Behind the seen

Cinema is an art form. Isn't that something we keep forgetting again and again? Too many gimmicks—ah, that's called marketing—can do that to almost anything. If you peel off the box office records, star fees, media shenanigans and other such worldly facets, cinema is bare and deceptive. All art forms are meant to delude us. Films are no different. Its ultimate purpose is to engage with strangers whom the filmmakers will never get to meet or know. That's the set canvas, be it for a stand-up comic who forces out laughter in the room or an Adele who commands silence when she performs. Audience is the ultimate common ground. Without an audience, there is no art. The tricky part being art is open to (mis)interpretations. Leonardo da Vinci might have spent 15 years at perfecting Mona Lisa but the world today is fascinated by her mysterious smile. Was this his original intention? We'll never know. What we know for sure—at least i do—is life remains meaningless no matter what. Being alive is like distracting a baby to make sure it doesn't get bored and cry. Art is the much-needed distraction here. However, the construct of cinema is unique not only because it's undoubtedly the most expensive art form out there but also because it involves so many people in its upbringing that you begin to wonder where cinema ends and reality begins. 

To help you break down this construct, let me list out a few inalienable truths about cinema:

• When you visit a cinema hall, you believe that drama is happening on the screen. You can't be wronger. The real drama is happening on the opposite side of the screen; the side where people are munching overpriced popcorns and slurping sugar-drinks. Like you and me. We are the ones who got tricked into laughing, weeping, singing, dancing, screaming... along with the movie. Those on the big screen are cold professionals who know exactly what they are doing. Unlike you and me. 
• A naive way of decoding cinema is to say that they put you in a dark room and rob you blind. Well, nobody held a gun to your head. And there can't be a greater metaphor for enlightenment when you are exposed to some never-seen-before realities in a given movie while you continue to remain hidden in the darkness of the crowd.
• Once you settle in that comfy chair, it doesn't matter whether the movie is praise-all or fuck-all. You already lost the battle at the ticket counter.
• The director is the first one to watch the movie. Even before it's made. There's no suspense in there for them. S/he somehow go through the routine of converting their vision into a reality. Challenging? Always. Boring? Maybe.
• Light might be faster than sound but horror movies scare you because of aural reasons. It's the deep frightening sounds that make a film scary. The visuals play a significantly lighter role.
• We'll never know why European (non-Anglophone) filmmakers are prone to playing obscure English songs in their movies.
• We'll never know why beautiful stories get marauded by studios in their lame attempt at making locals speak accented English instead of shooting the film in the local language.
• Like most art forms, cinema has unbearable masculinity sketched all over it. So much so even the words used in filmmaking have a bellicose tone: cut, shoot, action... as if a war is going on!
• It will strike you sooner or later that the highest rated film on IMDb, The Shawshank Redemption (1994), basically has an all-male cast.
• The masters of cinema are divided into two camps: those who love tea and those who can't do without coffee. You'll seldom come across somebody who doesn't belong to either or someone who has switched camps. 
• The masters of cinema are nowhere to be found on Twitter. 
• It's arrogant, if not stupid, of you to assume that you can understand a film in just one sitting. A process that took months, if not years, to condense into a (hourly) format merits a second sitting. Or even third.
• Korean movies are best served raw.
• Iranian movies are best served sincere. 
• You must have heard how Hindi film industry is a safe haven for money laundering. Guess what? The same is true for Hollywood. The guy who hugely funded The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) is a major fraud in the finance world—how apt! There's no such a thing as clean money in cinema unless you are an independent filmmaker who has mortgaged his house.
• Bollywood superstars (with the exception of Aamir Khan) face a strange dilemma: they can't afford to break their onscreen mould lest their fans denounce them. 
• You can't watch a movie and then refuse to call yourself a voyeur. Nope.
• Without writers, there is nothing on the table. Still, writers were rarely appreciated for their good work. So, over the past decade, we witnessed a chunk of these goodfellas move en masse to the television. Now, they are not only appreciated but also paid handsomely.
• Those who prefer the front seats want to be the first to watch the movie in the cinema hall. Nothing else can explain that lingering stress in their nape. 
• You may have never heard of Tarkvosky or his masterpieces but the finest filmmakers of our time have. And that's not it. A majority of them regard him as their ultimate inspiration. 
• Genres are for textbooks. Everybody is capable of enjoying all kinds of cinema. Just that we don't take THAT risk. 
• The nicest bit about cinema is it lets you judge it, not the other way round.
• You may have watched a movie a hundred times and may even remember all the dialogues by heart but here's the thing: if you miss the hidden symbols, which are mostly visual, you are missing the whole point.
• Cinema doesn't have a language as such but subtitles surely help.
• Expecting cinema to usher in change in our wretched society is a lot like hoping God to show up during the interval.

