A solitary Netflix has sat on top of my tv for the last month. It just sits there. Sometimes, it makes it all the way into the DVD tray. Maybe even the menu comes up. Maybe a few scenes play out. But, this is one movie that never ends because it never can begin. There [...]
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Perhaps the best reviewed movie of the year, David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence, pissed the living hell out of me. It has been proclaimed “Epic”, “Incredible”, blah and blah. I had been looking forward to this for a while. I thought – here is a good director, an interesting script and a lot of [...]
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The Rising is a Bollywood movie – with a vibrant palette and a song on the lips – unless it is a historical epic with a vibrant palette and a scowl on the lips. Oscillating between scenes of village life, romantic intrigue, communal harmony and British racism, oppression, exploitation, it sets the viewer up perfectly [...]
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update: Ok, ok. ok. Now, I am in it for the glory. We shall compile the Top 25 of Indian Cinema for a newbie. The movies should be representative of genres, influential directors or stars, cultural themes or epochs, and regional film industries. They should have had popular appeal. They should be available on DVD [...]
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The intellectual level of HT City, the no-brain supplement of a rather no brain paper, the Hindustan Times, went up many notches yesterday. They actually had a sort of debate on Empire, history, myth and representation on their front page (instead of a model saying that s/he loves reading ñ s/he just couldnít put down [...]
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Let me say it people, even at the risk of eternal damnation. I liked Kingdom of Heaven. I even liked Orlando Bloom’s second assay as a blacksmith. Has everyone forgotten ‘Pirates of the Carribean’ already? So am I, like Saladin, now destined to be a heathen in Limbo? What I like about the film is [...]
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It is through Richard the Lionheart that we get Saladin [neÈ Salah ud Din Ayyubi] into Western cinema. In most cases, these were small roles or even just dialogue. His character was peripherally important to the story of King Richard – the noble savage who personified the purity that eluded King Richard’s crusading brethern. Hence, [...]
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Meanwhile, how do these DVDs get to The Shop in the first place? This is a long and complicated story. And my telling of it starts in another shop. G. Electronics, in a market in Lodi Colony. S. G., the owner of G. Elec, is a movie fanatic with an encyclopaedic knowledge of Hollywood films. [...]
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[Names have been changed for obvious reasons.] January in Palika Bazaar. A day before the beginning of a major conference on Inequalities, Conflicts and Intellectual Property. I am with Brian Larkin, who is here for the conference, and we are looking for DVDs. Palika Bazaar, an ëundergroundí market in more senses than one, is of [...]
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A lovely group of Seattle-based cineastes are calling out for new independently produced films about South Asia. Their Independent South Asian Film Festival (ISAFF) was a blast last yearÖ a well-balanced mix of very cool filmmakers and ñgoers, but refreshingly lacking in pretense. Maybe it’s the salty breezes of Puget Sound, or some lingering spirit [...]
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David Denby, film critic of The New Yorker magazine, might do well to step out of the movie theater and sit in on a World Religions class. In his review of Gurinder Chadhaís gleeful Bollywood/Hollywood hybrid film Bride and Prejudice, Denby declares: ìin the street bazaars, cross-dressers and goofy guys with turbans break into dance.î† [...]
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Rex Reed writes film reviews for the NY Observer. He wrote a short review for Park Chan-Wook’s Old Boy. Damn thing is SERIOUSLY offensive to me. I am half-korean [on my dad's side]. All Pakistanis are. It is one of those nationalist pipe-dreams. Legend goes that under Ayub’s dictatorship, we were so advanced that the [...]
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Slate is having the yearly movie club that I enjoy tremendously. Everyone’s top ten is coming out in anticipation of award season. I didn’t get to the movies much this past year. Netflix was a heavenly savior. The best movie I saw was made in 2003 and won’t be released in America until later in [...]
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Last night we watched the Cannes version of 2046. DMan, as always, was the one who made the viewing possible. I have mentioned earlier how insanely psyched I am to see this movie. 2046 essentially takes place over the course of two and a half years in the late 60s. It does travel back in [...]
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The election, the class, and my job application occupy me all day looong. sigh. December cannot come soon enough. This past weekend, after quite a while, we went to the movies. Saw I ♥ Huckabee on Saturday and on Sunday, after a day of pumpkin farm goodness in gorgeous weather, saw Sky Captain and the [...]
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You might remember that old case of Nike shoes that spelled Allah on the back? Then there was the more recent Danish chapal that also had Allah. I don’t read Danish but that says the company apologizes for inadvertently offending Muslims. Then there was the Roberto Cavalli bikini that had various Hindu deities on it. [...]
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Hero(2002) is playing everywhere and making some good money. I am happy. It was one of the movies that I was really, really looking forward to. Gerry would read monkeypeaches on a biweekly basis, keeping us abreast of this coolness being directed by Zhang Yimou and starring Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung (anyone who knows [...]
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Some happy news on the movie front. I am a huge fan of Neil Gaiman – author of Sandman graphic novels. He is an amazing storyteller or myth-maker, as I like to call him. His 2002 children’s-book-for-adults, Coraline, is on top of the charts at the sepoy household having gone through innumerable readings. It is [...]
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David O. Russell is one of my favorite directors. I was watching Flirting with Disasters on cable this weekend and laughing my ass off. That guy knows how to film farce. Which made his 1999 film Three Kings that much greater. I remember reading a small interview in NYT before Gulf War II, where they [...]
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Busy today. I saw Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle last night. I was hoping to catch it with my peeps but ended up going late and on a whim. After watching the movie – hilarious – we decided to go get some take-out from Chinatown. We then proceeded to drive in a circle [...]
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