The Pacification Directive

What a hectic sequence of events we have been witness to! Two countries that have been teetering on the edge of war just silenced their guns. Individuals from said countries were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize no less. Malala Yousafzai. I have no idea how to pronounce her last name. Let's just refer to her as Malala. Tough young woman! She is described as a Pakistani female education activist. That's an activist for female education who is from Pakistan. Makes sense no? If the events surrounding her can be summarised, it is just a young girl who wants to go to school and better her life. She is an individual who is convinced of the value of a good education. It started with a blog she wrote. A young girl with a point of view. It however takes more than that for people to look up and notice a little girl. In Malala's case, it was 3 bullets. The fact that a man who had never seen her before was compelled to seek out and end her life tells us something. She survived the assassination attempt and what emerged was much more. To draw a parallel, she was 'the girl who lived'.
I have a confession to make. When someone asked me who won the Nobel Peace prize, I said, "Malala and some Indian chap". I am an Indian and I had never heard of Kailash Satyarthi(I had to go back and check if I got the name right). Information began to trickle in slowly and after a respectable amount of time had passed, all I knew was that he had done a lot for children. This tweet pretty pretty much summarises the state of the nation on that day:

BREAKING: Google crashes under load of 500 million Indians typing “Who is Kailash Satyarthi?” http://t.co/odQcrMkd96 #NobelPeacePrize
— The UnReal Times (@TheUnRealTimes) October 11, 2014

Even a single child saved is a deed that elevates you and Kailash Satyarthi had done that many times over. So why have we never heard of him? Why is there no publicity around this man who, according to modest estimates, has freed more than 80,000 children. Imagine that! 80,000 children! That is a staggering number and yet, unless you are fairly familiar with national happenings, you will not have heard of him. Here is a sample of his work : http://youtu.be/BWz8xB-xLbE

This is a man who walks into a scenario well knowing he could be shot dead. Here's a fun fact. Kailash's name has been nominated several times in the last decade! Here is the source. So what changed this year? The director of the Nobel Institute, Geir Lundestad claims they are making amends for not having given a Peace Prize to Gandhi. I will ask again. Why this year? Why now? What changed? What 'pricked' his conscience?
Malala is a shoo in for the prize. She is young and she is from a community that is being lambasted on a public stage for not displaying even the most basic tendencies of civilised people. She is one entity that covers diverse topics from education to better lives and rights for women.
I think the impact that we Indians have had off late on the world stage does not allow our country to be ignored any longer. The Nobel committee clearly saw there was no getting away with awarding a peace prize to a country(yes a country) that was at the very moment lobbing boom packets at it's neighbour. I might even add that they would have gotten away with it a few months ago. A lot has changed.

PS : Feeling a bit 'Ludlum'ish. Hence the title. 
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J.A.P - jest another post ....

Let me start very arrogantly. As all the many readers of this blog know, I am a big fan of the movies. I seem to have an appetite for even those deemed 'rotten'[a genuine rating in some circles]. I happened to see the posters for an upcoming SAW film. I realise that these people mean bsuiness and are here to stay...forever. There is always going to be a way to put humans together in one room and watch them act crazy! Can't say its an original idea. I remember watching cage matches on WWF. You put a bunch of wrestlers together in a cage and its fun watching them 'spreadin' the looooove'.Forced confrontation. That happens in offices too. Not that I have the temerity to speak seeing as I am in between jobs. You will be forced to share a cubicle with the person you hate the most! You don't like the creepy thin fella who whispers into the phone a lot, cool sit next to him. That woman who can't stop showing you pictures of her baby? You're paired with her for the next assignment. The universe is sending out a very clear and concise message to us. Keep your fucking prejudices to yourself. Maybe SAW people should do that. It's not long before aliens come to earth[actually even if they take a few million years there will be a SAW movie coming out at that time]. So maybe SAW will have aliens and humans pitted against a common enemy. Oh wait AVP already did that. I saw that movie. Waitaminit! I SAW that film. Cool!

