Why this kolaveri against Gandhis?

I made this cartoon for 21Fool e-magazine.

Adaminte Makan Abu : A movie beyond recognitions

Ustad symbolises the hope (or perhaps God) for an entire village, through whom they perceive the past, present and future. Hyder is the tea shop owner who is obsequious to the Ustad so much so that the good man continues to advise him even through his post-mortal spirit until Hyder himself turns into the next Ustad. The ancient theory of meditation which says if you are engaged in spiritual union with someone or something, you shall gradually end up to be them in this birth or the next. Read the story of the King Bharata and the deer.

Hajj is the dream or goal for Abu and Aisumma, the old couple deserted by their son for a rich modern life. In congruence with the famous lines in Bhagavatgita that advice you to toil without thoughts of the result (" Karmanyevadi Karaste Maphaleshu Kadhachana Ma Karma Phalahe Durbo Matesangatsvali Karmani" 2- 48), the Ustad asks Abu to keep the efforts going and let Him take decisions. A Muslim fakir advising explicitly on the lines of a Hindu scripture.

The old couple’s son Sattar who left them for a prospective life in the Gulf with a rich wife recasts the typical Kaliyug character described in Srimad Bhagavatham 12.3.24-42 (“Men will no longer protect their elderly parents, their children or their respectable wives.”)

The tree that the couple planted, nurtured and retained only to fell at times of crisis (which came as financial need for the Hajj trip) is a case of being untrue to yourself and your work i.e. like rearing a being with the intention of killing it. It represents Karma, the true result of your actions. Since Abu’s karma was not clean, the tree reciprocated it similarly by growing unworthy of any money for the couple. In other words, something akin to your bad karma returning bad results.

Thus, the spectacular movie Adaminte Makan Abu (Adam’s son Abu) conveys a much bigger picture of religious harmony and unity. It strongly drives home a point that religions propose fundamentally the same ideals in different forms, and hence any division on religious lines purely artificial and ill-motivated.

The movie is full of beautifully crafted symbolisms, whose meanings go beyond what appears obvious. It undoubtedly deserves much more than the national awards it received this year, and the official entry to this year’s Academy awards. Although it failed to clear for the next shortlisting in Academy awards, do go and watch it if you get a chance!

Happy Birthday Dasetta!

Das-etta means 'Das elder brother'. Now it would seem stupendously stupid of me to call Yesudas who is almost 50 years elder to me elder brother. But that is what Yesudas is to the entire population of Kerala, and that is what he will be for the next generation also! Dasettan.

Padmabhushan Dr.K.J. Yesudas is a phenomenon; one of the best that has ever happened to this small southern state called Kerala. A career spanning 50 years, Dasettan has sung in over 15 languages. Gods and humans alike, wake up and sleep to his songs. His voice was so omnipresent at one point of time in Kerala that almost everyone replicate it with near perfectness! (Thanks to the fact that there was no other singer's voice that they had heard besides Dasettan!)

To me, he is an inspiration. Not just the music. His dedication, will-power and unending energy that helped him remain the only winner in his field for 50 long years is simply brilliant and barely imitable.

Last but not the least, for many people (which includes me) his voice is that connects us with our culture, our Gods and our history. It is through his voice that we understand His divine aura. God sent... May God give Dasettan a long life...

Happy Birthday Dasetta!

Lock Pal

Rajya Sabha adjourned sine die. Future of Lokpal bill may be pushed to Feb 2012. Parliament closed for winter holidays!

Unarviyam- A Rising Star on the Stage

“I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.”

-Oscar Wilde

In today’s world where technical developments aggravate audience’s demand for perfection, dramatics is indeed a very risky challenge. Without re-takes, editing from multiple shots, digital effects or mesmerising visual lavishness, it is quite unthinkable of delivering something that appeal to today’s viewers. Not to forget, the enormous amount of time and effort consumed from the time of conceiving the idea to scripting the scenes to making the props to rehearsing to perfection and finally performing on various stages. In spite of all these, there are still ardent fans of the theatre who have pledged to revive this traditional art form, and what’s more important is to make it equally appealing and connecting with the audience as films and music.

It was my pleasure to have attended the first stage performance of one such amateur theatre group called ‘Unarviyam’ last week. An immensely talented bunch of youngsters who performed an indigenous story of an intelligent thief in their mime play called ‘The Looters Looty’.

For a maiden performance, the actors’ confidence and connect with the audience was definitely commendable. The script was very much Chennai-ish with acts referring to day-to-day life in the city. This along with the fluent ease and casualness with which the main characters in the drama (the part of the play that had dialogues) Vatsan Natarajan who plays Fallu the thief (also the director and script writer of the play) and Prashanth Ramaswamy who plays Tiger the cop (also the head of the production unit of the play) handle their respective roles cleared all airs of reservation one might have for a debutant team. To complement them to near perfection, the mummers who played the respective roles Karthik GJ and Lokeshwaran exhibit a grace of movement and acting unparalleled by even professional artists. Their ability to communicate with the audience without a single word uttered definitely invited a great deal of applause.

