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Thought i will post some more telugu songs and also give an introduction to people who are not aware of telugu songs.If you are a IR, spb, chithra or janaki fan you should not miss telugu songs.There are some awesome songs by these greats in telugu.

IR's telugu compositions are very different from tamil.They are jazzy , pacy and more sweeter than tamil, well iam talking only about the GOOD songs.A cheeranjivi dance, Illayaraja music and SPB singing a song was a deadly combination.SPB will sing with all kinds of absurd english and hindi words, i used to think how stupid those songs where, but it is an era that has gone by and that is never going to come back.Now looking back at those compositions, i find them rich in composition, the jazzy tunes and the verstaile SPB showing his prowess duely supported by S janaki,sighhhh those days are not going to come back.In many of those songs you can see heavy use of trumpets, electirc guitars & drums.Even though all modern instrument where used, invariably the song will change into a dappanguthu (folk beat).IR is just amazing in changing the music and feel of the song.

If we come out of those dance numbers there are some beautiful melodies in telugu, the sweetness of the language comes out through these many melodies.I always felt that chithra's voice was more sweeter in telugu than in malayalam or tamil.And off course there are these SPB SJ songs or rather competitions, where both of them will be trying to out perform each other.

Iam putting 4 songs two spb/sj and 2 spb/chithra.All IR compostions are great, i just took two randomly and analysing them.Two enjoy them, have a open mind and dont relate the way a telugu word sounds to tamil or other language words.

Let's start with SP and SJ.Here the song once without reading the explanation and hear it again :).

song:sayankallam
Film:challenge

This is one of my favourite trumpet songs.Follow the different instruments and you can see the greatness of the maestro.

Rythmic drumming (pedals) starts the song.It sets up the rhythm and pace of the song.The regular beats joins .Voice humming take's over (pa paba pa).It sets the feel of the song to come .The voices reach a cresendo and Yes trumpets start.Question of the trumpets are answered by the electric guitar.The trumpets and guitar change to a flat rhythm for the start of the song.

(0:38)SPB takes over with his humming (Hey he he hey), the humming is almost a continuation of the sound made by the trumpets , the trumpets die down and he moves into the song.The trumpets now appear with a different but powerful sound.A basic rhythm is set in the background by congo/drums.The first 2 lines have single words broken up and given lot of stress.Its a powerplay between the trumpets and the voice.Al music stops for a second to welcome the voice change.SJ takes over, she does the same routine.

the first words Sayankalam sagaratheeram are broken up with powerful trumpets finishing it

The single word sayankalam & sagaratheeram is made into
SA YAN KA LAM trumpets, Sa Ga RA THee Ram trumpets

A contagious energy is already generated.

1st interlude starts with keyboards layers of electric guitar and drums are placed on it.Electric guitar takes the lead for while. Oh did we forget trumpets , here they come again. After a brief period of lead by the trumpets the music is again changed. See how the music is slowed down to pave the way for the male voice.The drums are gone the guitar strums a softer rhythm and in the wind section the powerful trumpets are replaced by the softer flute .

1.53 1st para starts with spb singing drum's/congo's accompany, the rhythm is changed now. Trumpets are still following the song at the end of lines.2.12 the male voice ends sj takes over but spb is still humming, ending sj's lines harmonizing the high points of SJ's vocals. Let's do a check on the feel of the song now.The feel is changed, it is more of a Folkish song than the jazzy song it started with. SPB sings the pallavi at the end of the saranam. The song again gets back on track form the folkish feel in the second interlude.

2.38 2nd interlude starts with some powerful base guitar (2.44) followed by two trumpets the weaker one counter pointing the stronger one. Again see the finish, the wind section changes to a softer melody, flute is introduced to slow down the song for the start of second paragraph

This time the voices are reversed Sj starts the song and hums to harmonize SPB's high points, whereas spb starts late and continues. SJ sings the pallavi.

The songs comes to a close with both voices singing the first two broken words repeatedly and trumpets bringing to an abtrupt end.

That's the maestro for you.


Song:Navindhi
film:Abhilasha

There is no way you cannot laugh and frolic with SJ when u hear this song.Spb on a rampage doing all sorts of antics and SJ the heroine happy to get all the attention that she is getting.A classic SPB/SJ song.Oh did we forget the music director.

if you are wondering why SJ is laughing it is because of the lines

Navindi mallechendu - > flower has laughed

The song comes when radhikha expresses her love to chiranjeevi.The hero is extremely happy and as usual a songs flows out of that extreme happiness

This is also a nice composition but I leave it up to you to decipher it.The song has got some intresting violin pieces and xylophone??.

OK... lets move on to SPB/chithra.


Song: Ennadey
film:prema

you would have heard this song in tamil or hindi.But it is best in telugu.The sweetness starts right from the humming. The beautiful violin pieces and SPB, chithra's voice adds to the magic.

Song:Balapampatti
Film:Bopilli raja

I went crazy over this song, when i heard it.I will be frustruating my friends by humming the first line "BP BB ahha ekkey nerthukunta" repeatedly.Later i came to know that whole andhra went crazy over this song.


*This is my effort with the little musical knowledge that i posses.All the big guys dont beat me.Corrections are welcome.

Athai patri nan enna solvathu?,
athai patri sollavatha?, illai
athanal vantha payangallai patri sollavatha?

Athan payangal pala irukindrathu,
Ella muyarchigalayum, vetri pera udhaviyathu
vazhvin ovoru thunbathayum samalikka udhaviyathu
mallai yenna thadangal vantha pothillum
athai asaika udhaviyathu

eppadi pala vishayangalai sollallam
irunthallum athan azhagai patri sollamal irukka mudiyathu
dhidagathramana antha udambin azhagey athu thaney.
yenna yosikirirgal,
ambikayin kanavan nambiyin kai patri than
koorikondirukiraen.


Saw so many people writing poems to narayanan sir's competition.Most of them were serious, thought i will do a light one.This is not for the competition, it is over anyway, this was just for fun.

*Ganesh didn't understand it,before others say anything.let me explain it.I just split the word nambikai as nambi and kai(Nambi's hand).I have described the first 2 para with a common meaning, making the reader understand the poem in terms of Nambikkai and revealing the split word in the last para.ghannu bhai podhumma??

Chameli ki shaadi


Is an usual basu chatterji movie with loads of comedy scene.Charandas (Anil Kapoor) a jobless young guy joins an akhara(wrestling training school)run by Mastram (Om Prakash) and takes the owe of not geting married till 40.He meets Chameli (Amrita Singh) the daughter of a koyla(coal) depot owner, Kalloo mal(Pankaj Kapoor).As usual chameli's parents oppose their marriage and anil succeds with the help of a lawyer friend(Amjad khan).The efforts that they take to get this marriage done is all the movie is about.



Anil Kapoor through out the movie walks as if he has the a 8inch wings and biceps of arnold swaznegger.Amjad khan plays the role effortlessly.Young pankaj kapoor comes as an old man.Chameli's friend(Rupini),Kallo mal's wife(Bharati Acharekar) and her uncle Chadmi(Anu Kapoor) are some other charcters which add more color and comedy to the story.



A descent mild comedy.

Apne paraye



Utpal dutt , Harish(girish karnad) are brothers.Chandranath(Amol palekhar) is there cousin brother.Chandranath is a looser who wastes his time in music.His repeated efforts to start various buisness ends in failures.Shabna azmi his wife even though younger than utpal dutts wife(Ashalatha), is the one who takes care of all the house hold responsibilites. Enter Harish , his wife(Bharati Acharekar) and his son.They relocate from poona to calcutta to their brothers house.Problems arises between girish karnad's wife and shabna azmi.amol and shabna leave the house and go to village.Problems follows them there too.How they overcome those problems and get back to the old house is the rest of the story.

A visu type family story which lacks the usual basu chatterji touch.But again a clean movie with realistic characters.Good acting by shabna azmi and utpal dutt.Utpal dutt is a busy lawyer who is clueless on what is happening in the family and is hilarious in many scenes.

