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Boomerang (A Sci-fi Short Story) Wednesday, 4 November, 2009

Posted by ~uh~™ in Stories.
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11 comments

Achyut woke up with a smile on his face. He just dreamt what he always wanted to achieve in life- success and fame. He looked at the bedside cyberclock-

Time 7:30 am | Date: 04 November 2012 | Weather: Sunny and bright | Seconds more to live: 851471748

In another two cyber hours time his life is going to be changed forever. The dream is going to become a reality, which he is going to enjoy for the rest 27 years he is going to live., as computed by the cyberclock. He quickly got ready and while traveling to work, he thought about his past life.

He was a mediocre student in school and gradually developed an inferiority complex. He maintained a strong dislike for all who were successful or good at their work. The dislike slowly turned to hatred which provoked him to various mischiefs. Like once, the day of annual result, he kept a dead lizard inside the bag of the first boy. In another instant, he kept a pin inside the sport shoes of the captain, just before a cricket match. With his inconspicuous looks and low profile, he could always manage to get away unnoticed and enjoyed the suffering of his victims. As he grew old the petty mischiefs transformed into more creative and sadistic misdemeanors. He became smarter with every experience and his creativity became sharper with his age. By the time he graduated as a medical-hardware engineer, he knew what he was good at- creative sadism. He did not have any friends in life; he was not good with girls too. Neither had he had any interests in movies, music or books. But he kept the Devil in him nurtured and active. He bettered everyday in achieving a tremendous satisfaction by teasing people around him and watching them suffer. In his first job as an ‘Cyber Health Administrator’, he inserted a pornographic video at startup to his colleague’s computer, just because he was popular among the lady colleagues. The guy was fired. In no time Achyut became one of the most efficient Biometric administrators, infamous for his innovative and creative ways to improve Office Informedic systems. He always knew he could prove his genius, one day.

Today he is the Lead Inventor of Informedic Innovations, a manufacturer of cutting-edge gadgets and equipment for modern day office applications. The company owns patents for many sophisticated machines, much of its credit is due to Achyut. He invented the Psycopier, which can read human thoughts, convert it to alphanumeric texts and images and generate a print-out. That machine won numerous tenders from police departments, anti-corruption bureaus and marriage counselors across the globe, making profits for his company in millions and his growth in the Informedics industry, phenomenal. Their latest client, a multi-billion dollar online stock broking company, is about to place a huge order for a new machine. The mandate to Achyut was, to establish a foolproof Behaviometric system which would monitor loss of cyber hours and increase human productivity. After years research, Achyut came out with a technological marvel, a sophisticated firewall technology called Blazemo – a perfect combination of behavioral psychology and biometrics. The firewall is activated whenever the user’s intention deviates from being productive. Blazemo, short form of Blazing Emotion, detects the change in the user’s physical characteristics like body temperature, blood pressure, pulse rate and other measurable parameters of excitement and emotion. Then it maps it, processes it in its central processing core and then compares the reading with pre-stored ranges for various state of mind, namely- Overexcited, Angry, Happy, Sad, Lethargic, Revolting etc etc. All this is done within a few milliseconds. Blazemo then disables the user’s access to the computer, freezes the screen and displays the text is large fonts ‘Blazemo detected unauthorized emotion. Access denied till normalcy is restored‘. It would now be a cakewalk for administration to calculate the nonworking cyber hours for the user and take punitive actions.

Achyut had already run the pilot project on 5 selected sample users and the success rate was hundred percent. One of them was thinking about making love with his girlfriend while drafting an email, Balzemo disabled his access while Psycopier printed a picture of his girlfriend, nude. Achyut knew that this was the most revolutionary invention to radically improve office productivity. The users would be caught red handed, even if think of wasting precious cyber hours. With  sufficient repetition of this humiliating experience , the users would gradually learn to control and finally kill their emotions, while at work. Then, one doesn’t need to procure the expensive cyborgs for high productivity jobs, human users would match their efficiency. Productivity would increase like never before, economies will grow and world would advance faster towards the future ! Blazemo is going to be patented soon and would be bought by all large corporations. This final presentation, where he would demonstrate the installation and working of Blazemo, would change this world and his his life forever. Achyut could see his dream come true and he loved every bit of it.