Keeping it real with fakeness

If you’d ask me whether any actress managed to replace Madhuri Dixit in Bollywood, i’d say no. She left a huge void. Her versatility, range of choice and years in the industry ensured so. That said, the contenders for the crown narrows down to very few actresses (purely on their craft, not merely looks) who somehow lacked consistency. And still do. There’s no Hindi film actress around who can do justice to the C-word. Nope, not even Kajol or Vidya Balan. The former had a phase and so does the latter. Let’s not even talk about Deepika Padukone or Katrina Kaif. Yes, both have Smita Patil Memorial Award in their kitty but that doesn’t alter the fact that acting remains alien to them. Which is why it’s a good enough time to go back to Aishwarya Rai. She has had her share of rubbish movies but there are some gems she should be proud of. Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam (1999) takes the cake for me—Raincoat (2004) comes close second, interestingly co-starring Ajay Devgan again—for the sheer contrast between her character in the first half and the second half; the bubbly spirit giving way to a subdued married naari. And that particular scene where she is asked to smile for a picture remains epic. Holding back one’s sorrow with a pseudo-smile can’t get any better than this.

Anger (mis)management

Monty's Reflection: "Fuck me? Fuck you! Fuck you and this whole city and everyone in it. Fuck the panhandlers, grubbing for money, and smiling at me behind my back. Fuck squeegee men dirtying up the clean windshield of my car. Get a fucking job! Fuck the Sikhs and the Pakistanis bombing down the avenues in decrepit cabs, curry steaming out their pores and stinking up my day. Terrorists in fucking training. Slow the fuck down! Fuck the Chelsea boys with their waxed chests and pumped up biceps. Going down on each other in my parks and on my piers, jingling their dicks on my Channel 35. Fuck the Korean grocers with their pyramids of overpriced fruit and their tulips and roses wrapped in plastic. Ten years in the country, still no speaky English? Fuck the Russians in Brighton Beach. Mobster thugs sitting in cafés, sipping tea in little glasses, sugar cubes between their teeth. Wheelin' and dealin' and schemin'. Go back where you fucking came from! Fuck the black-hatted Chassidim, strolling up and down 47th street in their dirty gabardine with their dandruff. Selling South African apartheid diamonds! Fuck the Wall Street brokers. Self-styled masters of the universe. Michael Douglas, Gordon Gecko wannabe mother fuckers, figuring out new ways to rob hard working people blind. Send those Enron assholes to jail for fucking life! You think Bush and Cheney didn't know about that shit? Give me a fucking break! Tyco! Imclone! Adelphia! Worldcom! Fuck the Puerto Ricans. 20 to a car, swelling up the welfare rolls, worst fuckin' parade in the city. And don't even get me started on the Dom-in-i-cans, because they make the Puerto Ricans look good. Fuck the Bensonhurst Italians with their pomaded hair, their nylon warm-up suits, and their St. Anthony medallions. Swinging their, Jason Giambi, Louisville slugger, baseball bats, trying to audition for the Sopranos. Fuck the Upper East Side wives with their Hermés scarves and their fifty-dollar Balducci artichokes. Overfed faces getting pulled and lifted and stretched, all taut and shiny. You're not fooling anybody, sweetheart! Fuck the uptown brothers. They never pass the ball, they don't want to play defense, they take fives steps on every lay-up to the hoop. And then they want to turn around and blame everything on the white man. Slavery ended one hundred and thirty seven years ago. Move the fuck on! Fuck the corrupt cops with their anus violating plungers and their 41 shots, standing behind a blue wall of silence. You betray our trust! Fuck the priests who put their hands down some innocent child's pants. Fuck the church that protects them, delivering us into evil. And while you're at it, fuck JC! He got off easy! A day on the cross, a weekend in hell, and all the hallelujahs of the legioned angels for eternity! Try seven years in fuckin Otisville, Jay! Fuck Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and backward-ass, cave-dwelling, fundamentalist assholes everywhere. On the names of innocent thousands murdered, I pray you spend the rest of eternity with your seventy-two whores roasting in a jet-fueled fire in hell. You towel headed camel jockeys can kiss my royal, Irish ass! Fuck Jacob Elinski, whining malcontent. Fuck Francis Xavier Slaughtery, my best friend, judging me while he stares at my girlfriend's ass. Fuck Naturel Rivera. I gave her my trust and she stabbed me in the back. Sold me up the river. Fucking bitch. Fuck my father with his endless grief, standing behind that bar. Sipping on club soda, selling whiskey to firemen and cheering the Bronx Bombers. Fuck this whole city and everyone in it. From the row houses of Astoria to the penthouses on Park Avenue. From the projects in the Bronx to the lofts in Soho. From the tenements in Alphabet City to the brownstones in Park slope to the split levels in Staten Island. Let an earthquake crumble it. Let the fires rage. Let it burn to fuckin ash then let the waters rise and submerge this whole, rat-infested place." 

