Five feet under

Ring out the old: some ads I never want to see again

2011-12-28T11:12:00.000-08:00

1. Zomato.com
What's with all those thappads? Wait, don't tell me, I don't want to know. Thankfully, the ads are about the New Year's Eve, and the happy bells of 2012 will indeed ring them out. Sadly, that cannot be said about some of the other ads that are robbing me of my happiness.

2. goibibo.com
Again some thappads? Really guys, is the entire Indian advertising industry so totally out of ideas?

3. Snapdeal
I don't know if I'm offended by the sheer racism of depicting Yamraj as a South Indian villain or simply by how dumb and unfunny the ad is. Maybe both. Notice how all the most annoying ads are about websites? Speaking of which...

4. bestylish.com
"There is a thin line between sexy and sleazy," says Vidya Balan, who can incidentally use that line as a skipping rope. The 'sexy footwear' ad on the other hand, is far, far away from that line - and you know on which side it is.

5. 'December! December!'
Some car, I don't even remember which. Apparently they have some good deals going on in December. Thankfully, only 3 more days of watching that little kid jumping about with joy.

6. Tata Sky - Muffin!
Pregnant women are NOT dumb, annoying, unreasonable, selfish, obsessive fiends. Anyone who thinks otherwise, meet me outside my office unarmed and alone and we'll settle this like gentlemen.

And this is all the trash I'm exposed to without watching a single Hindi entertainment, movie or music channel. My mom was right. Television is bad for your brain. Man, do I miss Lalitaji!

The Foggy Picture

2011-12-12T04:02:00.000-08:00

It is not easy to pull off a film about films and filmwalas. Keeping the world of the real people behind the movies clear and distinct from the filmy world these characters inhabit, without indulging in documentary-like realism is a tight-rope balance. Ram Gopal Varma managed this in Rangeela, wherein the 'real' characters, zany and entertaining and over-the-top though they might be, were not extensions of their film-within-film roles. Zoya Akhtar's Luck By Chance is a loving, if indulgent look at the world of films, peopled by very real, vulnerable and flawed characters. There were of course, many lovely films in the 70's that deliberately showed us glimpses of behind-the-scenes realities of the film world to bring out the sharp contrast between the fantasy world woven by those artists and the actual world they live in - think Guddi and Golmaal (the film shoot where Amol Palekar goes to meet his friend Deven Verma, and manages to borrow an actor's costume). Entertaining, enjoyable films with a clear demarcation between the two worlds they portray. The Dirty Picture isn't one of them.

The film is packed with subtle messages delivered with a jarring tone. In the first half, the world of the young Reshma is far removed from the fantasy-world she watches on screen. Then as she gradually makes her way into this world, her own life becomes progressively less real. I must add that I cheered for the gutsy Balan at her every scandalous move, be it her bold seduction of a leading male star or the cool retorts to an artsy director. Minutes before the interval, as if in warning, she tells you, "I'm not a film which will change after the interval." And change, the film does. What started as a mockery of the OTT masala entertainers of the 80s, ends up imitating the very genre, complete with a ramp showdown right out of Khoon Bhari Maang. It's like telling us, the audiences, that the actors and actresses of the 80s not only did weird stuff on the screen, they carried on the charade in their real life too. The result is a something that bears neither the gritty edge of a Madhur Bhandarkar drama, nor a dreamy escapism. And when the story draws to its very expected conclusion, you want to feel sadder for the unfortunate actress than you actually are.

Tu Tithe Mee - old people are not all tragic characters

2011-11-19T03:20:00.000-08:00

Warning: This is going to be a rambling post, and incidentally it is not about Baghban. So you may skip directly to the fourth paragraph and lose out on nothing.

Whenever I hear someone talk about what a sweet, sad and touching film Baghban is, and how it makes parents reflect on their sad, imminent future, it makes me realise how little we Indians demand of our movies. Give us a kind old couple with golden hearts, a bunch of selfish kids who relentlessly mistreat them, a motley bunch of friends who help the old couple pull things together, and watch us wet our hankies. Like in many things, my dislike for Baghban stems not so much from the film itself - I think Hema Malini was looking gorgeous, and the improbability of having a teenaged granddaughter within 40 years of marriage (hastily explained in the opening scenes as a result of both Amitabh and his oldest son having married very early - what the heck?) or a man claiming to have worked 40 years in a bank which was established less than ten years before the film was made - these are all goofs that we have long forgiven Hindi cinema for.

My bias against the film comes from the fact that the story is so time-worn - I’ve seen half-a-dozen films in the Doordarshan days with similar sad tales of old people - two of them had a 40-something Rajesh Khanna play much older characters. Now there is nothing wrong in re-adapting an old plot with a new look. The thing is, Baghban adds nothing to the story by way of interpretation. The sons and daughters are all like one big, insensitive monolith. The two happy-family songs in the family at the beginning and the sudden turn-around in all the characters as soon as they learn that their old father is broke after retirement, has all the depth of a Madhur Bhandarkar film. In real life, when old parents move in with their sons and bahus after many years of both couples living independently, there always are domestic problems, conflicting lifestyles and a difficult phase of adjustment. This does not happen because either the parents or the children are bad people, but because they are different. But again, Baghban is not a psychological study, it is a Hindi film with an emotional story. And there comes the main source of my prejudice - just a few years before Baghban, there came a Marathi film called Tu Tithe Mee, whose traces are all too evident in the later Hindi film. And Tu Tithe Mee is such a gem.

I watched Tu Tithe Mee film many years ago, and don’t remember a lot of details, including the names of any of the characters. And yet the fresh approach of this film to many familiar plots and situations is so unforgettable, I can almost relate the story, scene-by-scene. I’ll call the leads by the names of the excellent actors who played them - Mohan Joshi, aka Babbanrao Kadam from Vaastav, plays the retired patriarch of a small joint family, and Suhas Joshi, who was Chandrachud Singh’s mum in Josh, plays his simple, nine-yard-sari clad wife.

When Mohan retires from service, he looks forward to spending some quality time with his wife, something the couple missed out in the years of looking after their children. They belong to a generation where responsibility took precedence over romance, and had never learnt to express their feelings to each other. Now looking at the sweet flirtations of young lovers in their neighbourhood, Mohan feels there is no harm sneaking some time away from their children and grandchildren to roam around in parks, give flowers and hang out with friends of their age. Of their two bahus, one has a job and one is a housewife, and the family lives in a general harmony, with the elders unobtrusive and the youngsters appreciative of their support. But when the younger son gets transferred to Kolhapur for work, neither bahu wants the burden of running a household without the elders’ help. So the two young couples hatch this brilliant solution: the mother would live in Kolhapur with one bahu, and the father would stay back in Mumbai. This decision is imposed on the elders without taking their wish into account and, when they had finally found the time for each other, the old couple is forced to live apart. How they convey to their children the need for each others’ company despite their love for the children, forms the rest of the story.

