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Movie Review – “Midnight in Paris”
The movie that you don’t really want to like, but can’t really help it. From someone who doesn’t even like Paris that much, the constant reminders about the beauty of Paris are too burdensome to agree with, and too elegant to disagree with.
But personal prejudices not withstanding, for someone to go back in time, and meet the likes of Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Pablo Picasso, Hemingway, Dali, Eliot, Gertrude Stein, Degas, and Manet is fantastic. Literally.
Some excellent quotes:
“I never heard of Valium, what is it?”. “I guess you can call it the pill of the future.”
We both like Indian food. I mean not all Indian food. We both like Pita bread, I guess nan is what you call it now.
That’s very French. You guys are very much more evolved in that department. (On loving the wife and mistress at the same time.)
The theme of the movie, is of course, as old as time itself. Fantasies about the 18th century were written in the 19th, and about the 19th in the 20th. There is no starting point about the fantasies and there is no ending point. Be it a subtle fantasy like the Steppenwolf or in your face fantasies like the Metamorphoses or modern day classics like the Groundhog Day or Back to the Future, the fantastic idea is the one that of imagining for the sake of imagining, and thus slowly peeling away all the layers of the redundancies and be left with what is the core, the true self.
Some more excellent quotes:
That Paris exists and anyone chooses to live anywhere else is a mystery to me.
–Adriana
Pablo is the greater artist, but Matisse is the greater painter.”
I met and fell in love with an American writer by the name of Jill Pender. He brought me earings and we made love.”
– Adriana.
This is the time we live in. Everything moves so fast and life is noisy and complicated.”
– Adriana, in 1920
In fantasy as in reality, the past lives in the future and the future lives in the past. And the present? Well, that is all over the place. We continue to look into the past, and also the future to decide the course of action in our present, even if a Hemingway crystal ball is not always available to tell us about obvious things that we may be missing.
If it reminds you of Groundhog Day when Gil gives Adriana a pair of earrings, you should remind yourself that “fantasy” is not just a genre, when it comes to art. As Adriana finds her way back to the Belle Epoque, the golden age of Paris, the realization that is building up slowly hits us all that no generation is great until the next generation can come and analyze it and elevate it to the highest pedestal possible. It takes a while for all the interpretations of Mona Lisa can be drawn out that make Mona Lisa what it is. Da Vinci couldn’t have done it all by himself. He needed the help of future generations to view ML from all different angles and define in the universe what it really stands for.
Perhaps in the future, we will look back at some artists today like Spielberg or Tom Hanks or Zubin Mehta, and elevate them to some new statuses. As Adriana puts it, “Present is a little unsatisfying, because life is a little unsatisfying.”
The movie has amazing soundtrack, which despite the monotony of the genre doesn’t get tiring, due to the variety within the genre.
Thankfully, the movie ends with no further clarification of the message. Gil walks away into the rain (when Paris is at it’s prettiest) with Gabrielle. Are they walking away into the future? Or, are they walking away into the present?
June 16th, 2011
Movie Review: The Adjustment Bureau
“In a Nutshell”® rating: 6/10.
Excellent Movie Quote:
If you google for just Elise, you get more than 357,000 hits. And none of them is about you.
Adjustment Bureau is the non-machine version of the Matrix. The premise is that everything is controlled, and there is a clean hierarchy, and structured, and the top person is called the “chairman” who is actually a distributed person, and can be different for different people. At this point, it just feels that the script writers ran out of creative juices. Oh well.
Overall, the movie is OK. Barely good enough to be seen in the plane. Probably, the directors and the script writers need to realize that it is not sufficient that the movie or the book have a nice conclusion at the end (which Adjustment Bureau does indeed have). It is also important that the main premise be compelling. To open doors using a bowler hat and have those doors open (literally!) in many different places, and then to end with conclusion that free will is important is a bit of a non sequitur.
June 4th, 2011
Movie Quote – Hall Pass
All this arch talk is really making me crave Mikky D’s. You up for some?
–Rick to Fred
February 2nd, 2011
Movie Review: We Are Family (2010)
“In a Nutshell”® rating: 9/10.
