RIFLE RANGE BOY

The Power of the Dog (2021) Director: Jane Campion King David, of the David and Goliath fame, went through troubles after troubles in his kingdom. He prayed to God. In the Book Psalm 22:20, it is said that King David had requested God to ' Deliver my soul from the sword; my darling from the power of the dog.' 'The power of the dogs', which the title refers to, is probably referring to the herd mentality of the mob that is out to humiliate, denigrate and decimate those who do not fall within the standard narrative. These dogs hide their deficiencies behind the strength of the pack. They may doubt their own convictions, but they know cognitive dissonance is too overwhelming. Hence, they just join in the barking match. The best way for the abused to fight the crushing power of the dogs, as suggested by the movie, is to stand tall against the pack. There is no point in clashing head-on against this unruly band but to win them over with wit, on the sly. The message behind th...

Exit (엑시트, Korean; 2019) Director: Lee Sang-geun Every time I see Koreans in action, be it in sports, movies or showcasing yet another new car, I get depressed. Koreans used to be our whipping boys in the Merdeka Tournament but look at them now, playing the same level of football with the big boys now. Kia started making automobiles in baby steps about the same time as us, but now, Korean cars are making Japanese cars sweat. Ours, on the other hand, is a national embarrassment. With the innovation of P Ramlee and his friends at Jalan Ampas studio, they churned out hits after hits and even won cinematic awards at the Asian level. But now, all we can do is reminisce, brood about lost opportunities and imagine a country that we could have been. Twenty years' master plan to learn, copy and innovate storytelling and moviemaking now sees Korean cinema and miniseries sweeping the world by storm. Korean culture is no longer alien to the people the world over.  This movie is living proof of...

Mission Sabah: The Manhunt V.G. Kumar Das It used to be that Sabah was one of Malaysia's high income earning states. In the late 60s, Sabah was poised to go places. Then the vultures moved in ..... First, they reaped the land of its natural resources. Then they divided the lands and sealed their dominance through the ballot box. Readers well-versed with Malaysian history of the early 1980s would be familiar with project IC where citizenships were given away like M&M's to 'eligible' subjects. Thousands of Filipina boat people flocked to the shores of Sabah to be counted. The project was deemed a whopping success with the favourable state election results (to the national ruling party) that ensued. Nobody actually wondered why most congregations of Pakistanis in the country are centred in Sabah - as if there was a mass trans-subcontinental migration of Pakistan êmigrês is in the 80s. Blame it all on project IC! Not to forget the moral and economic support of Islamic f...

Manifest (Seasons 1-3; 2018 - 2021) What happens when a flight disappears from the radar one day and lands at its destination some five and a half years later? A whole lot of questions naturally crops up. Tonnes of conspiracy theories spring from nothing, and the governmental agencies will jump into action trying to put a plausible validation to the whole speculation. The most unsettling part of the entire fiasco would be the relatives, who, after months if not years of trying to get over the presumed death of their loved one and putting their past behind. Imagine trying to place them back in their new lives! The puzzling (maybe not if one understands time travel) is that the plane passengers did not age a day older, even five years later, further complicating the hullabaloo. One twin was stuck as a preteen in this miniseries, while the other blossomed into the hormone-raged teenager. On a happy note, the preteen was sick with cancer when he started, but afterwards, he had five yea...

Gehraiyaan (Depths, Hindi; 2022) Director: Shakun Batra The democratisation of movie-making has  led to this - an Indian fairy tale movie  made in the vein of a soft porn Western movie  just to lure in India's Anglophile liberal English  movie-going viewers. The only thing remotely  linked to Indianness is the spoken language;  otherwise, it is just like any garbage c hurned out of the factories in Hollywood,   sex, lies, murder, and obnoxious flaunting of wealth.  The following are the few lessons I leant from this  movie: It is perfectly alright to have sex with your best friend's boyfriend without having a second thought or an iota of guilt; It appears to me that wealth is the justification for everything. After all, living life is for the experience. Doing the morally right thing does not fall anywhere near the equation; Two-timing is perfectly within your rights; Consuming alcohol is your birthright; indulge even when you are pregnant; D...