The Snake

Beauteous snake,
How much I learn from thee.

You meander through the grass,
Like a dangerous ornament.
Slithering over obstacles,
Your movement so elegant.

Your jeweled eyes cast,
A cold look so intense.
So still is your body,
An inexplicably terrifying presence.

A graceful form that hides venom.
A lazy gait belies your speed.
But what I like most of all is,
To sit aside and watch you feed!

Top telugu film dialogs

I am an insane fan of movies. I am constantly looking for updates wherever I can find them, on every site that is NOT blocked in my company! Like any PSBBian (madras people know what I mean) I prefer English movies to local fare. Being a Telugu person, I make time for as many Telugu movies as I can (insert cringe for Balakrishna movies). We all have that one idiot who ruins the name of the industry! Hollywood has Chuck Norris, Tollywood has Balakrishna, Kollywood(tamil cinema) has Vijay, Vijaykanth, Sam Anderson and many more (dig dig at sam people! :P), Bollywood has well ... suffice to say I do not wish to test the limits of my blog. Despite the presence of these pests, there are things we are proud of. I always thought telugu cinema dialogs were good. So I want to make an unofficial compilation. Right here ...
Post your favorite dialog in the comment section in the following format.
"" - :

let me start.

Sex in India ...

In most countries, sex is a proposition.

"Should we?" - "We should."

"Can we?" - "We can."

and many more such infuriatingly cooperative situations.

Sex in India however is a preposition.

"Have you ever done that?"

The standard reply to this question is more or less the same. Open your mouth in the shape of an 'O' and while emitting a steady sound rapidly cup and uncup your hand on your mouth(3 cycles per second should do the trick). The resulting sound should be something like this ...

"awbawbawbawbawba ..."

"You did thataaaa?"

"Tee Hee ... no"

5 cartoon shows that should have been made into films by now!

Before I begin let me make it very clear that the Power Puff Girls or the Care bears will not be featured here. Go fish yourself!

- Centurions : Everything about the show from the theme song to the satellite home base to the snap on body armour to the insane cyborg enemies to the ... ok you get the idea. This was a great show! 3 sachinodus(dudes to you) are referred to as the Centurions(echo effect).



Ray - usually wears suits that help him underwater ... hence the name ray!!
Rockwell - bloody obvious : land operations
Ace McCloud - yes yes without a doubt air support.

The three of them have a good time kicking some Cyborg ass. Hey if G I Joe(which by the way was my bloody bloody fav cartoon) can be turned into a film(I gag while I say this) Centurions can be celluloided too!

- Johnny Quest : The theme song! Yes we all remember this cartoon because it had a GREAT theme song! Those beats were insane. The action in the toon was pretty good too! This was the first cartoon I saw where people travelled between the real and virtual world. It was captivating! That indian kid(because he has a turban silly! all indians wear turbans) irritated me a lot!!! This movie will definitely do better than the Harry Potter movies(are they done yet?). Just found this by the way!



- Swat Kats : ok maybe not a live action film but hey MegaKat city is pretty cool! If they can make garfield,they can make T Bone and Razor! I would love to see these fellas on the big screen ripping across their sky in that ubercool fighterjet! I cannot recall the number of times I tried to make that hand thingy the Kats wear with all those gizmos on them!!!



- Top Cat : thats right I said it ... Top Cat! This was one of the first cartoons that made me realise that good dialogues go a long way to make the story interesting! The absolute cool with which Top Cat did everything, the natural leadership he displayed reminded me of one person alone - Simon Templar[a.k.a The Saint - sigh yes the Val kilmer movie - :( but previously a set of novels then a tv series(roger moore) and then the godforsaken movie!]. I think a Top Cat movie will be more of a challenge to the writers than the animators! Again .. not a live action movie!



- Thundercats : To be honest I don't remember much. All I know is a lot of half meow half human people walking around busting butts. Perfect recipe for a movie I say!!! I wanna here them say Thunder ... thunder ... thunder ... thundercats in DTS!!!




