Endhiran - Let's get interactive 2

Karthik a.k.a. Sundar,

First of all, congratulations on coming up with a well written post. I really liked the style of your writing. My only problem is with the content.

It's amazing how you have almost analyzed all critical elements from the movie and the only good things that you can come up with the movie is the absence of intro song and பூசணிக்காய், this is like முழு பூசணிகாயை சோத்துல மறைக்கராமாதிரி. Why do you want to introspect in to how a male lead could have possibly fallen in love with a female lead? Relationships are a bit "touchy" in both real and reel life, to find a reason for them is silly. I agree to the unethical method employed to pass an exam, but I am not going to a movie theater to learn ethics in life. On the constable scene, it came across as basic human instinct to run away from danger especially if you know you are the root cause for the situation.

So you expected an Indian movie - biggest budget ever, targeted at more than 1 billion people of all ages across the globe, simul-released in several languages and countries - to explain the laws of robotics so everyone can understand? Good luck! I can see why Shankar's first choice for this film was not Kamal.

Robotics conference being in Tamil, I had no problems at all with everyone in the room speaking Tamil. This is way better than "வசீகரன் நீங்க இன்ன சொல்லுது.." or someone disguised as foreigner with thick accent. This is like watching Ramayana in different languages and asking what was Rama's mother tongue. This type of shot making is way better than Tamil films that comes with generous sprinkle of English.

On super natural robots not being used by Vasee - remember, this is Tamil movie with Rajini as lead. It is a great risk not to have usual cinematic elements, especially in a much hyped Rajini movie ever. Movies are all about packaging and marketing - Shankar had to sell this to audience, hence the low tech, presence of Karunaas and Santhaanam. It is silly for some high tech folks, but hey, my 6 year old daughter was thrilled to see robots giving flowers. My 70 year old mom could enjoy robot doing mehndhi designs.

I have problems when filmy characters do something super "intelligent" that is beyond human. In those situations, most of  the time a super scene or act will get "யார் காதுல பூவ சுத்தறான்..". Imagine robot explaining how cancer can be cured using...yeah right!  There is a problem here. If a director is intelligent, that's great. But if the director tries to show he is intelligent through his movies, it has more often than not failed or came across as cheap antics. I can quote several Kamal's experiments here.

Oh, the great Terminator. For Indian cinema, we are still struggling - and will always due to our diversity on everything - to classify a movie as a particular genre. For some of us, we are totally ok watching summer comic flicks and disney pixar movies and accept them because we know what to expect when you watch a particular genre. 

You are an intelligent person and you are insulted? Sorry bro, I am an intelligent person and I like it. You  know what, I know a few other intelligent people and they like it too. I  have a  few moderately intelligent foreign friends (no offense intended) and they were perfectly fine with Avatar, which in my mind  is a 300 million dollars spent on a movie that had a storyline that is no different than several age old Indian movies where a city bred goes to village (or vice-versa) and become part of that place and never returns to his old life.

Shankar had taken a contemporary situation and created a parallel sci-fi track with robots to come up with an INDIAN entertainer that can be marketed and will also be appealing for most people. I think he succeeded in that for most part. dot.

P.S. Thanks once again for bringing me back to blogging! I AM BAACK!!!!

Endhiran - Let's get interactive

Here's a well documented post from my nephew on Endhiran:

http://apdipodu.blogspot.com/2010/10/endhiran-paarvai-written-by-karthik.html

Thanks to Karthik (I am used to calling him Sundar), I finally got the "kick" needed to start writing again after about 7 months hiatus, blame it on laziness.

Now, on to the interactive part -  Watch out for my reply soon! I am sure it will not stop there.

Cochin Cowboys

This post is purely a work of fiction and any likenesses to real life are purely coincidental. Also, all the disclaimers that have ever been created/documented/undocumented by anyone in this universe applies to this post. You are responsible for anything and everything that you get /not get after reading this post. Read at your own risk. 

Ever since IPL picked 2 additional franchises, one of the team and the franchise team members (FTM) got together and started to layout plans for next year IPL.

FTM#1: What should be name of our team? ideas உண்டோ ?

