My favorite actors and why they are my favorites

An old writeup ... resurfaces ...

My interest in watching movies has kinda skyrocketed recently. In record time, we completed watching all
those "Annowru" movies from India. Also, thanks to netflix I've been watching some awesome "foreign"
movies recently. So, I was just takin' a walk thinkin' about all these movies and somehow the thought
process shifted to my favorite actors. A list (fairly long one?) popped up almost immediately ... here
they go ... for lack of a better order, sorted by alphabetical last name.

Amitabh Bachchan
Johnny Depp
Robert Di Nero
Clint Eastwood
Toshiro Mifune (A recent discovery thanks to Japanese
movies)
Al Pacino
Dr. Rajkumar


Of course, the question that next popped was why were these my favorite actors among the 100's of movies
I watched of various actors? Simply because these are actors who bring a humanity to these roles. All of them are more often than not underdogs who've been cheated out of something they really love. However, they never really take that lying down. They revolt against that system that deceived them and seek revenge with anger that is colored in various hues of either anger itself or kindness or forgiveness. In the end, almost always everything ends well. Even if they do get killed at the end of the movie, their death would bring with it a better future for all concerned. But, the one interesting thing I discovered that I love the most
in all these characters is their love for humanity, which (probably except for Dr. Rajkumar) gets expressed in a very subtle way, especially with Clint Eastwood being the most subtle. They also tend to be super possessive about the people they love. One last thing is their amazing comic presence, sometimes it is super dry and black and sometimes it just makes you jump up and down and roll in your seat laughing.

I wouldn't want to leave this article high and dry without mentioning my favorite movies of each of these actors. Lets start in the reverse order of the above.

Dr. Rajkumar
Loved his roles in Haalu Jenu, Kaamana Billu, Bhagyadha Lakshmi Baaramma, Guri and Kasturi Nivasa.
All, just for his pure, unabashed expression of love for humanity -- which, of course some critics may
call overly emotional. Of course, he's also a very romantic guy ... the smile and the swing of his eyes
would make any of his heroines swoon. Also, he's got this sense of humor in these movies, which can just
make you laugh like crazy if you don't think too much about it.

Al Pacino
Ah! the firebrand. The favorites are Scent of a woman, Godfather II and Scarface. The guy's terminally pissed off and he still never loses that presence in the midst of being pissed off. Who can ever forget the scene where he shoots his newly married sister in Scarface or slaps his wife in Godfather II. However, his comic timing was perfect in Scent of a woman, though as usual laced with language that would make a sailor's face turn red.

Toshiro Mifune
A brand new favorite from Japanese movies. Probably unknown outside of the Japanese world. He's a
master of expressing anger as itself. Someone who just doesn't hide that he's been hurt, as he does in
Seven Samurai or Hidden Fortress. But at the same time, he shows that unabashed affection for his people
and doesn't back off from helping them in their moment of need, as seen in "The Red Beard".

Clint Eastwood
The quietest of 'em all, never seen him raise his voice in a movie and so incredibly cold all the time. Be it the early Fistful dollars or Few Dollars more or the more recent In the line of fire or Bridges of Madison County. If there's anyone hurt in a movie, its this guy -- super hurt. But, he never talks about it. All he wants is revenge, cold and clinical. Even a romantic movie like the Bridges of Madison County, leaves you with the coldness of this guy at the end of it. But, for all this that he brings to his movies, he also brings that subtlest love for humanity, where the innocent person gets to be saved. Justice is delivered.

Robert Di Nero
Again one of those cold, smiling, pissed off guys and very unforgiving. Once he knows something's
right, you can't pull him away from heading that way. Be it the revolutionary cabbie in Taxi Driver or
the possessive unloved boxer in Raging Bull or the cold don in Godfather II or the hired hand in Ronin
-- he's there to chill! But, if you see the human being underneath the chilling guy, he's really endearing. The love for the people he's looking out for is thrown at the audience, as a product of the crazy action that he just took. He doesn't talk about the love, he puts the love into action.

Johnny Depp
The queerest guy of the group - none of his movies resemble the previous one he made. In one he's
funny while in the other he's serious. In one he's a wonderful friend while in the other he's a psycho. But undiscovered in every movie is a skill he never showed earlier -- the comic timing of Pirates of Carribean or the chilling seriousness of Ninth Gate or the love for people in Finding Neverland/ Edward Scissorhands/ What's eating Gilbert Grape. The qualities I mentioned as common to all actors, may not be present together in one movie, but Johnny Depp as the actor brings together all these qualities and that is something so special about him.

