The Indian Cricket team has had a horrid outing this season in Australia. Outbatted, outfielded, outbowled - and thus outplayed by the perfect mercenaries game after game, they rapidly hit rock bottom within a year of winning a coveted prize and becoming the darling of a billion fans. Could you not detect the sense of dejection - in the resignation of their approach, the reports of infighting and the captain's nonchalant ways.
Then, out of the blue - comes an electrifying win where the same bunch of beaten men conjure up magic in a momentous win, and overcome an insurmountable target. One for the ages. As if to jolt us out of our jaded minds, our inertia of giving up on a bunch of humans who practice a skill we have come to value. These men are not gods, although we would like them to be. Some of us were quick to ask for replacements, retirements and rectitude. We burn effigies and often attack their homes, assuming these mortals could conquer their weaknesses every time they face a motivated opposition hammering at the same weakness. When they fail, we are merciless and unforgiving.
And because they are merely human, maybe we need to remind ourselves of their mortality when we celebrate their successes and castigate their failures. Maybe they are right in being a little nonchalant about facing success and failure. Maybe they have come to know themselves better than we think. And maybe they do really want to win every time they don the national jersey, but accept it is merely a sport where there will be losses on the way. Maybe they had paid attention to Rudyard Kipling while we were looking for an ego boosting world domination.
.....If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same; ...
From - "If" By Rudyard Kipling - http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_if.htm
I am willing to hold out for a few days of magic over the boring consistency of a dominator. I will always remember the old vaccum tube radio carrying wonderful news of an emerging nation in 1983, Dhoni's steely eyes at Mumbai - Circa 2011 and colossal Kohli on Feb 28, 2012.
And on the days magic remains elusive, I will wish for Yuvraj to get better, because he is mortal. As we are.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Movie Review - Aparajita Tumi (In Bengali with Eng. subtitles)
Official Trailer : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeMnAMU3rqI
Aparajita Tumi (The Unvanquished) is a complex movie and as such also one with many layers. Layered, not in the way requiring you to peel away one at a time, but instead challenging you to synthesize and enjoy all of them at once. Director Anirudha Roy Choudhury is from the genre of modern makers of Bengali cinema who practice their craft with an eye for the thinking crowd, and this by far is his best attempt in this space. Ultimately, as the name might lead you to believe, this is a film about a wife, mother, lover, daughter – and how a particular set of events initially question but eventually restore her as the unvanquished modern woman.
In a quintessential setting of a Bengali immigrant family in America, replete with the key ingredients in a classic Jhumpa Lahiri book on probasi bengalis – the social gatherings where everyone appears Bengali, loves Ilish mach and fond conversations on Ray and Rabindranath, the framing easily epitomizes the first generation Diaspora experience. The film was shot entirely on location on the west coast of California, aka as the “Bay area” or “Silicon Valley”, where the story is set. Ranajit Palit does a fine job capturing the rugged edges and unforgiving moods along the famous Pacific Coast Highway and in and around the famous city of “Frisco”. But the essence of the film is not restricted, although it is beautifully influenced, by the environment in which the events unfold. The romantic city provides an appropriate backdrop for the moments of carefree connections and meeting again, whereas the ocean provides the moods of a teetering relationship and impending separation. The songs are haunting and lovely, the music appropriate to the build-up, but appeared to overwhelm the visuals sometimes. Too many beautiful things could be distracting, especially if you are middle aged.
The film opens with the betrayed wife, Kuhu, walking out on the marriage and depositing the kids with the parents to get some personal time to gather herself. Always an independent woman, in her thoughts as well as in making choices about her life and love, Kuhu has developed a classic American directness of dealing with things. She is willing to deny herlsef a romantic relationship if it doesn’t assure the stability she seeks, or in telling the “other woman” to get a grip on her thoughts or even in telling her own parents that her marital discord is a her problem she has to sort out on her own. With Padma Priya, we have a Tamilian playing the role of a Bengali girl schooled in America, falling in love with a Muslim Boy from Bangladesh, discussing relationship dramas with a multi-ethnic single mother of three children and an old friend. What confluence of cultures, Tagore would have been happy.
