The (Not So) Dirty Picture

After a long time, yesterday I decided to go and watch a movie in theatre. First I looked for watching "Rockstar", but came to know that it was lifted long back from theatres. So after some research on the net, settled for "The Dirty Picture", mainly because I came to know that it is based on the life history of Silk Sumitha and another reason is Vidhya Balan :-).

Decided to go to the nearby PVR cinemas in Ampa Skywalk for the last show which was to start at 10:30 PM. Started from home at 9:40 PM and reached at 10:00 PM and took a ticket at the counter. "Children learn faster than we think. So do not take them with you for movies rated A", was something I enjoyed reading on a board above the counter. Ticket rate Rs. 120. Costly. They are physically frisking us and checking us.Though they give the reason as for our own safety, they are actually checking whether we are taking any food or beverage(including water) with us. All such items are prohibited, since if we take such items, it will affect the sales at their stalls where the price of the items is atleast 3 times their normal price.
The multiplex is very posh and hi-fi and I started feeling myself as the odd man out, as I am not much used to these multiplexes.

I felt a bit thirsty after entering the mall and since I knew that water will not be available, decided to buy a pepsi and went near the counter. Seeing that the price was Rs. 70, I decided to stay thirsty for the next 3 hours and go home and then have water. The complex was very neat, including the wash rooms. Exactly at 10:25 PM, they let people inside the hall. I went inside the hall, and it was beautifully lit in mild red color tone. The interior was pleasant. But the hall was small with only about 400 or 450 seats. The screen was large. I went and sat in my seat - J-18. Next to me were seated a couple of college students, who didnt knew Hindi. Initially they made a lot of sounds and whistles, but soon they lost track of the movie and started sleeping.

The picture had a linear story line, about the life of a girl from childhood until her death (while she was still in her adulthood). Childhood portion of her was shown in just 2 to 3 minutes and the story jumped straight to her adulthood when she runs away to Chennai to secure a chance in the movies as an actress. So Vidhya Balan started appearing within 4 minutes after the movie started.

No double meaning dialogs, but just straight single meaning ones - she says after showing her photos to an assistant director "Sir, please give me a chance... Do you want to see what is not seen in these pictures...". Through the well-known technique of "adjustments" in the cine-industry she secures a position in the cine-world. Her failed loves makes another part of the story and when her love is about to be successful, she fails in her life. Her adjustments with an aging(or already aged???) top actor occupies the main portion of the story. Finally, like most ladies in the cine-field she gets ruined and goes to the extreme of comiting suicide.

Nashiruddin Shah has played the role of the top actor who exploits her. His introduction was superb. The girl, Silk, goes to a movie and in the intro scene of that movie, the Top Star appears. First a Villan throws 2 one rupee coins into the air and fires 2 bullets from his gun, the bullets hits the coins. Then the Top Star throws a 100 rupee note into the air and fires a bullet from his gun. When the bullet hits it, 100 one-rupee coins fall from it. The whole audience burst into laughter. One can easily understand who that top-star in real world is from this scene.

Though the movie had a sad end, since it was an expected one, it didnt affect me much. Some of the dialogues were nice, if we take them their straight meaning. "Opportunity comes only once, if you dont take it, it will go to someone else". "If you ignore and leave a job half-way, that job will never come to you again"... to give samples.

When the movie ended, it was 1:10AM. Was surprised to find a tea shop open on the road. Had a tea, and walked back home. Suddenly a bike that came from the opposite direction with 2 men slowed down near by and when I looked at them, and found that they were policemen. The policeman in the back seat said to the other "He is coming after seeing the movie". It seemed to convince the other policeman and they went away and I walked home. Good to know that they are people who are awake in the night and going around the city for our safety.

I would suggest a one time watch, but not with family and obviously not with kids.

- Pavala.

Vanavasam & Manavasam

Recently I happened to read the book Vanavasam and its sequel Manavasam, both written by Kannadasan. These two books happen to be a chronological listing of the main events in his life. Both the books made an intresting read, Like many I am also a fan to some of his songs. I do listen to some of the old songs mainly for its lyrics. When I hear some of the old songs I wonder that we know all these words individually, but wonderfully he has joined them to bring out such a nice rhyming songs. To say for example "Muttukal sirikkum nilathil thittikum ninaipai vidhaikkum..."

Definitely he is a gifted Genius. But in this autobiography-Vanavasam he cliams that he got that skill through practice. Its a surprise to know that he has studied only upto 8th and with that he gained to manage such a mastery over Tamil and its grammer and vocabulary. Vanavasam talks about his early life and his political life in DMK party. After reading this book only I came to know that Kannadasan had an active, but unstable and unsuccessful political career. Vanavasam ends once he quits the DMK party. Manavasam start after that and it doesnt end. That is, he didnt complete Manavasam. Among these two, it was Vanavasam that I found more interesting. I was surprised to know the background and early life of some of the political leaders who are top leaders now.

In many places one call can get the feel of reading a third grade cheap books. Especially in those areas where he narrates his visit to prostitution houses along with his friend, both were budding entrants to politics at that time. I have read such situations even in some of the stories of R.K.Narayan. This makes one to come to the conclusion that Men visiting such places has been a common, partially accepted activity in those times. Even in older tamil movies quite often we can come across the dialog "Aambalaigna kalyanathukku munnadi konjam appadi ippadi than iruppanga...".