Amitabh Bachchan
Though it was not my intention to place his review last, I guess he's the one actor I've had the longest phase of admiration in my life - more than 15 years in the making! Gosh! he's such a multi-faceted guy. On the top, he's pissed off -- eternally pissed off -- started out as angry young man, is now the angry old man, the anger only amplified by that deep baritone voice. But every so often, the anger gives way to love for people or "roll on the floor" comedy or tears that are so genuine that they'll trigger the same in your eyes. Of course for all the stuff I love about him, I hate it when he dances or is in a super emotional romantic scene with his heroine, the guy just freezes. But, then again, he later makes up for it in the movie. Favorites include the comedy of Namak Halaal/Yaarana/Satte Pe Satta, the super serious Zanjeer/Deewar/Black/Muqqadar ka Sikander/Agneepath or the have it all Hum/Shahenshah/Sharaabi.

I guess eventhough I've seen so few movies of these actors, I guess their roles are so powerful that they tell the stories of their life - a trait so rare in the rest of 'em.

"A lot like love" -- a review

Ramya had added this movie a while ago and finally the movie got its turn in the queue.

The premise of the movie is about two 20-somethings Oliver (Ashton Kutcher) and Emily (Amanda Peet) who keep running into each other over the years, everytime having a good deal of fun but never really getting around to express their feelings for one another. They go through their phases of life of breaking out of adoloscence, struggling in relationships, building a career ... basically living life. But, everytime they meet each other, the movie turns into a riot where each one keeps getting back at the other with something funny to say or do that has you in peals of laughter. Of course, predictably enough, they come together at the end of the movie :-)

The movie has delightful performances by Kutcher and Peet with both putting in a natural effort and excelling in the same. The movie is never a pain on the viewer's patience and has lots of laugh-a-lot moments :-) Kal-penn has a short but energy filled role. Rest of the cast has done a fine job.

The locations of the movie, which are mostly urban have been picked tastefully. What's especially awesome is the house where Emily lives. The beautiful courtyard makes the house look so elegant.

The movie is overall fast paced, though I felt that the last 10 minutes could have used better editing.

Nevertheless, I'd rate the movie as an excellent watch.

Cheeni Kum -- Review

Cheeni Kum was a long awaited movie and a bunch of us friends got a chance to watch it last night at the Theaters here.

The premise of the story is around two protagonists ... Buddhadeb Dasgupta (Amitabh Bacchan), owner of a high profile Indian restaurant, Spice6, in London and Nina Verma (Tabu), a Delhi based software engineer visiting her friend Shalini, at London. The movie starts with proud and arrogant Buddha having a tiff with Tabu, who thinks his top class Zafrani Pulao is too sweet for her taste and she comes back with her own authentic Zafrani Pulao. This event bowls Buddha over and an unusual romance builds between them. This provides amusement to the restaurant employees, who get a break from their tough boss and also to Buddha's mom (an amazing Zohra Sehgal) and cute 9-yr old neighbor Sexy (the very cute Swini Khara).

The romance builds around Nina coming back daily to the restaurant to return his umbrella on rainy London evenings. Eventually, Buddha lets go off his guard and falls for this intriguing women. There is a problem however, Buddha is 64 years old and Nina is only 34 years old. The two are convinced they need to get married. Its easy to convince Buddha's mom. But its very hard to convince Nina's dad (Paresh Rawal), who himself is only 58 years old. How the mission is accomplished forms the rest of the plot.

There are a lot of amazing things about this movie. Foremost are the performance of Amitabh and Tabu. They are just natural for this role, as though they were going through it in real life. Amitabh's performance as a snooty, arrogant and proud chef is amazing. He has the best dialogues in the movie ... a non stop stream of one liners ... they are far too many of them, that tickle the funny rib. Tabu at the same time is no-nonsense, refusing to let go of her ideals but at the same time very human.

Sexy is the best supporting role in her cute part giving "romantic" advice of a 9-yr old to Buddha. Her fundas would shock anybody. Zohra Sehgal has an amazing energy going even in this advanced stage of her life, she is 95 yrs old now! She has a very cute dance at the end of the movie.

The rest of the crew plays a very good support cast, especially the chefs who keep making fun of one another, particularly the one with teeth jumping out of his mouth ;-)

The soundtrack is very awesome, especially given that Illaiyaraja has composed the music. He has reused a lot of his past work in Tamil and Kannada movies. Shreya Ghoshal has sung all songs to perfection.

First time director Balakrishnan, who was formerly an Ad Man has done a fantastic job, keeping the movie fast paced with loads of comedy.

On the flip side, the movie loses pace in the second half. It could have used some crisp editing. Paresh Rawal's talents are mostly unused, which is very sad, given his amazing comic abilities. The comedy dries up too, in the second half.

Nevertheless, it is a worthy watch ... maybe worth watching a second time too and owning the DVD for those laughs, isn't a bad idea. :-)

"Shwaas" -- a movie worth watching

We recently watched Shwaas. It is a marathi movie made in 2004 which was India's official entry to the Oscars that year.