420 IPC (Hindi; 2021) Director: Manish Gupta So that is how it is. Everybody claims to be adhering to the rule of law. For a simpleton like me, that sounds like sound advice. The law is there to protect the little people against the tyranny of the deep-pocketed. I was nurtured to believe that the Truth will always prevail in the end. Lady Justice is supposedly blind to coercion, they say. As I grew older, I realised that all these are just bunkum.  The people who frequently invoke the phrases 'rule of law' and 'by the book' do not mean what they say. What they actually mean is that they have masterminded the nooks, corners and loopholes in the legal system that they can literally get away with murder. They can legitimately proclaim that they can legally needle themselves away from being caught in a comprising position. They have got all their sides, frontal and posterior, all concealed. When and if ever they are queried, they have the fortitude to use the same law used ...

Unpaused (Anthology of 5 episodes, Hindi; 2020) Unpaused: Naya Safar (5 episodes; 2021) As the numbers of Omicron variant cases continue to rise, allegedly after a large congregation of unvaccinated pilgrims made it all the way to the Holy Land, now is an opportune time to reminisce the good old days when a virus from Wuhan labs jumped ship and affected humans. It is mind-boggling to fathom how much this pandemic had jolted the core of our existence. It goes without saying that the pandemic has affected everyone in so many ways. Economically, it affected all, predominantly those on the lower rung of the food chain. Interestingly, the ten of the richest globally has doubled their wealth at the end of the second wave. Inconspicuously, Covid infection started as a concern only for the affluent and frequent flyers as they picked the bug after globetrotting. The poor were not so concerned then. Soon, the tables turned. Living in a restricted living space and close proximity between family m...

The Worst Person in World ( Verdens verste menneske,  Norweigian; 2021) Director: Joachim Trier Maybe it is the pressure to experience all the sensations in one lifetime. Perhaps one lifespan is not long enough to complete Man's laundry list of wants and needs. There is a desire to do the right thing at the first attempt and not lose out to fellow world inhabitants. Are we so hedonistic, only caring for ourselves and not batting an eyelid for others? We have become so self-centred that nobody else matters. It is just me, myself and I. We look at life as a reward. We exist to experience, only to die and disappear into oblivion. There are neither before nor forever after stories after this birth. We get one chance, after which it is GAME OVER.  Like headless chickens, we seem to be running around, collecting experiences.  We cannot wait. We see the line on the other side is moving faster. We jump queue only to find that the last line moves much quicker.  We get frustra...

Reprise (2006) Director: Joachim Trier That is the problem dealing with mental illness, the unpredictability. This is worse when the affected party is young. If dealing with changing hormones and altered body image is hard enough, imagine how much more it would be to pave a life and steer himself away from all negativities of youth! This must be more challenging when society defines a person as an adult at 18 and pressures the person to chase his future, paving the path for self-development, finding his own identity and fulfilling the desires of youth. It is no easy feat. This 2006 film is part of the Oslo trilogy by director Joachim Trier. It primarily deals with two childhood friends who develop a passion for writing. They take a shot at writing and both handle their paths differently. With them are their three other friends who play an important role in their life. An interesting movie that would strike a chord with those who had grown up with a younger person with pressures of the ...

Jatt vs IELTS (Punjabi; 2018) Director: Devi Dutt It is a problem in most developing countries. The generation around the country's independence bent over backwards to provide for the family. They felt contented to be self-sufficient and to ensure their offspring were not deprived of the things they missed. With the advent of widespread dissemination of information and systemic glorification of modern living, the youngsters just turned out pompous and sluggards. This is a universal problem experienced by societies in upcoming post-independent Asian nations. The younger generation cannot wait to buzz off from their birth country. They feel they can only find their true potential away from the toxic environments enveloping their nations. The West, it seems, gave them the validation and liberation they needed.  Modern education provides equal opportunities for all. The end result of this is women performing way better in all academic indices.  About twenty years ago, it seems the...