PerfectMisfit 2.0

As the title of this blog suggested, 'I write therefore I am'. May be it is the need to express myself, May be it's my over the top reaction to movies which i am not able to make anymore, may be it's the feedback of the few ( but loyal ) readers i have, my tryst with blogosphere shall continue henceforth, but at a new place..
wordpress sounds exciting, simpler, feature rich and much more readable..so from now onwards, perfectmisfit is blogging at:

http://perfectmisfit.wordpress.com/

The Last Bow..

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes--and ships--
and sealing-wax--
Of cabbages--and kings--
And why the sea is boiling hot--
And whether pigs have wings."

You guessed it right, it's time for theperfectmisfit to leave.

Afterword:-
With this post theperfectmisfit.blogspot draws its curtains!!
Godspeed..

RAMBO IV - What am I expecting from it

Johan Rambo, The guy who has always been at the top of my fictional heroes list is BACK.
Jason Bourne comes a close second, but the silent grunts, the pain in the eyes of Rambo speak more than say the uber cool 'yipiee kay ye ye mothefucker' uttering John Mclane or the suave Bond…James Bond.
I don’t remember how many times i have seen The Rambo trilogy, but i always thought that sly was over with it. With Rocky Balboa returning with a bang, there was hope and Boy, Rambo is BACK..
Bigger, huger and better..Sly's looking huge, seems he can easily rip Arnie's head off.
The critics have always maintained that the Rambo movies are Gory, but we shouldn’t forget here that ‘Rambo’ means 'Violence' in Japanese.
Rambo is all about violence. He aint a human..He’s THE killing machine, one who creates his own missions. Always outnumbered and unaccounted for, he strikes back when you would least expect him to do that.
Soothsayers always say that Rambo movies are dumb action movies, operating on wafer thin plots, but if you are intelligent enough, you can always see each of the Rambo movies having strong political undertones.
The first two Rambo movies had umpteen references to (and based on) Vietnam, showing both sides of the war. The third one had introduced the first world to the atrocious acts at Afghanistan and now the choice of Burma and its struggle couldn’t be better.
When the rest of the world (including our very own 'peace loving' India) has closed its eyes on Burma, its John Rambo who shall turn the spotlights on it.
And although Sly's Ghost direction was very much apparent in each of the Rambo movies, this is the first time he officially directs a Rambo movie. Sly's credentials on film making cannot be questioned, 1976, he beat the likes of martin socrese's taxi driver to take away the best movie award for 'Rocky'.
If you have known John J Rambo, you shouldn’t be looking for a plot, it’s a boatful of carnage you will get instead.
So, my expectations are pretty clear. Character development, sweet story telling, spoon feeding and dreamy shots have never been a forte of Rambo movies.
Who's got the time baby?? Let’s get to the action STRAIGHT AWAY!!
The original old school badass style...The JOHN J RAMBO style!!

Ten Random facts about the PerfectMisfit..

10.The PerfectMisfit loves movies. His life, his thoughts, his actions can all be traced back to some movie scene , but please dont try looking for the source movie, because you possibly cannot search amongst all(read hindi, english, hinglish, B grade, porn, super B grade, tam, gulti, khatta, spanish, french, german, indie ) movies that he watches.

9. The PerfectMisfit is a big show-off(unlike what his testimonials suggest) and is well known for bragging. He can be found talking utter gibberish about anything ranging from the underlying naxalism in the current political parties to the t*t size of the girl in front of him.

8. The PerfectMisfit's favourite pastime currently is posing with other people's cars and bikes and clicking away to glory and then showing those pics to random people claiming the vehicles to be his own.

7. Once when the PerfectMisfit was in school, he fought with a girl over a trivial matter and tore her shirt and when the teacher( who was the misfit's mom herself) came to the class and the girl was about to go back to her bench, he shouted at the top of his voice at her 'Hey ***, your shirt is torn'..Needless to say, his mom spanked the living daylights out of him...he is still trying to figure out why he did that.

6. Unlike what he seems from outside the PerfectMisfit respects womenfolk a lot, particularly the ones who dont talk much, dont crib, dont love shopping, dont love babies, dont love SRK, dont love choclates and dont....

