RIFLE RANGE BOY

Innocent Man (2018) Miniseries S1E1-E6. This documentary series is an engaging one. It is based on John Grisham's sole non-fiction book based on two murders that happened in a small town in Oklahoma named Ada. Through two unrelated cases that occurred in this place in the years 1982 and 1984, the author tries to highlight the weakness of the American judicial system.  Debbie Carter was raped and killed in her home in 1982. Denise Haraway was allegedly kidnapped and murdered in 1984. Two men each were convicted for each crime. There were striking similarities in the handling of the cases - a common witness and the same prosecution and investigative team. The docuseries with Grisham's investigations and a separate team of journalists with a little help from 'Innocence Project', managed to illustrate how the system is so rotten to the core. Up to 4% of prison inmates in American prisons that accounts to 90,000 of them are wrongly convicted and are spending term for...

Bird Box (2018) Normally, I do not fancy post-apocalyptic disaster movies. I guess I got sucked into it with the constant bombardment of advertisements all over the place and the friendly suggestion by Netflix. It tells of a lady who is in limbo with an unwanted pregnancy. An epidemic of sorts seems to be affecting many towns the world over. People are committing suicide en masse! During her antenatal checkup, with her sister, she realises that it hit her town too. That cascades scenes of pandemonium, cars plunging into buildings and other car and people walking straight on into speeding trucks. After the horrid display of gore and blood, the remaining survivors try to make sense of the situation, fight remaining zombies who are hellbent on 'recruiting' 'suiciders' (for no apparent reason), staying alive, delivering babies, sacrificing most of them and finding safe space. From the outset, the viewer can sense the storyline. Even which characters will be...

Whilst everybody is arguing about the political correctness of spreading the spirit of the festivities and whether Winterval should replace Christmas, and on the other spectrum, whether X’mas is a religious celebration at all, people forget the message behind any celebration. It does not matter if it is a pagan festival. The spirit of any get-together is the fellowship, the fun, the laughter and the strengthening of bonds of camaraderie, of family and the temporary amnesia of the accumulating thoughts of uncertainties of the future.  As the arms of our family tentacles spread wide to explore greener pastures and in the advancement of careers, the number of remaining members slowly dwindles. If previously, greetings were expressed with bear hugs, exchange of presents and boisterous meetings packed with roars of laughter and trays of food, now we have to content ourselves with digital cards, heart signs and virtual kiss emojis. Messages after messages impressing and outdoi...

Marriage and Mutton Curry (2018) M Shanmughalingam The Jaffnese Tamil (JT) community in Malaya and later, Malaysia, can stand with heads held high knowing that they had a pivotal role in the establishment of the country's early post-Independence civil service and putting it on a right footing. The JTs, like many struggling minorities in the world, had their own set of quirky rules to live by. Their aim in life is a better life for their children. They are disciplined and being religious made it easier to instil order in the lives of the younger ones. They look at a job in the civil service of the ultimate joy in life. Education played a prominent place in society, and a young girl's biggest catch for matrimony is a doctor! The Ceylonese community is said to be very class-conscious, and success in education is looked upon as the avenue to escape their clutches of poverty and social class. Shan, a seasoned writer who wears many hats, has managed to rekindle the memori...

Manto (Hindi, 2018) The versatile Nawazuddin Siddiqui in the lead. Man is full of contradictions. He has laid rules that he proclaims to be of the divine decree, but nobody follows. They say one thing and do something else, knowing very well that their action is directly antagonistic to what they preach. But rules are for others. They say all men are equal, but everybody knows that that only applies to a select group of people with political domination. Others do not really matter. Every community has its codes of decency, social mores and laws to put things straight but vice and crimes never cease. We know what is right and what is not, but we still turn a blind eye to atrocities that happen under our very noses. What is really the duty of writers? Do they have any responsibility at all? Are they there just to preach a utopia that we can all transcend to? Is their job to highlight things as they are on the ground to create a certain awareness to change the status quo? T...

The Conformist (Italian, 1970) Director: Bernardo Bertolucci With rhetoric like "you're either with us or against us!", there is a pressure for most of us to conform. The daily bombardment of an overdose of information in the social media puts its followers in a quandary. The urgency to submit to the flavour of the moment and to be on the right side of history is quite confusing.    No man is an island. Living in a society, we are all interdependent. When one's own survival is dependent on goodwill and patronage of the others,  he would not want to offend the others' sensitivity; he would just conform or at least appear to.  In the current world climate and the country's political scenario, the need to follow the majority is very real. Merely following the tide is, of course, less tiring. Fighting back and arguing your stand may sometimes be an act of futility. Arguing with stupid and zombies is never easy. It takes a certain kind of resilien...

How to Win Friends & Influence People  Dale Carnegie (©1936) I must be exuding the aura of being a loner with very few friends that someone actually loaned me this book. He must have thought that it must be a sure way to end all my perceived 'woes'. Generally, I do not cherish books of this nature. To me, they appear like learning swimming by reading. Some things can be acquired only through practice, experience, and dents from the School of Hard Knocks. After reading through it, I find it to be more like a handbook for psychopaths. It tells its readers how to skew others' thinking and actions towards the readers' self-serving needs. The psychopath would slowly play mind games to influence his victims into thinking that they are doing something altruistic akin to how Piped Piper would rid the town all the mice for nothing (thank you very much). And how the children would be mesmerised to his enchanting flute music to march in like zombies in...

Christiane Amanpour: Sex and Love Around the World (Netflix Documentary, Season 1; 2018) This provocative six-episodes presentation discusses matter considered taboo in many of the towns the episodes were centred - Tokyo, Delhi, Beirut, Berlin, Accra and Shanghai. If one were to look at olden civilisations, it seems evident that our ancestors used to quite accepting of sexual practices and its deviations. The Japanese, during the Edo period, boasts of Shunga erotic art. They were a liberal and stable society. All that came to zilch when Commodore Perry landed in Edo Bay and Emperor Meiji banned their erotic drawings.  The Indians had Kamasutra long before the Western world learned to count, but in the New World, it was viewed as yellow literature. The Victorian mindset even deemed donning of saree was obscene. In the 19th century and before, the blouse was not part of the female attire. The saree was used to drape the chest and bosom as well. Legends say that the Tagore la...

Lost Loves  (Arshia Sattar; 2011) Exploring Rama's Anguish The question is whether the so-called divine scriptures are indeed infallible sacred decree or just mere guides for humanity to use as a precursor the complete the building block of life. Is it really God's orders or is it the human interpretation of what is best for mankind? I f the holy texts are indeed supreme, can it be deliberated or argued? We, the human race, used to live at a time when avenues were open for debates. Paradoxically, at this time and age when literacy is at its highest peak since the beginning of history, these doors are precariously shut. No place for questioning! Are the powers that be hiding something? I had always been under the impression t hat a King by the name of Rama as a human in flesh and blood, did actually walk on Earth. His subjects were have been awed by the dramas that revolved around the royal family. Their actions and decisions must have been closely watched by his cit...