James Cameron ... stop making "blue" films and bless us with your creative eye!
Michael Bay! Edo okati cheyyi be!

Just realised there are too many "cats" in my requests!

Edge of Darkness

I wonder how many of you have seen "Taken". Tough and gritty movie, not a single dull moment. Liam Neesons' daughter is kidnapped and he must find her within 48 hours before she is lost forever in the prostitution underworld. When I saw the promos of "Edge of Darkness", I was subconciously pushed to thinking, "Father avenges daughter, should be good".(background noise of director snickering) Mel Gibson plays the role of Thomas Craven a Boston Police Officer. His daughter comes visiting and she is obviously sick. Daddy is about to take her to the hospital when all of a sudden outside their home, a masked man guns her down, not before screaming "CRAVEN!"(if you remember in Taken, the kidnapper says, "Good Luck"). The police assume it was someone who had it in for the father. Thomas Craven is however more cranial(get it?) than that and decides to look into what his daughter was doing. We soon get to know that she was an MITian(seriously? are there no other good colleges?) and was(note how I am using the past tense) working for a firm called Northmoor(oooooooh). The next hour shows Mel Gibson rattling every cage he comes across, starting with the CEO of Northmoor - Bennet. Subsequently every person he speaks to says the same thing, "Bennet is the bad guy." "Bennet's the man you want". Until slowly but surely Craven realises that Bennet is the one behind everything(this is the main twist). Throw in a fat but creepy man with a british accent who casually talks about the edge of darkness with his doctor, a shady research fa cility that is making nuclear weapons for foreign countries, a flower child organisation that is completely anti-corporate and of course some henchmen in black suits, what do you have? Nothing. Don't even watch this film. Mel Gibson has corny lines. He exit line in one scene is, "... and don't forget to wear your seat belt!". Wow! We have a clear message here: You may have assisted my daughters death but I value your safety(this is my major wtf moment). What really peeved me is when he catches one of the henchmen(after shooting off his leg) and asks him to scream, you guessed it, CRAVEN! People do what Mel Gibson did, go watch "Taken" again!

An impeccable script

Twilight

Stare intensely at a Vampire.

Look down ... smile ... look up with a serious expression.

Take the most action packed and violent scenes and turn them into slo mo ballet.

Twilight: New Moon

Stare intensely at a Werewolf.

Look down ... smile ... look up with a serious expression.

Make sure there is no blood and gore in any corner of the screen.

Twilight Eclipse

The vampires and werewolves stare at each other and make cubs that shed their hair in sunlight.

I find this entire "saga" pathetic. You cannot take bloodthirsty beasts and turn them into bloody romance dolls!!! Barbara Cartland is turning in her grave and Joan Collins is on IV. When someone told me that the Twilight series of movies was about vampires and werewolves, I was genuinely interested. I was extremely disappointed with the Underworld series(they had a cool framework that got botched up with a pathetic script!). And what do you see on screen? Pansies. No violence, oh no ... we suck on animals. The werewolves have a continuous supply of bermuda shorts. While the special effects were definitely high quality, whats with Bella getting reflected in the werewolves eyes??! I've seen that happen only in Indian wedding videos!

What really pisses me off is the popularity. What is the demographic that is watching this crap?(not counting first time hopefuls like me). It's like encouraging a really irritating kid!!

I am too disoriented to even cuss properly ... please if you are a good friend of mine, don't tell me if you like this "saga"(sheesh!), if however you are a girl, I forgive you.

The Perfect Man

My excuse this time is simply this: Too much work. However I am now in a more enlightened place. I have realised the work will never stop. I might as well work around it. This post is quite predictably about my workplace. Give me time and I will align myself to things that are more real. Here goes.

I know he will not read this. He is too tied up in the most mundane of things life has to offer. I am praying he will not read this and I know my prayers are answered even before I ask. This is a post about someone I work with. I will try not to be too critical of this person. The reason why I am apparently 'attacking' this person is because I feel a lot of us risk becoming like this too early. Let me be very clear, this is NOT what you want to be.