There are many commendable aspects to Tu Tithe Mee. While the actions of the young people in this story come across as selfish, these characters are not outright condemned. In fact, they are so used to the parents’ loving submission to their own needs, that they have long forgotten that parents have their own emotional needs and life beyond their children. Part of the blame is on the parents who, in line with their own upbringing, have always put their children first.

There is a touching scene early on when Suhas, annoyed at her husband’s sudden transformation to a love-struck teenager, reminds him of a cheesy letter she wrote to him early in their marriage, when she was pregnant with their first son and separated from her husband for the first time - he never replied nor mentioned that letter to her, thus stubbing the rather bold move on her part. In reply, Mohan pulls out a tattered piece of paper from under her pillow - the very letter in question - which he recites to her verbatim.

Now before you think this is one big perfect-family bore, cut to another letter, later in the film from Mohan to his wife now living in Kolhapur. It is just the kind of formal, dry communication you would expect from a man of his age and bearing - except for the ‘I LOVE YOU’ inserted after every sentence. The wife, by now playing along, reads out a censored letter to her beta-bahu, and cutely complains about how her husband has written about everybody but herself. The amused son conveys her remark to Mohan over the phone, and thus the old couple manage a clever wink-wink at each other under the children’s nose. The film is sprinkled with cute, funny, witty moments - be it old man and woman lying to their children to sneak out on dates just for the kicks, the old woman’s jealousy over her husband’s friendship with his classier childhood girlfriend, the seventy-something lady from their senior citizens club breaking into a sensuous dance at one of the clubs’ gatherings, and not to forget Suhas Joshi’s inimitable drunken showdown!

In terms of social message, the film teaches by example rather than being preachy. The loneliness of many of the older characters is understood, but not squarely blamed upon the younger generation. A more comfortable solution is presented by senior citizens supporting each other to achieve some degree of self-reliance. Suhas and Mohan’s household is in a happy equilibrium without any TV-serial showiness or pretentious pairi-paunas in the morning. Elder bahu leaves for office just like the men, leaving her daughter to the efficient care of her mother-in-law and younger bahu.

Most importantly, the film manages to portray the delicate balance of relationships within a family, the love and respect that is evident in small acts of largesse and adjustment in everyday life rather than hollow speeches, cringe-inducing hug-fests and glitzy naach-gaana. Something totally lost to the sensibilities of the makers and lovers of Baghban. But then that would be asking for too much.

A small aside: If you remember the completely pointless sequence when Amitabh and Hema Malini, having decided to get away from their thankless children, meet up at the fictional small town where for some reason they had decided to spend their honeymoon all those years ago, the manager of the hotel where they stay is played by Mohan Joshi. At the time my mother and I were so convinced that Baghban is a sort of remake of Tu Tithe Mee - there was also some talk about such a remake with Amitabh Bacchan when the Marathi film first made news - we thought of Joshi’s inclusion in the cast as some sort of tribute to the original. A worse tribute there never was.

Mausam - belated review

2011-10-21T10:55:00.000-07:00

Shahid Kapur pronounces Edinburgh as Ed-in-burr-ah. That's about the only thing this movie gets right.

Yun hota to kya hota: An alternate history - Part I

2011-02-16T22:42:00.000-08:00

Before 10^th Century CE: Indian sub-continent is in the grip of Dark Ages, with the influencial Brahmin class holding sway over the ruling Kshatriyas and exploiting the working class people. Ancient mythological texts like Vedas, Puranas, and the epics Ramayana and Mahabharata are accessible only to Sanskri-reading Brahmins, and the common man relies solely on their interpretation for all religious and spiritual guidance, as well as more practical decisions in private and public life.

Trade relations with Europe in the West, China in the North, and the Aztec and Mayan traders from the Far East keep the economy healthy, but the poor peasants living at the bottom of social hierarchy have no share in the general prosperity.

The first jolt to the status quo came with the conquest of Arabia by African tribes around 8^th Century CE. The hostile new regime practically blocked the trade of precious fur, leather and Mediterranian herbs that had been thriving through the land route between Europe and Asia. Winters in the Rajputana deserts and Gangetic plains were unbearable without European fur.

It was however the conquest of Kabul towards the end of 9th Century that marked a new epoch in the Indian history.

Kabul had been the seat of ancient Buddhist learning since many centuries now. Scholars and monks well-versed in the original Indian Vedic texts, history, philosophy of the ancient saints as well as the teachings of Gautam Buddha, had thrived and prospered in this cultural hub. They ran schools and universities which through the centuries had nurtured Chinese scholars, Muslim poets and philosophers, and Indian princes. The reputation of these universities and the cosmopolitan mix of students they attracted, had given Kabul its unique identity as a cultural melting pot and a very prosperous international city.

Now, with Kabul under the grip of the hedonistic African tribes, the rich foreign students stopped pouring into the city. Consequently, the universities started crumbling and the Buddhist scholars began considering the lavish offers from Indian royal families that had long been trying to lull these masters to tutor their clans.

The return of the Buddhist scholars brought about an intellectual and cultural revolution in the decadent Indian society. These masters, rejecting the existing social hierarchy, set up educational Gurukuls in the midst of the most populous cities. These Gurukuls were open to anyone who wished to learn and was able to either pay or serve the school. Education became gradually more accessible to the masses. Sons of peasants began questioning the hitherto uncontested authority of temple Brahmins.

The Indian Renaissance had begun.

Sounds

2010-10-09T05:05:00.000-07:00

Ha! Another old story. Of course, the better part of my half-a-dozen followers have read this one already, but still...

It’s pouring outside. The sound of rain beating on the tin shed over the terrace is loud and articulate – it’s the language of water, glad to be free of the clouds. I’ve come to hear the words, the meanings, and the emotions in every sound. It is from these sounds that I get a sense of everything around me. They make up for vision.
Everything, every object seems to talk to me, perhaps because they all find in me an ear that they scarce find in people who see. I listen; I understand, or at least pretend to. At first I dismissed this extended sense of sound as just an exaggeration of my own feelings being reflected in everything around me, but its not so. Just like the source of these sounds, their meanings are external. I cannot claim to have created them. They come to me. They catch me unawares from an indifferent frame of mind, and make me listen. They induce thought, like the sound of rain right now is making me think of water drifting miles above, away from its rightful place on earth. Water wanting to come back, struggling and gathering strength against the imprisoning clouds, against the heat that has turned cool, life giving water to vapour. It eventually breaks free, comes pouring down to where it belongs, assimilates with the water down here – in lakes, in oceans, in gutters and in the mouths of jubilant young boys running around, feeling raindrops on their tongues.

I like the sound of rain.