Monty: "No. No, fuck you, Montgomery Brogan. You had it all and then you threw it away, you dumb fuck!"

(This splendid monologue from 25th Hour (2002) tells you so much about the state we are in today. The anger that we project on others, more often than not, is a diversion. We are angry at ourselves, at our shortcomings and our helpless failures but being humans, we look for scapegoats and dump the unreasonable avalanche of emotion on them. If there was a mirror to monitor your true self, you won't even dare to utter a word. Now, would you?)

To see and to be seen

Being a filmmaker must be the most boring as well as the most exciting profession in the world. 

Boring, because you've already seen the film you wish to make in your mind. That's like the greater spoiler crisis. In fact, the very fact that you already know everything about the film even before it's made makes your reality a downer. For what it's worth, the filmmaker takes the onus of making life interesting for the audience at least by persisting with what's in his head and working towards translating the mental picture into a physical reel. 

Exciting, because the filmmaker gets to create an alternate reality; a world that is controlled by none other than him. He moves things around like a chess-master who is basically playing against himself as there are no opponents in the field of cinema. It's only you and the time. So many things can go against you. The sun may not shine when the camera wants it to. Anything can happen. And anything does happen on a movie set. 

PS. During my interview of Ang Lee for Life of Pi (2012), i couldn't help but ask what inspired him to become a filmmaker. His reply was as enlightening as his aura: he has always been a curious person, looking for answers and he found out early in his life that you can't always get them too conveniently. 

PSS. A (great) filmmaker bounces the questions off the canvas of cinema while the audience often seeks the easy way out by paying closer attention to the answers derived instead of the questions posed.

Racist ruminations

Leonardo DiCaprio is living. The 41-year-old isn't presently shooting or signed up any film project since The Revenant (2015). Being the classic role model for work-hard-party-hardest, DiCaprio is nowadays in the news either for his humanitarian causes or bohemian excursions. And this peaceful boat was disturbed yesterday when the news (rumours?) of him being approached to play Rumi surfaced on the Internet. The initial reaction to this piece of possibility has been explicitly negative. How can a white guy with an American accent portray a Persian poet/philosopher/thatguywhosaideverythingawesomely? Fair enough. But, here's what i think should be the ideal case: DiCaprio takes up the project and plays Rumi regardless of what the online world thinks. Later, everybody would be able to throw in their one cent on whether he did a good job or not. Until and unless a biopic happens, our racist apprehensions are nothing but that. After all, didn't a dude who couldn't even speak an Indian language—let alone appear desi—portray Gandhi so bloody brilliantly? 