5. Once upon a time the PerfectMisfit used to be fat and ugly. His mom used to tell him that no girl would ever look at him. Boy was she wrong :D

4. The PerfectMisfit has a legendary knack of having road accidents.It started from the good old days of tobu cycles and continues even now when he's driving a car. Stop press - he's going to fly next week.

3. This ones's specially for single girls looking for so called 'Friends' on Orkut:- The PerfectMisfit may seem like the regular bloke next door who happens to be charming witty and fun, but in reality he was the 19XX underwear model for CK, has a PhD in advance mathematics, hosts his own cooking show, sings and dances in theatre, has been a CIA secret agent among many other things that he has done.

2. The PerfectMisfit is a great planner and considers his normal day as waste, if he doesnt make 10 new plans everyday and chalk out the exact manner in which he would execute them. Last known, he was planning to go to Nandigram.

1. Gosh, it seems he is almost done with the 10 facts with still tonnes to go :(. Still wrapping up..he is ur ultimate narrsisst, has recently been detected to be suffering from Schizophrenia, loves the only few friends he has and can kill for them, claims to be at the IIT ( which is a figment of his imagination and in all probablity he is at the Tau bhatija Institute of technology), makes it a point to fight with his near ones everyday and then loses sleep over those fights and firmly believes in one person and his one sayin which sums it all up :-
"Success is the sole earthly judge of right and wrong. "
- Adolf Hitler.

Now, that you have read all about him, if you want to get in touch with him for any issues/doubts/clarifications ( wish i could sign off my official mails to my manager this way ), the easiest way to do that is :-
Jump into the nearest lake/river/ocean.
You will probably find the PerfectMisfit as soon as you reach hell.

Rediscovering Subash Ghai..

