Of Critiques And Applauses

Giving In To Laziness

2010-09-19T01:10:00.000-07:00

Ok, it's official now. I can't motivate myself to write anything here any more. So here's a link to the stuff I've been writing about (surprise, surprise!) tennis, on the sports website www.sportskeeda.com.

http://www.sportskeeda.com/author/musababid/

Doing It In Style

2009-03-23T11:39:00.000-07:00

The match traveled all the way to the brink of excitement—two set points for Mr. Sauce in the second—only to be turned back to the routine at the last second. It's funny how differently we can perceive the quality of the same set of events: From my view in the stadium, I would have graded the match at B; in their pressers, Federer and Verdasco each said that the level of play had been poor; but watching a few games on a TV at my hotel later, it looked like fantastic, fast-paced tennis. The two people watching near me were certainly impressed. They were almost falling off their chairs at some of the rallies. "Look at Federer," a woman exulted, "he knows everything!" I thought I'd already heard all the compliments I would ever hear about the man, but that one was new. - Steve Tignor. How odd is it that lost amid the ridiculously frivolous and endearingly indignant pages of a tennis message board is a piece of writing so loaded with sparkling wit and understated humour that it almost seems like the work of an accomplished genius. Then again, Steve Tignor probably is a writing genius. I've been reading his columns on the site www.tennis.com since about a year and I can't stop marveling at the remarkable variety and flowing arrangement of thoughts in his articles that keep you hooked right till the very end. It helps, of course, that a large number of his columns are dedicated to the ubiquitous Mr. Federer.

Why am I doing this? Why must I insist on talking about Roger Federer when the tennis story of the week is clearly the frightfully machine-like march of Rafael Nadal towards greatness and unmatched glory? Nadal dusted off Andy Murray 6-1,6-2 in the final of the Indian Wells Masters tournament, the same Murray who's lately taken to giving Federer all sorts of fits while establishing a 6-2 head-to-head record against the possible GOAT (Greatest Of All Time, for the uninformed). Federer is no longer the No. 1 player in the world, he's lost his last 5 matches against Nadal, he's not getting any younger at 27 and is probably unlikely to ever add the elusive French Open crown to his collection of Grand Slam titles. At what point does the man stop being the most illustrious fodder for news, speculation and opinion?

Admittedly, Federer's PR team hasn't exactly been doing its best to keep things low-key. Federer's heart-tugging show of emotion after being vanquished by Nadal in the Australian Open final set the ball rolling (to be fair, however, Federer's PR team probably had nothing to do with Federer's tears, judging by the almost universal bad press heaped on the man after the incident); then came the 'leak' of the fact that Federer's back still wasn't 100 % healed after the injury he suffered last fall. If that weren't enough, Federer's team decided to let the world know that he was flirting with the idea of hiring Darren Cahill, the man widely regarded as the ideal match for Federer's understated dedication to the sport, as a coach - reports about the training sessions the two were having together in Dubai were stealthily and steadily fed to eager ears, leading to much wagging of tongues and scratching of heads. Excitement and joy among Federer fans at this development rose to a fever-pitch, until the bubble was burst with Federer announcing, with a perfectly straight face, that Cahill had turned down the job. Finally, of course, came the big news - Federer and his girlfriend Mirka were expecting their first child "in the summer". Is it just me, or do all of these announcements seem calculated to keep the 13-time Grand Slam champion in the heart of all tennis news? Federer's PR guys must be working overtime. And yet, they needn't have, because Federer is news no matter what he says or does or doesn't say or doesn't do - minor collateral damage that comes from winning 13 Grand Slams and being ranked No.1 for 237 consecutive weeks. It's hard to keep off the name Roger Federer when you're trying to write anything even remotely connected to tennis, and my poor little blog is no exception.

Is Federer being unreasonably stubborn about his game in this inevitable period of his career - the period of decline? Experts have been saying for years that Federer's one-handed backhand, while a breathtakingly gorgeous tennis shot, is simply incapable of holding its own in extended crosscourt rallies to Nadal's viciously spinning forehand. And yet, Federer repeatedly insists on trying to trade beautiful backhands for crushing forehands in nearly every rally of every match he plays against Nadal, often to less than spectacular results. Federer doesn't use his almost-legendary backhand slice nearly enough in his matches against Nadal, and no one seems to know why. His second serve returns continue to be bunted back rather than blasted to the lines the way most experts want him to. Is there really a simple explanation for all of these apparent acts of idiocy? There's been a lot of talk of Nadal's willingness to adapt his game, his style, even himself, to the necessities of battle. In other words, Nadal will do anything to win, and will take a win no matter how it comes about. Roger Federer, on the other hand, gives off the impression that he wants to win in his own style. And while this may seem like a counter-productive attitude at the moment, I believe that when all is said and done, history will reflect kindly on this line of thinking of Federer's.

Federer has always been a traditionalist - the awe and respect that he accords to the game's greats like Rod Laver and Bjorn Borg stand testimony to this fact. But Federer has also been a connoiseur of style and beauty. His one-handed backhand, which is both a devastating asset and a fragile liability at the same time, is perhps the best evidence of this. I can almost imagine an exasperated coach urging a 6-year-old Roger to use both hands on his backhand to gain greater control and power, but to no avail, because little Roger would keep saying "but it looks so much prettier when I use one hand!" Much has been written about Federer's almost balletic movement on the court - people have been known to say that Federer looks like he's flying when he's running around on the court; the term 'full-flight Federer' could not have been more apt for the man on one of his good days. His right hand, while capable of cutting a swathe through the court with a scorching forehand, also has remarkable touch and finesse - his volleys and dropshots are more aesthetic than seems possible for tennis shots. Is it possible, even conceivable, that Federer would have preserved all of these abilities if he had been as willing as Nadal to adapt to the necessities of battle? Would his forehand have looked as majestic if he had learned to put more topspin on it to reduce the errors that now flow so liberally off it? Would his brand of tennis been as eye-pleasing and attractive as it has been over the years if he had been content to lapse into 30-shot rallies built on patience and perseverance?

Federer is a gifted athlete who probably believes he has the divine right to defeat every man across the net from it. While there may be considerably more than a touch of arrogance in that belief, it cannot be denied that it has given us some of the most spectacular tennis that has ever been seen in history. His period of dominance, from 2004 to 2007, will likely be held up as the most magnificent exhibition of artistry and brilliance by any man or woman to have held a racquet. And those glory years would never have happened if Federer hadn't believed, from the outset, that his backhand could hold up against any shot that could be produced by even the most gifted of tennis players. Arrogance is sometimes necessary to become a champion, and so is being a sore loser. Just ask Serena Williams. A player like Rafael Nadal, on the other hand, seems to summon his fighting abilities from the belief that he may not possess a counter for every strike that his opponent throws at him, but he'll find a way to win by constantly improving every single skill he knows. These are two very different, almost diametrically oppposite ways to approach a contest, and the question as to which approach is the more effective one can probably only be answered when the careers of both Federer and Nadal are over.

Federer may likely never regain his form of old, and he may never defeat Nadal or Murray again. Why, he may never even win another Grand Slam title again. But that's alright, because he won all that he could when he played in his own style. And that style was a joy to behold.

P.S. If this post seems like a thinly disguised way to put a positive spin to Federer's depressing run of results of late, then I plead guilty.

C Is For Complaining

2008-11-16T07:26:00.000-08:00

For many years I'd considered the axiom "Humans are fundamentally greedy" as the one unshakeable truth that would forever stand the test of time, space and everything else in between. Now, however, I've come to the realization that that there may be another dictum that is so forceful and inflexible that it can supplement, if not altogether replace, the 'humans are greedy' idea. Be warned, this is not a groundbreaking new theory that I've arrived upon through a divine flash of inspired genius; it's just something I've noticed that has, thus far in my short span of life experiences, stood the test of every variable in existence. Before I get any deeper into this rambling mode of mine that I so often get stuck in, I'll pronounce my great discovery as concisely as possible. So here goes - Human beings are inherently inclined to complain. Alright, that may not have been very concise, but at least I managed to steer clear of the dramatics. Which can only be a good thing.

Think about it - we complain about everything under the sun. We just like to complain. We may go blue in the face denying this, but there really is no going around our undying fondness for complaining and criticizing. No conversation seems complete unless we bitch about something, whether that thing is in our own backyard or in some far-flung place halfway across the globe. Take the case of Raj Thackerey and the wondrous bunch of TV News channels in our country, for instance. The other day when Mr. Thackerey cut a cake on his birthday, a whole heap of people went up in arms over the supposedly evil way in which he brandished the knife before committing the deed. Then one of the anchormen on one of the news channels felt duty-bound to admonish the immaturity of these complainers, solemnly declaring that what goes on in a politician's household is no one's business but his own. And then the next day at work I couldn't stop complaining about the alternately hilarious and nerve-gratingly annoying news channels that we are blessed with in India. Of course, this sordid pile of complaints would never have come into being if Raj Thackerey hadn't felt the need, in the first place, to bitch about all people who exist outside Maharashtra. You see, this is one depressing chain of events that is much worse than the cliched 'vicious cycles'.

Work. I can never tire of complaining about work. Actually, no one can, as far as I know. We constantly complain about how our workplace bears an uncanny resemblance to hell, and we never get bored of proclaiming that nothing in the world is more boring than our work. And when we reach our sorrowful offices, we happily (or sadly, to be technically correct yet conceptually wrong) indulge in good old-fashioned office gossip, which is just another term for complaining about our colleagues. And the less said about the words we choose when talking about our bosses the better.

We whine about the poor infrastructure in our country (and that includes everything from our shoddy roads to our appalling education system) and we gripe about the politicians who apparently don't take steps to improve that infrastructure quickly enough. Heck, we even bemoan the political, moral (!) and economic conditions in countries other than our own, specially in the rich ones likes the US and the UK. We complain about the bad movies that are inflicted on us by clueless filmmakers in the name of cinema, and, when shown the 'House full' board at the ticket counter of our favourite multiplex, we grieve about how people are such losers that they have nothing better to do than go to the movies on a Sunday morning . We grouse about the restrictions imposed on us by our families, and we discover that taking digs at the most obnoxious member of our friends' group is the best pastime in the world.

I, of course, have my own set of pet complaints which give me a particular and oddly comforting pleasure. I grumble, loudly, when my room is messed up by the slightest amount imaginable. I never waste an opportunity to eloquently narrate to anyone who'd listen how incredibly tiring it is for me to travel some 60 km everyday to get to my workplace. I dramatically lament about how we still seem to live in the dark ages every time we have a power cut, and I curse my mobile service provider when I receive my phone bill every month. I condemn every single commuter I lay my eyes on when I'm stuck in a traffic jam (I think I need hardly mention how much disgust I express about the government and its road maintainence programmes at such times) and I grouse about rising costs when I go to my favourite restaurant and find that the rates have increased yet again. I blame everything from bad luck with the cards to the dishonest ways of my opponents when I lose a Pictionary game, and I say without remorse, when I strum out a particularly ill-tuned chord on my guitar, that my guitar strings need to be changed, all the while grimly muttering about how little time I get to practise or go to a guitar-learning class. I criticize the stupid draw system followed by the tennis tournament organizers when Roger Federer loses at any stage before the final of a tournament, and I abuse my ancient computer when, at the most riveting point of a tennis match, it slows down inexplicably and kills the live stream that I'd found after so much tireless scrounging. I think I could go on and on with this list of mine; fortunately, I've got work tomorrow so I have to wrap this post up sooner rather than later. God, that was one remarkably depressing sentence.

There are some things, of course, that I can find nothing to complain about. The movie Wall-E, for example. Watched it last week, and although I confess I was fully prepared to fall in love with it because of the glowing reviews it had received from nearly all quarters, I can fairly say that it is a stunning achievement in film-making whichever way you look at it. The guys up at the Pixar studio (incidentally, the last movie made by Pixar was the equally delightful Ratatouille) must have some seriously creative guys at the helm to have come up with as heart-warming a gem as Wall-E. The animation is gorgeous, the characters absolutely lovable and the premise immensely original and thought-provoking. If you thought The Dark Knight was genius, wait till you watch Wall-E. How I wish the Oscar jury members would get some sense knocked into their heads; if they don't nominate both of these movies for Best Picture they'd really prove themselves as the biggest bunch of knucklheads ever. Ahem, there I go again. We humans really are inherently inclined to complain, aren't we.

Shaking Off The Rust

2008-10-28T09:00:00.000-07:00

I'd like to say that I've spent the last 3 and a half months gallantly travelling around the world, meeting flamboyant people and experiencing memorable adventures, which is why I haven't been able to post anything since the beginning of July. Proudly declaring that I made some radical career decisions and have embarked on my career of choice - an unconventional, risky path that everyone advised me against - would have had a nice ring to it too. Heck, I'd even settle for having had the opportunity to say that I've finally started - and finished - writing the book that I've long been dreaming of writing, and am now anxiously hunting for a publisher bold enough to let my work of art go to print. To now say that I've not even come close to doing any of these things sounds so depressing that I'm already starting to regret writing this post. And precisely as I finish typing this astonishingly sorrowful sentence, a bunch of really really loud Diwali firecrackers go off in the distance, almost making me jump from my chair. 'Ironical' doesn't even begin to describe it.

3 and a half months is a really long time. And yet, all I've been able to do in that really long period is continue with my same boring old routine which goes something like this - work, get tired, eat, remain tired, sleep, remain tired, and work again. Oh, somewhere in the midst of this routine I have had the time to develop and solidify a deep hatred for my job, watch a few movies, wonder why Ernests Gulbis, the 20-year-old tennis player from with Latvia with THE talent keeps getting the worst draws imaginable in the big tournaments (I mean come on - Nadal in the Wimbledon second round, Roddick in the US Open second round and Nadal AGAIN in the Madrid Masters second round? You've got to be kidding me.) and muse indifferently at how weird it is that the global economy, and consequently the entire world and all of its people, really, depend on such few unpredictable, unreliable, lottery-like and completely manipulable elements like stock markets and real estate markets. I'd also like to have been able to say that I spent some time during my hiatus trying to find ways to shorten my sentences in my blog posts, but then, wouldn't that be too obvious a lie?

I hate my work. Period. It's so easy to say something like that. I don't know when exactly this hatred started, but I can assure you that it is in its full bloom right now. Of course, the fact that my current assignment requires me to travel on my bike for 60 km everyday (sometimes in the midst of pouring rain, and frequently through mind-numbingly frustrating traffic jams) contributes a great deal to that loathing. But I've come to the realization that I'd probably hate anything that I have to do, whether it's for earning money or for getting a degree. I can enjoy doing something, anything, only as long as I do it of my own free discretion. Heck, I'd probably start hating Harry Potter if I had it as a subject of my course material. I don't know why this is so; I don't even know whether everyone else is destined to suffer this awful fate or I'm the only woebegone one. Deep thoughts these - I think I need PLENTY of leisure time to adequately reflect on them.

Watched a fair few movies the past few months. I was completely bedazzled, enthralled and awed by the phenomenon that was The Dark Knight, both in my first viewing AND my second one, possibly even more in the second one. It makes me feel so good that I had declared Chris Nolan my favourite Hollywood director to anyone who'd listen more than a year before everyone else watched The Dark Knght and started jumping on the Nolan bandwagon. Rock On!! was good, but I really wasn't as impressed by it as most people seem to be (I know I'm nit-picking, but just why couldn't the director have asked Arjun Rampal to at least make an effort to look like he was actually playing the guitar?). Kidnap was tremendously funny; I simply cannot get Imran Khan's priceless expressions out of my head, specially the one when he mouths "Main tumhara kal, aur tumhar kal hoon" in a supposedly sinister voice. And they said the kid was a promising actor. I missed out on all those meaningful flicks like Mumbai Meir Jaan, A Wednesday, even Body Of Lies, but frankly, I think I'm a little tired of the terrorist theme being played out in nearly every single movie being released these days. The movie that I truly, truly regret missing out on is Wall-E; I have no idea when the movie was released in India, let alone when it was pulled out of theatres. Now I have no option but to wait for the DVD release, which is going to be sometime next month. I can't believe I watch all the piece of trash movies in the world but pass over the only animated movie in the past 20 years that is being talked up for a Best Picture nomination at the Oscars. I cannot believe this.

In other news, it has been confirmed that Jelena Jankovic is going to end the year as the world's No.1 tennis player, as is Rafael Nadal on the men's side, but for once, the women are causing a greater stir than the men among tennis fans. Jankovic, as has been widely asserted, has never triumphed at a Grand Slam, has only been in a Grand Slam final once (this year at the US Open) and has played the most matches on tour this year, losing as many as 17 matches. Serena Williams, on the other hand, won this year's US Open (and has won 8 other Slams overall), was part of a breathtaking Wimbledon final against her sister Venus, and lost just 7 matches throughout the year. I'm sorry, but in my opinion it simply doesn't make sense that Jankovic will end the year No.1 while Serena will be languishing at No.3. Jankovic does care about rankings a lot more than Serena, I'll give her that; but how fair is a ranking system that allows a player to play a bunch of tournaments towards the end of the year (incidentally, the 'end of the year' period in tennis is the period when most of the big guns have trouble gathering up enough motivation and energy to get through their matches with their reputations intact) and usurp the top ranking from a player who has just re-affirmed that she is the only player on tour who can blow away the competition (unless that competition is her sister) when fully fit and healthy? Someone should be asking this question to the WTA bigwigs.

I took so long to write this post that the fireworks, which at one point seemed capable of blowing a hole through my wall, have now been reduced to an occasional bang here and a half-hearted thud there. I guess that's a sign for me to wrap things up. This looks like one of my worst blog posts ever. But it's alright. I'm rusty. I won't think of it now. Tomorrow is a new day. God, I need to end this before it gets any cornier.

THE Match

2008-07-07T22:39:00.000-07:00

Clearly, there's not much I can say about Sunday's match between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal that will add anything whatsoever to the myriads of columns, articles, opinions and reactions that have already been voiced and written by all sorts of people all over the world. It doesn't help, of course, that I am actually at a loss for words to do adequate justice to the match that was of such epic proportions that it still seems a little beyond belief. Which is why I think I'll put aside any thoughts of an objective analysis or technical evaluation of the match and instead, write about it purely from the perspective of a Roger Federer fan. It might be a little more painful, but it will surely be more fruitful, no? (Forgive the Nadal imitation; it's become something of trend to add a 'no' at the end of every sentence these days).

Some people are calling this the greatest match in the history of tennis, and nearly everybody agrees that this was the defining match of our generation. Was it better than the Borg-McEnroe Wimby final of 1980? The jury is still out on that, but certainly, this match had everything, if having everything is the basis on which such things are judged. It had a confident, assured start by Nadal which served as an appetizing teaser; a stirring comeback by Federer to keep the ball rolling, and a relentless, hit-till-you-drop 5th set that took the rivalry to as dizzying a pinnacle as anyone could have hoped for. Throw in a couple of dramatically timed rain delays and a finish in near darkness with the flashbulbs of innumerable cameras sparkling upon the court like some kind of divine rapture from the skies and you have a transcendent sporting moment that will perhaps never be witnessed again. When the match finally ended after 4 hours and 48 minutes - incidentally, this was the longest-ever Wimbledon final - and Nadal fell to the ground in part relief, part disbelief, and part life-changing ecstasy, did anyone even remember the extremely high stakes that had rested on the match, the remarkable slice of history that Federer had been denied or the extraordinary accomplishment (the French-Wimby double that hasn't been seen since the days of, oh, Bjorn Borg and 1980) that Nadal had just achieved?

For a Federer fan, the match provided plenty of moments to savour and keep in memory, although I'm sure most Federer fans would actually want to quickly forget this match in its entirety. Federer began the match as badly as anyone could have feared, and seemed to realize soon enough that he would have to summon his TMF (TMF=The Mighty Federer, a delightful little term coined by members of the site www.tennis.com) mode to make a match of this. And summon TMF mode he did, racing away to a 4-2 lead in the second, seemingly gaining control of proceedings. But Nadal, in what has become scarily customary manner now, staged a brilliant comeback, and all of a sudden memories of Roger letting slip those 4-0 and 5-1 leads in Monte Carlo and Hamburg came painfully rushing back. Almost expectedly, Federer's level dropped, and by the middle of the 3rd set he was shanking backhands all over the place. At 3-3 in the third, Federer went 0-40 down on his serve, and even the most optimistic of Federer fans must have given up hope then (I know I almost switched off the TV after Nadal took the second set). But Federer's serve, as it has so often required to do throughout his career, bailed him out, and Federer survived. His bad temper lingered, however, and in the next game he let his grumpy side come out in full force, making such ridiculous challenges on baseline calls right at his feet that it seemed he was going prematurely senile. Muttering and grumbling away in typical Federer fashion, he somehow managed to hang in there till the rains came pouring down, giving him a much needed break for perhaps a few calming words from girlfriend Mirka and a cooling off under some ice cold water. When play resumed, of course, TMF mode was back, and he took the 3rd before most people watching it at home had even realized that the match had resumed.

The 4th set tie-breaker was perhaps the most spectacular display of tennis and spell-binding drama that anyone will ever get to see. Leading 5-2 with two serves in hand, Nadal choked; a double fault was followed by a backhand error, and when a player as mentally strong as Nadal chokes, you know that the match means much, much more than a Grand Slam title or 1000 ranking points. Federer then got yet another opportunity to show why Wimbledon is supposed to be his house, striking a backhand passing winner down the line on championship point. It was a shot so unforgettable and so unfreakingbelievable that it seemed like a travesty when they continued to the next point, instead of giving the TV broadcasters time to show maybe a 100 replays of it.