Two shades of politics

If you’re the kind of person who waits for trains on a daily basis, there are two possibilities: 

• you must have paid attention to the corrugated roof
• you’ve got better things to do with your smartphone

Either way, the roofs shadowing our railways platforms have gone through an interesting transformation. Earlier, they used to be of white-and-maroon shade. Nowadays, they are white-and-blue. This didn’t happen overnight. It was Mamata Banerjee’s initiative when she became the railway minister (for the second time) in 2009. Just like her sari usually is: white with blue border. Interesting move, isn't it?

OK. Now pay attention to this screenshot from the trailer of the upcoming biopic based on MS Dhoni’s life. Notice something? Yes, the white-and-blue roof there. That’s an error from the filmmaker’s end. It should have been white-and-maroon, ideally speaking. They could have done a more detailed job at recreating the early days of our beloved cricketer. For the record, Dhoni was a ticket examiner between 2001 and 2003. Mamata Banerjee’s first tenure as the railway minister of India was between 1999 and 2001; the period during which she had no interest whatsoever in leaving behind a colourful legacy.

Pointless analogy

Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) is a fantastic film. It's the kind of cinema that lays bare itself while doing the same to you. And when i say you, i'm addressing everyone who is a constituent as well as a beneficiary as well as a victim of capitalism. That's the beauty of Scorsese's filmmaking. He isn't shy to laugh at us for who we have become. 

But that's not the point of this silly blog post. 

The reason i decided to type 10 lines is something caught my thought this morning. In the aforementioned film, cocaine turned out to be an able supporting actor. And every time you see someone snort a line, the punctuation to the shot is complete with the person tilting his/her head back. Now, not to overstretch imagination here, but don't wolves also tilt their heads back? The only difference being one species sighs while another howls. 

One. Alone.

Wouldn't it be every actor's dream to be the only guy in a movie? All the cameras focused on just one person? Instead of having to share the screen with others, why not have the 70mm to yourself? Sounds enticing, no? Ditto. But when i tried to come up with a list of films where the entire film featured just one actor and nobody else, i couldn't come up with anything worth sharing. This was before it dawned on me that the recent past had two such glaring examples. Just that neither of them seemed like a one-man show. Life of Pi (2012) and The Jungle Book (2016). Both primarily starred just one actor (yes, in the former, there were others in the beginning and at the end but...) and played heavily on CGI or motion capture with animated animals. Both featured young actors of Indian origin. Wonder how it must be like to perform to the camera with no other person except some voices to guide you. In some ways, it must be terrifyingly awesome to hog the limelight. In some ways, Hollywood is too racist and won't have anything to do with brown skin on the screen. 

Finally!

Now that a bazillion Internet memes have subsided and a thousand lame jokes have died a natural death, i think it's the appropriate time to appreciate Leonardo DiCaprio's debut Oscar win. For someone who'd spent his entire life in front of the camera, that golden baldie must mean a lot to him. He was 19 when he earned his first nod back in 1993 for What's Eating Gilbert Grape (notice how the title didn't have a question mark; maybe because the film was an answer). Martin Scorsese watched this film even before the nominations were announced and noticed the young talent. They bumped into each other later and according to a story, the legendary filmmaker patted DiCaprio's back asking him to keep up the good work. They were to team up within a decade for Gangs of New York (2002) and have been teaming up again and again since. In this bargain, both of them ended up making brilliant films. Out of DiCaprio's five nominations for Best Actor, two came from Scorsese's films. Which makes you wonder whether 23 years is a really long wait. After all, Al Pacino bagged his first Oscar (and so far his last) on his seventh nomination. He hasn't been nominated in over two decades now. And that's also where my worry for DiCaprio lies. Once you've got the baby, will you continue to strive for perfection? Ennio Morricone would be excused because he's 87 and the music composer finally won his first Oscar this year after scoring 500 film credits and six nominations. DiCaprio, at 41, can't afford to be excused. 

