It happened once before!

 Joji (Malayalam, 2021)

We always complain about the conundrum that we are stuck in. We brood, curse and swear at the people who brought about all these. Then we stop and go about doing our own things.  When someone takes the trouble to push the boundary and actually try to change the course of their lives, nobody wants to be part of it. The rest do not want to be seen as complicit as it would tarnish their image of it but secretly, deep inside, they are happy that something is being done. 

When the plot hits a snag and the perpetrator is exposed, nobody wants to have any link to it. Conversely, they condemn the whole exercise and start talking about morality. They claim ignorance and assert that natural justice or the rule of law should prevail. Generally, people are unthinking sheep, quite happy following the shepherd like what the herd is doing. Little do they realise that the shepherd only has one sole purpose in life - to fatten his flock and march them to the slaughter.

This Malayalam film is supposed to be based on Shakespeare's Macbeth, but there are no three witches and their prophecies. In the strict Panachel Kuttappan household live three sons - Jomon, Jaison and Joji. Kuttapan, the controlling patriarch, has an iron-fisted way of controlling his offsprings and their dependents. He is pretty dogmatic about the management of his home and his property. Jomon is divorced, probably due to his drinking habit. Jaison is living in his father's estate with his wife and his teenage son. Joji is an engineering dropout, just loafing around, passing time, knowing that he will inherit his share of his father's large estate one day with his passing. 

Joji thinks his days of splurging were nearing when Kuttappan has a massive stroke and is bedridden. Initially, his moribund condition was supposed to be terminal, but with a craniotomy, he improves. Lucid and nursing back to health, Joji has a harrowing experience when he tries to con the old man to sign a cheque. The alert and buff patient almost chokes Joji. 

Realising that Kuttappan is not dying any time soon, Joji drugs him. A few family members appear seemingly aware of Joji's shenanigans but decide to turn a blind eye. The senior had been quite nasty to everyone in the family. The old man dies, but everyone is tight-lipped about his sudden demise despite an initial improvement of health. 

To a frightened child, every shadow of a movement appears like an apparition, they say. Joji, worried that his crime will be unrecovered, starts committing more crimes, burying himself more in the quicksand that he eventually finds too difficult to extricate.

Lesson to be learnt: People are forever looking for that sucker to do all the dirty job. Change is difficult, they know, and they promise all the support that the sacrificial lamb needs. When the push comes to shove, they bail out, preferring to hang on to the thicker branch for better support. People would suddenly talk about morality, not wanting to rock the boat and need to maintain equilibrium. 

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Make or break!

Gauri

There it was, another family celebration and another tête-à-tête with my favourite uncle. Whilst the rest were immersed in their revelry, we were pretty engaged in our own private discourse - with him looking for someone to impart his 85-year old life experiences, and I, just listening and sometimes trying to tease more out of him. This time around, we discussed the role of the significant other in the family, among many things. This post is what transpired out of that.

They say that behind every man's success, there is a woman. Many are quick to quip that behind their every fall, there is another, the other woman. Women have the uncanny ability to create as well as to destroy.

With the biological assets that they are endowed with, they can create, nurture and sustain life with their tenacity and ever-embracing progestogenic demeanour, like a mother hen, able to hide her chicklings under my wings away from the prancing eagle. And they will protect their little ones with the last scratch of their claw from hissing predator snake.

Mahishasura Mardini.

They can choose what they want. They can be Gauri, the epitome of peace and happiness comparable to the bosom of a mother, the all-embracing embodiment of calmness and purity, depicted by the all-white attire and an equally composed vehicle, the saintly cow. As Gauri, she plays the role of peacemaker, a rock of hope and anchor to hold an institution steady to traverse the uncertainties of life.

When the situation warrants, she needs to assume the role of Mahishasura Mardini, the slayer of the buffalo demon, Mahishasura, who, with the boon of indestructibility, terrorised the Universe. She took this fiercest form of Durga, with the Trident of Siva, to bring equilibrium to the system.

It may appear that the illustrative embodiment of shakti, female power, can act unilaterally with no control without the need for its counterpart, the male energy, Shiva. Not really. Harmony is achieved with the inclusion of both powers. Notice that Shiva's representation appears in both Gauri and Durga form of the female divinity - Trident, to protect and attack. Unbridled power, it seems, is also counterproductive.

Kaali

Remember the instance of Kaali, intoxicated with the taste of blood and energy of invincibility, she was on a rampage. Only Shiva could pacify her. His prostration in her path subdued her. In embarrassment, she let her tongue out, more of an admission of mistake rather than an intimidating posture. This tongue-letting image is often depicted as that of fearsome Kaali. In reality, it is not.

It takes two to tango. Both parties have to nimble and agile to produce an eye-soothing display of this Spanish light-spirited variety of flamenco.

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Within a generation?

Zindagi inShorts (Hindi, 2020)
Netflix

This is a collection of seven short stories, just nice for light viewing and those with a short attention span. It covers a myriad of topics, with women empowerment taking centre stage. In the first episode titled 'Pinni', a housewife with exceptional culinary expertise is only appreciated for her cooking skills but not for anything else. She is just viewed as a doormat - it is there to serve a purpose, but there is no need to go fancy about it. She strikes back when her husband got no time to remember her birthday.

'Sleeping partner' narrates how a woman's role is miniaturised in a family. She rebels by expressing her sexual freedom. See how she hits back when her lover starts blackmailing her. The story touches on marital rape. 'Sunnyside Upar' cajoles us to live out the only life given to us to its fullest via the experience of a young doctor in a cancer ward. Bad things happen to good people. Just deal with it. 'Nano so phobia' brings on the plight of a lonely elderly Farsi lady who has had once too many times cried wolf to be taken seriously. 'Chhaju ke Dahi Bhalle' shows how culturally close people from Lahore and Amritsar are. Through a dating app, a Muslim girl links up with a Sikh boy. After the pleasantries, they decided to meet up at a popular eatery. After failing to meet up, they realised that they were on either side of the India-Pakistan border.

'Thappad' is a story of empowerment where an adolescent sister with her younger brother stands up against bullies. 'Swaha' is a comical rendition of an insecure husband and supposed two-timing or three-timing wife. 

It is all well and fine that more and more women are finding their places in societies. Rightly they prosper from the opportunities that were denied from them earlier due to changing societal mores. The problem is that the rebel yell for change may be happening much too rapid than it can be handled by society. It seems that the morphing of female assertations is too drastic for their counterpart and the rest of the family unit. Like a single hard slap on the face before they can realise what hit them, things have morphed within a single generation. From the demure social norms abiding mums, they have metamorphosised to groundbreaking boardroom-chairing giant figures waiting to change the world. 

Herein lies the friction. Biologically, both sexes have their respective roles in societies. They are meant to complement each other, not compete against one another. The union of the male and female forces are interdependent. The energies of Siva and Parvathi are best when working in unison. The unabated individual force would only lead to self-destruction.

Let us look at the family unit. It has become acceptable these days that it is perfectly normal for a family unit to be led by a single parent. This does not, however, concur with the findings of many social researchers. They have linked poor students' academic achievements, high incidences of delinquencies, substance abuses, teenage pregnancies and its ensuing problems to single parenthood. A proper father figure and motherly touch seem essential in wholesome parenting.

The dominant role of the male in the family system has eroded. The traditional role of a strong protector and provider has somehow evolved. They are expected to appear strong and confident only on the outside for a picture-perfect display for the public. Within the four walls, they are expected to be emotionally dependent and easily be wrapped around the strings of their apron. But then, apron neither denotes feminine nor docility. When a male does not embrace this arrangement, he is deemed to exhibit masculine toxicity. That is dealt with by cancelling!

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Two sides of the same coin?