The movie didn't intrest me much , besides the 2 kjj songs.


Shyam Rang Rangarey is an awesome number which has two music changes where the sangathi's totally change.The other number was Gao mera Maan.

Clean family drama.


Gudgudee



This movie is a hindi version of 7 year itch.It's the story of Ajay Singh(anupam kher).Ajay singh is a dreamy person lost in his own world of dreams.He comes to bombay to attend a wedding alone.He stays in a flat arranged by his friend.He meets Chandni(Pratibha Sinha), an aspiring actress who stays int he same flat.she frequents his apt to escape from the heat,as his apt has Air condition and her's doesn't.Ajay starts creating his own imaginary world and thoughts that the girl is frequenting his house to seduce him etc.After a few confusions all ends well.

The movie was bad in many levels.The movie stands just by anupam's acting skills.other than that the local marlyn manroe pratibha sinha does a decent job.

A movie that you will forget even before it ends.

Guys, How about doing a East coast bloggers meet?.What do u all think?.If yes do throw in your inputs on venue, date, activities etc.My suggestion Aug 21st New york, can participate in the indpendence day parade and probably watch Amir khan's Raising and have a overload of patriotism :).

Today's audio blog is songs for my previous post Kshana kshanam
Here is both the telugu and tamil verison of the song.The audio quality of the telugu version is lot better than the tamil version.

Listen how the song starts with the sounds of nature and slowly goes on to a comforting lullaby type song.The heroine who is afraid at the start slowly catches the melody and joins the hero.


Telugu version
Jammu rathiri




Tamil version
Thanimai rathiri

*** Check out the beautiful voice of JO chetta here .

I thought i will fully utilise the trial period of my audio blogger.So here are some songs.This time it is the songs of one of the under rated singers of tamil film music, Arun mozhi.Arun mozhi has sung some nice songs for Illayaraja.He is actually a flutist in IR's orchestra.He started singing one or two songs, got noticed mainly for his songs in kamal's surasamharam.He was singing on and off for one are two songs every year.Later during a time period he used to regularly sing for actor Parthiban.

He is one of the few singers with good diction in tamil film music.He sings those mid range breezy songs, which are not flashy but slowly grows in you.Feel light, enjoy this simple and velvetty voice.






song:odai kuil oru
film:thalattu paadavaa
Think this is probabaly the first IR/Parthiban?arunmozhi combination movie.This movie has some more nice songs from arun.The song at places gives you the feel of the telugu song "Om namo namo" from surya IPS




Film:pondatti thevai
Song:aararo pattu pada
I love this song a beautiful combination of voices.chithra and arun.Chithra mesmarises with the starting humming.The song is sung by aswini who is parthiban's lover in this movie.She comforts parthiban who is sentimental about his mother.The beautiful voice of chithra is broken by arunmozhi, the voice does not start at the end of a line.It kind of starts in the middle and takes over the whole stanza.





song:unnai
film:kavithai padum alaigal

one of his oldest song, this was a movie taken by pachaiyappas students.Acted by obsure peoples.The movie has some beautiful songs by IR.I still remember the posters, the posters wont have anything other than the image of IR :).





song:punnai vana poonguiley
film:sevvanthi

Another obscure movie which has nothign important than 2 beautiful songs by IR.The other song is "Semmenney semmeney" by jayachandran.




song:vaasa karuvepillaey




song:muthamma
film:thanthuvittaen ennai




song:manasukulla

Thought i will also experiment with the audio blog.So here are some audio's related to todays post (Ankahee).




Song:kana kanum kangal rendu
film:agni satchi
singer:the awesome spb
music :MSV

I think everybody would have seen this song.The fears of saritha are visualized as a dancer dancing to some great music.For those who havn't seen it.It is is a comforting song, the husband comforts his wife who is someone having similar pshycological problems like Deepthi naval in aankahee.kumari uruvam, kuzhandhai vadivam (spb smile :)).... lines fits both the characters of aankahee and agni satchi.


Song:Thorathil
film:nizhalgal
singer:S.Janaki
music :IR

A simple song with beautiful music by IR.Kind of a meera bhajan.The telugu version of this song won s.janki the national award in 1984.








Song:Raghuvar
film:Aankahee
singer:pt.Bhimsen Joshi
music :Jaidev

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An intresting story that talks about the people who blindly believe astrology. Shreeram Lagoo is a famous astrologer whose prediction always come true.The movie starts with him predicting that his son nandhu's(Amol Palekhar) friend's(vidhu vinod chopra ??) wife will die in the pregnacy.And his words come true.Nandhu is in love with sushma.when he decide to get married .His father predicts that nandhu's first wife will die in 11 months after the marriage, during her pregnancy.Nandhu who beleives his fathers astrological predicitons beleivs that.During that time astrologer's friend comes and stays with his daughter indhu(Deepti naval)at nandhu's house daughter come and stay in there house.Indu is an immature person with some pshycological problems.Nandhu who does not wants to loose sushma decides to marry indu so that he can remarry sushma when indhu dies as predicted by his father.The marriage happens and as usual the husband falls in love with his wife.And the time of pregnancy comes.what happens is the climax.
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The movie is great for the first half and then it starts to sag and slows down a bit and ends with a nice climax.

Deepti naval plays a beautiful role.She is a young girl in a woman's body.She is mentally not matured.She is filled with emotions.Like bubbles in a boiling water, various types of emotions comes out of her only to disappear in a few seconds and reappear as a different one.Again it is not done in the usual masala type way with exaggerated emotions etc.Things are shown subtly.This is a character that a performance inclined actress would die for.Deepthi Navel does a nice job with it, wish she could have done better but definetly a good performance.Her innocent smile makes her a best fit for the naive village girl role.



Sriram lagoo has done a nice job in the job.He is the future predicting astologer.Amol is average in the movie and seemed to have saved some money on the production cost by not putting make up.

I dont know whether this movie took the inspiration for the deepthi naval character from K.Balachander's "Agni Sakshi".The lead characters in both the movie are kind of similar.The pshycologist like agni sakshi likes his patient and advices that she would be alright as time progresses.The kaana kaum song in agni satchi fits this character also appropriately.

After the movie was over.I listened to the songs again and again.This movie has some awesome songs.most of the songs are bhajans.

1)Kauno thagwa nagariya lutal ho - Asha
2)Mujkho bhi radha - Asha
3)Thumaka Thumaka Paga - Bheem sen joshi
4)Raghuvar thujh ko - Bheem sen joshi

The first 2 songs where by asha, i liked them a lot.Then came a song by Pandit Bhim sen joshi.With the first 2 lines i understood what it means to be a Pandit.The song was delivered with authority and style.

The second song."Mujhko bhi radha banaley" comes twice.one is when indhu is still that bubbling young girl and the next time after their marriage is consumated.
The song uses the same 3 instruments tabla,flute,sitar for both the version.But both the verions are done so wonderfully that they reflect indhu's maturity from a child to women.The first version is with so many swara chages and pacy, the songs flows like a river depicting the numerous emotions that she has and the second one is slow and sustained.That song explained why the movie got jaidev the best music director national award in 1984

Bheem sen joshi also sings 2 songs."Thumaka Thumaka Paga" comes during nandhu's marriage.This song was badly edited.The idea must ahve been that when the function is happening and a particular emotion is freezed for a second.Rather than putting a still shot, people act as if they are freezing while the camera is running.It was funny.

The movie got the national awards in 1984 for

Best Music Director : Jaidev

Best Male Playback Singer : PT. Bhimsen Joshi

Unfortunately asha didn't get the national award that year.The national award that year went to S.Janaki for "Vennello Godari Andham" from the movie Sithara.An awesome song.It is the telugu version of "Dhoorathil nan kanda un mugam" from nizhalgal.If you are scratching your head when this song comes in nizhalgal.It was in the tape but didn't make it to the movie.