Subash Ghai… not a very Hot Topic here in PFC, then why did I choose him for my first Post at PFC?Firstly, Off Late, rediscovering People, movies etc is quite ‘HOT’ in PFC and Subash Ghai is in the news for his “Kaun likhega Karodpati” script thingy.
Cinephiles tried finding his vile intentions and motivations behind the scheme, which at least brought him back to the news, and now with the so called ‘Intellectual’s Favourite bashing boy B Grade superstar’ Himesh reshamiaaya (did i get the no. of a’s in his name right??) buying the rights for a Ghai Classic ‘KARZ’, I decided… this is the time when Mr. Ghai deserves a full blown article and maybe a discussion on his films (and not him).
Finally, there is one more reason why i choose him as my first topic, as when i look at the name of PFC, the P stands for passion and my passion for cinema, right from my childhood has been shaped by many and the first and foremost among them is Mr. Ghai, whose films i grew up on.
I will start this article with 10 Ghai scenes, which are permanently embedded in my memory.
Film- KARZ(1980)—————-With the guitar prelude to ‘Ek Haseena Thi’ going on in the background, Raj Kiran and Simi Garewal are returning back home in the jeep.
Unknown to what future holds for him, Raj Kiran is humming away with the tune. The picturesque backround adds to the calming down and soothing effect. Suddenly, the Jeep comes to a halt. Raj Kiran climbs down to see what is happening, but what is this, the love of his life, his bride, Kamini, the enchantress starts the engines to a roar and drives the jeep again and again over him.
Afterthought:- Long before we had the RGVs and the Bhatts exploring the shock value of Dhokas and infidelity, we had this movie. Imagine the kind of impact this scene would have had on the people watching it for the first time.
Film- HERO(1983)—————Meenakshi Seshadree is praying in the temple, while jackie is lying wounded elsewhere in the village. She has not eaten since days. Suddenly the village elder annonces, ‘Beti use Hosh aa gaya”, the sombre mood changes and guitar notes start flowing in the background.
A chorus starts humming, “Mera janam, Mera Balam, Mera Balam,Mera Janam..”. Meenakshi starts running singing a long Janoooo….., and then they meet and as clichéd as it may sound they run towards each other, with the song “Tu Mera janoo hai” playing in the background.
Afterthought:- As artificial as it may seem, this sequence defined and embodied Hindi movies for the entire 80s.The Girl running to the boy sequence is present in thousands of more movies, but this scene refuses to get lost among them, maybe the superlative music has something to do with it.
Film- MERI JUNG (1985)———————-“Jeet Jayenge hum, Jeet Jayeeenge Hum…tu agar sang hai”, it starts out with this song being played on a Piano by Girish Karnad and within a span of 10, 15 minutes , with different parts of the song “Zindagi har kadam.. ek nayi jung hai” playing intermittently, Anil kapoor’s family is destructed.
His father is wrongly convicted and Hung, mother goes mad, and with the song closing out, we have scenes of waves crashing against huge rocks and the ‘now grown up’ Anil delivering animated dialogues in the court room, (suggesting that he is winning all the cases) facing towards the camera with a different pose every time.
The song within it’s start and end covers decades of time and shows the good times, the pathetic times and the slow and painful rise of Anil’s family again.
Afterthought:- Again a defining scene of the 80’s, many movies have used this type of story telling hence, but this one stands out primarily because of the music and the figurative execution of events.
Film- KARMA(1986)—————–Dileep Kumar is away with his band of boys to fight the evil ‘Dr. Dang’, when Shanta Tai comes and announces that his wife has called him. He goes, picks up the phone and starts asking Nutan about her well being. Alas he has forgot that she has lost her speech after the terrible shock she had when her entire family was killed by Dr Dang, and she can speak no more.
Suddenly he realises that her wife can’t speak to him, the dejection and grief evident in his eyes. How will they speak now? Suddenly, Nutan’s bangles make a sound and to his utter disbelief, he can understand what she is saying. He talks while she just shakes her bangles again and again, to convey what she means.
Afterthought:- Agreed, Ghai’s stories have always been inspired, but its scenes like these which don’t come any more original and take his inspired movies to a level above the original ones.
Film- RAM LAKHAN(1989)———————-“Ae ji, Oo Ji, Lo Ji, Suno Ji” Anil kapoor sings, while his group of Mohalleh ka lafangas dance in gay abandon with him. Anupam Kher, playing the quintessential bania, is rightly found to be looting people using false weights, much to the happiness of KashiRam ( Satish kaushik) his assistant as the song goes on.Where as radha, played by madhuri has given her heart away to lakhan and unable to resist his spell on her, her feet defy her and start dancing to his tunes as we enter the antara “main tera Mohan, tu meri radha” and the tabla beats start growing stronger.
Afterthought:-Ghai’s heriones, in 80s represented the Gaun ki Gori to the T, she would give her heart away to the hero and not able to control her emotions, would dance behind close doors and closed eyes, as the hero would be singing in the mohallah. Ahh!! adolescent innocence was never this believable in any other movies after this.
Film- SAUDAGAR(1991)———————-Employing the similar technique (as in Meri Jung) of having a song in the background while giving the story development across decades, this time the song is ‘imli ka boota’, with a badly wigged Anupam Kher playing mandhari telling a group pf village children the story of saudagars, right from their childhood, to youth to their present Dushmani. Another scene which uses a song to terrific effect in the background is the entry scene for Vivek Musran. With his mother and all relatives singing “Gopi jan ras raas abhilaashi, kaurav kaaling kans vinasi, himkar baanuk saan prakasi, sarva bhut hi vas vaiyakhi, bolo jai kanhaiyya ki…natkhat bansi wale gokul ke raja, meri ankhiyaan taras gayi ab toh aaja , aaja.., with this song palying Vivek Musran enters the frame, displayin all the sastra traning he has had all these years, bows before his elders and jumps on to the horses, signifying that he , indeed is the kanhaaiya here.
Afterthought:- Executions like this prove beyond doubt that Ghai is the master of picturisations and the justice he does to the music he has is unparalled.