Devil All the Time (2020)

At one look, it seems that the story is going all over the place. At one time, you think that one particular character is the protagonist, but wham! she is killed off. Then another also killed off, and another yet again. There are plenty of killings and dying on the whole, but then, it all builds up to make sense at the end. There are many cryptic messages embedded within the storyline that questions the perception of what evil really is. Our divinity and evil part and parcel of the same continuum, not in contradiction but a mere extension of a spectrum? 

One complements the other. Just like how light is appreciated in darkness, evil is necessary for us to appreciate goodness. Like how it is a necessity that Tom never catches Jerry for the excitement to continue. Will E Coyote will never have the Road Runner for dinner for Coyote may become mad if, one day, he gets up in the morning to realise that he has nothing to do. Satan can never lose if Goodness were to be appreciated. The fight (if there is one) has to go on as long as life exists. All the events that happen in the name of God and the Devil are the ones that give meaning to the journey of life. We kid ourselves that everything is a mission as willed by God, even though we wonder why He who heals the wounds also send the flies.

After much beating around the bush, the viewers would realise that the movie is basically about a boy and a girl pair (Arvin and Leonora) who end up in the same foster home. Since both grew up together from a young age, they are close. Together they both carry the heavy baggage of sins of their parents. Arvin's mother succumbed to cancer whilst his father, a WW2 veteran, commits suicide after failing to revive her despite offering a sacrifice to God. Leonora's father, an evangelical preacher who was not right in his head, thought he had an audience. He believed God's orders were to kill his wife and resurrect her from death. He attempted, failed, bolted off and only to be killed by a husband-wife pair of serial killers.

Leonora grows very religious like her mother and is taken for a ride by a visiting preacher. She kills herself after finding herself pregnant out of wedlock. Arvin avenges her death and lands up with an encounter with the serial killers.

The complicated plots are set in the heart of the Bible Belt of America, where everyone is Christian by default. Everyone has their vision of how religion should be. Some expect something divine to be one that is kind, loving, tender and all accepting. Others justify violence in the name of the law to ensure the tenets of the religion are enforced. Many endure sacrifices for salvation. We use the name of the original sin as a get-of-jail free card to excuse our follies. We follow the same ill-fated paths that our fathers followed and say it is genes or 'sins of our fathers' in theological terms. 

Simon of  Cyrene to Jesus' aid to carry the Cross

As seen in the film, many seemingly unrelated events happen in our lives, but they do affect us in mysterious ways. Are these mere coincidences or sleight of hand of the Maker himself? Are they of no causal relationships as insisted by Freud or meaningful synchronicity as described by Jung?

Perhaps blind faith does not do anybody any good. True, religion forms a platform upon and above which intellect should complement the scriptures. This is best described by the painting of Jesus' long journey to Golgotha. A battered son of God could not carry the Cross. A random passerby, Simon of Cyrene, was summoned to aid in the task. In the same vein, one should not just depend on the Grace of God; we should make an effort to do it ourselves as well.

A gripping movie with Tim Holland of 'Spider Man' fame as Arvin. 

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We built this country!

Some stories I have told and some that I haven't

Author: VC George (2021)

The powers that be wants us to believe their narrative. They assert that their concocted tale of how history happened keeps true to the natural chain of events. They create a smokescreen to justify the turn of events to explain social strata's current status and how social justice should be. 

Our history likes to paint Indian immigration to the peninsula as a single wave of settlement. With a single stroke of ink, they put all Indian in the same basket. That they were brought in the colonial masters as indentured labour (a milder wording for bonded slaves) to milk out not only the juices of rubber trees but also the milk the wealth of the nation. It was no coincidence that the Malay Peninsular was referred to as "Swarnabhumi" (Land of Gold). In the same breath, these keepers of Nation history declare that the British never really colonised us. They were just administrators. 

Sorry to burst your echo chamber, purveyors of fairy tales. Indians were sailing the seven seas even way before the Malaccan Sultanate, often quoted as the spark of Malay identity. The Malabari Indians even showed Francis Light the route Pulo Pinang, the island they had been frequenting for so long. How many of us know the Malaccan Sultanate kingmaker, Tun Perak, was of Indian extract? But then so was the despotic and corrupt Tun Mutahir, an Indian Muslim. On the royalty side, Raja Kasim who was summoned to the throne after Raja Muhammad's knifing fiasco had a mother who was Indian.

The Indians who reached here were traders and master boat builders in the early part of the country's history. Indian sojourners then sauntered in later at the end of the 19th century, equipped with the best of what English education could offer. They arrived at the behest of the colonial masters to help out in the day-to-day administrative work of a cash cow of a nation that paid for half of the Englishmen's extravagances back in their Motherland. 

Unlike other European colonialists who hurriedly left their posts in a hurry in total pandemonium, the British actually left Malaya with a comprehensive post-independence roadmap. They cast in stone the Constitution and the citizens' charter to ensure equality for all.

Somewhere along the way, this arrangement was hijacked. Politicians with self-serving agendas and a blank cheque for eternal power decided to use what they learnt from George Orwell and Joseph Goebbels to good use. They rewrote as they saw fit.  They knew that he who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past. They understood that they can create the illusion of truth by repeating a lie often enough to become the truth. 

They try to say that the indentured Indian labourer got immersed in estate life only to be torn about in the quagmire as the British planters left their plantations and the new owners decided to cash out. The Indian poor were forgotten in the greater scheme of things. Lost of job, home and wanting of skills drove them to the wild side of society, a world of crime and subsequently justified police brutality.

That is why we need more books like these - to tell the contribution of different communities to what was one time expected to emerge as one of emerging Asia's Tigers.  Sadly, the other sibling cubs have all gone places. We are left alone as the sick and wounded feline without a roar and probably needing crutches soon. 

VC George, a 90 years old retired Court of Appeal judge, tell us his life and times growing up in Klang in pre-WW2 Malaya all through his journey into adulthood and his illustrious career. He (Honourable, Lord or just George) has inked his narration in 100 short notes, which tend to end up with an unexpected twist or a witty footnote. This man was there in the flesh during the nation's birth, just like the many others referred to as pendatang (newcomers, just off the boat). These wrongly called pendatangs are the very people who helped to produce enviable students of international calibre, established medical facilities that transformed our health services to be at par with international standards, founded research centres and universities, and gave dignity to august Halls of Justice in the country.  

A good read. It is filled with many anecdotes and 'one liners'. It tells of a time when people would take jokes in a good spirit and not be offended or raise a big hue and cry, claiming victimisation. 

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A brilliant sequel

Drishyam 2, The Resumption (Malayalam; 2021)

Movie buffs would generally agree that sequels of hit movies rarely do well in the box office, more so with Indian movies—the sequels of 'Koi Mil Gaye', 'Dhoom' and 'Munna Bhai'comes to mind. Somehow, the magic of the original film is lost. 

Six years previously, Drishyam, a murder thriller, was released. It was then something of a revolutionary in storytelling where all the loopholes which are usually overlooked were patched and viewed had a chance to appreciate expert movie making at its best. Poetic justice was served when a peeping Tom, son of a high ranking police officer, meets his end at the hands of an outraged mother. The crime is concealed, and the victim was never found, leaving the deceased's parents with no closure. Georgekutty, then, had buried the victim in the place least suspected by the police - under a newly constructed police station!

Meanwhile, Georgekutty is now an owner of a movie theatre and plans to make a movie, much against his wife's approval. Life is not all hunky-dory as his daughter suffers from PTSD and seizures whilst the villagers still gossip about the murder. The victim's parents are still in mourning, and the new Inspector-General takes renewed interests in the case.  A newly released criminal professes that he saw Georgekutty living the then building site of a police station. Unbeknownst to Georgekutty's family, a husband-wife neighbour close to Georgekutty's wife is actually undercover cops.

