Head over Heels

This post was actually meant to be published on MD's birthday a few days ago, but then Bangalore-Puducherry happened and it got left out. 

Mohini, Mohini, Mohini…*

If Helen of Troy was the face that could launch a thousand ships, she was the face that could launch a thousand movies. When this* chant was inserted as an intro for a film song, little did they know that it would catapult the actress to stardom. She later on went to prove that she was a mohini indeed, an enchantress nonpareil; the real ‘acid’ that would burn a thousand hearts! If these many references can’t get you to guess whom I’m talking of, then go take a hike to the next hill!  There is only one of her kind – the inimitable Madhuri Dixit!

The face where a thousand expressions flit with ease, the grace and beauty undying till date, the smile that can set a million men into a tizzy, her laugh which can set thousands of hearts on a flutter –  you really wonder what there is, not to like in her. For me, she’s arguably the best beauty to have graced Bollywood (I haven’t seen much of Madhubala, who people describe was/is the epitome of beauty, other than a couple of songs and pics to judge, honestly). She danced her way into Bollywood with the cult classic – Ek, do, teen… That song did more than teach the nation to count the days of the month in Hindi. Saroj Khan (her choreographer) deftly extracted the best from her – Madhuri had arrived. And how!

As good an actress that she is, for me she stands out as the best dancer in the movie business. If you have any doubts, you need not take my word for it. I’d urge you to check out a few of her songs. Be it classical or free-form; be it Indian or Western, Madhuri lends a certain grace and personal touch to the choreography that cannot be imitated by anyone, na… not even by watching her songs a zillion times. Be it the highly popular Ek, do, teen (Tezaab); or the song that stopped one’s heartbeats, contrary to what the lyrics suggested – Dhak dhak karne laga (Beta)!

Choli ke peeche kya hai (Khalnayak)? asked a song very suggestively, and Madhuri added sensuality sans vulgarity. She looked like the hottest fisher-woman on the planet as she swayed to Humko aaj kal hain (Sailaab). Who can forget her diamond-cut back open blouse and blue saree of Didi tera dewar deewana (Hum Aapke Hain Kaun) fame?  She grooved to Ankhiyan milaun (Raja) and gave Sanjay Kapoor his (once and forever) two minutes of fame! She also single-handedly managed to make Bengal gram fields sexy when she sang about the scuffles in Chane ke khet mein (Anjaam). She swayed to Mera piya ghar aaya (Yaarana); which makes me wonder, which piya wouldn’t be glad to see her? No one else could have carried off the role of Pooja of Dil To Pagal Hain – a dancer by profession (Shiamak Davar’s delight, I am sure). She matched Prabhu Deva in Que sera sera (Pukar), and gave all the leading ladies a run for their money with the grace and poise she exuded in Maar dala (Devdas), inspite of having to manage the dress weighing almost 30kgs (I read)! I’ve tried in vain to twitch the eyebrows, one at a time, like she did. Sadly all I manage is a look which words can’t describe. What’s more, she made Aishwarya pale in comparison (aah, who cares about the ‘others’) when they matched steps in Dola re dola (Devdas). She made a comeback through Aaja Nachle, the title track of which is a delight to watch, for the Madhurian charm (there, I even made an adjective!)

She can make any co-star look appealing (Sanjay Kapoor and Akshay Kumar cases in point) and can turn any song into a blockbuster. Who else has made each costume of each song iconic? Whether it’s the orange sari of Dhak dhak; the blue sari of Didi tera dewar, the fisherwoman look of Sailaab, the ghagri choli of Choli ke peeche or the resplendent green costume of Maar dala? You are forced to go to cinema halls (Koyla), stick to the channel playing her movie (Raja) and stay glued to it to watch her on screen (Jhalak Dikhla Jaa) no matter how bad the film/show has fared, such is her charisma!

She can look sensuous without looking slutty; she can give Munni and Sheila a run for their money, any day – hands down! She is the lead star and the item girl, all rolled into one. The fact that she is/was a certain Hussain’s muse and she had a movie named after her, in which a small town girl aspires to be her (Main Madhuri Dixit Banna Chahti Hoon!) is ample proof of her popularity and magic. No doubt, the first crush for my generation. Even today, she need only smile once and you will hear a collective gasp from the audience. Guaranteed.