Mandhari has come to attend a party thrown in favour of Rajeswar as he has returned from the jail, after 14 long years( please note that it’s 14 here, signifying ram’s vanvaas maybe??), he accuses Rajeswar of having forgotten him. Raj Kumar thunders, “Mandhari, Ek baar tumne awaj to di hoti, hum salkhon ko cheer ke aa jaate, itihas gawah hai ki jab rajeswar ne dosti nibhayi hai. to afsane likhe gaye hain aur dushmani nibhayi hai to..”. There were lots of other great confrontration scenes between him and Dileep kumar, notably the one where dileep kumar gets drunk and shouts across from the other side of the river, when Raj kumar’s helicopter runs out of fuel and he has to land in Sanatanpur ( the garh of Dileep Kumar) and he says “Hum tumhe aisi jagah maarenge, jahan bandhook bhi hamari hogi, goli bhi hamari hogi aur jameen bhi hamari hogi” and of course the final Holi scene where they patch up again.
Afterthought:- Handling egos, massive ones at that is a consistent rumble in our film industry, but Subahs ghai showed not only how to handle the egos of Huge actors correctly, but also to harness moments of pure brilliance from them.
Film- KHALNAYAK(1993)———————-Ballu, the true embodiment of pure evil has been caught by inspector Ram. Now behind the bars, he refuses to have food and throws it away. When confronted, he hits the hawaldaar. The hawaldaar goes and complains to Jackie saying that Ballu has bashed up a police wallah. Inspector Ram tells them to bring him. When he confronts Ballu for a fight, Ballu points out that a fight is not justified, since Ram has a VARDI and he doesn’t.
Ram, being the true embodiment of RAM, takes out his shirt and although his well oiled biceps are nothing to show in front of the massive iron pumped biceps of Sanju, he manages to beat the shit out of Ballu. As he goes on beating the pulp out of him, he keeps on reminding him ” Police wale pe haath mat uthana”, finally it seems ballu is going to be killed today and that’s when the tuccha subinspectors and hawaldaars come in and stop Jackie. As Jackie walks away,he reminds ballu one final Time..”police wale pe haath mat uthana”. Then as ballu is being carried away by the hawaldars, he manages to give one huge blow back to a hawaldar, who promptly falls behoos. Finally, before fainting himself, ballu tells “Jakke apne Raam sahab se bol do, aaj ballu ne fir se police wale pe haath uthaaya’
Afterthought:- Talking of originality, sequences like these where Ghai played out unique and original scenes ( with a dash of humour)for the masses, must have fetched the maximum seeties and hoots from the crowds in the UPs, MPs and Berar sectors.Film- KHALNAYAK(1993)———————-As, Ballu is again languishing behind the bars, Anupam Kher playing Jailor Ishwar Girdhari Pandey stops by to have a check on his high profile kaidi. As he looks at Ballu, who is humming ‘nayak Nahi, khal nayak hun main, nayak nahin, khal nayak hun main’, ballu suddenly proclaims, “aaj se theek 11 din baad, 11 tareek, raat 11 baje, main, ballu balram aap ke jail se Furr ho jaunga..mujhe kasam hai , meri maa ki”, he then gives a twitch to his long hairs and starts humming ‘nayak nahi, khalnayak hun main’ again.
Hiding his hichki, Anupam kher informs jackie about Ballu’s challenge, and tells his forces to tighten the security on Ballu, suddnely, wire mashes get started to be built, the walls start getting higher and teh entire jail starts preparing for teh D Day. Meanwhile, jailor Ishwar, keep looking at the watch and the calender alternatively. Th eD Day comes, the destined time also comes and goes. But, what’s this..ballu doesn’t even make a effort to move, let alone breaking the jail.
As inspector Ram, asks him about his challenge and how he lost it, Ballu replies very naively” Shab aapne mujhe itna maara, mujhe itna dard hua aur aap log aaram se so rahe the, to maien socha ki aap log kuch din kaam karen, aur main aaram se soun”.
Afterthought:- This scene shows that Ghai was the master of prison sequences, court sequences where the use of subtle humour creates just the desired impact. Again, a scene which shall leave a huge impact on first time watchers.
Film- PARDES(1997)——————As Arjun(Shahrukh), is getting hit from all the goons in the climax,( with teh song Nahi hona tha, playin in the background, in typical Ghai style).. he bounces back very much liek baazigar and DDLJ and starts hitting them all. He goes on hitting Rajiv, with blood flowing from all possible places of his face, as if he would kill him. Suddenly, a hand comes into the frame and stops him. The hands belong to Amrish Puri, who was such a important part of all Ghai movies.
They break into confrontation, where Amrish Puri accuses Arjun of treachery and asks him what is his relation with Ganga,and in a style of his own, Shahrukh replies,”Hai..Pyaar hai..babuji..agar..kisi ke liye ladhna pyaar hai..to hai..pyaar hai..and so on and on..”Afterthought:- As Ghai was truly looking for inspiration for his movies after the debacle of ‘TRIMURTI, this is in my opinion, his ode to DDLJ, with the climax almost resembling the one at DDLJ. But as always, Ghai tells the story in his own special style and leaves a strong mark.
Hmm…there are scores of Ghai scenes about which i can go on writing, but i have tried selecting the 10 which cover the maximum number of his films. I would like to remind you guys that all these scenes have been based on my memories and may not be 100% faithful to what happened in the movies, but these are rather what i remember of those scenes.
Coming to Ghai, i agree that originality has never been his forte, and he himself agrees that he is a ‘Story teller’ rather than a director. It’s the way he tells his story is what sets him apart.Musically, his ability to extract good music from his music directors is perhaps second to only Yash chopra.But as they say, ever product has an expiry date and he seems to have run out of ideas.His contemporaries have either fizzled out (N Chandra, KC Bokadia, FC Mehra etc etc) or have reinvented themselves (Rakesh roshan, Yash raj films) or retired ( Mahesh Bhatt), but Ghai refuses to give up and is still searching for re invention.
Form is temporary and class is permanent, and i for one believe that Ghai, the master story teller has still some great stories to tell. One still yearns to see, the Middle aged man in a white Hat and Black Overcoat coming back with one special story of his, to win over the masses as well as the classes, one final time and giving that SPECIAL appearance in one of the songs of the movie, ( a blockbuster one at that!!!!).
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This article written by me, was published in passionforcinema first..here goes the link:-
http://passionforcinema.com/projekt-iview-rediscovering-subhash-ghai/