It was raining that September afternoon too, as I stretched out on a beanbag next to Mugdha. The rain beating against the slanted glass wall had a musical feel to it, enhancing the harmony of her little rooftop studio. So did the breathing of the girl stretched out on the red beanbag next to me – things had colours back then.
Since I spend a lot of my time in solitude now, remembering events through their sensations, the sensations seem to become more and more vivid in my memory – more, perhaps, than their real selves. I remember the colours, the feel, and the sound of that moment. I can hear Mugdha breathing in a light rhythm, feel her palm on my elbow, see the deep brown of her hair clashing against the red of the leather beanbag and the blue of the carpet. It is amazing how the most mismatched colours and objects in that little space fell perfectly in place and seemed to fit the entire picture just right. Even the fact of us being together at that place, that moment was so unlikely and implausible, that it felt correct.

It’s 4:15 in the afternoon now; she should be here soon.

I’ve been thinking a lot about us today; about the time we first met, my first sight of Mugdha, my first thought on seeing her – I was embarrassed. I had just walked in to my friend’s apartment for an evening with old friends and good whiskey, and was rather surprised to see a girl perched on the sofa, chirping away like it was her house. How many times do you register the exact frame in which you saw a person for the first time? Black sandals, an off-white skirt ending just below the knees, a black shirt that left the hands and much of her shoulders bare, smooth hair falling carelessly about the shoulders, completely oblivious to the partly amused, partly lusty stares she was getting. It took me time to realize that she wasn’t there with a boyfriend, and a complete stranger in the company of four men, all at least fifteen years older to her. I felt suddenly conscious of my airy kurta that I wouldn’t have worn if I knew we had female company.
We got introduced, and she laughed a hello, adding that she’d rather not stand up and spare us both some embarrassment – I’m 6 feet 2, she would be barely 5. She then lit a cigarette, and I suddenly felt at ease. We happened to be the only two people in the group who smoked.
Within a week after, it felt like we’d known each other forever. She claimed that she always felt comfortable talking to me, because she knew I was engaged and there was nothing more to it than conversation. I too, had been craving to talk, without knowing it. We talked like one rarely gets to talk, about everything, without caring for implications, without being cautious, without choosing our words. And yet, the most beautiful words I’ve said in my life just came out while talking to her, like they’d been there all the time, just waiting for the deserving listener. It was like summarizing your life to someone you met on a journey, someone you don’t expect to meet ever again.
I wasn’t indifferent to her beauty; it was just that her words took over all my senses, words like I had never heard before. She soothed as well as fascinated me. I knew Swati would never take it well, she would never see it the way I did, or understand it the way Mugdha did. Mugdha had an extraordinary comprehension of things that cannot be explained. She wasn’t philosophical, just practical. “Never, ever let things come to a point where you have to choose between me and Swati,” she said, “and if they do, choose Swati. Because I would never choose you, if I were in your place.” That point came; I chose Swati.

The rain is getting relentless and angry; sound on the tin roof is deafening. Water out on the streets must be getting angry too. Instead of seeping down into the earth, it is getting clogged on concrete terraces and tar roads. It would try to get away, protest on the roads, and block up traffic. Mugdha will probably get late.

I had got late that day in September too, but she hadn’t noticed. She greeted me cheerfully, excited as she was about her design for the cover of a new book. I remembered with regret her promise to take me shopping for some good books, a promise I wasn’t about to let her fulfil. As I waited for her to finish her work, I struggled to find the right words to tell her what I had come to say. It seemed incredible that we had only met ten days ago, and unfathomable that I would never see her again. Talking between strokes, she seemed oblivious to what was going on in my mind; I was wrong, of course. The next thing I knew, she was patting my hand as she placed down a cup of coffee next to me, smiling adoringly as she said, “So what is this, your last visit?” Not much time was lost discussing the obvious, things I had always known and she had always acknowledged – ‘just friends’, ‘hardly friends’, priorities, responsibilities, blah, blah, blah. She dozed off in the middle of conversation.
I should have felt angry, but I felt relieved. I didn’t want to continue that discussion. I wanted to watch her sleep, hear the rain, and feel that place around me, that room with a glass wall where everything reflected her…

Ashatai sure knows her job. I didn’t tell her I’m expecting a visitor today; she must have guessed. The smell of pakodas and the crackling sounds they make as Ashatai dips them in boiling oil is mesmerizing. I remember Mugdha mentioning some hill station near the town she lived in her student days, where she and her friends went out early mornings on bikes, just to have tea and pakodas on top of the hill. I was in Dubai, making an international call. Her description of pakodas cost me fifty bucks.
What is Ashatai, a psychic? Does she know I had promised to treat Mugdha to the best pakodas on earth? It was anyhow one of the many frivolous promises that I broke. Does Ashatai even know anything about Mugdha? Maybe I blabbered something last night – I was rather wasted…

Marriage had changed Swati a lot. She became a more secure person. She took to her new role in my life charmingly, efficiently. All my apprehensions about relationship and commitment just vanished. So would yours, if you married an angel. Once, conversationally, she mentioned how she had felt jealous about my friendship with Mugdha, admitting that it was childish of her. It was more because she could sense that I talked to Mugdha much more freely than I did to her, at that time. After three years of marriage, of some stressful evenings, hurried mornings and lazy Sundays, she knew me better. Even I no more felt I was missing out on anything. She asked if Mugdha and I were still in touch. I said we weren’t, and that I didn’t regret it.
Mugdha had last called me from the airport a year ago, to tell me that she was moving to Fiji. She was married. She was planning an exhibition of digital art in a month. She would miss me, and was happy for me. She didn’t know why she had thought of calling me. She was sillier than she thought she was.

The rain is tired. It will give up in a few minutes. I can already hear people venturing out to their unfinished businesses. Was that a bird? It must have been dying to get out of its nest and find some food. The water is through with its bullying. The pakodas smell good. But I’d rather have them later, with tea. They’ll still be hot when Mugdha comes – if she comes. What kind of a fool am I, really?

She had called me from Fiji, a week after the accident. I had no idea she had been keeping track of me. She was very sad about Swati and worried about me. She was relieved to know that I was alright – I didn’t tell her about my eyesight until a few weeks later, because I took it as a courtesy call and thought she might never find out. Wrong again. I have always been wrong about Mugdha. Like when I thought that she had only resumed our friendship because she felt I needed her. She actually needed me more than ever. She told me about her successful career and her failed marriage, her plans to come back which kept getting delayed. I derived comfort in this new phase of our friendship. Like everything else, Mugdha was now a voice. In my new world of sounds, as I began quantifying the life in every sound, life attained a peak in the sound of Mugdha’s voice. I was happy that way. I did not want to think of the real Mugdha, the Mugdha I could once see and feel. Or I thought I didn’t.
Last week, when she called up to say she was coming back, I told her not to visit me. Let us not spoil what we have now. Let us maintain this distance. Let us never think of each other as physical, tangible people, let us remain voices. There is nothing more to it, I told her. She brushed it off and went on talking of other things.

