RIFLE RANGE BOY

Cycle (Marathi, 2017) A Malay proverb goes, ' gajah mati meninggalkan tulang, harimau mati meninggalkan belang, manusia mati meninggalkan nama'. Literally translated it meant elephants die leaving bones, tigers leave their stripes and men leave their good name. Essentially it denotes that a legacy of a person is his deeds, not his materialistic assets. It may all be make-believe and fabled narration - that the world is so good where it provides for everybody. Your deeds are the only that matter. That is the only thing that is remembered of you are your virtues. The material representations of you are not you but the mere reminders of your existence. The movie set in 1958 rural India. Perhaps the innocence of Man that existed in the yesteryears is just a forgotten relic of the past. Modern Man is more self-centred and suspicious of the person beside him. Money has pervaded into everyone's life that it supersedes doing good or the right thing. Maybe somewhere in the corner of...

Credit: newmandala.org Dr Mahathir Mohamad (b 10.7.1925) A second chance to right the wrong? It is my Prime Minister's birthday, and I have a dilemma. Just last year, he became the oldest man in the world to be elected as a country's leader at 93. One year on and he is still going on strong like an Energiser Bunny.  The million dollars is not when his run is going to halt, but instead if indeed longevity is a blessing. On the one hand, on auspicious occasions, we wish each other hoping for a long life. We cling on to our dear lives averting dangers and seeking medical advice at the first sneeze. We plan things as if we would live forever. Some would say that being born as a human is our reward for our past karmic deeds. Hence, a long life must be a bonus. They are others who would vouch that life on Earth is a testing ground. A long life span means that they are more options to collect brownie points. If one only lives for the afterlife,  then there is ample opportuni...

Aramm (அறம், Deed, Tamil; 2017) This must be one of few attempts of Kollywood at a disaster movie; one which delves into the procedural intricacies of a rescue mission. It probably goes in the vein of great Hollywood flicks like 'Earthquake!', 'Jaws' and even 'Apollo 13'. On top of dealing with the nitty-gritty issues of rescuing a child trapped in a disused well, the film managed to bring to light many of the issues plaguing the common man in Tamil Nadu, may be in anywhere in the world. It is the eve of the launch of a rocket in India. The euphoric mood is palpable everywhere, but nobody seems to know what the hype is all about, but they join the revelry, nevertheless. On the one hand, the country appears to be at the zenith of technological know-how. At the same time, the state fails to satisfy its citizens' fundamental necessity, water supply. The film then focuses the plight of villager plagued with extreme water shortage. In this urgent situatio...