Monday, July 19, 2010

Thoughts to ponder

A post after a long long of time. And this mail compelled me to post following reply.

I received above said mail from my relative and I was like "ye kya chal raha hai? who creates such a damn mail?". Generally we all get such mails where the only action you need to take to prove yourself as true Human/Indian/Hindu/Marathi/Punjabi/Tamil etc etc etc is to FORWARD mails to your friends. (I wrote about one such mail on my blog here).

So the reply is like this:

"Very true, But the point is why should we expect someone serving us for free?

If someone is doing a hard work, that's right being a politician is a very very hard work, why should he not be paid adequately? If you are running a company or holding key position in corporate world, you will earn much more than what a politician earns. (I mean legal income for both ;) That's why talented persons don't opt for political career. I am of the view that political remuneration should be such that all the talented persons should view it much above IT/Banking/finance/consultancy jobs.

In the present scenario only ones who does not get any job enters to politics. Few others enter politics because their business is politics. All the second/third generation leaders are only carrying their family business forward. Their pa/grandpa have invested so much in politics that if they don't harvest the crop, who else will? They will make fool of themselves if they don't cash the crop.

Any type of work which needs dealing with people having lower IQ/awareness than you is painful. (Thats why I am happily designing buildings from office but not dare/willing to enter the actual construction business). Honestly ask yourself why you are not entering politics? The immediate answer comes there is a lot of "gandagi". So a person who is dealing with this gandagi day in and day out is ought to be "ganda" himself. Ralely people remain clean in politics. Because unless you have very strong will and very high vision you are bound to be trapped by the people surrounding you.

So Rather then blaming the politicians, many times I think that they are doing a great job by filling the position where none of "US" want to be. After the independence there was a shortage of higly-educated people entering in the politics. In the struggle of independence all top leaders were lawyers, journalists, teachers, philosophers, scientists or such. But I don't know why very few people opted for politics after independence. So there was vacuum. This opportunity was sensed by people who did not have great visions. Thus they entered into politics and subsequent generations tried to make politics difficult to be assessed by others so that they can have monopoly over it and run it as business.

Many time I also disturbed by the gravity of the situation of our nation. But a little deeper thinking reveals that everything is in the place where it should be. If the kind of politicians we have in our Vidhansabhas and Loksabha they deserve to be there, because better than those did not dare to fight elections.

It also happens that many times we are so obsessed with dark/dirty part of politics (and for that matter any other aspect of life) that we dont see gray or white shade of it.

So the problem is multidimensional. And the last line of the mail really makes no sense. 855 crore is not even sufficient for a flood relief of a small state. It can only make life's of very few few people livable."

I keep replying to such mails with unexpected replies, and I guess some people have removed my name from their "forward" list. At least my replies did save me if not humankind/India/Hindu/Marathi/Punjabi/Tamil etc etc etc.

Please also share your views on this.

Sunday, July 18, 2010

college kids got talent...

Remember the Super Mario thing from last year's 'India's Got Talent'? No? Here...





Now, take it to another level altogether... in America's Got Talent 2010...


Saturday, July 17, 2010

Trailer Park 3

Let's start with Frieda Pinto... Julian Schnabel... and Bombay Theme!



One for fun....



And the rest.... interesting for one reason or another...









Friday, July 16, 2010

Who would not want to buy this..

.. Atleast the ads are really cute!!

Also check out the links at the RHS of http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niOCmIuts90&feature=channel for more if you want to see more similar ads.



Cheers!

2010... the awards so far...

I have seen Inception only about an hour ago, so clearly this post will be unduly colored because of that. But that's ok.. we'll not consider this my "movies of first half of 2010" post, but a part of my "let me salute Inception" posts.. :)

Note: the foreign Language movies are mostly of 2009, but got proper US releases only in 2010. so....

so.....

Best Supporting Actor: John Hawkes (Winter's Bone), Guillermo Francella (The Secret in their Eyes),  and Niels Arestrup (Un Prophete)
special mentions: Pablo Rago (The Secret in their Eyes), Nana Patekar (Raajneeti)

Best Supporting Actress: Priyamani (Raavan/Raavanan) and Olivia Williams (The Ghost Writer)
special mentions: Soledad Villamil (The Secret in their Eyes), Dale Dickey (Winter's Bone), Ellen Page (Inception) (well, she looked great.. and we KNOW she is a great actress... didn't have to do all that much here though.. still, they are my awards, aren't they? :P which reminds me.. I think I'll give one to Marion Cotillard too!!)

