Midnight in Paris - Woody Allen

Midnight in Paris is Woody Allen's latest movie and is a completely self-indulgent and utterly delicious movie.

Woody Allen, you b****!

That was my first reaction to the movie. (Spoiler alert in general, but this is not a thriller like say, Match Point. So I am hardly giving anything away).

Woody Allen has made perfect use of the fact that he could get anyone to act for him and will and made perhaps his best movie in two decades. The movie seems to be his way of saying "I know I can get away with anything in my movies, but this time I will entertain you and I will get away with a lot."

Marion Cotillard....ooh! Such devastating beauty!

I am sorry Owen Wilson but you belong in Wes Anderson movies more than Woody's. You didn't do bad though. It is just that someone with a more expressive face would have done. Michael Sheen who I loved in The Damned United portrays a pedantic prick with style.

A bunch of other actors not usually seen in popular movies except Marion and Kathy Bates (who seems to be smugly telling herself not to laugh while she plays out her excellent role as Stein) essay excellent characters although Brody was just ok as Dali. Even Carla Bruni does ok.

Not since Woody Allen totally kicked butt in Annie Hall with this scene (jump to 2:23 for the exact moment), has he made watching his movies as much fun. This is Woody Allen of 1977, but suitably updated for the present day - new and improved to use the cliched term. Despite the obvious nostalgic nods to Hemingway, Picasso, Fitzgerald, Stein among others, not since Stephen Jay Gould viciously attacked romanticism about the past and golden ages in his book Eight Little Piggies, has anyone made such a beautiful commentary on the past, yet commended the virtue of the present age.

This movie could spawn a new genre of art and literature which tips its hat to the past but is not necessarily stuck there like a relapsing alcoholic. It belongs right up there with Jasper Fforde's Nursery Crime series or say the new "Sherlock" series by Stephen Moffat.

The movie has a tongue-in-cheek reference to itself towards the end and runs largely like a Christopher Nolan (of Inception) meets Giuseppe Tornatore (of Cinema Paradiso or the retrospective from the Oscar awards) movie. And the movie is wonderful entertainment with such tastefully chosen music - you know Cole Porter made awesome music. but did you know how much fun you can have when you walk in Paris in the rain with Cole Porter playing in your head? Go watch the movie to find out.

Marion Cotillard....ooh! Such devastating beauty!

Saint Ralph

St. Jude (patron saint of lost causes)
St. Bruno (patron saint against possession)
St. Anthony the Abbot (patron saint of gravediggers)
St. Thomas Aquinas (the patron saint of apologists)
Saint Catherine of Siena (patron saint of fire prevention)
.
.
.
1 for each month of training for Ralph, a 14 year old who thinks his winning the Boston Marathon will be the miracle needed to make his mother awaken from her coma.
Specially endearing if you want to run Boston some day.

Directed by Michael McGowan, winner of the 1995 Detroit Marathon as well as the 1995 Round the Bay Race (apparently North America's oldest race, predating even Boston by 3 years)*, the movie is a charming tale of an ordinary kid with extraordinary persistence.

Nice quote from the movie here:

"If we're not chasing after miracles, what's the point, huh?"

And of course, the awesome rendition of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah by Gord Downie (don't see the youtube video, since it has the ending of the movie)...

...
I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though
It all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah
...

Excellent viewing for a holiday especially in my current mood

* HT to IMDB

The Edge of Heaven

If someone needed convincing that World Cinema needed watching, here is one good poster child.

Spoiler Alert

The Edge of Heaven (aka Auf der anderen Seite) is a movie by Turkish Director, Fatih Akin and tells the story of a man who travels to Turkey in search of the daughter of his father's dead lover.

How the tale twists (and it really does) forms this endearing story. The song by Kazim Koyuncu which serves to knit the movie together is a positively haunting melody. HT to a pal for this one. I wouldn't have seen this movie but for my pal. My weekend has been phenomenal mostly due to watching this movie.

The gentle onset of grief, despair and then subsequent redemption of the movie, is best essayed by the episode during which the protagonist buys a bookshop up for sale in Istanbul, while being treated to chai by the original owner and then the episode repeats itself.

I could say a lot of things here about how the movie makes you feel but perhaps the best thing I can say is that you must watch it, if only to feel as happy as I did once I finished it. And believe me, it is worth the 1:55 that you spend on it. Sunday well spent.