The Party Begins..(PART II)

..And then I had met her..
Preity was the type of woman for whom monogamous men sucked in their stomachs. I wasn’t impervious to her charms but had learnt to deal with them in a positive manner so that I didn’t have to spend every waking moment thinking about the woman who was another man’s mistress.
It was ironic that a woman who looked like Preity did not actually have a husband or a boyfriend she could be seen in public with. What was not so ironic was that she used the spare time she had between trysts with her lover to amuse herself with other willing and able men whom she had no intention of ever falling in love with.
Preity had a peculiar character flaw, which only forced her to go after the unattainable. The only reason I felt safe in her presence was that she already had someone she couldn’t have more than me.
Not so long ago his wife had been a beautiful woman as well. Possibly not in the same league as Preity but I was happy with the picture she presented and the life we had together. Things had taken a turn for the irreparable after the miscarriage.
These were the things I told Preity on all those occasions we shared a drink at social events neither of us wanted to be at.So we talked and she had, over time, become the closest thing to a friend and confidante I ever had.
The last flakes of the cigarette hit my thumbs..I guess its time to make the call.
And it makes perfect sense to call Priety.
I retrieved my cellphone from my jacket pocket. She was on speed-dial. I wandered towards the window while waiting for the call to be answered.
When she answered the phone he opened with a question, “Priety?”
“Yes? How are you Rahul?”
“My wife is behaving a little strangely.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s lying on the floor and won’t get up. I can’t tell if she’s hurt or how she got on the floor. She’s breathing, I think, and I think there’s a pulse but she’s in this weird position and she won’t get up.”
Priety was dressed and waiting when Rahul called her. She looked at the doll on the mantelpiece. Her eyes twinkled as she thought of the pain caused by requiring a person to lie the way the doll was lying. She looked at the doll and imaged the way Rahul's wife must look while she listened to Rahul. It didn’t take long for Rahul to bore her with the details.
Details she was already privy to. So she interrupted him and said, “Rahul, will you be going to the party tonight?”
He sounded slightly surprised, “Actually yes. That’s what I needed her to dress up for. She knew this one was important and she’s just lying there doing God knows what.”
“Rahul.”
“Yes?”
“Since we’re absolutely certain that she is fine perhaps you should go to the party today and perhaps we can figure out what needs to be done when the evening is over?”
“You think it’s a good idea for me to leave her here like this?”
“Won’t the servants be in soon?”
“Yes?”
“It might be best if you weren’t home when they arrived Rahul. From what you’ve told me it doesn’t appear that it has escaped them that the boss and his wife fought. Take the evening off Rahul, you deserve it.”
“Okay. I guess I can do that.”
“Coincidentally I don’t have a date for the evening. Think you could pick me up?”
“Sure. It’s on the way. If I leave now, I can be there in half-an-hour…”“
That just barely gives me enough time to throw something on.”
“Okay, I’ll see you.”
On one of the many occasions that Rahul had complained about his domestic life he had expressed the wish to be rid of his current situation. “I wish it would all just go away,” he had said. Priety had merely sipped her champagne in response and he had moved on to complain about other things.Priety had been evaluating replacements for Rajiv for over a year before she ever considered Rahul. She didn’t like that Rajiv liked to hit. She also didn’t like that Rajiv enjoyed roleplaying where she had to pretend to be his wife so that he could hit her. For one thing Manisha looked nothing like Priety in the same way a rat resembles a proud jungle cat in no way. For another, Priety liked to be the one playing the games.
She liked the way Rahul looked after his wife and she knew that he would be a good father and husband.
All she had to do was move a few chess pieces around on the giant board of life to ensure that it was her that he chose to be married to when she was no longer in the picture.

