Recently in movies Category

Jai Ho has done India so much good, that Indians will realize this only a few more months down the line. I did hear of some femalish band buying into JaiHo, remixing it up, and making the music more reachable to the west.. especially the hindi lyrics that needed translation.

But I never knew it came out so interesting... as Jai Ho (You are my destiny)

The interesting part of the music is.. I could see the album as a celebration by the world, of India's vibrance... and the celebration of India's interest to grow and work and celebrate with the world as a mature country with globalized indians.

Ofcourse, India is poor.. and all this can be seen as falsification of the country's image.. but take it straight, probably working with other nations is what is going to teach how to eradicate poor, keep clean, make less babies and all that.. like all those foreign banks and supermarkets came over and made our own business people do their kind of service, eventually raising the bar now in banking and retail sector to an unbelievable amount in just a span of less than 10 years.

This is a nice family movie. Explains the importance of understanding growing up kids.. at various stages of their lives.. especially in an indian terrain.

Best, it is watched with family, especially the oldie-types/ mid-age mom-dads in your family who might not have seen the world or many people of the world, to understand the goods and bads of inheriting different cultures.. especially when it comes to allowing kids to become adults, make their own decisions in life.

I happened to go with my mom to the theatre complex(yes very very occassionally I take her out) expecting to see 'Padikathavan' a masala(read no-story) movie .. but because we were late and that movie had already started, I landed up taking my mom to this wonderful movie.. wonderful for my mom..it was though boring for me except that I was enjoying prakashRaj(lead actor) at his best of expressions

I actually don't enjoy much of philosophical movies or motivating movies at the theatres, I like to be entertained if I watch one in a theatre, like cartoons ;) Bond 007's,

My mom loved the movie and was within it so much, that I could see her hands folded(in prayer) when trisha(actress) was getting married at the marriage registrar's office (in the movie).

Enjoyable.. Moving.. for a family audience.

Actors Trisha - PrakashRaj - Aishwarya (play the very composed daughter - dad - mom in the movie)

Ofcourse you are expected to have seen Madagascar 1 to enjoy this movie in full.. A very good mild, comedy, with brilliant voice-overs.. actually both madagascar movies are low on graphics or animation compared to movies that pixar(Makers of 'finding nemo','incredibles') makes.. but the voice-overs take the stage and make you ignore your expectation of high standards of animations.

I actually don't like the idea of movie people taking a series.. like part 1, part 2... except if the different parts have isolated stories, jokes, and don't require the audience to have followed all movies in the series to understand the next one.. like they do with Harry potter movies.

Most of the comedy's(or entire movie's) context in Madagascar 2 goes back to you having seen the earlier movie, or at least having a friend next to you explaining you the context of the jokes. I went with a friend who hadn't seen the earlier part and was not enjoying the movie as much as me.

Children will love it I think, I found many children in the hall laughing out or screaming understanding the sequences in the movie..

And here actually I have an observation.. Children seem to like or relate to, or identify animals and characters in animation movies that are low on graphics.. just like they see in comic books.. more than understanding movies like 'Incredibles'/'Finding nemo' which I would say requires you to be an adult to enjoy it fully. Just like how Ice Age series are also popular with children.

So, maybe the crew of madagascar were indeed doing a stripped down comic book like graphics for animation rather than the other way like I was wondering in the first part of this post.

I have been seeing a lot of movies..over the past 3 months.. but two of them 'Freedom Writers' and 'Great Debaters' have taught me how to teach Toughness... especially the kind of toughness you have to teach an young team when it requires to get into a place where everybody would think they are kids...they are wrong.. they can't do it.. , and you have to keep them from running away or panicking, and make them stand to failures, expectations and deliver.

In a different perception, those movies can make you tougher if you relate yourself in to the characters of the students rather than the teacher characters I related myself to in both the films.

Both the movies are real-life based stories.. and as far as I have read, they have not exaggerated the story to make it good for the movies.. but may have in-turn been unable to bring everything that happened in real lives of the people involved into the movie format.