The price of a legend

I must have said this a hundred times by now but this is for the record: Leonardo DiCaprio's finest performance ever has to be in The Revenant (2015). It doesn't matter whether he wins the must-awaited Oscar or not anymore. In fact, his body of work has grown beyond the tenets of the Academy. There are many reasons why i believe so The Revenant is probably the second major film (after Barry Lyndon in 1975) to be shot entirely in natural lights. That's a massive task. That's like Instagrammers deprived of their filters. Or Twitter of its mehfil-e-chutiyapa outlook. Director Alejandro G Iñárritu shot the film mostly in Alberta, Canada. The storyline involves heavy snow and horse and blood and sacrifice. A $135 million project quite literally rested on the shoulders of DiCaprio. Apparently, it's a miracle that the river flows in the film and it's impossible to imagine having anything to do with that kind of coldness. So the makers of this magnum opus had to position themselves in such a manner that they don't lose out on time. In fact, about an hour of shooting everyday. That's it. If you lose the cut today, you basically waste the entire day. In such a scenario, selflessness is a must—no wonder the crew protested against the director by the end of film shoot because of harsh working conditions—and it's understandable how DiCaprio went to the extremes he did for this film. And that's not just being in almost freezing water for a long shot (using a stunt man could have helped but like i said earlier, it'd waste time) or eating raw meat despite being a vegan or facing hypothermia repeatedly. If you watch the film, which you should anyway, you can feel his pain and desperation. There is a scene where his body is being moved and he's coughing profusely. Turns out he was really sick during that time but decided to go to work instead of taking the day off. Because you see, acting, like any other job you love, is about showing up at office and pushing yourself beyond expectations. How Rahul Dravid continued to bat despite having high fever or why Nemanja Vidić never let the blood gushing out of his face disrupt his tempo on the ground. That's the passion one should have for what one does for a living. And i can't think of any other film—and i've seen all of his movies—where DiCaprio has enjoyed the screen time like he did in The Revenant. This film is really long (crossing 2.5 hrs) and entirely about his struggle. It's a no-brainer this performance will undoubtedly go down in history as legendary. He's at his best right now. The only worry is, if he wins an Oscar, will he continue to peak?

And your opinion goes to...

It's that time of the year when you'll stumble upon arguments/discussions on which film should have won which award and which actor should have been snubbed and whatnot. It's the beginning of the award season and this trend is going to continue until the Oscars. For instance, today, some of the debaters will be relieved that Leonardo DiCaprio won the Best Actor (Drama) gong for The Revenant while others will be aghast that the survival film managed to win other awards too. It took me a long while to stay away from such verbal circus where we like to believe that our opinion matters. Guess what? It doesn't. It never did. It never will. Golden Globes, like the Academy or the BAFTA or SAG, is exclusively democratic but the viewpoint of the few matters there. Lobbying plays another key role in the outcome. What else can explain The Martian winning an award in the comedy category? Just because you think Spotlight should have won the Best Picture award doesn't make any difference to the set narrative. It's a private party and we are just voyeurs who get a glimpse from the outside. If you are really bothered by this, you should host your own sweet awards function and hand out statuettes in absentia. 

Rise of the legend

Do you really want Leonardo DiCaprio to win an Oscar? No, seriously. You should be asking yourself this question because we are at that junction in history where an actor is acquiring legendary status. And it's a critical moment for humankind. (OK, i'm exaggerating here but you get the point.) He was in his teens when he first got nominated for this award (yes, we can always argue about the merit of an award decided by oldies but we can't come up with a bigger substitute for that golden baldie in the world of cinema) and he's 41 now. It's been a long ride for him. Going by his recent films, it's apparent that Robert De Niro doesn't care much about the script anymore. He's more into comedy nowadays and seems to enjoy having fun for a change. The same is true for Jack Nicholson, who hasn't given a TV interview in over four decades now! And Al Pacino. Gene Hackman hasn't appeared in a film in over a decade now. So, the male Hollywood actors who carved themselves a niche in the 1970s aren't around to bother. Their successors are going to be either in their early 40s or 50s. Which cuts down the table to the Brad Pitts, Tom Cruises and Johnny Depps of the world. Brad Pitt has done a great job of transcending from acting in good films to producing great films. Tom Cruise seems stuck in his Ethan Hunt persona which bodes well for BO. Johnny Depp can't be recognized in most of his films thanks to heavy makeup but how many of them stand out on his merit? There's no doubt that nobody comes close to Daniel Day Lewis in terms of thespian perfection. But then, how much can you grade an actor who has worked in only five films in 15 years? Hasn't his choosiness and knack for details worked against his opportunities to test himself more? On the other hand, DiCaprio worked in 15 films during this century, each film unique in its own way. Not a single role can be found cascaded into another. The argument isn't just about his amazing work rate but also his unperturbed dedication to his art. He comes across as a careless New Yorker in his real life who loves partying but when it comes to cinema, can you think of anyone who has pushed himself the way he has—at least in the 21st century? Take his latest venture, The Revenant (2015), for instance. The pain he showcases ain't very detached from the personal discomfort he appears to have experienced during the shooting of this film. Being submerged in freezing water for one scene while consuming raw meat (despite being a vegan) for another are just two of the several difficulties he must have gone through. I don't mean to give out spoilers here but i can tell you two things for sure: 