Priety met Rahul at the door. He never got to see the doll on her mantelpiece or the spring-loaded apparatus that hung menacingly over it. He didn’t see the cigarette lighter on a timer that was a clever little mechanism set to fire up at thirty minutes past eight. It would take a minute or two for the flame to snap the string that held the spring back and drove the needle deep into the doll’s crotch.
Rahul and Priety would be dancing in plain view of a hundred people when it happened. Her death would be ascribed to delayed complications ensuing from the miscarriage.
"Shall we move??" she asked Rahul.
"Yes", he said, "the Party must be begining.."

The Party Begins..

She is wearing this little red thing that would stand out in a crowd. I try speaking to her, silently, soothingly.
When will she start listening to me?
I'm sitting right next to her. Her hair was pulled back in a magnificent chignon that served to accentuate the sculpted beauty of her features.
I want her to learn to dress right for all occasions. For me, of course.
I just averted my eyes from the drab thing she is wearing.
I'm looking around, bored, when I spot one of God's most perfect creations that has ever walked this planet.
I let out a low whistle. She doesn't seem to mind it.
In my field of view is - or rather, my field of view is fixed to - an epitome of beauty, an embodiment of everything wonderful, sugar, spices and everything nice.
Suddenly my eyes are locked to hers. She seems to be drooling all over me. We continue doing so, a touch too long.
Then i see this fear in her eyes.
A fear that I will notice. A fear that she may start wishing for something unattainable. A fear that her fragile confidence will get a blow.
I can read her thoughts, and I find them very amusing, right now.
The amusement spreads on to my face, and i start smiling.
She glares at me and as if she wants me to shut up.
As if I care.
The clock strikes 9, breaking my fixation. I move to the terrace, open the packet of smokes and light one.
A long day it has been and the party was yet to begin. They all would start pouring in some time.
I started thinking about the past.
She had been beautiful all along. It had started like all love stories do. Our relationship had quickly jumped from the teen romance phase to marriage.
I was happy with the picture she presented as my wife and the life we had together. Things had taken a turn for the irreparable after the miscarriage.

It wasn’t anyone’s fault. The doctor had advised care but in the way that any woman about to carry a human being to term is advised rest and relaxation. We were happy and proud so there was no reason for anyone to be unduly worried or extra careful.
Until she lost the baby.
Accusations flew everywhere, we changed doctors, we tried to get pregnant again but something had gone wrong and there was no getting around the change. So she retreated into a shell from which I was unable to extract her.
I thought everything would get better with time.
But, suddenly one day I realised that she was someone completely alien, someone I didn't know at all.
The days started getting longer. I started coming home late and sometimes stayed over at a friends place….