FTM#2: ஆலப்புழா ஆண்டவாஸ்? Trivandrum Titans? Cochin Cowboys? வேஷ்டி Whales?

FTM#1: நன்னாயிட்டு உண்டு. Let's pick Cochin Cowboys.

FTM#3: Brand ambassador யாரானு?

FTM#1: Mohan....

FTM#2: Team song choice guess செய்யும்? 

FTM#4: கடலை நக்கர போனோரே..

FTM#2: Correct.

FTM#5: What is the Jersey களர்?

FTM#3: வல்லிய half whiteல், brown, ஜரி வெச்சு, பஷு மாடு logo?

FTM#1: டாப்-ஆயிட்டு உண்டு.

FTM#2: Who are the ஸ்போன்சொர்ஸ்?

FTM#1: Kerala Jewellers, Ramraj வேஷ்டி... 

FTM#4: Cheerleaders அல்லாம் வேண்டா. நம்ம கதகளி, மேளம் போதுமாணு.

FTM#2: Gra-eat idea!

When the FTM went to the new site where they planned to build a new stadium, they were surprised to see 2-3 டீகடா that have already started the business there. They promised those shop keepers a contract when the stadium is complete. The whole FTM team is working over time to be ready for IPL 4.

IPL 3 - Day One

Here's my initial thoughts on IPL 3 after day 1 and match 1.

- Not a full house, could be due to the fact that there is no local team involved.

- Commericals in between balls in the scoreboard - Pathetic. I am not a big fan of commentators these days, but this trend will totally take them out of picture soon. In between DLF maximum, Citi moment of success, MRF sky cam, how great this tournament is and bunch of other meanderings, they speak Cricket. Special note to Sunny Gavaskar: Please retire from your commentary job. I had great respect for you as a player, and I still do. I am tired of your Ranjit Singhji leg glance story every time someone plays a fine leg glance.

- It is very clear that only Superstars of Indian cricket and foreign players will be able to make this tournament attractive. Example: Vaas chiming in with early wickets, Matthews and Shah having a huge partnership, Gilchrist's 50 and more to come, which goes to show the importance of Test cricket and ODI existence and competition between national teams, so it will be easy to market T20.  I am hearing 90+ games next season, Modi needs to be very careful with overkill. 

If I were to bet/guess on 4 teams that will make it to semi-final (which looks so so far away), here it is:

Delhi - They are my favorites since IPL 1 and they really look a strong team even this season.

Chennai - Dhoni as captain & Hayden as a player are very capable of dominating any team and hence they are my favorites too.

Mumbai -Though I don't believe in Sachin's leadership, I strongly believe they will perform well this season to make it to top 4.

Bangalore - They have some very talented in-form youngsters in their side. Once they have all foreign players available, they will be a strong team.

Double Standards

Watch this first: Gambhir Watson Incident 

and then watch this: Johnson Styris Incident 

Gambhir gets one test ban -  International Cricket Council (ICC) match referee Chris Broad charged Gambhir with a level-two offence of not conducting play “within the spirit of the game as well as within the laws of cricket”.International Cricket Council (ICC) appointed commissioner Justice Sachs reached his verdict after studying video footage, documentary records and written submissions. “I am prepared to accept that he (Gambhir) had been the victim of prolonged and persistent verbal abuse by members of the Australian team, culminating in a moment of anger that led to his unfortunate lapse,” Sachs said.

Johnson was fined 60% match fee - Johnson, who was charged with a Level 2 offence, pleaded guilty at an early stage to avoid a full hearing. The umpires felt Styris contributed to the verbal exchange that preceded the physical contact and that his actions contravened clause 2.1.8 which covers actions that are contrary to the spirit of cricket or bring the game into disrepute. "Sometimes in the heat of competition players cross over the line of what is acceptable behaviour and that has clearly happened in this case," Madugalle said. "I made it clear to them that as role models it's important that they conduct themselves not only within the laws of cricket but also in keeping with the spirit of the game." 

