RIFLE RANGE BOY

Requiem for a Dream (2000) Director: Darren Aronofsky The President of India, a rocket scientist and an overall good soul, once told his audience, "Dream is not that which you see while you sleep, but is that something that does not allow you to sleep." Don't jump about it; put it in action! They also discuss the American dream, which states everyone has equal opportunity to achieve success and prosperity through hard work, determination, and initiative. Yes, we can convince ourselves that we can do it. We should go for it, putting our minds and souls into it. However, the fact is that people win and people lose. Only some people are cut for it. A thin line exists between having the mojo to do it and not. One should recognise their shortcomings and jump on to Plan B, not forever flogging a dead horse. Worse still, when one fails to pick up the telltale signs, one buries oneself deeper and deeper into a cesspool of self-defeating habits, hoping for a miracle to happen. Whe...

© Borderless Journal When I was growing up, the radio was the musical score constantly playing in the background. Blaring between Tamil movie songs and radio dramas were news of the hour and current issue discussions. The things that got imprinted on my impressionable mind as I was transforming from a teenager to a young adult were about violence, wars and bombings. I remember about the war in Vietnam as it was close to home. For every peace talk and the end of war announcement, there would pop up another bombing and a barrage of casualties. My simple mind wondered when the war would end, but it never did. It went on for so long that they had a Tamil film in 1970 named Vietnam Veedu (House of Vietnam), referring to a household forever in family feuds and turmoil.... https://borderlessjournal.com/2024/03/14/the-elusive-utopia/

Dedicated to a follower, HS, who enjoyed the post on Lotus and asked whether a 'one world' can ever exist where we do things for the greater good of mankind and where the need of the collective supersedes that of an individual. We are told that race is healthy. The human race is moving forward from cave-dwelling nomads to space-exploring nations by this very trait, the race to be better than the other. Nature is hostile. It does not care two hoots for the weak and the slow. It shows its mighty fury to those who cross its path. Only the fittest survive. Biology transmits this survival trait to the next generation so that the memory of how to thwart that adversity is implanted in their DNA. But we are told we have six senses, unlike members of the animal kingdom. We have developed empathy and compassion for the weak and the downtrodden. Still, the only thing keeping us from killing each other is the law, fear of retribution for our actions in this life, the next, or the afterli...

  Nanpakal Nerathu Mayakkam (Stupor of the afternoon, Malayalam-Tamil; 2023) Story, Direction: Lijo Jose Pellisary It may take a little background on Tamil movies (a lot actually) with some knowledge of Hindu teachings to fully appreciate the cryptic messages the director/storyteller is trying to tell his audience. A person not immersed or having lived in this environment may find it draggy. Since this is a 'Malayalam' movie made by one famed in the Malayalam film industry, I wonder if a person from Kerala will find the same connection to the film as one who hails from a Tamil background. The story's backstory is hidden in the numerous Tamil songs, including devotional ones and classic Tamil movies playing in the background almost throughout. The overhanging theme throughout is God, the purpose of life and the role we play in it. We walk into life thinking we know everything that needs to be known. We make our own rules and are convinced it is correct. We admonish others fo...

Bliss (2021) Director: Mike Cahill This is one of the movies that one will either love or hate; get it, or it just passes by! I thought it was good. It helps the rest of the population not be affected by the complexities of a confused mind.  Quite often than that, to the lucky ones unaffected by the hardship of modern living, it is sometimes how certain decisions should be made. And we cannot understand why the mentally ill repeatedly make wrong life decisions. They plunge continually into states of helplessness and hopelessness.  Greg (Owen Wilson) is a staff in a call centre-like office. Even though his superior keeps calling him to the office, Greg is immersed in his own pencil drawing of his dream holiday villa. We gather that he is divorced. Even though everybody else is huffing and puffing, busy answering calls, Greg is in bliss, adding details to his drawing.  When Greg finally meets his boss, he is shocked to find out he has been fired. Greg shoves his boss aside,...

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...

Green Book (2018) The moment you see the protagonist of the film, Tony Vallelonga, an out-of-job New York Italian nightclub bouncer, chuck a pair of drinking glasses into the bin all because two black plumbers drank from it, you know what the story is all about and which direction the movie would progress. Sure enough, it turned out just like what you predicted. What keeps you glued to the screen, however, is the dialogue between Tony and his new employer, Doc Don Shirley, an accomplished musician, who turned of to be black. The sort of coming-of-age film turns out to be an eye-opener for both parties. For Tony, to accept people of colour for their character and for Doc,  a realisation that even the whites go through hardship like the blacks. It was set in the heady times of 1962 when racial tension was a heated topic. There are numerous leg tapping songs of the era to transform viewers to a time when life was not (it never had been) had its own problems. Being pol...

Perched on a collection of rocks amidst the hostile winds and seas of the South China Sea, Macao may seem like a morose land with a grey skyline. Without fertile agricultural land, it had to depend on other source of economical dependence. What other way to make money than to deal with money itself, like use money to beget money, like gambling. Hey wait, the Jesuit forefathers who set sail to spread the good word of the God, established this land of the foundation of Godliness, gambling being one of the cardinal sins. The sin would be halved if all the remnants of the ruins are conserved and shown to the world to lure heritage status and to lure divine help needing tourists from whom we will suck their money. Not to forget our pre-Portuguese seafaring ancestors and Ah-Ma temple with the sea protecting goddess. The mysticism just makes Macao more mysterious. Even its name was erroneously derived when the visitors landed at the local Fujian tribes were seen pacifying their newb...

Pussycat Dolls (PCD) once sang... "When I grow up, I wanna be famous, I wanna be a star, I wanna be in movies! When I grow up, I wanna see the world, drive nice cars, I wanna have groupies!" At least his dream materialized two over scores years later!  Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream that one day over the rose hills of Georgia, sons of former slaves and former slave owners will be able to sit together in the table of Brotherhood and that his four children would not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character! Dream merchants like Walt Disney gave people a form of escapism through his Mickey Mouse, Goofy and Donald Duck characters. Soichiro Honda managed to pull his war torn bankrupt and defeated nation to be at par with its victors till of recent. From a humble bicycle repair shop, his company is now venturing into artificial intelligence and robotics! I too had a dream... which remains a dream. Growing up in the post May 13 era, what ...