The second heroine sushma is the biggest comedian in the movie.It beats me why she was casted in the movie.She is not good looking, pathetic in acting and looks like someone gave dubbing voice for her.probably she was the producers daughter or something.But Amol has cleverly got around this PROBLEM.When ever there is a case where she has act.he will make her turn and show her back to the camera or keep intresting camera angles so that she doesn't have to emote in front of the camera.It was comical.







A simple and different story with great music.

A nice, clean & different movie.The comedy in this movie is very unique, you dont know whether to laugh or feel sad for a situation. The story of an ageing parent and his children’s have been told in so many movies. But this one is something different form all the others that i have seen.It is a mild comedy, which arises out of the realistic situations, you as a viewer can see the comedy of a serious scene played by the characters. People who know hindi can enjoy it better as comedy get's lost in the translated subtitles lot of time.

The story is based on chandra kishore jaiswal's novel "GAWAH GHAIR HAZIR".

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The movie is the story of kishunshah(pankaj kapoor),who after dividing his properties decides to stay with his youngest son Ramsharan (Raghuveer yadav).Ramsharan wants to take care of his dad well.He tells his wife(Reema Lagoo) to provide him with all that he needs.As time goes by kishunshah starts complaining like the other old men and starts making mountains out of mole hills.Things get out of hand and one day ramsharan manhandles his father.Kishunshah decides to snap all his relationship with the family and spend rest of his life in a temple.The rest is climax.
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The movie does not deal the subject with all the sadness.It deals it with humour and pin points the misunderstandings and mistakes of the older people.kishunshah's helping hand are his grandsons nunulal, chunma, munma.Mainly chunma, the kid who played that role was sweet.The scenes between him and his grandfather are funny.



Similarly the scenes involving kishunshah's and his daughter in law are also good.
The movie does not go on the route of greedy,uncaring son and duaghter in law.It tells the story realistic with lot of comedy.



Pankaj kapoor is awesome in the movie.I can't imagine anybody else doing this role like him.He has done the role to perfection, good supporting roles by raghuveer yadav and rema lagoo.The movie is Directed by subash agarwal and produced by NDFC.

This book could easily be made into a sitcom running for 3 years.It has all the content for it.But jhumpa didn't wanted to make this into a sentimental tear jerker and has given a distant view of the breezy ABCD story.

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It is the story of Gogol Ganguly a ABCD.His father, Ashok ganguly who escapes a near death experience because of a book(The overcoat by the russian author Nikolai Vasilevich Gogol)names him gogol.Gogol detests his name and get's it changed.As a child he does not have any feeling towards why his father kept that name .The book ends with him, trying to understand his fathers feelings. The book spans over 30 years, starting with Ashok's accident, his immigration to US, till Ashok's death.
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I liked the way jhumpa gave enough space for all the characters, all the characters are well developed and surprisingly like many ABCD stories/movies it did not portrait the first generation immigrants in bad light.The book just explains every character as it is.The central character keep changing in the book.It starts with Aashima(ashok's wife), then ashok, then gogol and his wife maoushmi.Giving a complete picture about all the characters.

The great thing about the book is jhumpa lahiri's observation and writing skills.She puts even the minute of details beautifully.The writing is simple and sincere.

The book is being made into a movie by Mira Nair.checkout this blog.Iam sure mira nair will fully exploit the numerous sentimental situations which jhumpa didn't utilise and kind of make it into a movie with lot of emotional and sentimental scenes that can reach american audience.

Yet another ABCD story which brushes aside the common ABCD issues and stops short on sentimental scenes.A simple and straight forward book with a feminine sensitivity.

Links
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4080946.stm

She really didn't want to go to the dinner today. Now at this age, she has to dress up and do this routine. She is now in her late 60's.Old and tired after a life spent caring for others. But unfortunately the rest that she seeks eludes her.

She hails from a remote Indian village. A village which has got nothing significant to boast about other than the fact that she was born there. She was a typical village girl, when she got married to her well educated husband. She changed and adapted a bit for her husband. But even now, she is still a villager at heart. Most of her life she was yet another indian housewife, whose entire world was her family & relatives.

But that has all changed now. Now her husband has become an important person and she has to face problems that are outside her house. Her husband’s knowledge, hard work and luck have made him rise up in life. She is very happy about that. But with that raise comes lot of inconvenience for her, which she is not happy about. Like today’s party which is thrown by a powerful foreigner for her husband.

Nowadays everyone expects her to accompany her high profile husband. She is supposed to go with him to all the parties and dinners thrown to her husband. Even though her status has changed in the society, she is still a woman from the village and she detests dressing up and going to parties and meeting the rich and famous people.For her all those people seemed very diplomatic and so distant from her.Because of her background she was not that comfortable mingling with them.

Current affairs, politics, film, arts, money, music,lifestyle etc where not her subjects of liking. So there wasn't much for her to talk with them. She does not drink or not found of the western dishes. so the parties where not of much interests to her taste buds either. Her interests was her house, her village, her relatives,her family and her god. But topics related to her knowledge never pops up in those meetings. But she bears with all of these for her husband.

In those parties, she feels lonely amongst the crowd, she stands there like an oasis in a desert.Many a times lost in her thought,lost in a different time period of her life.A time period when her husband used to work in a local college. Those where her golden days, the days when her husband used to have lot of free time. But gone are those days when her husband was a nobody. Gone are those days when she used to wait for her husband to return from work every evening. The days when her husband had time to play with their daughters, had time to relish her cooking,had time to take her and their daughters to picnics and cinemas. Those days of family fun is over for her now.

Today is an important day. At the dinner the foreigner and her husband are going to discuss some major deals. She reluctantly dresses up and goes with her husband.

The foreigner's house was big and palatial. It was painted in all white and surrounded by a beautiful garden. The meeting started, the two men were busy talking some serious things. She on the other hand was not talking much. she had to give company to that foreigner's wife.

The foreigner’s wife was a well dressed, she was little younger than her. She had lots of makeup and was very confident. She on the other hand was at her usual self with minimal makeup and withdrawn. They both had trouble communicating and needed a translator. The foreigner’s wife started asking the usual aristocratic questions like, how was her trip to their place? and complements like her ethnic dress was beautiful etc. She had to answer those questions and answer them with a similar aristocracy. She had to be very careful when she talks. She cannot talk her usual village way of openly commenting and making fun of others. she has to be diplomatic and think twice before she talks, so that it wont put her husband to shame.

At times she felt like an animal put into a cage with another animal with which it was not comfortable. There were times when she didn't know what to speak, there where brief moments of silence which was usually broken by the foreign lady with very generic questions. She answered those questions in one or two words and there was silence again. The foreign lady seemed to be more uncomfortable with the silence than her.

She wanted to ask so many questions. why does everyone expect wife's to accompany their husband to these diplomatic dinners and meetings?. what if the wife is not interested in attending?. why do people take that as a disrespect?. The men have an agenda, but the women don't have any. what are two culturally very different women supposed to talk?. There only job seems to be to stand beside their husbands and smile for photographs. The whole thing seemed pointless to her. But as usual she was bearing it all for her husband.

At last came her favourite part of the meeting.The time to go home.She was very glad when the meeting between the men ended.After the usual goodbyes they parted.Before they where about to leave the white house. They had to sign the visitor's guide. She signed her name and her husband signed his as Manmohan.


* Disclaimer
This is entirely my imagination. A piece of news/pic triggered a question. The question made me create a character around the person i saw in the photograph and the result was this story.

Lot of people didn't understand my last story.So here is another one.This one should be easy i guess.

some intresting posts that i came across.

ghannu bhai has uploaded a song composed and sung by himself.check it out here

uma has a short post on santhosh sivan's NAVARASA (Nine Emotions) the national award winner of 2004's best tamil film.

keerthi the only guy who competes with me in uploading photos, has some intesting flood pics here and here

reva is discussing an intresting topic on education

Sandeep sawant's shwaas was the official indian entry for oscars last year.And it was judged the Best feature film at the national awards.A low budget marathi movie which created lot of stir. It was the marathi movie to win a swarna kamal after 50 yrs.