In his preface the author declares that he has the said the truth throughout the book, but at the same time he admits that he has not revealed many of the incidents that happened in his life, since he feels that it cannot be revealed in public. He claims that the truth is like one being naked and one cannot be nake everywhere. I could understand his reasoning. Even in Gandhi's autobiography too, Gandhiji has mentioned that there are some incidents which only he and God knows and he wishes to keep them within him and God and not reveal to others.

We can understand this to some extent. Being human beings, guided (or rather tied) by social and cultural laws we all will have some part of our lives which only we and God know. Vanavasam starts with Kannadasan as a grown up boy with ambitions to reach the sky and rule the world. Then continues with his early days leaving his native, searching for jobs in Trichy, settling in odd jobs, primarily in the publishing industry which was in its infacy those days. Then moving to Chennai, then to Salem, coming back to Chennai. In all these places and cities he narrates the men he met, ladies he met, and lived with most of those ladies - varying from single night and sometimes upto six months - which is sure will make many jealous :-).

The author claims that the many leaders in political parties didnt practice what they preached - a fact that we can understand by seeing many leaders having more than one wife now. Manavasam describes his political life in Congress and also his abroad visits. Unlike other autobiographies, the script in these books have a different style, partly because it was written by a poet. Each of this book can be read once, and it helps to understand the ups and downs in the life of the gifted Genius - Kannadasan.

- Pavala.

Mankatha Free...

See what and all has to be done to fill up the theatre where Mankatha is put up...

Eight - 8 - Years

With yesterday I completed 8 (actually 8.5) years of experience in IT industry.

- With love, 

-

My new Automatic Watch

My little friend Dhanu used to jump with joy – sitting on his mother’s lap - whenever our bike crosses the Amara stores while going to the nearby park. Even now whenever we visit a park with slide, see-saw, zig-zag, he jumps with the same joy. Today morning, I also wanted to jump with the same joy when I parked our bike in front of the hmt showroom(?!?!?) in nungambakkam. I was literally not on the floor and was almost flying since once of my longtime wish is going to come to true in the next couple of minutes – buying a new mechanical automatic wrist watch. My other wish to have a high end digital watch was satisfied last year, when my sister got me a CASIO databank from US.

While I was studying in school, one of my uncle used to wear a watch which used to run all the time, without any need to key in. It doesn’t have a battery too. I came to know that it was an automatic watch. The words ’21 Jewels’ was written on the dial, while most of the wrist watches during that time used to have ’19 Jewels’. But it has to be worn atleast a couple of hours a day so that it keeps running. While at college, while going with my dad to the nearby weekly market, we found a guy who was selling used winding watches from different brands for a price tag of around Rs. 150. There I found an automatic watch in which the back case was open. For the first time I found that there was something like a pendulum on the rear side of the watch, behing the back cover, which was oscillating/revolving inside when the watch was shaken, from which I understood that this motion is used to wind a spring and this makes the watch automatic. I wanted to get this piece and my dad also went ahead to purchase that. But on knowing that we will buy that watch for sure, the seller immediately rose its price to Rs. 250. Father still went ahead to negotiate the amount. But the salesman’s act made me angry and I immediately dropped the idea and we moved away from that place, though the seller was ready to negotiate the price once he came to know that we are dropping the idea to buy it.

During my stay at US, I came across a Citizen automatic watch, ladies type, in a jewellery shop. I at once bought it for my mom and with utmost happiness I presented it to her. I still remember the extent to which my colleague - who accompanied me to the shop - got surprised when I purchased that watch which was priced around $150. About a year back, when my friend came to know about the existence of watches whose cost might be as high as 8 to 10 K. I even surprised here by showing rado watches which costed around Rs. 2,35,000 by taking her to the rado showroom in the nearby shopping mall. Upon knowing it, she at once resolved to get a costly watch for me, knowing my passion for wrist watches. She fixed the budget at Rs. 10 k.

Yesterday we went to P. Orr & Sons and saw a couple of models, especially Seiko. Upon entering the shop I felt odd, and uncomfortable, since I appeared to be odd man out there. Though she insisted on buying an automated Seiko, I didn’t go for it. I told I don’t want any of those high cost models. They did charm me, but I was not comfortable buying it.

When I browsed the net a couple of days back, I came to know that hmt watches are still in production and sold (only) through their factory outlets and one such outlet near our home was at nungambakkam. After some preliminary investigation on phone, we decided to visit the showroom today morning. Upon entering the showroom, I couldn’t find any watch displayed there and it didn’t look like a watch showroom at all. It looked like a government office with two people sitting behind the tables and doing something. I told the person at the front desk that I need winding watches, including automatic ones. He said he will show them and then only got confidence that its indeed a watch showroom. He opened a cupboard behind him and took a couple of medium sized box from it and took out the watches one by one from it. I just asked him that whether these watches are still in production, in order to confirm that these are not old stocks. He said they are still being manufactured and the company is taking measures(???) to revive the brand again. What I had in mind was to buy a traditional looking simple watch for a reasonable cost. I was surprised to see the HMT-Vijay(which my dad has, but not using now) was still available. I wanted to buy that one, but my friend said, since we already have it, let’s go for another model. Janata, Akash, Kanjan, Aishwarya were some of the models we saw. We also saw HMT Kohinoor, which my grandfather had. But in these watches, the back cover now is push type, instead of the screw type that we find in their vintage counterparts. Among them, when I saw the NASL 11 automatic, I immediately liked and selected it, which was a blend of the traditional and modern ones. The salesman said that this watch had a modern improvised machine in it. Finally I have an automatic watch with me. And the happy news is that my friend assured that the automatic watch for 10K offer is still open.

Here are a few pics of my new watch: