Mayakkam Enna...Its time to wake up

Mayakkam Enna

After reading a lot of good press on Selvaraghavan's latest outing, this comes out in protest to that more than the movie itself.  Ten minutes into this rehash of his earlier movies (hero on the edge of lunacy who steals girlfriend/fiancee of some poor sucker routine) the director loses his audience and never manages to regain them.  Testimony to this is the long scene in which the heroine cries out in agony over losing her unborn child and the audience reacts with widespread laughter reverberating the movie halls.  I will stop with that as my intention here is not to write a review of the movie.

Dhanush, over the past few years has grown in stature as an outstanding actor and a formidable star.  He should be mindful of the fact that his movies draw more families and youngsters than any of his competitors. He has a social responsibility to stay away from such crass fares as Mayakkam Enna irrespective of who the director is.

Selvaraghavan has his creative freedom in this free country to make his brand of movies though it is highly recommendable that the  publicity of his offerings carry a statutory warning for families to keep away.

A lot of movie goers, especially families depend on the press for guidance of what to expect in the hall and it is sad that many eminent critics and celebrities have unabashedly lauded this often vulgar and painfully boring film which fails miserably to even titilate as intended and has very little entertainment value save the two super hit songs voda voda and Venanda venam.  

  

MKG : INDIA’S FIRST SUPER HERO

The festive season has begun and this time the hype of the nation is on SRK the super hero.  Talking of super heroes the first thing that comes to mind is their attire.  They are usually caped or masked or both and are essentially exceptions to Newton’s Laws.  The teasers and trailers of Ra.One, give us a glimpse of King Khan in a swank suit with the trademark super human expression performing death defying stunts to save Kareena and us, the common man.

 

Today marks the hundred and forty second birthday of a certain Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.  Like the elite mentioned above, he too wore a unique white costume which inspired simplicity the world over.  He carried a stick with him and his gait moved thirty crore people to follow him fighting for  the most important thing in life, peace. He gave meaning to words like Sathyagraha and Ahimsa, the most relevant ideologies ever.  He continues to live in the minds of the multitude as an idea passed on to generations to come.  Saluting India's first and the Worlds best Super Hero. 

Where it all began

Ooty in July

After a busy month on board the scripting team of a new film 'AAZHAM', I am back punching keys and hiking up memory ridges.  It was late in the afternoon, the second Sunday of July 1977 and in Ooty that meant only one thing...rain,rain and more rain. Forbidden to play outdoors in the slush and puddles, my two younger brothers and I were raising quiet a twister in the house preventing our elder sister from concentrating on her monthly tests.Mom had already developed a migraine and Dad tried Caroms, but my one  year old youngest brother,  wanted to sit on the middle of the board and play. Suddenly dad had a brainwave!.

The century old Assembly Rooms Theater, Ooty

He pulled me and my younger brother aside, announced that he was going to take us to an 'English Movie' and ordered us  to clean up and get dressed.  My eyes widened and the excitement was overwhelming as we had never watched one before.  At around 5:30pm  my brother and I wrapped in raincoats, complete with rain caps, mufflers and gum boots trudged along on both sides of my dad for the one and a half kilometer trek up a hill and down another to the cinema hall which played only English films.  As the constant drizzle and gusty winds combined to create an eerie howling noise we reached downhill and the Assembly Rooms Theater came into view and that image has stayed fresh in my mind gallery.

I watched my first English language film that day and it was the western spoof 'My Name is Nobody' starring Terence Hill and Henry Fonda.  My fragmented memory of the experience includes a long train sequence, a large  bowl of baked beans the blue eyed Terence Hill devoured that  brought a pang of hunger to my stomach, a few gunshots, thundering hooves of horses and a vegetable puff my dad got me during the interval that somehow tasted like baked beans.

The Entrance of Assembly Rooms Theatre

 I became the shrine's most loyal devotee and the next twenty five years, piously watched every movie

screened, changing twice a week, unless severe illness or travel intervened.  I moved out of Ooty to Chennai in 2000 and my most emotional farewell was to this holy place with red seats and a white screen, that served as my private sanctuary where  I could lose myself to merge and become part of  the magic of films, much like a Yogi's  penance in the deep forests. This was the class room chosen by Orson Welles, Stanley Kubrick, Alfred Hitchcock, Woody Allen, James Cameroon and Steven Spielberg among many others, to give me private tutoring.  I have a recurring dream often and in it my own film is  being screened there to a full house and I myself watch from my  favorite C-4 seat and  I wake up to a sense of steely  resolve to make that dream come true as an offering to the shrine where it all began

News from Hollywood, bollywood, tollywood,sandalwood,mollywood and.......

Hi ! every one, this is my first attempt at blogging and I hope I connect with you all in some way.Good luck to me on that one !.  The idea here is to share with  you, all my thoughts about  movies, be it  Indian, Hollywood or world cinema.  I am hoping here that information, that I find interesting will also be the same for you.  On this one I am trusting my instincts, which tell me, that we movie lovers are all the same.Well here I go  as a trial, a round up of movie news the past week.

This week the Oscar nominations have been announced and it sure looks like The Social Network  has 'book'ed its place as the 'face' of the show. With two nominations for original score and and original song for 127 Hours Indian Music Maestro A.R. Rahman has proved that his double win last year was "no flash in the pan"....
 

 

 

Bollywood siren Jacqueline Fernandez is ready to bare all in her forthcoming flick Murder 2. Here is hoping that this decision will do to her career, what the 'belly quiver' did to Mallika Sherawat's in  the 2004 film Murder.  Meanwhile the sizzling Katrina Kaif  has said that she would like poet Gulzar to pen a love poem on her....over to you Gulzar saab.

In Kollywood Action King Arjun joined the cast of the 'Thala' starrer Mangatha and this film is fast nearing completion and is expected to release on May 1st the birthday of Ajith.  The film directed by Venkat Prabhu boasts of the stellar cast comprising  of Trisha, Sneha, Ganesh Venkatraman, Vaibhav Reddy, Mahat Raghavendra, Premji Amaren & Anjali 

  The doyen of  the telugu industry Shri Akkineni Nageswara Rao has been conferred with the second highest civilian award the Padma Vibushan by the Indian government.  The 87 year old thespian is all set share screen space with his grandson Naga Chaitanya in a soon to be announced film

It is an electrifying week in the Malayalam industry as Mammooty is set to team up with world class director Adoor Gopalakrishnan after seventeen long years and Mohanlal  is going to tango with Priyadarshan for a new film. Jayaram has been awarded the Padmashri award by the Government of India. It's a fan's delight isn' it?

Shruthi Hassan the multi faceted daughter of Kamal hassan celebrated her birthday on friday the 28th January 2011.  Here is wishing her the very best and hope that she scales the highest peaks as a singer, musician and actress like her illustrious father!.