All through our childhood, my sisters and I had been watching manga without manga was referred to as so. It was then just Japanese cartoon, with characters having big round eyes, cute demeanour and screechy loud voices.
Later, Japanese cartoons developed into separate entities grew wings and started telling more mature stories and themes. The written graphic form became known as manga, and animated forms that appear in games and films are known as anime.
I was recently introduced to Japan's eminent cult figure in the field of animation and direction, Hayao Miyazaki. His film ‘Spirited Away’ has been hailed as Japan's highest-grossing movie for 29 years. It also won the Oscar at the 2022 Best Animated Feature Film. BBC listed it in its 100 greatest films of the 21st century.
Partnered with Disney, this film infiltrated the four corners of the globe. Thanks to the vibrant colours, creative storytelling, and interesting characters, it looks like Alice in Wonderland on steroids. A lost girl, Chihiro, is in a weird world, only to be helped by many characters with Shinto-Buddhist backgrounds around her. She ends up saving the day and learning many valuable life lessons.
One of the reasons to live is to immerse yourself in a land of make-believe.
The Great Indian Suicide (Tamil, Telegu; 2023) Director: Viplove Koneti
In the junior years of my training, I had the chance to manage patients who were brought in after suicide attempts. The drug of choice in that demographic was paraquat, a deathly organophosphate herbicide which worked well at keeping weed at bay. Unfortunately, it also proved to be lethal to humans. A tablespoon of the deathly liquid proved lethal. Even if stomach washout and chelation were instituted early, once urinary paraquat was positive, death is inevitable. Within 14 to 21 days, slow death would ensue with organ failure, specifically lung fibrosis. More amount of remorse, regret or prayers could change back time.
The population that thronged that hospital were plantation workers and had easy access to paraquat. Many of the victims were Indians, and the title of this movie brought the memory of that time of my career. Many of the parasuicides were for feeble reasons, to gain sympathy, to attract attention, to display undying love, for being jilted, scoring bad marks or even after being disciplined by parents. Unfortunately, their choice of drug proved wrong. They mostly, unfortunately, succumbed to the poison. At that time, I thought the Indian movies were to blame as many movies of the 80s included suicide as a selling point. They must have got their inspiration from the saga of Romeo and Juliet, the exemplar of pure, genuine, innocent love!
This movie turned out to be nothing like that. It seems to have been inspired by cases of mass suicide like Branch Davidian and the Waco incident, as well as the Jonestown massacre in Guyana, but with a twist. The components of a femme fatale and sibling killers (spoiler alert) are present.
A coffee shop owner is visited by a young lady offering her biscuit cookies to be sold in the shop. The owner, a young man who grew up in an orphanage, slowly falls for the girl. One thing led to another, and the girl dropped a bombshell. Her family plans to have mass suicide, as prescribed by their family holy man, to reunite with her dead uncle. Our hero marries the girl, goes to her family house, and tries to get to the root of the seemingly bizarre logic that her family seems to hold steadfast to.
P.S. The movie is based on the Burari deaths in Delhi in 2018. Ten family members, including an 80-year-old grandmother, died in a ritualistic mass suicide. The deaths were determined to be motivated by shared psychosis. Read all about it here.
When the film 'Predator' came out in 1987, it was a hit. It was the time of American jingoism. The free world believed that America was the only superpower around and only they could give the best solution to all of world problems. Rambo and his First Blood franchise did just that. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Muscleman from Austria, did not want to be left behind. After fighting baddies from all four corners of the world, it was only natural that our Mr. Universe try a hand at muscling down enemies from out of this world.
When 'Predator', a sequel to 'Prey' in terms of story timeline, came out, it was a super duper hit. Shot in the lush forest of South America with cinematography completed with sense-around movie theatres, moviegoers thought that was the pinnacle of Hollywood's moviemaking.
The movie developed a cult following. Comic books were rolled out, bankrolling on its success. Board games and computer games ensued. After all possible clientele were exhausted, the natural course of action was collaborating with followers of the 1979 'Alien' franchise. Since the main characters of both 'Alien' and 'Predator' fought extra-terrestrial forces, it was only logical that fighting matches were fixed between these two alien forces. Numerous spinoffs were churned out subsequently.