Fantastic movie. Must watch

Inception

Spoiler Alert!

Christopher Nolan shows why Dark Knight was not an isolated masterpiece.
Now that that is out of the way, as several people in the theatre said, the last time someone felt this way was when we all saw The Matrix. It was breathtaking cinema at its best.

Inception beats all comers from anywhere in the last few years. It is a super entertainer and a taut movie. Lee Smith, take a bow. For a 148 min to feel like this, the movie deserves big praise.

All actors essay likeable roles - Ken Watanabe as Saito, Marion Cotillard as Mal, Joseph Gordon Levitt as Arthur, Ellen Paige as Ariadne, Michael Caine as Leo's father in law and of course Leo. While there are shades of his nervy nature (think The Aviator, Blood Diamond, Shutter Island,...) he does sparkle under Nolan's direction. The delectable Marion lends the movie both and an angst-ridden air

The movie is surely a watermark in scripts.

Nolan who has also produced the movie with his wife will make hundreds of millions from this if not a billion!

And the background music by Hans Zimmer does not distract one bit while ensuring you watch most of the movie leaning forward in your seat to see what happens next.

Due to the nature of the movie, I shall not reveal much here. The movie tells the story of an extractor of people's memories who is engaged for a risky job. The underlying complexity to the job and associated events form the best part of two hours of the movie.

Must watch.

Mileage Log, long weekend

4 km on Fri

22.8 km on Sat in 2:05 of which I ran 21 km in about 1:54 or so and hence ended up doing the remaining 1.8 km in 11 min

9.6 km in 49:52 with Manoj Bhat. This was earlier planned as a fast 10k but due to the run y'day and also since I woke up late watching Marathon Man* till past midnight, ate humble pie :(

Ran all of them with old shoes incl. the run today in a pair of Reebok which I hadn't used since 2005! I still hate them...

Also managed to redeem some pride at the World Quizzing Championship 2010 scoring 64 from 8 sections. Not too bad compared to the disaster at the Mahaquizzer on the previous weekend. However it is troubling to note that the memory is withering to not even recall Emma Lazarus :(

* Marathon Man has little to do with running but is a decent watch although it has little running save for some amusing dialogue related to Dustin Hoffman's running in the beginning. He does run a bit in the movie in some chase sequence. Laurence Olivier is menacing.

Rajneeti

SPOILER ALERT

Rajneeti is a much awaited movie on the Hindi movie circuit. Big starcast - Naseeruddin Shah, Nana Patekar, Manoj Bajpai, Ajay Devgn, Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina (not much of an actress usually) and Arjun Rampal (not much of a star, but he is like the male equivalent of eye candy...) were assembled for what was hyped to be a big movie.

The movie is long, but it does not feel so. Prakash Jha attempts to do a Indian political version of the Great Indian Novel (GIN) and almost succeeds. The script is populist especially in the second half. Hardly any songs (atleast in the theatre I went to, they hastily cut a song which had just begun!).

The movie tells the story of a political dynasty and shows how the new generation takes over under a violent transition. The pace is excellent for such a long movie but one wonders whether the director attempted too much. The plot is extremely predictable and Manoj Bajpai and Nana Patekar shine. Katrina actually manages to speak Hindi*. The music by Wayne Sharp is not very noticeable but does not intrude/distract either. So I guess it is fine. There is not much need for it. There are some moments which remind one of Godfather in addition to the GIN - the car explosions and the new woman in the family spotting acts by goons which work with the family etc. Remember Pacino as Michael defending his family to Kay? Prakash Jha even makes a cameo.

Worth a watch despite the below.

The woman who plays Ranbir's mother has really poor make up and it is obvious she is a much younger woman. Shah is wasted and does not appear beyond the 1st reel or so. Some of the dialogue is unnecessary especially when Ajay Devgn finds out about his birth. Complete LCD kind of movie.

* much better than most of her contemporaries (of which I would like to single out Genelia D Souza for slurred speech!). But her Hindi does catch up when she shrieks Khyon once! :)

Plunderings of a bibliomaniac

I had promised that plundering would begin soon when I wrote this. A discount voucher to the new Landmark store in Phoenix Mills and some accumulated credit card points precipitated today's events, which have left my excesses from 2005 a little behind. So here goes...