Best Actor: Tahar Rahim (Un Prophete)
special mentions: Leonardo DiCaprio (Shutter Island/Inception), Filippo Timi (Vincere), Naseeruddin Shah (Ishqiya), Vikram (Raavanan)

Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence (Winter's Bone) and Giovanna Mezzogiorno (Vincere)
special mentions: Noomi Rapace (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), Vidya Balan (Ishqiya), Hye-Ja Kim (Mother)

Best Screenplay: Christopher Nolan (Inception)
special  mentions: Michael Arndt (Toy Story 3), Park/Bong (Mother), Sacheri/Campanella (The Secret in their Eyes)


Best Director: Christopher Nolan (Inception)
special mentions: Roman Polanski (The Ghost Writer), Debra Granik (Winter's Bone), Michael Haneke (The White Ribbon), Juan José Campanella (The Secret in their Eyes)

Best Picture: Inception
special mention: Toy Story 3
slightly less special mentions: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Secret in their Eyes, Vincere, The Secret of Kells
ohh.. and some more: Mother, Winter's Bone, Ishqiya, The Ghost Writer, Shutter Island

ohh.. wait.. Best Picture isn't the last award here.. I have another...

Master of Rahul's Movie Universe: Christopher Nolan :) :)

Update:


After seeing Inception second time....

I'm replacing Ellen Page with Marion Cotillard in best supporting actress... :)

Also... needless to say, Inception takes all the technical awards... Best Editing, Best Sound Design, Best Visual Effects, Best Music Score (a very special mention to Toy Story 3 but, really, Inception's score is something else entirely), and maybe even Best Cinematography (with Shutter Island and The White Ribbon giving it tough competition... perhaps even sharing the award).

Sunday, July 11, 2010

They knew you loved them already....

Was reading a post on Slashdot about extreme caving, and found this one comment...

I second the statement, "I'm not claustrophobic, but this is insane". It's the sheer un-rescue-ability of it all, if you simply get wedged, that gets to me.

A young man died cave diving in the Rockies not far from Calgary a few years back. The awful bit was that he got delayed coming back, wasn't sure how far it was, went to the limit of his air, turned the little knob that gives you the last five minutes, and used that time scratching out a goodbye to his family on the air tank.

Right around one more corner from where he would have seen the flashlights of his friends waiting for him.

Lessons I took from it:

1) Cave diving is insane.

2) If you're ever certain you're at that last moment of your life, nevertheless spend it trying to survive. Your family actually knew you loved them already.

United Colors of Music..

Udaan.. Aisha.. and now Puli is out too (and I hear good things about Pritam's Once Upon a Time in Mumbai too). Have to hear them for some days before saying much, but overall I'm sure between all these albums there will be definitely a few songs that will be part of my playlist for quite some time (unless Endhiran comes and kicks everything else out :P ).

Puli, specially, seems pretty good even after just one hearing. One of those "very catchy in the first hearing itself, which means it will probably never reach the status of one of ARR's great albums but a very fun listen nevertheless" albums. The one song that doesn't fit this desription, because it might rise to being one of those "greats" finally and is decidedly not a "fun listen" as the rest of the album is, is "Namakame". ARR brings together Chithra, Madhushree and Harini and the song definitely lives up to the high expectations I'd have had after hearing this "starcast" :)

Here.... listen and be happy...

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Amit Trivedi Strike 2

Aisha's music is out!
This is the second album after DevD by Amit Trivedi whose every single track is likeable (at least for me ;)). Some of its tracks (esp the Punjabi ones) may not be to everyone's tastes....but I quite like the foot-tapping number...perfect for that DJ-night :D

Check out one of the best songs from the album "Lehrein" here :




and one of the "fun" songs "Behke Behke" here:





I like how his music captures the mood of the movie but gives individuality to each song. Same was the case with Aamir, DevD and now also Udaan alongwith Aisha.

Speaking of Udaan.....the movie that I am really looking forward to :) here are two must-hear songs from its album.





and this Theme song is simply awesome!! (the video is 5:39 but the theme ends at 2:40 I think).


Christian the Lion

Found this lovely video on youtube. there are many videos on youtube with the same name.

Friday, July 9, 2010

"You can see now?"

One of the most moving scenes of a great movie ....... A MUST watch movie :)



Wish I had words to do justice to this movie ...... maybe someday when I am relatively free(er) ... till then this should do.

Wonderful piece of work.

Monday, July 5, 2010

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Udaan Trailer

Coming soon in India, after having opened in Cannes this year.. Looks pretty good. (Pesc. somehow didn't think this trailer is worthy of this blog. :D  she posted it on her blog, but not here!)

So true.. So true...

Looney Luna Loves Laddoos

Looney Luna had heard about them.. but never had anyone conclusively proved anything.

As the myth went.. when Merleshwar Appoliosus planted his wand on Mount Everest, there sprung a fountain of youth which showered Magical Besan ke Laddoo. Anyone who ate those laddoos could gain eternal youth and attain immortality.

