The modern day hunters watch and learn
A friend who calls himself an adventurer once told me that entertainment influences the explorer within and actualizes the creative genes fastest. ‘Reading? I asked. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘that helps. Though watching films is easier now and has a faster rate of conversion into actionable decisions.’ So yes, films do help us discover our potential...
The Pokhran Explosions
Pokhran 1998 wasn’t just about a series of underground nuclear explosions to impress the world or to frighten and quieten our neighbours, but to work as a viable deterrent to outside powers as in the past 2500 years it has invariably been foreign invaders in the sub-continent not once but many times. What happened 20...
You’ve nothing to be afraid of
Politics is at the heart of House of Cards, the television drama that has now entered its fifth season. The strange thing about watching it unfold on the small screen is that not even for a moment did I feel whatever I was watching isn’t somehow connected to what happens in our own country. Of...
Freedom to decide
Amitabh did not care about what people would say and decided to follow his dream to enter the world of films. I remember this story that senior manager in a company told me when the interview hopped from the tenets of sales and marketing to my wanting to write a novel. He told me that...
You can watch India’s finest films on television
Movie watching isn’t about any Ardh Satya talking about Gangoobai or Massey Sahib recreating a Qissa with a lot of Mirch Masala. Nor is it just about The Good Road to Dharavi that Mammo decides to take. Nor are they forever focused on Ek Doctor ki Maut or asking anyone to follow Gandhi. They do...
Magic is there when you look for it
Yes, the simplest formula that we all forget as we let the years take us from one dream to another is that magic is there when you look for it. We stop looking for that magic because childhood forever isn’t what most adults dream about. But the truth is that a child is there within...
We’re all inside a story
Life is fiction if that is what I want to believe in. Or real fiction. These are my choices because I am there in all my stories. I mean we all are there in our stories even when we weave one with other characters. So yes, like the one who created us, we are all...
A dark and romantic world. Review of ‘Badlapur’
Go on, dedicate as many romantic songs to the moon as you want, it will still continue to have its dark side. Ask the moon about it and it won’t really know about it… and I’m unsure if Raghu, the main protagonist of ‘Badlapur’, really knew about his dark side. The film transits from romantic...
‘History being made’ with Katrina
True. There is history being created all around and only a few are lucky enough to be a part of it. Take today. Take me, for instance. I am pretty sure I have a coffee date with Katrina… The Katrina, if I may add. ‘Katrina?’ murmured a friend, ‘but the grapevine talks about #KatrinaMissing and...
Wild at Heart and Weird on Top
Yeah, so I agree with David Lynch when he said that ‘the whole world is wild at heart and weird on top’ because the words fit off-beat films like evil intent does to the wily wolf in that fairy tale with a red riding hood. Off-beat films are about the real facts that we are...
Who got hit? – Review of ‘Chennai Express’
Yes, who got hit? What gets hit is surely not the real in me… and certainly not the fantasy within me. The movie actually made the fantasy genes in me prance with a lot of joy and the real in me was relieved to find a break worth the time spent watching this movie. I...
The Punjabization of insight. Review of ‘Luv Shuv Tey Chicken Khurana’
If you don’t know what rustic philosophising really is, see this movie and know it. The movie takes you straight into the heart of metaphysics that ordinary people repeat and believe in… more so in the untutored villages of Punjab where they whole-heartedly mix and grind it all with slap-stick humour to offer you a...