1. Hand of God (the life of Diego Maradona by Jimmy Burns)
2. 2666 by Roberto Bolano
3. The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano
4. The Map that Changed the World by Simon Winchester*
5. In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniel Mueenuddin**
6. An Utter and Incomplete History of Classical Music by Stephen Fry***
7. Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
8. Hammer of the Gods by Stephen Davis****
9. Stairway to Heaven (Led Zeppelin Uncensored)
10. Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
11. Making Movies by Sidney Lumet
12. Red Man Walking by Frank Worrall#
13. Inverting the Pyramid## by Jonathan Wilson
14. Stephen Fry in America
15. Sometimes I forgot to laugh by Peter Roebuck
16. Arth (a movie by Mahesh Bhatt)
17. Ankur (a movie by Shyam Benegal)
18. Saaransh (a movie by Mahesh Bhatt)
19. Utpal Dutt comedy movie collection### (4 movies by Basu Chatterjee)

Now for some serious pleasure. If only one had summer holidays....hum bhi agar bacche hote...

* about William Smith and the birth of Modern Geology

** my 2nd book by a Pakistani author

*** a book I had read before, but had not possessed

**** The Led Zeppelin saga

# about Roy Keane

## the history of football tactics

### includes Shaukeen, Pasand Apni Apni, Lakhon ki baat, Baton Baton mein

Endearing Self Destruction

Why do I love movies about characters who destroy themselves?

Actually why do I love characters who are comely one instant and combustible another?

Please watch "The Damned United" if you like football and its managers.

Ishqiya, Rann

After a long time, I managed to watch two movies - both on their day of release :)

Ishqiya is a movie from a practised hand - that of Vishal Bhardwaj. I have already raved about the music elsewhere. Both Arshad Warsi and Naseeruddin Shah essay their parts well. Vidya Balan is deglamorized and still attractive. The plot is pretty simple - 2 petty thieves get stuck in a larger game while on the run. The movie is not as tightly edited as it could have been, but is still a surprising short watch (less than 2 hrs). Recommended watch. I am sure you will be humming the music when you leave the hall if you aren't already.

Rann comes from a hand which has lost its touch in recent times, that of RGV. The movie is more evidence that he is nowhere near the man who once directed Sarkar or even Company, let alone Satya. The movie also has music (quite uncharacteristic for RGV), most of it forgettable, but relevant in the context. Amitabh Bachan performs (he does not ham, thankfully!). He alone is worth the watch, but not the 240/- PVR ripped me off for. Riteish Deshmukh has a mostly anguished expression (I like to think it reflects the lack of his acting abilities), but he has a likeable role. The rest incl. the pretty Panag are pawns in the movie. Paresh Rawal also manages a part but his role is very poorly built on and is largely limited to gesturing. The movie is populist (which to me means it has loads of scenes which are cliched and could have been dropped but our mainstream movies have them and hence RGV too has succumbed) but looks like RGV finally has a movie you can go watch . Hence, recommended. You won't get bored. You will perhaps even be moved by the primary premise of the plot - media and its manipulation (that is not a spoiler!) - having been battered by breaking news everywhere. In fact I saw the movie only since I knew there was some freshness to it. I am glad RGV got there before the self righteous Bhandarkar did (As I have said elsewhere on this blog, I am quite sick of his cynicism). As I said, AB holds the movie together. Go see it

Ijaazat

Excellent movie. Outstanding music (RDB). Heartwarming lyrics by Gulzar of course!
Difficult to believe that the entire soundtrack is sung by just 1 playback singer - Asha Bhosle.

And I was right about my crush on Anuradha Patel's character when I first mentioned her here.
If I had seen Ijaazat before JTYJN, I am sure I would have had a bigger crush on her ;) Beautiful woman.

And the Kapoor khandaan lends two of its fine specimens to the effort, to round off a nice starcast. Naseeruddin Shah wears some nice clothes. (Who said arty movies had to be dull?)

And the movie is 21 years old! Whoah!

I have but no choice to hum Mera kuch saamaan (which I had heard before of course, but I had never seen the movie in full)... The Moser Baer DVD I bought has some commentary on it (with atleast 1 typo!) which says the movie has feminist content. It may, but what I saw felt like a romantic movie to watch on a nice weekend.

Go watch it, if you haven't.

