50th Filmfare Awards

Last night I watched the Filmfare awards (bollywood?s Oscar) religiously, as I do every year. This year it has coincided with the Oscar?s weekend too. After all these years of seeing Manikchand Filmfare awards, it sounded strange to hear a new company called SGI sponsoring this year?s event. I doubt how many even knew that a company called SGI existed before this event. Anyways, except a few ?golden? moments ? thanks to the dance sequence by the beautiful women of yester years who went to prove that they were still more beautiful and graceful than the current actresses?, the rest of the evening was boring me to death. Zeenat Aman and Rekha looked stunning. Sharmila Tagore graceful.
As every year, the awards were not given to the best actors but to the actors in movies that were the most successful commercially. Wonder how one could award the best actress award to Rani for hum tum. I would have rather voted for Shilpa Shetty for Phir Milenge. But that would have been morally wrong ? wouldn?t it ? best actress award to a movie on a socially taboo topic. And when is this Shah Rukh madness going to stop? It was an insult to Amitabh when SRK was given the ?Power Award?. After a while when almost every actor recd. an award, it seemed that many awards were creatively crafted so that every one gets one! Remembering ?Sholay? after 30 years proved that it is still the greatest Hindi movie ever made (though I don?t like it much).

After watching the Oscars this morning, I felt Oscars can never be compared to Filmfare awards. It is a class in itself ? the setting at Kodak theatre, the designer costumes of actor?s speak for themselves. But you know what a colorful combination can be ? replacing the performances/dance sequences of Oscars with Filmfare awards 

Joy Ride

I take a different bus to work every morning. The mannerisms of the different people I travel with makes every ride a unique experience. You get to meet strange people and their weird habits like singing loud, sleeping and falling over the adjacent person’s shoulders, reading aloud, yelling at your boyfriend on the cell phone, peoplee with their earphones motioning their their heads violently to probably their favorite tunes, people at the back running through the bus to the front to disembark even before the bus has come to an halt (so time conscious).….the list goes on. There was this lady who was describing her bank balance over the cell phone and explaining why she cannot buy the kid a toy.
Yet another incident that made me think bathroom singing is out and bus singing is in. A few weeks back, the guy I sat next to, who appeared sane initially was flipping through the pages of Times of India. After a few minutes he neatly folded it and placed it on his lap and started singing. He started singing Carnatic music loudly with thalams. For minutes, I couldn’t believe what was happening. I looked at him to make him relaise what he was doing but there was no impact as his eyes were closed. Huh…and then the same thing happened this morning with yet another guy. This time it was some melodies from old Hindi movies. But as it turns out, it can either be entretaining or annoying based on the talent of the person! I told myself that it is better to laugh at them than being annoyed.

Another year pased by. I'm growing old. But all of my coworkers and friends made the day special. They got a coffee Mocha cake and smeared it all over my face :) :( And my team was sweet enough too!
Keeping up with the tradition V forgot and realised only after a call at midnight last night. The day has been great so far!

Smiley

Introduction of Smileys :) :(made instant messaging fun. But for people like me who use it a lot, it can turn out to be bad too. Among my friends I'm very infamous for the "wrong window syndrome" blunder I committed last winter. It happened again today with the same person. I typed "having a hard time with your ...? followed by a :) instead of a :( . He modestly replied "sort of". I hope he understands that's very typical of me!

The list of things I have to blog about is growing by the day. I checked the amount of hits this blog has recd in the past 1 week and I was surprised that the hit rate was 3-fold higher than usual. 60% of the hist are from some Nike freaks who are linking to this post -- Nike Shoes .

My latest fad is to get in shape before my parents visit us in a couple of weeks. so I've started going to the gym every morning..I hope I continue it for the next 3 weeks. I miss my bike so much.....that was so much better than gymming within 4 walls

Watch this space for an entry on Aero India show 2005 that we had been to last weekend. The journey to and from the venue where it was being held was adventurous.

BLACK

We watched Black with a bunch of friends this Sunday. I was in no frame of mind to watch a serious movie but everyone insisted that we see this one. And I'm glad I did. It was worth every Re. spent and much more. Truly, a masterpiece by Sanjay Leela Bhansali and his best. This one cannot even be compared with his 'so-called' brilliant works like Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam or Devdas.

Black, a namesake Hindi movie, as 75% of the dialogues is in English. Starring Amitabh Bachchan and Rani Mukherjee, and spanning a lil over 2 hours, this movie is directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali. The movie is a first person narration by Rani Mukherjee. It is the story of the life of a blind girl and her teacher who suffers from Alzheimer's disease and how both of them stand for each other when they need support the most. Rani Mukherjee plays the role of Michelle McNally, the blind woman and Amitabh plays the character of Debraj Sahai, her teacher. The first half of the movie revolves around how the McNally household copes with the eccentricities of the blind girl (I forgot the name of the kid that plays this character) and all their futile attempts in disciplining the kid. Michelle's mom makes one last attempt and they hire Debraj Sahai to discipline the arrogant kid. The portrayal of Debraj's character and how he transforms the kid is brilliant. His voice is powerful as always. I think this was the best part of the movie - when he spends 20 days teaching the kid to make sense of everything in life, with his fingers. It is amazing how he teaches her to mouth the word 'water' with his fingers. This movie though it lacks the dashing colors of Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and the extravagant costumes of Devdas, it is colorful in its own way - shot in the picturesque Shimla in a huge villa.

The latter half is how Debraj wishes to see Michelle successful by making her an arts graduate. There were times when I felt the movie was just dragging and he wasn't coming to the point- but that's Bhansali, the story teller for you. The much talked about kiss between Amitabh and Rani that was doing the rounds even before the promos started, was not obscene at all. Infact this was one scene that didn't seem out of context and was dignified with a meaning attached! Debraj goes away after the k* and makes a reappearance after 12 (was it 12? Well I can't remember. I forget the numbers) years and
Michelle realizes that he has lost his memory to Alzheimer's. She graduates when she is 40 years and this event brings back some of his old memories.. and the movie ends.

I think Bhansali did a very good job by not repeating the mistake he did with Khamoshi - placing high profile artistes for the roles of mother and father - one of the reasons for the movie's failure. His casting this time has been superb. Seeing Rani without makeup and yet appealing, lack of an item number and a wowed audience at the end of the movie was something that I liked!

I don't know if this movie would be a commercial success or not but it definitely is going to sweep thr all the Filmfare awards and probably find a berth in the Foreign Film category at next year's Oscar.

My favorite dialogue: Life is like an icecream. Have it before it melts.

Yo!!!! I've not been so ecstatic in weeks now. I've finally cracked the goddamn JSF problem thats been haunting me for days now. I now know the internals of the JSF lifecycle and what and how it happens at each of the 6/7 stages! I RULE this time!

This post is in reply to the following e-mail from a friend who reads my blog regularly. He writes --

Just an observation...apart from the baleno blog...thers not a single
blog in the recent past (jan) where u have been positive...all the
blogs talk something negative...not that there is no positive u can
highlight...but u take notice of the neagtives more than the pluses...I
think...may be I am wrong...

Well, a good observation my friend! It has set me thinking. And this thought actually occurred to me while I was composing the post last night. Negative energy lingers longer and affects in a strange way that happy events don't! I guess most of it has to do with the time I spend at work which sucks! So its probably time to do something different rather than let this build up..Point taken. Watch out only for the bright side of me in my posts hereafter...

Disillussioned, frustrated with the system, feel like burying under the pillows every morning not having to come to work, overworked, tired, disappointed - thats me today! Enough of negative wave.........

I fight the urge to not blog about work but I occassionally give in. This is a survey of how many employees are rehired after being laid off by companies.

In my opinion emloyees should not be rehired after being laid off. In particular if the reasons for firing the employee were not in good taste. What do you think?