The rest of the story is about how Georgekutty is arrested for his crimes, but all the collected evidence indicates no wrongdoings on Georgekutty. Even the body excavated from station premises was forensically reported as belonging to someone else.

Someone sent me a presentation about leadership qualities that one can learn from Georgekutty's way of handling the whole imbroglio. He took charge; he kept an eye on the pulse of things while assuring his down lines. He never assumed or left things to chance. He never rested on his laurels. He thought out of the box, strategise and execute effectively. He kept secrets close to his chest - secrets that can easily crumble the gameplan if too many people have access to them. He had no qualms about engulfing new technologies to his advantage. The most vital tool that was useful to him was his networking skills. He had contacts at different levels, and he knew how to keep felt needed. He spent time to gain trust.

 Please listen to the said Youtube below: 

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A future full of happy morons?

Idiocracy (2006)

This science-fiction film is no masterpiece, but it portrays a pretty close prediction to what Nietzsche predicted the future would be like. He envisaged a dystopian tomorrow where mediocrity is held in high esteem. Emphasis is on triviality and popularism. Evidence of this already gaining traction. Just look around us. People are frequently numbed by visual gratifications. Nobody thinks anymore. Intellectual discourse is just too energy-consuming; blind acceptance is becoming the norm. Astronomical science is centuries old, but many still swear the Earth is flat. Sowing wild oats without a care about the offspring that springs out of such an unholy union is defended as one's right to empowerment. 

Investing a wealth of time in something as ludicrous as catching 'Pokemon Go' is a legitimately approved pastime for a modern full-grown adult. Intellectual achievement is un-cool (and is becoming increasingly expensive for the average Joe). The people who least can afford to finance to provide for their children are the very people who have more than they can care for. Instead of using effective contraception to keep the aftermath of their carnal desires in check, they merely embrace their handiwork as a 'gift from God'.

Gluttony is hailed. Gulping tonnes of junk food is accepted as a lawful sport. Society is deep into consumerism without care about how the bill is going to be paid tomorrow. Living on credit is the modern way of living. Being prudent or thrifty is so yesterday. Speaking and writing well is vilified as queer. They lace their speech with profanity and hail it as a creative licence. The audience thinks it is a comedy when one spews obscenity in his conversation. Comedians get standing ovation when they curse or denigrate own's religious belief. 

The film imagines what the world would be like in 2505, and it does not look pretty. Earth is one big rubbish dump. Upkeep of high rise erections and structures is neglected as people are no longer interested in science. The world has lost its lustre in inventing and discovering. Corporations are bending over backwards to keep clients (i.e. everybody) happy, rewarding them with meaningless pleasures. People are lazy, indulging in purposeless cybergames consuming gallons of soda. It seems water is impure and is only helpful for sanitation. For all intents and purposes, it is Gatorade. The people of the future even water their crops with Gatorade with disastrous outcomes.

Everyone is required by the law to have a bar-code tattooed on their arm for identification, tracking and ease of business transactions. Society has become much dumber to indiscriminate breeding. Everyone is a happy moron craving for carnal pleasure and fantasy lacking in agency. Thinking is done by the powers that be.

The protagonist, an average Joe US Army Corporal, is transported five centuries into the future in a failed Army suspended animation experiment. The fellow subject in the experiment is a prostitute who was running away from her boyfriend pimp. Our subjects land in a lot of trouble with the law, but being the most intelligent person of the time, he is picked out by the POTUS office. Together, he tries to start crop planting, and he eventually takes over the post of President!

Not quite the wacky movie that it portrays, but it makes one think. Interestingly, after making the whole movie, the producers decided not to have the film release on a big scale to fear upsetting the multinational companies supporting Hollywood. Quite openly, the movie had condemned 2505 Starbucks and McDonald for stooping so low as to pander its crass customer desires.

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