When Achyut entered the presentation room, the client’s team was already present. His companies Director’s were visibly tensed. Naturally, as the order value was huge and the success of this presentation was going to create history. The projector screen was blank. After a short introductory speech Achyut inserted the installation disk to the computer. He then entered his login and password. The entire hall was silent.

He turned to his audience and said, ‘This is the happiest day of my life to present you our best invention so far- I present you……. Blazemo’.

Just then, there was a shrill beep, which forced Achyut to turn towards the projector screen.

There was this text displayed in abnormally large font ‘‘Blazemo detected unauthorized emotion. Access denied till normalcy is restored ‘.

xxx

Blue: Amusing Blue Job Thursday, 22 October, 2009

Posted by ~uh~™ in Bollywood.
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15 comments

The review was first published on PFC.

It's not a Blue Film, it's a Comedy !

It's not a Blue Film, it's a Comedy !

The expectation
A well promoted Diwali release. Big Stars like Akshay Kumar and Sunjay Dutt. Eye candies Katrina Kaif and Lara Dutta. Bahamas and bikinis in abundance. Kylie Minogue. Music by Rehman. Produce of Sri Asthivinayak Cine Vision that had earlier produced films like Bhagam Bhag, Jab We Met, Golmaal returns, Kidnap and Luck. Honestly, I expected something like Dhoom-2 or Race- a stylized thriller with some twists and sex.

The least I expected it to be is a comedy-circus combo !

Blue would definitely compete hard for the title of ‘the most hilarious thriller of the decade which is a superior unintentional comedy’, with another gem called Cash. It’s a pity Blue took Rs 120 Crores in Bahamas to make while Cash- a meager Rs 38 crores in Cape Town ! Another classic I can compare this with is Red. Clearly there’s some problem with primary colours.

The Plot
(Spoilers slightly discharged from this celluloid sludge)
A guy named Sam (Zayed Khan) is a self proclaimed champion biker in Bangkok. A miniskirt bimbo named Nikki (Katrina Kaif- with stud below her lower lip, glued with fevikwik) enrolls him in one of the street races. Sam wins the race and Nikki makes herself available as aloo tikki, for dinner. Sam declares his 12 hr old eternal love. She moans and vows to trust him. On her reference Gulshan (Rahul Dev), the loser of the race gives an important assignment to Sam- to deliver a Mac Guffin (a bag in this case). He zooms across thick city traffic, gets chased by the cops, loses the bag and ends up in a soup. Gulshan demands a huge compensation. Cops want him too. In short, he is Bangkok’s most wanted man. He gets further depressed when Nikki advises him to leave and save his life. Sam remembers his brother Sagar (Sunjay Dutt) in the Bahamas.

The story comes to Bahamas. Sagar is a giant pot bellied sad looking bloke who is befriended by a rich man called Arav (Akshay Kumar). Arav is a hedonist who spends his time in threesomes, while Sagar romances his girl Mona (Lara Dutta). Intermittently, they showcases their newly acquired scuba diving skills. In between, Arav wants Sagar to guide him to find a treasure which is contained in a sunken ship called ‘Lady in Blue’, which the Britishers were returning to India. Sagar is grossly disinterested in the treasure hunt. At this juncture Sam lands in Bahamas. Gulahsan follows. Bikes chase above trains and in rail tracks. Cars explode. Stuntmen do a water-scooter show with A R Rehman’s music. Mona is kidnapped (or ladynapped) after a fierce gun battle. Villas explode. Sagar confesses the truth behind his father’s death and discovery of the ship. On continuous persuasion by Arav and Sam, Sagar finally succumbs to the situation and the three gathers on Arav’s yacht to retrieve the underwater treasure.

