Dinesh Pratap

Manmarziyaan is a rivettingly drawn interesting script. Mr Kashyap has a way with the films. He takes an engaging sure fire hit movie and story and contemporarises it. He did it with Devdas, and now Woh Saat Din or HDDCS, which itself was a rehash of Woh Saat Din. Nothing wrong with that. The world is evolving. But wonder why the acknowledgements are amiss in every discourse. Might be he wanted the audiences to brainstorm and arrive at this fact on their own The story: Two narcisstic lovers, disrespectful to each other and firy as smouldering iron rod, were to be doomed in love. Had that relationship sustained this would have validated "Animal". The most crucial ingredient of love is RESPECT. A motif which runs underneath juxtaposes the extremities of life. This builds up drama and shades it with multidimensionality I guess. The Yin and Yang or Apollonian and Dionysian. One succumbing to hedonistic pursuits like Dorian Grey, and another staying freezing cold biding for the time patiently. Made me wonder of Devdas watching this movie( Mr Sinha also made Dev d, didnt he? So strain of thought deviating and detouring), and also the exalted staus of Bengalis and South Indians in our culture at one point of time. Elitism, a remnant of outgoing foreigners who seeded it here to cast a net of cultural imperialism. This is what it was. So, someone got privy to Wuthering Heights and made it into Devdas. Heathcliff and Catherine you have your dopplegangers here in Devdas and Paro. Worth watching film. Catch it.

I had seen this movie years ago and it stayed with me. I got hold of it recently and watched it again. Had the draft of an idea as it has been long time and memory going "Memento" with age, but turned up quite revelatory this time round. Pickled and aged perfectly to showcase its splendour. The cast is top notch. Jeff Bridges avatar is so unlike "The Dude". The gentleman transmutates with every role which speaks of his talent and versatility. Tim Robbins is Mystic Riverish and Shawshankish.Broody and cold and wronged. His charming personality is in total contrast to the job at hand, and has a feel of "Primal Fear". Affable, innocent looking with deep seated dysfunctional personality traits. And what a chameleon he is. He changes so seamlessly his roles on either side of the camera. For whatever I could gauge hom through his films, I could never envisage him helming "Dead Man Walking". A true auteur in tge league of Lumet, Kubrick et al. Both the protaganists have well fleshed out characters. But the screenplay leaves a gaping hole for equally talented Joan Cusack. But that is equally made up well with her parting concluding dialogue in the movie and shows her conniving and devious character. Worth watching~

I recently watched a movie Gone baby Gone. Was wondering where did I come across the same storyline. Voila. Its Baaghi 2. But what saddened me is that I did not find any reference of the movie GBG in all the reviews and analysis of Baaghi 2. Not even by the crème de la crème of Indian Film Reviewers'. A simple acknowledgement that the storyline was copied from Gone Baby Gone would have given due to the source. But NO. That's not the way we Indian operate. We are a bunch of ingratitude impersonates. And that too in an age of Copyrights protection so widely practiced by the whole world. Shame.

It is harrowing to see past replicated in its full abandon in this country and the gullible population fending off itself with whatever coming it's way. Was watching a movie called "judgement at Nuremberg".it struck a lot of painful chords. Quo vadis? The movie is a recreation of an incident of the past, and deals with empirical validation of the heinous crimes against humanity perpetrated by the Nazis. Although many people were tried during that trial, but few pronounced cases were taken up, like experiment with eugenics and the crime committed to pursue it and Feldenstein-Hoffman case.the latter can put Khap Panchayat to shame. The parallels are innumerable. Seems past catching up with gusto and replicating itself on a different stage. The remorse of the defendants is manifest of poetic justice. It is of no use once the crime is committed. The silence of snivelling lot to the executives in the face of impending doom has shown us in the past dark phases like Emergency. It's frightening that although there was historical antecedents of crime perpetrated by propagandist governments, emergency happened. We seem to have still not learnt the lessons and are stuck in the time warp. We are still allowing crimes to go on silentlly.aren't we partner in crime? We live for repeating the mistakes with impunity,like the groundhog day character, not realising that it would pounce on us like Frankenstein horror. Remorse is not alibi for crime. The finale between judge heywood and one of the convicts janning, played to aplomb by stalwarts of Hollywood Spencer tracy(what an ease with which the gentleman acts.he can put to shame the new generation actors) and Burt Lancaster, is the crux of the movie. one is equally, if not more, guilty to a crime if you are a mute spectator and allow the crime to take place. We are allowing it to happen here in our country and we are no less guilty. People with corruption written all over their body are elected to be people to rule over us. Incidents like lankesh, kalburgi,cow vigilantism, arbitrariness in imposing decisions to the detriment of common and indigent, human being like najeeb Ahmed lost in thin air and still not traceable. Retributive justice like the one in Madari might will open the ever somnolescent government. Its draining. It's like Bobo doll situation, wherein the culprits are going unpunished time after time and are bolstered enough to repeat it. We penalised the earlier dispensation as we accused the premier of supplicant who allowed the misdeeds of his colleagues to go untrammelled. The situation is no more different now, is it? The head of the government should not be a mere spectator like his predecessor. A corrective action will be a welcome change.The dysfunctionality in this country is not merely restricted to economic sphere, the societal values also need sprucing up. Not mere platitude of swacch Bharat, it needs to be followed up through some tangible actions. Judiciary need commendation this time round in our country, for it stood for the people, and gave an historical people centric verdict,making right to privacy as our fundamental right. But the future seems vague with people of extreme ideology, either occupying or waiting on the wing to corner positions which would have a serious bearing on our lives. Special mention to Montgomery clift who essays the role of a person at the receiving end of SS for his different ideology. The hobson's choice is what we are forced upon. tow the line otherwise face the brunt. what has come to our country where heads of state are ridiculed by the incumbent premier for he talks of inclusiveness. where do ordinary citizen stand in the firing line? Maxmillan schell, attorney to defendants, has uncanny similarities to Christopher waltz(nemesis of Bond in Spectre, but watch him in Polanski's carnage.).great acts. Movies like this and Skokie are not merely movies, they are lessons in learning. Isn't the movies new novels?

