One month into the New Year

It has been one month since the 2012 started and I have not been able to start reading any new book. The only books I have been looking at are the voluminous college textbooks. The books while full of knowledge are tailored to specific groups of people hoping to or pursuing a career in those fields. When I look at the academic rigor of this semester I don't think I will be able to read any book outside the curriculum of my school. I hope I will be able to catch a movie or two occasionally and post a review soon. Movies don't take that much involvement and it is over in a short period of time, usually less than 2 hrs. Even when I watch bollywood movies I shorten by fast forwarding the song n dance sequences and unnecessary fight scenes. This way I can cut short a 3 hr movie to less than 2 hrs. It is kind of time when I have to work long and hard and play short and hard. Look out for more movie reviews during the first quarter of this year.

Hindi Movie Review: Haqeekat

Haqeekat, starring Ajay Devgan, and Tabbu in the lead role with Amrish Puri, Johnny Lever and a group of villain actors is one of those typical bollywood potboilers. Shiva (Ajay Devgan) is an orphan who owes his gratitude to the local underworld don for having raised him. The Don is assigned the task of eliminating the Chief minister of the state by his competitor and quite expectedly Shiva is asked to execute it. Things go wrong and the Chief Minister survives and police start searching for Shiva.

Fearing for his life his boss sends him off to Mumbai and tells him that he will be known as Ajay in future. The actual story begins here. Ajay starts living in Mrs. David's home as a paying guest. Tabbu lives in the same apartment and one day some local hooligans attempt to rape her. Ajay saves her from them and love blossoms between the two. Later it is revealed that Tabbu is a widow and her sister-in-law prevents her from meeting Ajay. Amrish Puri the assistant commissioner of police intervenes and marries the love birds.

Ajay decides to go straight and give up the life of crime and opens up a car garage. Just when things seem to be settling down his past catches up with him. His former boss comes looking for him and asks him to return to the underworld. Ajay refuses and says he is now turned a new leaf and doesn't want a life of crime. His boss reveals that Ajay is the one responsible for the death of Tabbu's first husband and this leads to marital discord.

The next turn of events make the bulk of the story and it involves another attempt to assassinate the chief minister. How Ajay successfully eliminates his enemies and regains his love is interesting to watch. There are many loopholes in the story but that is quite expected I guess, it is after all movie showbiz.

It is worth watching once if you are an Ajay Devgan fan... I love the scene when Amrish Puri refuses to accept a bribe from the local politician. That is by far one of the best scenes in the movie.

Hindi Movie Review: Chal Chala Chal

Govinda Stars in Sentimental Idealist's story

This movie is the story of what would happen to an idealistic person in India - he would be oppressed, dominated and cheated by everyone he comes across. Govinda plays the role of the youngest son of Om Puri who is a retired school headmaster. Om Puri owns a beautiful bungalow in the heart of Mumbai which is sought after by several builders and real estate developers. Being idealistic young man Govinda is emotionally attached to the home where he believes the memories of his late mother are present. Govinda has two sisters who live with him with their families in the same family bungalow. Though well settled his brothers-in-law want to sell the house and get the cash. They don't attach any emotional significance to the home.

Om Puri is fighting a legal battle with the school he was employed at for his pension and retirement benefits. The opposition lawyer is none other than his own son-in-law who is bent to save the school the money. Finally the court orders the school to give Om Puri some property to the value of his retirement benefits and they end up with a broken down bus which Govinda decides to restore and deploy on the road to earn livelihood. His bus conductor flees with the collection of a whole month and not wanting to trouble the conductor's parents Govinda decides not to lodge a police complaint. This leads to further complications.

There is a namesake heroine in the movie who doesn't have much role. The part could well have been eliminated but I guess Indian movie makers are still obsessed with the idea that without a heroine it is impossible to make a movie work. The rest of the story focuses on the tussle between the driver, conductor and owner of the bus and how the union gets involved. At each juncture Govinda displays an amazing humanity and continues to pardon those who cheat him. Finally he decides enough is enough when members of the workers union decide to vandalize the bus. There is one final fight and a court drama before the end of the movie.

