June 2005 Archives

The past day or so I have been in tortoise mode. This is when I do things very very slowly, if at all. Adapting back to the wacky office environment takes time. Switching from a Starbucks quality latte to the filter Kenco coffee has side effects & also takes time. Switching from a pizza based diet to a toast & jam diet takes time.

I feel the need to remain in my shell & have the least contact with the outside world as possible. On the brighter side it feels like tuesday but its friday tomorrow. Over the weekend I'm sure to slip back into the do's & don't of wearing a striped collared shirt. On the bright side of today I checked out the local Esquires Coffee place, the relief washed over me in an awesome wave, they weren't quite Starbucks but they weren't bad. I had a humous salad sandwich with a chai latte (tea instead of coffee). I was impressed. I've still to find a place that does Orange Mocha Frappucino's hopefully near a petrol station.

Well my theory was proved some time on Friday 24th I suppose when I got drenched walking from my old home to my older home, (a 5-10 minute walk back in Mini-India). As I met my father I got an SMS message telling me off for bringing this wonderful weather with me to Leicester. The heat wave continuing was a helpful factor in that I dried up in the time it took me to reach the rival Odeon Cinema at Freeman's Park. I like rain, I just don't like being wet when remaining indoors, so I was mildy pleased with the weather. There have been some mild showers in the interim but I knew I was being followed when I returned yesterday evening to Woking to find myself in a thunderstorm of sorts. Again the SMS message from LiSPy gave me that 3rd party report so that I knew I wasn't imagining it. My vivid imagination has gotten me into some trouble in the past when I fail to distnguish between my wonderful creations & (not so wonderful) reality, but I am learning. Charlie is a figment of my imagination. I've managed to create something better than Robocop. m0stly.

Well my purpose for visiting Leicester now is complete. I have managed to fail my driving test one more time. This time for speeding at a mild 35mph in a 30 limit & an instance where i was revving at a red van instead of giving way & letting it pass through my path. The old instructor feller will surely have stories to tell. Yep as the title suggests this was attempt number #5 .. 6th time lucky? Time will tell. I then met up with 'The Farmer' and went to Starbucks. He reminded me a little of the cookie monster who shouldn't be trusted for he puts the cookies in his mouth but never swallows. Not for that reason however, perhaps the hairstyle, that must have been it. I haven't met za farmer for about 6 months & the last time we had a proper conversation would have been just over a year ago when we had unresolved issues (mostly mine). This time I'm a tad worried about him. He's reached approximately the same stage I had a few months back. Without details its the ultimate test of stress handling.

Kung Fu Hustle' ..
Tagline: A new comedy unlike anything you have seen before.
Runtime: 98m 45s - UK Rated: 15

Plot Summary:
In Shanghai, China in the 1940s, a wannabe gangster aspires to join the notorious "Axe Gang" while residents of a housing complex exhibit extraordinary powers in defending their turf.

A film by Stephen Chow starring himself amongst many others made me look back at what else he's done & there is a rather extensive library of films he's he's starred in. I note his speciality is comedy & rightly so. As described by Egbert on the poster this films is "Jackie Chan & Buster Keaton meet Quentin Tarantino & Bugs Bunny".

Overall Impressions:
Going by the tagline I think it is pretty accurate description of what they are selling to us. A lot of it seems rather surreal & partly reminds you of some classic Capcom game time well spent, but this definitely isn't a bad thing. Catch it with an open mind & you'll be pleased with the entertainment provided.

Though in a couple of cameo roles this year, Paheli marks the return of Shah Rukh Khan in a full blown role after Veer-Zaara. Once more it is safe to say the film rests finely on his capable shoulders. A star of his recognition and stature has quite a reputation to maintain & it is pleasant to see that he hasn't given up on finding challenging and varied roles.

Synopsis
Lachchi [Rani Mukerji] is married to Kisan [Shah Rukh Khan], who is only interested in making money. After the wedding night itself, Kisan leaves home for five long years on account of his business. A ghost, who is in love with Lachchi, takes on the husband's appearance and enters her life.

Four years later, when the husband returns home, the villagers and relatives are bewildered. Lachchi is caught in a dilemma. So is the husband. And also the ghost, who wants to remain human and love Lachchi. The villagers find themselves in a dilemma as well, whether to live with ambiguity or to resolve the Paheli (riddle).

Review
A supernatural concept such as this is not something the masses are used to in a romantic genre, if much at all, however handled with such sincerity it does capture you relating with the characters. Initially the ghost almost comes of as a stalker as he scares Lachchi before we even see him in human form, you begin to wonder as the narrative progresses how a ghost will be able to convey his feelings without deception, how he'll handle each situation that rises including the inevitable return of Lachchi's actual husband.