---- story----

It tells the story of a small boy Parashuram and his grandfather Parule.Parashuram and his grandfather who come to the city from their home town konkan to get treatment for the kids eye problem. The doctor tells that Parashuram has eye cancer and that his eyes have to be removed. Parule refuses to acknowledge the fact first, rest of the movie is how parule and parashuram acknowledge and accept the reality.

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There are 4 main characters in the movie.The grand father parule(Arun Nalavade),the kid Parashuram(Ashwin Chitale), Dr shane(Sandeep Kulkarni) and Asawari(Amruta Subhash, a pretty woman) as a medical social worker.

The movie is realistic at lot of places. Mainly when depicting the plight of how people from village have to deal with the hospital bueracracy. How the illiterates don’t have any help at these big hospitals.CT-SCAN's and declarations forms are all alien to them and for a hospital worker, that villager is one of the thousands of people he deals everyday.I wish there were seperate sections in the big hospitals to help people regarding the medical procedures.Asawari comes as a medical social worker who helps the patient but iam not sure how many people like that really exist.



Good acting by everyone. Especially the kid Ashwin Chitale.He has given a wonderful performance. He has that mischievous and expressive eyes, which are always curious to see the beauty of the world.How can someone go and tell that kid that he wont be able to see the world and that he has to accept it.He won the national award for best child artist in 2003.

Sandeep sawant, courtesy hindu

Sandeep sawanth has done a good job.But there are lot of holes in the movie and he has to improve alot.parashuram and his grand dad are from konkan and the director has captured some wonderful scenery of konkan.Interestingly a serious of konkan scenes showing varying mischiefs of the boy, which are generally shown with songs,is told with just background music.Not sure whether it was intentional or because of lack of funds to make the songs. There is a shot where the boy runs around in the beach shooing hundreds of sea gulls.Blue sea,light yellow sands, whitish gulls and a small boy with a wonderful smile, a beautiful shot.When seeing all those scenes the audience can relate what the boy is going to miss later.

The movie does not do a good vs bad theme.It shows everybody's point of view and we are made to understand both the doctor and patient's perspective nicely.The movie which is told without any big cinematics gets a little bit sentimental and cinematic at the end.The narration is plain and simple and all the characters were good.At times i kind of had a feeling that iam watching a K.Vishwanath Movie.

The music was not that great.Most of the BGM's were total lift offs from various albums and movies.

Marathi movie industry which has to fight with the big brother bollywood, was very proud of this movie.And lot of people where rooting for oscars.Shwaas production cost was an meagre 60 lakhs.The oscar promotion needed lot of money and there were money collection drives for promoting this movie at the oscars.

HUNDREDS of Indian devotees have been donating money to a temple charity over the past three weeks to raise funds for a low-budget movie`s Oscar publicity campaign in the US, one of the producers said.It is part of a nationwide drive to collect about Rs15m (174,888/$334,000) - more than twice what it cost to make the film - which the producers say they need to promote India`s entry for an Oscar nomination before the shortlist is announced in January. more

I think lot of marathi people got carried away on the fact that this marathi movie which won a swarna kamal for there state after 50 yrs will make them proud at the oscars also. But shwaas was a plain movie and was far away to compete against movies like "The sea inside" and "yesterday".So it didn't make it to the final 5.

The movie could have been made as a tear jerker or into an all sensitive and soul stirring movie or a very realistic movie. But shwaas fails on all front and has ended up as a mixture of all.None the less a decent movie worth watching once.

A realistic, plain and sweet movie.

links
Official website

Shwaas triggers a renaissance

Raghu was reading biology.Yeah biology, raghu wants to become a doctor one day.He has been hard working for that.At that moment he was reading how the chromosomes determine the sex of a child.XX makes a girl and XY makes a boy.He was by hearting the lines "XX is girl , XY is boy", "XX is girl, XY is boy","XX is girl, XY is boy"..... on and on and on.Now and then he looked at the goddess saraswathi photo that was hanging in the wall.Brought his hand to the mouth making a praying gesture. The gesture was to please goddess saraswathi, so that he can get good marks in biology exam this time.He has been studying from 4.30 am.He was feeling sleepy.Before he could realize he had his head on the table and was sleeping.

Goddess saraswathi, who was hearing raghu's prayer in the heaven. Granted raghu his wishes.Raghu was going to get 99% this time.He will get 20/20 for answering the sex determining chromosomes question.Godess saraswathi was getting ready to take rest.when she heard some sound.That was brahma.He just returned after finishing his days work(creating his qouta of living things for the day).Later when they were together in the night,saraswati whispered in brahma's ears.I want a Boy this time(Yeah boys are prefered in heaven too).For that brahma said "hmmm that means XY chromosmes not XX chromoses...." At that same moment Raghu woke up hearing his mom coughing in the next room.

He looked up at the saraswathi picture, the goddess was all smiles and was looking at him wih grace.It took a while for him to realize that the whole brahma episode was a dream.He started thinking about the dream and was little confused.There was something wrong between chromosomes and brahma, but he didn't know what it was.And offcourse his parents will be mad at him if he raised these sort of question.First of all they dont know what a chromosome is, but they will be mad at him for thinking wrong about the gods.He didn't wanted to torture his little mind with these questions.He started reading "XX is girl XY is boy","XX is girl XY is boy".

Raghu's mom who was sick that day asked him to accompany her to the hospital.Raghu who has been reading all day, also wanted to take a break.He obliged and took her to the hospital.It was a big hospital that was part of a medical college.Raghu's mom sat at the visitor section of her regular doctor. Behind that room was some surgeon's room.

The red saree woman sitting next to raghu's mom seemed tired and sad.she started talking with his mom and the conversation which started as simple enquiries & replies form his mom became one sided as the red saree woman started telling her problems.Her husband seemed to be having some strange health issues and his complex surgeory got completed a little while before.She was sitting there to meet the surgeon and ask about the condition of her husband.

The surgeon appeared from his room, the red saree women rushed to him and asked him about her husband's conditions. Rather than the usual "Everything is alright and he will be fine", He said "He is still in critical condition.What is in our hands?.Everything is his play" and pointed his finger at the sky.He said "We have done out best,Let's see what happens.You people pray to the god, he is there" and left the place.The red saree woman sat there and cried , later when she stood up and was ready to leave the place.Raghu's mother asked with concern where she is going at this time.She said, She is going to pay the remaining money for the operation and then she is going to make a visit to Mangadu and pray the meenakshi amman to save her husband's life.

For Raghu the doctor showing his fingure to the sky and the women decision to "pay and pray" confused him again.Some thoughts started popping up."If HE is there, why did the doctor do the operation?.Wasn't the surgeons hands supposed to save the patient??".He was about to ask those questions to his mom.But decided not to.As usual he kept scilent.

Well this was a decade ago.You what to know what happened to our raghu right??.Let's say his prayers where answered.He became a famous surgeon.He is well settled now.He has his own hospital and all.You wanna meet him??.Cmon Let's go.Let's meet him in his hospital.

Here we are at the hospital.Wow did u see his office reception area, well furnished, art works everywhere.Oh he even got his own secreatry.What is that above the door to his room??.It is a big framed goddess saraswathi picture with costly sandalwood garland and all.He is loyal, he didn't forget the one who answered his prayers,see he is a great guy.There he is.He is coming out with someone.He is saying something to those peoples.Let me listen to what he is saying.Ohhhh,this is what he said."What is in our hands, everything is his play", fingers pointing to the sky.

Lot of people have taken up writting short stories on the net.My favourite so far has been ramki.But many stories by others gave me the confidence.My Inner me told "Dude even you can write man....".So i decided to write, but didn't wanted to write the usual sentimental love stories.I was kind of not finding anythign to write about.Recently started reading 'pudhumaipithan's' short story collection.Suddenly my mind got freed and i was thinking about so many stories.I wrote a few, but didn't dare to publish it.

Here is the first one.Get the brickbats ready.Shower it on me.

Best Actor Saif Ali khan, Best Film Page 3 , Wholesome entertainment Veer Zara.Are you ##$%@ kidding me.Clearly the awards are not awarded fairly.India's perinial problem politics is slowly creaping into the national awards also.