To maintain a level of decency, we will call him Mr X. No, "he ain't that cool".

He is 28 yeard old, works for a software company(but ofcourse) and is looking to get married. Simple guy, simple desires? NO.

Here is a simple example of this mans' persona.

We were to submit a document for review. Since the people who had to take a look at the doc were in the US, we were looking at a 4:00 in the evening submission time. I had made my changes to the doc sent it to Mr X and was waiting for him to get his work done. None of us could leave the office until the people onsite sent us a thumbs up(this is usually followed by an impromptu victory parade in the aisles). So I sat there twiddling my thumbs with hope in my heart. After about 2 hours, Mr X gets up from his place looks at me and gestures to come over. So I went up to him and he shows me the document. "There is a problem boss", he says. So i pulled up a chair and say, "Sure, tell me man". he showed me this screen.

"The flowchart is too big so i have split it across 2 images", he says.

I said, "That should not be a problem."

"No no, thats not the problem. The images are not aligned."

"They fit the document fine, what else needs to be aligned?"

"Look at the connector"

"I am looking at the connector, it looks good. What's the issue?"

"The connectors are not aligned"

I stared at the screen for some more time so he did not see the expression on my face. I took some deep breaths and looked at him trying to keep my face as expressionless as possible.

"The connectors are there so we don't have to bother about alignment. Why do you want the connectors to be aligned?"

He bit his lower lip and stared at the screen for some more time.

"You think so? Can't you do something? I feel they should be aligned."

"I think the flowcharts look fine", I said.

More staring followed. A very real twitch was beginning to develop on my face.

"Maybe we can trying moving the images a bit", he said.

"The image fills the entire page, you can't move it anywhere", I was slowly losing my cool now. The man stares at the screen for some more time.

"Ok fine, let me see what I can do."

I got up and walked away while congratulating myself on how well I had controlled my emotions. He had been staring at that flowchart for atleast half an hour. At this point if you are impressed by Mr X's attention to detail, go visit a shrink.

Everyday for me is an intense battle.

Nimble me ...

This morning, thanks to the newspaper boy with a bad aim and a pathetic throwing arm, I had to do a little bit of Parkour to retrieve my newspaper. The local cat observed me warily as I 

"nimbly" dropped down to the sunshade, picked up my paper, stepped onto the top of the enclosing wall and leaped down to the portico in front of my landlords main door. Thankfully they were not in town and I did notice with some satisfaction a hint of jealousy in the cat. I did all this with the toothbrush in my mouth. If I had fallen, I would have tossed the toothbrush aside

and people would think I was frothing at the mouth(back up plan). The cat was still staring at me as I climbed the stairs back to my floor. I could see her chiding her kittens(there are three), "When will you learn to be 'nimble' like him??!"

Image Key(click on image to really soak in the details):

1 : Insertion point(excuse the military lingo COD and counterstrike take over sometimes)

2: Observe this insect in awe of me. Nature stands still when I make my moves.

3: Drop zone. No .. there were no cracks there ... No ... those were already there ... its a badly constructed house.

4: Newspaper was lying here(mission accomplished). Dropped some toothpaste foam when I smiled.

5: Exit point from whence I make good my escape.

6. Jealous cat was sitting here.

7. Final road to the stairs back to my floor.(Radio Static)krzzsssssssssssssssssssssch "Delta team to home base, we have the package"

I think we men do stupid things like this now and then just to show ourselves that we have "it". Where "it" is as ambiguous as "mojo" or "zigibae". It's a stubborn refusal to accept the onset of a state of inability. "No Sarat, you can't sit on that rocking horse" "No Sarat, that tricycle is not for you." Its difficult to keep track of all the things I grow out of. I have a simple rule of thumb or ass rather. I am too old for it if, "It makes me look like an ass" or "My ass doesn't fit there". So I prefer not to do anything overtly physical. In my present condition(shape is what I mean) I look funny even when I walk(yes mom! I will work out!). I am jealous of people with a high metabolism rate. They get away with eating whatever they want! I was like that a long time ago. 