Following the 1987 film, many sequels came out with not-so-creative titles. 'Predator 2' (1990), 'Alien vs Predator' (2004), 'Alien vs Predator 2' (2007), 'Predators' (2010) and 'The Predator' (2018).
After exhausting all avenues of reaping profit from the 'Predator' franchise, the logical next action plan is to return to the basics. So they went to the beginning, pre-independent New World, in 1719, when the Comanche people roamed the land freely. The first Yautja, the villain, probably landed on Earth and started his hunting expedition.
In keeping with the times, the cast and the storyline are kept politically acceptable to the people in Hollywood and the viewing crowd at large. The protagonist has to be a lady, of course, and from a minority group, a Native American. Comanche language is spoken liberally throughout most of the film. The whites are depicted as uncouth, uncultured and heartless carpetbaggers.
Everyone is a hunter here. The Yautja hunts for sport. The Comanches hunt for survival to satisfy their basic needs of food and shelter. Over the generations, the Comanches have developed a symbiotic relationship with Nature. They hunt what is needed and maintain peace with their surroundings for generations. The French hunters depicted here are observed to be evil, hedonistic, self-serving people who turn violent because they can. They abuse Nature by hunting bison indiscriminately for monetary gains and torture the Comanche for the kick of it.
In its visually pleasing display, we experience the hunted turning the table against the hunter in the thick of American wilderness at a time when being civilised meant staying in zen with Nature, not abusing and raping the environment for personal gains. The prey becomes the predator for survival.
(Based on a novel by Miriam Toews) Director: Sarah Polley
"What's new?" said DA. "Women can talk; they sure do." He started talking about the male and female brain and how their connexions differ and such... One is action-orientated, whilst the other talks!" But that is not the point. It is about women's empowerment and talking back against a system that subjugated them to stereotypical roles. Every civilisation and religious path must have started with novel intentions of giving everyone a place in the sun and a right to pursue certain rights in life. Along the way, the leaders found it easier to rule by decree, and certain obscure divine ordains showed their presence.
Even though they are built tough and resilient on the inside, women lost out on many physical day-to-day duties and worked in tandem with their male counterparts to complete their tasks. Manual labour in the good old days was intensive. Mechanisation and industrialisation of the Sufferage era made work less labour-intensive. And finally, the sexual revolution of the 60s, for once, gave women, for the first time in aeons, a chance to control their fertility. All these while, parturition and child-rearing were their most significant hurdle in reaching greater heights. Maternal hormones and societal expectations prevented them from pursuing their worldly desires.
With equal education and job opportunities, the past fifty years saw the fairer sex coming to par with their male counterparts. Their journey was no walk in the park. Their presence in education, economy and politics is beyond compare. Now, there is a re-look into their combative stance to be at par with men. Some have started asking questions.
With all advances in contraceptive methods, failure is a real thing. Unfortunately, the by-product of all the sexual merriment is borne by the female gender. The maternal hormones circulating in their veins draw affection to the newborn or the soon-to-be-born. It is just simply impossible to detach oneself from this. A mother cannot just stand idle at the sound of a wailing baby. Neither can she prioritise her sleep over nursing her offspring at o'clock in the morning. Anyway, all the deferment of fertility to concentrate on career prospects in endangering childbirth at a mature age. With age, with wisdom, choosing a life partner becomes much more problematic. Single parenthood has its own problem.
Again, some ask whether the biological differences in sex are for deservedly different reasons. Both perform various duties towards a unified front. One need not compete but rather complement the journey of life.
This film is based on a novel by Miriam Toews referring to what happened in a Mennonite colony named Manitoba Colony in Bolivia between 2005 and 2009. The Mennonites arose from the Anabaptist movement that emerged from the Reformation era. The Anabaptists believe baptism should be voluntary at a mature age, not infancy.
