Archive for the ‘Regional’ Category

Open letter to Mr. Nagaraj, Regional Head, CBFC (Karnataka)

Posted: September 5, 2011 by moifightclub in film, News, Regional
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Sir,

I am Pawan Kumar, the director of the Kannada film Lifeu Ishtene. On the 30th of August, you watched my film and you passed your views about it, and gave us a U/A certificate with a forced ‘voluntary’ cut. I’d like to bring it to your notice that if I had the luxury to fight for my right I’d not have accepted to cut what you insisted.

I am a first time director in a industry which is struggling to survive. Fighting for the cut meant you forwarding our film for further reviewing and that would take couple of weeks more, that would put a lot people involved in making of this movie in a very difficult position. Hence for their sake I simply shut up and bowed to your very tyrant behaviour. This letter is simply me putting out my thoughts, I am not challenging your decision through this. I want the people to know the truth, so that they can decide who was right and who was wrong. Am hoping that you will read this till the end and be convinced that you erred, that’s all I want, I don’t want you to change the decision or apologize, the damage you wanted to do is already done. The letter might seem long but I made it as entertaining as my film was, you will have a good laugh by the end of it.

This being an open letter, I guess the public should know what I am talking about. Here is a picture of the document that Mr. Nagaraj wrote down after seeing the film. He has listed his thoughts point wise, but before I dwell into those, I’d like to mention that I respect the man and his position. He is an IAS officer and I am sure it is pretty tough to be on the chair where he sits, I cant get there for my IQ levels. I like the man for the way he appears, he comes across as a through gentleman and has an aura of being smart, composed and intelligent. I was really hurt and shocked when he listed out his objections for my film. Something that I really didn’t foresee, especially by this person, whom I had met during the censoring of Manasaare and Pancharangi. I did and I still have high regards for him.

Mr. Nagaraj in the above document states “Remove the word sucker from the tag line of the movie, wherever visible in, Move on Sucker”. For those who don’t know, ‘Move on Sucker’ is the tagline of my movie title. Mr. Nagaraj had a problem with the word sucker. He simply said that I must remove that word. I tried arguing with him that it is not a bad word, that it is simply a slang term for someone considered gullible enough to fall for a very obvious prank or con and go about unaware of it. We all know what the word sucker is, we all have used it in phrases like ‘I am sucker for Chinese food’ or ‘I suck in maths’ or ‘the movie sucks’ etc etc. But he just didn’t want to listen to me. He said that he is not interested in the parliamentary meaning of a word, he is interested in how the word could be perceived by the masses and therefore I should cut it out from the film. There was no point arguing further because he was a man sitting there controlling the future of my film and I could see it in his eyes that he just didn’t want to understand even if I tried to explain. I said “ok I will remove it”. The word comes 3 times on the screen in the film, to remove that the producer has shelled out 45k till now. 45k is not a small amount, with that money I could have put an Ad in the papers and promoted the film more, get more people to watch the film and try to save our sinking industry, or I could have simply paid it to someone in the team who has been working day and night to offer something new to the people, but instead we had to waste it on a stubborn man with a lot of power. Look at the visual below, tell me how is removing of that word changed anything?

If sucker is such a bad influence on the society, what about the words ‘BoseDK’, ‘Ass Hole’, ‘Fucker’, ‘BlowJob’, all these words were featured in Delhi Belly. The same CBFC (Central Board Of Film Certification) passed it and the movie made pot loads of money!! I am not someone who encourages those words. I am a very clean guy, I don’t speak or promote bad language, you wont find it in my movie too. Before coming up with the tag ‘Move on sucker’ I did look through the internet to make sure the word Sucker didn’t mean anything wrong. Its only after I gathered enough information that I put it up. We are a small industry and we have very small budgets to make films. We are pitted against movies from Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and English; all these industries have huge budgets to take the audience away from us. If we have to get them to watch our movies we need to sound contemporary, talk to them in a language they understand. A line like ‘move on sucker’ would make the people in their 20’s connect to the movie, and they’d make an effort to watch it. Why is it that when Aamir Khan does it, its alright? He did way too much and it was still alright!!! By asking me to remove the word ‘sucker’ from my movie tagline, the Censor Board has been impartial to me. Mr. Nagaraj is aware of the financial state of the Kannada industry. He very well knows how much we are struggling to make people trust us. And he has seen my movie and he also said ‘your movie is 99% qualified for U certificate but sprinkled with some objectionable matter’. The word sucker was one of them. And the word was not simply a publicity gimmick, after you watch the movie you’d understand how that word makes sense in the movie. The guidelines by the censor board of India states – A film is judged in its entirety from the point of view of its overall impact and is examined in the light of the period depicted in the film and the contemporary standards of the country and the people to whom the film relates, provided that the film does not deprave the morality of the audience. Guidelines are applied to the titles of the films also.