My mother would rant and rave about how the other students at school turned out like laddoos over the holidays while I looked like a piece of coconut fibre. Now ofcourse she tells me I'm too fat and have to lose weight(women!). I like the spriteliness that comes with thin or let me use the accepted word fit. I dont want people to think I'm promoting anorexia. I love food. Ask the waiters of every popular eatery who look at me and a faint glimmer of recognition shimmers on their face. It's like they have a vague memory of a long lost brother when they look at me. I love food. That is the reason why a diet never works with me. 

At one time I successfully lost the pounds(not the currency) and even gained nay 'attained' the elusive 'abs' thanks to 7 months of intense swimming for an hour, everyday. It was such a gradual thing I never even realised that I had begun to lose weight until I found myself buying size 28 pants. I am a 35 now struggling hard not to hit 36. Not a sexy number on a guy! I miss swimming! Especially when my roomie called me and told me that he has a huge pool in his hometown. I miss the days I spent in Gachibowli stadium. 50 meters long 10 feet deep(the swimming pool u notty reader!). Most people who were beginners never had the courage to step into the main pool and so stuck to the smaller one. Me and a friend(santosh) were veterans and frolicked in the bigger pool(at a platonic distance from each other). 

I must add here that it was santosh who insisted we 'graduate' to the bigger pool. Now I scamper and panic wondering where would be a good place to lose the pounds(not currency, ok I slapped myself). Now that I will be moving to Chennai, the continuous sauna effect may help.

Ye Olde Filme!

After watching Arundhati, I began to remember the older movies that were telugu classics. Patala Bhairavi and Vittalacharya come to mind. These films defined fearless heroes well before Indiana Jones came along. The movies had everything in them. The swashbuckling hero who was at ease with a rapier or a woman in his grip, the damsel in distress, the evil sorceror whose life source lay hidden in a parrot caged across the seven seas and hordes of evil creatures!

They had gripping storylines and kept me glued for hours. One scene I cannot forget is where NTR is a prince and he has apparently failed at a mission and he has no wish to continue living. So he whips out a beautiful dagger(period cutlery! These directors paid attention to detail!) and throws it up and catches it on his neck on its way down. Even the way they killed themselves was so cool! What fascinates me is that directors go to such lengths to copy the same old script of boy meets girl and yet noone wants to do a decent remake of the kickass classics!

Allright, let me lay the groundwork. Who is good enough to play the good guy in this film?

	Balakrishna would have been the obvious choice ... 2 decades ago. I reject him on the grounds that his makeup alone would eat away a chunk of the movie budget(more than the special FX!)
	Chiranjeevi, let me repeat what someone dear to me had said, we could not see him as shiva, why push our luck
	Mahesh Babu, the prince of tollywood is good looking but lets face it he would look downright silly in the frock! And run me through with a sword if he opens his mouth to say ONE dialog properly.
	Raja, is already doing a period flick with namitha(hmm so that means he is acting with 2 heroines) more on that if and when the film makes it to the theatres
	Allu Arjun and Ram Charan Tej are too urban and fresh to do any justice to a role like that.
	Gopichand, would be a good pick. Tough guy who does subdued roles with panache but then again he lacks the classy looks one would want to see in a prince.

I liked Shrikanth's look in Operation Duryodhana. I would cast him as the villain. I think he would do a great job as the evil sorceror!

Well im as undecided as ever. I wonder how many of you have seen Princess Bride. Excellent movie in my opinion. They converted a complete pansy shepherd boy into a macho cool pirate. I want to see that in Tollywood. 

travelogue long overdue!!

I have not written a traelogue about my trip to the south east. A number of reasons come to my mind, chief of them being sheer laziness. I however think it will be a good thing to look back at some of the interesting things I picked up. 