“We Are Family” is an official remake of the Stepmom (1998). In fact, it is an almost word by word copy, and that is not a bad thing, since Stepmom was a fairly decent movie.
[Digression: I am for copying all good things and translating all good works of art into all possible media outlets and languages – so much so that I often fantasize translating the Essential Works of Pablo Neruda into Hindi. Other than the minor problem of me not having any background in literature or poetry, there are 3 other problems with that fantasy: (i) I am conversational, not fluent, in Spanish. (ii) I am conversational, not fluent, in Hindi; and (iii) I have never translated anything before.]
[Oh well, that is not my only fantasy that isn’t coming true.]
Ok, back to Stepmom. The essential line of Stepmom is when Julia Roberts says: “My fear is that they (the kids) will miss you at every important moment in life”, to which Sarandon replies, “And mine is that they won’t.” When you include a movie’s ten second précis in the local adaptation as well, at that point, you have done a VERY good job of copying all relevant details.
Ok, back to We are Family. All performances are very good. Kajol as usual gives a tour d’force. But thankfully, she doesn’t dominate the movie. Kareena is weak at times, but for most part, she does it quite well. The parts where she is weak (in acting) is where the character is in control, since that is not what the script is implying. Arjun Rampal handles the presence of superstars Kajol and Kareena very well, and comes across as a major acting force. Child artists give commendable performances. The boy’s expression of fear and subdue when approaching the mother’s deathbed is priceless. How does an emotionally aware child approach a dying or a dead mother?
So, what about the social issues? Without taking a stance on divorce, the movie’s message to the kids is that they are loved. In some cases they are loved by someone who is their parents’ partner. More people that can love the children, more perspectives and guidance they can get. That is important. Thanks to the director for conveying the message of Stepmom to the letter. One question though – movie setting was Australia, not India. Is Bollywood ready to talk about this in India, happening to Indian people, but not show happening this to Indian people in India? Will Bollywood need a second adaptation, such as “Hum Family Hain” that will be a copy of “We Are Family” set in India?
Where does this movie suck? All dialogues are canned. Some look natural, some don’t. In situations filled with drama, no one stutters a single time. No one has a false start. No one has a start and then gets lost in words. No one is caught speechless. No one tries to say something and checks themselves. Surreal. A whopping C+ to dialog writes. No one in the movie except the teenager girl says something that they regret. Actually, let us make that C+ a D.
Songs. The songs are nothing to criticize or write home about. I wouldn’t change the channel if any of them came on the radio, but I won’t be springing for its LP.
Overall. The overall rating is positive. In a nutshell rating: “9/10”.
August 12th, 2010
Movie Review: Rocket Singh – Salesman of the Year (2009)
“In a Nutshell”® rating: 9/10.
Excellent movie! Very down to earth. Love the excellent simple dialogs, and weak humor that doesn’t try to dominate the serious nature of life. There is no song and dance sequence (thankfully), although the title song is beautiful. Ranbir Kapoor gives an excellent performance.
March 18th, 2010
Some of my favorite movies
I thought, it wouldn’t hurt to share some of my favorite movies. We are a nation of lists, and if this helps you to know yours truly, so be it. 
- Sgt. Bilko
- City Slickers
- Father of the Bride (Part I, with Steve Martin)
- Gods Must be Crazy (Part II)
- Groundhog Day
- When Harry Met Sally
- My Cousin Vinny
- The English Patient
- Chocolat
- Odd Couple (Part I)
- City Lights
- Seven Years in Tibet
- Pulp Fiction
- Back to the Future
- Hillary n Jackie
- As Good as it Gets
- A Few Good Men
- Amistad
- Godfather
- Taxi Driver
- Titanic
- The Usual Suspects
- Last of the Mohicans
- A Civil Action
- Wag the Dog
- The Sixth Sense
- The Invisible Child
- Aladdin
- Great Expectations
February 5th, 2010
When you are far from me
[This is a poem translated from a Bollywood song - video link at the end. All credit to the music writer and director. The song is a duet, hence pink and blue colors.]