When the match went to a 5th set the general feeling was that the momentum had swung irrevocably in Federer's favour, and when Nadal went down a break point at 4-3, it seemed only a matter of time before the 6th consecutive title was in Federer's fashionable little bag. But Nadal had other ideas, keeping up his magnificent serving and refusing to let Federer get another sniff, in spite of the distinct disadvantage that he had of serving behind in the final set. Federer frequently went down double break points on his own serve, and with every ace or service winner that he thundered down on these points, the Nadal fans all over the world must have been trying their hardest not to remember those squandered break points from last year's final. After a point it got so, I don't know, routine that I could only laugh in amazement every time Federer fired yet another ace when he was in trouble on his serve. Has there ever been a better example of clutch serving in the history of tennis? I guess I'll have to dig out some of those Pete Sampras clips on youtube to answer that. Eventually, of course, Federer could not keep up in the face of the unremitting attacks by the Spaniard, and Nadal finally had the break to go up 8-7. And yet, there was more drama in store. Down another championship point at 7-8, 30-40, Federer came up with a return of serve that one commentator described as "the best return of serve that I've ever seen", only to falter a few moments later when an errant forehand found the net. Tell me, what did this match not have?

I didn't have the heart to watch the post-match ceremony, switching off the TV after Nadal had climbed down from the stands having embraced and rejoiced and cried with his support team. Federer looked so forlorn and lost that it seemed almost an invasion into his privacy to even watch him sitting on his chair, staring blankly into oblivion and trying, and failing, to look unbroken by the result of the match. I've been told that he almost broke into tears during an interview with John McEnroe some time after the match, and I'm fervently thankful that I didn't have to see that. Why was this match so important? Surely, Federer will have many more chances to win Wimbledon. Undeniably, Nadal has many more years to prove and reinforce his mastery over grass, if he hadn't already done that before this match. Even the rankings haven't been greatly affected by the result - it's still highly likely that Federer will end the year ranked No. 1. On Sunday, the Federer-Nadal rivalry touched its zenith, a dazzling peak that will perhaps remain untouched and forever ensconced in folklore and legend, and it was a crest that transcended all cause and reason. It was sport in its purest, most enthralling form. After the match, I felt really really sorry for Federer, but I felt sorrier for all the people in the world who don't have the chance, or in some cases don't want, to watch and witness the glory of sport.

P.S.: I also feel sorry for Venus Williams, whose remarkable 5th Wimbledon crown and the fantastic final she put up with sister Serena are destined to be forgotten and relegated to the after-thoughts heap in the face of the incredible, incredible men's final.

When A Treat Is Not A Treat, But Is A Double Treat!

2008-05-24T11:41:00.000-07:00

Trust A R Rahman to pull a fast one on us when least expected. For the past 3 years we’ve been fed on crumbs, literally – there have been a measly 3 albums (Rang De Basanti, Guru and Jodhaa Akbar) composed by the musical genius since 2006 and we’ve been forced to sportingly take that lying down. And now out of the blue, two A R Rahman albums releasing one day apart! Talk about a double treat. And even though I know that as a die-hard A R Rahman fan I should be ashamed for not having had a shadow of an inkling that Rahman had been preparing to cut his own album for the past 6 months or so, there’s a certain special charm to pleasant surprises like these. It kind of makes me wish I hadn’t spent the 6 months before the release of the 7^th Harry Potter book obsessing about the million or so theories concerning anything and everything about Potterverse.

Right then, so the big question, of course, is – how good are the two new A R Rahman albums – Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na and Ada? I’ll start with Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na, or JTYJN for short (I really did think Aamir Khan, of all people, wouldn’t find the need to have the title of his movie sound like the first half of the script). The movie is supposed to be a youthful romance, and Rahman, as always, makes sure that every track in the album perfectly fits the theme of the movie. The first track, Kabhi Kabhi Aditi Zindagi is - there’s no other word for it – vintage A R Rahman. In other words, a very very good composition. Jaane Tu Mera Kya Hai is somewhat a middling track – a little weird on melody, and the kind of song you don’t really know whether to like or not. Nazrein Milaana almost sounds like Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy territory, and I think I should add here that Rahman does a better Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy than anyone else, maybe even better than the trio themselves. I normally hate to use this word, but the track is wonderfully - peppy. So much for the perennial classical inclinations of the maestro.

Pappu Can’t Dance is, plain and simple, disappointing. If there has been one grouse I have held against Rahman these past few years, other than his tendency to occasionally disappear from the music scene for months together, is that he seems to have lost his touch when it comes to dance numbers. Which was the last really rocking dance number you heard from him? Masti Ki Pathshala from Rang De Basanti? When I heard that song for the first time, I had a hard time getting past the fact that the song actually had no tune to speak of. Personally, I thought the Meherbaan track from Tehzeeb was great, but even that was nearly 5 years ago. I don’t know about you, but I really miss the days of Rangeela Re and Humma Humma. But we must make do with what we have, and what we have is still quietly and impressively enthralling. Kahin To Hogi almost sounds like a Westlife/Boyzone track with Hindi lyrics, and it does its job well. And can we ever have a Rahman album without a single track that strays dramatically from the beaten Bollywood path? Tu Bole Main Boloon is laden with heavy jazz and funk elements, and while I’m sure it’d suit the context of the movie well, I can’t really say that I enjoyed the track.

Ok, enough of film talk. Let’s talk about Rahman’s own privately recorded album Ada now. The thing that struck me the moment I started listening to the tracks of the album is how unnatural Rahman’s songs sound when sung by typically dulcet singers like Sonu Nigam and Alka Yagnik. Maybe I don’t notice that in Rahman’s Bollywood albums, but then again, how often does he sign up the typical Bollywood singers anyway? I personally can’t get enough of Rahman’s own vocals – there’s something very endearing about the way he completely disregards the lyrics of the song (he still can’t speak Hindi, even after all these years) and gets lost, almost like a child, in the rhythm and melody of the track. As it turns out, however, there’s just one song sung by him in the album, and that put me off in a big way. Ada is a very nice album, no doubt, but I somehow get the feeling that Rahman is playing it safe with this album – almost too many mass-appealing numbers. Gulfisha is a fantastic track, but what on earth is Gumsum all about? For a second there I almost felt like looking it up on the internet and making sure that it was actually Rahman who’d composed the track and not some blissfully stagnant Nadeem-Shravan or Sajid-Wajid type of music director, what with the Madanpura-style beats and all. Hawa Sun Hawa restored some of my faith in Rahman, and Meherbaan almost made me feel guilty of my earlier disparaging thoughts about him, but Ishq Ada again goes on a tailspin, taking ‘weird melody’ to another level. Hai Dard and Milo Wahan are a little too ordinary for my liking, but Tu Mera Hai is again an impressive piece. I suppose by now I should’ve gotten used to the wild fluctuations in quality that have been the norm with any Rahman album ever since I can remember, but it always comes as a surprise to me that genius must necessarily have its low moments to inspire and propagate its incredible highs.

I think I’m going a little overboard with the whole ‘Rahman and genius’ thing. But you know what, when compared with the run-of-the-mill plagiarists that make up the majority of Bollywood’s musical talent, ‘genius’ might actually be a bit of an understatement. It’s not everyday, after all, that a Taal or a Dil Se is created. To be honest, however, the Rahman magic seems to be waning a little these days – perhaps he needs to take himself a little less seriously? He’s become the mascot, so to speak, of international music, and it just seems to me that he’s become a little too conscious about making sure that his music reflects the global appeal of his work. I think he needs to let go of all the baggage that comes with being a larger-than-life icon and concentrate, instead, on making uncomplicated, beautiful music, the kind of music he made for Roja and Rangeela, the kind of music that made us fall in love with his astonishing – I’m sorry, but there’s no other word for it – genius. No, I have not over-used that word. Some people just deserve to be exaggerated about.

Sport in All Its Fascinating Glory

2008-05-19T03:16:00.000-07:00

I had sworn I wouldn't write about tennis at least until the French Open got underway, but guess what, I'm notoriously bad at sticking to resolutions. And besides, the tennis world hasn't exactly been lacking in sensational developments lately, has it? Ok, I'll admit that Justine Henin's retirement from tennis wasn't as big a shock as some tennis analysts seem to think it was, but it was huge news anyway. Let's leave Henin and her motivational problems aside for a bit though, because right now all I can think of is of Roger Federer and his ridiculously captivating quest to solve the Rafael Nadal puzzle on clay. The Hamburg final yesterday between the world's top two players looked very much like a repeat of their Monte Carlo final three weeks ago, which Nadal won 7-5, 7-5 after being down 2-4 in the first set and 0-4 in the second, but yesterday was, for Federer fans at least, infinitely more satisfying and more disappointing at the same time. That may sound like a paradoxical statement, but if you watched the match, you'll know what I'm talking about. How can you not admire Federer for playing such sublime tennis that he got to leads of 5-1 and 5-2 respectively in the first two sets against the superhuman king of clay Nadal? And yet, how can you not be infuriated that Federer blew both those leads through some very poor serving in crucial games?

The final score went 7-5, 6-7, 6-3 in Nadal's favour, and for some reason I wasn't as depressed at the end of the match as I thought I would be. Part of the reason for that could be that I was rapturously happy that it went to a third set at all after Federer went 0-40 down on his serve at 5-5 in the second. Some mighty fine serving got him out of that hole, and then he ran away with the tie-breaker, restoring some of my faith in his ability to play well on the big points. But I think the main reason why I'm not so gloomy right now is because Federer seems to be playing like a claycourter for the first time in memory, and he finally seems to have discovered the right strategy to play Nadal. Those 5-1 and 5-2 leads mean nothing with respect to the result of the match, but I'm sure it's more than comforting for Federer fans to remember that those leads did happen; Federer is fully capable of dominating Nadal for reasonable stretches of time, and, short of a large bunch of crushing victories over Nadal on clay, I don't know what else can give Federer and his fans greater hope and confidence for the French Open. And to top that, Nadal maintained his grip on the No. 2 ranking by winning his semi-final against Novak Djokovic, which means that the terrifying prospect of Federer facing Nadal in the French semis has been firmly avoided. Comforting thoughts aplenty for the average Federer fan.

Speaking of Djokovic, I can't believe that I actually called it right when I said his semi-final match against Nadal may turn out to be the best match of the year. The tennis that the two put in the match was spell-binding, breathtaking, insanely riveting and spectacular all at the same time. The thing that was firmly established in my mind while watching it, however, is that when Nadal is at his best, it won't just take a superhuman effort by any player in the world, including Roger, to defeat him - it will take much, much more than that. Nadal's defense, particularly his incredibly steady forehand when pulled wide and his nearly-unfailing backhand passing shots simply defy belief. How do you defeat a player who refuses to let even the most ferociously well-timed potential winner convince him to give up the point? Djokovic played fabulously throughout the 3 hour long match - for the first time ever, I found myself feeling bad for him - and I have a feeling that the years of torture that Federer has faced on clay at the hands of Nadal will now be passed on to Djokovic. I guess if he wants to inherit the No. 1 ranking from Federer, he'll have to take on everything associated with Federer's famed legacy. Federer and Djokovic may do all that they can to adapt their games to suit clay and spend months practising on slow courts and hire the most adept and inspiring coaches to help them get their hands on the French trophy, but the truth is that Nadal will always be there, forever stalking their paths, eternally intimidating, absolutely relentless.

Someone who will not always be there, of course, is Justine Henin, who became the first woman in the history of tennis to retire while ranked No. 1 in the world. The thing with such premature retirements - Justine is still all of 25 years old - is that they invariably invite comparisons with Bjorn Borg's retirement back in 1982 (or was it 1983?) at the age of 26. For once, however, I think the comparisons are justified - both were at the top of their games when they bowed out, and both were thwarted in their attempts to capture the last bit of glory missing from their respective careers - the US Open for Borg, and Wimbledon for Justine. Justine actually went so far as to admit in her retirement press conference that she never believed she had it in her to win at Wimbledon, and that it was always a distant dream to her that never seemed within her reach. Perhaps that's what made it all the more desirable for the undisputed clay queen?

Then there's also Justine's admission that her win against Maria Sharapova at last year's year-end championships, the 4th-longest women's match in history which Henin won 5-7, 7-5, 6-3 after nearly 3 and 1/2 hours, took too much out of her both physically and mentally. Can anyone say Wimbledon final 1980? Borg won that match against John McEnroe after a titanic struggle and an epic 4th set tie-breaker that McEnroe won 18-16. Borg was never the same after that, losing 3 Grand Slam finals to McEnroe before formally announcing his retirement. It was the changing of the guard - McEnroe was a brash, arrogant, but also prodigiously gifted tennis player who was showing signs of embarking on a GOAT-worthy career - and Borg knew it. Did Justine Henin undergo the same thought process as Borg? Her crushing defeats at the hands of Sharapova and Serena Williams this year certainly point to that possibility. But then again, all of this analysis and theorizing is based entirely upon conjecture; there's no real way of knowing what exactly goes on in an athlete's mind, is there? Specially if the athlete in question is as reticent and guarded with the public as Henin. She said she had no 'fire' left in her to play tennis any more - and that could be because fighting and neutralizing the power games of her opponents took a heavy toll on her body and mind, but it could also be because of a totally personal matter that had nothing to do with tennis, or maybe she simply got bored of tennis, period. All I know is that these are the kind of poignant moments that we watch sport for - if sport was just going on the field and playing to win then there wouldn't be much charm in it, would there? Justine's retirement has been a fascinating subject to think and talk about. Almost as fascinating as Federer's already-legendary pursuit of that last bit of filthy silverware. Almost.

The Different Forms Of Art

2008-05-13T12:08:00.000-07:00

There is something to be said about playing to the gallery with such pinpoint precision that the very act, provincial and classless as it may seem on the surface, is elevated to an art. The makers of Iron Man 'play to the gallery' with such remarkable intensity that it's hard to imagine anyone not thoroughly enjoying the movie. The loud bangs and vivid scenes of mindless flinging and flying of heavy objects are all in place, as are the mandatory romantic subplot and crisp humorous lines by the protagonist. Just about every cheap mass-appealing cinematic technique is thrown in, but no one's complaining, because all of it works so perfectly. It helps, of course, that the film is laden with some of the most magnificent cinematography and special effects ever seen, and that Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow have no shortage of that thing called screen presence. No, this movie won't be thought about in connection with the year's Oscar hopefuls, not even as a joke, but I can tell you one thing: you'll have a blast watching it. Which is considerably more than you can say about any potentially Oscar-winning movie. Don't get me wrong, I still think Batman Begins is the best superhero movie ever made, but sometimes it's nice to not keep looking for cinematic brilliance or aesthetic expertise or thought-provoking dialogue and instead watch a movie for pure entertainment.

Moving on to a completely different subject, I've just realized what the best thing about the game of tennis is: it allows for very little mourning time. The tennis schedule is so jam-packed with tournaments that the average tennis fan gets very little time to wallow in his miseries and bemoan the total lack of joy on earth when his favourite player or players lose, because before you know it, the next tournament, and the chance of redemption for the player in question, is already underway. And this is exactly what happened with me this week, when Roger Federer's quarterfinal loss to Radek Stepanek (?!) at the Rome Masters was followed by Novak Djokovic winning the tournament, which, trust me, is a big, big tragedy in my eyes. The Hamburg Masters actually began even before the final match between Djokovic and Stanislas Wawrinka started, so I had no option but to snap out of my depression and get back to my nervous checking of the tournament schedule and live streaming/scores and assure myself that Federer hasn't yet made an early exit at a tournament for the umpteenth time this year. Incidentally, a potential semi-final match between Rafael Nadal and Djokovic at the Hamburg Masters might just turn out to be the marquee match of the year, considering the fact that the winner of the match gets to walk away with the No. 2 rank in the ATP computer rankings. I'm nervous for Rafa already.

Just finished watching the extended, unedited versions of all the three Lord of the Rings movies (which might actually be the exact antithesis of a movie like Iron Man) for what seems like the hundredth time. And yet, the sheer magnificence and grandeur of the trilogy never ceases to amaze me. I think I've said this to nearly everyone I've ever talked to about any sort of movie, but this is the first time I'll be putting it in writing: In my opinion, the Lord of the Rings trilogy is the greatest set of movies ever made. You can have your Godfathers and Shawshank Redemptions and Gone With The Winds, but nothing comes close to the jaw-dropping spectacle created so lovingly by Peter Jackson. It's just as well that the 3 LOTR movies together picked up no less than 17 Oscar awards. Just goes to show that the Oscar jury does get it right every once in a while.

Back Without A Bang

2008-04-28T23:55:00.000-07:00

Ok, I'll admit I can no longer stand the guilt that comes with not writing a post for over a month; I feel I can be brave enough to concede that the only reason I'm writing this is because every other blog writer I know continues to merrily write post after post without so much as a hint of a furrowed brow, while my blog has been languishing in the sorrowful shadows, unattended and ignored. Ugh, looks like the month-long hiatus has made my writing a little over-dramatic. But what the heck, as long as I'm writing something....

Perhaps the most significant development in the last one month, other than Hilary Clinton closing the gap on Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential race in the US, the previously unheard-of phenomenon of foodgrain scarcity scaring the living daylights out of Americans, Priyanka Gandhi meeting with one of the assassins responsible for her father's death, and our dear old MSEB announcing that Pune will not have to face load-shedding at least until September but deciding to subject Puneites anyway to frequent, painful power-cuts lasting anywhere between 5 seconds and 5 hours (whew, this is turning out to be one long sentence), has been the roaring success of the Indian Premier League, or IPL, to be more hep about it. Actually, 'roaring success' might be an understatement - there's something so enthralling, so rivetingly amusing about seeing those mighty Australian and South African players being meekly obedient to their Indian captains and eagerly putting in the yards to, oh, defeat just another State team filled with a bunch of second class Indian cricketers, that there never really should have been a doubt about the success of the tournament. It helps, of course, that the format of the tournament is eerily similar to that of the many football leagues in Europe that are so wildly popular with a small but substantial segment of Indian sports watchers. The IPL has done to cricket what a 100 years of Test cricket and 40 years of one-day cricket couldn't: it has made cricket, in every shallow and amateurish sense of the term, 'cool'. Way to go, BCCI!

In other news, the tennis clay season has begun, and the question that has enchanted and consumed tennis followers for the past 3 years has surfaced again: can Roger Federer beat Rafael Nadal at the French Open? Federer, for his part, seems to have overcome his early season hiccups by stringing together two consecutive finals appearances on his least favourite surface, notching up his first title of the year at Estoril before losing to Rafael Nadal in the final at Monte Carlo. Yeah, I know, nothing new or earth-shattering about that last bit - Federer losing to Nadal on clay has become somewhat of a given, has it not? What does surprise me, however, is the continued and insistent belief that Federer's supporters hold that he will, one day, manage to overcome the King of Clay at the French Open. I mean seriously, if you saw how much advice, not support, but advice that Federer gets before each match that he plays against Nadal from thousands of people who may never have wielded a racquet their whole lives , you'd think Federer was the prized protege of nearly half of the tennis-watching population of the world. Play the slice backhand. Use the forehand dropshot. Come to the net more often. Attack Nadal's second serve more aggressively. Improve your serving percentage. Some have even suggested switching over from a one-handed backhand (that gorgeous beauty of a shot) to a two-handed one. Even Jose Higueras, Federer's celebrated (?) new coach, hasn't been spared the 'expert' counsel. In the midst of all this, some rather more well-informed columnists gravely pronounce that Nadal on clay is a puzzle that cannot be solved; that Federer simply does not have the patience or fitness to get the better of the muscular Spaniard on dirt. How true is that last statement? Being a sworn Federer fan, I like to believe that it isn't in the least true; but it's all rather pointless for us to be armchair psychologists, is it not? At the end of the day Federer has to go out on the court and play solid tennis and outwit Nadal. Nothing more, nothing less. In the meantime, he can continue to delight us by displaying the kind of dazzling tennis that he put on show in his quarterfinal match against old nemesis David Nalbandian, and by handing out a few dozen more defeats to Novak Djokovic, preferably including several bagel sets. And of course, a few more moments like the "Be quiet, ok?" admonition that he shouted out to Djokovic's mother in their semi-final match at Monte Carlo. That was just so unexpected and so very wonderful. I mean, wow.

Watched a couple of Bollywood flicks last week, first Tashan, a strange movie that has all the right ideas but falls sorely short in execution. The first half is stylish and mildly interesting, the second half shoddy and exasperating. A shame, really, considering the extraordinary hype generated by the movie before its release and the oodles of hard work that must have been put in by Kareena Kapoor to achieve that thing called size zero. The other flick that I watched, U Me Aur Hum, is almost the reverse of Tashan - intolerably boring first half, mildly touching second half. Here too, the makers had a great premise, but the mandatory theatrics and Bollywood-style wooing sequences ruin things considerably. Kajol comes up with a vintage performance - even after all these years, she still holds, in my opinion, stomping rights to the mantle of being the best actress in Bollywood, and there are quite a few heart-rending scenes towards the end of the movie, but that's just about it. Just a thought: is the tagline of the movie, "Sometimes the greatest journey is the distance between two people" supposed to be a quote from an outside source, knowing as we do how the Ed Norton starrer The Painted Veil has the exact same tagline, or is this another pathetic attempt at thinly disguised plagiarism by Bollywood's dear old thieves?

Okay, for what seems like the umpteenth time, I seem to have run riot with my post - there's nothing more irritating than a post that never seems to end, is there? So I'll end right here - no conclusion, no dramatic parting line. Yes, this is it. The End. I quite like the ring of that. Hehehe.

Turmoil in the Tennis World

2008-03-24T12:12:00.000-07:00

While those among us fortunate enough to classify themselves as 'non-tennis followers' sleep comfortably in their homes, blissfully ignorant of distasteful things like Masters tournaments and ranking points, a battle as fierce as any you could imagine rages in the tennis discussion forums of the great big internet. Is the King really dead? Has Rafael Nadal run one step too many in his insanely intense efforts to win at all costs? Is it actually possible for the Royal Clown, or (D)Joker, to ascend to the Emperor's throne? Most importantly, however, are Pete Sampras's Grand Slam record and his standing as the pre-eminent GOAT safe from falling into the clutches of a weirdly aristocratic Swiss snob? Perfectly harmless questions, you may feel, but step into one of the forums discussing any of them, and you'll know the meaning of violent bloodbath.

Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal's tame losses in the semifinals of the Indian Wells Masters, and Novak Djokovic's subsequent triumph in the final, have sparked off a tennis supremacy debate the like of which has not been heard of in 4 long years. For 4 years Federer has dominated the men's tour with such effortless and magnificent ease that it seems almost inappropriate, even vulgar, to talk about the battle for the No.1 ranking. And yet here we are, more than a quarter into the tennis season, and neither Federer nor Nadal has won a tournament, while the Djoker has clinched the two most significant titles thus far. Changing of the guard, for real? Hold your horses, people. Federer, for one, has a very valid reason for his sub-par performances this year: he had contracted mononucleosis prior to the Australian Open, which, while not remotely a life-threatening disease, can be a devastating curse for sportspersons, causing as it does severe fatigue that can last nearly 6 months. Of course, this story itself had its doubters, with many questioning why Federer had to bring this up nearly a month after bowing out of the Aussie Open semis, with some even going as far as suggesting that his doctors made the whole thing up so Federer could blame his loss to Djokovic on the illness. I know, it is sacrilegious to even think such a thing about the man who's just about won nearly every match he's played in 4 years, but Federer certainly does have to let his racquet silence his critics, and soon. His loss at Indian Wells in particular left many of his fans wondering whether he still has the desire or motivation to keep maintaining his incredible standard of play. A lot hinges on how things go for The Mighty Fed, or TMF for short (the nickname that's become really popular on www.tennis.com) in the next few months, not least important of which is the No.1 ranking. Djokovic is closing in on Federer and Nadal faster than Federer can serve or Nadal can run, so it's become almost imperative for TMF to win everything in sight until the hardcourt season, or at least to defend all of his points at every tournament he plays. Personally though, I'd be more than happy if he just won the French Open once. I wouldn't really mind if he didn't win another match his whole life after that. But that's just me.

Nadal's case is a little more complicated. A lot has been written about the delightful spirit that the Spaniard brings to the tennis court, but these past few months tennis watchers have increasingly been getting the feeling that the spirit has deserted Nadal. He just doesn't seem to be enjoying himself in his matches anymore; he looks spent, both physically and mentally. It may be easy to brush off this judgment as a knee-jerk reaction to the fact that Nadal hasn't won an ATP tournament since July, but if you watched some of his recent losses, specially the ones to David Nalbandian last year and to Mikhail Youzhny and Djokovic this year, you'll know what I'm talking about. Then again, the clay season is about to start, and considering how many experts think Nadal is one of the best, if not THE best claycourt player in history, maybe his fans don't have that much reason to worry. If I were Nadal, though, I would worry, specially since Djokovic is far closer to the No.2 ranking in terms of points than Nadal is to the No.1 ranking. And based on the evidence of the past couple of months, there really is no stopping the Djoker.

Why do rankings matter so much in tennis anyway? The last time I checked, rankings weren't exactly the most accurate reflection of a player's credentials. Look at Maria Sharapova, for instance. The blonde Russian had had a white hot start to the year, winning 18 of 19 matches and capturing two of the three most important events so far (including her third Grand Slam title). And yet, she is placed a lowly 5th in the computerised rankings, below her compatriot Svetlana Kuznetsova at No. 3 and Serb Jelena Jankovic (No. 4). I'm sorry, but is there even a comparison between the headcase Kuznetsova, the can't-stop-playing-until-I-break-down-completely Jankovic, and the fearless, if somewhat incosistent champion that is Sharapova? You've got to be kidding me. I really don't get why there always is such a huge fuss about rankings in tennis. Maybe it's just one of those things that cannot be explained, you've just got to accept them as they are. Like the interesting case of Novak Djokovic being the most hated tennis player on earth. No wait, there is a reason for that. Lots of reasons, actually. Ok, I think I need to stop.

P.S. Random musing: who is the most likely young player to have a breakthrough season and cement his place among the game's elite? Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Andy Murray, Marin Cilic or Richard Gasquet? My vote goes to Murray, but again, that's just me.

What's That You've Got Missing? A Heart?

2008-02-21T10:40:00.000-08:00

Ok, let me start by saying that I went in to watch Jodhaa-Akbar fully prepared to fall in love with the historical epic. Ashutosh Gowariker, after all, does have a rather splendid body of work to impress and excite people with. You don't get nominated for an Oscar for nothing. And the premise this time seemed so perfectly grandiose - a sweeping love story set in the royally magnificent days of Mughal Shehenshahs and phrases like "Takh Liya!" - what more could one ask for? Everything seemed so right about this movie that, much as in the case of Sanjay Bhansali's Black, people were talking about the Oscar prospects of the movie months before its release. Sadly, they spoke too soon.

I can't really give the exact reason why the movie failed to impress me. The plot construction and character development are more than adequate, the acting is top-notch and the painstaking attention to detail evident throughout the movie is truly commendable. I guess it's just one of those movies which you can brush off with a comment like, "but it had no soul!". And as snobbish as that sounds, I think it's spot on. Gowariker seems to have got a little lost amid all the splendor and the fancy Urdu. The cornerstone of the movie, the fundamentally vulnerable bond between Emperor Akbar and the Rajput princess Jodhaa simply doesn't create an impact as strong as one would have expected in a larger-than-life saga such as this. As contradictory as this may sound, Gowariker had an excellent premise to cut his teeth into, but not enough meat in the central plot to chew on. A cinematic head-scratcher, I'm sure, that not many filmmakers have to deal with.

Historically speaking the movie seems well-researched (for a wikipedia-educated person anyway), though it is certainly questionable whether Akbar would have spent so much time and energy wooing the politically-bonded Jodhaa when he reportedly had over a 100 wives to worry about. The military conquests and political travails of Akbar are intricately woven into the plot in an efficient enough way so that no sub-plot seems out of place or unnecessary. When I say 'sub-plots', of course, I don't include the overly long-drawn sequences of grief and melodrama suffered by just about everyone in the movie, because there sure are plenty of 'unnecessary' instances of those. The movie trundles along at a luxuriously leisurely pace, and while that is forgivable for a period drama, one does wish that Mr. Gowariker hadn't wasted so much time in the first half just trying to establish the proceedings. And the battle scenes. How do I put it? When I first heard about the lavish budget and use of CGI in the film I began to dare to hope that for once, Bollywood would turn out something revolutionary in the purely technical realm of live action. All that came crashing down the moment the Battle of Panipat came on. The sequence is a seriously ridiculous piece of trash, and I was almost in tears by the end of it. Thankfully, however, the quality of the battle scenes improves dramatically as the film moves on (thanks in no small part to the fact that all the subsequent battles aren't really full-fledged, all-out wars but more of small-scale, half-hearted negotiation-cum-conflicts). The final one-on-one fight between Akbar and his principle nemesis bears striking resemblance to the Brad Pitt-Eric Bana fight in Troy, and though it isn't quite as good as the Troy one, it is reasonably well done. The swordfight between Jodhaa and Akbar, however, scores over all the other fight sequences, and considering how much the cinematography and stunt direction of this movie were being talked up, that's a little sad.

The movie's dialogue is considerably difficult to understand, specially since the actors simply refuse to pronounce Urdu the way that it is supposed to be pronounced. And sorry, but there just aren't enough memorable lines for a movie of such epic proportions. The music by A.R. Rahman is fantastic as usual, particularly the Azeem-O-Shaan Shehenshah track, which, in one word, is awesome. As for the acting, I can confidently say that Hrithik Roshan has matured into a truly marvellous actor - he brings out every confused and passionate facet of an emperor with such incredible intensity that I repeatedly had to hit myself on the head for ever having doubted his capabilities as an actor. That said, however, I could never quite shake off the lingering feeling that Hrithik just didn't fit the role of Akbar. He looks - how do I put it? - far too - chiselled? and a little, um, puny, for a king. If you're laughing at me for calling the man with probably the best body in Bollywood 'puny', you ought to take a look at the size of the guy who plays his brother-in-law. Aishwarya Rai is perfectly cast as the headstrong woman-who-would-be-queen, and manages to look like an exquisite dream even when she's straining every nerve trying to make those sobs sound genuine (I have to say I admire her immensely for the effort she puts into acting). The rest are all sidekicks who get sidelined repeatedly during the course of the stuttering romance between these two, though it must be said that Sonu Sood does surprise you with a competent performance.

The cinematography, I'll make no bones about this, is disappointing. The imposing forts and the sets look grand, I'll agree, but I always felt like there was something missing, something that Gowariker forgot to add when taking all those sweeping shots of architectural marvels. There was no majesty in the art direction, no sense of awe-inspiring grandeur. The only times the movie looked anything close to a visual spectacle were when the camera focussed on Ms Rai. This, however, is a completely subjective opinion; I'm sure there are lots of people out there who were totally taken in by the sets and the photography. It's just that I wasn't. It's one of those things. And the movie's length! God, did no one on the sets of the movie remember to carry a watch? 3 hours 45 minutes is WAY too long for ANY kind of movie. One thing's for sure, this film is not going to win any awards for editing.

Gowariker'e last movie, Swades (which I personally loved), was widely criticized for being too much like a documentary and for lacking heart and entertainment value. I think that sort of criticism is much more appropriate for Jodhaa-Akbar. The movie has all the right intentions and the means to be going on with, but it simply fails to ignite the emotions of the viewer. It almost looks a little robotic - some of the lines and sequences, like the one where Akbar abolishes the jizyah tax, come off as downright mechanical. Not a major fault on the part of the director, by any means, but sometimes this sort of thing stops an ambitious and well-made project from becoming a great movie. Swades was a great movie. So was Asoka, if you're talking about historical epics. Not so Jodhaa-Akbar.

The Vitch King And The Queen Of Scream

2008-01-28T10:49:00.000-08:00

I could spend the next half an hour heaping lavish abuse on Novak Djokovic for, well, a lot of things, but I'll restrain myself a little. It is, after all, not his fault that he's so freakishly talented. Nor is it his fault that his parents are rude and plain stupid (who on earth says "my son is never going to lose to Roger Federer again"??). But let's give credit where it's due. Djokovic played a flawless tournament to win the Australian Open, almost as flawless as Roger Federer's magical waltz Down Under last year (Djokovic lost one set through the tournament to Federer's zero last year). Incidentally, speaking of Federer, did everyone really think he'd win 3 Grand Slams in a year for a third consecutive year, and fourth overall? Perhaps Federer should start spending as much time on teaching tennis followers the law of averages as he does on designing his super-special 'royalty' outfits. Federer is human. He can sometimes, some very rare times, be brought down by a combination of a stomach virus, Novak Djokovic and mental fatigue. Throw in boredom as well. He's human. He's made it to 15 straight Grand Slam semifinals. I'm a little confused.

The women's section was dominated by the irrepressible Maria Sharapova, and for good reason. That girl can hit the ball hard. For all the constant talk about the 'unnecessary' hype surrounding her, her play during the Open fortnight was breathtaking. It's not often that a player as sensational as Justine Henin gets bagelled. As much as the 'serious' tennis followers like to hate her relentless, ball-pounding game, her incessant screams and her somewhat classless father (I must admit I can't stand Yuri Sharapov either), Maria Sharapova is here to stay, and to dominate. Her remarkable fighting qualities alone can win her at least a couple more Grand Slams. And when you add her tremendous power-hitting to the picture, a Seles-like dominance cannot be completely ruled out. And that's saying quite something.

The tournament as a whole was thoroughly entertaining, with numerous classic matches going deep into the Australian nights becoming the norm at the the third round stage. Frankly, I don't really see why the Australian Open is considered a second-tier Slam considering how many great tennis matches have happened at the Slam over the years. The Federer-Safin 2005 semi is still talked about in reverent tones by tennis purists, while the Roddick-el Aynaoui match, that of the 21-19 final set, still brings back memories of back-breaking exhaustion and tireless fortitude. Of course, last year's semi final match between Federer and Roddick will be forever remembered too, but for altogether more exalted reasons (just for the record, I don't think I've ever seen as magnificent a display of tennis as Federer put on in that match). This time, however, Federer was considerably less magnificent, and his third round scrap against another Serb, Janko Tipsarevic, was as good an exhibition of his fantastic clutch serving as it was of his at times erratic groundstrokes. The match was great to watch, nevertheless, as was the Baghdatis-Safin third second round encounter. (As a side note, do Jo-Wilfried Tsonga's thundering groundstrokes and overall freedom of play remind anyone else of the glory days of Safin?) The Lleyton Hewitt-Baghdatis match was one to savour too, even if the quality of tennis wasn't all that high during the latter stage of the match. Perhaps the most thrilling, high quality display of tennis, however, was the Roddick-Kolschreiber match, a match in which the unknown Kolschreiber smacked 104 winners - yes, 104 winners, and only 33 unforced errors. Talk about unreal tennis. And the Australian Open is still considered a lightweight Slam? Wake up, people!

I don't know about you, but the end of the Australian Open always spells the beginning of a period of doom and misery for me. Five months without a Grand Slam! It's tough. Incidentally, Federer's quest for immortality has undoubtedly become several notches tougher, what with Djokovic now a shining new member of the 'Challengers to the Federer Reign of Absurdly Overwhelming Dominance'. My only hope is that if Federer does actually lose his No.1 ranking at any point this year, it is Rafael Nadal and not the arrogant prick Djokovic who temporarily latches on to the throne. And just in case you're wondering why I am being so negative about Djokovic, you should just watch one of his matches. He's got a brilliant game but my word is he annoying! The least he could do is take some public behaviour tips from his adorable fellow Serbs Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic. Those may be the Serbian Vitches, but Djoker is the real Witch. Why can't people like Tsonga win Grand Slams just for their personality?

Overreacting to Molehills

2008-01-08T10:01:00.000-08:00

It's been 3 days since the India-Australia Test at Sydney got over, but the furore over the events during the match simply refuses to subside. I suppose you could call this a good thing, what with Test cricket getting such passionate attention after a prolonged spell of unpopularity, but that would be being optimistic in the extreme. You know what else has been extreme? The knee-jerk and unreasonable reactions to the whole unfortunate episode. I'm sorry, but threatening to boycott a cricket tour because of a couple of bad umpiring decisions and a harsh sentence for an allegedly racist remark is going WAY overboard. I wonder if the series would have been in as much jeopardy as it is now if India had managed to save the Test?

The media has been every bit as excessive in its assessment of the affair as the boycott-happy Indian cricket board. The Times of India has been particularly boisterous in its coverage of the episode, first calling for the result of the Test to be annulled and then proceeding to devote headline after headline (and editorials too) to the threatened tour. Perhaps someone should tell the guys up at The Times of India that if the result of every Test match that suffered from umpiring errors was annulled, there would barely be more than a couple of Test results in the sub-continent in the 80's and early 90's. Umpiring errors, specially when they come from non-biased umpires (Steve Bucknor and Mark Benson are both 'neutral' umpires; they have almost no connection with Australia or Australian cricket) have to be taken with a pinch of salt; there's nothing much you can do about them until the ICC and the cricketing world in general realize the importance of bringing technology into all decisions on the cricket field. So much for level-headed common sense.

As far as the 'bad sportsmanship' of the Australian cricketers is concerned, I'd like to know when the Aussies have ever been a saintly group of sweet-talkers. The Kangaroos have been known to be past masters at sledging, or 'mental disintegration' as Steve Waugh liked to euphemistically put it, and if the rest of the cricketing world could tolerate their nonsense for a whole decade, then why the hue and cry all of a sudden? The English and their 'jellybeans' tactics hadn't attracted half as fierce a backlash as the Aussies have in this Test, which makes me really wonder whether it's just human nature to revel in the foibles of the mighty and the powerful. And puh-lease, since when has claiming half volley catches become a criminal offense? Nearly every player in the world has done it at some point of his career, and while that doesn't make it any less distasteful, it certainly does raise a few questions about the indignant reactions to Michael Clarke's catch to dismiss Sourav Ganguly (which, incidentally, wasn't even proven to be conclusively illegal).

The Harbhajan Singh-Andrew Symonds spat was a serious issue, I'll admit, but wouldn't a straightforward motion for an appeal (which is all the Indian management was left to do eventually anyway) have sufficed, rather than the dramatic boycott threats and disturbingly grave statements that the BCCI so foolishly indulged in? Ah, theatrics! How we love to honour thee! Ok, maybe that was a little cheesy, but I really am at pains to understand why the media and the Indian cricket board have made such a big issue out of this matter. It was only a cricket match, after all - a cricket match in which a few decisions unfortunately and unwittingly decided the course of the match, but also a cricket match in which one team lost because it couldn't survive an over of part-time left-arm spin. Perhaps it would do the Indian team a whole lot of good if its management spent half as much time and effort as it did in attacking the umpiring and refereeing in the match into teaching its bowlers how to hold a bat.

Bollywood 2007: Highlights

2008-01-06T10:46:00.000-08:00

I know this is a little late, but here's the second of my 'best of the year' lists, which is about Bollywood. I guess I'll just have to abandon the third of my lists; my posts about tennis hardly get any readers anyway.

Movie of the year: A tight three-way contest between No Smoking, Taare Zameen Par and Jab We Met. After a lot of thought I’ve decided to go with No Smoking for its fantastically imaginative and original script that is treated with such immaculate flair by Anurag Kashyap. No Smoking has almost made me forgive Kashyap for his disparaging comments about Sanjay Bhansali’s Black. Almost.

Performance of the year: Kareena Kapoor’s exuberant turn as the rumbustious Geet in Jab We Met may not have been the greatest exhibition of acting, but it will be remembered for years to come for the sheer fullness of its spirit and naturalness of its expression. Jab We Met wasn’t so much a story of a chance meeting between two potential lovers as it was a celebration of the star that is Kareena Kapoor. And did Kareena enjoy the celebration!
Honorable mention: Darsheel Safary for his stunningly realistic portrayal of a dyslexic child in Taare Zameen Par.

Disappointment of the year: Om Shanti Om may have been the biggest blockbuster of the year, but it fell miles short of my expectations from Farah Khan, especially as it came after the super-enjoyable Main Hoon Na. Someone needs to tell Farah Khan that the spoof-cum-tribute thing is getting a little old now.

PR mastery of the year: Amitabh Bachchan made all the wrong moves career-wise, starring in duds ranging from the ridiculous Jhoom Barabar Jhoom to the pitiable Ram Gopal Verma Ki Aag, but he was mighty successful in one thing – teaching his son how to handle the media. Abhi-Ash was low-key and unglamorous, but not one joint public appearance by the couple failed to whip up a media frenzy. Clearly, the B Family’s got what it takes. I’ve finally figured out how Aishwarya Rai could ever have agreed to marry Abhishek Bachchan. Enough said.

‘Still got it’ star of the year: Shahrukh Khan defied his age and lack of versatility to come up with a couple of blockbusters and Anil Kapoor proved in Welcome that there’s no one who can quite do the loveable hooligan as well as him, but it is Madhuri Dixit who gets my vote for this award for simply being the Madhuri Dixit we’ve all grown to love. Five years after her last cinematic appearance in Devdas, Ms Dixit-Nene in Aaja Nachle is every bit as charming, as beautiful and as magical as she was in her heyday. Too bad her comeback movie itself was as silly as was Madhuri enthralling.

‘Serves you right’ act of the year: The legal team of Hitch suing, or attempting to sue the makers of Partner for plagiarism. It’s about time Bollywood puts a stop to its shameless and utterly disgraceful ripping off of Hollywood flicks.

Song of the year: As many as 3 songs from Taare Zameen Par could have come up trumps in this category - Aamir Khan sure does know a thing or two about songs and their place in a movie. Maa was unbelievably heart-rending and the title track was magnificent. But Mera Jahan had it all - great music, terrific lyrics and choreography that was almost too perfect to be true. Well, the movie was Aamir Khan's directorial debut; something had to be perfect.
Honourable mention: The Main Agar Kahoon track from Om Shanti Om for its wonderful, wonderful picturization, Tum Se Hi from Jab We Met for its beautiful construction coupled with its sweetly soothing tune and Phoonk De from No Smoking for, well, you'll never get it, so never mind.

Dance sequence of the year: Kareena Kapoor and Saroj Khan’s Yeh Ishq Hai number from Jab We Met. Most people might shudder in alarm at a Kareena Kapoor dance getting any sort of award in the year that Madhuri Dixit made a smashing dance-oriented comeback, but Ms Kapoor was something else in that song. She wasn’t dancing in front of the camera; she was having a whale of a time out there. So much so that some of her enthusiasm seemed to rub off on everyone else who appeared in the song. And I haven’t even started on the effortlessness of it all. *shakes head in awe*

Unintentionally hilarious movie of the year: Without a doubt the indescribable Cash. The only thing I want to know is: how on earth could Ajay Devgan have gone from the sensational Omkara to something as alarmingly inane as Cash? Incidentally, Cash would also be a strong candidate for the worst movie of the decade award, if ever someone decides to give such an award away.

Cricket 2007: Awards

2007-12-31T09:32:00.000-08:00

It’s that time of the year again. No, I won’t be a cynical prick this time by bemoaning everything that’s wrong with silly New Year’s parties and launching into the ridiculous behaviour of the depressing bunch of people that make up the party-going crowd. Instead, I’ll follow the second most popular trend that people tend to follow at this time of the year – compiling ‘best of the year’ lists. So here is the first of 3 lists that I have come up with:

I. CRICKET:

Team of the year: Perhaps the most yawn-inducing category. Was there even a hint of a challenge to Australia’s supremacy in any form of cricket that lasted longer than 4 hours? I don’t know why opposing teams even bother to turn up against Ricky Ponting’s demons.

Player of the year: An infinitely more difficult category than the first. Do I give the nod to Jacques Kallis’s metronomic brilliance, Kumar Sangakkara’s assured artistry or Muttiah Muralitharan’s mind-numbing consistency? Purely in statistical terms Sangakkara was beyond all competition, but I think I’ll go with Kallis because of the quality of opposition he faced while making all those hundreds and the grittiness of his response to being omitted from the 20-20 squad.

Match of the year: A tough contest between the Australia-South Africa group clash at the 50-50 World Cup, the Sri Lanka-South Africa thriller at the same tournament and the two Indo-Pak battles at the 20-20 World Cup. The Indo-Pak matches - both of them - get my vote for the sheer novelty and thrill quotient of 20-20 matches.

Tragedy of the year: No disrespect to Bob Woolmer, but the pathetic organization of the 50-over World Cup was the unqualified disaster of the year. The forlorn crowds and lack of competition at the event made most cricket aficionados shake their heads and wonder whether this was the worst World Cup ever, only for the ICC to seal the debate by declaring that contrary to popular belief, the tournament was a resounding success. Reality check, anyone?