(TO BE CONTINUED)…

Blogically Dead?

...No!!! Just been busy with a lot of things..interviews,travel,exams,roadtrips.Spikes of energetic activities followed by the extended flats of plain laziness.

But, have been working on this new template as suggested by all the readers ( Hope it has increased the readability now)..but i love my former background picture..so i will keep it in this post..in remeberance of the Departed..

PS:- i'll soon be back with newer posts :)!!

Chiriyakhana ( The Zoo) 1967

Chiriyakhana marks the coming together of many greats of Indian Cinema, and when i say Greats, i mean it.
The directorial craftsmanship of Ray, acting excellence of Uttam, storytelling of Saradindu Banerjee and the charecter of Byomkesh Bakshi( the true indian inheritor of sherlock holmes).So, when i started watching it,i expected nothing short of a masterpiece.And what i saw was nothing short of one.
Nothing, it seems, can take away the fire. Ray's eye for detail and the old magic of his genius can't let go of this one too, a tour-de-force. The camera is wielded like a conductor's baton as it strikes chords deep in the mind. For first timers watching Byomkesh,the characterisation is swift and deft and for Byomkesh fans,it takes his fan following to levels of fanatism.Be it the setting of his room, be it the phisophical talks with Ajit( His watson), the setting up of the suspense, Ray shows how a movie made in 1967 was still way ahead of its times, and one sadly feels while watching that no single bollywood director has been able to match up to this kind of filmmaking till now, even in the 2000s when the technology has advanced so much.Ray proves that a story and story alone makes a movie and nothing else!!.
I, in no way fit to review and comment on Ray would take the liberty of marking it as one of Ray's best, but in an interview with Cineaste magazine, Ray described Chiriakhana (The Zoo) as his most unsatisfying film. He said, "Chiriakhana's a whodunit, and whodunits just don't make good films. I prefer the thriller form where you more or less know the villain from the beginning(the format he follwed in Sonar kella and Joi baba felunath years later with one of his greatest muses 'Felu mitter' ). The whodunit always has this ritual concluding scene where the detective goes into a rigmarole of how everything happened, and how he found the clues which led him to the criminal. It's a form that doesn't interest me very much". It's after reading comments like this that you realise that how much of learning is still left in the art of Filmmaking.

Coming to the story, An out an out whodunit which takes place in post independence bengal, in a colony outside calcutta set up by a retired judge,Mr. Sen with misfits, criminals and outcasts.The judge initially comes to Byomkesh with a minor case, that of finding out the origins of a movie song, but the plot thickens when the judge himself is murdered.The sheer number and nature of the suspects involved is huge and complex, but one never feels that Ray fails to do justice to any of the characters, and in a film where he could have easily have lost his grip on the screenplay, he excels.
The story and screenplay is a must study for all the current Bollywood directors who are trying to come up with multiple story movies like saalam-e-ishq or HTPL.
The ideas, the treatment and the dialogues are excellent.The twists and turns leave you spellbound.The murder leads to another one, that of a witness and you see secrets tumbling out of the closets of the colony where each character has a notorious past.With subplots ranging from illicit relationships to failed marraiges, to a doctor with a criminal past and a tollywood startlet who faded into oblivion after a single hit, the complexity of a whodunit does not get thicker than this.
Finally as Byomkesh says, he was able to solve the case as he trusted no one, not even Ajit, but only his pet snake, Basuki.
Acting wise Uttam delivers a knockout performance, straying away from his ritiualistic romantic image.The film is a milestone of Uttam Kumar's film career as he won Bharat Award for this film.Uttam forces one to wonder what would have happened had he played 'Feluda' in the other whodunits by Ray.I know, Soumitra has his own fan following and i am also a huge fan of his and the Feluda movies,but Uttam's potrayal of Byomkesh is bang on and perfect, to say the least.
For the cinephiles, this is a must watch( even with the unapt subtitles) and for the novice, there is nothing like it to spend your sunday afternoon with a cup of tea and hot pakoras at the 'Chiriyakhana'.