When you are far from me
Remember me
And make me remember you
Don’t forget
That I will come back
I am going just for a little while
When you are far from me
Remember me
And make me remember you
When you are alone, it shouldn’t be like that
The beautiful smile that you wear now
Shouldn’t disappear when I am gone
Meet your friends
Laugh with them and make them laugh a bit
If you meet a good looking girl
Perhaps she is in need of your friendship
If she approaches and smiles at you
Then really so should you
When you are far from me
Remember me
And make me remember you
But don’t forget
That you will come back
You are going just for a little while
Translated from a song in the movie Mashaal.
February 1st, 2010
Best scenes in Hollywood
Citylights’ final scene remains one of the best scenes ever produced in Hollywood, in my utmost humble opinion.
Here, take a look:
August 20th, 2009
Coming back to a friend
If you ask anyone about their “best friend”, usually it is someone from high school or college. Not many of the “best friends” are those from full adulthood. The reasons for this human phenomenon may be buried in simple practicality and logistics of friendship versus family life. Yet, it can be argued that human adulthood is simply not conducive to many friends. By a certain age, the psychological persona is well established, we already know enough about ourselves, and sincerity is often questionable.
Now, where I am getting at? What is up with an especially sensitive subject today, you might ask? The answer lies in the best adulthood friends. The best adulthood friends that we can hope for are books.
As I undertook a small travel, I was separated from a book that I 
was reading. Now, a book is different from a movie in two aspects. First and foremost, the book moves at the reader’s pace. If you want to take a nap, go for it. If you want to chew each sentence, do it. If you want to chew each word, well, you are slow, but go ahead. It is not possible to same extent in movies. You can pause, sure, but it doesn’t work that way. The second main difference between movies and books is that books are read in your own voice. You read the sentence as you think it was written. (Books on CD/Tape come somewhere in between books and movies, but I leave that to you as to where they fit.)
As I finish a book, a certain melancholy usually sets in. That is related to the impending departure of a friend, who stayed on a few weeks, and is probably a week or two overdue. Yet, you have not had a chance to talk everything and about everyone, but it is time now.
July 18th, 2009
Movie Review: Up (2009)
“In a Nutshell”® rating: 8/10.
Finally caught up with Pixar’s new movie UP. Pixar has a knack for making animated movie for adults (Toy Story, etc). Up is another movie in that chain, and by the way, the first animated feature film to open at Cannes. It starts off awesome, Carl meets Ellie, they grow up, get married. Then the tragedy hits – them not being able to have children. They move on, get busy with other things, and keep their dream alive of adventure. Of course, along the way, life happens and their dream of adventure constantly needs to be postponed a little, until it is a little late (Ellie dies), but still that is when it happens. Carl gets tagged along with Russell, an 8 yr old, who no one would miss out as his emotional child. They start off as an odd couple, but the paternal bond is all too vivid.
To me, it appears that the story lost the plot when they reach the Paradise falls and gets surrounded by the speaking dogs. I don’t have any problem sharing the gift of speech with other species, but that might be better done in a separate movie. If I have to hazard a guess, it looks like the screen writer wrote the story of Up in two separate sittings, and then slapped them along. The arrival of the balloon house at the Paradise Falls is the point of the discontinuity for the movie.
So, what is the movie’s message? (That is a question Nabakov says should never be posed for any work of art. Artist need not be saying anything, and least of it, need not be saying anything specific, that multiple people can agree upon. Still, that is the way reviews go – messages, and detestable allegories, that allow us to highlight the meaning that we drew from the work of art.) The message of the first part is entirely clear (and beautifully banal). The struggles of life that we all go through are essentially the photo album of our journey. That is the Cirque De Soleil message. Though of course, the constant breaking of the money jar that Carl and Ellie are trying to save for their adventure is also reminiscent of the myth of sisyphus, but in a benign kind of way, because each challenge is different. The second part of the movie does not appear to have any clear message, except perhaps to Canis lupis familiaris.
The funny aspect is critical to any Pixar movie, and in this, Up is a winner, but not a slam dunk winner. Humor comes easily in this movie, but more importantly, rarely appears forced.
All in all, I give Up a “Should See”, 8/10 rating.