Sharmila Tagore, a sweet mom and the Chairman of Censor Board of India has just bought a new toy to her son.The National award for the best actor.I first dont understand how an actor like saif was even considered for the awards.How did they let him be a contendar for the award first?.The pathetic thing is that the next in line was shah rukh khan.

"According to inside information, Sudhir Mishra, head of the jury, was very keen on Shah Rukh Khan getting the award. However, the other members voted him down, arguing that "Swades" was pretentious and too obvious".Sudhir mishra proudly goes around saying that he voted for shah rukh khan.Dude the award was for best actor, for that persons ACTING in the movie, not for the message and story that the movie carries.Have we gone down so low that shah rukh khan and saif ali khan have to contend for the top spot.Sudhir mishra should taken responsiobility for this fiasco, rather than going around praising saif's acting.

Chairman of the Jury for Feature Films, Sudhir Mishra defended the choice of Saif, saying, 'Shahrukh in Swades was not a bad performance. There were other performances also which were good. But here is an actor who is approaching a role in a different way.more'

Being the head of the jury,he should have seen to that the award goes to the right people.Last year the jury was headed by basu chaterjee and the best actor went to vikram and best actress to Meera jasmine for her role in "padam onnu:oru villappam",direction went to gautam gosh and the best film to the sweet marathi movie Shwaas.

Basu chatterji with the jury

Apart from sharmila tagore, the yash chopra's gang has also been responsible for the award coming to saif.Hum Tum was there films.Yash chopra was awarded an undeserving dada saheb phalke in 2001, he got a phalke award even before mrinal sen got it.

Page 3:
Madhur Bhandarkar himself is surprised that this movie has won a national award.And is trying to guess why he was awarded the swarna kamal.

"The film has surprised me and everyone else. I think the National award jury must have liked the fact that the film tackles several socially relevant issues all at once. I feel a film that has a positive message for the audience always has a better chance at the National awards.more"

Madhur bhandarkar's page 3's selling point is the same thing that he is supposedly talking against.People saw the movie as they read the page3 of any newspaper and after 2 hours 10 minutes of entertainment for 20 mins he moves to the page1(real news).I consider madhur as another person who gets inspired from parallel movies to make semi commercial movies.Chandhini bar has its core story from dharmaraj's chakra, and this movie page 3 is nothing but a commercial version of govind nihlani's "PARTY".There is the four times best film winner girish kasaravalli's(the only person right now who can break sathyajit ray's record of 6 movies) movie, there is a budda deb das gupta's movie on the fray and the award is given to page 3 :(.

Veer Zara:
Again the Chopra gang.First of all, why award it for 2 movies in the category.Either it should be for autograph or veer zara.Why put both of them?.Why stop with 2, they could have awarded it to 20 movies.

Similarly vidhyasagar.Just because he scored for a K.Vishwananth movie, he gets an award.Every year the kerela film industry produces atleast 4 movies with better classical music than swarnabhishekam and they dont see it.What's up with Best Lyrics for Pa.Vijay.Very average lyrics, looks like he just tagged along with the other awards of autograph.

Its nice that autograph got some awards best entertainer and best singer.And it was nice of the jury to recognise J philip.
"Also highly-appreciated was the Special Jury Award to J Phillip ‘Kutty’ for his performance in the Tamil film Dancer, with the jury applauding him for his 'incredible acting and dance performance despite being a physically-challenged person'".

The Congress MP Rajeev Shukla has written to the I&B ministry, questioning the integrity of jury for National Film Awards.

"Following from what seems like haphazard criteria for the selection of the jury, including its Chairman, the selection of award winners becomes even indiscriminate and the jury appears to pick and choose winners based on personal choices or even vested interests of the jury members. more"

Well this is not the first time these kind of things are happening.When i was writing the review on umrao jaan and 36 chowingree lane i thought jeniffer kendall was not awarded the best actress that year because the movie was in english.But found out that there was politics in that also.see below

1. At the 2000 National Awards, at least two of the 129 films — Daman and Pukar — which were unanimously rejected by the 17-member jury, went on to win major awards. While Raveena Tandon got the Best Actress Award, Anil Kapoor was adjudged Best Actor. Both films had not even been fully screened for the jury.

2. Claiming that Raveena Tandon had campaigned for BJP during the last elections and her uncle Macmohan was on the jury, director Pradeep Krishan and two others (cinematographer Shashi Anand and Odissi dancer Madhumita Raut) quit the jury.

3. A year before the Raveena-Anil imbroglio, there was an uproar from Calcutta over Kirron Kher winning the Best Actress Award for Bariwali, in spite of her dialogues being dubbed by a Bengali actress — a fact that was not mentioned in the entry form.

4. The first big rumble on the National Awards front was when Rekha won the Best Actress Award for Umrao Jaan over Jennifer Kapoor’s far superior performance in 36 Chowringhee Lane. Many were shocked again when Amitabh Bachchan won the Best Actor Award for Agneepath, by no means his best performance.

Anil kapoor won it for pukar, but nothing changed for him after that, he is still a nobody.There is a difference when undeserving people win it

Raveena & Anil
Yash Chopra

and when the deserving people win it.The joy is immense when the right talent is recognized and awarded the nation's prestigious award.Hope the iformation and broadcast ministry will look into the the letter of Rajeev Shukla and fix this big hole in the jury system.
Vikram,Mrinal Sen & Meera

Links
Mom serves Saif honour on platter

Why is caste a taboo topic??.From my experiences, lot of people tend to push this topic under the carpet rather than deal with it.why is it?.Is it because this is a sensitive issue which might hurt someone feeling.Or is it cause the caste fanatics have succeded in installing a fear in our mind.

From what i know, from the many people i talked, most of the them seem to agree that it is primitive and outdated.But we all seem not to discuss about it.I know that in the real world, some political parties have been using violence as a means to stop anyone opposing the views of their leaders.These kind of fanatism is directly and indirectly affecting the flow of free thoughts and fair discussions.But atleast these things shouldn't affect us having a civilised discussion on the internet.

How can we say that we are not for caste system and we dont like it,if we are not even ready to freely talk about it?.Shouldn't we be discussing it more,without any inhibitions if we were are out of them??.I think we should discuss it.Discuss it more, discuss it within the limits of civility and discuss it to arrive at solutions.

Do we still need the caste system?
If yes why?
If not.what should be do to make society without a caste system?

Iam doing this post according to the resolution 101.45.67.23:8080 passed at the DC Desi bloggers meet.For those who don't know, it is "If some one scratch's thy back, you scratch his".

Robbie did a post on the DC Desi bloggers.Off all the bloggers who were mentioned by Robbie, one person was left out.It was none other than himself.Thought i will write about ROBBIE.Iam gonna do it in my ishhtyle.

His Real Name:
He wants to be anonymous,so iam not going to reveal that.I would just like to say that his name is a big irony to his left leaning, agnostic??athestic beleifs.When i first heard the name i thought this guy should be one BIG Fruit, surprisingly he turned out otherwise.

The straight shooter:
Robbie never minces word.we once asked arvind to sing a song.I wont say arvind as a bad singer, i would say he is the someone who has all the potential to become a good singer, someone who has to improve a little(a very relative term) bit,someone who is in the lower rungs of the ladder to become a great singer, guess you would have understood it by now.After arvind sang, ganesh was like yeah yeah it was ok. For me it was a fight between being true and hurting others sentiment, atlast the seond option won and i was also like yeah yeah it was good.But robbie not only outrightly told him it was bad, he started pulling his legs from the next time onwards.Cruel robbie killed a budding singer.