1. The Revenant is one of the finest films of all time and it is so because DiCaprio's dedication to the cinematographer's vision is incredible.

2. Technically, you shouldn't want DiCaprio to win an Oscar because there's a lingering fear that he might stop pushing himself if he wins one. 

Caught in a lingual trap

People look at me suspiciously whenever i tell somebody that i don't watch an English film without its subtitles. And i do this despite working as a business transcriber for exactly four years. During which, i used to come across different accents as a routine. So much so i could distinguish where the speaker is from by the way s/he speaks. Boston English isn't the same as Yankee English. Finns speak English differently than Danes. Chinese and Japanese might look similar in appearance but their approach to English is as stark as their foreign policies. An Aussie speaks English with careless attitude while a Scot speaks the same language with a hidden disdain. These are some of the characteristics i picked up while transcribing conference calls of MNCs as well as smaller corporations. Despite all these vagaries, i STILL prefer to use subtitles while watching Hollywood films (British and Australian films as well). Simply because i can't pretend to understand something i don't. And if i miss a dialogue since i'm more verbally inclined than visually, then it bugs me. However, if i'm in line with the words spoken in a film, then i'm at peace. So, it's a personal reason. But what i've noticed among my friends and colleagues is they avoid subtitles because they don't like to read while watching a movie. That's also their excuse for overlooking non-English gems that come from the world of cinema. They'd rather pretend to act like they understood everything that they heard in an English film (when they haven't) than take the effort to read in sync with the movie. Which makes you wonder, what precisely is foreign for us Indians? English spoken by non-Indians or non-English spoken by non-English? 

A rehabilitated mind

Since i don't really have anything to write about, i thought i'll recommend TED-Ed to you. I've benefited a lot from this site. It's an humbling experience. In any case, the TED platform seems like a great place to exchange ideas. But then, somebody told me that nothing is accomplished there other than talking. To which, i retorted that that's not true. There's a lot of listening going on there too.  

Speaking of which, we don't listen anymore. It's a dying art form. Everybody wants to be on the stage and nobody wants to be in the audience. A young boy who committed a horrible crime is about to work free in our country. The society is obviously scared as well as furious. But what's surprising here is the same society somehow manages to make peace with the unmentionable acts by our politicians and entertainers. Which is why it's time we revisited Red in that parole room of The Shawshank Redemption (1994), not only to understand what rehabilitation is all about but also why some wrongs can never be righted.  

Officer: "Ellis Boyd Redding, your files say you've served 40 years of a life sentence. Do you feel you've been rehabilitated?"

Red: "Rehabilitated? Well, now let me see. You know, I don't have any idea what that means."

Officer: "Well, it means that you're ready to rejoin society..."

Red: "I know what you think it means, sonny. To me, it's just a made up word—a politician's word—so young fellas like yourself can wear a suit and a tie, and have a job. What do you really want to know? Am I sorry for what I did?"

Officer: "Well, are you?"

