Movies, Movies and More Movies

Last weekend Bay Area had two film festivals. 1. Latino Film Festival in Redwood City and 2. South Asian Film Festival in San Francisco. Close to 80% of the audience for Latino Film Festival were Latinos. At South Asian Film Festival not even 50% were South Asian. I think this is really sad.

I ended up watching 1 film at Latino Film Festival and 4 at South Asian. Here are my opinions about the movies I saw.

The Violin - Mexican-Spanish
I was attracted first by the name and next by plot. The movie is not about Music. It about rebels, ruthless soldiers and a father who wants to help his son. It is a well made dark film. Photography is amazing.

Loins of Punjab Presents- Indian American - English
Weird name. I went to watch the film as I had to go to the city for my finger printing. As usual I got a parking ticket at that parking lot. When I bought the ticket I saw a huge line that extended a block and half. The movie is about a singing contest in New Jersy. It was a laugh riot. Dont expect anything from the movie and it is politically incorrect humor. I had a stomach ache after watching the film.

Unni-Indian-Malayalam
I love Malayalam movies. They introduced the movie as being a Pather Panchali. It is about a child and his relationship with friends. It is a not a Pather Panchali. Pather Panchali is like a song. This movie is not. The movie doesnt have much of a story line. It made me relive some of my childhood memories in Hyderabad.

Sankara-Srilankan-Sinhalese
This is my second Srilankan film. It is about a Buddhist monk and his temptations. The movie is strictly for art film aficionados. The film is sheer poetry and beautiful. Photography, acting and direction were fantastic. I wished they did not describe certain things in the end though.

Kya Tum Ho-Indian-Hindi
I was debating whether I should watch this movie or not. They called this movie neo noir film.It's about 3 people whose paths are interwoven. I was expecting the film to be a very dark film. But it was not. I felt the movie was very average. I could not understand what my dissatisfaction about the film was.

So last weekend was all movies, movies and more movies.

Movies, Previews & Reviews

Previews are expected to give to an impression of what movie is all about. I watch a preview and think that I am going to watch a drama and the movie ends up being a mushy romantic film or a senseless action thriller. Latest in that list is 'The Kingdom'.

Watching the previews I thought that this is some film like Syriana. I liked Syriana. Infact the film opens with history of friendship between Saudi Arabia and US. A suicide bomber attacks an oil company picnic. After that it is a regular Hollywood action thriller.

If it is not a serious film and does not want to talk about politics, why do they give an impression that it is a political film? They are probably turning off the regular action movie watchers. Ofcourse you could ask me why the hell I haven't checked out the reviews. My reply "Oh yeah! Do they mean anything?" King Kong got rave reviews, but the movie royally sucked.

Now my point, don't rely on previews or reviews. Have a friend who watches every film that releases, and ask them the story and make your decision. :-).

A few rants about India..

There are a few things I have been wanting to rant about but did not find time to do so. So here are the short pieces.

Ram Sethu Project: Politics in India are always sad( I don't mean to say that politics here are any better, but atleast I'm a spectator here not a citizen.), but Indian media also going down the drains. Most of the reports I have been reading in the media talk mostly about Ram sethu as a symbol of religion. None of reports I read talk about possible environmental havoc it could create. Dont people in India want to talk about environment at all? I refuse to believe that. Media is selling what majority of people are interested in hearing/reading. Whatever has happened to the responsible journalism?

Infrastructure in India: Recently bridge collapses in middle of Hyderabad, it takes four hours for rescue team to reach the place. It's time government did something to improve our infrastructure. Why do we even talk about India shining, we our citizens cant get them aid in the right time?

Indian cricketers: These idiots win once in a life time. They shower crores(1 crore=10 million) of money on them. Why? From what I hear some 10s of crores of rupees have been showered on these guys as gifts. How about spending them on infrastructure development or education instead?

Rest later...

The God of Guitar?????

Yesterday when I got my email that informs me about different events that take place around Bay Area, I was very upset. John McLaughlin was performing today at Masonic Center in the city as a part of San Francisco Jazz Festival. Had I known it before, I would have definitely gone. Not that I had any plans, I did not think that I could get tickets.

But I wanted to give one final try. I posted an ad on Craigslist. Then went to SFJazz website and checked the availability. To my surprise a few tickets were available. I bought the ticket and deleted my ad. My seat was on the side, that did not bother me much(Infact it turned out be a great seat).

I reached the city at around 6:15. I wanted to be a little earlier as parking in the city is superpainful. I just couldn't believe my luck. I got street parking right in front of masonic center's parking lot. After that I grabbed a quick dinner and went to the theater.

Another jazz guitarist Kevin Eubanks performed before intermission. He was excellent. After a break of about 20 minutes, John McLaughlin showed up in a blue and red colored pochampalli shirt(I had a similar chudidar) and auditorium exploded in applause. Many people I talked have seen him before, but a while ago. My seat was in perfect position to observe his hands.

There are couple of things I loved about McLaughlin. One, He gave every member of the ensemble to showcase their talent. Every performer pretty much got equal time, including him. The other the way he acknowledges his audience. He looks at them smiles and while talking to audience he moves around to every corner.

