It is war, but where is the enemy?

The Looming Tower (2018)


Sun Tzu's 'Art of War' suggests the best way to win a war against your enemy is when they (the enemy) do not realise that they are not at war. "Know your enemy know your environment" he added. Despite this knowledge, the mighty Ming Dynasty fell to the lowly Manchus.

Twenty years ago, two then Colonels in the Chinese People's Liberation Army, Qiao Lang and Wang Xiansui published a book named 'Unrestricted Warfare'. Here these two officers outlined ways to overcome a mighty force like the USA. It seems that the CIA also got hold of this book and was reading material for their trainees. In a gist, it proposes trapping the country into indebtedness, economically and militarily. Cost of waging a traditional war may prove too costly, money-wise, and annihilation of the planet as we know it. 

Probably the other enemies of the USA have also got hold this knowledge. With the widespread of information on the net, nothing is sacrosanct anymore. After all the meddling of the Americans to almost every country in the world, in the name of keeping world peace, upholding liberty and freedom, the victims are biting back. 


The miniseries narrate the countdown to the biggest assault on the American soil after Pearl Harbour. Garbled up intelligence, concealing of information between CIA and FBI and fight for supremacy amongst civil servants all led to the tragedy. It is a moving account of the lives and tribulations of many real people who worked in these agencies. A good watch. 

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They want us to believe!

X Files Season 10 (E1-E5)

More than 10 years after their tour of duty, the last the two renegade FBI agents are still at their conspiracy theories. They are still keen to expose to the world of their employers’ devious plans to hide major secrets from mankind and their attempts at hastening the annihilation of mankind as we know it.

Many things have happened since their last outing. The paranormal department had been closed. Fox Mulder is on medication for depression. Dana Scully is working in a hospital, minding her own business. There is a mention of Scully having been abducted by aliens before. They (Mulder and Scully) have an 11-year-old child whom they have given away for adoption for security reasons. They have reason to believe that the child must have been infused with alien DNA, hence the secrecy.

The smoking man is still around! The last time I saw him, he had laryngeal cancer. In the first episode, he is seen with a tracheostomy but still smoking via his tracheal aperture! And still up to his tricks! Telepathy and killing through mind control make its presence again. The episode on were-monster is set on a light note and is more comical and thought-provoking than scary! A trashman is a thought form (a monster which arose from an artist’s mind!) who is a killing machine who seeks justice for the homeless. The homeless are treated like trash - everyone knows it is there but nobody wants to know what becomes of it!

In keeping with the sentiments of the times, the 5th episode is on suicide bombing. In their attempt to extricate information from a comatose bomber, Scully and Mulder with a set of sort reverse image of their roles, two other FBI agents, try to do the job. One pair decided to partake this task through out-of-body experience with magic mushroom (hallucinogens) and the other through analysis of EEG wave.

It is amazing how imaginative the writers can be to keep the interest of fans after all these years. Another round of galore for conspiracy theorists and for those who want to believe that the truth is still out there. Whether we would be happy to know the truth, would be satisfied to learn of the truth, believe that it the truth when the truth is laid bare or be able to handle the truth, that is another story. They say the joy is in the journey in finding the truth. The truth is just the icing, we can live without it!