  - In Singapore, just like in India, everyone older than you can be called uncle or aunty. just add an 'a' sound at the end.

  - The landscape in the phillipines is exactly the same as you would see in naidupeta or kavaraipeta(yes im on the train as I write this).

  - Macau has some of the most amazing casinos in the world and attracts millions of english speaking tourists in the world but none of the natives speak english. If you cant speak cantonese, stay the FUCK off our island they say.

  - Hong Kong is a vibrant city that hates brown boys. You can thank the bangladeshis and africans for sustaining the lucrative drug trade. Pakistanis are bloody friendly and make excellent Parathas(buggers charge you heaven and earth in case you think im going soft).

  - Indians are studs in china as proved by the interest shown by the chinese girls(in yours truly ofcourse). Wherever we went in Shenzen, girls would ask us where we were from. It was nice to be the "stranger from the exotic country"!

Singapore is crawling with indians and so it is for that reason that the native singaporeans stand out. The women are beautiful and maintain a healthy figure. They wear shorts most of the time and their legs are immaculate. The men are smartly dressed and are very polite when you ask for help. Everywhere in Singapore it is their politeness that floors you. The city has such a disciplined system in place. It makes you want to be a part of it! I personally feel two years in this city will not only kick my career to phenomenal heights but also make me appreciate the finer things in life. It is amazing how everything the government does is for the people. All the time.

The Phillipines is a wonderful place to be in. Its like walking into India. The people are extremely friendly. The women are stunning. I saw nothing but perfect figures wherever I looked. Stare at any one for more than 5 seconds and you are greeted with a musical "Hello sir, may I help you". We did not go to Manila, but a smaller town named Clark. We trekked up to a volcano and swam in its crater(filled with rainwater, a sulphur lake). It has to be one of the most blissful experiences. Two hours of trekking and we were worn out, but one look at the paradise we had reached and all we wanted to do was take off our clothes and go for a dive! 

We also got to fly an Ultralight and that was a memorable experience! 

The whole experience was capped off with a trip to the local casino!

Macau assaulted us with its garish display of wealth. It was the first real casino experience and the showgirls were something else! Graceful moves! The highlight of the macau trip was the route we took from Macau to Hong Kong. The turbojet! Ripping across the water at incredible speeds!

Hong Kong gave us Disneyland, an experience we wanted for a long time. All I can say is, a childhood fantasy was fulfilled!

Shenzen was mindblowing for the lovely experience at "The Window of the World". Every famous landmark in the world finds its place here. It's like walking through the entire world in half a day! China has surprisingly modest people. The men and women kept frowning at my shorts!

Shri Gurubhyo Namaha

After reading harshas post about his teachers, I was inspired to write about some of the people who shaped my life. Some molded me and some left dents. For obvious reasons I will not mention names.

"Finish the problems I have assigned to you fast ma ... I will tell you a nice joke."

We wiped the sweat off our foreheads and did our best to take all the time we had left. However sheer brilliance took over and we all managed to finish the problem. She stood there with a very satisfied look on our face. Her complete conviction that we were actually interested in her joke was interesting to see. She began the joke. 

"See ma, one lady came to buy some toys ma and then she realised ma that she did not have money in her purse. Then ma the shop owner maybe he was doing mouna vradam* or something he did not want to speak to her so he picked up some blocks to ask her R U M T (are you empty)"

end of joke.

If you think the silence in the class was deafening, you are highly mistaken. Yours truly and some cooperative friends let out hideous and inhuman guffaws of laughter. The same teacher liked to torture us with her poetic experiments. She had a particular affection for acrostics. 

Creating new organics

Resultant of yesterday

Abhorrent fumes arise

Please close your nose.

Something like this. Ofcourse she used some very inspiring words like LIGHT and SHINE. Moving on. I soon realised that this lady was very low on the rung of people who are crazy. 

