screen has had such a profound impact on the viewer. This particular scene alone has made me a repeat audience of ROPOA, although there are a few more such incredible scenes.

There’s really nothing much to talk about anyone else in the movie and this is not because the performances are bad. It’s because Caesar just eclipses everyone else! James Franco and Tom Felton play their parts well and Freida Pinto doesn’t really have much to do.

The earlier Planet of the Apes was not a bad movie. I watched it ten years ago and the only emotion those apes evoked in me was fear. ROPOA instills the same kind of fear in the viewers but it’s the process of the instillation (through emotions and dialogues rather than through larger-than-life stunts and explosions) that makes ROPOA a lot better movie.

Have you ever felt sympathetic to someone while simultaneously being afraid of him? No? Then go watch ROPOA and when you meet Caesar, your answer will change to “yes”! Oh, I can’t wait to see the aftermath of Caesar’s rise!

My mobile can take good pics too!

Random Thoughts

Being the subject of constant scrutiny mixed with a bit of ridicule is not easy. This manifests itself in anger followed by denial followed by acceptance finally followed by discount. This painful process is amplified further if your decision is condemned but YOU know it’s the best for you.

While there’s no denying that this kind of scrutiny is an excellent growth proposition for the character, it also indefinitely limits the comprehensive decision-making abilities of the person. Developing a sense of insecurity as a result is - I would dare to extrapolate - very common. It also tricks you into thinking that life is very complicated and the only way to simplify it is to let go of all conceptions – good and bad.

Restricting the psyche of a person is by far the worst you can hurt him. What’s more appalling is people never realize the extent of this damage they have unknowingly inflicted. One challenge lies in getting them to realize this. For most victims, overcoming this challenge is a “work in progress” for almost their entire lives. There is really no fool proof method to go about this because though simple as it sounds, it is not as easy, especially because you are not dealing with enemies but with people you love. You have to deal with complex egos built up over long periods of time and such constructs that you may absolutely disapprove of but have to face nevertheless. The other challenge lies in bringing about a positive change in those people. Now what makes this challenge a grueling one is that though everyone knows that change is the only constant in life, they still prefer to resist it. So, not only is it your responsibility to make them vulnerable to this change, but you also have to cajole them to truly accept the change.

But that’s not all. Now comes the most difficult part - Absolution. When you feel that a person close to your heart has wronged you, let you down or has gone against your decisions, the most common reaction is anger and you draw yourself away from that person. This seems logical and normal, and the thought process stops here. Only on cogitating further can one stumble upon the realization that the person had the right to hurt you - a right needed to make the bond stronger. What better test could there ever be for the bond of love than the infliction of a state of facing your worst fears for your loved ones? And what better way to trump this test than to forgive the person from the bottom of your heart? 

Our bravest and best lessons are not learnt through success but through misadventures. And it is immensely pleasurable and easy to sail through these misadventures when you know that your loved ones are there for you, no matter what.

Cowboys & Aliens

I believe in comparing a movie to a dish and the director to its chef. There are world renowned chefs and there are aspirants with promising talents. And then there are those who are neither here nor there – the “middlemen” if you can call them that. Leaders, Aspirants and Followers.

So, there are leaders like James Cameron, Quentin Tarantino, Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, John Lasseter, etc, and there are worthy aspirants like Zack Snyder, Paul Greengrass, Danny Boyle, etc. These master craftsmen don’t follow a “trend”. More often than not, they define and build an era. And then there are people like John Favreau, Michael Bay, etc., who are proficient followers of those trends. James Cameron is what he is because he invents the recipes of his dishes. Even if you don’t love the dish, you most certainly will not hate it; and you cannot help but be amazed at the brilliance of the recipe and its ingredients. The aspirants are more inspired by the passion that goes behind the invention of such recipes than the recipes themselves. Which is why some of their initial attempts may founder but eventually they are guaranteed to join that altar where their works are beyond success and failure. The followers, on the other hand, are more interested in acquainting themselves with the ingredients used by the leaders and the aspirants. Just a mish-mash of different ingredients from different recipes and –voila – you get a movie like Cowboys and Aliens.

Faint and few streaks of genius intertwined with blunting performances further marred by blotches of déjà-vu is how I would define C&A. Oh, who would have expected Harrison Ford to choose C&A as one of his now-a-days rare silver screen appearances! And I constantly fail to understand why Daniel Craig literally sweats incessantly for his one-expression-fits-all acting prowess in every single movie. Dude, lose the drive to make yourself look cool. You remind me of SRK – that’s how pathetic you are on screen.

If Iron Man2 was a small step towards the abyss of self-annihilation for John F, C&A is one giant leap toward the same. After the well deserving debacle of Iron Man 2, John F takes another futile swing at the action + sci-fi genre, thus sealing the fact that he is better off acting than directing. The plot is straight out of a Hollywood studio blender; the alien creature VFX are Cameron’s Aliens meets District 9, and even the bonny Olivia Wilde looks like she just woke up with a horrible hang over - completely out of place.