This is clearly a case of double standards that sub-continent ex-players, commentators and even public are complaining about for several years. The above scenarios are near identical and they both are breach of code of conduct and they both deserve punishments. Concerned players were punished, however the punishments were different. There is very little or no hope on the hearing process and how ICC would handle a situation.

Day/Night Test Cricket

Mr. T20 genius came up with this new idea - "Test cricket must go day and night", if not he warned that test cricket will die. 

Here's my take:

- What do we do with the ball? Seeing a RED ball under lights is difficult not only for the players but also for the spectators. Changing it to white will NOT work since they already cannot keep the white ball white for 50 overs in ODI. So we need a change in law to make this happen.

- What about the pitch and outfield? It gets wet due to fog in most of the countries and in some of the countries, even summer is cold during night time. The dew and cold weather could dramatically favor batting team or bowling team.

- Spectators in the stadium - Though ticket sales does not impact the revenue in a big way these days, spectators in the stand is crucial. Thinking people will show up after work for a test match is a huge assumption. (BTW, claiming that people have work to do during day time hence cannot watch a game is an useless comment. People in the nineties had to go for work too.)

- Claiming broadcasters run the game - This is such a shameless comment. The game should be bigger than anything. Regardless of commercial interests, passion for sport should be the prime reason for playing a sport. The same should be the case for administrators too.

When ODI was introduced everyone thought test cricket is waste of time, now everyone hates ODI. T20 is new and people seem to like it for now. I am sure money motive people, the one dimensional nature of the format and the overkill of number of tournaments will make this format boring soon. T20 organizers have successfully shortened the career for bowlers, made batsman more greedy and demoted spectators, especially young ones, from being involved to impatient.

Don't worry about test cricket and leave it alone, it will survive and people who loved test cricket will always love it.

(Dis)Connected..

"I have more than 200 friends"
"Wow! so many friends..so what are you doing this Saturday evening?"
"I will be in front of the computer"

This funny, yet eye opening dialog from the movie "Funny People" on social network is the inspiration for this imaginary post.

Raj - Son
Dia - Daughter
Mom and Dad

Raj: Hi Mom, sorry I woke up late, good to catch u on IM, what do we have for dinner?

Mom: I am late to a meeting, the menu and sample pictures of the food for the entire week is posted on my Facebook, your Dad sent a text to me and trying to reach you. love u Raj, c u later.

Raj: Great, I will check it out and comment on the changes I want. I will also call Dad.

Raj calling Dad: Pop, I need cash.

Dad: I will wire transfer to your checking later today. We need to catch up on arrangements for Dia's wedding.

Raj: Don't worry Dad, I have high level plans almost finalized and I will send you the PPT when it is ready.

Dad: Thanks Raj! Buzz me and I will check the PPT. love u, talk to you later.

Slide 1 - Invitation: Raj logged in to Geni, Facebook, LinkedIn contacts and created an invitation distribution list. He also roughly calculated the invitation numbers based on other family member's social network contacts. Once Raj had the headcount, he selected eVite, Facebook and Twitter updates for sending invitations and updates.

Slide 2 - Photos/Video: Raj Google'd photo/video broadcast professionals in the area and short listed a few. He planned on podcasting the event live and later make it available on YouTube. Twitter updates will be posted every 5 minutes during the marriage ceremony.

Slide 3 - Food: Raj short listed Pizza Hut, Saravana Bhavan and Jamba Juice with Salad as the possible options for food ordering. The attendees will either get a food coupon that they can redeem on the marriage day or get rain check for later use.

Slide 4 - Thaamboolam: Once the attendees successfully login and attend the function, they will get album of their choice as free download from iTunes as thaamboolam.

Slide 5 - Gifts: Attendees can send their gift via Fedex (prepaid free shipping) or choose to use Paypal for cash gifts.

Raj emailed the PPT to Mom, Dad and Dia and sent an Outlook invitation for video conference call later that day and hoped every one can attend.

If we continue our passion and craze for social connections through technology, who knows, we might end up like this soon.

Are we really connected?

Kollywood Trends

All Ajith has to do is speak his mind and pass a comment to get wrath of everyone in our home state. Our mindset has become so narrow we cannot even take a simple comment with true spirit.