Watched a very old movie but very relevant in present context.The movie is called SKOKIE. Please don’t fret. It is very much an English movie. Skokie is a town in Chicago with majority Jewish population. Will not divulge the whole story, unlike my brother who used to get this sadistic pleasure in revealing the climax of the movies to me. This movie I am going to talk about is not merely a detailed analysis of an incident in Chicago happened long time back, but reverberates with the developments in this Country at present time. It talks about “Freedom of Speech” and lends credence to the practice of practicing freedom of speech. It surmises with this thought that if one tramples over this freedom for one reason or other, there could be possibility that the same perpetrator would be at the receiving end when they would be in a need to use this freedom. This is the premise of the movie. Everybody knows how Jewish people have suffered in the hands of Nazi Germany and Spanish inquisitors. But in spite of the reprehensibility of the actions of Neo Nazis, the American Supreme Court allowed them to March with Swastika and all geared up the way Nazis used to dress.This was disgustful from Jewish perspective, but stood for the Freedom of voicing one’s thoughts.Even the scum of the society were given the freedom to voice what they wanted to say. To summarize. So long as the actions are not distasteful , the people should be allowed to speak whatever they want.Actions should be yardstick for checks and not mere speech. “The test of democracy is not just majority rule, but that the power of the Government is limited by freedom, and the first place you go out and defend that freedom, is the first place it is under attack.”—Skokie Freedom of speech has not mere philosophical undertone. It is a necessity.It was not protected in Pre-Hitler Germany. The Weimer Government did not favor that. Everybody knows how disgustingly the history shaped up thereafter. The rise of Nazis and death of million innocent lives. Lot of learnings to take from this gem of a movie. Hope it reaches the Government.