Of green cards, H1Bs and onsites

After more than an year of introspection, self realization and complete scanning of my mindspace, and then dissecting my ‘needs’ gingerly on Maslow’s hierarchy and standing at the twilight zone of my MBA where i have to decide on the sector i want to branch into in my placements, here is what i have decided.Read on-
I still vividly remember the look on my project manager’s face when I handed over my resignation at Infy, ‘stay on Lalit, you will be moving to US shortly'.
I gave him a contemptuous look….poor soul doesn’t even realize that I am destined for higher things in life -investment banking, consulting and so on.
Well, after an year, the economy is picking up but unfortunately consulting & investment banking sectors are kinda small and software sector is still big; even Infy and IBM are recruiting massively again…..
"You get monkeys, if you pay peanuts" …..please, please, look closely at my face…do I look like a monkey?
I am here for the holy grail, ‘gyan’!
I am here for learning, the quest to be a complete professional (Comically I realize I still don’t have a ‘Raymond’ suit L ).
So Software it is, and hence my quest for THE Company starts.With more than 8 months to go for my placements i guess i still have time to zero in on my Prey.
The search starts with good old Infy.All my batchmates are at Onsite now.People who had joined in my batch, my client, my IBU, all of themi mean ALL THE PEOPLE i knew seem to be at onsite.People of all kinds, who were great, regarded as 'Fundu' to people whom i remember getting backs in all semesters of engg. are at onsite now.how did i know??
Well one Mr.Orkut Buyukkokten is to be blamed for this.How does one identify a techie cooling hisheels in onsite.Simple.
Follow the folowing steps for a postive match.

Step 1. Go on to his Orkut Profile.The Location will read something like "New Jersey, USA" or "Toronto, Canada". But his Brown skin ( you can call me a racist pig for this, but this aint no Big Brother!!)and a very Indian face flatters to decieve and you realise that this is the same person you knew who belonged to a Bandra, Mumbai or a T.N.Road, Chennai.

Step 2. Next stop is the Album section in Orkut.Believe me it shall be full(12/12) with atleast two snaps taken on snow, two in front of NASA or Eiffel Tower ( depending on which part of the globe you are in) with the person you knew wearing a very trendy western outfit as if he/she was born with it.Dont be decieved by the clothes or the shorter and trendier DCH Hair Cut that you see.The chap knows how big a hole that Hair Cut and that trendy coat made in his/her pocket.Don't you understand..?it was for the photo session you see!!

Step 3. Lets move on to the scraps.Lets see the scraps and my reactions to them embedded in brackets inline. Here you will find exclamations like "Ohh you know it Snowed out here..My God it was unbelievebale" ( yeah it is..unbelieveable!!) or "It's so cool out here, i mean everything is so organised so unlike India"(wait till they organise your Visa expiry, then you will realise how orgainsed they are). Some self appointed patriots will try showing off their psuedo patriotism thinking that they are brand ambassadors of 'India Shining' with scraps like "Whatever you say, India is India, Ohh i miss india so much" ( Dude!! who's stopping you??pack your bags and take the next flight home!!) One more very common scrap is of friends and lesser mortals enquiring "Wahin settle hone ka iraada hai kya, ki wapas aa rahe ho??"(Do i see a blush on the 1/4th NRI's face??Dont worrie dude, he wasn't Born there , as soon as his PM decides that he is done with this Guy he will chop him off, and the next in line will have his VISA stamped!!)

Step 4. Chat with the Guy and you find the Americanisation of his Vocab. 'Petrol' has become 'Gas', he has stopped watching the DDLJs and KANKs and has started watching the Firangee movies. He even asks for the rates in Dollars.Good Lord!!Don't worry Dude, you are not on a green card, it's just a H1B and the day they shove you back you will be paying the Autowalla 20 rupees for the ride back home and not 20 dollars!!

Don't tell me that i am bitching and don't tell me the story of sour grapes.Even i am in the queue.Even i will get my turn at Onsite some day, my'Nirvana', the 'Moksha'..I will get that state of bliss. All great men have been enlightened under one tree or another - Buddha had his bodhi tree, Newton had his apple tree. Unfortunately for me, I will attain nirvana under a Coconut tree.By the way, do they have Coconut Trees in USA?? ;)