The next person who comes to mind is an english teacher who took his classes very seriously. We would sit around in awe as he shifted between heavily accented colloquial english and a heavy british accent with clipped words and all. I still remember on a hot day after a heavy lunch, he was pacing up and down reeling out paragraphs from a non detailed prose text book. He walked up to a window and leaned on the bars while reading something out. We all slowly looked up as his words died out. He had fallen asleep on the grill. We slowly started snickering and I think it disturbed him. He woke up. The breeze near the window had flipped a few pages in the book. He simply continued reading from the page that was before him completely oblivious to the fact that it was a different lesson. None of us dared correct him!

Hello college. With great tension in our hearts we sat down to listen to some lectures. Those of you who have done pure sciences and physics in particular, will know that a lot of the theory we learn involves lengthy derivations. One particular derivation lasted 30 mins. The professor went on explaining concept upon concept that was involved in each step. He made very clear the physical phenomena that translated into numbers. At the end of the derivation he satisfactorily concluded

v = g;

meaning the velocity is the same as the gravitational pull of the earth. We had frantically noted down each step and now sat back to crack our fingers and take a quick look at the whole thing. One of the brighter students slowly raised his hand and said, "Velocity should oppose gravity so where is the minus sign" we all realised then that the result of the derivation was supposed to be 

v = - g;

The whole class went silent and the next few words will remain with me forever. The professor walked up to the board, turned around to look at us and said, "What is there, you can always put it." and scratched a little minus sign before the g in the  equation. I know, very profound.

* abstinence from speech.

Billa : wtf??

An interview with the director of BILLA.

Director = dir ; Bakra  Man who Watched it = bmw

Bmw : Before I begin to listen to ur nonsense let us get one thing clear.

Dir : yes?

Bmw : Billa is a copy of the tamil movie of the same name?

Dir : yes ..

Bmw : and that Billa is a copy of an old tamil movie starring rajinikanth

Dir : yes ..

Bmw : and that old movie was a copy of the amitabh bacchan starrer DON

Dir : yes .. but you see since my Billa(smug smile) and the original DON(dismissive look) have the same story, I have actually only cop..err .. remade the original done with local telugu flavor.

Bmw : please excuse me for a second ...

(Bmw comes back he has obviously been crying)

Bmw : why?

Dir : sorry?

Bmw : why did you want to make this film?

Dir : Well basically I thought it was a fresh theme and I felt I could explore some of the intense portions of the story that had been ignored in the original Don.

Bmw : do you realise that large portions of the film involve the hero(face contorts intensely) walking to some hip hop beats and worse just standing there looking like a model for shoppers stop or west side.

Dir : Yes you see namitha cant move much thanks to all the ...well you know ... so every scene involving her meant we could not let actors move too much.

Bmw : who got the idea to include Krishnam Raju in this film? Who dusted his coffin and dragged him out?

Dir : yes we were very happy to have the rebel star as part of the film. His creative inputs really helped us bring out some wonderful aspects of the story.

Bmw : Who allowed him to speak english? Couldn't you find someone to dub for him?

Dir : Krishnam Raju gaaru was very cooperative he insisted on doing all the stunts himself.

Bmw : yes about that, who put a gun in is hand?

Dir : Yes I know he looked so natural with it. Everyone has been telling me Krishnam Raju gaaru has shown us all what a real police officer looks like.

Bmw : You mean traffic police dont you?

Dir : Sorry?

Bmw : nothing ... so tell me .. the part where ranga gets trained in (wipes tears) computers. Why did u spend so much time explaining about a pen drive?

Dir : we wanted the film to be educational also ... infact cbse people are seriously considering using our film as suggested reading for 8^th class students who are being taught computer science.

Bmw : excuse me for a second

dir : bathroom eh? Hehehehehe

Bmw : (slowly turns around) yes ... excuse me

(this time when he comes back his eyes are puffy and reddened)

Bmw : where were we?

Dir : I want to tell you about the music in this film.

Bmw : music? What music? You lifted tracks from famous hip hop artists and added a few veena notes in the background.