The music by Muthukumar Anil was apt, with a distinctive ability to keep the audience excited and at the edge of their seats. The story was about an ‘intelligent’ thief who stole for passion. Though a few of the acts were inspired from popular cop-thief films, most of them were originally thought and adapted to suit the story. The character of Fallu the thief in both the drama and the mime were impeccably executed, always unleashing a flood of laughter in the hall. The script went on to tell us how there were almost ten ways of stealing happening in the society, and why Fallu felt that theft was integral at all strata of the society from politicians to tea-stalls. The policeman Tiger (who reminded me of Asrani from Sholay) also shone well among the audience with his repertoire, although the crowd was keener on pulling his legs with meowing sounds than supporting the character’s rationale.

Although thrilling to the deepest extent, there were some places that stood out amateurish in the execution of the play like the stage not being set before curtains went up and in between scenes, the script falling a bit shallow at times and dragging at a few places here and there. Though theatres have been responsible for creating revolutions in the past, I believe that political anecdotes in an apolitical context do not always add flair to the theme. Dragging the DMK and AIADMK, Anna Hazare, price rise etc. in this play I felt went a bit out of context and didn’t serve any purpose whatsoever in creating an impact or impression.

These minor things apart, I must admit it was a rejuvenating experience. In less than ten minutes since its beginning, the play and its cast were successful in making me shed the idea that I was watching a group’s first on stage performance. Unarviyam, the theatre group is undoubtedly here to stay and if they are able to adapt and improvise with every performance you can definitely look forward to a rising star in the otherwise plain night sky, under the light of whose success I’m sure other aspirants will also be motivated to enter the field and thus elevate theatre arts at par with the established art forms in today’s society.

Good luck Unarviyam!

Why did SRK make RaOne? (The story you didn't know)

“Why did he have to do this?! Why, I say!”

I had gone to watch RaOne with a bunch of friends. The show got over and we squeezed ourselves out of the movie hall, and were now recasting ourselves into what we actually looked like and catching some lost breath to regain composure. Some of the kids who had come to watch the movie seemed to go back happy and excited, but many of my friends were asking questions. “Weren’t things going fine for him; why did SRK have to do such a movie?!”

“Why did SRK make RaOne?”

These questions seemed to echo deep within my head, and I felt like some high frequency movement inside my brain. Like small cubes being tossed all around my cerebrum causing a virtual particle wave that translates into a real-time sensation called ‘pain’. This sensation increased steadily to a peak, and I was getting geared up for a black out in case of system collapse, but surprisingly there seemed to be a localised blackout inside my brain and it appeared as if I was staring at a pitch black screen, so grand in size that I could see no other thing. There was a single source of light that looked like one from a movie projector. The story unrolled and I could see it.

Only I could see it.

The year is 2006. The place looked like a very modern robotics research lab. Something intuitively told me that it was located in India. Perhaps it was the whole arrangement of the place or the big ‘Om’ symbol on the wall, but there was not single explicit evidence about its location. The lab and the project that was running there were owned by Mr.K. No one knew the real person behind this masked man wearing robotic overalls and appearing to be around 6-7 inches taller from five feet.He seemed to have been educated in one of India's top engineering colleges and cut off from the world completely. His identity was a secret more than the project itself.

Mr.K ‘s project was aimed to destroy the self-proclaimed king (or emperor, the person in question was quite confused!) of a virtual kingdom and thus conquer the kingdom of Bolly-wood all to himself. Coming back to the lab, there was a white board on a stand that said- ‘Project Dhan’. Yes, it was planned to destroy the king by attacking his wealth and to accomplish this feat, the team had just successfully devised a super villain robot that was closest to invincible.

The robot was the most advanced one on the planet. It had Advanced Adaptive Learning, Instinctive Strategizing, Well Evolved Lability Level (‘AAL IS WELL’); skills that made it unique and indestructible machine. But the team had not come up with any name for him. It was decided to call him Duryo-Dhan, in short D-Dhan.

D-Dhan could influence anyone into doing anything, but he was meant to influence only one, and he was already on his mission.

Early 2008, SRK was in his Mumbai apartment taking a break after the success of Om Shanti Om. There was a discussion going on about a cricket league centered around Indian cities. The short, round-faced Bengali person who was trying hard to convince SRK dada took his hands in his and reassuringly tried to persuade him to choose the Kolkata team in the league. In a matter of few minutes, like a Midas touch, the obstinate SRK was magically convinced and he signed the franchise for Kolkata. Kolkata, which had another prince who would not bow down to kings and queens of the real world, a prince who revelled in the arrogance and authority of his leadership, a prince who would charge in spite of successes or failures and most importantly a prince who is loved selflessly by the people of Kolkata.