The colony's 151 women and young girls were mass-sedated with cow tranquilisers and were sexually assaulted. More than seven were charged with rape, and so was the veterinarian who supplied the drug. The novel is a fictional account of what the affected women would have discussed before taking their next course of action.
This type of discussion going back and forth is what our forefathers must have had before leaving their lands and family in India, China or elsewhere. Even longer before that, when our first ancestor took his first step out of Africa. Quite recently, my daughter had to decide this before moving lock, stock and barrel to uproot from Malaysia and work under the NHS as a skilled immigrant labourer. They all must have considered the three choices - do nothing but forgive, forget and hope for the best, stay and fight, or leave.
With depleting national coffers while keeping the vote banks happy with race politics, civil service has taken a drastic deep in quality, efficacy and integrity.
[P.S. On another note... In the story, the ladies noticed that on the nights someone kept vigil, the said molestations did not occur. Gruesome assaults happened when everybody slept soundly. This reminded me of the double-slid experiments in quantum mechanics - results obtained with and without an observer, suggesting that everything is unreal.]
[P.S.S. Realising that humans need to live in a community and be herded to the correct path, which religion seems to offer, individuals prey on gullible victims to fulfil their desires.]
First, we were told that our vocation determines us; staying true to fulfilling the goals of our job is equivalent to being close to Divinity. But just see what it let us to - a social classification system that essentially pigeon-holes one's future by birth. Karl Marx then asserted that life is more than mere monetising one's labour. Man has to find balance in maximising time spent on Earth by indulging in things that excite him, maybe hunting, art, music, etcetera. And that led to Lenin extrapolating it to stir the working class to rise against their enslavers.
Now we are told that we should find a life-work balance. We should not bring home the stresses of our workplace home and vice-versa. We cannot let our personal dilemmas affect our work performances as well. So what better way to severe these two intertwinings?
This is the premise of this miniseries. Workers of an unspecified company doing seemingly so much yet nothing agree to undergo this dissociative procedure. A small device is implanted in the brain, which gives no memory of their outside life once they enter the office. Essentially, they lead two individual lives, oblivious of their two lives.
Soon the workers realise that there is more than meets the eye. The latest recruit wants to resign, but she is told resignation is not an option. Pretty soon, the workers discover a way to find their outside life. This leads to many events with a nail-biting cliffhanger at season end. The miniseries is far from over and has built a cult following. Season 2 is in the pipeline as internet sleuths try to identify the Easter Egg cues that may explain the whole meaning behind the story.
On the side, the viewers also sense that the tale also takes a swipe at the modern environment and etiquette of the typical modern workplace. There are plenty of unproductive actions in the name of work, and there is a tendency to self-aggrandise one's frivolous 'success'. This 'success' motivates workers to continue their pursuit to lick the boots of higher management and the imaginative figures of 'Big Bosses'. Non-conformers are labelled troublemakers, and their career paths can be far from smooth.
We always associate destruction with negativity. Erection and construction, on the other hand, is hailed as the epitome of prosperity. Hence, annihilation, collision and termination are scorned upon. Unfortunately, life is not so simple. There can never be peace without prior anarchy; no construction without demolition and no shanthi without ashanti. Life, with its ups and down, are aplenty with cyclical loss and gains.
That was the same dilemma when I came to discover about Lord Shiva, one of the main component of the Trinity in the post-Vedic Hinduism. The trident-bearing Lord is revered for his greatness and ferocious power to destroy and is invoked for peace on Earth. It baffled me how damage can lead to prosperity. Herein lies the profound philosophy of life. Someone or something who jolts the equilibrium, the status quo, has to or to be destroyed before life can proceed in a just manner. The evils do not necessarily come from without to spew negativity. It could be within; an ill-thought good intention, a self-serving need, blinded vision of what is right and the list goes on. We need to kill the roaches to take control of our house. The roaches do not know that they are doing any wrong. They are just performing the tasks they were programmed to - to find territory, food, procreate and ensure continuity of species. Their biological mission is only a hindrance to us, not them. In their compound eyes, they are doing the right thing. We, from our perspective, spring at them with fear of disease, filth and loss of territory. Probably dominance too as we know cockroaches can resist a nuclear meltdown.
