Quirky tale of 12 years olds who elope!

Moonrise Kingdom 2012
Of late, I have come to hear all about a director, Wes Anderson, with his different approach to filmmaking and direction. Well, I agree but I do not enjoy it. This film, is a coming of age movie about a disturbed 12 year old orphaned boy who has difficulty adapting himself with the other foster kids and another disturbed girl who hates her mother after seeing her intimate with a police officer (Captain Sharp, Bruce Willis).
The boy, Sam Shakusky, runs away from his scouts' camping site with the plan to elope and subsequently his new found love, the girl, a 12 year old Suzzy Bishop, whom he met at a show.
This quirky film is set in the year 1965 on an island paradise.
Sam's disappearance alerts the Scout Master (Edward Norton), Captain Sharp, the fellow scouts and the Bishops on a manhunt. They are eventually tracked down after some drama but they escape detention and rush off to be married by another scout master!
A storm brews. After some masala kind of drama, everything is solved. Sam is adopted by Captain Sharp and the Bishops resolve their marital problems.
A sheer waste of time. The sense of humour is warped and a test of the audience's intelligence.

A course in symbology & cryptic messages

Metropolis (Silent, 1927)

Director: Fritz Lang

This silent film is a treasure that was lost in the annals of time, and the reel of films was recovered piecemeal in Argentina. It was written by a husband and wife team of Thea von Harbou and Fritz Lang, who later separated due to a difference in political ideologies.  In essence, it portrays a futuristic time (2026) when a city built by Joh Frederson is divided into two social classes. The ruling party enjoys a cushy life on land whilst the oppressed robotic-like workers live deep underground, literally working themselves to death to keep the evil machines in working order so that life as they knew in Metropolis, the city, can function.

The film references many biblical events, although many of these religious innuendos can be construed as a pure figment of our own interpretation of the story. The copy I watched had some exciting director's comments explaining cryptic messages hidden in the story.

Metropolis 2026

It has the reputation of being the most expensive silent movie ever produced and ear-marked Lang as an influential film-maker making Nazi's Propaganda Minister, Josef Goebbels, approach Lang to fulfil the Nazi party's agenda, which he politely declined and absconded to Paris before the day was through.

Queen used scenes from this film in the music video for their 1984 hit song, 'Radio Ga Ga'.
The film starts with the classic scene of workers changing shifts, dragging their feet in a zombie-like fashion as they enter and leave a lift deep into the city's depths.

Virgin Maria

Up above on land, the privileged sons of the ruling class (industrialists) have a carefree life in the 'Club of Sons', enjoying sports and social activities. All girls go agape, trying to be Mr Joh Frederson's only heir, Freder's consort. (Joh is supposed to denote  Jehovah)

Freder's philandering days end abruptly when he lays his eyes on Maria when she brings the children of the workers' clean up on the surface just momentarily to show them how rich people live. (Maria, a virgin with children?)

Freder runs after Maria as she disappears behind the door. He misses her but instead witnesses an explosion in the machine room. He is aghast at the workers' living conditions and the accident.

He rushes to his father's office, Tower of Babel, the highest building in the city to convey the news.
The father, a true 'time is money' industrialist, does not take the news well. Just then, the engineer, Grot, walks in some sketched plan found in the injured workers' clothes. Angered, Mr Frederson sacks his personal secretary, Josaphat. Depressed that dismissal would mean moving into the depths to join the workforce, Josaphat attempts suicide just to be stopped by Freder in the nick of time. He is hired by Freder instead.

Meanwhile, Freder trades places (uniform) with a struggling worker, #11811. The worker later absconds with the money found in his pocket to be wasted in the red-light district Yoshiwara.

Hel

We are then shown a strange house in the middle of Metropolis occupied by an inventor, Rotwang, who lost a hand during a mishap. He now wears a steel prosthesis (a hybrid of man and machine).

All three men have something in common - Frederson's deceased wife was Rotwang's former girlfriend and was Fredo's mother. The lady in common is Hel (Nordic Motherly Goddess of Death).

Frederson pays Rotwang a visit, who is still sore for losing his girl even though Hel is long dead and gone. The slightly mad Rotwang had a statue of Hel and invented a 'Machine Man' in her mould. Interestingly, we see perched above the machine is a pentagram with a downward pointed star denoting the Satanic practises.