(Dr).Robbie:
Doesn't it rhyme with Dolittle??.Noo he is not a vetenary doctor or the other Big Ape doctor.He is doing his Phd.Ahemmm... Phd in some cell #@$!!*&.I was at his house,First the idea was to stay at his place and have dinner. I had some chocolates and was feeling thirsty.I asked him some water, i was casually commenting that today its sultry and iam feeling very thirsty.He started saying that it is because of the chocolate i had.He said something like, the chocolates takes the oxicacid from the cells and so the cells need blah blah and after that it was all %^&*$$$$ ))(&*&^%$$####$%%%^ for me. The Dr explained me the science of my thirst.i thought to myself, Hmmm i just asked him a simple glass of water.I decided not to have dinner at his place.

Action Hero, fan of universal Hero:
Me, robbie and ganesh were talking about some topic, think it was poor people or caste sytem in india.Robbie started saying that how the current system is not allowing the downtrodden to come up etc.Well i thought it is just another tea shop talk.He then told about his personal experiences about how the servant maid & her family who work at his grand parents place will remain the same even for the next few generation.He said he thought that the class structure that is in place now is a reason for it and he threw away his sacred thread to come out of such a structure.I looked at him with admiration.ON these kind of issues not many people put what they think, into action. He is one of those very few action heroes .Maybe iam judging him soon, maybe he was trying to follow his favourite hero,the universal hero :), the one & only oscar probable from india(sarcastic smile :)) Kamala hassan(yeah he is a step away from being termed a kamal fanatic).

well what else can i say about him. Actually, i already overshoot what i was paid for by 200 words.so THE END.

PS:Robbie dont forget to send the money to my address.

Atlast it happened.Last saturday we met at the SSV temple here.First thing first, I went straight to the canteen.I thought i will finish some snack before any of the other guys arrive.But mukund, ganesh and robbie were already there in the canteen.

I took bisi bela bath and sat with the guys.Then arvind,eashwar,shiva and raman joined us.i found shiva's face familiar, but he said he havn't seen me before and i left it there.Later while talking, i came to know that he also studied in anna university , same department & same year but different streams. Images of him standing before the department and lab all came back to me. Thought to myself, such a small world :)

The meeting was a laugh riot.As usual gannu bhai was the scape goat.It started with ganesh, and predominantly the target was set on him.now and then it changed to me, arvind & robbie .But majority of the attacks were on ganesh, who as usual took them with his innocent smile.such a great sport he is.

We discused different topics, one topic i would like to share is the one of blogging and COMMENTS.We were discussing the ways to increase the comments in our blogs.some of the ideas that we thought would increas the comments

1)Do a post on rajini/kamal

2)If you want more posts that technique no 1).Do a post on rajini and go to the comment section and leave a anonymous post saying something bad about rajini.

3)We thought the best thing would be to switch over to a different blogger where its template for every post will have a default 15 comments.The 15 comments will be general comments like "hi good post","excellent post","Keep it up" etc.The first comment would be the 16th and the default number should be customizable, some members where talking about keeping 50 default comments :).

4)The ganesh formula. write a blog.you yourself go and leave multiple anonymous comments and people will argue over it.someone said that those multiple comments should take different sides.Say one like rajini is great and the other like kamal is great and rajini is not,after those 2 anonymous comments take rest and see the show,the fight will be taken care by the rest of the bloggers who visit the blog.Another sophesticated version was told by raman,who said that every blogger should become a anniyan in this case, he should become someone with a Multiple personality disorder and leave comments thinking himself as ambi,remo,anniyan etc.

some lighter moments followed those topics.

1)we were talking about some one's blog, think it was eashwar's.And

eashwar said, he started writing last year itself and then he stopped blogging for six month

some one asked, "Why didn't you blog for 6 months?".

Robbie quipped, "He was waiting for the first comment".

2)Robbie talking about the pain of waiting for the comments, narrated his own experience with the first comments.He once did a big post and was eagerly waiting for the comments.Nothing was comming,the comments was still showing '0'.After a while he saw one comment, he was so happy, he went and eagerly checked the comment.The commentor was none other than Ghannu bhai .Who in his usual style has left a message on the comment section.Which was something like "I have updated my blog, take a look and write your comments".Here, our poor robbie is eagerly waiting for comments on his well thought/well written post.But the first comment that he receives after a long time was one of another blogger, who first of all didn't comment anything substantial on his well written post and above that he is asking him to comment at his blog :).

We even coined a new meaning for the word pachaippas, "which is to do the damage first and then do the damage control".Here is how it came into existence.Ghannu bhai talking about colleges said "Actually pachaiappas used to be a rowdy college, now it is ok".Then he turned to me and asked."Senthil Did you study in pachaiappas?".Well Ghannu bhai asked that question with his usual innocence.But all the guys started laughing, just after finishing the sentence that it is a bad college, he asked me whether i studied there.Then he started doing his fire fighting with sentences like "What i meant was...","I didn't mean to say.." etc etc.But i was fumming like kaundamani in karagatakkaran."Enna pathu eppadra antha kelvi kekkallam?"

Well that was not the only time. Ghannu bhai did pachaiyappas style damages a few more times and some others also did it.So when ever someone does that , we will say why are u doing a pachaiyappas to him.That's how "pachaiyappas" a new term came into existence, thanxs to ganesh.

I had a hearty laugh.Iam smiling typing this.i had a great time.Not just me,all of us had a great time.

Most of the guys who attended the meeting have written their own posts on it. Everybody in there own way.i thought i would write about one of the topic that we touched, COMMENTS. ROBBIE's has blogged about his thoughts on the various bloggers, I was almost flying in the sky reading the post.But he has cleaverly cornered me with it.Now he has forced me to become a gentleman and a nice guy.He has already made me change a little on something that even my parents where not able to do in all these years.BTW don't forget to COMMENT in his blog :D.mukund, ganesh arvind & shiva also have there summary on the meet, do check them out to.

I still remember a movie that i saw in the early 90's.Me and my neighourhood gang used to go to obscure movies , just to make fun and enjoy ourselves.Most of the time it will be ramarajan movies.One time we decided to go to a movie with a weird title "Yennamo nadakuthu"(something is happening).I thought this was one of the Dr.rajashekhar's Vaada Pooda type movies.I suggested let's go to this one .There wasn't much crowd in the theater.The movie started and for first 15 minutes there was the usual comments, whistles etc.As the movie progressed the noises came down and after 20 mins nobody uttered a word and it continued till the end of the movie.When we came out of the theater everybody was appreciating the movie and thanking me for taking them to that movie.I was puzzled, the movie that we went to make fun, turned out to be an awesome one.That movie was none other than the tamil dubbed verion of Kshana kshanam.It was also dubbed into hindi as Hairan. I got to watch it again recently ,realised that the movie still has some of the magic that it had on me then.

The story is a bank robbery gone bad.1 crore rupees is robbed from a bank and hidden in a secret place and a note containing the details of the hidden location mistakenly ends with sathya(sridevi).A gang is behind sathya to get the note. chandhu(venkatesh) a small time crook gets involved in the mess and what follows is a serious of chases. sathya & chandhu solve the riddle at the end.A road movie brilliantly told by ram gopal verma.

This was one of RGV's earlier movie that followed shiva.He gave a movie that was so different for that time period.In telugu 100% masala type movie where being churned out with chiranjeevi toping the list on the amount of masala.RGV broke away form those gang and showed the way by making a clean,sensible yet highly entertaining movie.

The movie has some good star cast sridevi, venkatesh, paresh rawal.It mixes serious chases and stunts with comedies from sridevi.sridevi is a force.she just bulldoze's venkatesh with her acting skills.Venkatesh who's timing sense is impeccable stands like a dwarf before sridevi.Sridevi with her million facial changes is just awesome in the movie.Another actor to mention is paresh rawal.RGV made him act in a telugu movie in 1991 itself.Well RGV sure has an eye for talented peoples.

The photography was the first thing noted by everybody about the movie.S.Gopal Reddy's the phtographer did a great job with the camera.Stunts were also done beautifully, the climax scenes with train running in between huts where just great.