Red: "There's not a day goes by I don't feel regret. Not because I'm in here, because you think I should. I look back on the way I was then: a young, stupid kid who committed that terrible crime. I want to talk to him. I want to try to talk some sense to him, tell him the way things are. But I can't. That kid's long gone, and this old man is all that's left. I got to live with that. Rehabilitated? It's just a bullshit word. So you go on and stamp your form, sonny, and stop wasting my time. Because to tell you the truth, I don't give a shit."

Lyrical twists and turns

♫ ...Hmm tere kohhre badan mein sil jaaungi re
Jab karwat lega tu khhil jaaungi re...♫ 

Bollywood songs are quite deceptive, not just because they go overboard with romance but also because they sound different to different people. Some will hear “...toh baat ban jaaye” while others will decipher “...toh baap ban jaaye” effortlessly. José Covaco knows what i'm talking about. It's almost funny if you overlook that medical condition called mondegreen. Google it, i'm not explaining it. What i'm going to explain though is how a song written by Gulzar for Omkara (2006) can turn into something more experimental if we change the way it sounds. FYI, i already did that with the aforementioned two verses. I changed dohhre to kohhre and chhil to khhil taking creative liberties which might make India more intolerant than necessary. The above two lines can make an inference to tattoos now. (No, i'm not into body art anymore, been 13 months since i got inked!) So, the lyrics suggest that the heroine would stitch herself into the hero's skin (like a tattoo?) and will showcase herself elegantly when he stretches his body (like tattoos do on taut skin?). 

Sorry, Gulzarsaab. 

Abetment to waking up

Yesterday, i finally watched Court (2015). Before you assume it's a Marathi film, it's not. It prominently features four languages—Marathi, Hindi, English and Gujarati—depending heavily on incomplete subtitles. If you haven't watched it, you know what you should do. No, not just download. Downloading is very easy. Hoarding movies is easier. Watching is the toughest part. Anyway, if you aren't aware yet, this film is also India's official entry to Oscar this year. Going by the buzz, it won't be harsh to keep our expectations low. It's not going to win the golden statue. The closest we got to winning was two years ago but then, we botched up by sending The Good Road instead of The Lunchbox. That's how it is in our country. And coming back to Court, it's a simple film that doesn't believe in oversimplifying the ways of the world. I don't remember the last time i saw a sessions court in an Indian film. To a majority of us, adaalat is how a court is supposed to look like. Bazinga! There are many more surprises in there.

Spoiler: If you haven't watched the film yet, don't read any further. When it comes to cinema, interpretations (and misinterpretations) are always going to be a part of the package. The final five minutes of Court delivers the gist of the entire story. A tight slap on the (sleepy) face of our judiciary. However, if I were to provide a different climax, i'd have made the protagonist commit suicide and pin the blame on the system (read: the judge) for misreading the events. That would have been interesting.  

On top of the world

The year was 1974 and a French wire-walker named Philippe Petit wanted to walk on a wire. Not a big deal, right? Oui. The only problem being he wanted to do that between the two tallest buildings at that time: World Trade Center (WTC) in New York City. Both were at least 100 meters taller than Eiffel Tower to give you an idea how high they really were. Imagine the amount of vertigo that will induce in a human body no matter how trained it is. To make it more difficult, the act was not only dangerous but also illegal. He gathered few accomplices—that included his girlfriend—in France as well as the USA to make his crazy dream a reality. To cut a long story short, he pulled it off beautifully. One fine early morning, New Yorkers gathered on the streets below, looking up at the sky with their palms working as their visors, trying to understand what was going on. Why and how would a man walk on a rope stretched between two ugly buildings? Yes, ugly. What's little known about WTC is that New Yorkers didn't immediately fall in love with this monstrous piece of architecture. Most felt those two buildings were just bullying the sky behind by obstructing the sea view. Weren't they just two tall blocks with no external grace whatsoever? People's response to them was quite similar to what Mumbaikars felt about Ambani's Antilla. But, but, those who gathered on the street were relieved, if not ecstatic, when Philippe completed his stunt. They applauded in unison even when police arrested Philippe. Of course, his act became a global news eventually but what's worth noting here is he unwittingly played a key role in making New Yorkers love those twins. I wonder how he must have felt like when he saw them crumbling down on 9/11. After all, he was the only one who got the best view from those buildings.