The movie is the story of a Grandfather and grandson who live in Rural Konkan region. The child is 4 years old and is stuck with cancer of the retina. The grandfather brings the kid to the city for the treatment and the news of the cancer is revealed. It is a really hard moment because the kid has a choice between blindness for the rest of his life or death ... if he chooses to live, it means that he can never easily pursue his favorite passion of education.

The emotional movie has many a touching moment including the "climax" where the child has one nice evening to remember before his operation and the moment where he stumbles upon the realization that he'll be blinded forever. Ooh! I am getting goosebumps typing this :-)

The kid portrayed by talented Ashwin Chitale and the grandfather by Arun Nalawade have put in Stellar performances. They have been very well supported by Sandeep Kulkarni as Dr. Sane, Amrutha Subhash as Ashawari the social worker and Ganesh Manjrekar as the kid's uncle.

Bhaskar Chandavarkar's music is perfect for the movie's setting.

I'd definitely recommend watching it. Read here for a full plot summary

The inspiring story of Suresh Kamath

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Read the whole story

The old woman who gave her town a swimming pool

An inspiring video of how Maisie raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in her own simple and inspiring way.

"The Namesake" -- my review

After procrastinating on this for a while, Ramya and I finally watched "The Namesake". It was well worth the wait :-)

Premise

The story, as must be already known, is about the immigrant Ganguli family (Irrfan Khan and Tabu) in upstate New York and their two children Gogol (Kal Penn) and Sonia (Sahira Nair). The movie begins in a bit of a flashback around Irrfan and Tabu's marriage. They make a very cute couple who are beginning a new life together. Then the children arrive and gradually grow up among their white counterparts. Somewhere along the way, Gogol hits a roadblock about his name where everyone starts teasing him about its weirdness and he feels left out. This leads to constant bickering with the parents about why they named him so. The name incidentally happens to be derived from Nikholai Gogol, a favorite author of Irrfan.

The rest of the movie is about how Gogol comes about to discover the links behind his name and eventually discovers the peace and freedom which has always been missing in his life and leads to all the confusion and battles of his life.

First off, what really impressed me about this movie is how well the story has been formulated. Jhumpa Lahiri's work is really amazing. What is more amazing is how well Mira Nair has brought to life such a complex story to life without getting drawn into lazy frills or avoiding difficult shots. That, for me, is the mark of a true filmmaker.

The other two winners of the movie are music and cinematography. The movie starts off in the mid-70s and ends somewhere in the last couple of years. The music shifts according to the different eras and different moods. It literally drew us to become involved in the movie. The background voice for Tabu's hindustani alaaps are really haunting. But, our favorite was definitely the sexy remix of Mukesh's soulful "Yeh Mera Deewanapan". No one could guess that this song could be remixed!!

The camera work has been stunning in being able to capture the beauty of New York and Kolkata. Ramya, who lived in New York for many years was continuously baffled about what part of the city was being showed! The shots were stunning. Kolkata has always been famous as the city of joy and the camera work has captured the dizzy life of the city. We were left with the feeling of being home and wanting to visit Kolkata on our next trip to India :-)

As far as acting goes, Irrfan, Tabu and Kal Penn shine in their own right. Irrfan has played the sensitive role of a dad with aplomb. He doesn't push his son too hard to discover everything about life. He gives the gentle nudges required but then again gives his son the space that is required by children to discover life. Irrfan's scene where he has a long chat with Kal Penn was definitely very moving and brought out the value of being a dad, really well.

Tabu plays the role of a wife and mom in a way that probably only she could. She is shown to be a normal, everyday woman who loves her family like crazy and is deeply strong and powerful yet kind and gentle on the top. Aren't all our moms like that? :-) Yet, in the latter half of the movie she emerges as a brave woman who is out to balance and shoulder the responsibilities of the family. Her scenes in this part of the movie are sensitive and very moving.

Kal Penn has evolved a lot from playing the boorish college kid in "Harold and Kumar go to White Castle". There are shades of that at the beginning of the movie. He then gradually evolves to playing the confused kid in the middle of the movie making interesting decisions about his lifestyle and preferences. But where the really best part of his role emerges is towards the ending where he is forced to take a long look at life. He could have been a lot more human in his emotions but still manages to get the message across.

The rest of the cast is mostly ok and doesn't have much of screen time to make any impact. The movie running time is mostly ok, though it drags towards the end. The ending could have received some crisp editing.

That apart, its a fabulous movie ... a movie at the end of which, Ramya and I got into a long winded discussion about parents, parenting, immigrants and life in India. You'll surely would want to do that :-) We plan to send a gift of this DVD to our parents as soon as it releases ... this is one of the better tributes we could give to them, for the fine job they've done!