Wednesday, June 29, 2005
Take me out to the ballgame
A stopgap pic while I write my next post. This shot was taken during last week's trip to the Phillies-NY Mets baseball game at the Citizens Bank ballpark in Philly. And no, the red does not mean that I support the Phillies, it means I support the RedSox :)
Monday, June 20, 2005
A Tale of Two Movies
Last weekend, I had a chance to catch up with two of the biggest Hollywood and Kollywood offerings this summer. On Friday, I saw Batman Begins on IMAX and on Saturday I drove all the way to North Bergen, NJ to see Anniyan. I shall try to objectively review and compare the two in this post. Bear in mind that my tastes have changed significantly over the last five years I have been in the US and might even indicate a bias towards all things American. I can assure the reader that while its a possibility, its not always the case, since I loved Chandramukhi and a large part of Mumbai Express too.
Batman Begins in one word to me is all that can be done right with a movie. Good star cast, good cinematography, great sets and most of all, excellent writing and directing. Chris Nolan of Memento fame, gets everything right with Batman Begins. Hours after watching the movie, I was still trying to remember any perceptible flaw in it and the effort has continued to be futile. Its that good. Frame after frame, the effort shows and the result is a very enjoyable adult comic book movie that blows past all expectations.
Anniyan, on the flip side is really all that can go wrong with a highly touted movie. A good message of civic responsibility is lost in the cacaphony of over the top acting, glaring holes in the script and a loud movie if ever there was one. Vikram not only acts, but overacts too. In the enthusiasm of trying to delineate multiple characters in the movie, he goes completely overboard. The movie is supposedly U rated with no censor cuts. I am really not sure why we need a censor board if this is the job they are doing. The movie is bloody, gory and violent. Some of the scenes were really unwatchable for the gore content. The only things that work for the movie are the songs and their picturisation and vivek's comedy that sparkles after a long time. Even the songs could have been done better, what with almost no dancing of mention by the lead stars.
Batman Begins was an adult look at a comic book hero. It works well with both adults and kids, although it skews more towards the former with a PG-13 rating. Anniyan is an adult look at a very contemporary issue that really supposedly skews towards everyone but it fails badly in that. I didnt have hopes for a classy movie from Shankar. What I hoped for, was a sensible movie (Mudhalvan is a case to point, if you exclude all things Manisha Koirala from it) and what I got instead was a rehash of all old Shankar movies with more gore and Matrix like stunts thrown in for a good measure.
I very highly recommend Batman Begins and ask that people approach Anniyan at their own risk.
Batman Begins in one word to me is all that can be done right with a movie. Good star cast, good cinematography, great sets and most of all, excellent writing and directing. Chris Nolan of Memento fame, gets everything right with Batman Begins. Hours after watching the movie, I was still trying to remember any perceptible flaw in it and the effort has continued to be futile. Its that good. Frame after frame, the effort shows and the result is a very enjoyable adult comic book movie that blows past all expectations.
Anniyan, on the flip side is really all that can go wrong with a highly touted movie. A good message of civic responsibility is lost in the cacaphony of over the top acting, glaring holes in the script and a loud movie if ever there was one. Vikram not only acts, but overacts too. In the enthusiasm of trying to delineate multiple characters in the movie, he goes completely overboard. The movie is supposedly U rated with no censor cuts. I am really not sure why we need a censor board if this is the job they are doing. The movie is bloody, gory and violent. Some of the scenes were really unwatchable for the gore content. The only things that work for the movie are the songs and their picturisation and vivek's comedy that sparkles after a long time. Even the songs could have been done better, what with almost no dancing of mention by the lead stars.
Batman Begins was an adult look at a comic book hero. It works well with both adults and kids, although it skews more towards the former with a PG-13 rating. Anniyan is an adult look at a very contemporary issue that really supposedly skews towards everyone but it fails badly in that. I didnt have hopes for a classy movie from Shankar. What I hoped for, was a sensible movie (Mudhalvan is a case to point, if you exclude all things Manisha Koirala from it) and what I got instead was a rehash of all old Shankar movies with more gore and Matrix like stunts thrown in for a good measure.
I very highly recommend Batman Begins and ask that people approach Anniyan at their own risk.
Monday, June 13, 2005
At the Crossroads in Kalimdor
This a screenshot of my character Bheema at the Crossroads in Kalimdor. For the uninitiated, this is a place in the virtual world of the MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) "World of Warcraft". I have been having an unbelievably fantastic experience taking my Tauren Warrior Bheema from L1 to L14 where he is currently and there are 46 more levels to go. The cooperative gameplay is just awesome. It has to be experienced to be believed.
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Oru Manidhanin Kadhai
My good friend George Costanza describes a baldist thus:
"A person who does not associate with bald people".
In a recent email conversation amongst a bunch of friends, this whole idea of baldness and how people react to it, came up. Certainly in the US, baldness is not considered as bad as most other places throughout the world (read India). One friend, who went from hairy to no-hairy over a period of five years, had this to say about it. The email is produced here verbatim.
