Sunday, February 19, 2006

What's going on?

Monday 02/20/06 is a holiday! Welcome break. Had plans to go out of town, which got screwed. I have three books and two movies lined up for recent future.

I watched Clerks today. Serious humour. Will recommend it for days when nothing seems to work, and you feel like venting out the schmuck in your head!

Also watched The Constant Gardener last week. Rachel Weisz is stunning, hands down. The movie raises several questions and answers them rather well. And even though I am no expert on this - the cinematography was supreme stuff. The background provided by Africa reminded me of two books. First is V S Naipaul's A Bend in the River, for its depiction of African way of life. The second is Frederick Forsyth's The Dogs of War. There is a piece in this which mentions how it is fearful, almost menacing to see an African man with a gun. A raw power to kill minus the responsibility. Much the same feeling you have while watching the movie - esp the end. Also in the same league as The Constant Gardener is Syriana, an epic about the reality of how business almost dictates politics in our times. Nice work this is. It is not so often, that we are shown both the sides of a story with so less prejudice.

And lastly on a friend's recommendation I watched George Clooney's Good Night, and Good Luck which is about politics in America during the 1950's, something which I have no clue about!

Lined up for today and tomorrow are Arth & Jarhead. Arth is part of this newly found interest I have developed about parallel cinema in India during the 70's and 80's. Judging by what I know and have felt I think the Indian people were (or are) rather naive, not to appreciate the work done in those times by the likes of Naseer, Shabana, Farooq, Smita, Om, etc. Or maybe they did in their own way - that is why these guys hung around for so long to do such remarkable work!

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