People, please tell me and Mr Nagraj, if the word ‘sucker’ has in anyway depraved the morality of you all. What censor board needs is a sense of humour. It needs to grow up and wake up to the people who live around them and not in their guidelines. Television today has become horrible, it is impossible to see and hear many of the things that is aired on many news and entertainment channels. Something that you can probably watch with your family is Discovery channel and sports channels, not even the sanskar or astha who are using the dangerous weapon against the society, the religion . But the censor board is all quite about it. Television has no censor, it doesn’t come under their jurisdiction.

Mr. Nagaraj, we are all suckers, you are one, I am one too. And the people know that. They know that they are one too. And that’s the funny thing about it. When we accept our flaws and imperfections and laugh about it, we can put our egos behind and try to progress. That’s what my movie on the whole was trying to say. For some reason you didn’t see it beyond the word ‘Sucker’ without even knowing the meaning of it.

Now coming to the other angle to the whole issue, which I hope is not true but is very possible. I think it is the ego. I very strongly feel that it is the ego of Mr. Nagaraj that makes him do what he does. He sitting in his little cabin in the govt building, enjoys seeing us film makers dance to his tunes. I am sure it must be giving him a kick that he can in 2 hours 30 mins control a film makers 10 months of hard work by just using one word. He knows how difficult it is technically to remove those words from a completed film and that’s why he does that. For people who are not aware it might seem very simple, you must be thinking how difficult it is to just delete a word. If I get into the process I can do a 6 hour workshop and probably you’d learn most of the technical aspects of film making. In simple words, it took many people and many days of work in Banaglore and Chennai to erase that word. I hope all this makes Mr. Nagaraj very satisfied and gives him a good night’s sleep. This is the story of how the word Sucker got separated from the film Lifeu Ishtene.

Now, let me introduce you to some more blunders. But I could live with these because frankly I don’t give a damn whether my movie is U or U/A, and thankfully neither people are interested in those ratings anymore. Like I said the Censor board is so stuck up with their guidelines that they don’t see how people are today. My movie got a U/A because of a scene which is got something to do with condom. The government is trying really hard to reach out to people, they even come up with jingles, in kannada there is an ad – maatadidavane mahaashoora. But Mr. Nagaraj feels that it is very uncomfortable for adults to see such content with children. That’s precisely the point sir, that’s what government is trying to say ‘don’t be shy about it, talk openly and spread awareness’. Teenagers should get aware of it, they should be bold enough to talk about a condom and not make a taboo of it. But instead Mr Nagaraj goes to the extent of writing – delete comedy episode surrounding condom for a U certificate. But I didn’t agree with him, I agreed for a U/A instead and the scene is intact. In a week you will see it and you will know that it is not in bad taste and is for sure spreading awareness.

The second one is debatable, Mr Nagaraj has pointed out a shot where a woman is smoking. His justification was that it is not right to show women smoking and therefore he writes – also delete the visual of lady smoking. I am not going to defend this much. I don’t smoke and I am for anti smoking. I had even made a short film on the anti smoking subject.

In Lifeu Ishtene, the character which the lady was playing was of the types who would smoke and therefore I hade to make her light up. Deleting this shot would not change the reality though, we see so many women smoking these days, and it is really bad. Smoking is bad for both men and women, and I sincerely hope that smoking comes to an end. And in no way is my film promoting or glamorising smoking. The Censor guideline says – scenes tending to encourage, justify or glamorise consumption of tobacco or smoking are not shown. To show the bad result of a habit, the story needs to build up and then show the effect. That’s what my shot of the lady smoking was doing. No problem here, I will gladly take a U/A for this point.