Goof-up of the year: Without a doubt the cringe-worthy farce at the end of the World Cup final. Seriously, what was Aleem Dar thinking? Honorable mentions to the Jamaican police for their cheap mystery novel antics after Bob Woolmer’s tragic death and Pakistan’s captain Shoaib Malik who was daft enough to be ignorant of the bowl-out rule at the 20-20 World Cup and dafter still to actually express his ignorance to the world.

Guffaw-worthy moment of the year: The winner here is Shane Warne’s George W. Bush-worthy gaffe, wherein he accidentally sent a dirty SMS to his wife which, quite remarkably, was addressed to someone else. Honestly, that guy’s got one thick head. It’s a miracle he actually knew which side of the pitch to bowl to, with a brain like that.

Colourful character of the year: Santhakumaran Sreesanth, how ridiculous art thou? The bat-swinging in Andre Nel’s face (Nel, incidentally, was another strong candidate for this award) last year was adorable, but Sreesanth's incredibly wayward bowling on the England tour, his riveting altercations with Andrew Symonds, his moments of infamy like the one where he tried to unsportingly run Symonds out and his astoundingly intelligent interviews have made him one of the most polarizing cricketers in the world, and also THE cricketing character of the year. Move over Shane Warne, your successor is here.

Debutant of the year: Mitchell Johnson may not have had quite such an eventful Test debut, but he’s shaping up to be a darn good bowler in all forms of the game and there was no other significant debut all year, so an automatic choice, really.

Let-down of the year: Brian Lara’s failures in the ICL, the rebel 20-20 league floated by Kapil Dev and Co may not have tarnished his legacy all that much, considering the very small number of people who took the ICL seriously, but his decidedly sub-par performances were still quite depressing. After all the hoopla surrounding the ICL’s very expensive signing of the legendary Trinidadian, Lara disappointed spectacularly, barely reaching double figures in any innings. A joke went around that Lara’s runs were some of the most expensive in history, what with his paltry 31 runs through the tournament fetching him a reported 1 million dollars. I’m sure Lara wouldn’t be amused.

Quote of the year: The quote I have selected is not particularly witty or humourous, but its emotional appeal, specially for Indian cricket fans, make it one of the most memorable quotes of the decade. Here's Mahendra Singh Dhoni on seeing the tumultuous response given to his World Cup-winning team in Mumbai:
"We are told that Mumbai is a city which is always on the move. See, me and my boys have brought the entire city to a standstill today."

Women's Empowerment: What's The Real Obstacle Here?

2007-12-16T12:01:00.000-08:00

Serious Subject Alert: Here I go again, posting a very grave and very long article on my blog, and consequently running a very serious risk of losing all my readership in an instant. But what's life without a few risks?

When Oprah Winfrey decides to endorse Barack Obama and not the force of nature that is Hilary Clinton as her preferred U.S. presidential candidate, you know the feminist revolution that once swept across the world, threatening to obliterate everything in its path, is in trouble. Suggesting that this was probably just a case of the ever-magnanimous (and incredibly influential) Ms Winfrey playing favourites amongst her chosen discriminated groups is clearly a futile argument. Hilary Clinton certainly has tried everything in her rich armory to gain the support of Americans – she has played the understanding wife, the cold, calculating strategist, the empathizing leader, even the caring mother-figure. Everything save for the undignified role of the seductress (a role which she prefers to leave, no doubt, for the Monica Lewinskys of this world). And yet, she seems to be fighting a losing battle that is slipping away from her every single day. For all the talk about the West being more broad-minded and supportive of women’s rights, Ms Clinton’s wardrobe and her desperate attempts to break the bubble of pre-supposed feminine inadequacy have attracted far greater attention than her political policies. And that, no matter which way you spin it, is a sad commentary on the efforts of those countless activists who have been trying to prove to an amused and disbelieving world that equality of the sexes isn’t such a fanciful concept after all.

There is no social issue today, except perhaps for AIDS, that elicits as much attention, both positive and negative, as does the idea of women’s empowerment. Which is why it is particularly surprising, not to mention a little annoying, that so little has changed in the way that society looks at women despite decades of unstinting efforts of thousands of activists the world over. Women have been objectified for centuries together, and they are objectified even today. We may go blue in the face denying this, pointing at the purposeful strides that women have supposedly made in every field, but the fact remains that the prettier women are always the ones making the bigger strides while the not-so-pretty are left to wallow in their glorious wakes, wondering and muttering how things might have been a lot different but for a few quirks of fate. Which was the last popular women-centric movie to come out of Bollywood? Chak De! India earned all the big bucks and, as an added bonus, picked up bucketfuls of critical acclaim too, for its supposedly noble theme highlighting women’s rights. However, I couldn’t help but notice that the prettiest lass from the team not only got the most flattering camera space but was also given the royal treatment in terms of character development. Didn’t it strike anyone else as odd that the midget-like, and decidedly unattractive rival of Preeti Sabarwal (the beauty of the team) was consistently painted as the villain in the fight between the two even though both the characters were equally guilty of wrongdoing? And rather unsurprisingly, audiences across the country gleefully lapped it all up without noticing anything amiss. If you want any further confirmation of what I’m trying to say, you only have to turn on your TV and catch the first fairness cream ad that is aired; nothing that I say here will convey my point better than those lovely ads. And oh, if you’ve got a little more time to spare, keep watching the tube until an ad for a men’s fairness cream shows up. Trust me, if nothing else, it’ll keep you thoroughly entertained.

So what exactly is the obstacle that is preventing women from getting their rightful share from society? There can obviously be no clear answer to this question, but my thinking says that the problem lies not in the basic intent behind the feminist movement, nor in the means used by the feminists to achieve their ends. It’s in the peripheral matters, the issues secondary to the whole purpose of the endeavor, wherein all the bungling occurs. Women are equals of men, say the feminists. Right, we agree whole-heartedly with that. But pray why must they insist on thrusting the idea down our minds that women are identical to men? Women are not identical to men; they were never meant to be. Suggesting that women are, in terms of ability, indistinguishable from men, or, in other words, that women can do everything that men can, is not only inappropriate, but also highly insulting to women, men and humanity in general.

Individuality is one of the strongest qualities of humans, which is why it is only imperative for each human to retain his or her unique identity. This is obviously not taken into account by the convoluted logic behind wanting women to do anything and everything that is done by their male counterparts. We can ignore the realities of the world all we want but there’s no going around the fact there are some things that men do better than women, and some that women do better than men. Men are lousy parents and lousier cooks, but so are women terrible at driving and sports. Ok, ‘terrible’ might be a bit harsh when it comes to sports, but honestly, can women ever compete with men on a sustained basis when it comes to the really athletic games like soccer, hockey or tennis? Let’s get real; the main reason why women’s tennis is as popular as it is today is that the hemlines of the ladies can’t stop getting any higher. And as much as I admire the Williams sisters for their determination and athleticism, there’s no way they can convince me that women play tennis at the same level as men – you’ve only got to watch a three-set women’s match that lasts longer than 2 hours and all the huffing and panting and collapsing will give you a fair idea of just how ridiculous the notion that women can do everything that men can really is. And I’m sure everyone has experienced the undeniable truth that a woman working in a male-dominated field is never taken seriously, which again leads to the objectification and bias that I mentioned earlier.

Before anyone takes me for a bigoted male chauvinist, however, I must add that there are numerous things that men can’t do as well as women. Take building and maintaining relationships, for instance. Or being organized and efficient. Or giving shape to the future of humanity by being the ever-compassionate superpower that is a mother. But do we have the men clamoring to prove to the world how they can do all these things as well as women? Definitely not. This, however, opens up another can of worms. Why exactly do women want to compete in male strongholds and not vice-versa? A quick answer would be that the male strongholds are generally the more important and lucrative areas of work, while the things women are good at are just frilly, unimportant non-issues. But is that really so? I defy anyone who says that raising a kid is not important as fighting in a war. In fact, I’d even say raising a kid is actually more important than fighting in a war. What, then, is the real reason behind this disequilibrium? Another unanswerable question, I’m afraid, but I’ll try my best.

To my mind, the single most significant and pivotal reason for the gender inequality that has outlived every civilization in history is the attitude of ALL humans towards the qualities of the two sexes. Bravery, physical strength, decisiveness – all the attributes generally found in males have always been considered the most desirable qualities that a human can possess. ‘Manliness’ is something to be excessively proud about, as is ‘being a man’ or ‘not being a girl’. On the other hand, having qualities like kindness, compassion, patience and love have never been anything to shout about. Being virile is an achievement, even if it is completely inborn, but being girlish is distinctly undesirable. And this is not just the mindset of males; women think the exact same way. That is why, if a woman can cook, something that she’s traditionally supposed to be good at, it’s no big deal. But if a man is a champion at sports, he’s a hero worthy of reverence. Wouldn’t it be a lot simpler for everyone if we just attached a little more value to the abilities and domains traditionally ruled by women? If, for instance, we considered cooking as an admirable career to have, is there any doubt that women would rapidly and completely gain full control of the entire hotel management business all over the world? How about teaching? Or child counseling? Or fashion, for crying out loud? Is it really that shameful to have successful careers in any of these fields?

Alas, for simple logic. Instead of encouraging women to come out of their homes and carve out a distinctive place for themselves in society doing things that they are naturally good at, the so-called feminists are encouraging women to come out of their homes and do things that they’re not naturally good at, thus making their job doubly difficult and triply uncomfortable. Women’s empowerment cannot come from making labored and wince-inducing strides in areas that men are naturally better in, but from making purposeful and confident strides in areas that are suited to feminine abilities and powers. There will always be an Indra Nooyi here and a Serena Williams there to remind us that there can be wondrous exceptions to the rules, but hoping for the exceptions to become the rules is foolish in the extreme. Equality does not mean sameness – men and women have their own unique identities and the best way to reinforce the equality between men and women is to give due respect to the identities and abilities of both the sexes. If we can manage that, there won’t be any need to ‘empower’ women – they have enough power within them already.

Me Bored, So Me Write

2007-11-26T11:20:00.000-08:00

I never thought I'd literally see a phrase written all over an event, but it was really hard to keep away the phrase 'too much of a good thing' from my mind while watching the 1st of 3 Test matches between India and Pakistan in Delhi. Honestly, the cricket throughout the match was so vapid and flavourless that it was startling. It didn't help, of course, that the current Pakistan team has about as much talent as a second string New Zealand team. The fizz has clearly fizzled out of Indo-Pak cricket and anyone who still insists that the cross-border rivalry is the definitive cricketing rivalry in the world needs to be rapped sharply on the head with a golfing iron or worse still, be forced to watch the movie Beowulf twice in a row. As a cricket fan, I'd like nothing better than the two countries to go back to their precious bickering and huffy cold shoulders (though only in the cricketing arena). Surely that would bring back the crackling intensity that once made Indo-Pak cricket so thoroughly mesmerizing? And for a short-term solution, how about giving Virender Sehwag a game or two?

Watched Bhool Bhulaiya over the weekend, and I must say, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Akshay Kumar really has come into his own after all those long, tiring years of insipid roles and lame acting. The show-stealer, however, is undoubtedly the magnificent Vidya Balan who's possibly brought the most engaging charisma and endearing screen presence to the movies since the days of Madhuri Dixit. If only Bollywood was a little kinder to its less beautiful citizens....

Incidentally, if you're at all planning on extracting revenge from a particularly disagreeable adversary, you'd be well-advised to gift him tickets to the movie Beowulf. The poor guy won't know what hit him.

One Time Too Many

2007-11-10T03:21:00.000-08:00

We know you like poking fun at Bollywood, Farah Khan, but it's getting a little old now. It all started, of course, with the hysterical Woh Ladki Hai Kahan number from Dil Chahta Hai. Main Hoon Na took Ms Khan's derring-do a step further; the subtlety and the sheer audacity of the humor carried it far beyond the most accomplished Hollywood spoofs in memory and, in my opinion, it can now be bracketed among the masterpieces of the decade. Yes, it's worked before, but that doesn't mean it will work every time. Om Shanti Om, Farah Khan's latest offering, is everything that a typical Diwali blockbuster ought to be, and yet it's remarkably unsatisfying, almost as though she had all the right intentions and cinematic techniques in mind but forgot somewhere during the making that she was making a full-length Bollywood movie, not an MTV gag show.

Om Shanti Om is as extravagant as they get - the huge sets, colourful songs and charismatic stars are all dutifully in place, as are the melodramatic lines and intentional over-acting. The plot is ludicrously fantastical - an unabashed mixture of Madhumati and Karz, if you will. Shahrukh Khan hams like there's no tomorrow, Kirron Kher weeps buckets as the quintessential tragic mother and there's also a disarmingly gorgeous newcomer in the form of Deepika Padukone to keep things electrified. In short, everything that made Main Hoon Na such a delightful charmer is recreated in this nearly 3-hour long saga. If only Om Shanti Om was half as entertaining as its predecessor. I'm sorry, but Farah Khan has some major explaining to do as to why exactly the first half is as boring as it is. The 70's may have been a fascinating time in the Bollywood studios, but Ms Khan's depiction of the same is decidedly not. Forget the tongue-in-cheek potshots at melodrama, lovers playing lousy tennis and garish costumes - if it doesn't keep you entertained, it's all a waste of time.

The second half is considerably better, and thankfully moves at a lively pace, but again you always get the nagging feeling that something's missing. The almost non-stop sprinkling of stars in funny cameos does manage to perk things up appreciably, but things go flat the moment the movie comes back to the central plot. For some reason, the movie decides to take itself more seriously as it approaches the climax, with expectedly disappointing results. A Madhumati-inspired culmination wasn't exactly the brightest idea, and the end credits, with every single crew member getting to dance absurdly for the cameras, is downright annoying. An overdose of MTV, perhaps?

The songs, for once, DON'T slow down the pace of the movie (surprise, surprise!), and that's mainly because all of the songs have a definite purpose and carry the story forward (with the exception of Deewangi Deewangi - but then again, weren't the "31 stars" the biggest attraction of the movie?). Moreover, the fact that Farah Khan is a choreographer par excellence is a major plus point too. Main Agar Kahoon has to be one of the best shot songs in recent times - one of Farah Khan's finest works ever. Dard-e-Disco is a bit of an eyesore, but the rest of the songs are fairly tolerable, and coming from a sworn song-hater (only in the middle of a movie) like me, that's gigantic praise. You've got at least one department of Bollywood filmmaking completely covered, Ms Khan.

Comparing a director's product with his earlier works isn't always the fairest thing to do. However, when the director decides to repeat or even refine his earlier methods, then comparisons are justified and more importantly, inevitable. And I can confidently say that Om Shanti Om's biggest drawback is that its director is the maker of a gem like Main Hoon Na. While Main Hoon Na was fresh in its appeal and made you laugh hysterically, Om Shanti Om looks repititive and only manages to make you chuckle, and that too sporadically. Again, while Main Hoon Na had a concrete, if laughably unrealistic script (as intended), Om Shanti Om suffers from jerky writing and an excess of needless subplots. And of course, someone needs to tell Ms Khan that the whole spoof-cum-tribute thing looked cute the first time; the second time it only comes off as stale and unimaginative. Please, Farah Khan, get down to some serious filmmaking next time; brand SRK can only save you so many times.

P.S. All of these disparaging comments about Om Shanti Om have stemmed mainly from the fact that I absolutely loved Main Hoon Na. If you haven't watched or worse still, absolutely hated Main Hoon Na, then the chances are that you might just thoroughly enjoy Om Shanti Om.

P.P.S. Deepika Padukone might just be the next big thing of Bollywood. If only she had a remotely pleasant voice to go with her stunning looks (and this is assuming that her voice wasn't dubbed for the movie).

P.P.P.S. Akshay Kumar is positively hilarious in his two-minute role. The movie might actually be worth watching just for his brilliant turn.

The Good Side Of Bollywood

2007-10-27T12:00:00.000-07:00

I'd almost forgotten how it felt to watch a clean, wholesome and thoroughly entertaining Bollywood movie. Now don't roll your eyes at me as though I'm some Hollywood-crazy wannabe. Bollywood actually has been churning out some pretty insufferable stuff of late; you can't blame me for fawning over every new Hollywood release while only coldly condescending to declare to anyone who'd listen that I have no time for the melodramatic trash that is churned out by Indian filmmakers. But every situation has a saviour, as they say, and I can confidently say that I have found, if only accidentally, the perfect balm to my Bollywood-aversion - the deliciously charming Jab We Met.

To put it very simply, the movie is a top-class entertainer. If Socha Na Tha, director Imtiaz Ali's first venture was a refreshing take on the quintessential Bollywood love story, then Jab We Met is more of the same, only considerably funnier. The plot, admittedly, is nothing much to write home about - there can be only so many variations of the boy-and-girl-meet-on-a-train-and-decide-to-embark-on-a-life-changing-journey-together pitch. Ali's execution of the trite, formulaic story, however, seems something like the wave of a magic wand - all of a sudden the situations seem more realistic, the characters more likable and the journey more fascinating. The dialogues are witty, the visuals stunningly dreamy (just why haven't our filmmakers explored Manali to the fullest?) and the melodrama is kept to a bare minimum. Did someone talk about the definitive Bollywood romantic comedy?

There are many things wonderfully close to perfection about Jab We Met, but none as close as the casting. Kareena Kapoor was born for the role of Geet, the high-strung Punjabi who lives life in its most dangerous and intoxicating fullness, and every single scene in the movie screams this simple fact loud and clear. For someone as prone to over-acting as her, Kareena shows remarkable restraint and poise, and some credit for this must definitely go to Ali. This girl clearly has oodles of talent; why do so few directors make full use of it? As she sprints across the railway station, completely out of breath, screaming, "Besharam, apni wardi utar ke phek de", you know you're watching a potential legend. Shahid Kapoor, though overshadowed by the sheer charisma of his co-star, puts in a thoroughly accomplished performance. The music is melodious and the choreography of the songs is breath-taking; however, you can't help but notice that the songs do more harm than good: slowing down the pace of the movie is NOT a good idea. But I can forgive one blemish in a movie which is otherwise so thoroughly entertaining.

The movie has a certain subtlety to it that transcends the loud Geet and her louder family. It has no sermonizing and no unnecessary tears, yet the difference between living one's life impetuously and taking life too seriously is brought out with mesmerizing vividness. The movie has one of the most heart-warming separation lines in the history of Indian cinema and it can also boast, quite unusually for a movie of this genre, of a brilliantly taut climax. Is this the best Bollywood romantic comedy ever? Ah, looks like I'm going a little overboard now. Blame it on the excitability of human nature. Or on the incredible star appeal of a certain Kareena Kapoor. Don't sneer, watch the movie.

Random Reactions

2007-10-21T11:54:00.000-07:00

What have you done, J K Rowling?! You've completely ruined Dumbledore for me! (If you don't know what I'm talking about, you really need to read the newspaper more often.)

Also, I think I made a big mistake by including Kimi Raikkonen in my list of over-rated people. He fully deserved to steal the F1 World Championship from right under the grumpy noses of Lewis Hamilton (who's still my favourite driver), Fernando Alonso and McLaren. And did he do it in style!

ALSO, I hate it when Roger Federer loses, specially in a tournament final, as he did today against David Nalbandian at the Madrid Masters. By the way, has it become some kind of a fashion to defeat the top 3 ranked players in consecutive matches?

A Disease That Refuses To Go Away

2007-10-20T11:59:00.000-07:00

I've been told that I write about useless, frivolous things (read: sports and movies) far too often on my blog. And while I'm not usually one to take criticism sportingly, I think being told anything about my blog is certainly an improvement over the cold ignorance that my blog is usually subjected to. So here's my first 'serious' post in quite a while:

Science research studies are in quite a terrific vogue these days. There are scientists doing research on the most diverse subjects imaginable, from analyzing the changes in the average person's favoured pastime to finding out the effects of blogging on general intelligence levels. And then we have scientists speaking disgustingly filthy garbage supposedly backed by some mysterious 'tests' that no one has ever heard of. Ladies and gentlemen, the eminent scientist going by the name of James Watson, THE James Watson, he of the legendary (at least for Biology students) Watson-Crick DNA model, has just become another publicity-hungry Paris Hilton, but without the good looks, of course. Apparently Mr. Watson is aware of certain 'tests' that prove conclusively that white people are inherently more intelligent than people of all other races, particularly those of African origin. Mr. Watson's remarks, pronouncing this extraordinarily dim-witted conclusion, came just days ahead of a lecture in Europe and more suspiciously, the release of his new book (any guesses why he wants all the publicity?) and have predictably sparked an outrage all over the world. He has, since, taken back his comments and apologized, but only after being suspended from his research centre and being forced to cancel his European tour. What I'd like to know, however, is whether making despicable racist comments such as these can be punishable by rigorous jail sentences in any court of law. Also, is there a way to take back the Nobel prize awarded to him in 1962?

We're living in the 21st century, yet the malaise of racism continues to haunt and disgrace us. Just a few days ago Australian cricketer Andrew Symonds complained about being racially abused by sections of the Indian crowds. While reactions to Symonds's claim from the Indian authorities have ranged from the ridiculous ("The crowds weren't doing monkey imitations; they were praying to Hanuman, the deity associated with monkeys") to the silly ("Symonds probably misunderstood the crowds because of language problems"), the Australians should hardly be in a position to cry foul over racist crowds. A year ago a number of coloured South African players were at the receiving end of racial abuse from the typically boorish Aussie spectators, and for years Asians have been mutinously insisting that the regular mistreatment that Muttiah Muralitharan receives in Australia has as much to do with the supposed illegality of his bowling action as it does with the fact that Murali, a true-blue Asian, has forever been close to overtaking the very white Shane Warne in the race to the highest wickets record. But this in no way condones the behaviour of the Indian crowds. Indian spectators, together with those from our beloved neighbour Pakistan, are by far the worst behaved cricket spectators on the planet, and these latest incidents have only confirmed this sorry fact. Most of the Indian authorities, however, would clearly love to condone every Indian spectator in their sight, as comments like "It was all a misunderstanding, we Indians are not racists" amply show. We Indians are not racists? How many times have you seen a North-east Indian walking unobtrusively along a street and a very audible comment like "Chinky chinky chow chow" not coming up from someone on the street? Don't rack your brains for such a memory, it doesn't exist.