The story unfolds on many fronts. In the immigrant’s dilemma of going back to the people and places left behind, in the longing for the lost days of youthful camaraderie, learning the notes and finding an elusive harmony, and in having to deal with the certainty of death of people we have loved. But the central theme appears to be the “grey” area of relationships, amidst the many societal and some biological pressures on it. The film takes a stance on the subject in the end, after pondering on the fundamentals of how to sustain one comprising of pillars of marriage and offspring, and the question of fidelity of pure companionship versus fidelity in general. This is the where the complexity of the movie lies, and exactly where you have to unravel all the layers at once to find its subliminal message.
(In the spirit of full disclosure, the author claims no authentic knowledge of the subject, and could be biased by insignificant personal involvement in the project. Also in the same spirit, he claims to be objective in his views in spite of subject matter inexpertise and human influences)
Aparajita Tumi (The Unvanquished) is a complex movie and as such also one with many layers. Layered, not in the way requiring you to peel away one at a time, but instead challenging you to synthesize and enjoy all of them at once. Director Anirudha Roy Choudhury is from the genre of modern makers of Bengali cinema who practice their craft with an eye for the thinking crowd, and this by far is his best attempt in this space. Ultimately, as the name might lead you to believe, this is a film about a wife, mother, lover, daughter – and how a particular set of events initially question but eventually restore her as the unvanquished modern woman.
In a quintessential setting of a Bengali immigrant family in America, replete with the key ingredients in a classic Jhumpa Lahiri book on probasi bengalis – the social gatherings where everyone appears Bengali, loves Ilish mach and fond conversations on Ray and Rabindranath, the framing easily epitomizes the first generation Diaspora experience. The film was shot entirely on location on the west coast of California, aka as the “Bay area” or “Silicon Valley”, where the story is set. Ranajit Palit does a fine job capturing the rugged edges and unforgiving moods along the famous Pacific Coast Highway and in and around the famous city of “Frisco”. But the essence of the film is not restricted, although it is beautifully influenced, by the environment in which the events unfold. The romantic city provides an appropriate backdrop for the moments of carefree connections and meeting again, whereas the ocean provides the moods of a teetering relationship and impending separation. The songs are haunting and lovely, the music appropriate to the build-up, but appeared to overwhelm the visuals sometimes. Too many beautiful things could be distracting, especially if you are middle aged.
The film opens with the betrayed wife, Kuhu, walking out on the marriage and depositing the kids with the parents to get some personal time to gather herself. Always an independent woman, in her thoughts as well as in making choices about her life and love, Kuhu has developed a classic American directness of dealing with things. She is willing to deny herlsef a romantic relationship if it doesn’t assure the stability she seeks, or in telling the “other woman” to get a grip on her thoughts or even in telling her own parents that her marital discord is a her problem she has to sort out on her own. With Padma Priya, we have a Tamilian playing the role of a Bengali girl schooled in America, falling in love with a Muslim Boy from Bangladesh, discussing relationship dramas with a multi-ethnic single mother of three children and an old friend. What confluence of cultures, Tagore would have been happy.
The story unfolds on many fronts. In the immigrant’s dilemma of going back to the people and places left behind, in the longing for the lost days of youthful camaraderie, learning the notes and finding an elusive harmony, and in having to deal with the certainty of death of people we have loved. But the central theme appears to be the “grey” area of relationships, amidst the many societal and some biological pressures on it. The film takes a stance on the subject in the end, after pondering on the fundamentals of how to sustain one comprising of pillars of marriage and offspring, and the question of fidelity of pure companionship versus fidelity in general. This is the where the complexity of the movie lies, and exactly where you have to unravel all the layers at once to find its subliminal message.
(In the spirit of full disclosure, the author claims no authentic knowledge of the subject, and could be biased by insignificant personal involvement in the project. Also in the same spirit, he claims to be objective in his views in spite of subject matter inexpertise and human influences)
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