The third is silly actually. In the third point Mr. Nagaraj says – delete lip to lip kissing in the song. Well not much defending here, for some reason we Indians want to think that showing love on screen is more dangerous than showing violence. On a funny note may be the government has a strategy behind this, Lets not teach people to express love, there by reducing population and lets show more violence so that they could kill each other and again reduce population!!!! Am I the only one laughing at this stupid joke??? Ok Mr. Nagaraj I will accept a U/A for this too. I am sure the 15frames (less than a second) of lip to lip pecking in the mayavi mayavi song would make the adults very uncomfortable to watch it with children under the age of 18 years old. However I have one question for you – How did you pass the song ‘Padmavathi’ from the movie ‘Johny Mera Naam’ with a U certificate? That one really shocks me. Because though I am an adult and my father is an adult too, we both would be uncomfortable watching it together in theatre or on TV. Please ask yourself if the very aesthetically shot 15 frames of a small peck on the lip in my movie was worse than what you can see in a 4 min song. Here is the link to that song if you want watch it again and wonder why you gave it a ‘U’.

Your guidelines clearly states the following – human sensibilities are not offended by vulgarity, obscenity or depravity; scenes degrading or denigrating women in any manner are not presented. Isn’t this song violating all of this?????

People please note that from what I can read of Mr. Nagaraj, he is a very good person, I am not being sarcastic, I might be against his decisions but I don’t hate him. Please don’t think that he was expecting a bribe or anything like that. I can for sure say that he is NOT a corrupt govt servant. He is doing his job but he has to simply get some of the realities in the right perspective. Lets help him know what he is not aware of so that he stays with us as the regional head of Karnataka for CBFC, and make right decisions and help us all save good kannada films. If you believe in this article and you want to support me, then please mail Mr. Nagaraj your views in a few words and a few words only, lets not waste his time. I hope you will not send abuses because I am not in support for that. Mail him on robanglore@cbfcindia.gov.in or nagarajk1@yahoo.com and cc a copy to me on actorinme(at)gmail(dot)com . I guess the subject line of the mail should be with a sense of humor, keep it as – Lets grow up, suckers! 😉

(Note: I still haven’t received the final Censor Certificate from Mr. Nagaraj, he is going to give it to us after he checks the film and finds no ‘sucker’ in it. We have followed his instruction and removed it and showing the corrected film copy on monday. I could have waited till monday to get the certificate and then put this article up. But I didn’t want to be a chicken in expressing my views. I hope Mr. Nagaraj will stand up to his gentleman image and not take this article to his ego and create problems to the release of the film on the scheduled date. He is in a position to completely reject this article but he is not in a position to take this personally to take revenge.)

( PS – This letter was first posted here)

Rituparno Ghosh wants to act. Why ?

Posted: March 12, 2011 by moifightclub in cast & crew, cinema, first look, Regional, songs & videos, Trailer
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Well, he can shout out Meri Marzi! Fair enough. But do watch the videos in this post. The first one is a trailer of his new film Memories in March. The film is directed by Sanjay Nag and stars Rituparno Ghosh, Deepti Naval and Raima Sen.

To quote from the official release, “Written by Rituparno, Memories in March unspools the story of a bereaved mother who comes to Kolkata to collect her son’s ashes. She is Arati Mishra, an art curator who lives in Delhi. Through his friends and colleagues, she discovers that they knew him in ways different from the way she knew him as his mother.”

Seems like Memories In March is Hazar Chaurasia Ki Maa, just replace Naxalism with sexuality. But from the trailer it feels like Rituparno Ghosh might have killed the film with his acting. Because he is just playing himself.

A filmmaker who knows how to explore that intimate space in a relationship so bloody well, and someone who has done it so many times, why this acting keeda suddenly ? Mr Ghosh, you can do better.

The second clip is from another bengali film titled Just Another Love Story (Arekti Premer Galpo). Directed by Kaushik Ganguly, it’s about a filmmaker Abhiroop Sen (played by Ghosh) who makes a documentary about Chapal Bhaduri, the legendary jatra (Bengali folk theatre) actor who spent his entire career playing female roles on stage, primarily as Goddess Shitala. Thus begins a journey where director and subject learn from one another – on the one hand is Bhaduri (playing himself) who was a closeted gay for fear of social ostracism but was openly accepted as a cross-dressing actor, and on the other is the modern urban filmmaker who is open about his sexuality but is still negotiating his gender identity.

The film stars Rituparno Ghosh, Raima Sen, Jishu Sengupta, Indraneil Sengupta and Chapal Bhaduri.