Rotwang reads the sketched plan as referring to a catacomb (an ancient underground cemetery). Frederson and Rotwang follow flights of stairs to the catacomb to witness Maria, the priestess, giving a sermon on love and patience and to wait for the mediator to arrive to allay the workers' worries. Amongst the crowd is also a love-smitten Fredo.

The story of the biblical Tower of Babel is told, emphasising how (just like in Metropolis) there is a discord between the brains of the construction and the brawn, resulting in revolt.
Rotwang devises an evil plan to make the Machine Man, in the image of Maria, mislead the workers to fight the establishment, simultaneously destroying his arch-enemy, who stole his girl. He chases and apprehends Maria. This sequence is supposedly legendary with brilliant use of series of light and shadows to evoke fearful emotions in Maria. (The comments say that it is symbolic of a hybrid of man and machine (steel-handed Rotwang) and evil (torchlight will illuminate light- Lucifer bearer of light)??)

On a 7-headed 10-horned beast

The false Maria starts her nefarious act. Seeing her intimate with his father, Freder falls ill (Oedipus complex, as the machine man, is shaped after Hel!). By the time Freder is convalescing, Metropolis is in tatters. The workers have stopped working, the city is flooding, the rich kids patronising Yoshiwara are up in arms against each other over False Maria, and the workers have abandoned their kids while they just follow False Maria aimlessly, creating anarchy. (Here, she is compared to the Whore of Baghdad as described in the Bible).

To summarise, Fredo, Josaphat, and the Real Maria rescue the children. Fredo and Rotwang engage in a duel in a cathedral with gargoyles, which ends when Rotwang falls to his death.
Workers realise that they have been misled. Sanity is restored. Fredo becomes the Mediator they have been waiting for, acting as the go-between between his father and Grot, representing the working class. END.

Memorable quotes

• People spoke the same language but could not understand each other.
• Great is the world and its creator, and great is man.
• The mediator between head and hands must be the heart.

It is all about survival, my friend!

Life of Pi 2012
Finally watched the coveted 'Life of Pi' to judge for myself whether it is 'cheesy, hyped and dwelling in the sentimental yearn of mystical eastern culture' as described negatively by my daughter or is it worth the accolade offered to a film directed by a Chinaman (Director Ang Lee) experimenting with Indian culture and having a Tamil song in its soundtrack!
The impression I got after watching the whole film was that the story behind the story is indeed well hidden behind the story. It needs a little of literary and artistic skills to appreciate its meaning. At one look, it looks like a story of a boy from exotic India who is shipwrecked, escapes from a tiger, deserted in an island and lives to tell his story! But wait! There is more to it...

Ang Lee

To me, it tells that fear is one feature that drive us to go living. Fearing the uncertainty of life and what it has store for us, we hold on to believes like God and spiritualism. Even animals have this fear for survival, even the predator or the hunted feel it. Fear is the basic need to survive and go on living. I especially like the part during the storm, on the life boat, where both Pi and the Richard Parker (the Bengal tiger) hold on to their dear lives under the cover of the sheets as the storm terrorises and shows its full glory.
It is just like when 'In Golden Pond' was praised to high heavens and we teenagers could not understand what the fuss was all about in 1980! Err.... It needs doing time in the School of Hard Knocks and Heartaches to understand these things.
Piscin Patel or Pi (his name is based on the picturesque swimming pool in France named Piscin Molitor, which he changed after being bullied by schoolmates by calling him Pissing Patel) tells his story to an author who was looking for an interesting story to write. Pi (as in the mathematical formula) and his brother Ravi grew up in the French Pondicherry before independence (of India). Their father ran a zoo and his mother was a botanist there. Pi and Ravi had a interesting childhood being exposed to various facets of life in Pondicherry, the white French Riveira like setting, the Muslim section as well the others. Pi was exposed to various religions and at a tender age, he started embracing them one by one. His parents, of the New Indian variety, open minded about exposing things to the children were happy about it.
Then came bad times. The zoo had to be closed. Pi's father decided to migrate lock, stock and barrel (with animals too) to Northern America by ship.