Now about his music, somethings are better left unsaid. To sum what I felt after the show, "What the hell! Why is it so short?" He is called The Consummate God of Guitar not without a reason.

National Steinbeck's Center

I drove to Salinas by mistake a few years ago. I got lost driving back from Monterey. At that time I didn't find that town fascinating. I wanted to come back. Not for Salinas but for John Steinbeck.

Finally I could make that trip to National Steinbeck's Center. My friend Sahithya & I took off at 12:00 from Santa Clara. Traffic was bad. It took us 2 1/2 hours to reach the place. An hour and half short of what we needed.

Museum was amazing. It gives you an insight of how Steinbeck was influenced by people he knew, his family, and his experiences at farms of Salinas. They also had orientation films and introduction videos to some of his works. We didn't get much chance to check them out in detail.

Another interesting aspect was culture of Salinas. It's migration patterns and how they influenced the local economy and agriculture. They also had information about local labor and their issues and different points of view.

I'll go back now for two reasons Steinbeck and Salinas. If you are in the area, don't miss out on this one. I bought their membership. I'll get free admission. ;).

The Bridge

Golden Gate bridge fascinates many people. People travel from all over the world to see it. People travel from all over the world to jump from it as well(But the average jumper is from bay area according to a recent study).

There is a guy who left cameras in 2004 to capture the scenic golden gate bridge. I forgot what he took permission for. All he filmed was people jumping from the bridge. He released it as documentary. I had heard about this film at San Francisco Film Festival last year.

This film was played on IFC last Monday. I happened to watch the last hour of it. It was incidents of people jumping interlaced by relatives of the jumpers and survivors talking.

I dont know what compels people to end their life. All I know is, it very difficult on the family. I read somewhere that attempting suicide is a cry for help. May be if they seek help in time or call that suicide hotline(there is one on the bridge) it may keep them from doing that.

There is one thing I could not fathom. Mental state of the film maker. Seriously, how did he edit the darned thing? He has to watch the entire footage to see whether somebody was jumping, he had to go back edit the scenes of the person before he jumped. What gives me the eerie feeling is the fact that they are real people. It was difficult for me to watch, I wonder how the film maker could do it.

The movie does make somebody contemplating suicide think twice. May be that's what motivated the film maker.

It is a supermorbid film. If you want to watch it, please do. It does provide some insight.

One the greatest film makers is no more!

Ingmar Bergman died today. It is a huge loss to the entire film industry all over the world. And to all of us cinephiles.

He is a master film maker who made excellent films about human relationships and complex factors of thought process. The first film I saw of Bergman was Seventh Seal. It was mind blowing to say the least. Next film of his I watched was Saraband in a film festival. His wild strawberries along with seventh seal ranks among my all time favorites. I also have a few films of his in my netflix queue.

I hope there will be a tribute film festival around bay area soon. I will not miss it.

Ghatak - Broken Dreams??????

Ritwik Ghatak made 8 feature films. None of them were hits. Heck! Not many people have even heard of him. Is he a failure?

A film is a form of artistic expression. If you have any doubts, watch Ghatak's films. His protogonists go through a lot of toughtimes in their life. Most of the times are failures. I usually dislike that kind of films. But not in Ghatak's. His movies seem like reflection of his soul. He wanted to all his anguish in them.

I was watching Subarnarekha lastnight. In that you see 2 characters who love to cry(That's a crude way of putting it. One likes to sing sad songs/raagas and the other writes sad stories). Another character asks the girl why she sings sad songs all the time. She replies that's what she sees around her all the time. That's what ghatak has seen. He wanted you to see it.

Now coming to the question whether he's a failure. You may say he is. He was an alcoholic and died at 51. Made 8 films none were hits. But hey, his films are a relection of his soul. How many artists can really do that? Now he's considered by many as one of the best film makers from India. His dreams probably were broken, but his work will live on forever. Thanks to British Film Institute trying to restore them.

And Finally He Wins!!!

Few months back there was an article in the headlines of the onion "Martin Scorsese's Next Film To Be Three Hours Of Begging For Oscar". I thought it was hilarious for 2 reasons.
A. It talks about how pointless Oscars are and
B. How Scorsese detiorated as film maker over a period of time.

Somehow my 2 of my other favorite directors never won Oscars either. Stanely Kubrick and Alfred Hitchcock. 2 Visionary directors. One who can send chills down ur spine without being gory and another a visionary who was way ahead of his times. Kubrick was nominated 4 times for best direction and Hitchcock 5. (Kubrick won it for best visual effects for 2001:The space Oddessy though).

When the departed won other oscars I thought it wasnt going to be scorsese's night. Though departed wasnt as bad as "Gangs of New york" and "The Aviator", it lacked the magic of his earlier films. It's noway close to Raging Bull, Taxi driver, or Mean Streets. If you see a scene of those films, they just glue u to the screen. Departed clearly lacked that. Another downside was the sound track. Where was the haunting sound track a trademark of Scorsese's films! Also, I couldnt take the soulless rendition of "Comfortably numb" in the background.

But at the end of the day I'm happy for Scorsese. He had to make a sub-standard film to win and the award was presented by 3 of the most overrated directors. But, nevertheless and award is an award.