I cried when Hilary swank cried..
I smiled when Denzel washington smiled.
..

When the movies got over.. I was amazed at the presentation of them, and what changes such great movies could bring if they were shown to children and teachers all around the globe...

and then..
google tells me that the movies have already inspired people all around, and you could spend a day or two reading so much of the good changes the movies had already created.. organizations, funds for education, better teachers.. etc., all in america of-course.. and since both films talk about racism, black-white problems, you would see how they have helped the american culture. Like the 'Freedom Writers Foundation', something that has become immensely popular after the movie on Freedom Writers.

If you like teaching/mentoring, and you haven't watched either of the movies, I bet you should.
Because these are not just movies, they are powerful movies.

I had a sister in benaras and had to go to bambai(as pronounced in hindi) to solve the family's financial crisis... and something and all happened and i was rohan and proposing suddenly to rani mukherjee.

I was just inside the hall enjoying being part of this well presented film 'Laaga chunari mein daag'.. sometimes as rani's character.. sometimes as abhishek's.

I have a question about the title, but I will keep that for the end of this post.

Ok. How was the movie..

Please don't see it if you like rani mukherjee so much that you will cry when she cries on screen.. The usual sacrificial elder sister story that we have seen in many hindi and tamil and actually all language films.. but presented so well you wouldn't complain. The story's bottomline is easily understood from the title of the movie...Laaga chunari mein daag.. which means my veil got stained.. or something similar.

About a girl who forces herself into a becoming an escort for settling the family's financial committments and allowing her family to live better while she lives every moment with a doubt as to when she should stop doing it. And once her young sister comes to live with her in bambai and gets to know what is happening with her sibling, things try to unfold emotionally. Seen this in many movies with the same storyline before, and you would watch this one only to know whether it has a happy ending or a sad one.. and also if you love rani mukherjee on screen like me.

For expressions and speaking many sentences with just facial expressions and some tear-filled eyes, our own rani, abhishek, and mrs.iyer(konkona sen) pull it off much much better than their hollywood collegues with multiple oscars.

Abhishek was the cold breeze for me... for whenever he was there he gave me a relief from the emotions 'vibha'(rani mukherjee) was going through in the movie.. and the tears collected in my eye pockets go back without falling off embarrasingly. :o)

Abhishek's unclean dhadiwala charm works for him.. when I try it, atleast one friend will ask me questions as if trying to know whether I hadn't taken a bath in days.. or worser the friend will offer to pay the bills at the restaurant talking it over in a manner like I am financially broke enough to even not get a shave. :o) Works for abhishek though. hmm.

Even off screen, until last year, I always thought, abhishek and rani are such friends that they will get married. But that bathameez bunti gave up bubli for some umrao jaan. How can I forgive him for that.. May be I will if he does bunti-babli II like the rumours are saying. For now, he is excused because he is making it up with rani in this movie atleast.

The cast of the movie, its colors, locations, and importantly the poetically descriptive movie title.. were all carefully chosen and it showed through.

Though at places I didn't like the movie because rani had to look sacrificial.. but the package didn't stress anything too much. There were no blood thirsty villains, nor total family crying over some stopped marriage like mishap.. neither was father/mother dying though they showed occassions where they have severe heart attacks or emotional attacks which are usually pre-cursors in indian cinema to kill a character.

So, overall the movie was a happy-ending, easy, colorful one.. for a normal person who would like a simple emotional movie.

At the end of the movie.. you get a song free for remembering on all occassions. Be it you are very happy and someone asks you why.. or be it you are very sad and someone asks you why, or may be you did a mistake.. or whatever somebody asks, you can just sing... "hum... tho.. aise hai bhayya.. arre.. hum..tho.. aise hai bhayyaaa"

For the question I had on the title
I didn't understand what "Laaga" meant.. or why they chose that.. I stupidly even thought it was a spelling mistake until I saw that the hindi name of the movie is also 'laaga'.. for me, it should have been Lagaa chunari meing daag... if you understand the difference of why it is laaga.. let me know.