What happens then?
The blue job goes wrong sucking the brains out of the thriller, but creates a comic entertainer.

Entertainment- Out of the Blue

The dialogues: in a good subtle comedy, it’s the dialogue that makes intelligent audience laugh. Else it becomes a Priyadarshan type slapstick madcap one, meant for low IQ masses. Each and every dialogue of Blue is a masterpiece on its own.

Sample these-

Nikki: Hum ko mile 12 ghante bhi nahin hue aur tum humure future ke bare me soch rahe ho ?
Sam: Main to peechle bara ghante se hi humure future ke bare me soch raha hoon ! Aur tum ?
Nikki: Sabkuchh batane ki zaroorat nahin hota *lips tremble*
Sam: *grins* (but gets a boner, secretly)

Sam: Bag mein kya hai ?
Gulshan: Mauka. Utha sako to utha lo. (Now that’s called raw machismo)

Sam : Ek bag ke liye 50 million dollars kuchh zyada nahin hai ?
Gulshan: Bag mera tha to kimat bhi main tyar karunga ! (Lesson in Valuation)

Mona: Mera sapna hai ek oceanography institute, marine life ko protect karne ke liye.
Sagar: Is janam me wo sapna hi rahega. Main machhli pakadta rahunga, tum pakate rehna…. (har har har)

Sagar: Koi aadmi sirf tab andhere mein baithta hai, jab wo isqh mein hota hai ya phir pareshan ho.
Sam: Who ek aur karan bhi andhere mein baithta haijab roshni chala jaye. (makes perfect logocal sense but also makes me laugh out loud)

Arav: I always have two of everything heh heh heh.
Mona: That’s Arav for you, he has two of everything! (makes me ROFL)

Then, there were lot of interrogative dialogues using the word ‘Sawal’ which teaches a sure shot way to compose the sharpest comeback lines. I am sure this can be effectively used in office and homes. Allow me to exemplify-

Boss: Maine jo kam bola tha wo tumne kiya ?
Me: Sawal ye nahin hai ki kam maine kiya ki nahin. Sawal ye hai kam hua ki nahin.

Then at home,
Wife: Tumko aadha kilo kanda lane ke liye bola tha, laya ?
Me: Sawal ye nahin hai ki main kanda laya ki nahin, sawal ye hai ki tumko kanda nahin mili to kya honewala hai.

Characters
Akshay Kumar (nicknamed Sarkar) is simply hilarious. His dialogues, attitude, goatie, underwater antics- all makes him the head clown of this once in a blue moon venture. He makes fun of Kylie Minogue in an elite nightclub and wriggles chiggy-wiggy in a song where the cameraman tried hard, but the editor worked harder to prevent Kylie showing her undies. Let’s hope there would be uncut special features in the DVD release.

However, the cameraman successfully captures every inch of underwater Lara Dutta, except her face. Gharki murgi dal barabar.

Sanjay Dutt (nicknamed Sethji) features in one of the worst shot gunfight in the history of Hindi cinema ever. After one hundred rounds, he kills only one villain at the cost of his villa. His efficiency was better is Shootout at Lokhandwala. Though, he shouldn’t have tried so much to be emotional and romantic on screen. His efforts made him look arthritic and constipated, respectively. Also next time he should get a larger lady opposite him, may be Amrita Singh or Raveena Tandon instead of Lara Dutta. Atleast Nagma or Shilpa Shirodkar, please ?

Both, Zayed Khan and Rahul Dev to the movie were what suspenders are to a strip-dancer. They were taut, good looking and were abandoned, once the song and dance was over.

Anthony D’souza is the land Director. Clearly, the the underwater director did’nt know they were directing the same movie.

Shortcomings

Like the scars in the blue moon, thorns in the Hilsha fish, like the nada knot in the pajama, Blue too has its own share of setbacks.

Why Katrina Kaif was so dry and dressed all along? Why was she not there in Bahamas? She should have also given a chance to go underwater. There, atleast she could have kept her mouth shut and we could enjoy the better parts of her. She was shared by Akshay and Zayed, which means the movie could have easily afforded one more bimbo. Like Prachi Desai or Zia Khan.

If Akshay Kumar is grandson of Kabir Bedi, why there was no mention of his dad? Gulshan Grover or Shakti Kapoor could have suited the role well.

The skeleton of Sagar’s dad, exactly in the same waving position at the time of his underwater death, was a very well thought out detail. However, showing the oxygen cylinders still tied to his rib cage, wristwatch and goggles, could have made it more dramatic for us viewers.

Why were the sharks just swimming around and not eating people? Were they vegan ?

I have learnt that it took the cast 15 days to master the underwater air-ring released from mouth. I am sure if they farted instead, it would have been much easier to get the desired result.

Helicopters, submarines, hot air balloons, elephants and rocket launchers should have been added in the actions. Especially when the bikes were riding the train, a hot air balloon with an elephant on it would have added stunning visual effect.

Aftermath
I wanted to see The Deep again, to get out of my blues.

Wake Up Sid: Serene Serendipity Tuesday, 6 October, 2009

Posted by ~uh~™ in Bollywood.
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16 comments

I know, I have developed a reputation of writing bad movie reviews. The interpretation can either mean reviews of bad movies or bad reviews of movies; depending on how much disgusted you are with my reviews.

The point is that, I find it much easier to write on bad Bollywood movies. I normally don’t write on movies I like. There are two prime reasons for it.

One- the movies I like are quite obscure, mostly non-bollywood, sometimes even non-hollywood, rare and unheard of [check this article], which restricts my readers putting any useful comment. I find, getting a paltry response and not adding any value (other than notifying handful cinephiles about the existence of such movies) is not enough motivation for me to write about them. However, I have the intention of writing about them in future.

Two- the other type of movies I like are already famous and have obtained a cult following. The reputation of those movies won’t change irrespective whether I write about them or not. Such movies are too popular and have been discussed to death in popular forums. Hence there’s little left to be discussed afresh. So there’s not enough motivation to write on them either.

That leaves me with a very rare occurrence- a new Bollywood movie which is also a Directoral debut, that I can’t resist writing about. Examples- Khosla Ka Ghosla (Dibakar Bannejee),Manorama 6 ft Under (Navdeep Singh), Taare Zameen Par (Aamir Khan), Barah Aana (Raja Menon), 99 (Krishna D K). I beleive a good debut deserves a good review.

Ranbir & Konkona- Serendipity and the City

Ranbir & Konkona- Serendipity and the City

I liked Wake Up Sid, the debut film of Director Ayan Mukherjee [writer and asst director of Swadesh and KANK]. Honestly, I kept my fingers crossed knowing it’s the first bonding between K-Jo and Yashraj, both I hate to the core for their overdose of romance, melodrama and uncommon nonsense.

The basic story of Wake Up Sid is an intelligent cocktail of the ingredients taken from the following successful movies, especially the ones by Farhan Akhtar -

1. Jane Tu Ya Jane Na – Today’s youth culture, electronic lifestyle, hedonism and confusion between love and friendship.

2. Dil Chahta Hai- A today’s perspective of urbane and jovial youth, living for the present, escaping from the future

3. Lakshya- Dilemma of youth towards the right choice of career, life, ambition and it’s repercussions

4. Luck by Chance- Tale of struggle and aspiration of a newcomer in Mumbai.

5. Life in a Metro- Relationship and stress in a big city life.

Screen bonding- Truth and Togetherness

Screen bonding- Truth and Togetherness

As it should be well understood, nothing in this script is ‘new’ at all- a young boy, college friends, parties, rich self-made dad, a sweet mom semi-blind with affection, hedonistic lifestyle, carefree friendship, defocused future and love disguised as friendship. On the other part we have a new girl in town, confident and aspiring, looking for independence and a future in the big city. They meet, they live together and the rest is formula. Like most rom-coms, the script takes some liberty of over-romanticizing of the situation.

Yet, the movie is a superior from the bollywood bandwagon in lot of aspects. Unlike other bollywood potboilers, it’s not an over the top, melodramatic family drama soaked in bucketful of emotion and impossibilities. Rather it’s a sharp, soft, suave, elegant, practical, colorful, joyous presentation of humdrum life sequences which involves the audience with its not so unexpected twirls. It’s simple, feel good entertainment.

For a change, I would keep this one short and list out my reasons for liking the movie-

Exceptional direction by Ayan Mukherjee with a difficult combination of fresh faces and veteran actors like Anupam Kher and Supriya Pathak. Like most Bollywood movies, there’s a radical and distinct change in ambiance in first and second half in terms of pace and progress, which would have different appeal to different viewers depending on which generation s/he belongs to.

Ranbir Kapoor as Sid- natural son of a rich

Ranbir Kapoor as Sid- natural son of a rich

Ranbir Kapoor is outstanding in his roles, with his natural and high coolness quotient, expressive eyes and just the perfect body language. Konkona heavily reminded me of her role in Luck by Chance and Life in Metro, especially for the conversations on overhead tank scenes of the latter. She is brilliantly ordinary and poignant. I think, this would be one of her best role in commercial Hindi film and one of the best on screen chemistry after Irrfan Khan in Life in a Metro. Anupam Kher’s rock-steady performance as affluent but unconventionally responsible dad, complements Supriya Pathak’s projection as a lovable mom, trying to bond the pieces of mother–son relationship with her broken English. Rahul Khanna did much better than Bobby Deol (Dostana) and himself (Love Aaj Kaal) in similar roles. In other short roles Namit Das (Rishi) and Shikha Talsania (as Laxmi, is she daughter of Tiku Talsania btw ?) did wonderfully well, the sparkle in Namit’s eyes and friendship in Shikha’s heart is too bright to be missed. Kashmira Shaw does her bit believably. However, the eye candy girl Tanya’s (Kainaz Motiwala- weirdly fair and fresh) story ended abruptly. The Amit guy (Munir Kabani- facebook profile) of the Mumbai beat magazine was prominent with his intellectual-photographer get-up ( something like Prateek Babbar in Jaane Tu, who was also named Amit)

Konkona- a dash of fresh Bong sens

Konkona- a dash of fresh Bong sens

Shankar- Ehsan- Loy’s music with Javed Akhtar’s lyric is trendy, catchy and groovy. The title track is a potential chartbuster, but I liked the softer ‘Jaisa hai koi Iktara Iktara’ composed by Amit Trivedi ( Aamir, Dev D) sung by Kavita Seth/ Amitabh Bhattacharyya. The song and visual combo of “Life is Crazy” is probably the most conventional one, yet enjoyable.

The details in the movie is well thought out, the continuity objects are used very well, like the red Lamy used by Konkona or the DSLR of Ranbir. The production quality, camerawork, locations and overall theme is artistically vibrant, urban and contemporary. The set design of the Mumbai Beat magazine office resembled more like a Artist’s studio! Some part of the movie reminds us about the fading romanticism of Bombay (Mumbai, for some sick touchy retard whose a*shole is bigger than his brains) which most of us have lost, in the run. It talks about loving it’s people to love a city.

The movie talks about one’s choice of passion over convention as career, in Sid’s case – Photography. I could connect with him when he realizes that he inherited his flair for photography from his dad, and gives his first pay check to him. That was one of the most emotional yet life like moment of the movie.

This movie would definitely connect strongly to the generation of the achieved Ram Mehras and the generation of the aimless Sids, yet for us who belong somewhere in between, who has lost something to gain something,  can pause to say ‘been there, done that’, before stepping into bigger responsibilities of life.

Overall, a clean cinema with abundant light humour, nominal drama about subtle sweet truths of life packed in a superior production design- a perfect treat for the family!

The Wake Up Team

The Wake Up Team