D-Dhan had begun his work thus and SRK immediately put in US$75Mn into the team and called it KKR with the prince being its ‘senapati’. In time, D-Dhan ensured that SRK lost quite a bit of his money, his team flopped and he fell out of favour with the prince whereby falling out of favour with the people of Kolkata. Before he could recover from the fall, D-Dhan returned to him in the form of a friend with a Bollywood science fiction story.

SRK decided to produce and act in this movie, and D-Dhan took the shape of Ms.Pia from Mr.K’s lab and made herself a part of the whole scheme to be in constant touch with its development. Money was pumped into it as continuously as water flows in a waterfall. D-Dhan could instantly make himself look like any person he wanted to, and took various peoples' forms in these days to ensure the successful execution of his strategies.

He suggested shooting several scenes of the movie in the UK so that the cost of production wentup. He took up the role of an advisor who helped SRK and his friend with the plot. After a really poor opening scene for SRK, they zeroed on having a Tamil character as lead, where it was completely irrelevant. He also scripted the dialogues and shots in such a way that any south Indian who watched the character in action would want to puke on his face for his unbearable representation of a South Indian family man whom they all knew so well. (He also coaxed SRK to eat noodles with curd in this pretext, and now the Chinese government is planning to lodge a formal complaint against him for insulting their cuisine in public!) To rub salt on injury, D-Dhan recommended the inclusion of Rajinikanth in the movie so that the south audience would all make a trip to the theatres to catch a glimpse of their superstar, thus increasing their movie’s collection. Impressed by the idea, it was decided to cast Rajinikanth as his latest successful science fiction character ‘Chitti’. Now, D-Dhan scripted the action of the other characters sharing the screen to be so much overacting and the music too in a way that to many a viewers they appeared to be ridiculing Rajinikanth in that shot. All these ensured that SRK’s fan base in the south dwindled to abysmal levels.

Then came the part of giving the movie a name. D-Dhan made sure that they picked a name that he wanted them to, and managed to pass through the name ‘RaOne’ that sounded very much like ‘Ravan’ the latest Maniratnam movie with Idea mobiles ad star Bachchan Jr. He did this so that this movie did not get a unique identifier and if he could somehow manage to make the movie less impressive than the Maniratnam flick in the long run, SRK’s would NOT go down the annals of history as the original ‘Ra-v-an’ and shall always be referred to as ‘the other ra-one’ or ‘the not-so-good-ravan’. Smart of you, D-Dhan!

Once RaOne was made, and D-Dhan was inching close to the completion of his mission by having made the script weak and easy-to-be-forgotten, sequences mediocre and the whole experience debatable for most audience, he decided to put together his final act in the form of SRK ‘s promotion campaign manager. In this final role he managed to direct SRK to make a big-time predictable fool of himself going around the world like a door-to-door salesman so much so that social media was abuzz with rumours that SRK had turned himself into a domestic help in order to promote ‘the easy-to-handle, user-friendliness and perfect command reception skills’ of his superhero gaming character in the movie. For someone who could lower himself to the level of an annoying salesman (oh c'mon they show up everywhere!) in order to promote his movie, even his staunch fans were now made to wonder if the movie was not good enough to market itself! SRK spent close to US$30Mn on the movie.

While all this was happening, the media had begun to get clues about Duryo Dhan the super villain from the generation after RaOne, and were trying to trace up to his makers. Though no one had established who the primary instigator of the whole mission was, it was believed to be a product of the Khan rivalry. Nothing more could be said now.

Arr---j-j-u—uuu--nn..... Thud! Thud!

(Snapped back to reality) It was my friend who shook me up from ... what shall I say, my dream? I was there in the movie theatre, everything was normal. No one knew about D-Dhan or his plots. They were still cursing SRK for making a movie like this, and our friend Deepak for volunteering to reserve tickets for all of us.

Why did I come to know of it? Does Duryo Dhan actually exist? I am confused to say the least.

Then suddenly someone came up to me and started talking. I wasn’t listening, but.

“Arjun, you are dreaming again?”

‘A-R-J-U-N’, it struck me. If there is a Duryo Dhan there must be an Arjun to defeat him in the battle of the next generation. Yes, I am the new superhero who fights the super villain! When the story of RaOne continues, you know where things are leading to and you also know who’s gonna be the super hero in that super movie.

‘Arjun’- Me! Duh!

The Value of Freedom

My latest article for 21 Fools. Though it has been there for quite a while now, just realised that I never posted the link on my blog. So here it is - The Value of Freedom @21Fools

It about how a soldier realises the value of freedom from his old father, and why we must understand and appreciate the value of the freedom we have.

Hope you like it!