This movie reinforces the message that if one is an idealist, he/ she has no place in the corrupt dog-eat-dog Indian society.

Book Review: The Offensive Internet

I read a major part of this book over the winter break. When internet exploded during the decade of 1990s it was fascinating and presented a whole new world to everyone. Specially to people like me struggling students in the third world India. Now decades later the internet is slowly and surely becoming extremely offensive. Internet is everywhere and everything about everyone seems to be online. There has been no discretion about what should and should not be posted on the internet. It is free so everyone wants to post everything over there.

Then there are those who hide behind the cloak of anonymity and post offensive stuff about people, religion, communities, laws, countries, and everything possible. The internet has become the breeding ground for illegal, unethical, and offensive behavior by people who would otherwise be law abiding and quiet citizens of the world.

This book focuses on the perils of having an unhindered internet. This kind of research that focuses on the baneful effects of the internet is perhaps first of its kind. This is one of the few volumes that I have come across that focuses on the abuses and malpractices that are possible because of the anonymity, freedom from litigation, and lack of accountability that the internet provides. The essays featured in the book are all written from scholars of law, philosophy, technology, and other humanistic fields. This concept of the book is more like how to control/ curb the frontier spirit that once upon a time resulted in the conquering, and subsequent elimination of native American tribes and formation of this country. I wonder how much of a real effect this book will have on the establishment, but it sure provides a great starting point.

Sankranti Greetings

Last week was Makara Sankranti or Pongal festival in India and across the world. I would like to recall a song in Kannada Movie Halli Meshtru in which the hero and heroine sing a duet on the occasion of this festival. This song only shows the enjoyment and fun aspect of the festival in rural Karnataka. The spiritual and learning aspect has been completely ignored.

Saradara Kannada Movie Review

Kannada film industry seems to be getting more and more mature. The films are getting better and there is a distinctively different storyline in many of the movies I have watched. I don't know whether the movies are being remade from other languages or they are originally conceptualized for Sandalwood. Saradara, starring Darshan is a movie with a difference. The storyline is well narrated and it upholds the traditional Indian values of family, marriage and how things work in rural India.

Darshan plays the hero with Srinivasa Murthy, Lokesh and Tara rendering excellent support for the storyline. Maada (Darshan) is an orphan whose mother would have given him to the temple priest and breathed her last. He is raised by the village and he works for the village headman. The village headman's daughter falls in love with Maada and then the twist happens. The twist that leads to several things, more and more sadness, sorrow and grief for Maada.

Throughout the movie the importance of respecting elders, and parents is emphasized. This is much like Darshan's previous movies he seems to be taking up movies in which respect to elders is the subtle message. I guess it comes right in time when young people are abandoning their parents in favor of career and other pressing priorities. I do hope the film industry continues to get better and the social message affects today's youngsters.

Kannada Movie Review: Chandu

Kannada film industry went through a transformation with the advent of younger (now older) stars such as Ramesh, Sudeep, Darshan, Puneeth Rajkumar, and others. One of the initial movies of Sudeep is Chandu, a romantic love story with several twists, a little bit of action. This movie helped establish Sudeep as a hero in Sandalwood - Kannada film industry.

Anyway the story of this movie is pretty straight forward. Sudeep is a n angry young man living in Hyderabad, he beats up the local don and his brother and during the street fight is when he encounters the heroine for the first time. His parents fearing for his life send him to Bangalore to live with his sister, whose house is incidentally next to a ladies hostel, where the heroine lives.

Invariably both of them end up in the same college, become friends and later lovers. A small altercation leads to the lovers fighting and getting separated. The rest of the movie shows how each of them behave and finally marry each other. The movie highlights Sudeep's performance as a carefree young man with a romantic heart and a short-tempered, and stubborn heroine who finally caves in and marries him.