Thanos with his Infinity Gauntlet.
Like Shiva, is a destroyer. Vapourised up to half of the population of the Universe. If the population explosion is leaving a long and an ugly trail of carbon footprint, then Thanos' actions should be lauded.
We always think that colonisation, wars and enslavement are only found in the confines of our history book. The truth is far from that. Even though we are living in an era where education and knowledge had never been so freely available, we are all far from wise. Forget Nazi Hitler and Pol Pot. Even in the 21st century, we have people like George Soros and the Cabal who are hellbent on destroying societies. Soros, the leading globalist is still actively trying to re-organise the community which has evolved itself into a steady state. It looks like he will not stop till anarchy prevails. The Cabal, with its web of destruction, spreading through the world over with the cooperation of the Bank of London and fellow similar minded magnates, have been linked to many well planned and well-executed significant tragedies. There is a concerted effort to destroy the sovereignty of nations, open borders, restructuring societies and make communities godless.
One wonders whether Gandhi's passive resistance would save the day. Do we fight fire with fire, douse with water or practice self-immolation?
To enjoy Avengers: Endgame, one has to have a little background that brought the whole Marvel Cinematic Universe into turmoil. Thanos, the unstoppable destroyer, has in possession the six Infinity Stones (that controls time, space, mind, reality, soul and power) and had sent many of the superheroes into cold storage. With a little push from Carol Danvers (Captain Marvel), the ingenious mind of Iron Man, time travel, Hulk's scientific know-how and a lot of kissass action from the Marvel heroes, sanity prevails. To the uninitiated, without a background of the various characters, the film would appear a tad confusing. With so many different heroes with different suits swerving past the villain throwing ammunitions of different hues and explosive potentials, everything would seem like a fiesta of pyrotechnic display. Then, one would be wondering who those cute animals and weird looking ladies are and how they get pulled into the melee. The movie also gives the millennials a crash course in time travel, just like what Back to the Future did for the Generation-X in the 80s. Time travel comes with it its own benefits and peculiarities.
In war, everybody loses, but the winner takes all, whatever is left. In the war to end all evils, the protagonist also faced heavy casualties. You have to watch to find out. The audience goes back with a sombre feeling that this outing could be the last for the Avengers. Bearing in mind that the MCU is a make-believe one, anything is possible, especially when the fans (a.k.a. suckers) feel nostalgic and the filmmakers feel a need to fill their coffers. Talking about fans, while watching the movie, as and when various superheroes appeared on screen or landed a blow Thanos, I had a certain feeling I am watching a Tamil movie. The viewers were upstanding cheering and even giving hearty laughs to the tongue-in-cheek dialogues uttered by the characters. This is a new experience in Malaysia. The usual cinema going crowd here pay to see bigger-than-life explosions, gore and flesh, not dialogue. And to top it, a large portion of the audience was reluctant to exit the hall even after the credit finished rolling out. As if the 3-hour long movie was not long enough! I later found out some even wept at the ending when.. (oops, no spoiler alert!)
Encountering Kali (In the margins, at the centre, in the west) Edited by Rachel F McDermott, & Jeffrey J. Kirpal To the uninitiated, like the Europeans who arrived on the Indian shores to encounter its natives paying homage to a gory angry looking dark imaged Goddess with weapons of destruction hanging from her multiple arms, wearing a necklace of human scalps, skirt of human limbs and protruding tongue, it must be the image of Devil itself. For the non-believers, it must have appeared like devil worship and a warped sense of divinity of the tribal people. To the natives, however, it is their expression of the embodiment of how the world is to them.
The world is a cruel place. Man's survival is paved with the daily struggle against the elements of Nature and is a constant combat against various atrocities. It is not easy, but life has to go on. Civilised people in India had apparently realised these long ago, even before the spread of Brahmanic and Vedic teachings. The forces of Nature are believed to be feminine in origin. The same mother with the maternal instincts to cuddle is the same one that shows wrath when she is not pleased. The same mother, despite her anger, would not bear to see a hungry child cry. Hence, her bosomy posture with an angry looking stance. The rage within Devi is also to combat negative forces in the world.