J. Edgar Hoover, complicated man!

J. Edgar (2011)
Taking freedom of speech to the extreme, Clint Eastwood produced and directed this 2011 movie on American icon of paranoia who made Americans to perceive that there is USA and there is the rest of the world, John Edgar Hoover, the first director of FBI. The movie dwells upon at best speculative stories that surfaced after his death regarding his secret private life, essentially, opening up his closet and displaying its contents in full for public scrunity. Looks like Leonardo De Caprio is slowly stereotyping himself into acting in biographies - first he acted as Howard Hughes in 'Aviator' now this. A stellar performance he did give and is slowly earning a reputation as a actor of class.There are a few 'myths' floating around in books and Internet on J. Edgar Hoover. He is alleged to have black ancestry and was adopted by the Hoover family. His wirery curly hair in his younger days is testimony to this effect.
The movie starts with an old JEH dictating his side of the story to a young agent. From here, the film, as in the trend in present day film making, it flip flops between the past and past, narrating the story as it went on. One interesting way of shooting was how these two are interposed - e.g. two characters enter a lift in the 60s and exit it in the 1930s! Edgar lives with his mother (Dame Judi Finch) who has a strong influence on him and his mentally ill father. He fancies a new secretary who joins his department but his love is turned down as she rather be married to her job. She (Helen Gandy, Naomi Watt in a less glamorous role) , however, becomes his lifelong personal assistant.
Edgar heads The Bureau of Investigations (before it had the prefix Federal) after overshadowing his superior in apprehending some subversive Bolshevik elements. He revamped the Bureau with his firebrand way of no nonsense leadership. He introduces fingerprinting to track communist sympathizers at a time when it was still a pseudoscience.
After that came the Depression era spates of bank robbery and highway machine gun wielding gangs.
Edgar took in Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer) as his assistant at the Bureau. It developed into a lasting relationship which got people talking. They went shopping for clothes together, went for holidays and dined toghther wothout fail.

Long arm of the law: J Edgar Hoover in 1936.
New York Daily News Archive/Getty Images

The case that shook the Bureau was the kidnapping of America's 20th century hero, Charles Lindbergh's toddler. Local police's bumbling manner of collecting evidence ended with tragedy for the Lindberghs. The case helped him develop a sophisticated forensic laboratory. Edgar is said to hold secret recordings of many prominent signataries like Mrs Roosevelt, JFK, Nixon and many others in his 48 years of leadership. Apparently the information he acquired were his bargaining tools to get his things done the way he wished and to continue to hold the helm of chief.
There was many gangsters caught by his team but Edgar is accused of not doing enough to eradicate gangsterism as the urban legends say that the mobs hold many evidence of Edgar's sexual preference. At a time when gay men were frowned upon and ostracized, Edgar denied his feelings by purposely going after the homosexuals and showing his prowess.

Dorothy Lamour

The team also gets a breakthrough via their use cryptography technology and marking of dollar bills.
Edgar is depicted here as a person who takes prominence over the successes of his men.
During one of their holiday outings, Edgar tells Tolson about his intention to propose to an actress, Dorothy Lamour, which enrages Tolson who confesses his true love!
He even has a secret recordings of Martin Luther King (of his sexual imbroglio with a white woman which was a crime then) which he used against him days before his Nobel prize for Peace awards which Edgar tries to block.
The film also shows a weak moment where Edgar tries his hand in cross dressing in the comfort of his own room after the passing of his mother. It also subtly suggests that Edgar may have a hand in Dr King's slaying and perhaps in exposing Nixon's Watergate scandal.
Towards the end, Tolson accuses Edgar of making up most of the crime busting escapades mentioned in his manuscript with a lot of exaggerations to boost up his image.

T Rajendar

In the typical Nixon depiction, who is filled with profanity and double faced politician's fashion, he sadly announces the demise of J E Hoover, the agent who served 8 presidents and the iconic hero of many including himself whilst his men seal and ransack his office for the secret files which were never found!
Clint Eastwood not only produced and directed the film, he even wrote the music score! Hey, he is following the footsteps of T.Rajendar and his co-film makers in Kollywood!
A definite Oscar contender!
Just a thought... If I were famous and enviably important, they would label me gay too! I have cordial relationship with my mother (albeit our differences sometimes), I enjoy weekly indulges of activities which involve drenching in sweat with the boys on Sunday mornings as well as the breakfast of thosai afterwards,  enjoy songs belted by many gay singers (Sudirman and Queen) and I sometimes go undercover with a pseudonym of a person is flamboyantly overt about his sexuality!

Memorable quote...
When moral declines and good men do nothing, evil flourishes.

The secret life of J Edgar Hoover http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2012/jan/01/j-edgar-hoover-secret-fbi
Five myths about J. Edgar Hoover http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-j-edgar-hoover/2011/11/07/gIQASLlo5M_story.html