No, I don’t think she’ll come after all. It’s an hour past already. And it doesn’t make sense, anyway. How many years has it been? Could Mugdha actually have grown seven years older? Maybe she’s keeping her hair longer now, I never asked her. It would be quite becoming of her, the deep, vibrantly coloured hair grown to waist-length – I can at least touch it……….

Shut up! She’s not coming, you fool. Ok, so the doorbell rang. Let Ashatai open it, must be Bansi. Or maybe Nikhil. Or maybe...

Bijender Singh

2010-10-09T04:40:00.000-07:00

I'm posting another short story I wrote some three years ago. Sweet, innocent times those were.

Bijender Singh was following me. I hadn't noticed.

It was my first time exploring Kolkata on my own. Without much of an agenda, I took the Metro to Park Street and wandered around the periphery of the vast Maidan, following the dead tracks of trams that once wheeled around the place. I did not see where I was going, or notice the man who asked me the time. I went on, following the tracks that got lost under a bridge.

I started walking along the edge of the bridge. I was thinking of how I had got here, in Kolkata, of all places, of all the places I had been in before – Vallabh Vidyanagar, Vadodara, Pune, Bengaluru. Switching from one course to another, one job to another, I had given everyone the excuse that the job I had taken up in Kolkata would give a boost to my career.

It was nothing of the sort. I just had to move out somewhere. And here I was, tracing the dead tracks of an outdated mode of transport in a new city.

Someone called out from behind me.

It was the man who had asked me the time. He was warning me that the bridge was not meant for pedestrians. I smiled and turned back. He told me his name was Bijender Singh, a guide who worked sometimes in Kolkata, and during summers in Dalhousie. I smiled again, and told him about my camping trip in Dalhousie; about how I loved the flower-laden valleys and the view of the town from our distant campsite. I was surprised at the ease with which I could talk to this stranger. My well-wishers would have killed me for trying so hard to get abducted, looted, raped, murdered, or all of above.

Now I’m not much of a museum person. But when someone, who’s just saved you from getting run over by speeding cars on a dangerous no-pedestrian bridge, offers to show you around a few boring places, you kinda say yes. We walked across the Maidan, had soft drinks at a stall. Bijender insisted on paying. He tried showing me around the garden surrounding the Victoria House, and blushed to see it infested with love birds of every feather. His stream of conversation dried up inside the Museum, where I busied myself for a while looking at colonial paintings and reading historical accounts, trying to trace the exact point in history where a glorious old city called Kolkata was degraded to Calcutta by ignorant colonizers.

Surprisingly, the little man didn’t ask for much of a tip, but in true Bollywood style, he wanted a souvenir to remember me by. I gave him my pen. He escorted me right up to the entrance gate of the Metro Rail, regretting perhaps, that he could not come right on to the platform and see me seated in the next train, just to make sure I was really going back home, and not just looking for an excuse to get rid of him. He also took my number. Of course, I gave my number to my new Bihari friend—with one digit altered. You see, I am not that trusting, nor very romantic.

But I do wonder at times, if Bijender Singh tried calling me that evening, and in the days that followed. Did it hurt him to realise that I had really just got rid of him? I shall never find out. Outside of the few hours that we spent talking on a day stolen from my routine, our worlds are completely different. Yes, we all grow up with those cute little stories of how two people from different worlds form these sweet little bonds of friendship that go beyond social perceptions. Whether such things happen in real life, and then how often, is one of those questions you don’t want to bother with. What is beyond doubt, however, is that you always take back something out of these little interactions. And so Bijender the Guide went back home with a pen. And I came back with a little story.

Meandering

2010-09-24T15:56:00.001-07:00

Been trying to write for a while. As in, really write. Put thoughts paper - at least an MS Word document, give form to ideas, create characters, stories with a theme and a conclusion. But for some reason, the only thoughts coming to me are the really morbid ones. The only stories I can get myself to write down are ones with bizarre twists. Heck, even while reading a story or watching a movie, I find myself rejoicing at some level when something really bad happens to one of the nice guys.

The darkness seems sudden, unaccountable, uncalled for. Maybe this is just a phase. Maybe you can't be positive all the time. Or maybe somewhere deep inside, I have always been evil, something that a shroud of goodness had been concealing for most times, and maybe now, being left to myself for a while, the real inner evil is getting the chance to peep out... maybe.

I'm trying to let the darkness be. Watching it as if it is not me who's having all these thoughts. Watching dispassionately, impersonally as if my own mind is some sort of a lab mouse, and its experiences, its pain and anguish are nothing but events of some vague scientific relevance that I need to record. Even so, even at an impersonal, purely academic level of interest, my own mind keeps surprising me. At times I provide the cue and wait for the mind to respond. I watch movies that I always loved, and they bore me. Or one that really wore me out, suddenly makes me smile. Or cry. I cried watching 3 Idiots. Something is definitely not right.

The funny thing is, nobody seems to have noticed. They don't seem to see a change. I tried explaining to Dinesh... "It's been 2 weeks, dude, I just can't dose off before morning... and then the cook comes in and I'm startled out of sleep for good," I almost cried.

"Happens," is all he could say.

The landlady, the cook, the maid haven't commented on my working all night and keeping to my room all day so consistently since the last few weeks. Or maybe they have. Maybe they're just not surprised. Maybe, for them, I've always been the weird writer guy.

"But you're not selfish," Mom insisted, "why are you doing this to us?" After I dodged their calls for three days, she finally called up my landlady to check on me. She can just not fathom that I simply don't want to talk. Wish I could explain. But that would be talking too. And it will be a bunch of lies anyway.

Damn, I need to snap out of it. This is not me. I'm a pleasant guy, the quiet neighbor and generous friend. They love my parties. They like me, they do. I should give another party. I'll cook, Dinesh will arrange the drinks, we'll get some good movies... I'll just forget this crap and get back to my life. Its really easy, I'm simply making it difficult. People like inventing these little games for themselves, spinning a dramatic story around simple everyday events, playing the victims, marking down someone as the culprit. I'm not a goddamn victim, nothing's happened to me. Everything is just like it was. Every day is the same - its easy, just sleep, wake up, go about your routine cheerfully, positively. I can do that.

That's what I'll do. Tomorrow morning, I'll wake up early, clean up the house, do some shopping, call up everyone and we'll have a party. And every day after that will be normal, ordinary but peaceful. That's all the closure I need, nothing has changed, I just need to tell myself that. Everything is just like it was. It will get better. Why, I'll even plant some new flowers in the backyard.

Yes, that's what. Tomorrow I'll go buy a nice sapling and plant it in the backyard. Right over where I buried her.

Its official. Indian women kick ass!