The Devi, Sakthi, the generic name for this female divinity, assumes many roles. In the form of a loving wife and kind mother, she is Parvathi, the consort of Lord Shiva. When the situation warrants, she would assume the role of Durga, the fearsome tiger-riding Goddess. Certain quarters insist that it is from the female energies indeed that the Trimurti, the union of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva (the creator, protector and destroyer respectively) arise. In fact, She is Brahman, the ultimate force that spins the Universe.
Kali is said to be the concept that resides in the female psyche. It is the dominant force which climaxes when a situation warrants for her to be to protect her loved ones. When a wounded animal is cornered for the last kill, it will garner all its last remaining strength to fight back, most voraciously and in an unstoppable manner. That is Kali. It is said in a Purana that this force was invoked when a demon (asura) obtained a boon from Brahma which promised indestructibility by any living man. Kali, with the help of Shiva, was so intoxicated with the victory over this demon and the gore of his blood that She went on a rampage. The carnage went on. She was on a killing spree that no one could stop. Shiva was called in to stop his 'wife'. Shiva laid amongst the corpse. Only when Kali realised that She was stepping on Shiva, she relented whilst biting her tongue. That is the persona of an embarrassed lady, extruding her tongue and gently biting it!
While some would look at Kali as the current state of the world, hostile and unforgiving, there is still some humanity in the form of comfort and security from this towering figure. Others would associate Her with the left-handed Tantric practices. These are habits considered deviant from the mainstream, the use of sexual energies of the unsanctioned kind, intoxicants and abnormal behaviours. In the realistic world, these negative forces still make up the equilibrium of the world that we live in.
Dakshineswar stance
The belief in the feminine forces of Nature predates Brahmanic and Vedantic teachings. It was a way then to appease the forces with blood sacrifice. Some quarters assert that it is a perverted practice. When the seemingly humane practices of avoiding animal sacrifices came forth, Kali worship became marginalised. It was taken to areas considered to be at the fringe of civilisation, Bengal, South India and the mountainous areas of India. When sea transportation became a trendy thing, Kali worship was re-introduced to the world, at least to the Western world through Calcutta and sea-ports of the South.
To the marginalised societies, Kali gives them hope and redemption. To the Tamils who were persecuted during the Sri Lanka's systemic genocide, She shone a light on them despite all the adversities. Like Her, behind the epitome of destruction, there was a glimmer of love and maternal cuddle to the hungry and the tortured ones. Oracles who invoked the spirit of Kali gave them closure to their missing or lost loved ones. Kali was not expected to change or be blamed for the situation they were caught in but rather remained a beacon of hope to the downtrodden.
These tuft of faith was also given to the indentured labourers who crossed oceans for survival. Kali worship is still widespread in South East Asia, the Caribbean Islands and the spread of islands over the Indian Ocean.
As the world became 'civilised' and inhumane blood offerings became a taboo in the eyes of non-tribal people, there was an attempt to classify Kali worship as 'low-caste' or subversive. The practitioners of younger religions like Jain, Buddhism and Brahmanic brand of faith, viewed it as the devotion of the low-caste, natives and the dark-skinned South Indian coolies, especially so in places they were brought in as labourers.
It is interesting to note how the word 'thug' made it into the English Language. It was just about the time when Indian raised arms against their colonial masters just after the 1857 Sepoy Revolution. The wanted terrorists (freedom fighters) ran into the Vindhya mountains to escape persecution and found solace in Devi Thuggee (a manifestation of Kali) temples. Soon these troublemakers were labelled as thugs. Of course, for the hunted they just yearned for an abode of hope in their patron Goddess to focus on their next move.
From Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
Psychoanalysts do not want to be left out in the interpretation of what Kali means to the world. The female gender has always been said to passive and irrational, at least in the eyes of the West. The community expected the male counterpart to take charge of the situation to maintain order. Feminity has a wild, aggressive side which is kept under a calm demeanour that they seem to exhibit. When the situation demands or the time is ripe, the explosive magma of physical energies, sexual prowess and rage just spew out. Another critic suggested that perhaps the West is a male-dominated society with their phallic projections penetrating the weaker natives. To see a powerful feminine force with pent-up energies was unacceptable. Hence, the denigration of Goddess Kali in the mainstream media and by the celluloid industry. Take for example the depiction of Kali in 'Help!' (1966) and 'Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom' (1984). For believers of Kali as their guardian, the whole persona of this Goddess is just Mimesis, imitation of real life in art form - a dialectical, double-edged, complex play of mimesis and imagery! Kali is Mother India against foreign oppressors (Ferringhi). I suppose, for the colonists, it is reverse mimesis. Many Indian Independence fighters like Bose and Aurobindo used this dark avenging ferocious icon to rise to the occasion, whereas Gandhi must have used the subtler subdued form of Kali when he opted for passive resistance.
This towering matriarchal role of Goddess Kali in our daily lives cannot be overstated. As the unifying force Nature is feminine, it has to assume different roles in combating different situations. The message here is that an angry mother, no matter how angry she is, would still feed her crying child. We have to understand that the narrations are that of people from vast areas with their own perception of the Divine. Therefore, the knowledge may have been lost in transit or in translation. The idea is that all our attributes are divine and our ability to converse, mobilise, protect and think is a blessing to cherish. These are remembered on certain days, like Navarathri.
In the modern era, after being oppressed for millenniums, the female gender is out with a bang. Their dormant powers have suddenly been unleashed. The fairer sex is out with a vengeance. They are now slowly but surely making their presence felt in all fields including some that were considered too physically or intellectually demanding for what used to be called the 'fairer' sex.
Blue Velvet (1986) Story and Direction: David Lynch My impressionable young mind used to wonder when I used to read of random shootings in schools and somewhat bizarre behaviours of certain people in the so-called civilised world. I thought the deviant acts were the price one paid for development. The phenomenon of adolescent psychology was not even an entity in this part of the world till about 20 years ago. Is it a first world problem as we set different priorities as our target and different role models to follow? Perhaps this film, another David Lynch classic, is trying to tell us that the dangers were lurking inside all the while. It is just that avenues are available to express now. It had just been swept under the proverbial carpet all this while.
It starts on an idyllic day in the 60s on a sunny day with everybody smiling and Bobby V's 'Blue Velvet' song in the background. A man is watering his lawn, and his family members are drawn to a TV series. The man is suddenly paralysed with a stroke. The camera shows him falling on the ground, the water from the hose goes all over the place, and it zooms down into the ground. Way down, showing bugs chewing on dead tissues and soil. That, in essence, is the message behind the story. Many unpleasant thoughts go deep in the minds of seeming perfect people.
The college son of the stroke returns home to mind the business. He discovers a piece of a severed human ear while walking through a short-cut to the hospital. He brings it to the police. He decides to be a 'Hardy Boy' kind of private investigator to unveil a web of kidnapping, blackmail, forbidden love, fetishes, masochistic love and a lesson in Freudian psychological development.
There are a lot of unnecessary displays of what would make members of the guardian of morality hot under the collar and symbolisms to prove the storyteller's point of view. Not everything that appears ascetically appealing is what it seems. Look at the dove. The dove, the symbol of peace and harmony, can also be destructive to survive. It swallows a bug whole while it is still alive. To the bug, a dove is a monster that draws the life out of down. It is anything but a sign of bliss!
This cult film did not really hit it when it first hit the cinemas. It, however, had a resurrection of sorts after it was released on DVD. In fact, there was fear that this film may initiate copycat activities from youth just like they had in Kubrik's 'Clockwork Orange'.
The cult following is probably from connoisseurs and students of philosophy, anthropology and existentialism. The subject matter involves things which are difficult for an average Joe to grasp. It questions the futile depressive nature of our modern living through the eyes of the narrator and main character of the movie. Incidentally, we will eventually discover the real meaning of his actions with a twist at the end.