In short it is a highly entertaining movie totally family friendly. It is more than ten years old so you will have to find the movie in a DVD format or online on Youtube.

Movie Review: The Eight Legged Freaks

Image via Wikipedia

I had watched part of this movie several years ago in India and had forgotten about it. Out of the blue I somehow remembered the movie about larger than life spiders and searched for it on Youtube and found it. So now I can say that I have watched the complete movie The Eight Legged Freaks.

The movie takes places in a small mining town in American heartland.  A chemical spill leads the local creek getting polluted. Close at hand is the home-cum-laboratory of spider researcher Mike. The spiders consume insects from the creek, caught by mike and grow into disproportionate sizes. They first eat the scientist himself and start attacking life in the town. Cats, dogs, chicken and other small animals begin to disappear and the people of the town are perplexed. One day the phone lines go dead and the spiders attack the town killing and eating everything moving people, cattle, even cars. Nothing and no one is spared.

How the town reacts and how they get over the spider menace forms the rest of the story. There are small sidelines which deal with the deputy sheriff's family. How her teenage daughter and geeky young son handle the situation. Her estranged lover returns and they how they make up and get together again. There are some interesting off road motorcycle riding scenes. It is definitely worth watching and a completely family movie at that.

Movie Review: Fatal Desire

What happens when a beautiful woman is stalked by two men, one handsome and reckless, another creative, and business savvy? Who does she choose to be with? What is the outcome of such a love triangle? Is there really love or just plain convenience and lust? These are the questions that come to one's mind when you watch this movie. Directed by Roberto Schlosser, Fatal Desire is a 100-minute romantic thriller with a dash of erotica, starring Wendy Guess (Sue), Pierre Perea (Rick) and Jordan Williams (Ben).

Ben is a movie producer on whose sets a stuntwoman is killed on sets and he is facing charges of negligence. Ben has other problems, his trophy wife Sue - beautiful and sexy - is having an affair. Ben sets a private detective to follow her and get evidence. Meanwhile Rick the man who Sue is cheating with devises a plan to eliminate Ben and make it look like an accident. This way their obstacles will be cleared and they also get to collect the $2 million Ben's life insurance money. Initially hesitant, Sue agrees and the duo execute the plan. Something goes horribly wrong and Sue is being stalked by a stranger on a big motorcycle.

The end of the movie is quite surprising and goes on to show how a manipulative, and beautiful woman can get away with everything and emerge winner. I'd recommend this movie to adults and older teens. It is definitely not a family movie.

Kannada Movie Review: Indra

I have started watching Kannada movies only after moving to the US. I could say that I started watching movies itself after moving here, because when I was in India every minute of my free time was spent reading about adventure travel or participating in outdoor activities. So my movie reviews may not come across as professional but just the opinion of viewers.

Indra features Darshan and Namitha in lead roles and it is the story of an educated individual who would have given up his white collar career to become a rowdy following the brutal killing of his entire family. The movie starts off with the killing of an industrialist in Mumbai close to the Gateway of India and immediately scene shifts to the Agrahara (Brahmin's colony) in SriRangapatna town in Karnataka. Indra (Darshan) is the focus in both settings. In Mumbai he is the killer and in SriRangapatna he comes to Rama Shastri's home seeking employment as a clerk in the temple.

Indra's good nature and silent demeanor captures the hearts of Rama Shastri's family members and the neighbors. Time passes on and one day Indra hears about the release of rowdy sheeter Cat Rama from the jail. This becomes the turning point of the movie when Indra murders Cat Rama in cold blood in full view of Rama Shastri. Then there is a dramatic scene in front of the Shastri residence when Indra's background is explained and shown as flash back.

The rest of the movie is how Indra eliminates all the bad elements of the state and emerges victorious. The movie deserves one time viewing and nothing more. There is no role for the heroine, her role could have as well been eliminated. Songs are totally unnecessary in this movie. The movie can be watched with family except small children who would be better off without watching all that blood and gore.