A Week full of movvys

This week has been a week full of movies. It started from Goa @ Sathyam on tuesday, Tamil Padam @ Kamala on wednesday, Striker @ Sathyam on Friday and Asal @ Kamala on saturday. Goa is totally Fun. its a combination of spoof and mindless comedy. Tamil Padam is total spoof without any solid storyline. If you ask me , go for Goa than tamil padam. Yesterday I had a look at the trailer of Kites, starring Hrithik , Barbara Mori & Kangna Ranaut. The trailer
was of international class & blew my mind. Seems like a Romantic thriller. Barbara mori is uber cool speaking Spanish. The film is written and directed by anurag Basu, who gave us two gems , life in a metro and Gangster.

Asal Ajith's next offering is releasing this Friday. Expectations are big, this time as the trailer's look promising. Sidarth is back in Hindi film industry after a two year hiatus in a film called Striker. The film is set in the ghetto's of Bombay is about a carrom Player. The soundtrack looks very promising with 8 songs composed by several music directors. Sidarth has sung two songs in that album. Cham Cham a sufi number is the best of the lot. As the Oscar fever is catching up, I have not seen most of the films that are nominated for Oscars. I have seen only avatar and inglorious basterd's, so its tough to predict anything. Best thing is to catch up the Oscar night from TV. :) Chalo PPl. talk to you laterz :)

Goa* - A venkat Prabhu holiday- Conditions Apply *

Call it spoof, Call it madness, Call it fun, Call it Goa. Goa is a non-stop fun film that will make you laugh all the time. This is Mr Venkat prabhu's third offering after the Cult film chennai-28 and the comedy thriller saroja. Venkat has created a set of character's based upon current generation of youngsters and made it look simple. He has kept the plot simple. Four individuals in Goa, finding their love life and understand relationship's. He has taken the bunch of guys from his well known cast & asked them to chill out at Goa, as if they are on a holiday. Believe it or not, they have done exactly that and delivered big time. Venkat keeps it simple and straight when it comes the screenplay as well as the character sketches. It sinks effortlessly in the screenplay of the film.

Jai, Vaibhav and Premji are from the same village, where the traditions and customs are still like the 1980's ramarajan/ Gangai amaren films. They get tired of answering questions in the town panchayat & leave the village. Jai meets his friend at a wedding to know that, he has married a foriegn girl from Goa. The three friends flee to Goa in search of their love and the way they find their love has been portrayed hilariously.

Jai- Pia's love story is the best of all. Jai finds what he wants in Pia, but refuses to accept her because of the stupid reason that he wants to marry a foriegner. Pia has fallen for Jai on the first meeting. The scene where Pia takes Jai to an empty theater for listening her sing was a beautifully constructed sequence. At last Jai accepts Pia as she is even after knowing that she had an affair with Vaibhav( Jai doesnt know vaibhav lied). That's the way it is today. This generation does not care about the past. This is venkat prabhu's take. Pia has a certain charm in her & she looks good with those curls and outfits even though she is short.

Vaibhav-Sneha 's story is about two concepts that prevails in this generation's men-women. Vaibhav badly wants to be in a relationship and have sex, for that he chooses sneha. Sneha is full of attitude and chauvinism. They both get married and divorced. Vaibhav accepts to sneha that he was never in love with her and it does not work out for hm. Vaibhav and sneha both have come out with a solid performance.

Premji-Melanie - This will bring the roof's down as well as make some sob at the end. It takes guts to portray a love story between a guy from a village and a foriegner. Melanie is beautiful and refreshing to see in the screen. She has done her part well, except for the dialogues in tamil. Premji has spoofed a lot in the past two films and has continued the same way in the third.

The fourth one is a gay relationship between Aravind Akash & Sampath. Sampath has given a mind blowing performance. He has made people believe that they are a gay couple. Aravind Akash has hit gym & put a six pack abb's, Both him & the six pack Abb's shines throughout the film.


There were a few drags, a very few dull moments that could have been taken care in the edit of the film. This film has the potential to acheive cult status. Our audience are very different these days, no one is not sure what to accept ?. Applause for the bravery of Soundarya Rajnikanth and venkat Prabhu to make a film like Goa. They have succeeded in reaching the films to the hearts of A center audience. I believe venkat will not continue with the same kind of films, which he has made till now in his next offering.