Magical Besan Laddoo

When the Patil sisters had their first nephew, their family sent over a large package to the twins at Hogwarts. A huge parcel arrived with the morning's owl post and a large tawny dropped off the package painted with cauldrons of gulab jamun and mithai-laden flying saucers. Padma opened the parcel with gleeful anticipation knowing it was going to be filled with goodies from home to celebrate the arrival of the young one.

And that's when Luna spotted them. Nestled cozily in a large pile, golden brown spheres jeweled with greenish nuts. Besan ke Laddoo!! Were these the legendary Magical Laddoos? They seemed innocent enough. Parvati reached in and grabbed a few. One by one came everyone's turn.. the whole school got to try the celebratory Laddoos.

Finally Looney Luna got her prize.. it lay in her hand like an ordinary candy-ball. But when she lifted it up to eat, the laddoo leaped right out of her grasp! Darting and twitching, left and right it whirred.. she tried to grab it.. but it wasn't easy to catch the little devil! Everyone around her was doing the same... jumping and leaping, trying to catch their laddoos!! Luna turned to Parvati, "How do we eat these?" Parvati smiled annoyingly, "Of all the people here, you should be the first one to get your laddoo!!" she said enigmatically.

Looney Luna was mildly miffed. She couldn't imagine what would be the use of giving out candy if one couldn't eat it! Oh well, life's intricacies did not bother Luna for long. She simply left her flying laddoo alone and started to pack-up for class. As she made her way through the Great Hall her laddoo followed her, zipping around her, taunting and tempting her with every move. But Luna politely ignored it.

On her way out she remembered that she had forgotten to wear her radish earrings!! As she fished them out of her bag, gazing idly at the Wrackspurts hovering over Ginny's head, it struck Luna that her laddoo was slowing down and getting closer to her. She noticed tiny little golden fluttering wings on the laddoo. Could they actually be the endangered Golden Snidgets enchanted illegally to look like laddoos.. ? The more Luna analyzed this possibility, the more the laddoo slowed down and the closer it came. That was weird.. was the laddoo suffering from Loser's Lurgy?

That was it! The laddoo plonked right into Luna's hand and just sat there waiting for her to eat.

Why this abrupt beneficence from the prank-laddoo! Hmm.. reminded Luna of the recently published work on Duality in Quantum Phygic! Incidentally, Luna was a staunch supporter of the latest theories in Quantum Phygic and Mathemagic. She particularly adored Booleo Maradona, the young Mathemagician who had boldly challenged established Seers, claiming that his “equations” could be used to predict the outcome of Quiditch World Cup better than their tea leaves. Ron and Harry's laddoos, whizzing in the air near Luna, were now also starting to slow down and approach her..

That was just about when Padma Patil announced in the Hall, "Everyone who has never eaten Magical Laddoos before... we celebrate birthdays with fun and laughter. So you need to think something silly and funny if you want to eat these laddoos."

Interesting, thought Luna, this silly thoughts strategy could be the laddoo’s way of forcing people to remember their childhood, in effect imparting eternal youth!!
The myth of the Magical Laddoos was true after all. Just as Luna had always known! Perhaps she could get the Patils to send a few laddoos as evidence to the Quibbler.. and some more to Booleo Maradona..

Plonk! Plonk! Plonk!
----------------------------

PS: This is our 100th post!!

Trailer Park -2 (The animation edition)

Some pretty good trailers of upcoming animated features. All of the movies might not turn out  to be great, but definitely all of them do look promising to some extent.











Saturday, July 3, 2010

Apna Mithunda

Yesterday, along with the hyped I Hate Luv Storys, another movie released which surprisingly got more coverage than expected. I say "surprisingly" because it is a Bengali movie, and usually non-hindi movies that release do not get much coverage.
This one's called "Shukno Lanka" or "Dry red chillies". Till now, I have only heard/read good things about it, including good performances.....

Take a look here:

http://www.washingtonbanglaradio.com/content/7913910-shukno-lanka-2010-bengali-movie-review-aditya-chakrabarty

or here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1ObCvqK-Kc

TOI says "For those who still remember Mithun Chakraborty's sterling act in Buddhadeb Dasgupta's Tahader Katha, here's another chance to discover the true colours of the thespian actor who has the ability to grab eyeballs with something more than his disco dancing abilities."

The trailer does not say much...but with the praise as above...I would like to go watch it (let's see if I can make it).

Friday, July 2, 2010

Oh Boy!

The timing is perfect, no? As we more oh-so-close to our 100th post, Warner Bros have decided to help us out with our HP posts. I *love* this poster. Gave me shivers. I don't know why, but it did.