2010-09-18T22:31:00.000-07:00

So while the nation was busy lamenting the state of Delhi stadiums and forwarding nasty Sania Mirza jokes, look who just went ahead and bagged a world championship for the fifth time in a row, and that in a totally different sport... but first, a few basics:

1 Indians are aware of the existence of a sport called boxing.
2 Women box too.
3 Manipur is a part of India. See, its there, in that godforsaken part of the map that politically correct people call North East. If any guys from my college are reading this, Manipuris are NOT Chinese!

So now for the news: yes, it is that 48kg Manipuri gal, M C Mary Kom! And while I know nuts about boxing or any sport for that matter, this piece of news makes my heart swell. Not just because this gives me a vague sense of national pride or anything, but... you see... the girl's a boxer! That's the dream, folks, that's every girl's dream come true. I mean, how many times in life does a girl feel like really punching the shit out of someone... really, really letting off all that emotional angst in pure physical form? So do you know what Mary Kom's victory means for all of us?

Soon enough, we'll have a new face selling Taaza Chai and Amrutanjan Balm on TV, or telling us now Tiger Biscuits can make a champ out of a North Eastern girl. In a couple of years we might even see her pitted against the top notch forgotten celebrities of all times in a dance reality show, or trapped in a jungle and eating roaches to feed hungry campers. We might even have a TV serial of a girl from a small town (which will look suspiciously like the Sanjay Gandhi National Park) aspiring to enter the Olympics to represent the country in the Women's Boxing matches, and how she manages to win plenty gold medals despite all the evil plans of her scheming sister-in-law. Soon, Mary Kom will rub shoulders with Saina Nehwal and the Late Kalpana Chawla. And before you know it, your one-year-old niece will start speaking in coherent sentences to tell you she wants to grow up and become Macy Kom....

... and thus, becoming a woman boxer will become a legitimate inspiration for a whole generation of growing up girls. Yay! If my niece is one of them, let it be known she has my blessings to practice her punches on any guy she wants to. In fact, I'll give her my own list of the most excellent punching male-bags. Anything to make my country proud.

Boi boi!

2010-08-10T09:14:00.000-07:00

Watched Ladla yesterday. Yes, the same 90s saga that had Anil Kapur (or is it Kapoor?) proudly flaunting his lush fields of... you get the picture... and Sridevi (in a role originally meant for Divya Bharti) as the evil independent woman with all the vices you could imagine in the female of the species gone wrong - ambition, discipline, business sense, not giving a shit to men, and who can forget that snappy - Understand? You better understand.

Like every good pre-Hum Aapke Hai Kaun movie, this one went full on with the chauvinism and pious mother-son stuff. Suit-wearing leading lady would conveniently don a saree for the upcoming rape attempt, the baddies were... well, bad. And then there was Raveena.

Clad in the most modest sarees of her career, Raveena as the wronged girl gives such gems of wisdom to her rival as, "it is natural for a woman to doubt another woman, but you should at least trust your husband!" Ooh la la...

I was wondering what it is about the outrageous and unabashed decadency of the whole thing that is so soothing. Let someone try making that kind of a movie now. Let me see Ranbir Kapur (Kapoor? I'm never sure) tell Katrina (I was going to write Sonam, but for my Kapoo(u)r problem), "Mard ho to aisa jo sar utha ke jiye; aur aurat ho to aisi jo sar jhukana jaane". I'm not going to translate that.

I searched hard for the reasons that make me just sit back and enjoy this stuff without getting offended. I think it is this - that an early 90s film did not pretend. It didn't pretend to be sensitive or intelligent or sweet or innovative or unique. The film is just what it is, and it is proud of what it is. "So, I say that women belong to the kitchen and the man should wear the pants in the marriage," Union Leader Raju seems to say, "and I don't care what you think about it. I'm the pious hero who carries his paralyzed mother in his two arms, who doesn't care for a female boss, who throws a shirt at the half-naked, halfway-molested woman while bashing up her molesters, flaunting my unshaven chest (and back and shoulders and hands). You don't like this, flick the channel. I've built my career, I've had my success. Deal with it."

Audience and critics back then didn't mind, they didn't try to label their movies. They hadn't had a taste of the sacrificing Salman of Hum Aapke Hain Kaun or the righteous Shah Rukh ala Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge or the silently suffering Shah Rukh ala Dil To Paagal Hai. The Hero back then didn't wait for the stoic patriarch or the handsome Other Guy to have a change of heart. No sir, he took the situation by the horns and put things right on his own. There was something very comforting about knowing that our guy will figure his way out of any mess, no matter what.

Enough with the retro look already!

2010-07-31T14:18:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time in Mumbai, no self-respecting woman left home without the dramatic sweep of eyeliner in place. Or so our recent movies want us to believe. So to all you retro lovers, here's my special treat:

Don't you just love the 70s look?

Inspired?

Now for a small detail: the picture above is from a 1966 film. The one below is from a 2007 film pretending to be set in the late 70s, given that the opening shot finds our hero on the sets of a film that released in 1980.

Now, I am not underestimating our talented art directors and costume designers, seeing that a period film requires a lot of research before rounding up on the right costumes and hairstyles.

A lot of research indeed, which can be busted with a few minutes of Wikipedia and Google Images. FYI, few of the prominent films of the 70s (prominent, more so because of the way they redefined style for that decade):

Bobby: 1971

Notice: no eyeliner, no colorful headband, just the sizzling mix of wide-eyed teen innocence and understated sexuality.

Yaadon ki Baarat: 1973

Notice the hair simply let lose, no jeweled pins holding up an elaborate bun. Fashion and class personified.

Khel Khel Mein: 1975

Notice the bubbly girl next door look and total lack of the now obsolete filmi glamour.

In fact, another, completely contrasting celluloid image from the same year...
Choti si Baat - 1975:

Well OK, there's the eyeliner again, but this is Vidya Sinha. When eyes are the only thing you really dress up, you have to make the most of it.

But THIS style of draping a sari (dunno what its called):

died with the 60s. Yes, Mumtaz looked sexy when she did this. But she looked sexy in 1968. In the 70s, Mumtaz made it a point to demurely cover up her ever expanding midriff.

The point being, the dramatic eyeliner, the tightly draped saree, the bejeweled hairdo, the body hugging hip-length kurti with churidar was as fashionable in mid-70s as a loose long kurta with "parellel" salwar aka Madhuri in Dil to Pagal Hai would be in 2010. The period look is fine, but please don't go overboard. And an eye-linered face in every single frame of the movie is definitely not done. Heck, there was a girl with the 'look' completely with thick headband in a scene where this politician is making a speech in a volatile all-Muslim locality! Because you know, that's what lower middle class Muslim women in Mumbai dress up like.

So all of you appreciating Om Shanti Om and Once Upon A Time In Mumbai for the 'authentic' 70s look, have fun watching Action Replay, the upcoming assault on the senses. I'm done with the retro look. In fact, I'm going to hibernate in my room and bury my head under a pillow till the retro winds have blown over. Wake me up after every period film with the fake 70s look is gone from public memory forever.