barrier broken

The ship meets a nasty storm and goes down with all its passengers, save for Pi and a few animals (zebra, orang utan, hyena and a Bengal tiger). Pi and the animals are thrown into a life boat. The story is on how Pi survives the 277 days of ordeal stranded on a boat in the middle of the Pacific Oceans. It tells us how a tennage boy and predator build a relationship to stay alive. The fear to stay alive drove him to feed the tiger fish and rain water and hold a rein of control over the beast. Using his mental faculty and his trust in God as his anchor, he sailed through the choppy waters.
They reach a mystical floating island paradise which actually had its water turn acidic at night and the plants become carnivorous. This drove Pi to search for safe land. They finally reach Mexico and the predator and Man relationship just fizzles out just like that as both follow their own path.
At the hospital, his tall story is unbelievable to the ship insurers. Pi modifies the story replacing the animals on the life boat to characters on board the ship - the mean cook, the kind sailor, his mother and himself.
It displays intense human emotions spiced up with excellent CGI for which a Malaysian company (Rhythms and Hues) can be extremely proud of. Bombay Jaishree sings the soundtrack.

A meaningful tale of survival of man on earth, based on fear which is somehow allayed by his quest into the unknown and trust in entity referred to as God!

What I want to know is that why the Patels are speaking Tamil?

Rythm & Hues used a swimming pool to create an island scene for the film.

.... a film that is technically excellent, aesthetically superb, well acted and directed. a fairy tale, a tale of survival, a tale of belief in the self in face of adversity,or surrender to god so he may do as he will,but not before we give it all that we have with his grace. still thinking about it. GR

Love among common people

Vazhakku Enn 18/9 (Court Case Number 18/9; Tamil, 2012)
I ended up watching this 2012 India's nomination for the Oscars in the foreign film category. It was recommended to me by my wife as the next best thing since sliced bread using an unknown cast. Unlike me, she never had the chance to appreciate the late 70s and 80's era of 'arty' mainstream Kollywood film shot in unglamorous villages using new plain atypical film-star faces and relatively little makeup. Films in this category would include 'Pasi', 'Nizhalgal' and 'Moodu Pani'.
The way I see 18/9, this film can be divided into 3 parts. The first part showcases the daily trials and tribulations of the low-income citizens of Chennai. Every living day is another day of survival, ferociously arguing and barking at fellow human being for a piece of the dwindling pie in the material world. The second reveals the relative comfort of the prospering 'milder' mannered but shrewd and cautious middle class with their way of living emulating the affluent and the third being the tying up of the story of both.
It starts with a police inspector hurrying to a hospital to interview a patient and her wailing mother. I always find this type of wailing demanding pity by portraying their helplessness a tad irritating behaviour in the community. The officer is told of a certain young boy who had the hots for the victim.
The boy, Velu, is summoned to the police station and he starts telling his story. Remember, till now, the viewers are kept in the dark on the nature of the crime committed and its victim. Velu tells his story to the apparently sympathetic officer...
Velu left his native village to work in a sweat shop making and packing savoury snacks in Northern India to pay off his parents' debt after a dismal harvest. Toiling day and night to this end to this end, he absconds from his workplace when he discovers that the news of his parents' death was kept away from him.

Velu

Velu lands in Chennai literally half dead and penniless. He survives as an assistant to a road-side food peddler. He develops a soft spot for a domestic maid, Jyothi. However, Velu is always seen in a bad light in front of Jyothi and her ferociously protective mother, earning their dislike! After many scenes, things kind of cools down. The next thing he knew was that he was marched to the station for questioning.

Intermission....

Sweets making sweat shop

The teenage daughter of household in which Jyothi worked, Aarthi, volunteered to the police of a certain neighbour boy whom she suspects of the crime. She then narrates her side of the story...

What the heck!

Dinesh, a school going young adult, befriends Jyothi in the pretext of discussing school subjects. Their relationship becomes close, but later she realised that he was up to no good. He had filmed her privately and had boasted about his escapades to his friends via MMS. When she tried to avoid him, he became aggressive. Aarthi suspects that Dinesh must have thrown acid on Jyothi's face!

The final part...

Dinesh and his mother are summoned for questioning. This is where you see the uncouth ways of speaking, abuse of power, police brutality and corruption which are rife in India is bare open. Dinesh's mother, a secretary to a minister, draws in the minister to use his clout and money to bribe the investigating officer, Kumaravel. Velu is beaten to pulp to confess. When he stayed adamant, Kumaravel, played good cop. He made a deal with Velu to confess while he used the rich man's money to finance Jyothi's plastic surgery bills.

Love among common people

The next thing Velu knew, he was doing time for 10 years and Jyothi is ostracized and home bound with a scarred right side of her face.