And click here to read Variety’s review of the film and more about Ghosh’s acting debut.

We haven’t seen either of the films and may be it’s completely wrong to judge his acting just on the basis on the trailers. But then,  if the reverse is true, we will write the apology post in big and bold font too.

The new avatar of Rituparno Ghosh

Posted: January 14, 2011 by moifightclub in cinema, pics, Regional, Tollywood
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Not very long ago we had put this post on filmmaker Rituparno Ghosh and his changing avatar. And now he has gone a step ahead. Check out the slide show.

It shouldn’t matter much to a film buff but when he is flaunting it all, how can you not notice! And it seems he is exploring gender and sexuality with his films too. Once, twice and more! Click here to read the complete interview published in The Telegraph, where he talks about his new passion, his new film Chitrangada: The Crowning Wish and how he is preparing for it.

Pic Courtesy : The Telegraph

An Open Letter to Laletta

Posted: December 18, 2010 by moifightclub in cinema, Regional, Simbly South, Special
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2010 – Is it going to be remembered as the Year of Open Letters ? Think so. Wonder why ? Because there are hardly counted few cinema gurus in this country and when they disappoint too, where else do you go ? This one comes from a fan of Mohanlal, someone who knows the cinema of the region as well. I still remember this post by another friend and we still talk about the header of his post – Mohanlal can act with his back to the cinema! How many can do that ? And if he can, why turn to other side to kick the villains in slo-mo. Leave it to others. Read on….

Dear Laletta,

At this moment you must be celebrating the release of your new film that you also produced. A year ago I was very excited when you were reviving your banner, Pranavam Arts for this film. To Malayalam film buffs this banner needs no introduction. This banner has actually given lot of gems that pushed Malayalam cinema to new heights in terms of cinematic growth.

The first film to be made in this banner was His Highness Abdullah and the last film that released in this banner is Kandahar, which released on Friday. With Kandaha

r you have officially killed the quality of your banner and the brand. As the title credits started unfolding, the first tag that actually caught my attention was “The Legendary Superstar- Mohanlal”. Then I did not think much about the tag moved ahead with watching the film. A film titled Kandahar is actually an out and out commercial film, yes it also has a plane hijacking plot thrown in to do justice to the title, that too the most twisted way. Major Ravi as a film maker has found a way to make pathetic army films using his Major tag. A film maker who gets to cast two good actors, Bachchan and you, plainly wastes the idea and the script catering to pathetic mass demands without aesthetic sense, quality or taste, expecting audiences to clap at every move of yours. All I could see was audiences getting more and more uneasy in their seats, as the movie progressed. I am not sure which set of your fans love this sort of crap from you ?

What was the idea of using Amitabh Bachchan in a character, when the story remotely does not demand it? What was so extraordinary, that no other actor could play it? Have you lost your sensitivity in a film that deals with plane hijacking, what is the need for the pathetic underwear humour? And Laletta, by the time Major Ravi narrated the script to you, I am sure you realised the film has nothing to do with the Kandahar incident that took place in 1999. Yet you decided to make this film under your established Pranavam banner, I feel Major Ravi continuously making these cheap army films makes him a bigger disgrace to the nation as he appears to be making money out of pseudo patriotism. Yes the icing on the cake, the film also has an item number in a disco. Do you really think the masses love this? Where happened to your taste?

You once played an assassin who reached a royal family to kill the king, and through your mutual passion of music, you and king form an inseparable bond. Forcing you to think whether you should eventually kill the king and turning against the same people who hired you. Below is the scene where you are thinking about whether you should proceed with the murder, when Gowthami comes to you, in her innocence, she tell you whatever you are thinking, she’ll pray for you. Subtlety was your greatest strength then.

Below is a song from Bharatham, the second film of Pranavam Arts, when you played a singer, who is forced to hide his elder brother’s death during his sister’s marriage. The night before the marriage he finds out his brother is dead in a road accident, and when he returns with the news home, the family at home receives a letter saying the brother is in a holy trip to Kashi, you decide not to reveal the news to the family, deciding to wait till the wedding gets over. That’s when the relatives ask you to sing. You go along, hiding the grief. The performance won you the National Award that year. The song still gives me goose bumps.