The music is by M M Keeravani.Hearing the songs now is a nostalgic trip.A time period when SPB at his peak converted ordinary songs into beautiful ones.

jamu rathiri
Chased by the villians,sathya and chadhu are staying in the forest.Night falls and sridevi is hearing all kind of animal sounds, she is very afraid.There is danger everywhere, animals and the gang of peoples who are trying to kill them.The hero starts singing a beautiful melody,sort of a lullaby to comfort the heroine.The natural surroundings, moon lit night and there it is "Jammu rathiri jabilamma.Keeravani starts the song with the natrual sounds and slowly takes it to the melody and when someone like spb sings for such a situation, it is just perfect.

Those where the days.when you can hear vairamuthu lyrics ,only in dubbed telugu movies and movies of secondary Music Director's.You just cannot put down a talented person for long.This great lyricist penned beautiful lyrics even for dubbed films, where he is constrained with the lip syncs.I still remember some of the tamil lyrics of this song."Thanimai rathiri innimai yamma..."

The heroine is scared of the people trying to kill her, wild animals and she is not sure about this guy with whom she is spending the night alone.The hero comforts her by singing

"Manithan pola yannai karadi ondrum kodithalla,
Kangal moodi thoongu kanney naanum pulli alla".

Ko ante Koti
Its an all spb song.The song is a dream sequence one.Both chandhu and sathya think of what they can do with the 1 crore money.Venkatesh syncs with SPB's voice to perfection and SPB is ........ SPB.

Ammayi Muddu
A melody by SPB and chithra in telugu, that's all that has to be said.For some unknown reason I find chithra's voice more sweteer in telugu than malayalam or tamil.

Challi champu kunna
The song strangely reminds you of some other song.Dont know why keeravani asked mano to sing this song when GOD was there.High light of the song picturisation is sridevi's dance.

Listen to the songs here

sridevi won filmfare award for best actress and RGV won the nadi award for best director for this movie.

A clean and pacy entertainer.

Srivatsan started it, with his post "My Cultural Identity" and visithra followed it with "Embracing our culture" on why Indian men find it uncomfortable to wear their traditional wear.

I started answering visithra's post and kept on writing, so thought i will put it as a separate post.There are several reasons for tamilian men not sticking to the traditional attire.

1)Comfort
First of all salwar kameez or churidhar is not a traditional indian wear or at least a tamilian wear. But most of the women folk have switched over to them. Why, simplify because of the ease and comfort. The same holds for men, Trousers are more comfortable.

Women folk don’t have a clue about dhothi’s. It is a time bomb, you have to be on a constant fear of when the dhothi’s is going to slip from your stomach. That too wearing the ever slipping polyster dhothi without a belt is extremely dangerous, a big risk taking.I would like to point out that ,it is under these constant threats and dangerous conditions that men folk wear the polyster dhothi’s on ceremonies.


2)Acceptance
The society has changed, it still accepts a women in saree as modern.But it does not accept a man in dhothi as modern.If a bunch of young girls are there and they see two guys one in the traditional dhothi and towel and other in levis jeans and adiddas shoes. who will they be attracted too?. But in a vice versa situation, the women in saree will get equal attention with one in jeans. And similarly in a software company or any other offices the saree or salwar is a dress code. Iam not sure whether a dhothi or a kurta is.

3) Beauty
Traditional women wear has changed with times, it has re invented itself so much.From the traditional heavy kanchevarams we have the light sarees with beautiful designs and wonderful array of accessories for that.If you are talking about dhothi, it has been the same since the day the first dhothi was made. There is only one color, WHITE. If that color changes it means either iam going to shabari malai or i have renounced worldly pleasures.Ok, even if i accept the only color available to me WHITE,Trying to attend a function in white shirt and white dhothi in itself is an adventure.Even if we escape the ever stagnant rain water/drainage water and pan spitting guys from the bus windows, within five minutes into the function there will be a stain somewhere, and it will become a thing to talk, worry and explain about.

Traditional tamilian dhothi's are plain & dull. We men switching over to wearing trousers was a silent revolution seeking color in our life. A courageous act by men suppressed for generations by the women folks who glitter in traditional dress, while their men folk get lost in the dull white sea of dhothi's. Now like women folks we also talk about our dresses.”Nice shirt, where did you get it machan? “. And the talk goes for a few minutes. Otherwise the answer will be simply “Co-optex / handicrafts / local store” and end of topic.

A woman does not take any risk in keeping the traditions alive.But men on the other hand show extreme valor and courage in wearing polyster dhothi’s to keep up our ceremonial traditions and rituals alive.Men Embrace their culture risking an Embarrassment to their culture.This one point is enough to show how men embrace their culture more then women.

So because of all these reasons only we poor men folks are forced to wear Trousers. Please understand it :).

An awesome peice of art.This is a collabrative art project by a bunch of artist.

http://www.eviltree.de/zoomquilt/zoom.htm
Get ready for a ride.Hold and move your mouse on the image.

Bloggers in NYC
Are u a new yorker and would like to know who else blogs from your city, borough ,street.Check out this cool site.click on the map.

http://www.nycbloggers.com/

Sutradhar


Is a story of a straight forward village school master who fights against the injustice of a fuedal lord.He takes the support of politics for his fight.Power corrupts him and he ends up doing what he was fighting against.A movie which is probably inspired from K.balachander's Achamillai Achamillai.Cast includes Nana Patekar, Smita Patil, Girish Karnad, Asha lata, Nilu Phule.



Sazaa-e-maut
The movie is vidhu vinod chopra's first film.The film is definitely different from its contempraries.The movie is pacy and the plot is something that you would have seen in many later movies.None the less nasrudeen shah's acting and a pacy screen play makes it intresting.

contact arvind for more information.

A beautiful movie.I felt only a female director like aparna sen could bring out a sensitive movie like this.A simple story told in an elegant and touching way.

The movie totally has 6 are 7 characters and only 3 are the important ones.The story is about Violet Stoneham.An old anglo indian teacher who is leading lonely life.Being a women who was born and bought up in india.She does not want to move out of the country, fearing the uncertainty involved with it.

------------- The story -------

Violet stoneham(jeniffer kendal) leads an empty and lonely life which consists of a certain routines. Nandita(Debashree Roy) and Samresh(Dhritiman Chatarji) are lovers who meet in parks and make out in taxi's.Nandita an old student of miss violet, meets her accidentally when going around with samresh.Violet insists that they should come and visit her.Samresh thinks that miss violets house would be a perfect place for there meeting.Nanditha tells how samaresh the amateur writer is having trouble writing at his noisy house.violet offers her house for him.Nanditha and samresh use violets house for there sexcapade. For lonely violet the entry of these love birds in her life, changes her regular routines and she thinks there attention towards her as friendship and genuine concern for her.In the end violet recognizing that it is not so.

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The movie belongs to 2 people.Jeniffer kendal and aparna sen.For Aparna,her first movie, supposedly is her best.The movie got wide recognition and raised eyebrows for talking about pre marital sex in early 80's.From her own words

'It started as a short story,and then it just kept growing'.She remembers how the words formed pictures and the story quickly evolved into a screenplay. But it was an English screenplay at a time when crossover cinema was an undiscovered genre and English cinema originating from India was unusual.

She went to Satyajit Ray, described as her mentor, who told her he would read it after two months. He called her back after that period and told her to make a film. 'Really?' she remembers wondering, uncertain about the prospects of an English film. Approaching producers, she was repeatedly asked what she was trying to sell. 'Sex? Violence? What are you trying to sell, they would ask me,' she says about producers. 'And I would answer: a small human tale.'

Following advice, she sent a synopsis of the plot to Shashi Kapoor, who shared it with Jennifer Kendal and Govind Nihalani, all of whom liked it and asked her to come over to Mumbai. That was the beginning of 36, Chowringhee Lane, which went on to win many national and international awards.more

The violet character is beautifully acted by jeniffer kendal(wife of shashi kapoor).I didn't first appreciate jeniffer kendal acting.I thought she is prety much what she acts in the movie.Then i realized that she is the same woman who comes in shashi kapoor's other movie junoon(she is the mother of a british girl, whom a pathan wants to marry).That character was different than this.She uses a different accent, walk and body language in this movie.Jeniffer has created the violet character in its entirety. She expresses so much in subtle & elegant way.Distant looks, childish laughs, controlled expressions & expressionless face at time, jeniffer is just awesome in the movie. It is unfortunate that the national awards that year went to rekha for Umrao jaan.I was wondering whether jeniffer kendal was overlooked because she was a foreigner ?.