Also Socha na Tha earlier in the day as someone had recommended it. Slightly unpolished movie, but welcome watch from the usual trash that passes for movies these days.

Return of the bibliomania(c)

Crossword announced its clearance sale and I promptly decided to enrich their coffers ;)

The Birthday of the World by Ursula Le Guin
Japanese (Language Lab series - book + CD)
Terrors of the Table by Walter Gratzer
Mad about the Mekong by John Keay
Farokh Engineer by John Cantrekk
The Man Who Knew Infinity by Robert Kanigel
Brain Men by Markus Berkmann
Lewis Caroll in Numberland by Robin Wilson

All of this manic buying helped fund a coupon with which I got a DVD of the movie Ijaazat (just the song "Mera Kuchh Saamaan" is worth it)...

Sherlock Holmes

Good Watch.

I am usually a stickler for the original, but in this case, considering most of what we know outside AC Doyle's own writing has been added on by illustrators and adaptations for the TV, etc, this one is worth a watch too. After all, movie is another form of story telling and Guy Ritchie keeps you engaged, although despite his usual style, the movie does feel a bit weak on the dramatic side, all the thrills accompanying his style, notwithstanding.

And Hans Zimmer's music does not hurt at all. I have already listened to the superbewitching tune of The Rocky Road to Dublin by The Dubliners some hundred times.... (Am sure it will become as popular as Shipping up to Boston by The Drop Kick Murphys made known by The Departed)

You see your Robert Downey (Jr),
I see my Rachel McAdams.

We are all happy.

(Ok, Jude Law too! but that does not remind you of an S&G song, does it)

Adapting Books to Screenplays

A nice piece by Pradeep Sebastian, one of my current favourites, not in the least due to the fact that he is a bibliophile

3 Idiots

Go Watch It!

Spoiler Alert (not much, but still...)

For Aamir Khan fans, there is good news... he is back with a good movie.

It is a little longer than needed, but fun for the most part.

Swanand Kirkire shows he can write lovely lyrics yet again.

Even Kareena is watchable, while Madhavan and Sharmaan are good as Aamir's flunkies.

There are loads of stereotypes and a couple of insensitive, politically incorrect moments, but the movie is an entertainer. Rajkumar Hirani retains his magic touch at the box office.

For those of you expecting a movie version of 5.1, forget it (thankfully so!).

Nice way to end my old year.

Mary and Max...

is an outstanding claymation movie and tells the story of an 8 year old girl in Australia and her 40 something pen friend (obese guy) in the USA and how their extra-ordinary friendship pans out over 20 years or so.

Strongly recommended if you love animated flicks. Strongly recommended if you love off-beat scripts and strongly recommended if you love good movies. And

This is my favourite to win the Oscar in its category.

In the tradition of the movie, here is a P.S. -> A random look at the IMDB entry for Toni Collette reveals "...At the age of 11 she showed her phenomenal acting skills when she faked appendicitis out of boredom and longing for attention; her act was so convincing that doctors had to remove her appendix, even though the test showed nothing wrong with it...." I already love this woman... One more addition to the crush list

Update: I forgot I had seen Up and liked that immensely too. Up has a lot more American humour and frankly I loved it while M&M is more heartwarming and I am a sucker for heartwarmers. So now I am confused :( Why can't they split the Oscar?

Charulatha

I have been in love with all the Charulathas I have known incl. Ray's.

Here are some random notes, written in the fashion of Alberto Manguel's A Reading Diary, which I just finished, thereby acquiring a writing style I thought one would not get paid for ...

What is the best name you could come up with for a samosa, what the bengalis call a singara - trikona bishishta khaddo shamagri

Random reading by Charulatha's husband "..to be outspoken is not to be disloyal..."

Charulatha's brother in law ..."mediterranean - the sound of a tanpura"

Charulatha cheered me up for multiple reasons - It is an outstanding movie, beautifully shot, beautifully told. Ray continues to rock. And I am in love with women who write.

Oh yeah, I hand out a lot of love around ;)

Fabián Bielinsky

Did you know that Fabián Bielinsky, director of the phenomenal Nueve Reinas (Nine Queens) died after directing just 2 movies?
And he died at the relatively young age of 46.
And the news is nearly 3 years old and I didn't know :(
Cruel Life, eh?