By the way, this scene was created out of
footage from the 1966 film Amrapali. 70s indeed.

Udaan - review

2010-07-18T10:16:00.000-07:00

Its good to see a well-made film at long last. Its good to see an entire Hindi film set in a place like Jamshedpur, and yet not hear the word 'small town' uttered even once. For that matter, its good to see a story set in Jamshedpur, shot completely in the Tata city, and not in some studio in Mumbai to justify high production value. And better still to know that a film can be pleasing to the eye without spending 50 crores on lavish sets.

Its good to see the likes of Ronit Roy and Ram Kapoor playing roles that do justice to their talent. Nice that the stock character of an authoritarian father gets some shades of grey without vindicating his cruelty. Also nice that a naughty little six-year-old can be adorable without mouthing any cheesy lines. Better still, a film can do away with any cheesy dialogue or melodrama and still be engrossing till the end.

It is so refreshing to hear the story of a teenager that does not revolve around encounters with the opposite sex. Good to know that teenagers in our country have more serious issues to deal with, and many ways to rebel beyond humiliating college professors or other cringe-inducing methods. Refreshing, that somebody feels the travails of a young boy yearning to be a writer is a worthy subject for a good movie.

But most of all, it is so bloody refreshing to see a seventeen-year-old protagonist being played by a really young actor. The director certainly played a gamble by not casting someone more experienced in playing teenager roles. For that courage alone, Udaan deserves a dekko.

Jai Maharashtra!

2010-05-06T06:08:00.000-07:00

Watching an unsarcastically brilliant Nat Geo documentary on a perishing culture has failed to take the edge off my sarcastically exuberant mood. So here goes another unsolicitated rant.

With due respect to the Thackerays and their love for the soil, may I know the deal behind imposing Marathi on all and sundry? I get it - Marathi is a brilliant language, I love it, its my mothertongue, it has a rich literature and culture and should be, must be respected. My point is, how does forcing non-native speakers to pick up the language add to its glory? Isn't that a bit like offering up a woman to every layman in town, hoping that this would earn respect for her beauty?

A knack for language is a gift not everyone is blessed with. To learn a new language, to be able to communicate with it, to appreciate its beauty and give it the respect it deserves takes some innate ability. If you don't have it, don't even try. Don't throw ruptured sentences on my face. You're not being funny.

Just look at what they've done to Hindi. Hindi is the national language, hurray, which means anyone from any part of the country will try twisting in his own way. And a polluted version of the language, think Mumbaiyya Hindi, that bastard child of slum Marathi and emigrant Hindi, goes on to become the lingua franca of the cool new generation. Chee, chee, spare me the horror and don't do that to Marathi. Mr Thackeray, I respect your dedication to the dignity of everything Marathi. But there's a lot more that can be done to empower the Marathi junta. The language need not be the shackles in our feet. It is our strength, our identity, and above all, it is ours. To cherish and nurture, not to throw around.

On change...

2010-04-18T03:47:00.000-07:00

As I pack my bags for the 8th time in two years (not counting all the packing before coming to Pune), I can't help reflecting on all that has changed in this time. I don't know if the change has been in me or things around me, or the way I look at people, or the way people look at me. But as I gear up for some more changes, I do discover one thing about me - I like change.

Sure there is always that bit of apprehension, that phase of darkness preceding every change. A brief period when nothing seems to be working out. You wonder if you went wrong about the whole thing, if you were responsible for upsetting everything when things were going so well. That phase, that sinking feeling makes you suddenly understand and emphasise with all the people who avoid change in life - people who go about systematically planning each and everything, living life meticulously from one day to the next, putting all their energy in keeping things as they are... And then comes the Solution...

That is what makes the change exciting - the one moment, when you are about to give up, when you are about ready to submit and compromise, and then suddenly you find just what you were looking for. And things fall in place. Believe me, it happens. It has happened to me so many times, I am almost addicted to it. So everytime I am starting to get cozy in a comfort zone, something stirs inside me, prodding me to look for the next change. Not necessarily a step "up", but a step ahead, a step away from where I have been for a bit too long.

And then comes the all new settling in phase, the whole new journey of rediscovering yourself all over again, finding yourself in a whole new context, unearthing facets of yourself you had shelved away for a while. That is when you feel all the trouble was really worth it.

Just felt like it...

2010-04-12T10:41:00.000-07:00

Nothing to write about. Nothing to sing for.

Nothing to die for, nor to live.

NOTHING defines me,

so don’t search my soul. You’ll find nothing.

I dream of what I will not be

I fight against what I don’t want.

I am a big negation of what I don’t believe -

forever in the quest of a zero…

And have nothing more to say.

Learning to get touchy-feely

2010-04-06T10:21:00.000-07:00

So I lost my mobile. My humble thanks to all my dear well wishers who were kind and supportive in my darkest hour. Especially to those who, after they got tired pointing at my gmail status and laughing, were good enough to share their number, while I went about the ardous task of updating the phonebook on my new touchscreen mobile.

Touchscreen. Who the hell came up with that one?

I mean, the thing is all buttons! For the first two days I was trying to figure out a way to talk on this phone without accidently dialling another number with my cheek. I keep the phone in my pocket and the next thing I know I've changed the time zone. I store my dad's number under my sister's name. I'm typing text messages in a calendar note. (Yes, I'm technology-retarted, and I KNOW you're supposed to lock the keypad, but shit happens.) Serves me right for not listening to Maddox.

Anyway, its been two weeks, and my Samsung Corby and I are learning to get along. I've even mastered the Crazy Penguin Catapult. Someday I'll learn to use the GPRS and spend the rest of my life Facebooking.

Ladies and gentlemen, presenting..... JAANI DUSHMAN!

2010-03-07T01:14:00.000-08:00

Four followers. Thank you God. (sniff) I celebrate this day with a Jaani Dushman Special.

Now you must remember that Jaani Dushman is the film that re-re-re-launched the talented, good looking Armaan Kohli with a specially designed re-re-remake of every hit his dad delivered (total: 2). Armaan Kohli - ring a bell? Hint: Ayesha Jhulka. Go brush up your 90's history.

It was the film that had Manisha Koirala studying at what I can only guess is an adult education institute that confers full-time student status to people past 35. She is kept company by everybody in Bollywood who was out of work at that moment. It was the film that led Sonu Nigam into the darkest abyss of his career, a brief spell when he tried to act. It was the film packed with stunning visual treats like snake-Manisha and her lover snake-Armaan romancing against photoshop locales, stomping on a hill till it crumbled... outstanding original action sequences and special effects that went on to inspire a generation of action thrillers... and gems of cinematic moments like, "Jallad hoke naazuk phool ko chhoota hai!"