I have seen so many movies with BGM by vanaraj bhatia.If asked this is his best.There are lot of scenes where there is no music at all, to show the emptiness of jeniffer's life.But at places beautiful BGM adds so much to the movie.As the main character is an anglo indian lady,he has cleaverly avoided indian instruments and has struck with scene enhancing western scores.

Art direction by bansi chandragupta(chakra).THe movie was written and directed by Aparna sen.Aparna sen is great in the movie.She took liberty to stray away from the main story at 2 places.In a dream sequence and a song showing night in calcutta, nothing major though, those were very insignificant deviation.At least the song was adding to the already lonely feeling of violet but the dream sequence did not fit into the movie.But i have to admit that the dream sequence was intresting though.A young Violet shown in black and white is searching for davie(karan kapoor) her lover.she then sees her house and pushes the door,which opens to a view of a grave yard next to a ocean.A strange ritual is being performed. Marriage wows are told in a funeral setup and davie(who dies in a battle) gets into the coffin himself. Troops start shooting jeniffer and in fellini's style everybody in her life is there at that function.



Aparna depicts the violet character so beautifully.This is a character that is lonely inside and outside.You are made to pity at her.she is a meek character that is ignored by every one from her school principal to a shopkeeper in the fish market.Living in a old apartment all alone with a cat, she is demoted to teach the dry grammer after teaching dramatic shakesphere for decades(imagine a anglo indian woman who recites shakephere as and when she wants, teaching adverb and noun), she spends time with her retarded brother,reads mails from her granddaughter(soni razdan), visit's the family graveyard etc.All these scenes of her life depict's her loneliness.Lot of scenes or told in visuals.The visuals like her gaze outside the window from her class room,the antique objects in her house,out of order lift,the cat etc all makes us understand her solitude and take pity on her.Again the visuals in her house/apt are done with less light,which adds to the gloomy feeling.Cinemetography by Ashok Mehta.

The movie does not get too emotional anywhere.Subtle emotions and beautiful acting by jenniffer kendel makes you feel violets pain deeply, without making you cry.A breezy and sensitive movie.




This movie has the 3 generation in it.Geoffrey kendall(jeniffer's father),jeniffer and her son & daughter karan,sanjana kapoor.
(Eddie Stoneham played by Geoffrey Kendall)

young violet played by sanjana kapoor(jeniffer's daughter)

karan kapoor

Understanding the true nature of nandita and samresh's.violet the shakesphere fan, ends the movie with quotes from shakeshphere's king lear.she takes solace by reciting the words of another old person, who was lonely and foolish in believing others. King lear gives his kingdom to his 2 daughters, who publicly tell how much they love him.King lear later realizes that all those words were false.Now after being sent to jail by his 2 daughters he tells these lines to his other daughter who didn't praise him publicly(kurosawa fan's would have guessed what movie this is).

Pray, do not mock me;
I am a very foolish fond old man,
Fourscore and upward, not an hour more or less,
And, to deal plainly,
I fear I am not in my perfect mind. --(King Lear, Act IV, Scene VII)

And Lear's last words to Cordelia:

Come, let's away to prison;
We two alone will sing like birds in the cage:
When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down,
And ask of thee forgiveness; so we'll live,
And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh
At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues
Talk of court news; and we’ll talk with them too.
Who loses and who wins; who’s in, who’s out;
And take upon the mystery of things . . . --(King Lear, Act V, Scene III)

some other shakesphere qoutes used in the movie.
Malvolio in "The twelth night"

If this fall into thy hand, revolve. In my stars I am above
thee, but be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great,
some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust
upon ’em

The film won the Grand Prix (The Golden Eagle) at the Manila International Film Festival.Jennifer Kendall won the 1983 Evening Standard British Film Award for Best Actress and a BAFTA nomination for Best Actress that same year.

In india it fetched aparna sen the coveted best director national award for her first film itself.But it was not represented in film fare and other awards.Maybe cause it was an english movie.

An unforgettable movie, which has made Jeniffer kendal immortal.

Links
king lear summary
36 C Lane in sujatha's list of top ten movies

Shashi Kapoor is well known as one of the innumerable member of the famous Kapoor family.Like any other kapoor family member he is also remembered for acting in the usual formula movies that came in the 60's and 70's.But there is a different side to this person.He is some one who became a pauper trying to make quality movies.

Shashi kapoor from mid 70's started producing parallel movies.He made some significant movies under the banner film-vala's.He produced Junoon and kalyug with shyam benegal, Vijeta with govind nihlani, Utsav with girish karnad and 36 cowingree lane with aparna sen.



what made him do this.I dont know.But surely jenifer kendal had some part to do with it.Jeniffer was his childhood sweetheart, who he married later.There love story is a sweet one.Read it here

Not only did they produce good movies.They also did a lot for the theater scene in bombay.After his father prithviraj's death in 1971.shashi kapoor built the prithvi theater as a tribute to a his father.

Somewhere in the seventies Shashi and his wife Jennifer decided to build Prithvi Theatre of their own. They were discouraged by many. The land on which they wanted to build the theatre was prime property in Juhu. They could have made crores of rupees selling it. Jennifer (whose entire family, the Kendals were madly dedicated to theatre) who was involved in English theatre) however was determined to build Prithvi Theatre and Shashi inspired her with all the help she needed to help her dream come true. Prithvi Theatre started on a small scale. It then grew and flourished and today it is one of the major landmarks of Mumbai.

At times I wonder what Hindi theatre would do without Prithvi Theatre. I wonder what so many young and talented young men and women from all over the country would do without Privhti Theatre. It is this very Prithvi Theatre which has given so much talent to theatre, films and in very very big way to television. Prithvi is a blessing to the starving for talent Mumbaiwala.

There was a time when Shashi lost interest in Prithvi, especially after he lost his wife Jennifer who was the central pillar of Prithvi Theatre, the woman who looked after Prithvi like her own child. Shashi was stopped from doing such a cruel thing by his son Kunal and daughter Sanjana. Today, both Kunal and Sanjana are taking care of Prithvi Theatre and taking every step to make it a major institution in Mumbai. They have vowed to keep Prithvi Theatre alive which means keeping so many hundreds and thousands of hopes and dreams and inspirations alive.

Thank you, Jennifer

I still remember that memorable evening at Prithvi Theatre. It had just been inaugurated. Not many people knew about it, not even all those who should have. It was Shashi Kapoor and Jennifer Kapoor's gift to Mumbai, it was their house for the talented who had no place to stand in a crowded city like Mumbai and prove their talent. It was their own little way of keeping talent alive, of keeping theatre alive, of keeping young artistes and directors and artistes alive. It was their way of thanking theatre for making them, Shashi and Jennifer and their families what they were.more

Seems,At the start Jennifer sent the architect of the theatre, Ved Segan, to travel around Europe and England to see different kinds of theatres. Meanwhile, the Kendalls brought in their expertise in play-acting, and some talented youngsters — Om Puri, Naseeruddin Shah and Amol Palekar, to name a few — became a part of it.more

The first play was performed on 5 November 1978, The play was G.P. Deshpande's Uddhwasta Dharmashala, directed by Om Puri. Prithvi Theatre, the building has now become a landmark in Mumbai.

There contribution to india's theater scene is now carried out by there childrens.Shashi & Jeniffer had 3 childrens. Sanjana(she used to host shows in Star tv), Kunal(starred in vijeta) & Karan Kapoor(The bombay dyeing man).







Shashi kapoor,co-authored by Deepa Gahlot wrote prithviwallah's a book about his experiences with the prithvi theater.




More Links

sanjana-princess of prithvi
Prithvi Theatre Festival
prithviwallah's
prithvi theater
nice article about the theater