Jyothi comes to learn the whole truth and avenges by splashing acid on Kumaravel. Velu's case (18/9 - the title of the film) is reviewed. Velu is freed, Jyothi is sentenced 7 years of imprisonment and the police team is reprimanded. The film ends with Velu crying, promising to wait for her till she completes her incarceration albeit her half-burnt face. End.

The story is nothing unusual, having seen injustices of those with wealth or power over the have-nots in too many Tamil movies. The only gripping thing about this thriller is the suspense created by not revealing the crime and to a certain the victim. The main thing that aroused my attention is the director's contrasting depiction of the symbiotic way of life in Chennai of the have-nots on the lowest rung of the social ladder versus the middle class who in a way depend on the other to carry on their journey in life. And there is no running around the park love songs. I would give it a liberal 8.5/10.

"bravura piece of filmmaking that will leave you stunned - and even invigorated - by the time it ends"

M. Suganth, The Times of India (4.5 / 5)

What is the difference?

So no private lawyer in the whole of India want to defend the six who stand accused in the recent infamous rape and murder of a physiotherapy student, Jyoti Pandey, (christened as “Nirbhaya” @ Braveheart)  in the capital city. Probably they are fearful of the public backlash on their career. The public response towards the sad incident has been anything but civil. Rape which used to be accepted as part of life in many remote areas of the sub-continent with no recourse, is not going to taken lightly any more after the recent turn of events. Gone are the days where the hassle of complain and judgemental attitude of those in power were a deterrent. The new change in social outlook is going to expose the 9/10 of the base of the iceberg (actually 1/6 of iceberg is visible) which had been hidden all this while. A social revolution is set to happen in a country where ladies all this while have been only placed on a pedestal in the temple altars and their mythological literature but not in real life.

On the other side of the world, not necessarily in the Western world, even in our backyard, another kind of humiliation of the female anatomy had been going on in the form of the oldest profession known to mankind and pornography. BBC in 2005 did a 9-episode documentary of the effect of the porn industry and the sad victims and sick people associated with it.

Fernando Valley in Los Angeles, porn city of the world, has many sob stories of young girls from broken families and disturbed personality flocking here for fame and fortune. There was once a HIV epidemic which infected a young aspirant. After an intial scare and damage control, it was soon business as usual. What do you expect from a place where 60 gallons of male ejaculants are wasted in front of the camera annually and a record of 4000 sexual encounters occur daily!

Nobody knows what happened of 

Bambi Woods after the film. She may

have started life anew with a new

identify, putting her past behind.

Another theory is that her body is 

slouched somewhere hidden in

the USA! No one knows her

real name anyway.

What was supposed to be something private between two consenting adults, sometimes after the approval of the Gods, powers that be and the elders is out in the open. This craze to join the bandwagon of exhibitionism had spurred many amateur voyageurs. Partners who want to immortalize their sexual escapades on film call in the ever willing film-makers. Problems come a-knocking when they end their relationship but the reel is still available for viewing by everyone at the click of a button and the World Wide Web! All these impulsive actions will haunt them forever.
Then there are plastic surgeons would abandon their oath to do more harm on dysfunctional unstable individuals with dysmorphic view of their bodies. Lolo Ferarri, a porn star, an obviously disturbed lady had graduated to 54-J status and subsequently succumbed to loss of public attention as her popularity waned.

In spite of porn being a bad word, San Fernando Valley's industry is strictly legal. On one hand, they talk about equal rights but on the other hand, it is abuse and disrespect of the fairer sex too! So, what is the difference?

He found his elusive dream blonde in his wife!

Hitchcock (2012)
I guess that it is a must-see film for suckers of Hitchcock films, of which I am guilty of. Whatever the reason may be for watching this flick, one can understand that many tears, heartaches, gambles, feuds, anxiety and initial naysayers a part and parcel of the background in the production of anything earth shattering, like the production of Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 blockbuster 'Psycho'.
Hitchcock's 'Psycho' broke the standard mould of a scary movie by venturing one step further by suggesting murder and violence without actually showing the act. Even this met great resistance from the censorship board those days.
After his success in 'North by Northwest', he was taken aback when a reporter asked him whether it was an opportune time for him to retire! This only ignited his desire to recreate another with the same passion that he had in his earlier days. Somebody suggests a novel based on a real crime by a Ed Gein. Even though, he was  told that such a story was not palatable to general viewing, this man, Hitchcock, whom his wife, Alma, describes as obsessed with murder, goes on with it. He buys all the novel in the bookshops so that nobody knows the ending of his film.