As a special treat to my readers, here is one scene out of this genre-defining epic (well yes, I have since been rating movies on the Jaani Dushman scale; Kurbaan was a 7).

How to kill a hero

Become a snake with the power to transform into man, woman, vehicle.

Put tough and macho adult education institute student into coma. The day he gets out of coma, you threaten his friend's retarded brother. They flee on a motorbike. You turn into a motorbike, smash hospital windows and follow. They reach a secluded beach. You catch up. Fight. Stab. Stomp on the dagger in hero's chest.

Little bro escapes on water scooter, coz you know, someone parked a water scooter and forgot to take out the keys. Anyway, you run over water and catch little bro. Hero (still alive, what were you thinking?) catches up on another water scooter. You wrestle in water, and hope that the salt water will finally do the trick, and the physical weakness of being just out of hospital kicks in, and the hero finally gives up.

Distraught, the hero will crawl back to the adult education institute to make a dying speech in the lap of the Principal before finally and terminally dying.

(You continue chasing little bro till big bro The Hulk catches up with you for a breathtaking climax.)

Hah.... I'm going out looking for the DVD right away. Have to watch this classic once again.

What up, man!

2010-02-23T02:30:00.000-08:00

Just because I am bindass does not mean I am not serious about my career.

Just because I am bindass does not mean I don't believe in God.

Or do drugs. Or sleep around.

It just means I am OK with a TV anchor snooping on my girlfriend because I am too much of a gentleman to confront her. And I love watching music channels and letting them tell me how to live. And my life aspiration is to be a cuss-spewing roadie. And I fulfill my responsibility towards social awareness by publishing my inner colours on social networking sites.

Yo man I'm bindass. Go green. Save water. Save tigers. Save SRK. Go vote.

Yo.

Do you happen to hate Kurbaan too?

2009-11-23T01:14:00.000-08:00

I am not insensitive to the big issue that is terrorism. I do feel sorry for hot hunks like Saif who are forced into masterminding terror plots by the big bad global superpowers. Tch tch, the heart goes out to him. What I cannot comprehend is how anyone who's watched New York can afford to watch Kurbaan. Aren't we still suffering from the effects of recession?

Ah well, the movie does teach you a lot. Here's what I've learnt:

1. Don't marry a good looking Muslim guy. He could be a terrorist.

2. Afghans are terrorists. They are also spooky people who stare at you wierdly like a bunch of undercover aliens and kill you if you threaten their secret.

3. If you suspect your neighbours of wierd undercover activities, just snoop around, tiptoe into their basement and you'll uncover a deadly terror plan as well as find a dead body or two.

4. Terrorists are dumb louts who don't watch much TV, and so can't tell a journo from an Islam fundamentalist. So the next time you want to blow their plans, just give an anti-America speech and next thing you know, you'll be in their clan - don't even bother to conceal your identity, they won't notice.

5. There are two types of Muslims - the ones who think Americans deserve to be kicked, and the ones who don't.

6. A bunch of Afghans and a Pakistani use a Delhi girl as a pawn in their war against America. This is India's problem, so we have to make a movie about it.

7. To make a dark, sultry thriller, take a good film, strip it of all colour, get a bunch of expensive actors, tell them not to act and just look tense in every scene, paste some sex scenes (refer Mahesh Bhatt productions for guidance), add a dash of gore, some extra tears. For a dash of authenticity, get Kiron Kher do an Afghani accent. There you have it. Now sit back and enjoy the critical acclaim. And dare anyone to call you candy floss again.

8. Kareena Kapoor can act: she has three very distinct expressions in this one - in the first part she's deeply in love, and can't get her hands off her new husband. Less than an hour later she's scared, and in the end she's sad. Great performance.

9. If you want to make a sexy anti-terrorism movie and still sound secular, just sprinkle some pro-Islam arguments. Nobody will blame you for killing all the Muslims, since after all you've been sympathetic to their sorrows and their motivations. Let them speak, and them kill them in the larger interest of humanity. Its a win-win situation, everyone's happy.

10. 500 hard earned rupees are nothing if compared to the sorry saga of innocent people forced on the path to terror, and noone could understand their pathos better than Karan Johar. So give him all your money.

P.S. Can't wait to write that Jaani Dushman blog. Coming up soon.

Tata has gone nuts! And this is not about some vanishing species of turtles...

2009-08-31T22:23:00.000-07:00

Heard of OkTataByebye.com? I hadn't heard of it either - apparently it is a community portal for travellers, initiated by makemytrip.com. Bizarrely enough, Tata Sons have sued the company with the claim that the domain name infringes on the Tata brand name! Well I hate the expression, but WTF?

More about it on: http://www.oktatabyebye.com/support-us/Appeal.aspx

This isn't corporate bashing, but I do feel the company has taken it too far. If this is some ingeneous ploy to take over a popular domain name, kudos to the legal eagles in there. But if they actually contend that by being born into the Tata clan, they win copyright over a colloquial expression, then duh-uh... wait, is that copyrighted by someone too?

Do pass on the message. Not that its gonna help anyone, but we ought to know the levels of absurdity prevelant in our country.

Fly You Fools - Indian Comics about Life.

...and, we're back!

2009-07-02T03:30:00.000-07:00

Don't you just love Google?

After years of technologically retarded existence, humble ol’ self is finally learning the ropes. And indeed, staying ahead of the geeks who first scoffed at me for not having an email account (1999), then for not knowing what to do with it and always forgetting my password (2001), then for not having a gmail account (still on rediff? Tsch. – 2004) or not understanding what all the fuss around Orkut was (2005). Ahead of them, because I figured Twitter and got hooked on to it on my own! (Loud applause) Thank you, I love you all. Muah.

My romance with the Internet really started when it first helped me find a home and roommates in a new city. Three years, two cities and umpteen relocations later, Internet is again the reason I have the apartment I always wanted, and a sweet li’l roommate, everything worked out within a week and right under all the estate agent noses left sniffing the rainy air! And yes, my present job too. Just the one I wanted, and noone else thought such jobs exist. No need for applause.

The Internet has also been remedial to my Queuephobia – no more physical banking, ticket booking for me, sir. The scoffers of yore would be delighted to see my (company sponsored) lappy with four browsers – one to browse in German, another for English, one exclusively for using Outlook and one with a fancy logo.

AND the point of telling you all of this is… uh… I did have a very good point… never mind. Just wanted to blog.

Is there life after death?

2009-06-11T13:00:00.000-07:00

Well, I had to talk about it. This is the story of a magazine gone wrong. It was called India Insight.

Many people would have many different sides of the story to tell - this is my side of it. More than a year ago when I had the crazy urge to stop working as a translator and try my luck as a copywriter, I packed my bags and came to a city I thought I knew - Pune. The King in Paulo Coehlo's Alchemist says that when you set out on the way to your dreams, nature rewards you with a little success on your first step - its called beginner's luck.