Saw Bajirao Mastani yesterday. Reflected on the movie and came up with this version of my take on it.Thought, is it relevant? Does it hold any water? Nonetheless, here I go. It has been a down time for me for quite sometime, and I really was looking for something crisp which can alleviate my mood. Did the movie help me? It did, to an extent. It transported me to a world, which must not have been that exquisite as it is shown, but a world which was captivating and seemed real. The characters well etched and their growth palpable. Was shuddering with the thought that the Director might have spoofed the characters. But unlike Mr. Dutta, who slaughtered Umrao in his interpretation, Mr Bhansali is a painter and master of nuances. He recreates the atmosphere, and the passion flares up in every frame, and has been able to seamlessly integrate the bygone era with modern look. The movie draws inspiration from the Classics like Pakeezah, Mughal E Azam and Umrao Jaan, and for a good valid reason. These movies(few others would be Shatranj Ke Khiladi, Anjuman, Gaman, Garam Hawa,Junoon(not the one where Rahul Roy changes into an animal in a jiffy!!!!)) are landmark in depicting the rich and mesmerising Muslim culture and could be considered as subtle representation of a certain segment of the society. The diction , the whole persona and the mood have been rightly captured by the Director. People who have subsisted on movies like Mughal E Azam will straight away see the sister of Anarkali from Mughal E Azam emerging from the screen as a maid of Mastani. The amorous eyes and sonorous voice of Meena Kumari with her tresses floating in a small pond like structure, and a reptile fleeting around lifted the tone of the movie Pakeezah. This movie has that type of feel and It is these moments which uplift the movie to a different pedestal altogether. Unblemished acting from each and every actor. When movies like Mughal E Azam and others mentioned earlier were created, the recreation of an era must not have been that big a challenge, as the era had not died its death. But this is a different time where lot many aspects of our earlier societal values have become either irrelevant or have been dumped in the backyard. Imagine Deepika Padukone, the alpha actor who has been lauded for Cocktail and Finding Fanny and Piku, coming up with this act to sweep you off your feet. She looks mesmerisingly beautiful and acts the part with great sensitivity. That is hallmark of a great actor. The same for Mr. Ranvir Singh. What an act. He rightly drew an analogy between him and the Director vis a vis De Niro and Scorcese. The downside. First, for good reason, the gifted Director who also has given music for the movie, could not retain all the songs.The movie, after all the pruning, stood at three hours.So I missed seeing picturisation of sonorous and full of dramatic content laid songs like “Ab toh Jaane na Doongi”. I guess the song would have the mood of song “Na jaao saiyan”from another path breaking movie Sahib Bibi Ghulam. i wish the Director’s cut DVD will have all the songs in entirety.Secondly,the externalities of characterisation( for Bajirao and Mastani) gets upperhand to the internal relationship dynamics between the protagonists. Thirdly, the movie had the opportunity to give blindfold moment, which could have made it a little edgy, which it missed. Nonetheless, the movie is a painting, and a painting worth seeing. Quite a job to write up with sincerity about a movie!!!

It is always interesting to watch Spielberg movies. I am, like millions of others, his fan, for the wonderful stories he has woven and allowed us to be privy to that. His repertoire ranges from comic to thrill to introspective ouevre. The latest to add in is The Post, and the cherries on the top in the movie are my all time favorites Meryl Streep and Tom Hank cast as top honchos of The Washington Post. It is a hectic movie with very little morsel of entertainment. Has a feel of docu drama. But the drama is intense with no scope of any frivolity, and I would put this as an edge of the seat docu thriller. What really stands out out in the movie is the premise of the story which underpins the ethos on which the democracies are built , and the vision and courage of people to defend it against all the odds. The protagonists world are at stake with certainty of vengeful retribution from right at the top of the political machinery, but the courage and the fortitude is exemplary to fight the dysfunctional system. The movie also portrays the megalomaniacal narcissism associated with people in power. The fall out of the Supreme Court ruling in favor of the so called renegades (Read as people with voice and patriotic to the core and principled) is that the President categorically shuns people from The Washington Post to be part of any event associated with Presidential affair. The world moved on since 70s and has come to a full circle in The States as well, with the current dispensation also towing the lines of earlier Republicans. No wonder the birds of same feather stick together. This story which unfolds in 1970s finds its resonance in our part of the world even now, with The fourth Estate debarred from accessing the highest office. Have you come across any impromptu conversation the top most leader of our Country engages in? The scene stealer is towards the last quarter of an hour in the movie where Ms Graham (Meryl Streep , Owner of The Washington Post) weighs the options of playing safe vis a vis taking a stand which would be good for the Country, and veers towards the latter, and voices that the truth should be of paramount importance and is the prime most responsibility of newspaper. The dialogue by one of the correpondent of The Post towards the end of the movie that he wanted to be part of a small rebellion, showcases the potentiality with which every individual is endowed with, and the passion to approach an event can be a big differentiating factor. To stand for truth is a big high. The wike leaks, Panama Leaks are pointer to the problems which we are beset with and should not be swept under the carpet. The movie concludes with the message that a person at the helm should not be allowed to run the Country on his own volition. All the affairs of the Country whether Domestic or Foreign should be run after proper discussion in both the houses of the Parliament and also by engaging the opposition( we are seeing opposition skirted over issues), and should not be unilateral. An act of revelation should not be dubbed as treason, as is being done at this point of time in our Country. If the Government start envisaging that the revelation against the state is an act of the treason , then it would tantamount to the person declaring himself that he is the state. How can we justify today the detention of Octogenarians by the Police in Pune as risk to the nation? With no FIR, no police records of any misdeeds , the Government gets hold of people and put them under vigilance. How insecure politicians could be? This anxiety ridden politics where the rule of the game is to win at any cost is no good. When the doom is near the perversion in people is at its peak. The Watergate happened just after this incident and led to the end of the rule of misanthropic Nixon.