Wake up sid & Rocket singh

I wanted to write this update, after watching two back to back movies starring ranbir kapoor. I bought the dvd of wake up sid in landmark. This one is really good, i mean the features inside the disc. This comes with the making of
the songs, the making of wake up sid, deleted scenes. If you love the film, go get one soon. If you have thought that wake up sid is Ranbir's best performance, then comes Rocket singh. Rocket singh is a film that will stay with you for a long time, if your are looking for realistic cinema, I feel bad that i did not see it in theatres. Rocket singh written by Jaideep Sahni has also taken care of dialogues. Set in a small office, which does computer sales. Jaideep has etched out a wonderful set of characters, who has done an amazing performance given rocket singh as their debut. In fact except ranbir, most of them are new to cinema. The film is directed by Shimit Amin who gave us Chak de India. Bloggers spend some time watching this small ode of a film. ;). Both Wake up sid and Rocket singh, has been coming of age kind of a film, for Ranbir as well to bollywood. It was in the best film's list of many indian critics for the year 2009.

On the professional front, I have just started to work on a screenplay for a new project on Srilankan-Tamil problem, called the Eelam, researching is on for that script. I am reading a book called screenplay by Syd Field, so far so good. Tweaking the minor mistakes and corrections for saranalayam script before it goes to the producers hand. Saranalayam is kind of special for the whole team. Sarath-Actor , George C williams - Director of Photography, Prasanna G.K.- Editor ( It is a highly personal film for him) as well for vishal because it is a musical. I can tell you that, this is the best script or screenplay i have written till date. I am also working on the dialogues for my friend Kaushik's film.

CONGRATS ARR Sir for getting the Grammy awards :) . We all love your music & You as a person :)

Ayirathil oruvan - A Flawed film, but a visual experience

Ayirathil Oruvan, believed to be selvaraghavan's magnum opus, which has been in the making for three years has had a grand opening at the box office hugely because of the pre-release hype and the publicity for the film. As two week's has passed by, two versions of the film are out. The first version of the film which has been 3 hours long and there is a trimmed version that is twenty minutes shorter than the first one which was in the theatres from the fifth day of the release.

The film travels through the journey of two archaeologists (Andrea jeremiah & Reema Sen) to East-Asia in search of the ancient tamil ruler's chola's kingdom along with military base headed by Azhagu perumal and Local workers headed by Karthi sivakumar. The events and sequences that unfolds throughout the travel forms the first half of the film. The second half is an entirely different genre, that explores the civilizations of the Chola Kingdom.

Ayirathil Oruvan is of a fantasy genre, where a few minor logical error's can be kept aside. Watching this film in the huge screen has been an amazing visual experience. Its a visual treat, with Ramji's camera work that deserves special a mention. When it comes to film making its an visual experience, there should not be a difference between camera work and CG work. In this film we could clearly differentiate the sequences shot & the CG's used. It requires more time and techinical finesse to make the CG portions of ayirathil oruvan to look more realistic and authentic.

The script is not a fresh script, with selvaraghavan drawing inspirations from Mckena's Gold( The Nataraja - Stone Henge sequence) , 300 (War and stunt sequences) , The Lord of the rings Trilogy and Indiana Jones series. He has done enough research for the tamil dialect, the chola's lifestyle and the costumes. The research work has been

indeed wonderful. The screenplay has a lot of loose knots, which has not been taken care even in the edit. There would be a sequence where Karthik, Reema and Andrea escape from the fourth form of danger the snakes. They would escape through the river after that there is a sequence of loosely interconnected shots that does not even relate to each other, and finally we find them in the middle of the forest.

We agree that the script is a fantasy, where a few logical errors can be neglected. There were more big blunders in the screenplay that is hard to believe. Before the beginning of an military journey, the equipments and machinery would be properly planned for the whole trip. In the final sequences of the film when Karthik and the boy escapes from the militants, its hard to believe that they easily escaped in front of so many militants with weapons. The casting of the militants is not commendable, I meant they must look like a person working for the Indian military. whereas the casting of the people living in the Chola civilization is especially with the black make-up.

When it comes to the performance's Parthiban has done a mindblowing work. Karthik shines effortlessly in the comic sequences than the serious scenes. In the first of Half, Karthik has started from where he left off in paruthi veeran. Reema Sen has done a brilliant portrayal as the girl from the pandiya kingdom. Both Andrea and Azhagu perumal does not have enough scope to perform.

The soundtrack of the film is commendable for the songs, specially in the second half. The Theme's A celebration of life and The King arrives were really top notch from a young music composer like G V Prakash. The Background scores were heavily inspired from the tracks of Metallica. Different ancient instruments has been used for the soundtrack to provide the ancient historic era feel.

Set design and the art work for the film, specially the second half meets expectations. Costumes are designed by Erum Ali deserves a special mention, considering the magnitude and the junior artists of the film.