Paheli is a different kind of a 'love triangle' and the writer takes care to open the cards with care. Suniel Shetty, Juhi Chawla and Amitabh Bachchan are stars and their fans may expect that they would be given sufficient footage considering their star status, if so they may feel a little disappointed since the three actors don't really have much to do in the film. Having said this if you treat the three actors as mere characters that have a small but significant role to play in this folklore, you will appreciate the professional work from artists more supporting the film than starring in it.

Though recently there is a lot of news flying around which I'm trying to avoid, we do have a pretty sweet poster for X3 which according to the poster should hit the cinemas May 2006.   Have a look here!

We've gona well past the stage called 'warm'. Its frickkin boiling & I hate it, luckily the office has air conditioning as do coffee shops, supermarkets, cinemas & every other place I tend to hang out. All expect that place called home. I've switched off the heating for the first time since I moved in & am glad I live alone, it means I can sit around in my pants watching West Wing :) I know I know there's a visual you've all wanted. On a related subject, Batman Ruled! I still haven't got over it.

Through this weekend in the heat & boiling blood from how great that whole Batman Begins experience was. In between watching the trailer repeatedly, I've managed to watch the entire 1st season of Seinfeld. Its really quite good. I'd heard out on the street from a couple of dealers in the DVD market that this was a pretty sweet deal & as always I thought I'd invest. The part where I actually opened the box set & actually even watched it is the surprising part. I recommend it if you haven't yet had the experience.

Its about a standup comedian & shows how his life experiences day by day inspire his show. Thrown in a wacky next door neighbour who hasn't left the building in 10 years, an ex-girlfriend who is still a friend & a geeky buddy who's more pessimistic than pessimism itself & you're pretty much guaranteed entertainment. For me, it delivers where friends did in its earlier seasons. That touch it lost with time. So far so good!

Batman Begins' ..
Runtime: 139m 55s - UK Rated: 12A

I'm still in a state of drooool, this film was all I expected & much much more, for once they haven't ruined it for fan boys (like myself who went to watch it in my batman t-shirt to the biggest screen in the country) & yet covered all the aspects non fanboy types look for. Overall this film is brilliance defined in the shape of a bat. I'm still in denial about the show being over, i keep repeating clips in my head & watching the trailer, chanting quotes that I can remember.

This film since 24 hours of its opening has got 8,685 votes & is currently at 8.6/10 average rating on imdb.com, in addition it is rated #83 in the top 250 films ever calculated by such average votes. Even I gave it a 9 & rarely give anything 9, I think the last film I gave a 9 was Fight Club all so many years ago.

I just can not fault any part of this film & believe me I have tried. Christian Bale fits into the role like it was a god-given birth right & clearly it just wouldn't have been the same if he was replaced, having said this the rest of the starcast too fit in perfectly. Though I suppose Liam Neeson deserves a special mention. ;)

ORANGE WEDNESDAY:   Mr. & Mrs. Smith' ..
Runtime: 119m 50s - UK Rated: 15

A couple who have been married for five or six years & are quite bored of their marriage come to know each others tiny little secret when they find each other out to be elite assasins & in turn try to kill each other. All this explosive foreplay & mindless violence puts their marrieage back on track & entertains us in a stupid yet enjoyable manner.

Brad Pitt as John Smith, Angelina Jolie as Jane Smith & Vince Vaughn as Eddie (who happily lives with his mother) are the only real recognisable names but you don't feel the need for any others, they all have their screen presence & it can't be denied (even Vaughn makes his presence felt in the scenes you do see him in).

Overall Impressions: A visual treat for both genders, an entertaining package of comic violence, comic romance, and tongue in cheek humour which works perfectly with Brad & Jolie. Just what you expect & more.

Over at Dark Horizons they are talking about who's signed up for the sequels already. However, this news is coming straight from the stars and it does go to show that they are keen on the sequels.

Christian Bale says that he is definitely signed to play the Dark Knight again. "We got a sense of who he is, but there's so much [more]...I haven't spoken with anybody about this, but I just really think it would be nice to come up with some kind of R-rated version, too, like a movie that is at one time PG and R, where you do two different edits for it."

Christopher Nolan - "I don't really know. I did enjoy making this one. It's a fascinating character."

Morgan Freeman - "I'm not. I'm not sure that they really think that Lucius is an integral part of the series necessarily..."

Gary Oldman - "I'm signed."

Michael Caine & Katie Holmes - Caine said of both of them "No, no. We're not signed." He then turned to Holmes and said "I mean, we'd do it, wouldn't we?" Holmes nodded affirmatively.