High time this chant* is altered to give the person behind the persona some credit -

Madhuri, Madhuri, Madhuri…

That’s more like it.

Favourite Hero Entry

Karan Johar claims that he has introduced Shahrukh Khan in slow motion in all his movies (it's for you to check if he follows the trend in My Name is Khan :-P). None of his 'dramatic' entries compare to my favourite entry in a film - that of Ajay Devgan in Phool aur Kaante:

He stands mounted on two bikes, one leg on each. The bikes along with their entourage consisting of a few more bikes are zooming with high speeds and the hero showing absolutely no signs of any imbalance even in the sharpest of the turns. He's required to break his perfectly comfortable stance on approaching a road divider, where the bikes separate out a bit, and he spreads his legs out wide. He resumes his original position on arriving outside the college campus, where he's welcomed by hordes of female fans lined up on both sides of the road cheering wildly. The hero breaks into a big grin, raises his fists in the air and does a "Yay"!

The scene ends rather disappointingly though. The bike gang approaches the college building with a jerk, and the 'acrobat' is thrown out of his amazing stance and lands in the laps of - hold your breath - an overweight sidekick!

Absolutely amazing :-D

PS: It'll be immense fun in knowing your own "Favourite Hero Entry".

From Bah to Wah!

Just yesterday during one of our music sessions, I attempted to translate a beautiful Hindi verse into crude English which resulted in pure disaster. As expected, it won some insightful comments from my partners like "eeww" and other unprintable pronunciations. Surprisingly enough, one comment did suggest a poetry award at a local kavi-sammelan, if not at the National Awards, which brings me to my point: I'm NOT a poet! The best I've done so far is a Quartet on Roger Federer before his US Open 2009 final a couple of months back. It went like this:

Early to bed,
Very early to rise.
To watch Fed,
2 AM to be precise.

It's axiomatic that poets have great imagination (whether they only imagine that people will actually read their poems, is another issue). Honestly, I suck at poetry whenever I have a shot at it. To put it in a better way, I'd never been too fond of poetry. In fact I'd be one of the types who unknowingly landed up at a poetry recital (at the Poona Music Society) and wondered why each poem didn't rhyme.
Throughout school, poetry was my biggest villain - simply because I hated the idea of mugging it up and puking it out either on paper or sometimes in front of a class full of uninterested peers. The hatred continued so much that I'd switch the TV channel every time I heard a deep voice narrating "Main, aur meri tanhayee…" or politicians praising a former PM's latest book 'Meri Bayaalis Kavitayen'.

* P.T.O.*

Then I saw Gunda...

... which transformed my entire approach towards poetry and reintroduced me to the world of 2 or 4-line rhymes (A-B-A-B, A-A-B-B etc.). Now I could go on and on about this entertaining 1998 Mithunda blockbuster, but then after having received plenty of blows on the skull with blunt objects after having done the same, I'll restrict myself here. Gunda (directed by Kanti Shah, dialogues by Bashirbhai Babar) has a gigantic collection of rhymes and verses that could convert any poetry-hater into a Wordsworth!

Sample:
"Mera naam Ibu Hatela.
Maa meri chudail ki beti,
aur baap shaitaan ka chela.
Khaegaa kela?"

For reasons unknown, it unfortunately couldn't reach the box office critics, but has won enough fans and worshippers to achieve its cult status comparable to Sholay or Pulp Fiction. I know I should stop raving more about this film, but then at the end, the fact remains that I've finally started appreciating poetry (what if it's after watching Gunda)!
Soon you could catch me at the next kavi-sammelan or a poetry recital in rapt attention; but whether any poems will actually appear on my blog, only time will tell... :-D

Note: Check out Gunda's community on orkut for the details, more rhymes and verses.