I'm sorry, but racism is just as prevalent in our dear country as it is in present-day America or the Hitler-era Germany. We just don't realize it. We fawn over anyone remotely Caucasian or better still, with blond hair, and view every black foreigner with suspicious disdain. We even refer to blacks as 'niggers', blissfully unaware of how offensive the term actually is. We laugh openly at our Northeastern brethren (ever wondered how humiliating that must be for them?), and the worst part is, most of us don't even find anything wrong with that. Which is why I find it particularly annoying when Indians take the moral high ground and claim that "our beautiful culture has no place for racism".

This is, of course, not to say that Indians are the worst perpetrators of this abhorrent sin. Racism, sadly, is about as ubiquitous around the world as water. And no amount of political correctness, superficial 'equality' drives, Academy awards (did Halle Berry even deserve the award for Monster?) and Grand Slam victories (does a day pass by when one of the Williams sisters doesn't receive hate mail?) is going to change that. It comes naturally to most of us, just like the ability to walk and talk. Or as the wonderful Mr. Watson would like to prove, some of are just inherently racist. If the African-American race could be inherently dumb, then why not?

The Shame!

2007-10-07T11:33:00.000-07:00

Lies, shame and misery. What is the sporting world coming to? We always thought Marion Jones was one heck of an inspiring lady. She was the woman who had set the 2000 Sydney Olympics alight with her audacious public desire to capture 5 gold medals in the track and field events. Her final medal tally - 3 golds and 2 bronzes - may not quite have matched her bold expectations, but it did firmly ensconce her in people's minds as a champion athlete, a woman to be revered and admired. Which is precisely why her stunning fall from grace, coming as it did in the midst of liberal tears and visible shame, evokes as much pity as it does disgust. Sure, Jones did cut a sorry figure as she tearfully admitted to a shell-shocked public that she used performance-enhancing drugs during the course of her stellar career. But when you think of all the times that you cheered for her apparently indomitable spirit and celebrated her famous victories, you do feel horribly cheated. How could she have had the gall to even smile at her adoring audience after her many race wins, knowing as she did that they had not come fairly? It's disgusting, there's no other word for it.

Sportspersons, I believe, have a greater duty than all others to be honest and fair when they're competing, for the simple reason that people consider sport to be the exemplification of the human spirit. I can forgive a businessman defrauding his way to success or an actor manipulating his way to the top, but when I see a sportsman celebrating the moment of his triumph, I know, or I assume, that there's an awe-inspiring story of toil and struggle that has led to his crowning glory. When we talk about sport, we talk about a phenomenon that is stripped to the bare essentials, a phenomenon that is a pure and fierce battle of wills - on the playing field, nothing else matters except your ability and desire to keep fighting. Besides, the fact that most sports events these days are televised makes everything all the more poignant. On so many occasions we actually see the sweat, blood and tears that go into the making of a champion, and that is why when we applaud the accomplishments of a sportsperson, our applause is truly heartfelt. And that is also why when a sportsman comes forward and confesses that he didn't actually deserve to be a victor, or more distressingly, that he swindled his opponent out of his well-earned success, we feel a sense of betrayal like no other.

The Marion Jones shame saga is not the only distasteful event to have disturbed the sporting population of late. Tennis is currently in the throes of its own match-fixing scandal, with no less than the No. 3 men's player in the world, Nikolay Davydenko, being at the centre of it all. What started as an isolated investigation into the irregular betting patterns over a match in which Davydenko retired against a hopeless opponent has, predictably, snowballed into a murky and far-reaching episode of conniving gamblers and suspiciously naive players. Scores of players, some rather well-known like Dmitry Tursunov and others remarkably unheard of, have come forward claiming that they have, at some point during their careers, been offered to throw matches by bettors. Of course, all of these distinguished players have proudly declared that they were conscientious enough to refuse the offers, but would it have killed them to report such incidents earlier? No one knows right now just how much of the tennis world is infected with the match-fixing disease, but honestly, will we even care when all the investigations are finally done and dusted? I hate to imagine tennis going the way of cricket - we have too few glorious sports to let them be eternally tarnished with nauseating evils like match-fixing. Sadly, however, the signs are all in place. The next thing we know, we'll be thinking things like, "Did Roger Federer really lose to Rafael Nadal?" I know, it's sickening.

10 Things We Learnt From the 20-20 World Cup

2007-09-25T11:53:00.000-07:00

To call the recently-concluded Twenty20 World Cup anything less than a roaring success wouldn't quite be a shameful blasphemy, but would certainly be mighty close to it. We should know, the ICC officials wouldn't be grinning from ear to ear if the event was anywhere near as bland as the 50-50 World Cup in the West Indies. So what were the things that we learned from this very special event? Taking a cue from the innumerable movie message boards across the internet, I'll do my own list of the 10 most significant lessons that the Twenty20 World Cup taught us:

1. An Indo-Pak match is an Indo-Pak match is an Indo-Pak match: Maybe this isn't such a new lesson. No matter how strange the format or how neutral the venue, India and Pakistan really do know how to produce electrifying cricket matches with more twists than your average Bourne flick. If the first round encounter between the two turned out to be historic, what with the bowl-out and all, the final that these two teams put on show is already being heralded as the best finale to a major tournament in cricketing history. The Ashes? What's that?

2. South Africa are chokers, but never expect Graeme Smith to admit that: Honestly, Mr. Smith, the cricketing world is tired of bringing up that semi-final of the 1999 World Cup whenever your team crashes out of a major tournament inexplicably. Why not spare us the trouble and not raise everyone's expectations by performing so brilliantly in unimportant matches?

3. Stuart Broad can do a Daan van Bunge: I know, I should probably concentrate on Yuvraj Singh's jaw-dropping splendor in that unforgettable 6 sixes-over, but pray why has no one thought of taking a poke (or several pokes) at the bowler who made it all possible, Stuart Broad? The fact that only one international bowler (a Netherlands bowler, no less) in the history of cricket has ever let such an embarrassment come to pass should be a fair indication of how poorly Broad bowled in that over. Ah, the English! They can be quite freakish sometimes. And that brings me to the next lesson.....

4. The English can be pathetic at every innovation that they bring into cricket: Ok, 'pathetic' may be a little harsh here, but the English side was supposed to have a better shot than most at winning the tournament, armed as it was with a battalion of '20-20 bits-and-pieces specialist cricketers' and because, well, they started 20-20 cricket. Which is why the solitary win against Zimbabwe must hurt, perhaps even more than their customary insipid performances at the 50-over World Cups. 'Skill' is still the most important virtue for a modern cricketer, dear Englishmen.

5. Santhakumaran Sreesanth will perpetually try to be the Shahid Afridi of the bowlers: 21 runs off his first over, 0 from his second. Was he trying to create some kind of record? To be fair to him, he did bowl brilliantly against Australia and he played a big role in India's victory over Pakistan in the first round. But I do know that if India had lost the final to Pakistan, forgiving Sreesanth would have been a pretty hard thing to do. How do you let a batsman like Sohail Tanvir hit you for 2 sixes in a single, desperately crucial over?

6. Mahendra Singh Dhoni can make singularly inspired decisions: The tournament made a strong case for Dhoni to be appointed the Test skipper to go with his newly-acquired one-day responsibilities. His choice of players to bowl in the bowl-out was fantastic to say the least, and his handling of remarkably inept bowlers like Joginder Sharma deserves applause of the highest order. Maybe if he regained some of his batting magic the selectors will give him the chance he so thoroughly deserves?

7. It's never too late to announce your arrival on the international cricket stage: At 33, Misbah-ul-Haq is 3 years older than Mike Hussey was when Hussey first started to show the cricketing world that there can be better finishers of a match than Michael Bevan. And yet, Misbah batted so breathtakingly well throughout the tournament that one was almost tempted to give him the title of 'Best finisher in world cricket', or even 'Mr. Cricket', if you will. Unfortunately for him, only 'almost' - the cute chip/nudge/glance or whatever other name you wish to give to the ungainly shot that Misbah played on the last ball of the tournament will haunt him for the rest of his life. Nevertheless, Misbah undoubtedly was the most unlikely star of the World Cup - he sprang up from virtual nothingness and played not one, but two innings for the ages during the tournament; I'm sure Mohammad Yousuf isn't quite so wild now that he lost his place in the team to a nobody like Misbah.

8. Australia are not invincible in every format of the game, and Ricky Ponting can get REAL cranky about that: Just as we were getting over Graeme Smith's child-like condemnation of the tournament's format that was supposedly responsible for his side's early exit, Ricky Ponting came out and blamed everything in sight for his side's rather unexpected early exit (on a side note, it's a mark of Australia's supremacy in all forms of the game that a semi-final loss is dubbed an 'early exit'). Lack of match practice, his openers being too prolific for his side's own good, luck, the cruel scheduling of Australia's matches in distant venues.....the list was endless. Dear me, have the elements all of a sudden turned their back on the Australian cricket team? Or did Ponting listen to one Serena Williams press conference too many?

9. You can score a century in a 20-20 match, and still end up on the losing side: Poor Chris Gayle, he was in such a violent mood in the very first match of the tournament, bludgeoning 10 sixes and blowing the South African attack to pieces, that it seems he scared his own bowlers. I'm sorry, but the West Indies bowling attack is really quite ridiculously spineless, and it wouldn't surprise me if Chris Gayle ended up on the losing side even if he made a double century. Honestly, nothing about this West Indian team can surprise me any more. Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

10. Twenty20 Cricket is THE FUTURE: Daniel Vettori and Adam Gilchrist can turn their noses up at the format all they want, but it is clear that if cricket wants to have any semblance of an existence on the world sports stage, then it's got to invest in Twenty20. Get rid of 50-over cricket within a year, I say. And puh-lease, get rid of the ludicrous dancers/cheerleaders too.

The Fine Art of Over-Rating

2007-09-16T11:45:00.000-07:00

Every age has a favourite darling. And every darling has a golden age. And when the darling becomes the favourite in the age that is golden, the result is an insufferable dose of good, old-fashioned over-rating. In today's post I'm going to list some of the people, mostly famous people, who I personally think are hugely over-rated by the media and subsequently (or consequently) are rewarded with a large amount of undeserved hero-worship by an adoring but intensely gullible public. So here are the most overrated (in my opinion, at least) people of our generation:

Abhishek Bachchan: Since his name starts with an 'A', I thought he'd be a nice place to start with. And even if the people on this list were ranked in order of most undeserving, he'd definitely be at the top or very near it. Since the past 6 years I've been trying to figure out why he's constantly been lavished with so much acclaim by critics and fans alike for his supposed 'acting abilities' and 'charm' when it has been clear to me from the outset that the only thing charming about him is the fact that he has great genes. The man cannot act to save his life (and neither can Fardeen Khan, another star-son with alarmingly low artistic powers - but at least Fardeen is showered with his fair share of flak from time to time), and yet the media and critics go on and on about his 'powerful' screen presence and restrained execution of his roles. There's a difference between restrained acting and NOT acting. If only the people of this country understood this simple fact.

Kimi Raikkonen: He was supposed to be the youngest world champion in Formula One history. He was also supposed to be the sparkling new heir to Michael Schumacher's throne of F1 dominance. Perhaps someone should have told these two oft-repeated truths to a rampaging Fernando Alonso, who not only stole the 'youngest champion' title from Kimi but also usurped Schumacher's throne while the legend was still in business. I'm sorry if sworn Kimi fans are offended by this, but the fact remains that when Kimi was at McLaren, the team was desperately floundering and in the depths of doom. This year, Alonso joined McLaren, and all of a sudden they're comfortably leading the drivers' standings. Engine problems, bad luck, a sub-standard car - what's the latest excuse for Kimi's continued failure to live up to the expectations? A team that is too perfect, perhaps?

Martin Scorsese: I must confess that I haven't seen many of the most-acclaimed movies of this supposedly genius of a filmmaker, but if the praise that some of his latest movies garnered is anything to go by, I haven't missed much. Gangs of New York was quite intolerably boring, The Aviator was really nothing great and The Departed has to be one of the best examples of how an unnecessarily long second half can completely ruin a movie. Honestly, I think the Oscar jury, for once, was right in denying Scorsese the glory of the Best Director award for as long as they did in spite of the nearly two decades of sustained critical acclaim that sat so prettily on his resume . Just goes to show the critics don't know everything.

Saurav Ganguly: Sure, he led India to the final of the 2003 World Cup, and beat the visiting Australians at their own game in 2001, but has there ever been a more self-centred player in the history of Indian cricket than Sourav Ganguly? Two years ago he almost brought Indian cricket to its knees with his ugly altercation with coach Greg Chappell, and this year he was at it again, creating divisions in the side which very probably led to India's humiliating early exit at the 50-50 World Cup. And don't even get me started on his glaring shortcomings as a batsman in the longer version of the game. I, for one, am really at a loss to see why a man who is clearly afraid of the short ball, creates ungainly camps in the team and is as much a team player as Shoaib Akhtar gets such enormous and unwavering support from his countless fans. Perhaps it's just the Bengali tendency of over-hyping every single person who hails from the state of West Bengal at work here.

Almost every fashion designer on the planet: This one's my favourite. Just when you think that clothing designs can't get any more bizarre, out comes a fashion designer showing off to an unsuspecting public an outfit that tightly binds your two hands together in a manner that forces you to constantly keep your hands outstretched and parallel to the ground. I honestly felt very sorry for that unfortunate model. Tell me, how many of the outfits that celebrated designers showcase in the scores of fashion shows across the world are actually wearable? It's one thing being creative and letting your imagination run wild in a field that prizes innovation and inventiveness, but quite another to put your admiring patrons through long periods of discomfort and embarrassment. Some would say there's no difference, but others (including me) would say there's all the difference in the world.

Pete Sampras: Alright, this may be a shocker for some - Sampras is the one who's won the most Grand Slam titles in history, right? Pete Sampras was a great tennis player, I agree. The only reason he's on this list is because roughly half of the tennis following population considers it appropriate to call Sampras the GOAT (or Greatest Of All Time, for the uninformed) in spite of the dazzling four years that Roger Federer has just put on show in front of an awe-struck audience. Federer is a better and more complete player than Sampras ever was, period. I know this may sound childish and a touch harsh on Sampras who was indeed a wonderful champion, but I can't understand how a player whose only major weapons were a monster serve and a terrific volley - ok, I'll add the running forehand to that frighteningly small list - and who never even made it to the finals of the claycourt Grand Slam can be talked of in GOAT discussions with as much reverence as is Sampras. Maybe this time it's the American tendency of over-praising the sons of its soil at work.

Heavy metal/hard rock bands: One of the biggest mysteries I've ever come across - why would loud, mostly unpleasant noise (that is actually supposed to be 'music') and generally crude and frustrated-with-life lyrics command millions of devoted fans all over the world? Does the fact that most rock musicians are shabbily dressed, cocaine-snorting, potential suicide candidates somehow add to the charm of rock/metal music? As I said, one of the biggest mysteries I've ever come across.

Ayn Rand: Ok, her books make for fairly interesting reading, but that's just about as good as it gets. Her strangely self-glorifying philosophies, fierce trumpeting of Objectivism and generally scathing views on generosity and charity that are prevalent in most of her major works are nothing short of laughable when thought about for more than a minute. Moreover, the effects that reading an Ayn Rand book can have on an impressionable youngster are quite disturbing to imagine. Quite why every celebrity worth his or her salt likes to declare that The Fountainhead is the best book they've ever read (it's not even the best book that Rand's written - Atlas Shrugged is, in my opinion, a better read) is beyond my comprehension. Maybe they think it makes them sound smart. In Rand's case, nevertheless, there is one small comfort: literary critics have, by and large, dismissed her writing as melodramatic and unimportant. Maybe the critics do know some things sometimes then.

Shilpa Shetty: She became a household name in the UK by claiming to be a victim of racism, and for that is held up in our country as a shining example of an Indian making waves internationally. Do I need to say any more?

Whew! That's a long list. And yet I haven't mentioned even half of the many names that came to my mind while starting this post. We do seem to have perfected the art of over-rating. How wonderful.

Cricket Gets Its Saviour, Tennis On The Lookout For One

2007-09-11T11:52:00.000-07:00

As Chris Gayle got down to some seriously savage ball-thwacking in the first match of the Twenty20 World Cup between West Indies and South Africa, all I could think was: why are they still playing 50-over cricket? If any cricket follower still feels the need to defend the logic of holding 50-over tournaments in the face of the adrenaline-rushing, maddeningly exciting blur that is Twenty20 cricket, then I have to fear for his sanity. Cricket needed something to save itself from the embarrassing doldrums that it was plunged into after the match-fixing saga, and it has got one. Twenty20 is fresh, innovative, thrilling and intense: just about everything you'd ask for in a modern sport. Thankfully, Twenty20 is also a money-spinner, and that would probably be a good enough reason to induce the bunch of dolts that is the ICC, which had the gall to insist to an outraged cricket community that this year's World Cup in the West Indies was a 'great success', to do some progressive work for a change. And while they're busy slobbering over the enormous mounds of money that they're bound to make through this new golden egg, will someone advise the idiots to push for Twenty20 cricket to be included in the Olympics?

Speaking of Olympics, I'm sure the fact that tennis is an Olympic sport must have alerted a lot of tennis followers to the deliciously fascinating possibilities the next year holds for a certain male tennis player. Roger Federer has achieved just about everything there is to achieve in tennis, having this week added yet another Grand Slam title to his already bulging collection by defeating Novak Djokovic in the US Open final, but a 'Golden Slam' might just be the one thing that firmly and eternally closes the GOAT debate. It's never been done before by a male player - Steffi Graf managed to win the Olympic gold medal in addition to the 4 Grand Slams in 1988, but no man has ever even come close to such a feat. Of course, Andre Agassi does have a career Golden Slam, but his career spanned two decades, so there. (On a side note, isn't it simply fabulous that the only two players in the history of tennis to have completed Golden Slams, whether in a calendar year or a career, ended up being married to each other?). The French Open remains the most worrying obstacle for Federer to achieve this Holy Grail-like accomplishment, but I like to believe that he's been saving it for the year when the full force of his achievements will hit the tennis world like a tornado. Yes, a Golden Slam next year would be totally stunningly terrific, and honestly, if anyone could ever do it, then it's got to be him. Federer will, however, have to watch out for an outlandish young player who likes to do silly impersonations of his well-respected peers, looks to the crowd instead of his coach when in need of advice whether to challenge a call, and who goes by the name of Novak Djokovic.

They said Federer didn't win the US Open final as much as Djokovic lost it, and for once they were right. When you get 7 set points spread over 2 sets, 5 of them on your serve, and fail to convert a single one of them, it says a lot about your poor mental strength, but if you're playing Federer, it also says a lot about your huge talent. Federer played awful for long periods during the game, I agree, but at times he was also outdone by Djoker's range of shots, his amazing movement, his effective serve and his exquisitely potent backhand. He's almost like a mini-Federer, to be very blunt. Of course, Federer managed to withstand all of Djokovic's weapons without so much as a grunt of frustration, armed as he always is with his own, much more important weapons like the ability to play the big points alarmingly well and an almost indefatigable serve. And that's precisely why he is THE Federer, all glory and perfection, and not a 'mini-Federer'. But Djokovic, it cannot be denied, is an irresistible talent, and it seems clear that from now on Federer will have not one (we've almost forgotten Rafael Nadal, haven't we?), but two great rivals. All the more motivation, I think, for Federer to raise the bar even higher, even if age isn't exactly on his side, and go for something that no man has ever dreamed of before. And oh, Pete Sampras's record is just a formality now, don't you think? 14 Grand Slams? If I were Federer, and that's a big 'if', I wouldn't settle for anything less than 18. Maybe even 20. Scary? You bet.

Of Sportsmanship and Showmanship

2007-09-09T09:09:00.000-07:00

So, one half of my US Open nightmare has come true. Justine Henin has just capped a stunningly successful, almost Federer-like year with an incandescent showing at the year's final Grand Slam, destroying three former champions - Serena Williams, Venus Williams and Svetlana Kuznetsova in succession to a well-deserved 7th Grand Slam trophy, and I'm not smiling. Sure, Henin may be an aesthetic shot-maker and her backhand may be 'a thing of beauty', as many people like to put it, but her lack of personality and charisma make it very hard for me to root for her in any match that she plays. Of course, her 'incident' in the 2003 French Open semi-final against Serena Williams, when she raised her hand during Serena's service motion leading to a serving fault, and subsequently refused to back Serena's perfectly legitimate request for another first serve may have a big part to play in my unqualified prejudice against her. Unfortunately for Henin, that incident isn't the only one that people like to twirl about when vociferously pointing out how un-sportsmanlike Henin can get. The 2006 Australian Open final, when Henin retired while trailing Amelie Mauresmo 6-1, 2-0, thus denying Mauresmo the unadulterated glory that comes with a maiden, hard-fought Grand Slam triumph, is still fresh in everyone's minds, perhaps much more vividly in mine. I suppose you might say that talking about these past fallacies in the face of the unquestioned brilliance that Henin has put on show this year is childish, but is it that difficult for Henin to muster up a belated but much-warranted apology, specially about the French Open incident? Ok, I think I'm starting to sound like the sore and cranky statistician that I always do after things don't go according to my liking in a sports match, so I'll just let Henin be for the moment.