" Atleast for gaining weight we can blame ourselves, but what can we do about going bald ... it is never in our control, so no point in feeling bad. also, being bald and hair(or lack of) is an issue only in India. Here, I have known personally from 95% of girls, nobody gives a damn(thankfully!).
I did some self analysis and psychologically analysed male baldness. we go through 4 psychological stages ....
1. Shock ... when we see the initial receeding hairlines (this happened to me in 4th year)
2. Denial ... we pretend not to notice the reduced hairline and try to hide it by combing accordingly and not even think about it (for me end of 4th year and initial year here in US)
3. Anger ... this is when no matter how much we try to hide by combing hair over or not notice ever increasing baldness, the hair loss has become so much that it will be noticeable. The anger part is a bit compounded by friends/family asking .... "thalaikku ennai thekkaraya illaya? ... en ivlo mudi kotti pochu?" etc etc. Sometimes when guys(mostly Indian since hair is never an issue for guys here) continue to tease we have an angry retort like "amaam mudi kotti pochu, otha adhukku enna ippo?" (for me the next 2-3 years in US).
4. Rejected Acceptance ... It is just there and we cannot do a damn. We painfully realize that we have to live with it. We look at old pictures once in a while and sigh inside. But we also start looking at bright side ... that hair is not that much of a big deal and try to find alternative ways of accentuating our personalities to cover up for a "physical" loss. This is also when we start making sarcastic jokes at our own baldness. (since last year for me)."
Now to make this even more interesting, I am posting 5 photographs from that same friend, capturing the essence of his writing. We had so much fun reading the email with the photos, I am sure everyone here will too. Click on the thumbnail image to see a bigger version in Flickr.
Note: Big Thanks to my friend AP who was gracious and sporting enough to share this image and his own words on the evolution with all of us. An additional thanks to fellow blogger Pradeep for pasting together multiple images to one cohesive pic.
"A person who does not associate with bald people".
In a recent email conversation amongst a bunch of friends, this whole idea of baldness and how people react to it, came up. Certainly in the US, baldness is not considered as bad as most other places throughout the world (read India). One friend, who went from hairy to no-hairy over a period of five years, had this to say about it. The email is produced here verbatim.
" Atleast for gaining weight we can blame ourselves, but what can we do about going bald ... it is never in our control, so no point in feeling bad. also, being bald and hair(or lack of) is an issue only in India. Here, I have known personally from 95% of girls, nobody gives a damn(thankfully!).
I did some self analysis and psychologically analysed male baldness. we go through 4 psychological stages ....
1. Shock ... when we see the initial receeding hairlines (this happened to me in 4th year)
2. Denial ... we pretend not to notice the reduced hairline and try to hide it by combing accordingly and not even think about it (for me end of 4th year and initial year here in US)
3. Anger ... this is when no matter how much we try to hide by combing hair over or not notice ever increasing baldness, the hair loss has become so much that it will be noticeable. The anger part is a bit compounded by friends/family asking .... "thalaikku ennai thekkaraya illaya? ... en ivlo mudi kotti pochu?" etc etc. Sometimes when guys(mostly Indian since hair is never an issue for guys here) continue to tease we have an angry retort like "amaam mudi kotti pochu, otha adhukku enna ippo?" (for me the next 2-3 years in US).
4. Rejected Acceptance ... It is just there and we cannot do a damn. We painfully realize that we have to live with it. We look at old pictures once in a while and sigh inside. But we also start looking at bright side ... that hair is not that much of a big deal and try to find alternative ways of accentuating our personalities to cover up for a "physical" loss. This is also when we start making sarcastic jokes at our own baldness. (since last year for me)."
Now to make this even more interesting, I am posting 5 photographs from that same friend, capturing the essence of his writing. We had so much fun reading the email with the photos, I am sure everyone here will too. Click on the thumbnail image to see a bigger version in Flickr.
Note: Big Thanks to my friend AP who was gracious and sporting enough to share this image and his own words on the evolution with all of us. An additional thanks to fellow blogger Pradeep for pasting together multiple images to one cohesive pic.
Saturday, June 04, 2005
A picture is worth...
Well, this picture is worth 3 days, two 128 MB SD cards, multiple gas refills for the car, hundreds of dollars, and yep, 277 other pictures.
The joy of seeing it all in one single collage - priceless.
For all places shown here, visit Los Angeles, California.
The joy of seeing it all in one single collage - priceless.
For all places shown here, visit Los Angeles, California.
Wednesday, June 01, 2005
Climbing the social ladder
Vetri Nichayam. Taken in Rodeo Drive,CA during my Memorial Day weekend trip it reminds me of Thalaivars pose in Annamalai and then Baasha. And that thrills me to no end.
More on the trip soon.
More on the trip soon.
California and Wine
This photo was taken last Saturday in Solvang, CA. The color and contrast in this picture are excellent, coming from a 2 year old 3.1 MP camera. Nothing fancy, yet classy.
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