Inspiring Mov(i)e

This post comes in the wake of the newspaper story of one Mr. Banerjee getting inspired by the movie Swades – giving up lucrative offers in the US and returning to India to start an English-medium school for the rural people. I really appreciate his move – risky but worth following. Just a few days before this story was in the news, I stumbled upon a poll to decide the most inspiring Bollywood movie of recent times and the result was... ...Rang De Basanti According to the poll, the standings were - 1) RDB 2) Swades and Taare Zameen Par 3) Lakshya 4) Lage Raho Munnabhai and A Wednesday About RDB, I thought it was an interesting movie, and I did see the movie twice after its release, but the movie did not inspire me to do anything different. My vote went to Lakshya. Not for Kargil, not for patriotism, not for Farhan Akhtar, not for Hrithik Roshan, not for anything fancy. But for these very simple lines that Romi's (Preity Zinta) dad says to Karan (Hrithik Roshan)...

"Tum jo bhi karo achha karo. Agar scientist bano toh achhe scientist bano. Agar ghaas kaatne wale bano toh achha ghaas kaatne wale bano. Warna kya faayda?" (Whatever you do, do it well. If you become a scientist, be a good scientist. If you become a grass-cutter, be a good grass-cutter. Otherwise what's the point?)

I love that movie for these lines. I really did wake up and feel different the next day. About my hobbies, about my… About everything actually. PS: Had overheard this while exiting the cinema hall after watching Swades: "Bass re...GRE, MS cancel" :-D

Movie Review: Taare Zameen Par (without being a critic)

(I know I'm awfully late in reviewing this movie. Though, unlike the critic-version of the reviews you might have possibly read so far, I'm writing this without being one.) Taare Zameen Par brought back memories of childhood. No, I wasn’t dyslexic - at least not clinically! But there are some things that are common to children - whether dyslexic or not - they create their own world of imagination and love living in it. I remember discussing this with a couple of my friends during one of our post-rehearsal discussions (to be precise, the one we had when I was recording "Maa") - and we all agreed on one thing - when we were kids, we often imagined ourselves as being heroes - larger-than-life creatures, almost mythical characters. One of us saw himself as a cricketer who uprooted the middle stump with every ball he bowled in his dream stadium located in the living room. Then this girl was the next Madhuri Dixit – all the moves et al. One even used to imagine himself singing with a guitar in his hand, in a huge stadium with the packed-to-capacity crowd chanting his name! Sorry for digressing...I am thinking – this is what a movie like TZP does to you, it makes you think! It doesn’t take a film-critic to notice the attention-to-detail given by the makers of the movie in as far as the characterization is concerned. Certain things which really stuck into my memory (while watching it again last weekend) include: 1. The way Ishan Awasthi behaved when he is thrown out of the class in school 2. When Ishan is playing with dogs and the kids in the neighbourhood ask him to get the ball, the dog on his lap is actually sleeping! 3. Aamir’s at-times vocal and at-times controlled expressions 4. Facial expression of the school kids throughout the movie 5. The climax - when Aamir reveals the portrait followed by the hug...very touching :-) It is amazing how so many sub-issues can be dealt with without losing sight of the central theme. Certain sub-issues addressed in Taare Zameen Par (besides for the central theme – dyslexia, of course) include: • Physically-handicapped children • Teacher-student relationship • Corporal-punishment in schools • Parents’ attitudes towards under-performing kids and their over-expectation from the performers • Society’s tendency to add a “number” to every child – judging him/her solely on the basis of academic qualification/achievements The lyrics and the music totally standout – both in the context of the movie and even otherwise. What I liked most about the music was the extensive use of distortion guitars and the melodious strumming in most of the songs. Credit to Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy and Prasoon Joshi. Different movies evoke different reactions from audiences. OSO might make you laugh (?). Black might make you weep. Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi will make you think. Taare Zameen Par will make you do all of these things. Besides, it will make you feel!