While we're talking of un-sportsmanlike sportspersons, the name Serena Williams can't be too far away, can it, particularly since she chooses to state in her press conference after getting whipped by Justine Henin that she lost because "Justine played a lot of lucky shots". Alright, I know that press conference made Serena sound really bad, but that doesn't quite explain the unmistakable hatred that most tennis fans (well ok, when I say 'most tennis fans' I only mean most of the people who visit internet message boards) have shown in spelling out their distaste at Serena's words. Serena Williams has been, in the words of her father Richard, an arrogant "pit bull" for the whole of the 10-odd years that she's been on the women's tour. In fact, most tennis analysts in the past have admitted that her stubborn refusal to believe that anybody could beat her when she was playing her best had a major part to play in her 8 Grand Slam trophy wins. Which is why it is plain irritating to find people still giving her grief about the 'lack of respect' that she gives her opponents. Even though I personally wish she took a leaf or two out of her sister Venus's book who has matured considerably over the years, I can totally understand if she still wants to doggedly believe that she can be the best player in the world anytime that she really wants to. After all, isn't 'believing in yourself' the favourite mantra that mentors like to throw at their charges to inspire them to greatness and beyond? There is, of course, also the inescapable fact that Serena is every bit as good a tennis player as she claims - she can be hideously overweight, sorely bereft of match practice and completely lacking the agility and speed that made her such an irresistible force back in her glory days, and still manage to win a Grand Slam ranked 81st in the world. I'd like to see Henin try that. Serena is still the woman with the highest Grand Slam tally among current players, and has been the best player of the decade according to many tennis experts. So why all the malicious Williams-bashing then? I don't like to bring up the R-word, but it's very difficult to comprehend why a Martina Hingis, who is fair, pretty and lissome, can get away with downright offensive remarks, alarmingly childish tantrums and embarrassingly loud sobs after her losses while Serena Williams is labeled a disgrace to the sport of tennis for unwaveringly believing in her own abilities, unless there was some sick and disgusting attitude at the back of it all. For those of you who didn't get it, I'm talking about racism. And before this post gets any more sordid, I think I should move on to less unpleasant things.

The men's final will begin in a few hours' time, and I just can't wait for it because it's going to be a cracking match, if the level of play of the two finalists throughout the tournament is anything to go by. There's been a lot of talk about this being the first 'interesting' US Open final in years, and while I'm willing to give Novak Djokovic the credit for bringing 'interest' back to US Open finals, I just don't see him putting it past Roger Federer barely two years into his thus far impressive career. Remember, we're talking about defeating the man who's won 11 Grand Slams in the space of 4 years, and who managed to defeat Andy Roddick, a former No.1 player and US Open champion, in straight sets, in spite of the fact that Roddick was probably playing the best match of his career. That's unreal, unbelievable fantasy, that's GOAT stuff, that is. Djokovic needs to improve his serve a little, and learn to be more aggressive, and for heaven's sake he needs to drop all of that ludicrous showmanship and arrogance. It's amusing, even entertaining, to watch an up-and-coming tennis prodigy doing imitations of well-known tennis stars to thunderous applause from the crowd, but it's simply unacceptable for a potential Grand Slam champion to be doing that. Get a grip on yourself, Novak, you want to earn a little respect from tennis enthusiasts. And oh, while you're preparing yourself for the final, you might want to have a nice long chat with Rafael Nadal and collect a few tips from your physio about the best way to survive a marathon, lifeforce-sapping encounter in the New York heat. Against Federer, you'll need all the help that you can get.

By the way, if you're wondering what the 'other half' of my US Open nightmare is, it's Djokovic winning the men's title. So much for a stress-free US Open final.

Bad And Worse

2007-09-01T11:05:00.000-07:00

Right then. This has got to be one of the first US Open tournaments I have ever watched. The horror show started yesterday evening, just the 5th day of the Open, a time you wouldn't normally associate with heartbreaking losses. First Marat Safin, that charming little volcano-man, went down with disappointing tameness to Stanislas Wawrinka. Then Novak Djokovic, that outrageously gifted but hideously arrogant peacock of a man didn't go down to an inspired Radek Stepanek, instead eking out a scary five-set marathon. I say scary because it is clear to me now, if it wasn't already before the Open began, that Djoker has it in him to give a mighty challenge to the Grand Slam dominance of Federer-Nadal. And that was just the start of my miseries. The big blow came next. Lleyton Hewitt, the one sportsperson I have stood by through injuries, atrocious lack of form and repeated humiliating whippings at the hands of Federer, gave me yet another solid reason why I should probably move on to a new favourite player. I mean come on, Hewitt has become so nondescript now that the tennis websites didn't even bother to write anything about his defeat, which by all means is still significant considering he's a two-time Slammer. I've been trying to find the story covering his match all day, hoping that there perhaps must have been a legitimate reason why he lost to a decidedly over-the-hill claycourter like Augustin Calleri, like maybe an injury or something, but haven't had any luck so far. And much as I hate to admit this, there probably is a legitimate reason for the tragedy - that Hewitt is just not good enough anymore. Sad, sad.

Things just got worse today. Maria Sharapova, the defending champion, lost to a player whose name I can't even spell, let alone pronounce. It was someone called Radwanska, I think. Yeah, I know, Sharapova cannot lose to a Radwanska in the 3rd round, just a year after her glory days of defeating Amelie Mauresmo and Justine Henin back-to-back. But guess what, the blonde Russian has regressed by around two years instead of moving anywhere forward since January. If you thought being regularly dismantled by a Williams sister wasn't bad enough, look what's happening to her now: being bounced out by 17-year-old Radwanskas. Poor Maria, the avowed anti-Pova club members aren't going to be anything less than scathing in heaping their gleeful scorn on this latest embarrassment. Incidentally, I don't think I can visit a tennis discussion forum anytime soon, considering how vociferously I have been battling these distinguished anti-Pova members for the past month. I'm sorry, but reading a thousand-odd statements like "Look where the overrated brat is now", "She's just another Kournikova" or "HAHAHAHA" is just not my thing.

So could things get any worse after these tragic few hours? Well yes, they could. Sania Mirza could get overawed by a higher-ranked player and put in a completely listless performance in her 3rd round match. And she did precisely that. To be honest, Anna Chakvetadze is probably a much better player than Mirza and will likely defeat her 4 time out of 5, but that doesn't make the loss any less sad. Mirza needs to do well at the Slams if she has any hopes of being counted as a world-class player, and clearly she hasn't done too much of that yet. Chakvetadze, on the other hand, suddenly finds herself in a very favourable position now that Sharapova is out, and I'm willing to bet that she'd be the one to come through the bottom half of the draw and book that final against a Williams.

Right then. This is now officially the worse US Open I have ever watched. All I need now is for Roger Federer to not win the men's trophy. Or for Djokovic to win it. Or for Justine Henin to win the women's trophy. Wow, the US Open is fraught with more potential disasters than the regular Hollywood blockbuster. Maybe I need to stop following tennis and watch more movies instead. Hollywood blockbusters.

Birth Of An Industry

2007-08-26T10:14:00.000-07:00

First up, I want to give out a disclaimer for all those who think there are too many movie reviews floating around blogosphere and the world in general: this is NOT a movie review of Ratatouille. This post is dedicated not just to one movie, but to the whole wonderful realm of animation. It's about time I did this too, considering just how much I love animated movies. So anyway, has anyone noticed that animated movies are no longer just a sporadic summer attraction that appeal exclusively to kids? Hollywood has been pumping in the big bucks into all things animated, and the creative minds of the world's biggest movie industry have, by and large, responded magnificently. The best part about this revolution of sorts is that moviegoers across the world have given their whole-hearted approval to the Hollywood bigwigs' inclinations towards expanding the genre which once had a very limited appeal into a full-fledged, multi-million industry.

Consider the facts: Shrek 2 is the 3rd highest grossing movie in the history of US cinema and the 8th highest grossing movie worldwide. Shrek The Third, despite the mostly poor reviews, came through most of the intense summer competition this year unscathed, and ended up making more money than Pirates 3, Transformers and, gasp! Harry Potter 5. The Lion King and Finding Nemo hold their own steady places on the all-time box-office list, while last year Happy Feet gave James Bond and Casino Royale a run for their stylish money. And get this: as many as 8 animated movies find a place on imdb's list of the Top 250 movies of all time. Clearly, the animation business is booming. Of course, there are many who've been protesting that there's been an overdose of animated movies the past couple of years, and I do admit that churning out Madagascar and The Wild, two movies with almost identical visuals and storylines, in very quick succession was a bit of a perfect personification of the word 'overkill'. But then again, animation is not just a genre any longer - it's an industry; it has its share of lean periods, as I'm sure does every other film industry in the world. And just when duds like Surf's Up and Barnyard were starting to give the naysayers solid justifications for their nay-sayings, out comes a little gem like Ratatouille.

Most critics have used horribly predictable words like 'sumptuous', 'feast', 'delicious' and a whole lot of other food-centric adjectives to describe Ratatouille, so I think I'll steer clear of those tasteless clichés. Ratatouille is not delicious, delectable or luscious; it's a marvellous example of high quality cinema that will, in the long run, prove to be the standard by which all other animated movies are judged. For once, imdb's users aren't wrong in their ratings - Ratatouille fully deserves its 8.5 rating and 77th rank in the Top 250 list of imdb. If not for anything else, the movie deserves credit for going beyond the genre-specific, or should I say industry-specific premises that have been so thoroughly exploited by other filmmakers. For instance, there's no faithful-but-dumb sidekick here. Nor are there too many pop culture references or crude, childish jokes. And considering the very mature handling of the story, it would've been truly embarrassing if Remy, the protagonist, had found a facile love interest at the end. The movie has an actual, identifiable storyline, which is very rare for an animated movie. And that's precisely where it scores handsomely.

There's something delightfully elegant and classy about the pacing of the story, the visuals, and of course, the fantastic dialogue. Maybe it's the French element in it, I don't know. Then there's the quality of the animation itself. I watched the movie with a friend who's doing engineering, and even though he was a little bored that "it wasn't outrageously hilarious", he couldn't stop raving about the precision and level of detail in the visuals. Of course, Pixar has set very high standards for animation with the ultra-realistic Cars and the beautiful The Incredibles, but that doesn't stop us from being amazed, every time, at how efficiently and perfectly the computer geeks do their job. The background score is indescribably fantastic, and since it is indescribable, I'm not going to attempt to describe it. The subplots are well-crafted, the actors chosen for the characters almost perfect. The ending is innovative and pleasant, and the monologue by Anton Ego (voiced by Peter O'Toole) at the end has to be one of the most beautiful and meaningful speeches I've ever heard in a movie. Frankly, I couldn't really find anything to complain about the movie, except perhaps that they could've made it a little funnier. But Ratatouille would've been a very good movie even if it didn't have a single gag in it. That, however, is not the case, which must make it obvious, really, that this is one movie that no one should possibly miss. Personally, I'd definitely rank this as the second best animated movie I've ever seen (I'm sorry, but nothing beats Shrek for me).

Now look what I've done - I've ended up writing a review of Ratatouille in spite of the bold (and pretentious, now that I think of it) disclaimer at the start. But honestly, I couldn't help it. I just had to write something in praise of such a heart-warming yet skillful attempt at movie-making. Oh well, I think I'll have to put in something now to make this sound less like a movie review. How about a Top-10 list of my favourite animated movies of all time? Yeah, it's cheesy, and it's unsophisticated, but what's life without a little cheese and a little unsophistication? Ok, I'm not even sure 'unsophistication' is a word, so I'll just get this over with without further ado. Here goes:
1. Shrek
2. Ratatouille
3. Shrek 2
4. Monsters, Inc.
5. The Incredibles
6. Ice Age
7. Flushed Away
8. Madagascar
9. Chicken Run
10. Shrek The Third

Cheesy Gets Fun

2007-08-19T11:25:00.000-07:00

What is it with Steven Spielberg and aliens? Just about every significant movie about aliens, weird creatures or supersmart/monstrous/robotic freaks of nature in the past decade (and maybe even the decade before that) has had some connection with the legendary filmmaker. Which is not to say that he's always been brilliant at the gory extra-terrestrial dramas. War of the Worlds was a positively dull (and incomprehensible) CGI-reeking mess, while Men In Black had a tad too many gooey/slimy/disgusting creatures for my liking. The fact remains, however, that Spielberg loves extra-terrestrials. Which is why it is not surprising that the man has a firm connection with the big movie with even bigger aliens, Transformers, as its executive producer. Of course, Michael Bay is the captain of the ship here, and though it was totally expected of him to continue with his tried-and-tested formula of making thrill-a-minute entertainers with no depth whatsoever, I thought Spielberg's involvement would have made some difference here. Well, I was wrong - Transformers is as mindlessly entertaining and frivolous as Hollywood could ever get. And hey, I'm not exactly complaining. It's alright if filmmakers go for the Star Wars/Spider-man effect for their blockbusters at times; we don't expect a Batman Begins every single time. And even if we did, we wouldn't really be granted our wish, would we?

The visual effects in Transformers are, to say the very least, stunning. The level of detail and sophistication, together with the scale and magnitude of the cinematography makes 300 look amateurish in comparison. One just wishes, however, that they'd slowed down the camera in some of the fight sequences - it's almost impossible to keep up with the lightning pace of the transformations and stunts. On the flip side, the plot of the movie is about as ridiculous as Roger Federer losing to Guillermo Canas twice in a row. I don't know about you, but the whole 'allspark-code-grandpa glasses' angle almost made me burst out with laughter. But the thing that really had me in splits was the line "I AM MEGATRON!!!" - not exactly the first words you'd expect to hear from a robo-alien that has been defrosted after a hundred years. Nevertheless, the flick was great entertainment - the over-the-top theatrics (especially the unfathomable attachment that the lead characters feel for the far-from-lovable robots), the melodramatic humour and the ultra-cool Megatron (aside from his ludicrous opening line) bring more than a few smiles to your face. You almost want to forgive the childish dialogue and lack of depth in the plot and characterizations. Transformers is immensely likable, and is one of those rare movies that you can watch any number of times without getting bored. So three cheers to frivolous cinema!

"Ba ba blu bley"

2007-08-12T04:56:00.000-07:00

There are very few things that I never get tired of. One of them, of course, is Harry Potter. Possibly the only other is (and I hate how this makes me sound so childish) - Friends. Yeah, I know what you're thinking: here comes another Friends-infatuated teenager who can't see beyond the immature and slapstick humour of a cheesy, run-of-the-mill, mass-oriented comedy. But you're wrong, so very wrong. For one thing, I'm not a teenager (wow, it feels so great to say that!). For another, I defy anyone to watch a single episode of Friends and not go down in peals of laughter at the crazy antics of Monica, Chandler, Ross, Rachel, Phoebe and Joey. And yes, I never do get tired of watching the same old Friends episodes over and over again. Nor do most of my friends, if their constant insistence at borrowing my Friends DVDs (and their reluctance to return them, may I add) is anything to go by.

I got acquainted with the Friends phenomenon very late, I think around the time of the 8th season, somewhere around 2002. Prior to that, I just had some vague idea about a wildly popular TV show that starred a certain somebody called Jenifer Aniston, who, going by the frequent appearance of her name in the glamour section of newspapers, was in some way related to Brad Pitt. Heck, I didn't even know how Aniston looked, and for the first couple of episodes I kept confusing her with Courtney Cox. Fortunately, however, our dear old Star World and Zee Cafe never managed to air the latest seasons, so I watched the earlier seasons first and not the 8th season (which was the least funny of all the seasons, in my opinion, and would probably not have got me so completely hooked to the show). But once I got started, there was no looking back. The show was just so irresistibly funny! It may have been nothing more than loud, slapstick humour at times, but oh my God did I laugh while watching it! I don't think I've ever laughed so hard at a piece of fiction as I did during those countless 7.30 slumps on my couch (ok, maybe I did laugh harder while reading P.G. Wodehouse's Right-Ho Jeeves, but let's just confine 'fiction' to TV and movies for the moment, shall we?).

All the characters in the series were so well-etched out that you couldn't help but precisely understand all of their actions and reactions. When Joey bought a boat at an auction that he couldn't afford, you could understand why; when Phoebe decided to spy on her twin sister's stalker, you could empathise perfectly with her; when Ross put on a British accent in one of his classes for no rhyme or reason you had no problems in comprehending the innate rationale of it all. Of course, a major reason why the show was so amazing was the strength of its actors. I seriously doubt that as many as six actors with such fantastic comic timing as Matt LeBlanc, Courtney Cox, Jenifer Aniston, David Schwimmer, Matthew Perry and Lisa Kudrow will ever be assembled together, whether on the big screen or the small. It's no wonder the producers had such a hard time getting them together for the last few seasons.

We all have our favourite Friends characters. For me it has always been the ridiculously hilarious Phoebe, who together with Nina Vanhorn from Just Shoot Me and Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes is the funniest fictional character I've ever come across. No matter how many times I watch the episode where Ross plans to play the bagpipes on Chandler and Monica's wedding, I always laugh hysterically at Phoebe's line "Eeee Peee Teee" in response to Ross saying, "You guys know the song - sing along!". In terms of acting ability, however, David Schwimmer and Jenifer Aniston stand out as the most accomplished. I'll probably never forget Aniston's expression when she says "Oh my God" in response to Joey saying that one of his moves on a date was to get the champagne served by a fan. And Schwimmer jumping around with Rachel and Phoebe when he gets his new apartment was simply, wonderfully priceless. Chandler, Monica and Joey all had their terrific moments too; Chandler's expression when he says "I'm leaving you" to Monica when Monica and Ross kept gushing about a tacky gaming show nearly had me in tears. Joey and Monica were probably the least funny of the characters in my opinion. I know Joey is a favourite with most fans, but he was just too dumb for my liking - you'd be hard pressed to find a man who doggedly keeps spewing out "Ba ba blu bley" when asked to repeat a French line "Ju ma pel Claude" (at least that's what it sounded like) in real life. But his impersonation of Chandler at the costume party was unforgettable, as was Chandler's reaction to it.

There are so many lines, so many funny situations, so many priceless expressions throughout the series that one blog post would be WAY too short to narrate them, even if I restricted myself to only the very finest ones. I know I have spent countless hours discussing the countless side-splitting gags with my friends, and like I said before, I honestly never get tired of doing that. It's immeasurably sad that plans for a movie version of the show didn't materialize; that movie would have had a mind-boggling run at the box office. Friends may have been only about crude and vulgar tomfoolery at times, but you always ended up laughing your heart out at the irresistible hilarity that was at the bottom of it all . If sheer enjoyment was the only yardstick for measuring such things, then Friends would have to be the greatest TV show ever. But that's obvious. Or, as Monica would say, "I KNOW!"

A Monumental Moment

2007-07-22T10:48:00.000-07:00

So it has come to an end. It seems hard to believe, even harder than laying hands on the book in the wee hours of the morning of the 21st of July, almost overwhelmed by excitement and happiness. The time has come to look ahead at a life in which we'll never again be enchanted by the magic of Potterverse; in other words, to look ahead at a depressingly unmagical life. How brilliant a writer would J K Rowling have to be to inspire such sadness amongst her fans just because she has ended a story, a ludicrously hard-to-believe, unrelatable fantasy? I took more than a day to read the book, withstanding numerous distractions, a truly awful digestive disorder and a splitting headache (all of which were entirely unrelated to the quality of the book), but never even for a moment during those 24 hours did I think I was being silly or childish in setting such great store by a mere book. It's almost immaterial whether the book is good or bad (for the record, I think it is the best book of the series); just the thought of never again experiencing the unadulterated joy of reading a new Harry Potter book is almost too dreadful to imagine. I know this may sound frightfully juvenile, but right now I'm very tempted to call J K Rowling the best writer ever. You can sneer all you want, but you'll find that much harder to do when half of the world's population backs me up on my statement.

So how satisfactory a conclusion to an epic journey is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows? I must confess that when I first heard that the book was going to be only as long as Half Blood Prince, I became extremely apprehensive, not to mention a little irritated at JKR for cowing down to the greedy demands of the publishers. How could she possibly explain everything in such few words? God knows we Potter fans had done enough research on the first 6 books to know that there were more than a few loose ends that demanded detailed and convincing explanations. It seemed ridiculous, almost impossible to believe that JKR could squeeze in clarifications about things like the mysterious Veil in the Department of Mysteries, the many interestingly weird delicate instruments in Dumbledore's office or why it was important that Lily Potter's wand was good for Charms when, in all fairness, it was incumbent for her to devote all space to Harry's epochal quest to destroy Voldemort's Horcruxes. After reading the book, however, I've realized that it doesn't matter in the slightest that Ms Rowling chose to leave a million things unexplained. What she gives us in place of tying up loose ends is so gripping, so fantastically enjoyable that you can only marvel at her incredible knack for not disappointing her fans in spite of their colossal expectations.

JKR had said before the release that many would loathe the bloodbath in the book, and at times it does seem like she killed off characters just because there were so few deaths in the previous books. We have people dying left, right and centre in this one, and almost all the characters are perpetually injured, but that is to be expected in the final instalment of a series. There are many fight sequences and a grand battle at the end, and though you do tend to think about how spectacular these will look in the movie, the less-than-satisfactory adaptations that have come up till now make you appreciate JKR's writing even more. Dumbledore is a dominating presence in the book in spite of being dead, and the bit about his questionable doings in his youth is one of many masterstrokes from JKR. He always was my favourite character, Dumbledore, but this book makes sure that he will be remembered as the most intriguing Potter character of all, usurping the position from Severus Snape, who's given a bit of a raw deal this time round after his stupendous role in Half Blood Prince. The book moves at a lightning pace throughout, and this is not surprising given the depth of material JKR had to cram in even without the insignificant explanations the lack of which so engaged Potter fans for the last two years. The book is, to use a very clichéd term, a thrill-a-minute page-turner, as were all the other Potter books, but this being the last one makes everything that much bigger and better. The climax is monumental and awe-inspiring, and the fact that JKR manages to explain every little blood-Horcrux-hallow complication so convincingly even with Harry and his companions in the heat of the battle, fighting for their lives, speaks volumes about her narrative skills, though it must be said that the re-opening of the Harry-Voldemort mind connection is a little too convenient and leaves a tiny plot hole. The epilogue, however, is a big let-down, filled with cheesy dialogue and cheesier circumstances, but I guess we can forgive Ms Rowling one minor blemish; heck, I could even forgive her a hundred blemishes, after all that she's given us.