NB. I wrote this blog post after watching The Walk (2015), which i feel everyone should. If not the entire movie, then at least the final half an hour. It's filled with moments that take you on his 280 feet journey across the wire. One step at a time. The climax marries art with philosophy so as to make us understand that he wasn't just defying gravity up there. There is a point when he feels absolute peace, something he admittedly never felt before or after. His initial fear turned into resolve, overlooking how close (given the distance from the ground!) he was to death. However, if you want to peel off the cinematic touches, then you should watch Man on Wire (2008) to see what drove him to this madness. If you remember, when this documentary won the Oscar, Philippe balanced the golden statue on his chin. What is not well known is he practised that move at Woody Allen's house on one of the many Oscars he had won. Yes, Philippe was THAT confident of his documentary winning the Oscar!

Connecting the invisible dots

Have you ever been to a museum and stared at people staring at a painting? You aren't alone. I used to do that during my younger days. Most of the exhibitions i attended were marked by my curiosity about the people there more than the creations on display. For some reason, i couldn't figure out why so much importance was given to random strokes of colour. Or shapeless objects. I admired the visuals but somehow couldn't comprehend the hidden clues in them. It was beyond me. I was more fascinated by words. Still am. However, as i grew up, i also became attached to cinema. I can't explain how i ended up becoming a cinephile but it has something to do with the marriage of words and visuals. Movies provided me the window to peek into others' lives without having to pay the price. It was a perfect scheme. Over the years, i started reaping newer meanings from what i saw on the big screen. Many a times, the director wants you to notice a lot but you miss them because you are too busy watching the movie. Which is why it takes you a while to understand why certain characters behaved in a certain manner in certain films. For instance, it's only at the end of American Beauty (1999) that you realize Kevin Spacey's character spent about two hours of your life in finally acknowledging that he was seeking beauty, not love. Similarly, Al Pacino's Scarface is never going to be happy because he loves his sister way too much, to the point that he can't tolerate another man in her life. The only problem being he is restricted by incest to ever have her. On a different lane, Robert De Niro's war hero could have shot that deer at the climax of The Deer Hunter (1978) but you can't shoot a harmless creature after what you've been through in Vietnam. Brad Pitt's Tristan attains his adulthood by chopping off a bear's claws in Legend of the Fall (1994). Eventually, his life comes a full circle with a gruesome death by a grizzly bear. During the classic parole scene in The Shawshank Redemption (1994), the camera zooms in on Morgan Freeman's face but you don't even realize it. Dissimilarly, the camera is always shaky when Marlon Brando's face is in focus because even the camera is scared of the godfather. Christian Bale's different accents in different movies are more than just about showmanship. It's about building a character and that takes extra effort. It's a different story that Charlie Chaplin managed to do so even during the Silent Era as well. There are dots to be connected in great cinema. If you miss them, nothing would change but you'll remain oblivious to what great filmmaking is all about. To appreciate it, you'll have to stare at the right people.

Much against yourself

One of the most grueling onscreen interviews has to be from The Departed (2006). It's set in FBI's office where Leonardo DiCaprio's character can't wait to shed his family's ill reputation by becoming a cop. The proverbial good guys. But it can't possibly be THAT easy for him so, the interviewer is tough on him. Tough is actually an understatement. Mark Wahlberg was brutal. At the end of the interview, it becomes obvious why what just happened happened. Leo's integrity wasn't under the scanner. It was his perception about himself and where he comes from. He wasn't supposed to be deluded. You see, it's easy to let go off one's family roots but once you do that, you are on your own. That interview was an assertion of this ground reality.  

Accept my exceptions perhaps?

This classic line from one of my favourite movies of all time, The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2013), always makes me think. I keep thinking and thinking and thinking. Then i think harder. And that's when it strikes me that it doesn't matter whether the above quote is true or not. We believe the bullshit we assume we deserve. You can't do anything about it. If you ask me (which i'm sure you won't as i don't give a fuck about replying on time), i'll add that we accept the penis we think we deserve. Like i said, you can't do anything about it either.