Movie Review: Slumdog Millionaire

Slumdog Millionaire has hogged too much of media headlights. I finally managed to watch it last weekend. There was a debate about west lapping up India’s slums and how the movie was so sentiment-evoking. I am disappointed on both the counts. Our own Indian movies have shown poverty/child prostitution/people on fringes in much more evocative manner: Traffic Signal, Kalyug, Chandni Bar, etc. And a substantial part of movie Slumdog Millionaire is similar to Traffic Signal. Though, latter takes it on a deeper level. Wait, I am not accusing Slumdog Millionaire of plagiarism. All I am saying that this movie that has been immensely moving to West, has been seen by us Indians several times before. I haven't read Vikas Swarup’s Q and A, but whatever things his story has weaved in: we have read often in magazines, watched in our movies, heard in news. It has every single thing we know: police mutely watching in case of communal riots, guides of Agra, begging business, child prostitution and last but the least our call centres. The entire story has been weaved in the background of Who wants to be millionaire?, which could be easily be replaced to winning a lottery to show a rags-to-riches story. It’s a sad thing we are getting used to grimness around. However, to be fair to Danny Boyle, I do not think he has set out to exploit India’s slums. Though there is an opening sequence, where policeman chases slum kids, camera pans to show us glimpse-of-dirtiest-possible-place on the earth, something our movies have shied away even when capturing penury. But you can fairly say, "story ki demand thi" :P Good things: Performances and cinematography. The young Jamal, Salim (especially Salim) and Latika played by slum kids were wonderful. Dev Patel is endearing. Anil was good as catty host. But disappointment Frieda Pinto, there wasn’t much for her to do, you see.

A Wednesday - Stupid Common Man

First of all, here is another silent prayer for the unfortunate souls who died in the terrorist attack (26/11) in Mumbai and I am not referring to the bastards who attacked Mumbai. The terrorists were neither unfortunate nor do their souls deserve a prayer. May they rot in hell. Now, I shall try and be as brief as possible about the movie, which would be being true to its running time as well - around 95 mins. Excellent acting all round by Anupam Kher, Naseeruddin Shah, Jimmy Shergill and others (there might be a few glitches) but the excellence of the movie overshadows everything. It is not a paragon of cinematic finesse, but a triumph of storytelling excellence with just the necessary wicked kick in the tale. No songs, no drama. Just plain good cinema. Actually you don't need anything else when you have two of the best actors in Anupam Kher and Naseeruddin Shah! Good work by Neeraj Pandey (script, direction) and his team which had the courage to bring this light. "A Wednesday" tells the story of a man who holds the city of Mumbai to ransom for a day, asking for four terrorists to be handed over to him. The movie gives just the right raw feel of a nation whose citizens are currently awash with rage/outrage (make your pick), including yours truly. The rest of the movie tells the incredibly prescient story of what follows. I believe every Indian must see the movie. Half of the reason the 1st paragraph is worded like it is, is due to the movie. The other reason is that I had decided to pay some homage to Mumbai in my first post in the aftermath of the attack. Please see the movie. If the producers/director are half as savvy as they were when they made it, they should re-release the movie. They will make a lot of money, I think.

Why So Serious?

After waiting a few days to let the "dust settle", we grabbed the opportunity to catch The Dark Knight. I don't profess to be a fan of comic book movies, but I am a fan of classic summer movies. And what a summer movie it was! A monday morning show usually does it for us ( monday = official "pichcher" day...or was it the Project day?! ) The Dark Knight follows Batman (Christian Bale) as he partners up with Lt. James Gordon (Gary Oldman) and District Attorney Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) to fight crime in Gotham City. The film opens with our first encounter with the Joker (Heath Ledger), but it escalates into something much darker as the Joker gains control over Gotham. And all you late-latifs, miss the starting sequence at you own peril :-P I enjoyed the film for its entertainment value, but I also appreciated its strong acting, thought-provoking themes, and setting. Don't get me wrong; this is not exactly a deep film, but for a summer thriller it goes the extra mile. In terms of acting, Heath Ledger outperformed everyone - hands down! I read somewhere that it was so good, Michael Cane reportedly forgot his lines out of fright during the shooting of the penthouse scene. Cane hadn't met Ledger until this scene, so apparently, he was extremely convincing. Eventually, The Dark Knight is a must-see film...as simple as it gets :-)