The above two was just the beginning of Pranavam Arts; you repeated consistent quality in terms of stories, performances in every project of Pranavam Arts with different directors including Priyadarshan, who has no more stories to tell these days. You actually achieved a mile stone when you produced Vanasprastam, when a lot of Kathakali teachers refused to teach you the dance form. They said the scenes that require Kathakali couldn’t be performed by any actor, since it takes years of practice by any artist to achieve that perfection, you proved them wrong.

Vanaprastham was not a commercial hit for you, after which you closed down the banner, but deep inside you could sleep peacefully you opened Malayalam audiences to a different world, something you can proudly show in your body of work. You actually showed your potential, there is no role that you couldn’t handle. Mani Ratnam called you the Gerard Depardieu of Indian Cinema. You don’t need those comparisons; your fans know what you are capable of, be it comedy, intensity or subtlety. You were everyman’s Lalettan then.

Somewhere today you have lost the passion of the actor and artist. Unfortunately the bunch of cronies like Major Ravi and your gang, whom you have been backing off late under Aashirwaad, have lead to your destruction and deterioration in your work. You are surrounded by people who have made you blind with such pointless positioning like Tamil stars who need milk worship. A pathetic bunch of fans actually resorted to idol worship you on every release and decided to give sad tags like Legendary and Universal Superstar, when you were and are our Lalettan, unfortunately none of those stupid fans know what you have done for Malayalam cinema or for what you have achieved in this craft or do they remotely respect you as an artist, with them lot more agendas are at play, I am sure you are well aware, they expect you to ape Bollywood stars, romance young 20 something heroines and want you to send goons flying in the air, when today you should be playing your age, exploring characters your age and pushing the envelope like Pacino or Depadieu. You should be actually thinking of collaborating with artists internationally. When you should be making a Pranavam Arts film under directors with strong voices like Blessy, who force you to break your image, you choose people like Major Ravi who massage your ego. All this makes me worry; I don’t want you to become a Rajnikant and getting lost in the Superstar tag that we no more will get to see our Lalettan who we once knew. You are beyond such tags as an artist. Ever think of the first time you acted?

Here is the actor in you begging the director to complete the film with whatever funds, while the director advises you to believe in yourself and your work. A classic scene from Mani Ratnam’s Iruvar. The film ranks as one of my favourites

Years ago on TV, I watched Guru, directed by Rajiv Anchal, which was India’s entry for Oscars where you played a man who had sight in the land of the blind. The film was one of the most profound films and I could never take it off my mind. In the film, when you loose sight like the others, you are asked to explain what blindness is to the people who can’t see. You talk of a wall that is blocking you, unless that wall breaks…

Even as I write it, I know that this  post does not even begin to sum up your body of work, but it pains to see you chase stardom even at this age, no tag will do justice to the biggest tag we know you as, Lalettan (Lal brother). I sincerely hope that you read this letter and return as Lalettan.

Till then, I am assuming in reality you have become blind.

An Anguished Fan

WTHolyF – Gandu Trailer & Bet you havent seen a desi trailer like this one!

Posted: August 11, 2010 by moifightclub in Bet You Didn't Know, cast & crew, cinema, first look, Regional, songs & videos, Tollywood, Trailer, WTF
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If the header seems to over-hype the trailer, quickly click on the play button!

UPDATE – The video has been removed by Youtube. And if you haven’t seen it yet, click here or here to watch it.

Its a bengali film directed by Q. Ok, thats Quashik Mukherjee. Call it porn or  whatever you want to but it looks killer! Porn, sex, masturbation, mommy, expletives, bengali rap and all in black & white – deadly combo! Gimme more ! Tell me more! Who got more dope ?

Thanks to Aseem Chhabra for the tip.

POTD : Amar Singh – as you have never seen before!

Posted: May 27, 2010 by moifightclub in cast & crew, cinema, film, pics, POTD, Regional, Simbly South
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Our heart skipped few beats. Sar pe wig aur haath me sitaar, kaisa hai yeh tera emosanal atyachaar! Wah wah! And it rhymes too.

Amar Singh goes for a complete makeover and is playing the role of a hindustani classical singer in a Malyalam film titled Bombay Mittayi (Or has it been changed to Mumbai Mittayi? Whatever) And sitting next to him is Dimple Kapadia who plays his wife in the film. What a jugalbandi!

Jaya Bachchan, Jaya Prada, and now Dimple Kapadia! Surely bald & pot-bellied men can also have some charm. BTW, we have one more query – are they gonna just sit like that and fake it all, or dance too? Imagine Amar Singh doing the Rishi Kapoor act in the song Jaane Do Na. Bet we will book our tickets now!