I can go on and on about every little thing that was so wonderful about the book and the very few things that were not, but the bottom line remains that this is the end, the sad and surreal end. No more looking up fansites for new theories, no more arguing with friends whether Snape is good or evil, no more rapturous delight at every new revelation by JKR in one of her interviews. I'm sorry if I'm sounding too gloomy, but believe it or not, there are probably thousands of people around the world who are crying their eyes out right now because the series has ended. Most certainly, this is a monumental moment, a tragically monumental moment. One thing's for sure, however: no matter what subject JKR writes about in the future, or how trashy her writing becomes, every one of her future books will be an instant best-seller. And I, for one, will not be complaining; she's thoroughly earned every bit of her reputation. In the meantime, I suppose we'll have the Potter movies for another 3 years to keep our spirits up. Ouch.

A Week Before D-Day, and Things Have Turned A Little Sour

2007-07-15T11:41:00.000-07:00

Here's an unusual question for Harry Potter fans: Is watching the latest Potter movie the best preparation for reading the newest Potter book? The guys up at Warner Bros must obviously have felt that the answer to that question is yes, a feeling that will most likely be vindicated by the bumper box office returns Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is bound to get. On the flip side, of course, Deathly Hallows is releasing on the 21st of this month, almost exactly one week after the opening of Phoenix, and heaven help Warner Bros if they think Potter fans are going to spare even a sideways glance for Harry's frustrating struggles with Dolores Umbridge when they could instead be grappling with monumental things like Snape being evil after all or horror of horrors, Harry himself going out with a painful death. But that's not the only problem the movie faces. I hate to admit this, but Phoenix suffers greatly from a tad too many over-creative liberties taken by the director David Yates, who perhaps needs to be told by someone that you just cannot fit an 800-page long book into a 2 hr 20 min short movie. Math, anyone?

The best that can be said about OOTP (Order of the Phoenix, for the uninformed) is that it is better than the first two Potter movies. The movie satisfies the hardcore Potter fans in managing to squeeze in nearly every important event from the book, but sadly, that very intent makes many of the scenes look rushed and fleeting. As for the changes from the book, well, let's just say that Yates should have had a serious chat with Alfonso Cuaron (the director of Prisoner of Azkaban) or even Peter Jackson, for that matter, about the do's and dont's of bringing new plot details in a hugely popular book before even thinking of directing the movie. Most of the changes in OOTP seem forced and unnecessary, and it only my fear of being labelled a raving/lunatic/obsessed Potter freak that's stopping me from listing all of those disagreeable changes here. Many sequences in the movie have an unfinished, anti-climactic feel about them (note the vapid end to the scene where Trelawney is sacked or the irritatingly docile reactions of Ron and Hermione to Umbridge's torture tactics). Sirius's death is butchered mercilessly, and Harry's outburst in Dumbledore's office, one of the most poignant episodes in the books, never comes to pass. Bellatrix Lestrange looks like a deranged medieval witch most of the times, and Grawp the Giant looks cute rather than scary. Ok, maybe I am sounding like a raving/lunatic/obsessed Potter freak after all, but who cares?

The special effects are fairly satisfactory, but the acting from the Trio is not. Alright, I'll leave out Rupert Grint from this - he's been consistently decent right from the first movie; but will someone please tell Daniel Radcliffe that he needs to put something on his face, like say, expressions? Emma Watson looks all pretty and charming (which Hermione is NOT supposed to be), but would definitely make things a lot more tolerable for everyone if she just stopped making her eyebrows continually dance like they're preparing for a ballet, or even if she refrained from delivering EVERY line looking like she's terribly out of breath. The older actors, on the other hand, put in very good performances, particularly Jason Isaacs, who as the pure evil/subservient Lucius Malfoy steals the show from everyone (including Gary Oldman in another appropriate Sirius Black turn). Imelda Staunton as Umbridge is almost perfect, specially with the 'Hem, hem' rendition and the revolting girlish wickedness, and there could not have been a better choice to play Luna Lovegood than Evanna Lynch. However, my biggest grouse with the Potter movies remains the shoddy portrayal of perhaps the third most important character in the books, Severus Snape. Alan Rickman may be a fine actor, but it is simply unacceptable that the makers have chosen to reduce Snape to a bumbling, comical idiot whose most significant moment is hitting Ron with a book. It's amazing how I seem to be the only one who finds fault with Snape's portrayal in the movies, but J K Rowling had always intended for Snape to be a no-nonsense, vicious, supremely smug persona, and the movie Snape is anything but that. I seriously cannot understand how they're going to undo all the damage they've done to Snape's character when he comes into its own in Book 6, the title of which, funnily enough, is named after him. In my book, Isaacs would have actually done a marvellous job as Snape, but will anyone listen to the true Potter fan?

The one thing that can be said about OOTP is that it hardly ever gets boring (ok, maybe the first half is a little boring, but you can't really blame Yates for that - nothing much happens in the first half of the book either). It would've been all perfectly good fun if it wasn't for the inescapable fact that it is an adaptation of a Harry Potter book, which naturally makes us pick at and frown at every minor detail which is inconsistent with the spirit of the book. It would also have helped greatly if they'd taken the trouble to explain everything about the plot adequately enough (my non-Potterized friends kept breaking out into perfectly understandable questions like, "what the hell is going on?"). And while we're talking about explaining things, I shudder to think how they're going to do that in Movie 6 with things as complex as Horcruxes flying around, specially if they're going to be hell-bent on sacrificing justice to the books for cash-generating ploys like keeping the length short. Alfonso Cuaron, where art thou?

When Rafael Nadal Almost Made History, Part 2

2007-07-08T11:56:00.000-07:00

Just about the only thing that the men's and women's finals at this year's Wimbledon Championships had in common was that one of the players wept at the end of each match. And oddly, the two weeping players did not share the same result; while Marion Bartoli was distraught and disheartened after being overpowered and outplayed by that wonder-woman Venus Williams, Roger Federer's tears were a little more complicated. He did not lose the final against Rafael Nadal, no, but it is not hard to imagine how relieved and ecstatic, not to mention physically and emotionally drained, he would have been at the end. Bjorn Borg watched from the stands as Federer scrapped and battled his way to equaling his record of winning five consecutive Wimbledon titles, but I'm sure he was sorry, as were most people who watched the match, that there could only be one winner.

To say that Nadal is adjusting well to playing on grass, his least favourite surface, would be a gross understatement, and also a little dismissive of the man's amazing fortitude. Nadal didn't just match Federer shot for shot today; on many occasions, it was he who looked like the one at home with the conditions rather than the King of Grass Federer. He served well, played well from the baseline, charged to the net more often that is customary for him and hit some amazing passing shots when Federer came to the net. Basically, he did just about everything that you need to do to win a match against a grass court dab hand. This was his second consecutive Wimbledon final, and he seemed passionately determined this time to create his own bit of history by becoming the first man since Borg to win the French and Wimbledon back-to-back. Is it just me, or does Nadal raise his game several notches higher when playing against Federer? The trouble for him, however, is that Federer is not just a grass curt dab hand - he is an artist, an almost flawless genius. He played the big points exceptionally well (how does he manage to come up with all those aces on break points?), and in the end, he managed to wear Nadal down (surprise, surprise!). Maybe the five matches in a week that Nadal had to play finally took a toll on him. Maybe his knee (for which he took a medical time-out in the 4th set) really did hamper his movement. Or maybe, Federer simply refused to lose to his nemesis on the surface that is so dear to him and his playing style. Whatever be the reason, tennis fans got to witness a classic encounter (it certainly was the best match that I've ever seen live) between the two players who are disturbingly too far ahead of their peers. Nadal gave us enough evidence to emphatically dispel the notion that he's "only a claycourt specialist", and Federer finally showed us that he is willing to be a scrapper and dig deep to win his matches against never-say-die players like Nadal, in the process accomplishing one more thing that Pete Sampras never did - winning five Wimbledons in a row. Bjorn Borg would be proud. Of both of these fantastic champions.

In the women's section, Venus Williams showed us yet again that it's never safe to pass over the name 'Williams' when talking about the potential winner of a Grand Slam event. If Serena Williams was all fire-in-the-belly and fight-till-the-last-breath at this year's Australian Open, Venus was a ruthlessness-and-invincibility act here, at least from the fourth round onwards. Honestly, did any of her opponents stand a chance against her inch-perfect, fearsome serves and crunching groundstrokes? Sharapova was bounced out mercilessly, Kuznetsova was handled with ease, Ivanovic was never really in the game and the surprise finalist Marion Bartoli was taken care of with clinical finesse. And all this after coming into the tournament ranked 31st in the world, a comeback from injury that had been heading nowhere in particular and a solitary title in the bag for the last one year or so. It's things like these that make one agree with repeated assertions by the Williams family that there's no player in the world who can defeat a fully-fit Williams (and that refers to both the sisters). What a pity that Serena couldn't make it an all-Williams final; she certainly seemed the only player who could have given a contest to the rampaging Venus.

So at the end of yet another Wimbledon tournament, let's just congratulate the players who produced dazzling tennis and took the game to another lever to emerge champions. Take a bow, Roger Federer, Venus Williams, and bravo to you too, Rafael Nadal! Your time will come, surely.

For Once, Stephen King Is Not Awfully Unreadable

2007-07-06T12:50:00.000-07:00

I don't quite feel up to writing much today, but I did stumble upon a fantastic column written by the oft-unreadable Stephen King. The column is about, you guessed it, Harry Potter, and I don't think anyone could've put into words the feelings of us Potter fans as July 21 approaches any better than how King has. Click on the link and be overwhelmed, just as I was:

http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20044270_20044274_20044682,00.html

When Rain Makes Folklore

2007-07-02T11:29:00.000-07:00

Fortune favours the brave, they say. To that I must add that it also favours the insanely determined. If you watched Serena Williams battle on in a seemingly hopeless situation against Daniela Hantuchova in her 4th round match at Wimbledon today, you'd know exactly what the hype surrounding her is all about. The woman was so badly injured that she could barely stand, let alone walk (and I mean this very literally), yet she simply refused to surrender the match, limping from one side of the court to the other, trying to finish points with a maximum of two strokes. It was a sight so unforgettable that it seemed ridiculous that anyone could possibly have had any thoughts of writing her off as a 'has-been' just six months ago. "Folklore awaits if she wins this one", one of the commentators piped up rather unassumingly during Serena's Herculean struggle, and Serena promptly went ahead and belted an ace. Not that she could hear him, of course. But nature, it seems, heard her despairing grunts loud and clear, and the rains came pouring down with Serena hanging on in the second set by her very last nerve, down 4-2 in the tie-breaker. That one moment of respite was all that Serena needed, and though she went on to lose the second set when play resumed, she won the third with consummate ease, all power and glory. Poor Hantuchova never really had a chance, and this day was never really about her. Serena Williams may not get past Justine Henin in the quarterfinals considering how much this match must have drained her of her energy, but she did more than enough today to ensure that she'll forever be remembered as one of the most brilliant of tennis champions. Like she needed to, after all those Grand Slam trophies and periods of invincibility.

Meanwhile, Rafael Nadal is locked in a marathon struggle with Sweden's Robin Soderling, and if there's one player who isn't thanking the rains that have so gleefully ransacked the schedule at this year's Championships, it's got to be Nadal. Thanks to the disturbingly inflexible adherence to tradition of the tournament organisers, his 3rd round match that was suspended on Saturday will now take 3 days to be completed, because Wimbledon's middle Sunday, according to the great traditions of yore, must necessarily be an off-day. This also means that many players in the bottom half of the draw (including Lleyton Hewitt - why don't my favourite players ever find favour with fortune? It's not like Hewitt's not brave!) will have to play 5 matches in 7 days if they aspire to take home the trophy this year. And what about the players in the top half of the draw? Roger Federer, for one, has to play just one game in the next 4 days, thanks to Tommy Haas pulling out of his 4th round clash with the World No. 1. Looks like Federer's inherent advantages over Nadal on the green grass of Wimbledon just got plenty stronger.

It is precisely at times such as these that calls for Wimbledon to shed it's lofty traditions and move forward with the times seem perfectly justified. Wimbledon is trying to adjust, certainly - the roof that will presumably be functional by 2009 will definitely ease a lot of the tournament's struggles with the weather - but perhaps what is needed for Wimbledon to keep pace with today's expressly fast game is not a cursory architectural venture, but an unrestrained willingness to adapt to the moment. If Saturday was rained out, there should have been someone among the organizers go, "We've got to react to the situation and keep up with our schedule. The forecast is for wet weather the whole of next week, so let's dump tradition and have play on Sunday for a change". I know, I know, wishful thinking never really does anyone any good.

Rain, Suspension of Disbelief and Monotony

2007-06-24T11:17:00.000-07:00

So the rains have well and truly started in Pune. And, to borrow a quote from Fred Weasley (or George, can't remember which one of the twins said it), I haven't been properly dry since Monday. And just to set things straight, I am not still in the innocent, wondrous phase of adolescence when getting wet in the rain seems to be the most thrilling thing imaginable. Yes, I know, I should've used some common sense and stayed indoors or travelled by a bus, but strange beings that we humans are, I refused all thoughts of obeying the little sensible voice in my head and kept hopping around the city on my bike, getting ridiculously drenched all along. I guess my sense of reason, the one superpower that I like to attribute to myself, has seen better days.

Watched two movies this week (and got drenched on the way to the theatre on both occasions). Ocean's Thirteen is everything that Ocean's Twelve was not - it's witty, easy to understand and entertaining. I know many people didn't like the idea of the gang hatching their elaborate plan for revenge as opposed to personal gain, but somehow I could identify with the plot of Thirteen more than that of Twelve or even Eleven. Ocean's men seem more human and not quite the royally pompous, conniving, swaggering thugs that they were in the first two, and that's all for the good. And besides, any movie that has Al Pacino in it has to be watched at least once, if not for anything else then for his sheer extravagant presence alone. Andy Garcia finally comes into his own in the final instalment of the series, and though the movie misses the star power of Julia Roberts, it is a fine conclusion to a merry, ridiculously unbelievable tale of a bunch of crooks with big ambitions and even bigger resources.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer is, like the first part, a perfect example of how to make a pure popcorn movie. The film's small length (it barely crosses the 90-minute mark), the likable stars (notwithstanding the fact that at times the movie seems, and annoyingly so, nothing more than a showcase of two of Hollywood's most good-looking actors, Jessica Alba and Chris Evans), the stunning visuals and the total lack of any complexities of plot all combine to make this one of the most enjoyable movies of the year, even if it is not the most thought-provoking one. And oh, that thing called 'suspension of disbelief' would come in really handy while watching this one (and while watching Ocean's Thirteen too, now that I think about it). Nevertheless, for once, a third instalment would actually be welcome.

Wimbledon begins tomorrow, and for the first time in 3 years tongues are wagging about Mr. I'd-like-to-see-anyone-try-to-beat-me-on-grass Roger Federer's ability to take home the most prestigious Slam of them all. Skipping the tournament in Halle, a tournament which he has owned for the past 4 years, may not have been ideal preparation, and after his latest attempt to make history at Roland Garros being thwarted in devastating fashion by Rafael Nadal he does seem to have lost a considerable amount of fire. But hey, he's not known as Mr. I'd-like-to-see-anyone-try-to-beat-me-on-grass for nothing. No one has won five Wimbledons in a row since Bjorn Borg, and if that doesn't bring back the fire in Federer's belly, I don't know what will, considering how little he has left to prove on grass. Justine Henin, meanwhile, is being talked up as the hot favourite among the women, and for some weird reason her victory over Serena Williams at the French has made most people comfortable enough to assume that the Williams sisters will not be major threats at the Championships this year. To these people all I've got to say is: Go fry yourselves. No one has performed as ferociously and as consistently as the Williams sisters on grass in this decade, and after Serena's victory at the Australian Open this year, I seriously can't understand why people like to write her off at every Grand Slam with so much imperiousness. And don't forget Maria Sharapova, Amelie Mauresmo or Jelena Jankovic either - boy, the women's draw seems incredibly competitive when compared with the men's draw. That's the Federer effect for you, French Open victory or no French Open victory. But maybe he'd like to be a little generous and give someone else a chance this year, yes? It's just that a little break in the monotony would suit everyone just fine.

If You're not Cool, You're Not Hot

2007-06-19T11:32:00.000-07:00

'Disgusting' is a strong word. So is 'repulsive'. But to be strong is to be effective, as they say (Ok, that's not exactly an actual saying, but it puts my point across well enough). So as I was saying, 'disgusting' and 'repulsive' may be strong words, but it's not at all misplaced to use them to describe the tendency of college students these days to let their lives be wholly and purely dictated by fashion trends, social norms and popularity ratings. You can hardly walk a step in any of the swank, upmarket colleges of today without getting a glaring view of the sickening disease amongst students to entirely conceal their true selves in their ill-advised, and often horribly unsuccessful attempts to pass off as 'cool'. It's quite disturbing, actually. And entirely unnecessary, too. Not to mention astonishingly stupid. But then again, smartness is not something most people pride themselves on.

A lot of the norm-conforming, popularity contest-playing madness amongst the college youth of our country takes inspiration from the not-so-rosy pictures presented in Western fiction, particularly movies like Mean Girls or American Pie. (On a side note, isn't it really really painful that the stuff that we are reduced to taking inspiration from is comprised of such horrors as American Pie?) Anyway, things in the West have reached a stunning extreme, or at least that's what the movies want to portray. Geekiness, gawkiness and gaudiness are unpardonable crimes, the hip American college dude shouts out loud (perhaps here lies the answer to America's befuddling mystery of school shootings?), and the ever-so-impressionable Indian rich brat is only too happy to take that as Law. Talk about naivete. Incredible naivete.

So here were are in the wonderfully happy 21st century, and all that is on an average teenager's mind is how to score points in the college popularity and coolness contests. Following the latest, most bizarre fashion trends, from wearing alarmingly low-waist jeans to sporting appallingly spiked hairstyles works well for most people most of the time. But that's only one area covered. To be well and truly on the path to coolness, one must necessarily talk in 'cool' lingo, never mind how incredibly inane it may sound. I don't know about you, but hearing words like 'dude', 'like', 'awesome', 'rocks', 'totally', 'sucks' or 'man' approximately 23,000 times in a day does drive me just a little crazy. I mean come on, how normal is it for a sentence like, "Dude that is like awesome, like totally awesome dude, seriously man" to be spoken aloud by a human, whose greatest advantage over animals is supposedly having good communication skills?

Swearing and using abusive words in perfectly normal conversations is a great hit too. People who stick to decent, doesn't-make-you-throw-up speech are sissies, apparently. Giving up on studies is another effective weapon in the battle against 'uncoolness'. So is splurging mammoth amounts of your parents' hard-earned money on horribly unhealthy junk food, or even making regular, and often unnecessary, visits to the next-door multiplex. All things traditional must of course be shunned as religiously as possible, and if you don't stock up millions of CDs of those awfully noisy rock bands then you're just not 'happening' enough. Talk about sex as frequently and as loudly as possible, and make dreadful comments about anyone even remotely nerd-looking. Shout a lot. Be as 'bold' (or indecent, depending on what you wish to call it) as you can. Forget your responsibilities. Forget your career. Ignore your parents. Lose your mind. Go down the gutter. Sounds like a nice journey, doesn't it?

Surely there must be a way to avoid all of this horridness? Wait a minute. Can it really be - 'good sense'? Wow, that's a revelation. (It's at times like these that I feel the written word isn't so effective at communication after all - how I regret I cannot let my readers know how fiercely I'm rolling my eyes right now!). It's only about being true to yourself after all. It's amazing how a simple thing like expressing yourself honestly can give you happiness the like of which can't possibly be found in trendy clothes and trashy pop culture. And that's not to mention how easy it becomes to make and keep a few but truly wonderful friends. Ah! The wonders of using good sense!

When Federer Almost Made History, Revisited

2007-06-10T10:31:00.000-07:00

Does the No. 1 player in the world, possibly the best player in history, need an urgent lesson on how not to lose a match? Maybe Roger Federer doesn't, but he sure does need to be told by someone, anyone, that he isn't helping his cause towards being unanimously and unarguably hailed as the GOAT by repeatedly failing to mentally turn up for his matches against Rafael Nadal. I'm sorry, but when you convert just one break point out of 17 against a player of Nadal's calibre, and that too on clay, then you're clearly giving out the impression that you're not mentally prepared to win. Throw in 60 unforced errors, and the point is sealed. Quite frankly, and though this may sound a lot like one of Serena Williams's post-loss conferences, all that Nadal had to do today was show up for the match. Federer took care of the rest.

Federer's win over Nadal at Hamburg had caused many optimists to believe that this may be THE year for Federer, the unachievable Grand Slam year. The signs certainly were good. Federer did seem to have finally 'cracked the code' to defeating Nadal on clay, and his matches through the early rounds of the French Open seemed delightfully similar to his early-tournament breezes at the other 3 Slams. He was doing everything right most of the time, and even on the days that he wasn't doing everything right, his sheer determination made sure that he prevailed, most notably in the semi-final against Nikolay Davydenko. The trouble, however, was the fact that most people chose to ignore the assertions by the Nadal supporters that he only lost the Hamburg final because he was genuinely and undeniably fatigued. And today, Federer made sure that the Nadal supporters were well and truly vindicated. I guess we all were too caught up with the mouth-watering possibility that Federer would script an unforgettably historic tale by capturing the Holy Grail of tennis, the calendar Grand Slam. Perhaps we should have expected Federer to be human.

What irritates me most about Federer is his stubborn refusal to listen to tennis experts. Come to the net more often, they all keep saying. Play the slice backhand more frequently, they chant. Be more aggressive, they chorus. Each of these 3 perfectly well-intentioned pieces of advice paid handsome returns when he followed them sporadically in today's match, but the key word here is 'sporadically'. Perhaps it is unwise in any case to give advice to a man who has a habit of firing his coaches and then promptly rampaging around the world winning tournaments by the dozens. But on clay, against Nadal, Federer needs his advisors. And he needs his mental strength too. He needs all the weapons that he can gather to ensure that he doesn't again have as awful a first serve percentage or as regular a display of his characteristic wild shots that go sailing into the crowds off his backhand (and sometimes today, even off his forehand) against Nadal in a French Open final. Heck, at one point his 'audience' shots became so frequent that it seemed possible there was a spectator in the stands who he didn't like. It's just as well that the amiable French crowd found these shots highly entertaining.