I read elsewhere that a stuntman filed a compliant on Ajith and his fans, availability of pirated DVD on his latest movie அசல் right after the release of the movie, Ajith not being mentioned in any of the Kalai TV's promo on the grand CM function, demanding unconditional apology from Ajith for his comments, Ajith visiting CM in the last few days and there will be few more in the coming weeks. Why so much hate on one man? God knows what will happen to his upcoming movies? Remember the delays that வேட்டைக்காரன் had to go through, just because Vijay had a casual meet with Rahul Gandhi?

Movies like தமிழ் படம் are good for the Tamil industry, however they are accepted not just because they are good. Producers and directors, though angry, have kept quiet for wrong reasons. Kollywood is slowly playing in to the hands of one family that runs meetings, functions and now movie production. This is a dangerous trend developing in the Tamil movie production. Even AVM had to go through a "process" to have their movies released. Very soon stand alone film producers will become thing of the past.

Nagpur Nadir

Right after the end of fourth day defeat, the team management and the board set up a conference call to discuss the situation.

MS: We are in to the 7th minute of the call and why is everyone quiet. OK, let me start. I can go to public and say this is one off bad test and we will be back for the next test and ask them to be Pepsi cool. But we need help from selectors.

Cheeka: What can I do man, pehale hi bolna chaahiye, if everyone is injured how do I know unless you guys tell us. Yuvi was always injured, but he was always in the team-na?

MS: I never thought I would say this in my life, but why did you guys not pick Dinesh Karthik?

Cheeka: Don't ask me, ask other selectors. Since we already picked Vijay and Badri, I was forced to maintain balance on city, state, region and zonal policies, hence the exclusion.

Ravi: Why not pick 16 or 17 players and send them home after we start the first days play?

Cheeka: Machaan, this is not comm box. If Rohit gets injured five minutes before the start of the test and if team physio could not send actual assessment report on Laxman soon enough, what can we do? I told everyone that we don't need a full strength team for Bangladesh tour, look what happened now.

Modi: Excuse me please. I just wanted to know if Australia is cleared to play IPL in Mumbai next month. (before someone could answer, he gets 2 cell phone calls and he answers both of them simultaneously with one phone on each ear)

Ravi: But why did we pick four fast bowlers when we have always used only 2?

Cheeka: Did you forget what Nagpur board did to our team when Australia was here? Though it was not the first time, they even made Ganguly fall sick right before the start of the test match.

MS: Alright, I will pick team for next test. Dump Saha and bring back Karthik, Kohli and Raina in the line up. Hopefully Yuvi will not be close to 50% fit, otherwise he will play. I promised my bowlers that they will play regardless of winning, losing. Anyways there is not much we can do with the reserves.

Cheeka: Do you also want to talk to the curator @ Eden, just checking.

Ravi: I can take care of PR from the comm box. Just make sure you guys show some fight and spring in the stride.

Pres: I asked for bataata vada, meeting is almost over, still did not get it. What's going on?

விண்ணைத்தாண்டி வருவாயா - Music Review

Expectations were sky high (at least for me) since this is Rahman's first tamil album since Oscar and he teams up with Gautham for the first time. There was some pre-release talks and interviews from Rahman on his unconventional approach to songs on this album and you will realize what he was talking about after hearing the album.

Omana Pennae - Benny Dayal excels and once again came up with nice variations within a song that has some interesting and subtle musical notes like the nathaswaram in the background that comes and goes right through the song. Kalyani Menon's malayalam portion is mixed well in this heavy instrument dominated song.

Anbil Avan - Heavy use of synthesizers in this joyful number sung by Devan and Chinmayi definitely creates the happy mood. Chinmayi's intentional nassaly rendition with thick accent to sound western gels well with Devan's voice. The highlight of the song is the intelligent use of "Anantham Anantham.." instrumentals in the middle to go with the mood of the song.

Vinnaithaandi Varuvaaya - This song is unconventional and the use of electric guitars and keyboards make this song sound like an unplugged jazz. The music is quite loud in some places but Karthik's soulful singing with lots of expression is brilliant.