The narrator (Ed Norton) is a disillusioned car insurance man who suffers from insomnia. His therapist suggests stints at various support groups to ease his pain. Nothing changes except his meeting with an equally individual, a Marla Singer. Along his daily duties, he develops a relationship with a stranger, a soap salesman, Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt) on-flight.
One after another things fall apart for the narrator. His luggage on the flight is retained by the airport, his apartment is bombed and his performance at work takes a dive.
Left without a place to stay, he lives with Tyler and hence begin a bizarre lifestyle with mind boggling dialogue philosophy and ideas. In fact, that is the greatest selling point of the movie. Together, they start a fighting club to release their tension and pretty soon it develops into something beyond control. They and the club members, led by Tyler, indulge in various anarchic and destructive activities with special vendetta against big corporate companies. They find destroying thing cathartic. Fighting and releasing all that suppressed energy to them are therapeutic. They justify their actions by rationalising that the human design is for hunting. Now, there is nothing to kill for, nothing to overcome and explore. We are all in our comfort zone, satisfying our inner desires by consuming and overindulging. But then, that is the real reason why rules, regulations and religion came about - to give the downtrodden and outcast a chance to savour the beauty of life!
We're designed to be hunters and we're in a society of shopping. There's nothing to kill anymore, there's nothing to fight, nothing to overcome, nothing to explore. In that societal emasculation this everyman [the narrator] is created. —David Fincher We're consumers. We are the byproducts of a lifestyle obsession. Murder, crime, poverty, these things don't concern me. What concerns me are celebrity magazines, television with 500 channels, some guy's name on my underwear. Rogaine, Viagra, Olestra. Listen up, maggots! You are not special. You are not a beautiful or unique snowflake. You are the same decaying organic matter as everything else. We are the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.
Never had the chance to watch this movie the first time around, the movie that catapulted John Travolta's acting career back into orbit after many repeated failures since Saturday Night Fever. As in other Quentin Tarantino's films, the layout of the movie is different and is full of gore, violence and flowery explicit language. Bruce Willis career too had a kick-start here. I kind of liked it with its unique brand of humour, the right chemistry between the main hitmen, Samuel L Jackson and Travolta and the witty dialogue.
The story is basically disjointed and is told in a non-linear fashion, but they all make sense in the end. You would be wondering why Travolta gets shot dead in the middle of the show but reappears later.
It starts with two novice robbers chitchatting and decides to rob a diner. When they (one of them is Tim Roth of 'Lie to Me') hold a gun to hold up, the credits roll in. The story stops there and continues at the tail end of the movie. But then the tail end is not sequentially the end of the story as the end is told in the middle! A new concept, a breakthrough that was earth-shattering and earned many accolades.
Vincent (Travolta) and Jules (Jackson) are hitmen for Wallace. They are mean killers who collect some merchandise from double-crossers. Then there is a scene where Vincent has to babysit Wallace's wife, Mia (Uma Thurman). She overdoses herself with heroin and creates a heart-stopping scene for Vincent.
Another plot is the story of Butch, a boxer, who is supposed to lose a fight on Wallace's orders but defeats his opponent instead! The mob is hot on his heels while he makes a dash. He has, however, to return to his apartment to retrieve an old wrist which he inherited from his great grandfather! Vincent is waiting for him there but is shot by Butch instead.
In a twist, Wallace and Butch get entangled with a shop owner who apprehends them.
In another scene, Wallace accidentally shoots a victim and calls upon Jimmie (Tarantino) to clear up his mess.
The scene finally returns to the diner where the two robbers are. Coincidentally, Vincent and Jules are there. Because of what Jules perceived as a miracle and a message from God, he gives his money to the robber and leaves his profession.
All through our childhood, my sisters and I had been watching manga without manga was referred to as so. It was then just Japanese cartoon, with characters having big round eyes, cute demeanour and screechy loud voices. 
.jpeg)