Dev D and Luck By Chance

Dev D is fantastic. For once, Anurag Kashyap dazzles while indulging himself. Nice music, especially the Pardesi song (heart rending stuff in the raw literal sense, not touchy feely sense - like I wrote about The Wrestler, you will need a whisky after the song!) and the brass band version of Emosanal Atyachar. Watch the movie. Make Kashyap rich so that he can make more movies like this. The movie is so good that I can only recommend it strongly that you watch it rather than read this post!

If you are still reading this post for Dev D, it is an irreverent take on the much venerated tale of Devdas. Great coming together of a wild script, great music (I hope there is no plagiarism here - have once been disappointed by Pritham before when I liked Life in a Metro only to discover a library of places where music was filched from!) and nice acting (yet again!) by Abhay Deol. Mahie Gill has great eyes and a nice role. I really loved the clothes washing bit when Dev D is wallowing in filth. Further fun is had at the expense of SRK's or if you prefer SLB's Devdas with frequent tongue in cheek nods to it. If you love alternative cinema and the fact that good Indian movies can be made with Indian scripts, this movie is it. Good Luck to the makers to produce more such output in the future.

Now for Luck by Chance - a movie about the industry, from a family which is rooted in it.
Zoya Akhthar manages to pull off a great show.

Dialogues by dad with her bro as main actor, what could go wrong? Actually based on my experience as a compulsive movie watcher, everything!

The strength of the movie is the script. It does not have madhur bhandarkar's moral high ground kind of position with excess mockery rather than self mockery. Am a little tired of that anyways, as is the indian audience (thankfully). Hope he gets back to the chandni bar level.

shah rukh, aamir essay brief roles. srk has perhaps the best lines that the stars have in the movie. aamir has a brief role which seems like disguised mockery of his obsessive self. karan johar also has some lines of wisdom. hrithik has perhaps been the most generous in his time on the movie.

anurag kashyap has a cool cameo as script writer.

My major grouse with the movie is that it takes spoofing the world it belongs in, a little too far while having bouts of serious stuff. For ex., Isha Sharvani's role is great, but then that gets mixed with Dimple Kapadia's self-indulgent and simultaneously parodied character. Farhan Akhtar shows his role in Rock On was not a fluke. He is my other nominee to lead the resurgence of Indian movies.

Overall good watch. In fact it partially inspired me to stretch my neck out and write that other post on resurgence of Indian movies...

Resurgence in good Indian Cinema

I managed to see Luck by Chance, Dev-D and Delhi-6, over the weekend trying to brace myself for 3 more weeks in the Indian hinterland.

Delhi-6 has great music by AR Rahman. Sonam Kapoor is pretty and young. Rakeysh needs a scriptwriter.

Dev -D is fantastic and half the reason to write this post. More on that later.

After Dil Chahta Hai which came out when i entered college, one wondered whether there would be others. For the count (I may be missing something) here are some (can't recall others mostly due to poor memory)...

Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi (the best of the lot) so far - great script, good acting and incredible music
jhankaar beats
life in a metro
khosla ka ghosla
rock on
honeymoon travels
manorama six feet under
cheeni kum
johnny gaddar
wednesday (one can't imagine this movie was actually allowed to be made, released!)
dev d (what wisecandyman describes as devdas on LSD)

There was a streak earlier as well which died prematurely - bombay boys. snip, etc. as is obvious this streak is longer. So there is hope that we will get quality entertainment which is not necessarily directed towards the lcd. And i have deliberately left Sajjanpur out since Benegal did it. If he can't do a good movie, who can?

For writing on good Indian movies, not necessarily in the category of the above, also read
parallecinema.blogspot.com and passionforcinema

I ended up discovering alternativeperspective.blogspot.com and this particular post on Swades

My Oscar predictions

While I write this post from the airport waiting to leave my beloved city, the Oscars are on. By the time my flight lands in Vizag, I expect AR Rahman to have created history. Since I haven't seen all the nominees, my predictions are limited. But here they are

Mickey Rourke for best actor from The Wrestler
AR Rahman for best song and best score for Slumdog
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button for best movie (I don't like this choice, but I don't like its competition either)...
I don't think that the best director and best movie will be for different movies this year. Hence David Finch should win for direction, but if I am wrong on one of these, I guess Slumdog will win both. Or maybe there will be a curious consolation and splitting of the prizes b/w TCOBB and SM.