Hosanna - This is my favorite song of the album. Tune is so fresh and Vijay Prakash's voice blends very well with the orchestration that flows like a beautiful stream and Thamarai's lyrics is probably the best of the album. This song is one of those that you will remember and hum after hearing just once. A masterpiece that will become an instant hit with everyone.

Kannukul Kannai - This song starts of with a beautiful violin bit followed by Naresh Iyer 's beautiful voice. There are quite a few intelligent violin interludes right through this westernized song that has shades of Maramkothiye.

Mannipaaya - A melody rendered by Shreya Goshal and Rahman is very good to hear. The Thirukkural in christian style chorus is intelligent. Different styles and types of மன்னிப்பாயா sung by both singers gives you the real feel and mood of the song. This song brings காதல் ஒன்றல்லவா from Taj Anthem to my mind.

Aaromale - This is my another favorite from the album. This song starts slowly with a country style guitar music and hits you at full steam soon. The singer has typical mallu voice and accent and this song is a good fusion of western and south asian music and it is a very new style of song for Tamil films.

No set pallavi, charanam pattern for any of the songs, some interesting western/south asian and Tamil/Malayalam fusion, intelligent use of Thirukkural, marriage songs, nadhaswaram, guitar etc, this album has so many new and good things. It was a long wait to get a Rahman album in Tamil since Sakkarakatti, but it was worth a wait. Hope Gautham Menon does not disappoint with the movie.

Watching TV in India..

In US, we are stuck with just 2 satellite service providers and what we watch is pretty much determined/dictated by local channels (if you want to know more, just YouTube Family Guy FCC).

During my recent trip to India, I was pleasantly surprised to see so many satellite companies and choices for TV viewing. Tata Sky, Big TV, AirTel TV, Dish TV, Sun Direct.. the list goes on when it comes to satellite television in India. The problem though is the content in channels and how programming is rendered. Too many commercials and they come at inappropriate times. This is similar to சமையல் மாமா serving மோர் குழம்பு on top of your சாம்பார் சாதம் without your consent during marriage lunch. Too many things happening too quickly during the shows and you get a feeling that you are watching the actual program between the commercials, when it should be the other way around.

Watching cricket was awful since there is always a side bar or a pop up between every ball and tons of commercials between overs (most of the time you miss the first ball of the over). The worst part is there is no time for replays when a batsman is out, you have to watch it live, if not you just have to wait for quite a while.

What's with big hero movies dominating the TV channel commercials and programs. வேட்டைக்காரன் commercials and promos were popping every other second, between the programs and sometimes the talk show on movie itself was the program. I heard they did the same with ஆதவன் and படிக்காதவன்.

TV commercials used to be intelligent before, but was a huge let down recently. Except for a few, most of them were silly. Fill it, shut it Honda guy may look cute for some college girls, but he came across as a person who is naive to SMS. Why would an elephant not let the boy eat a banana when all he needs is one banana?

You can name a Tamil channel for every single alphabet and there is a Tamil serial on every girl name that you can think of. I saw a new role/title called "Head of Creatives" during the shows. I can see the hunger for new titles, but it is silly to call "Creative Head" as "Head of Creatives". We definitely need parental controls on TV serials and comedy channels that expose Vadivelu's back and portions of Vivek's crass comedy.

You can browse through all the channels without watching any and still spend about 30 minutes on TV. Is that not a huge plus?

Back from Vacation..

Phew.. after a hectic work schedule followed by an excellent five week vacation, I am back to my routine, more or less. Here's some of the items that I want to write about in the next few weeks:

- Commercials and TV watching in India
- So much of வேட்டைக்காரன் in Tamil channels, I want to write one line tweet jokes on the movie/promo, may be I should call it Tweetaikaaran
- Brilliant music once again from ARR in his latest album விண்ணைத்தாண்டி வருவாயா (some one tell Simbu to stop saying நான் ரொம்ப அழகா இருக்கேன் on every single interview about the movie, தாங்க முடியல)
- IPL auctions and Pakistan's outcry

Let me see how it goes next few days.. too much caffeine in the system.