Movie Reviews - Udaan

Once in a way you stumble onto a movie, start watching it without any expectations, with hardly any known actors in it and in the end get totally blown away by it. I'm sure everyone of us has experienced this atleast once. I was talking to silent the other day and she happened to mention to me about this non commercial movie called Udaan winning lots of awards.

Like always, I downloaded the movie for free and started watching it on a late evening with a drink in one hand and a bowl with some good ol homemade peanut masala in the other. I promise you that the story will not be revealed here. So this post is rated PG with no spoiler alerts.

The movie starts with four guys in a residential school trying to sneak out in the night to watch a late night screening of a  desi soft-core movie. Yeah yeah I know, all of us have been there and done that. The boys get caught by their teacher in the same theatre who would have come there with some company to get some action. As a result of this, they get expelled and so is the laughter from the rest of the movie. The movie then concentrates on one of the guys who is an aspiring writer and his relationship with his father, whom he hasn't seen for the past 8 years.

The boy named Rohan is forced to call his father 'Sir' and is stripped of all forms of freedom. While he has no say infront of his father, he is also strictly ordered to put his pen down and start working in a factory. Amidst all this, he also has a 6 year old step brother as well whose acting is one of the cutest. While the boy Rohan gets abused by his father both verbally and physically, he secretly tries to pursue his passion and indulge in drinking and smoking. For all we know, he is a typical teenager with more things to hide than show.

The movie becomes even more gripping when the father's anger becomes responsible for a tragic event in the family and Rohan finds out about the actual truth. If you really want to know as to what happens next, go and buy a DVD and watch the movie or just download it, like I did. Ronit Roy delivers the performance of a lifetime as the father (totally unexpected from his 'K' series nonsense) and the debutant youngster Rajat Barmecha is absolutely brilliant. The story isn't the greatest but the new director Vikramaditya Motwane has brought some real spark and life into the art of film making. 

The movie's name 'Udaan' translates to 'Flight'  and does it take off or what. There are subtitles if you cannot understand Hindi and I really recommend everyone to watch this underrated movie. If you still don't believe me, IMDb has rated it 8.7. It had been quite sometime since I had enjoyed the brilliance of a Bollywood movie to this extent. It kind of reminded me of the time when I watched Khuda Ke Liye which is another must watch.

I give it a 10/10 rating without any second thoughts. Do watch it and let me know, if you haven't yet.

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Remember Remember the Month of November

November, a month to remember and a month which did a bit of emotional atyachar. The 1st day of the month was when I graduated. The gowns, the hoods and finally a comfortable suit made it a bright day even though it started raining later on. Bar hopping on that night with a special guest from out of town turned out better than expected. I finally needed something to soak up the booze and while I was busy hogging, some people just couldn't keep their Guinness down and the pavements were painted black. I'm a huge fan of beer, even carry a beer belly to support my claim. I had tried Guinness long back and its one of the worst beers I've ever had and it served lover boy right for downing it and actually pretending to like it.

It was time for some 'V for Vendetta' on the 5th. Coincidentally, it was Diwali back home on the same day. The fireworks were truly fabulous and it was nice to see the kids on the street trying to scare people with their rockets. Reminded me of the time when I used to light rockets in my hand and also when I had once managed to T-off a canoodling couple in the corner of a park with a rocket.

After a truly memorable and fun filled week, it had already turned 7th. This meant that I had to say goodbye yet again, only this time I knew that it would be a million times harder than the last time. No surprises at the airport this time, and definitely no filmy scenes. Just the one time I wished it was true and to come home to see a totally unexpected surprise. Naaaah. Life is too cruel and these things just wont happen. I came back home to see a letter on my lappy which proved to be just too much for me to handle. It was lunch time and thank you Big Mac, you beefed up the rest of my day :-)

I've probably met the most interesting and insanely inspiring people this November. While I started blogging for a blogzine, I also had too much time on my hand. Came up with so many new dishes using almost the same recipe and all of them turned out to be del.ic.ous. Might well start a new blog dedicated to my culinary skills.  