Selvaraghavan has the gifted potential to create those unforgettable moments in a film, fails to perfectly execute his visualization. The effort that has been put into this project is truly huge and has opened avenues that Indian cinema's got to explore upon. If the detailing of the first half as well as the screenplay had been slick, it would have been better.Watch it in a big screen once for the experience.

Crazy week - end of Jan 2010

This week is sort of huge in terms of profession as well personal issues. There is enough madness, to kickstart the week by a huge setback for my next production. I have been looking out to make the movie, materialise it soon. I am planning to approach a few producers. At work , @ Inautix there has been a big production move
this weekend, All the efforts spent for the last 5 months comes to a close today, something like a judgement day. Fine moving on, I had a dilemma whether i got to switch over to media. I asked my friend venkat for a suggestion, he replied just think whether you are worth there? as if i am worth here in IT :) i laughed my heart out when he said that!

Coming to the Soundtrack of VTV, ARR's new offering after the academy award. ARR-Gautham Combo is fresh as well the songs. Lots of western instruments as well as orchestration. Indian music lovers takes time to like it. A week ago, a colleague of mine and I had an argument over aaromale song. Thats the pick of the album sung by malayalee music director alphonse. Its really refreshing to hear Kalyani menon sing, Omana penne with malayalam lyrics. For starters, Kalyani menon is Cinematographer-Director Rajeev Menon's Mom. Her voice sound's like a teenager. Songs like Anbil Avan does not even stay with the rhytm, seems like a deliberate attempt from rahman Ji. We are loving it ARR. No one except you in this indian industry sets standards and achieve it slowly. Its Chinmayi who has sung it with devan ekambaram. Her choce of songs, Oru deivam for kannathil muthamittal, Mayya Mayya from guru, Anbil Avan from VTV. She has carved a niche for
herself in the industry.

As sun sets in chennai on a long friday evening, the weekend madness starts, Saw Ayirathil oruvan selvaragahvan's so called Magnum Opus. Will write a detailed review of that soon. Got to catch up Goa, Tamizh Padam and also Ishqiya. Heard Ishqiya is a must watch, set in the suburbs of INDIA and is a battle between Love and Lust.

Movies has become a sort of excitement for me since childhood. The first real sort of inspiration to me has been Farhan Akthar & he made me realize movies is my world. His scripts are really strong with a kinda screenplay that grows on you.  He is one of the few bollywood directors who has changed the way hindi films are worked on. His first film Dil chahta hai still has a cult status & a huge fan following. His way of working out the characters , the choice of technicians and the casting . I closely follow his style of working , his movies , how his characters are played.  I have read his interviews and the articles about him.  His stories are more realistic and fresh. I have seen around a lot of movies , thats why i feel that its pretty fresh . 

Sean Penn

Hi all, 

About Sean Penn , the two time academy award winning actor:-) 

I just want to share whatever i know about sean penn. :-) It gives immense pleasure to even talk or think about him. 

Probably i have seen a few of his movies, mystic river , Milk and 21 grams . He got academy awards for Mystic river and milk.  A method actor who prepares intensely for the role he has taken up. 
I saw Milk and Into the wild in a span of 24 hours, the first one is his latest offering as an actor & the next is his directional debut. Into the wild is the only film he has directed till date. Into the wild is a road movie 
based on a true story of a graduate named Christopher Mccandless. The film explores the road trip of a graduate to alaska , into the wild. Its the process & the people that he meets with forms the crux of the film. 
The main lead Emile hirsch has given an outstanding performance as Chris .  The film , adapted from the book , has been infact beautifully adapted by Penn. IMDB has received a user rating above 8.5 which makes it around the 
150th position of all time movies. 

                                                         The relationship between Chris and the Hippie girl has been showed in a way altered from the book, perhaps to add more value for the movie goers as its cinematic. In my point of view , it deserves more applause for Penn , for choosing a real life story & presenting it the way it is :-) The book deals about  the thinking of the a matured graduate & excerpts from the journal he wrote while his travel of 189 days through Arizona, California , South Dakota , Mexico and finally Alaska . The scene where he learns that , he is gonna die in a few days after consuming a poisonous weed , makes the viewers believe he has actually done it. 

                                                           Sean penn deserves an Academy award for Milk. His acting has took the film to much greater heights. The way he convinces Hirsch in the role Cleve Jones , is a must watch scene . Sean looked awesome in his hippy look as well as the Middle aged Supervisor look. The transformation mentally was very subtle and underplayed. The way he reacts , after winning in The Los angeles county was a work near perfection.