Seriously, borrowing the “unobtanium-obsessed humans invading Pandora” plot and shockingly downgrading it to “gold-obsessed aliens invading earth” is freakishly infantile. Movies that lulled me to sleep are far and very few. C&A has joined that distinguished club – I found myself making an effort to stay awake at least a couple of times during the boring, long and “made to look and sound cool” cowboy conversations. While I agree that trying to copy the minutiae-obsessed but intensely grossing conversation styles of Quentin’s movies is not an easy job, I also despise anyone failing so poorly.

All said and done, you can’t help but sympathize with John F because the leaders have set the bar so high – you either die trying or live long enough to see yourself become a pitiful parody. If you are a teenager or have a teenager who is trying to make himself popular with his knowledge of movies, watch this movie for the numerous proofs it provides of how not to make a movie of this genre. Otherwise, you are well off giving it a skip and watching it at home whenever it is aired on TV.

Insanes...

Please don’t expect a call from me every day as an evidence of my love to you, especially when you don’t call.

Please don’t expect to be included in EVERY decision of mine, especially when am not included in any of yours.

Please don’t expect me to accept the fact that you don’t treat me like a grownup just because you love me a lot. You can't hide from facts for long.

Please don’t think of me as a cockeyed rebel just because I do not THINK and/or DO things like your friends’/colleagues’ offspring. It is just futile negative correlation.

Please don’t put conditions for my acceptance into your “circle”.

Please don’t judge me to be emotionally barren when am only pragmatic.

There are people who are adept at “showing” their love. And then there are people who don’t. If having a different definition of Love makes you think am insane, then am not the least bit ashamed to be one of the INSANES.

As a very good friend of mine once remarked -

Relations don’t get closer by meetings, but get sweetened by remembrance; I care for you in my own special way. May be you will never know and maybe I will never show.

Life and photography…

One can draw a lot of analogies between the two.

1. No one is really an expert in either.
2. If at all there is a real expert, you will never have access to him/her.
3. You begin to think you have learnt and experienced a respectable lot and then you face something entirely new that will make you either quit or go back to the learning mode, again and again.
4. You are on a never-ending search for a better tool that can make you an expert and that “better tool” is always a phantom.

A camera works on the basic principle of light that is let in through the lens onto the sensor to capture a photograph. Life works on the basic principle of the “light” you are willing to let in through your sense organs onto the brain to experience an occurrence. What the brain makes out of that experience makes up the “photograph” imprinted on our lives.

The aperture of a camera combined with the shutter speed is what dictates the amount of light that is let in and hence the quality of the photograph. In our case, the aperture – the receptiveness, combined with the shutter speed – the speed at which we can adapt to a challenge, is what dictates the amount of knowledge that is let in and hence the quality of life. No wonder great people remained eager learners all their lives.

There are many world renowned photographers – renowned only because of their brilliance in technical skills and the subjects they choose to photograph. That’s all you need to take a good photograph - the right technical skills and the proper use of those skills to capture the right picture.

Few awesome snaps of my Sunderbans trip

Infamous2 on my PS3

When I bought Infamous-1 last year, I had absolutely no idea about the game, let alone expectations. So the BD just lay there in the disc stack for quite some time. It took a really bad day at work followed by a very bad movie in PVR (Komaram Puli - for all the curious folks) to prod me to try the game.

So I started the game at 9:30PM with a bad mood and an even worse temper. By the time I was too tired to keep my eyes open, it was 2AM and I was in LOVE with the game. This game justified my decision of buying a PS3 (and subsequently all the petty arguments I had with my wife due to the long hours of game play). In fact, this game defined "gaming" to me. I would rank the climax of this game among the top 5 of all time great Hollywood endings.

And then started my wait for the second part. I was checking all kinds of sites and blogs for any whiff of info on when the sequel would release. After an agonizing wait of almost 9 months, the sequel finally arrived (had placed an advance order in Landmark with a waiting period of 3 days). As soon as I was back home, I went at it with the same gusto I had when I got my hands on the last Harry Potter book (I was up at 4AM and was in the queue at Landmark till 6:30AM to get my copy of the book!)

So started my second journey as Cole on a Friday evening. By the time I was too tired to keep my eyes open, it was 00:45 and I was MIGHTY disappointed with the game. Not that the game is bad but maybe I just had expected a bit too much. After finishing off the game on good karma, I was further more disappointed not only because the game was too short (finished the game in roughly 16hrs of game play as against around 25hrs for the first part) but the climax was also one of the most diffident endings one could ever imagine.

Agreed I would have to shave off some negative points due to the "high expectations" factor, but the game didn't give me any reasons to like it, let alone love it. People who haven't played the first would no doubt like the sequel due to the amazing new powers Cole can acquire and the innumerable (but disappointingly short) side-missions packed in but there's no denying that Infamous2 just lacks the soul, the spirit, the zing factor and ultimately an awesome story line to keep the player interested in it. Sorry all the folks at Sucker Punch, but you all made a sorry piece of a circus instead of a worthy successor.

Buddah...hoga tera baap

A perfect tribute to the biggest star of India!

Buddah is a name perfectly apt (even the tagline goes perfectly with the plot! Sorry for the spoiler!) for the movie which aims squarely at one thing and one thing only - show BigB's superstar heroics in all possible glory. And Puri succeeds at it completely.

If you can't stand the very routine masala potboilers Puri makes, you can still watch the movie just for "Go Meera Go" for all the unique BigB dances and signature moves (which are sure to put a lot of current self-proclaimed superstars to shame) and the typical south-style punch dialogues which will sound infinitely silly from anyone else's mouth.

Sonu Sood never has disappointed me so far and he does a clean job in Buddah as well with his incredible screen presence and subdued histrionics. Who Sonu Sood is and how important is his role in the movie is easily answerable with the movie tag line (sorry again for the spoiler!). Charmi gets a surprisingly good role and does an even more surprisingly good act at that. Hema Malini is quintessentially beautiful in her small albeit important role. Raveena Tandon is the only complaint I have with the movie - incessantly irritating with her lusty gyrations and advances towards BigB. What a dumb role to choose for a comeback!!

All said and done, I think all those "superstars" declaring themselves to be better and/or bigger than BigB with their gaffes and lowly acting capabilities should take a jab of common sense, stop and look at what this "Buddah" is capable of doing at this age. And then I hope, if they have the slightest pinch of self-respect, stop acting in movies completely. So I reiterate, go watch the movie to gawp at BigB, the real superstar of India (who ofcourse is forgiven for being the father of a gambol who passes along as an actor just by fluke).

Pastime in Lalbaugh...

Transformers - The Dark of the Moon

!!Might contain spoilers!!

So I put myself in the theater for the latest and supposedly last installment of the Transformers series, hoping yet again that Michael Bay won't disappoint me this time. The guy had exceedingly become narcissistic about his best talent - blowing all sorts of things up and showing the glory in it, all the while forgetting that a movie needs sanity in the plot, even if in tiny portions. This time though, its a bit different as he has graduated from an irritating little scamp to a teenager who has just hit puberty (no offense John Woo, Paul Greengrass and co).

Food for thought - How many movies have forced you to make your mind stop "logical" thinking and still thoroughly enjoy the rampage on the screen? I mean just how many times have you caught you telling yourself - "Hey, all this makes no sense but why am I enjoying it?" How many times have you really marveled at the genius of a prank played on you?

With the "incredible and expensive" waste of a movie that was called "Revenge of the Fallen" behind him, Michael Bay still managed to get the whole world waiting for what he had in store for Witwicky and all the bots. And boy he delivers, and how!! If you are a fan of movies like Matrix, V for Vendetta, 300, Watchmen, etc., just for the fabulously choreographed fights, you are going to LOVE this movie, even more so because the fighters here are all non-humans. The first encounter between the Autobots and the Decepticons is one of the best fights orchestrated in movie history ever (even though Optimus Prime is not in the fight) and am not exaggerating.

There are scores of new Transformers thrown at you but the Sentinel Prime, however grabs the key role in the movie, which has its pros and cons. Pros being the Sentinel adds a bit of sanity to the plot (at last!) and his fighting skills are seriously worthy of envy. Cons being Megatron is ridiculously side-lined (so is Optimus to some extent) and the movie gets too melodramatic just before the climax.

The movie has its bad moments (in abundance) - a couple of the penultimate combats seem protracted although they don't bore you. Hmm... I can't seem to recollect any more negatives, which I think is a good thing!

The plot of this movie is by far the best of the three although definitely not something you can compare to Christopher Nolan or Quentin Tarantino's movies. Rosie Huntington-Whiteley is a welcome respite for me as I could not stand the dumb sight of Megan Fox on the screen (apologies to all the fans!). Well, to sum it up, the movie is a lot like a cocktail invented by James Bond - the recipe might sound tempting but no guessing works in how it might taste. You actually have to taste it yourself. So I would dare say do yourself a favor by watching this movie in 3D.

A little bit of Hope...

I hope everything goes well today when I wake up in the morning.
I hope God is with me in tough times and otherwise.
I hope that when needed, I have the guts to challenge myself.
I hope my friends will find solace in what they hunt for in life.
I hope I will never lose my loved ones.
I hope I can make my dreams come true, some day.
I hope I will stand as an inspiration atleast to one person.
I hope to make a li'l difference in my own world.
I hope everyone in this world finds the common sense to live and let live.
I hope.