Source: themovieblog & dark horizons

The song "Hip to be Square" by Huey Lewis & the News was in the movie, but when Lewis found out what the movie was about, he insisted that the song not be included on the movie's soundtrack. The song was on the already-released soundtrack album, but the company managed to recall most copies.

Leonardo DiCaprio was initally being cast for Bateman, also stars of Fight Club ~ 'Brad Pitt' & 'Edward Norton' were both at one point or another being considered for Bateman. We all know who eventually got the role. :)

A gentle sensation flows about me as I am reminded by someone of my roots. Its rare that you find me talking of religion or politics with people because I like to have my beliefs but not preach. An interweb acquaintance brought up a simple question which led to a bit of a discussion. In the end I felt in touch with feelings & thoughts that I haven't felt in a long time, in fact I surprised myself with how much I actually had to say on the matter.

I was told I appeared quite knowledgable on the matter, which for once I took as a compliment without my ego interrupting. I repeated to her twice & I thought I'd share with y'all. Many aspects that I may not speak of can be uncovered about myself by merely asking.

Yeah Baby ... I have za ticket!!! I'm just a happy camper .. rockin and-a-rollin!!!! wooohoooooOO!!

Kolkata 1962. Lolita [Vidya Balan], orphaned at an early age, is sent to live with her uncle's family, where destiny introduces her to Shekhar [Saif Ali Khan]. Shekhar, a budding musician who is the son of an affluent businessman [Sabyasachi Chakraborty].

Official Website

Together through childhood and adolescence, Shekhar and Lolita share joys and sorrows, fond memories and bittersweet experiences… and unknown to them, a relationship of deep friendship and trust takes place. It is an unspoken right they hold over each other that metamorphoses into love so intense, they do not even see it coming.

We call ourselves a multicultural society & yet I still get this pushed at me for having a wife of the Apple-Mac variety. I have only one answer for those of you that think this is justified. ;)

Quote of the day.
"never explain.
your friends do not need it
and your enemies will not believe you anyway."

On a related subject: ctrl-alt-del pretty kool site, from time to time. :)

After some discussion with an acquaintance, (who I think I manage to piss off with my harsh words) it was put to my attention that my post yesterday was somewhat abrupt as though I was about to give a speech & said something like "I welcome you all here to tell you that .." & then stopped about there. So here I return to comment some more on my thoughts.

and where was I ?? Hmm right .. I was saying how reconnecting myself I'm going okay on the long-term path however a little less so over the stumbling blocks short-term. Adding to this I suppose, my writing {film scripts} have come to a bit of a halt, my first experience of writers block I suppose, I feel I may be losing touch with some of my contacts that are going to be an integral part in my 'big' secret plan.

To fix these minor issues I've started work on another side project of editing & creating my own adverts/trailers from film clips. More for the learning process than anything else, I find when you do things yourself you know what can/can't be done, this way you know what to demand & expect when it actually comes down to it, besides its all good fun. A friend I have (Becky ~ The Legend) has similar aspirations in this field so I'll be liasing with her too on this one, stealing all her knowledge & hopefully building upon it for her & myself. The additional software I'm expecting in the post early next week will make this an easier experience & a little more respectable to commerical standards as opposed to that cheap & lethargic stuff I have been using.

As for losing touch with individuals of importance in the future of my work, I fired off a bunch of emails to those I felt fit this category, hopefully filling the lack of prior contact some. I love the interweb, it's the future I tell you! it's the future! :)

Having been on London shifts all of this week, it meant reconnecting with myself, my goals in health, wealth & fame, my mental state, my social circles, lack of it, etc etc .. Before explaining the reconnection factor, let me cover the details of the 'London shift'. The London shift involves hanging out in a London office on your own, you have some additional checks to do in the early hours of the day & you need to be in there for 8am, you get to finish at 16:30, you get your travel reimbursed & are rewarded an extra £200 for the week. The point of this is if the Woking place goes up in flames or teargas or whatever it is those terrorist types use these days, then London is the backup. So basically if Woking disappeared I would become Jack Bauer for the next 24 hours, or get fired for not pulling it off. The lack of drugs in my blood might get me fired i guess .. *shrugs* ah well'

Anyhow as I was saying, this has brought me the opportunity to reconnect & re-assess my wonderful magical thought process that has got me to my current status. I'm doing okay looking ahead long term, there are however some short term issues that require resolving ..

Trivia: Did you know her grandfather (Peter Parker) was the AMAZING spider-man, now a motion picture.
Recently retired from British Intelligence I first acquainted with this one some months back through my links in Moscow. As most of female-kind she immediately took a liking to - well .. me!

She was originally recruited for her hatred of 'James Bond' films, they figured if she despised James she's stand a chance against the charmers out there.