It was 'happy birthday' time once again and I wasn't happy about it, not because it wasn't mine but it was the birthday that I missed the most. I personally had felt very bad for not making it a special day last time and did a lot of things this time just to see a smile on that face. Yet again, no filmy scenes and no surprises for me but there were quite a few from my side.

Off late, I've started to attend a lot of interviews. In one of the interviews, I found myself chatting with lookalikes of Charles Darwin and Justin Timberlake. I've actually started enjoying it as there are too many dishes on the table to eat. I still remember the time  when I wasn't considered even for a cleaner's job and few months later I found myself juggling with 3 jobs (actually 4) and had to decline one of them. Ha ha , screw you fellas. Still things aren't as glamorous as they appear to be but I surely hadn't expected anything like this when I was writing Pilot .

As if the weather was not already bad, just to make it even worse, the sky has started emitting dandruff flakes. Snow in November is very rare and the DST actually seems like the clock has been turned ahead by one month. It is expected to go down to -20°C in some parts of the country this week BBC weather report. Just the time when one can literally experience the phrase "freezing your ass off". Facebook was bombarded with "I love snow" statuses a couple of days back and I'm sure all of them would like to take their statuses back after having to walk around in 10 inch snow.

Nevertheless, this month has been a hot cookie to handle inspite of this cold weather. My moustache has also started to become thick as mentioned in November and Movember and guess I'm shooing away all the female species. Not that I enticed any in the first place, but even the dogs seem to run away after seeing me. 

Have a great November. See you in December.

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Life at a flyover junction

I have been very fascinated with the way the flyovers at Hebbal and Indiranagar have been constructed. They not only succeed in confusing a first timer but also meddle with their sense of direction. One either heads north to turn east or heads west and completes a loop to turn south thus making them a visual treat from Google maps but not before leading many people in the wrong way. The ones who planned both of them were very close in constructing a paradox or sending the vehicles to a state of limbo. When you are at crossroads, it is easy to see the path in front of you but when you are at this kind of a flyover junction, even though you eventually see your future path, it is the direction that you take that matters. You might want to trust your gut feeling and risk everything or take a leaf out of a wild stranger's book who made you read that book in the first place.

Everyone at some point in their lives go through this phase and I never thought it was going to happen to me so soon. One of these roads is of a career change in which even though I know which road I want to get on, deep down I know that I have to take some calculated risks. This loop also has small deviations in terms of the "salary slip" and "geographic location". Even though I have got on this road at least 150 times over the last 6 months and got off, I'm very sure the D-day to complete it is fast approaching. There is another route which threatens my existence in a particular country. My choice ahead is to either let the "visa power" run out or extend in asap thus jeopardizing my monthly quota in my savings for Nando's chicken and other censored worldly pleasures.

One of the most important roads in this junction is regarding companionship and its intricate details. Even though I would like to sound like a pessimist and say that I don't intend to exchange rings more than once in my lifetime and have also zeroed in on that unfortunate innocent creature, it actually gets more complicated than you can think. Suddenly movies like "Meet The Parents" and "Meet The Fockers" look more like a horror or in the best case, a thriller family drama rather than a funny comedy movie. Even though I can't imagine my dad to look or act anything like Dustin Hoffman, he has only started to remind me more of Don Vito Corleone. He recently made me an offer that I couldn't refuse and am only hoping for "Aal Izzz Well" at the end of it. One day you are a student with the only aim being to see the clock tick 10 so that you can just about make it to the cheaper morning show in a theater. The next day before you even realize what happened, you find yourself in a flyover junction with hundreds of vehicles honking and whistling past you with not much time to make your decision. Even though I know that the journey is going to be tough, I have made mine, have you? Do it before it is too late and at give your heart a chance to do all the thinking.

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