(Pic courtesy – http://twitter.com/sai_iyerzz )

First Look : Ramu’s Rakta Charitra (promo)

Posted: May 5, 2010 by moifightclub in bollywood, cast & crew, cinema, first look, News, Regional, songs & videos
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So, the big question is will Superstar Surya save Ramu’s almost dead career or will Ramu manage to kill Surya in his bollywood debut! Though the hindi promo of the film is not out yet but this one surely looks like Satya-meets-Sarkar-meets-Sarkar Raaj! Ramu doesnt even give a new frame to stare at, forget anything else. Anyway, we will continue the bitchfest later on, have a look.

It stars Vivek Oberoi, Surya Sivakumar, Priyamani, Radhika Apte, Shatrughan Sinha , Kota Srinivas Rao and Tanikella Bharani.

Umesh Kulkarni’s Vihir (The Well) is bloody brillant, cinematic masterstroke and a must watch!

Posted: March 19, 2010 by moifightclub in cast & crew, cinema, film review, Must Watch, News, pics, Regional, reviews, songs & videos, Story / Plot / Synopsis, Thoughts
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Now that the post header has made you curious enough to book your tickets, do give the film some time and space. Its not your corn and cola cinema. For that you can wait for pottymaker’s Housefull!

As I returned home after the screening and looked at the bucketful of water in the bathroom and the reflection of the light on its surface, I could not look beyond. A bucketful water never meant so much. Never held my attention. When you go to a theatre to watch a film, its entertainment but when you come back home with a cinema inside you, you know its a masterstroke.

Vihir is one such cinematic masterstroke. Directed by Umesh Kulkrani and written by Girish Kulkarni & Sati Bhave, its devastatingly gorgeous, warm and heartwrenching tale of two freinds and their adolescent days. Of lost and found. Of life and death. Of hide and seek. Of love, lost and longing.

According to the official release, the synopsis of Vihir is as follows…

A story of two adolescent boys Sameer and Nachiket (cousins who are best friends) standing on the crossroads of life… to choose between the life that leads to petty worldly small existence or the life of free existence that would let them spread their wings and soar high in open skies…

They play a game of hide and seek in a rather unusual way. Where one cousin hides in death and the other is looking for him in the life around him. . . . Samir’s search leads him towards the experience of oneness where he can unite with Nachiket again!

Scratch the surface and you will find that the water runs really deep. There is family politics, pain of growing up, existensial crisis, chinese whispers, detachment and finding that “best friend” during one of the most difficult & exciting time of life – adolescent days. When suddenly one day you spot some soft hair strands slowly making a thin line just below your nose, you dont remain the same anymore. You want to talk to someone who belongs to the same club. You try to make sense of the world.

And like me, if you have spent your summer vacations at your nanihaal or mamabadi or mamaghar or Grandma’s place, you will instantly connect with it. Uncles, aunts, cousins, grandparents – all under one roof. Things that you should not have known, tales that you should not have heard and incidents that you should not have been part of – you grow up then and there. You become Adult. Vihir moves in similar territory as Sameer & his Nachiketdada try to decipher the meaning of life around them. They are not only cousins but best friends too. One (Sameer) idolises the other but the other is lost. He is also trying to find himself. And its through one’s loss, that the other discovers himself.

But what kind of loss is it ? Is it just being invisible ? Or more than that. Here comes the maturity in the writing and direction part.  And now slowly all the dots connect. The simple game of hide and seek & chinese whispers dont remain the same anymore. Dont want to write more here to spoil the experience for you.

The character actors are all familar faces of marathi cinema. Lead actors Madan Deodhar (Sameer) & Alok Rajwade (Nachiket) say it more through the silences and gestures than the dialogues. Alok was also the lead in Siddharth Sinha’s FTII diploma film Udhedbun which bagged the Silver Bear at Berlin Film Festival in 2008. Shot gorgeously by Sudheer Palsane, the camera takes you straight inside the family affairs. The acting across the board is so natural that it looks like someone just put a camera there. Am not sure if the actors spent some time together before the shoot or what lead to such strong bond on screen but its pure magic.

When the first half got over, I was bit lost wondering if its the end of the film. And it could have been a superb end there. As i came out and met few other film buffs, realised that others also felt the same. So now what ? What will he do in the second half ? How will he wrap up ?