Her special attention to a healthy well balanced diet even surpasses my own in that she has pizza more frequently than I do. Anyone that knows me well enough will be impressed by this. Anyone that doesn't should. {both get to know me & be impressed [both by me & the pizza consumption] }

If only one flew over the cuckoo's nest, it'd be her. Her speciality in the agency was witchcraft & ancient flames. Did you know there are some candles whose scent still lingers here after 100 years of its extinguishing?

Levitation is also annother aspect of her research the British government is very interested in. Her research has got them nowhere so far, but this is partly because she's been withholding information as she thought it'd put the M25 & congestion charges to a low hence removing a hefty part in the income of the government, "the risk of this outweighs the convenience of the general population" she said in a recent interview.

When asked if her early retirement anything to do with the levitation issue, she merely comments "My retirement has only one reason behind it, because I'm worth it". A witty comment in reference to the loreal shampoo ad's she directed while undercover in Hong Kong in '85. The picture you see was taken in '73 when she was aged -11. She doesn't look much different now, just a tad bit taller & lack of piggy tails on orange wednesdays.

Amongst many millions of reasons, a few that stuck out I bring forward to you all ..

A good rant is a way to relieve stress, pass on useless information & kill teletubbies through intelligence. In addition it nourishes those parts of the brain which you rarely use, like the big pink bit. It means stimulating your entire nervous system. Its like healthy food for the brain, like Pizza but without the dough. Its a way to make people believe you are more smarter imaginative than you actually are. It allows you to express wisdom, grief, hatred, happiness, anchovies, lard & even combinations of the above. Other good reasons I've heard circling the planet in recent times include:

Whether it be cynical, pompous or kiwi, its true that humanity is selfish & like a little pea. From the cave-man days & beyond the astronaut day we have had people thieving bread and garments. Bare essentials need to be obtained by hook or by crook, it is but natural. It can be justified to some small level that many of these thieves are victims of bad times/events.

From the Ram Gopal Varma camp, we see yet another release with the underworld mafia storyline as its central theme, we wonder how many times he can use this without boring us, admittedly he hasn't bored us yet & it seems he has no plans to.

RGV has impressed us with SATYA {truth} and COMPANY both of which created massive strides in the careers of new-finds Manoj Bajpai & Vivek Oberoi respectively.Yet another two newcomers are introduced to us by him this week in 'D' (Actor - Randeep Hooda & Director - Vishram Sawant).

Frank Miller's Sin City' ..
Tagline: Walk down the right back alley in Sin City and you can find anything.
Runtime: 124m 05s - UK Rated: 18

April 1st in US & today in the UK - honestly.. some kindof april fool joke right at us if you ask me. Having said that it was certainly worth the wait.

Plot Summary:
A collection of interweaving stories all based in the corrupt, crime infested hell-hole that is Sin City. Heavily influenced by film-noir, the main storylines concern a hulking brute called Marv (Mickey Rourke), who is seeking the murderer of a beautiful woman who was killed while asleep in bed with him; an ex-photographer Dwight (Clive Owen) who accidentally kills a woman beating hero cop and has to cover it up; and a soon-to-be-retiring policeman Hartigan (Bruce Willis) who is incarcerated for a crime he didn't commit. All based on the brilliant graphic novels "Sin City", "The Big Fat Kill" and "That Yellow Bastard", written and illustrated by Frank Miller.

Robert Rodriguez, who brought us From Dusk Till Dawn, the Mariachi trilogy & the Spy Kids Trilogy ;) has now gone back to his roots & come up with a novel concept for this day & age, partnering up with Frank Miller that is sure to kick off trends.

Overall Impressions:
Awesome collaboration of film noir, graphic novel & absolute style. Not the best of original storylines, but when you watch it, you really won't care about that, besides it needed to be faithful to the novels too. :) Having said this I can see it won't be a universal taste since not everyone likes film-noir or even graphic novels, I'd say its more of a treat for the fans of both and may educate the younger generation into the style which currently is an alien concept to them, maybe even get people to pickup a graphic novel.

"The years teach much which the days never knew" ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

I find this quote rather accurate. My epiphany is in conjuction with a part conversation I had yesterday with a good friend, as well as years of seeing this: Routines though good for your physical health can become monotonous & so perhaps not so good for your mental health. As a side product it can also lead others to predict your behaviour. This very predictability can lead to logical assumption that you will do / not do certain things. When any kind of change is brought about your original routine, the assumptions can now become contradictory & even confusing, since you don't expect them to assume.

This can bring distance between people & has done more than once in my little lifetime. Unfortunate to say its not the fault of either involved party since logical assumption is just as natural as change.

The only solution is to accept this I suppose ..
What flagged this up was my predictability being noticed, a cycle towards self-destruction?
For the safety of the world, let's hope not.