RIFLE RANGE BOY

  Kumbalangi Nights (Malayalam, 2019) For the longest time, the idea of a family unit, at least amongst the average middle-class family is that it would comprise a father who would predominantly contribute towards the material needs of the family. A mother would always seem to play second fiddle to the patriarchy but would be a tresure trove of love and affection in abundance. She would oversee the everyday running of the household. On the surface, the mother, the wife, seem to live under the shadow of her husband, dancing to his puppet-strings. In reality, however, she has her own ways of controlling the narratives in her own passive-aggressive way.  In modern times, family dynamics have evolved. Not only have the extended family concept where relatives live under the same roof is getting rarer, one has to put up with single parents and same-gender parents. The notion of a male-domination in households is viewed upon as male toxicity.  This movie compares two families, o...

Jallikattu (Malayalam, 2019) Director: Lijo Jose Pellissery A simple story of a raging buffalo which escapes the slaughterhouse forms the basis of this film. Many in the village are dependent on the buffalo - for the butcher, it is money that it can fetch; for the rival group, it is free meat for their taking; for gangsters, it is a time to show their machoism; for the father whose daughter is getting engaged, he needs to feed his guests; for the ex-convict, it is time to settle a score with the butcher, and the pastor needs to feed his congregation. Jallikattu is primarily a Tamil tradition, where brave youngsters in a celebratory mood try to tame a raging bull to clutch on to the bag of coins tied to its horn. Hence the name; Jalli @ Salli meaning coin and kattu is a tie-bag. This practice was started as a form of finding the best bull to improve the stock of cows in ancient times. Unfortunately, over the years, it has become a blood sport of sort. Bulls were drugged, and their eyes ...

Trance (Malayalam, 2020) A sucker is born every minute, they say. Probably what they meant was that the rooting reflex was innate in all babies. Stroke the cheek and the baby would automatically turn its head towards the stimulus and initiate a suckling reaction. It also could imply to the many who are suckered up to racketeering and daylight robberies.  Watching this movie was a sort of a deja vu experience for me. A close relative had discovered Jesus late in life, and she made it her raison d'être to spread His word. And along she went to all four corners of the country praying for the sick and the fallen. She would personally harbour drug addicts and vagabonds in her home to nurse them back to functionality. I remember her style. To get her congregation interested in her sermon, out of the blue, she would blurt out 'Hallelujah' on top of her lungs to get approval what she was saying. And an often repeated phrase was that Jesus spoke to her in her dreams. How she would i...

Stories by Rabindranath Tagore Netflix (26 episodes; 2015) Even though Tagore wrote these stories more than a hundred years ago, it remains fresh and relevant to today.  Rabindranath lived at a time when India, as well as the rest of the world, was rapidly changing. His motherland, after missing the bus of the Industrial Revolution, thanks to the British East India Company and the British Empire, was doing catch up. Starting with the First Indian Rebellion @ Sepoy Mutiny in 1857, India had awoken. After being plundered by foreign forces repeatedly, it tried to make social and political changes. Many leaders emerged. Some approached them through political means, others through armed hostility and yet some via passive aggression. Tagore infiltrated the minds with his literary work. This collection of twenty stories in twenty-six episodes cover a range of issues. The stories were authored by Tagore between 1890 and 1941, just before his death. They talk about the mistreatment of young...

Pint-sized power barrel Is it not funny that eulogies tend to paint a rosy picture of the recently departed? They make it sound as if he was such a good person that the world has lost another good man (or woman) that it could do better with. The audience would feel like kicking themselves for not taking the trouble to know him better when he was around. Whenever somebody passes away, everyone will be expressing their condolence, praising them to high heavens (pun unintended).  A little help from the 'Hand of God' I have always thought of this every now and then. It came around again with the recent passing of Diego Maradona, easily the best, if not the second-best footballer ever to be born. (The first being Pele). I was prodded to write this post, especially after a friend sent a Twitter post curated by a fellow Twitter user. Like a wet blanket, whilst the whole world, football enthusiasts and otherwise, were sending condolences in their social media platforms, he warned netiz...

Mookuthi Amman ( மூக்குத்தி அம்மன் , Nose-ringed Goddess, Tamil; 2020) This movie is obviously a bashing against BJP's imminent entry into Tamil Nadu politics. Since the 1930s, Tamil Nadu politics had been secular (read anti-Hindu). From the time of EV Ramasamy and subsequent leaders of the state, they have always claimed to be atheists. They all fell prey to the British's devious 'divide and rule' strategy. They also subscribe to the now-defunct 'Aryan invasion theory'. They believe that the story of Ramayana is the story of Northerners (Aryans and Brahmins), of King Rama, colonising the Dravidians led by Ravana. What they fail to realise is that Ravana actually hails from the region around modern-day Uttar Pradesh, hence from the North too. He usurped the Lanka kingdom from his half brother, Kuberan. EV Ramasamy had always been sceptical of the Hindu hierarchical order. His idea was the Brahmins were out to aggrandise themselves and vilify the lower castes. Be...

Ular (Snake, Malay; 2013) Director: Jason Chong This is a knock-off of the many Hollywood and Bollywood horror flicks. Even the film poster bears an almost near-replica resemblance to Hollywood's blockbuster 'Anaconda (2008)'. Besides that, it is a worthy effort, nevertheless. The CGI effect looks believable. It creates uneasiness; not laughs. The storyline seems credible enough. How different can a disaster movie be? As per usual, it starts with a potpourri of characters landing at a resort island, gleaming from ear to ear, hoping to have a whale of a weekend. Whale, they did not have, but snakes aplenty. The owners of the resort took great pains to keep the news of killer snakes away for the public. To ensure the safety of the guests, the owner did install an electric fence to keep the snakes at bay. As to how Murphy's laws dictate, anything and everything may go wrong when it is destined to go wrong. Thanks to a few mischievous frolicking holiday-makers, the fences f...