Dir : I want to thank my music director who sat with the entire creative team and produced such wonderful music. Ofcourse the choreographer was able to feel the audience pulse and make the stars do some amazing moves.

Bmw : well im amazed he made namitha move. One song mostly consisted of Prabhas trying to pull down anushkas pants but lets move on.

Dir : Anushka worked out a lot and lost a lot of weight for her look in this film.

Bmw : lets talk about her acting. For the most part she looked like she just sucked on a lemon. Why was she not told to emote a bit?

Dir : I was really impressed when she told me that she had understood the psychology behind the character. She said, a person who has lost her loved ones does not have many expressions left.

Bmw : bloody smart. What did you achieve by using Jayasudha?

Dir : jayasudha madam graciously agreed to be a part of the creative te ...

Bmw : yes we know and her inputs hauled your sad excuse for a film to a point where dogs could pee on it without cringing. WHY WHY WHY? Why did u use her?

Dir : She is basically a directors actor and ...

Bmw : I think we are done here ...

Dir : but I have not told you about the action sequences.

Bmw : I want my 100 rupees back.

Puppet on a chain ... my tribute to McLean!

My First Graphic Panel.

My first attempt at a graphic novel(panel rather!). Valuable comments please! :) click to expand.

Let him be ...

Under the fierce gaze of the sun,
Lies this beast of immense pride.
His eyes close ever so gently,
The beams warm his leathery hide.

His talons like blades cast aside,
His tail curled casually there.
The lazy toungue flickers a bit,
Noone disturbs him in his lair.

Cold blood meanders through his heart,
His breath is ever so slow.
He is ageless by any stretch,
He has watched the pebbles grow.

An ancient force such as this,
Is not to be dealt with lightly,
Men who are ignorant of this,
Their fate could turn ghastly!

Armor clad the knight comes in,
This peace he chooses to defy,
He will learn in a fiery moment,
To let sleeping dragons lie . . .

my girl ...

Now so gentle, at once a fiery temper;

Thats the kind of girl to whom I would surrender!

broken wing

Yesterday I saw a bird with a broken wing. It was a beautiful creature small and endearing. There was so much life about her. The broken wing was a minor inconvenience and she twittered around happily playing with the things around her. And in a trice she was gone. As suddenly as she had fluttered in.

You dont mess with the Zohan : review

Adam Sandler has, in one hurricane move, taken a jab at Israelis, Arabs and Rajnikanth himself! He does this quite confidently because apparently, "You dont mess with the Zohan". This elaborately titled film has a good dose of satire and crude comedy for the sick minded ones like me. However dont watch it with an aunt like I did. I had to hold back a lot. Not my style at all. Like all good movies that begin well, this film falters somewhere at the end and leaves you a bit unsatisfied(yes like sex with your fat man-servant). While Zohan with his over sized crotch does give us good reason to point and laugh, the humour does get a bit over the top. 

Zohan is an elite Israeli counter terrorist and he is sick and tired of blowing up terrorists(read Arabs). His heart lies in America and he wants to be a hair dresser. He nurses dreams of making the entire world 'silky smooth'. When he is dragged away from a holiday to recapture a militant he had already put behind bars, he sees and opportunity to escape. He fakes his death and stows away on a flight to America.

How he realises his dream of becoming a hair dresser, finds his soul mate and keeps his identity a secret is the rest of the story. 

There is nothing  really that stands out in the film. All the usual faces are there in the film. Rob Schneider et al. It is somehow a very comfortable feeling to see the same caste doing a decent job of a amusing you. Zohan the Israeli quite naturally falls in love with a palestinian hair dresser played by the very very luscious Emmanuelle Chriqui whose accented english is enough to wrench your heart from its foundations! Guest stars include Kevin James(King of Queens, Hitch), John McEnroe( yes THE John McEnroe - he takes off his shirt by the way. Very pathetic) and of course a has-been bimbette, Mariah Carey.

Not a must watch but I would not miss it either. A mindless movie with crude humour. You decide if you want to watch it. I did!