Scarlett Johansson as Janet Leigh

Hitchcock, as seen in the movie, is not the most pleasant man to live with. His wife, despite his idiosyncrasies and sarcasm, stands loyally behind him supporting him and giving her valuable advice.
In the meantime, a bored Alma tries to add spark to her life by writing a screenplay with a friend, Whitfield, who also hopes that his manuscript would be accepted by Hitchcock.
Hitchcock has to mortgage his house to finance his next film, Psycho, as his studio, backs off. Facing mounting challenges in the form of resistance from the censors, delayed shooting, illness and the suspicion of his love of his life having an affair, Hitchcock crumples. His wife, however, rises to the occasion and saves the day.

Anthony Hopkins

Alfred Hitchcock

In the course of the movie, we discover that Hitchcock really enjoys his food and drinks. He has a fetish for beautiful blondes and is even portrayed as a peeping Tom. He is seen having hallucinations of having conversations with the killer upon which the film 'Psycho' is based on. His build-up of oppressed anger is said to have produced the outrageous shower scene when he himself swang the knife in a frenzy to vent his anger, giving Janet Leigh a fright of her life.
The release of the film also met a hitch. It was scheduled to be screened in a few theatres only with minimal marketing. Hitchcock successfully spiced up the curiosity of the public by, for the first time, forbidding entry after the movie had started! It met with outstanding public reception taking Hitchcock to the pinnacle of his artistic career.
The film ends with him giving a speech to the audience pondering on his next film just when a bird perches on his shoulder hinting to us of his 1963 'Birds'.
Anthony Hopkins gives a sterling performance as the Man himself with his mask-like expressionless face and bombastic expressive sentences filled with cheeky word play. I wonder what happened to his daughter, Pat who is nowhere to be seen in the movie. Overall, an entertaining flick.

Those who have not sinned, cast the first stone!

Elmer Gentry 1960
Elmer Gentry (Burt Lancaster) is a hard talking hard drinking traveling salesman who talks more than he can deliver. He just drifts from town to town living hand to mouth, calling home everywhere he lays his hat.
He meets an evangelist, Sister Sharon Falconer (Jeans Simmons) who leads a revivalist movement. Elmer with his persuasive talk manages to infiltrate the Christianity revival movement and gives confidence to Sr. Sharon to spread her word of God to even the most hostile of the congregation in the town of Zenith.
The movement is reviewed by the local newspaper man, Jim Lefferts,  who is a sceptic but is fascinated with how Elmer manages to convince his audience.
Pretty soon, they are the talk of town and Elmer leads the townsmen on moralist hunt to wreck establishments selling booze and flesh!
In one such brothel that Elmer led to destroy, he was taken aback when he bumped into his old flame, Lulu (Shirley Jones, mother of Hardy Boys co-star Shaun Cassidy). Lulu is still vengeful on Elmer for jilting her.
Elmer manages to get Lulu out of prison.
In the meantime, Sharon confides to Elmer of her humble beginnings and her life long ambition to establish a tabernacle to spread the word of God. She turned down Elmer's proposal to settle down and start a family.

Jean Simmons

Lulu, with evil on her mind, calls Elmer over to capture pictures of them in compromising postures. She blackmails Sharon for cash, failing which the pictures would be sold to the press.
Sharon offers to pay up but at the last minute, Lulu declines and sells it to the press anyway. The backlash leaves the movement in tatters. Lulu, on second thoughts, makes amendments in the papers later, when she is saved from her pimp who beats her to pulp for losing money and Elmer comes to her rescue.
A grand mass was in progress when a fire gutted and Sharon perishes in the fire.
Elmer moves on with his life with his suitcase whilst the rest of the Sr Sharon's gang decide to continue her good work.
When Elmer is asked to continue his preaching, he just says, "When I was a child, I understood as a child and spoke as a child. When I became a man, I put away childish things." (1 Corinthians 13:11)
I could swear that many of Jean Simmons' demeanour and mannerisms were much like Audrey Hepburn's.
They managed to bring forth many controversial issues like the poor records and management of funds by the evangelist group, the gullibility of people to religion and the sinful lives that the preacher are or have had without creating much of adverse publicity. I was pleasantly surprised to see a forewarning at the start of the film of the sensitive nature of the story and the unsuitability of the story to the young impressionable minds of children.