So with no experience, no training in media, I ended up with the job I'd have killed for - not as Junior Copywriter in some obscure advertising company, but as subeditor for a newly launched weekly magazine with some ambitious plans to redefine journalism in India. For the first few weeks, the work was maddening - intimidating, exhausting, but oh, the feeling of holding a fresh copy of the magazine in my hands... 64 pages of honest, if a little amateurish journalism, that I helped organise, arrange into one issue packed with stories on every subject of interest from politics to films to history to sports... this was May and June 2008. India Insight was launched on May 4, I joined the tiny team on May 13. By the first week of July we got a real office - by mid-July I got help as two more sub-editors joined us. By end of July, from a team of two - me and the creative head slogging on issue after issue of the magazine - we had grown to a full-fledged editorial team of 3 sub-editors, a chief editor, a copy editor working from Delhi, and 3 assistants to the chief designer. By August, publication stopped.

I won't get into blame games here, so never mind what went wrong. Only a lot of dreams were shattered - big deal. But one issue of that magazine, dated August 8-14 2008, which was the first product of our complete team, never made it to the stands. Somewhat hurts. It also hurts, still hurts that two people among the new faces were there because of me. I told them we needed more people in this amazing new publishing house, that we had two magazines running and more in the offing, that yes it was a risk for them to quit their present jobs but that the risk was worth taking. I'm not conceited enough to think that I influenced their decision or the course of their lives, but I was the Nimittya - there's no better word for it. Had I not told them about this job, they wouldn't have quit their jobs in Bangalore.

I'm still chasing my dream. And I remain indebted to India Insight for marking my first step towards it. Journalism is what I wanted for my life and if I started late, it was only because I hadn't had the nerve before. This was my beginner's luck. This weekend, I'll be in Bangalore, watching a play by my favourite theatre group. We'd done a little story on them, in the August 8 issue - very few copies of that issue were printed, and I've managed to save one with me. I'll hopefully be able to hand it over to the group's director.

India Insight, meanwhile, lives on. After August last year, it was re-launched from Bangalore in October. And again from Pune last month, this time as a fortnightly. The publishers remain optimistic and I too wish the magazine all the success. Only hoping that this time, the still-ambitious project does not displace a lot of young people, play with their dreams and render them jobless in a month.

Truly multi-media

2009-06-10T04:33:00.000-07:00

Television has changed. Thank God.

Gone are the Tulsis and Parvatis and the entire generation of low IQ TV shows they had inspired - I don't care to be politically correct. If you don't agree with my views, read some other blog. While the sari-clad, heavily bejewelled bahus no longer rule the roost, the intellectual damage they have done to Indian television will take some more years to repair. The Ballika Vadhu generation of popular soaps address serious social issues - but in form, story development, characterisation and dialogue, they still largely survive on Balaji-created clichés. Good girls still prefer ethnic wear, and a pair of well-toned skirt clad legs usually carries a femme fatale with evil intent. Sigh.

But well, a Sarabhai v/s Sarabhai isn't everybody's cup of tea. Intelligent television humour is what I'm talking about. Sarabhai created its own definitions, with characters replacing old clichés with fresh pet peeves. Who can forget the middle class Monisha; lazy and lovable, missing no chance to save every rupee of her wealthy hubby, to the point of selling stale wine packed in a plastic bag to a cop! That was Star One of yore, with fresh, funny, youthful content which provided good relief from the run-of-the-mill productions of that time. Sadly, Star One soon sold out. Dill Mil Gaye and Mile Jab Hum Tum might not fall into the Saans-Bahu category as rightfully boasted by their respective makers, but the bird brained doctors and collegians looking like 30-year-olds definitely don't qualify as quality television…

So well, the change I’m talking about isn’t really a change in content. A few shows might have relaxed the dress code for their leading ladies, but television IQ has a long way to recover. What I am talking about then, is the PR approach. TV shows realise that to get noticed in times of shorter attention span, they need to have a presence on various media. Who would have thought 10 years ago of a TV show sponsoring another show on another channel as part of its promotional campaign? Or for that matter TV stars pretending to be their screen selves for the benefit of media? Enter Sony Entertainment Television. Some years ago, the ingenious publicity campaign of totally overwriting Mona Singh’s true identity with the bespectacled Jassi succeeded in creating sustainable hype around the otherwise mundane show. The same channel now has gone a step further for the new show Bhaskar Bharti – a lame TV execution of an outrageous concept. A guy turns to a girl overnight, and is doomed to a woman’s life.

While the show itself is lame, the way it is being promoted is interesting – besides the usual hoardings and advertisements, Bharti maintains a blog and regularly updates her Facebook and Twitter profiles. Now, TV shows having a Facebook profile may not be new, only that here, the tweets are actually an extension of the fictional show. Wish that kind of creativity had also gone into the making of the show.

What intrigues one is, what if that idea was applied to some classic old shows – imagine what Joey (from Friends) would daily tweet about – who’d be on Harriet Brindle’s friend network? Maybe we’ll soon have an entire network of fictional characters tweeting on the net, forever blurring the line between Tellyworld and cyberspace…

Learning to walk

2009-04-25T12:07:00.000-07:00

Learning to walk

I was about to start off with a story of my life, but face it, nobody wants to read that. So here I am, my first blog, with no clue about what I want to write about. My own life is too insignificant, and while the people in my life are my personal superstars, I don't know about you guys. In fact, I don't know you guys at all!

So let me just say that I meant to write, since a long time. And only got the courage now. Special mention here to two blogs that have kind of given the li'l ol' push: One is Woman in Black (http://womaninblack71.wordpress.com/), a blogger I started following a couple of months ago that has me hooked for her sheer wit and honesty. Hers is also the vein I'd love to see myself writing in - WIB, please watch out for plagiarism :)

Second was an online review of the embarrassingly amateurish movie Dashavatharam (yes, Gayathri, I'll still call it that) to which I posted my opinion, and ended up in an online war of counter-comments with a little racist down south. No, I'm not saying South Indians are racists - I still speak fondly of my time in Bangalore and the people who made it special for me. But boy, did I enjoy snapping at my racist friend! And I thought, well, its about time I had my own little column too.

I'll share more about myself in weeks and months to come. For now, I am Deepti*, I work for a magazine, love movies to the point of obsession - I promise you a Jaani Dushman blog soon, which will summarise years of hard work researching crappy movies, appreciate food enough to enjoy Sushi, dream of writing a novel and becoming the ultimate polyglot.

And finally a confession - I'm bad at concluding! So I'll just say ciao, and thank you for stopping by. Hopefully the next post will actually have a subject :)

*Thought of using a pseudonym, but forget it. Maybe I'll create an online alter-ego later to say all the nasty things I can't say here. Or I could post nasty comments to my own blog!