Fuck Syd Field and fuck all plot points. Umesh Kulkarni’s second half is pure visual delight. Mood piece. At one point, some 20 minutes of the film is complete silence. No dialogues. And once you are with the character, you know what that silence means. If you have ever loved and lost someone, you know its difficult to find a way out.  You dont want to hear people talking. They just dont make sense. You need no gyaan. You need that journey to nowhere. Remember last year’s Dev D ?

In the secod half, I felt the same once again. When “the well” scene comes, I thought here is one more end. But then there is some more. Its a journey of self-discovery. So, no point trying to figure out an end to join the dots. Let it go on.

And as a killer line in Rocket Singh song goes…Uljhe nahi to kaise suljhoge…bikhre nahi to kaise nikhroge. Nobody grows up in years, its always in deeds.

Water is life. And death too. In every drop. Everywhere. The subtle hints, the subtext and the layers – by the end it seems nothing is as simple as it looks.

(PS – Its great that AB Corp produced it. All respect. Hope they do more such films. And those of you who still think that am biased against the Bachchans, doesnt this post say enough to shut you up! We all love to champion a film that we like. Rest doesnt matter. It seems Jaya Bachchan was the key person for making this happen. This surely is one tight slap on the face of Raj Thackeray and his supporters who claimed Guddi buddhi zali, tari ajun akkal nahi aali. And do watch it on big screen. You need to dive into that water. The dark theatre and the big screen sets the perfect mood. )

Click on the play button to see the opening scene of Vihir

For more on Vihir, click here.

Harishchandrachi Factory is out of Oscar Race! (Foreign Language Film Category)

Posted: January 21, 2010 by moifightclub in Awards, bollywood, Breaking News, cast & crew, cinema, Hollywood, News, pics, Regional, songs & videos, Story / Plot / Synopsis
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Yes, its official. And it was expected. Indian’s official entry to this year’s Oscar Award in the Foreign Language Film Category was Marathi film Harishchandrachi Factory. Sixty five films had originally qualified in the category.

The nine films which have been shortlisted for the next round are…

Argentina – El Secreto de Sus Ojos (Director – Juan Jose Campanella)

Australia – Samson & Delilah (Warwick Thornton ) 

Bulgaria – The World Is Big and Salvation Lurks around the Corner (Stephan Komandarev )

France – Un Prophète – (Jacques Audiard )

Germany – The White Ribbon – ( Michael Haneke )

Israel – Ajami – ( Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani )

Kazakhstan – Kelin – (Ermek Tursunov )

The Netherlands – Winter in Wartime – ( Martin Koolhoven )

Peru – The Milk of Sorrow – ( Claudia Llosa )

Out of the nine films, five will make the final cut for the nomination which will be announced on February 2nd, 2010. And the Academy Awards will be presented on March 7th, 2010.

BTW, Harishchandrachi Factory is releasing on 29th January. And do watch the film. The early reviews and the buzz from the festivals has been quite positive so far. The film is directed by Paresh Mokashi who has been doing theatre since last twenty years. Harishchandrachi Factory is Mokashi’s debut film.

The film traces the obstacles and hurdles faced by Dhundiraj Phalke (Dada Saheb Phalke),  also known as the father of Indian cinema,while he was making the first Indian film Raja Harishchandra in 1913. And here is the theatrical trailer of the film…

For more details about the film/director/promos, click on the website link http://harishchandrachifactory.com/ .

Xclusive First Look : Cinematographer Santosh Sivan turns actor – To play Raja Ravi Varma!

Posted: November 5, 2009 by moifightclub in cast & crew, cast news, cinema, first look, News, pics, Regional, Xclusive
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Santosh Sivan is the new one to join the club after Farhan Akhtar, Rituparno Ghosh, Anurag Kashyap and Hansal Mehta. Cinematographer turned director Sivan is now in front of the camera for a Malyalam film titled Makaramanju. The film is directed by Lenin Rajendran.

Sivan plays the role of renowned painter Raja Ravi Varma in the film and Karthika, yesteryear actress Radha’s daughter is the lead actress in the film. And we can bet for one thing. Sivan will be much better than Randeep Hooda in Ketan Mehta’s Rang Rasiya because atleast he knows how to hold the paint brush as he comes from a painting background. Rest we are not so sure! Take a look!

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