The most that can be said about Federer's performance today was that it was better than his show in last year's final. And considering how absolutely horrendous his performance last year was, that isn't saying much. His supporters keep insisting that he's 'getting closer' to finding the formula to win the French, but the hard truth is that time is running out on him. He'll be 26 this year, and Nadal seems all gung-ho about winning the French Open for the next 6-7 years. If anything, today was sort of a regression for Federer. Nadal was clearly physically drained towards the end of the match, and yet he seemed to have no problems holding his serve or capitalising decisively on Federer's errors in the big points. As I said earlier, Federer just wasn't there mentally, and as much as this sounds like Serena Williams, it probably is the truth. And that's not very comforting.

Meanwhile, in an eerie parallel to Nadal's success story, Justine Henin-Hardenne coasted to a third successive Roland Garros triumph, proving once and for all that she IS the best women's player on clay by a long distance. Maria Sharapova did well to reach the semis, but once there she actually looked like a 'cow on ice', losing with astonishing ease to the new Serb sensation, Ana Ivanovic. Is women's tennis being taken over by eastern Europe and Russia? Ivanovic, Vaidisova, Kuznetsova, Jankovic, Dementieva, Hantuchova, even Sharapova (if you count the fact that she was born in Russia)...the list is almost endless. Where are the Americans and the western Europeans, you ask? I don't know about the western Europeans, but the Americans have precisely one player still competitive enough to pose a serious challenge in the Slams, and that player is Serena Williams. The rest, including Venus Williams and Andy Roddick, should probably look in their mirrors and ask themselves thousands of unanswerable questions.

Right then. So we now move to the green pastures of Wimbledon. Mauresmo, Serena and Sharapova should be the favourites in the women's draw. As for the men's, we should perhaps give Federer a breather and concede that he is human after all. I'm sorry, did I say human? I apologize. 4 complete years, not a single loss on grass. Forget everything that happened today, Federer is going to romp through the greatest Slam of them all. Seriously, God help anyone who comes in Federer's way. And I hope Nadal does come in Federer's way.

Movies, Work, etc. etc.

2007-06-07T11:36:00.000-07:00

Ahem. I never thought that the price of a professional job would be going blog-less for a month. And that's not the only handicap either; in fact, for some, that would actually rank among the least annoying of the miseries brought upon them by the headsore called work. Take, for instance, the fact that you are made to intermittently suffer positively awful spells of exhaustion, or that you are reduced to regularly having magnificently bland food disguised as lunch, or, the most painful misfortune of all - that you are forced to cut down on your sleep! So the real question at the end of the day is - is the money worth it? To be very truthful, no amount of money can ever be worth all that, but being truthful went out of fashion a century ago. So yes, the money's worth it. But it isn't really worth it. Okay, my rant is getting really incoherent now. I must move on to less muddled things.

Watched three movies in the last week. Cheeni Kum is surprisingly funny, it has no airy pretensions about it and succeeds at bringing out the innate humor in an unconventional love story. Amitabh Bachchan is in his element after a long time, and Paresh Rawal is dependably funny as always. But it is Tabu, that long-forgotten actress of sparkling caliber, who holds the film together with her wonderful naturalness. It's amazing how sometimes a simple role that doesn't require too many histrionics or intense emotions can make us appreciate the real quality of an actor. It happened with Kareena Kapoor in Omkara, with Rani Mukherjee in Bunty Aur Babli, with Akshaye Khanna in Dil Chahta Hai, and if I may dare to club him with Bollywood actors, with Al Pacino in the Godfather. I guess it's just one of the things that make movie-watching such a delightful experience.

Shrek The Third was probably my most anticipated movie of the year (well okay, my second most anticipated movie of the year - Harry Potter 5 grabs top spot without any kind of a fight). But the movie turned out just good - not outrageously funny, not amazingly pleasant, and not even completely devoid of boring moments. It would've been an exhilarating joy-ride if it weren't for the inescapable feeling of repetitiveness about the humour - there's only so many times you can roll on the floor with laughter at Eddie Murphy's Donkey jokes. And while I'm definitely not among those who hate Justin Timberlake with a passion, his Artie was downright uninteresting and even a little irritating. Mike Myers, Antonio Banderas and Cameron Diaz continue with their good work, but the whole film has a little staleness to it which not even the novel subplot involving the feelings of the perennially hated fairytale villains and the whole bit about how fairytale heroines can be anorexic party-loving bitches when away from the public glare can erase.

And that brings me to the movie that dwarfs all others in terms of scale, budget, length, box office returns and a whole lot of other things. The title of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is not the only thing that is excessively long about it. The official runtime of the movie is 2 hours and 48 minutes, and that beats most of Bollywood's overlong melodramas by a distance. Everything about the movie is enormous - the star cast, the budget (it reportedly cost a whopping 300 million dollars to make), the action sequences, even the supernatural goddess Calypso. Personally, I enjoyed every single second of the movie - I'm a die-hard Pirates fan, I've been one ever since Captain Jack Sparrow said, "But why is the rum gone?". It's infinitely better than Dead Man's Chest, and comes very close to being as good as The Curse of The Black Pearl, which is saying quite something. I'm sure plenty of people hated the movie heartily, and perhaps even more were left thoroughly confused by the many twists, turns and double-crossings in it, but that is wholly understandable for a trilogy that evokes as sharply divided reactions as does Pirates. The film actually looks as expensive as 300 million dollars, and is a grand epic in every sense of the term. The added bonus is, of course, that it is a very funny epic. Johnny Depp, Bill Nighy and Geoffrey Rush are, expectedly, the stand-out performers, but the support cast does well too. The CGI is ridiculously breathtaking and the fight sequences are going to end up as the defining cinematographic achievements of the decade. Admittedly, the pointless Calypso sub-plot, the frustrating complexity of the Dutchman curse and, of course, the somewhat tiring length of the movie do sour things a bit. But otherwise, it is a very worthy finale to a fantastic series and is quite easily the best movie of the year. Yet. Harry Potter 5, remember?

The GOAT Who Doesn't Like Dirt

2007-05-14T12:32:00.000-07:00

He's the most breathtakingly artistic tennis player to be seen in the last 20 years. He's flamboyant yet consistent, inhumanly skillful yet robotic. He's The One. The only potential GOAT (Greatest Of All Time) since Sampras. Roger Federer plays perfect tennis on his good days, and magnificent tennis on his average ones. And yet, lately, some have had the audacity to call Rafael Nadal 'The One' too. Even if only The Claycourt One. 77 consecutive victories on clay is no joke. Admittedly, Federer's 48 consecutive victories on grass is hardly kindergarten stuff either. Yet, Roger Federer has just seen the rug pulled from under his feet, by a a couple of dirtballers called Guillermo Canas and Filippo Volandri, and Nadal, his exasperatingly exceptional nemesis of the last two years. The All-Surface Grand Slam dream has never seemed more distant. Federer's 4-tournament title drought is cause for worry too, but a very minor one compared to the ever-troublesome Grand Slam challenge. This is GOAT stuff we're talking about - Federer needs that Roland Garros trophy.

What is it about claycourt tennis anyway? Why is it that a surface which produces tiring, artless slug-fests is considered so important to test a player's ability? No tennis follower ever lapses into lyrical nostalgia about the great claycourt specialists. Who remembers Guillermo Vilas, Mats Wilander or Thomas Muster? Well okay, maybe a few do remember these all-time greats, but certainly not in the same vein or numbers as people reminisce about Bjorn Borg, Rod Laver, Pete Sampras, or even Goran Ivanisevic. Pete Sampras never won the French. Heck, he never even reached the final. Sure, Borg did win both Wimbledon and the French five years in a row, but his legend lies more in his astonishing ability to switch between the two surfaces, year after year, than any particular dexterity at 'grinding it out' on clay. I guess what I'm trying to say is that the grass and hardcourt greats, rather, the non-claycourt specialists, have always been considered the more legendary and irresistibly endearing champions, as opposed to the claycourt greats, who've more often than not been consigned to the dreary areas of records and streaks.

Why the big fuss, then, about Federer being unable to stand up to the unshakable clay demon that is Nadal? Maybe it's because a No. 1 player is not supposed to lose as consistently to a single player as Federer loses to Nadal. Maybe it's because the sheer length of the claycourt season is too large to ignore. Or maybe, it's because Federer is, simply, the best player of all time, and so him not being able to win the French can turn out to be a damning indictment of the reasoning behind using different surfaces in tennis. Sigh! If only there weren't all these logical explanations! Then we could all just happily ignore the filthy red surface and rejoice in the jaw-dropping genius of the Swiss maestro.

But we are humans, and blessed as we are with the powers of logic and reasoning, we should necessarily agree that Federer has to win at Roland Garros. The bad news is that he's in worse form than he's been at any time in the past 3 years. And oh, he's just split with his coach Tony Roche, and will travel without a coach to Paris. Most worryingly for him, however, Nadal is playing almost perfect claycourt tennis, and it's pretty much a given that Federer will have to defeat Nadal to win the tournament that Nadal has won almost effortlessly for the last 2 years. Impossible? Well, it does seem pretty bleak right now. But doing the impossible shouldn't be that difficult for the GOAT (I know, I'm using the term far too often, but I've taken a strange liking to it). This is Roger Federer we're talking about. The man who can make the Roddicks, Hewitts, Blakes and even Agassis of this world look like mesmerized bystanders. Surely he can turn it around in time? Surely Nadal has to suffer an injury sooner or later?

A Slow-Paced, Boring, Melodramatic Must-See

2007-05-07T11:58:00.000-07:00

An alien symbiotic creature that clings to a piece of clothing, a man with a curious ability to conjure and resize his clothes entirely from sand but who wilts when exposed to water and a fully grown superhero weeping like a two-year-old when his girlfriend dumps him. 'Spiderman' was never about being realistic anyway. And with Spiderman 3, the improbability stakes go up just that bit higher. But who's complaining, when the stunning action scenes, breathtaking cinematography and lightning pace keep the audience obscenely entertained, right? The trouble is, Spiderman 3, for all its action-packed thrills and feeble attempts at philosophy, just cannot keep you glued to your seats - it is, quite simply, boring. And for a series as record-breaking and amusingly awe-inspiring as Spiderman, that's not good news at all.

The movie attempts to deconstruct the psychology of superheroes (now isn't that a Herculean task!) and underline the most basic doctrine of all - being bad is fun. The old guard of Tobey McGuire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco and Rosemary Harris reprise their roles as the central Spiderman characters in this mildly dark and very slow-paced affair. The movie starts off with Peter Parker (McGuire) and Mary Jane (Dunst) firmly ensconced in a compromising yet carefree romance, who spend their time together entangled in gigantic spider webs. Parker is still without a permanent job, but this time, MJ joins him on the list of the unemployed after being kicked out of a ridiculously dull stage performance the like of which I'm pretty sure will not find a single a viewer in the real world. The relationship begins showing signs of strain, what with Spiderman being such a hero and all and poor Miss MJ being reduced to working as a singing waitress. Things take a turn for the worse for the cranky couple with the appearance of the shockingly unimportant Gwen Stacy (Bryce Dallas Howard, utterly wasted) and her snotty boyfriend Eddie Brock (Topher Grace). For some reason, Spiderman thinks it a good idea to share a passionate kiss with Gwen in the presence of a shell-shocked MJ, which makes one wonder whether Spiderman is inherently evil after all, Venom or no Venom.

Meanwhile, Flint Marko (Thomas Haden Church), a predictably wronged convict on the run from the police, gets transformed into the invincible Sand Man under highly mysterious, not to mention amusing, circumstances. The script's excuse is that a 'particle physics' laboratory carries out highly dangerous, 'demolecularizing' experiments in frightfully unguarded pits, under the open skies, with not a hint of a worry about any thing or being falling into the pit accidentally and getting its molecules ripped apart. So Flint Marko, now Sand Man, comes to be a pretty invulnerable monster who is furious at the world for some reason, but who also has a human side to him, compassionately trying to rob every bank in sight to gather funds for treating his daughter's incurable illness (no idea what the illness is). All this while, the alien 'Venom' stealthily sizes up the emotionally ploughed Parker, waiting for the right moment to cling inseparably to the noble superhero and turn him into an arrogant, aggressive demon. And wait, there's another crucial subplot - Harry Osborn is finally ready to take up his due post as the new Green Goblin or the Hob Goblin (the name fans of the comic will assure you is the correct one) and avenge his father's death. A bout of amnesia for this one considerably eases things for poor Spidey, who has his hands quite full with not one but five different adversaries (MJ can be counted as an adversary too - she barely looks at him with anything other than pitying disdain during the movie). A case of too many villains? Fans of Spiderman the comic will wholeheartedly agree.

The film has plenty of moments to savour - the action scenes are brilliant as usual, and the fight sequence between Peter and Harry, (not the one between Spidey and Goblin) is fantastic, with the underlying simmering tension and deep-seated affection between the two spilling over quite dramatically. The episode where Spidey willingly gives up his sickeningly saccharine self in favor of the evil yet cool alter ego guided by Venom's venomous ways has been handled with wonderful deftness. You can actually feel Parker's enjoyment at being allowed to be bad, and McGuire, it has to be said, does a thoroughly efficient job in these parts. The character development is really shoddy though - there doesn't really seem to be any point to the Sand Man character, and Venom is quite unceremoniously dumped to the sidelines by all the romance and irritating sequences concerning the murder of Parker's uncle (turns out he was killed by Sand Man after all). Gwen Stacy is laughably insignificant - it seems the makers intended to give her a full-blown role at the beginning but forgot all about her somewhere in the middle. Nothing else can explain why they chose an actress as brilliant as Howard for the part, or why she accepted it.

The dialogues are predictably trite, but that's completely forgivable in a Spiderman flick. The acting is fairly average, though one wishes McGuire would tighten up his act in the emotional scenes - all he had to do was look at Dunst, who undoubtedly is the best performer in the movie, even if her character is horribly annoying. James Franco and Topher Grace do adequate jobs, and Rosemary Harris, thankfully, has very little to do in this one, because there's only so much of Aunt May reminiscing about her poor old husband and their lame times together that one can tolerate.

The romance is overbearing, the action too little, the pace too slow and the storyline too hackneyed and melodramatic. And yet, Spiderman 3 deserves to be watched at least once - the 'evil is fun' theme is far too irresistible, and the movie's box office returns are far too humongous to be ignored. There are many movies that are deserving contenders to qualify as the definitive movie of our generation, but none as strong as the Spiderman series. This is Hollywood at its costliest, loudest and most extravagant - let yourself be overawed by the hype, it's fun. Even if it is boring.

Erm, Time Travel is a Ridiculous Idea, Hollywood

2007-05-02T11:45:00.000-07:00

Hollywood filmmakers really do know how to get on your nerves. They may use a lot of fancy special effects, get the most photogenic actors to prance around like saintly superheroes and dress up all of their movies with the snazziest of technology and production values, but at heart they're only really out to surprise, confuse and thoroughly irritate their unsuspecting audience. In the midst of all this, if the audience are lightly entertained for even a second, then it's a monumental victory for the average Hollywood moviemaker, and is taken as his cue to start work on a string of similarly logic-defying scripts, or better still, to make a sequel. Okay, that may sound a little insane, but at least it can explain the stream of movies based on time travel constantly coming out of Hollywood studios, and with all top drawer actors, no less. I just finished watching Deja Vu, a movie based on time travel, which stars Denzel Washington, of all people, as the main lead. And to be very honest, after two hours and six minutes of fairly entertaining, fast-paced thrills, I was only left wondering who on earth could have written such an outrageously ludicrous script, and why in God's good name Washington ever agreed to be a part of it.

The thing with time travel is that it is inherently such a ridiculous idea that when Hollywood scriptwriters take the concept and try to construct intricate plots replete with loads of sci-fi hogwash around it, they end up thrusting the most insanely unbelievable tripe at their audience. I know that sci-fi is supposed to be unbelievable, but most sci-fi movies do have a central logical theme to their plots that at least makes some sense with a degree of imaginative leeway on the part of us watchers. But time travel! It makes no sense whichever way you look at it.

Now I don't claim to have watched all of Hollywood's time travel movies, but I have watched a fair few - The Terminator movies, The Time Machine, Kate and Leopold, Deja Vu, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and The Butterfly Effect, the last of which was a surprisingly high quality product for a genre of such fatuousness. The Terminator series concentrated more on the robot/cyborg element, with time travel being just an auxiliary part of the plot, so I guess we can forgive the utterly crazy premise of humans and evil robots sending ultra-stylish marshals to the past to protect and destroy, respectively, the future leader of the human race. Kate and Leopold is a romantic comedy, and frankly speaking, is actually more believable than the slew of mindless, coincidence-abounding fairytales that are the norm for the genre, even with the 'crack in time' theory and Hugh Jackman playing the inventor of the elevator who somehow finds himself in the apartment of the remarkably unflustered Meg Ryan, who incidentally exists 120 years in the future. The Butterfly Effect, a completely fanciful venture that is mainly preoccupied with human emotions and fate, is darkly depressing yet unexpectedly stirring, and would certainly have had a very large cult following had Ashton Kutcher been a little decent at acting. It manges to get away because of the underlying supernatural theme, but only just.

It is when the filmmakers try to bring science into the equation that the plots fail spectacularly. In Deja Vu, for instance, Denzel Washington uses modified satellites to travel to the past and prevent a terrorist attack that he knows has killed hundreds of people. The trouble is, he also has to reverse the death of a beautiful young woman who conveniently yet bizarrely is crucial to the attack. And this, as you may very well have guessed, sparks off a series of confounding and fantastically ludicrous events that only the director can fully explain (though I'm not sure even he can). Apparently, the story moves through four different and discrete timelines, with Mr. Washington existing in two different forms in any given timeline, and each of these two forms is wholly oblivious to the existence of the other. At one point, we are even told that there is a 'dead' Washington who somehow managed to take along his mobile phone through the time machine even though he was strictly advised not to carry any extra baggage when making the leap, and an 'alive' Washington who notices, to highly amusing effect, that a victim of the attack (in other words, the dead Washington) receives calls at exactly the same time that he himself does. So in the la-la land of Deja Vu, mobile phones can travel through time too. If you think all of this is stunningly laughable, you should check out the 'theories' about the film at www.imdb.com. They'll leave you in very pleasant splits, I assure you.

I know this may sound a little biased, with me being such a big Harry Potter fan and all, but I honestly believe that J K Rowling's version of time travel is far saner than most other theories. In Potterworld, 'reality' cannot be changed no matter how much anyone may fiddle with 'time turners'. There can only ever be one timeline, and even if somebody does go back or forward in time, his or her actions will somehow be aligned with the existing reality as we know it, so that there can never be alternate universes or bringing of the dead back to life, thus eliminating at least two of the most worryingly unbelievable phenomena of time travel. In short, 'destiny' cannot be changed in Potterverse: Time is only a function of Fate, and no amount of time travel can bring any sort of disharmony to this fundamental truth. In spite of this rosy, intellectual-sounding explanation, however, the fact remains that the time travel part of the Harry Potter books and movies is still the most misunderstood and hotly debated Potter concept. Which just goes to show how terrifically inconceivable and needlessly confusing a concept time travel is: people are willing to accept flying on broomsticks and storing parts of one's soul in many different inanimate objects, but they refuse to accept time travel, even in as perfectly imaginary a work as Harry Potter. Something for Hollywood to think about?

A Tournament with many Losers

2007-04-29T06:57:00.000-07:00

As the Aussie juggernaut, no wait, I'll have to rephrase that - 'juggernaut' is really quite a horrible cliche; so, as the Aussie missile tank cruised towards a thoroughly wondrous third successive World Cup triumph, the predictable SMS's of dejection and doom began doing the rounds. "These Aussies are invincible", went the more obvious ones, but there were some gems around too, like "Australia should be given a wild card entry into the final for all future World Cups so that we'll have to watch only one miserable Australia match" or "They should rename the World Cup the 'Australian Open' or the 'Aussie Invitation Trophy'". I quite like the idea of giving a different name to the World Cup. But I suppose the ICC might not be be too keen on giving up the the uneasy prefix 'ICC' attached to the name. Honestly though, the prefix actually sounds quite embarrassing now, after the utterly disgraceful mess that the officials somehow managed to create at the end and the torpid yet autocratic organisation of the tournament in general. I don't think there can be any worse indignity for the ICC than some people labeling this the worst World Cup ever. But we'll get to that later.

The final in itself was yet another damning indictment of the very wide gulf between Australia and the rest of the cricketing nations. Sri Lanka are no pushovers; their bowling attack is actually better than Australia's, and they've got some fantastic firepower in their batting. But their greatest strength is the wonderful sense of camaraderie and enthusiasm amongst the team that has been largely attributed to Mahela Jayawardane's astute leadership. All of this was, however, brought to a dismal naught by Adam Gilchrist's truly fearsome knock. There have been calls for his head by some former Australian cricketers considering his rather poor form in the last 6 months, but the fact remains that a Gilchrist on the rampage is far more worrying for an opposition captain than anything that Matthew Hayden or Ricky Ponting can come up with. This may sound sacrilegious to some, but I do believe that after Shane Warne, Gilchrist has been the most special payer of this utterly dominating Australian team. And history will remember him so too; if he retires now, I scarcely think any farewell by any cricketer can top what Gilchrist managed yesterday.

The Sri Lankans did, of course, keep interest alive in the match fairly long; Jayasuriya was at his slashing best, and Sangakkara kept unfurling shots of the most delectable order, almost as though he was hell-bent on winning the unwinnable battle of the wicket-keeper batsmen. Glory for Sri Lanka was not to be though, thanks to some steady Aussie bowling and the permutations of the very confusing and at times very unfair Duckworth-Lewis system. At the end of 33 overs, the Sri Lankans found themselves at 206 for 7, needing another 63 runs to win off 18 balls. A done and dusted game, surely. There was also the small matter of the ground being in near pitch darkness because of the heavy cloud cover. So the umpires offered the light to the batsmen, and the Sri Lankans took off, which was not altogether surprising given that Shaun Tait was lurking around the corner. And this was the beginning of the most embarrassing farce ever witnessed in a match of such significance. The Australian players dissolved in ecstatic celebrations, the scorecard flashed out 'Congrats Australia!', the ground staff began preparations for assembling the presentation stand, the Aussie fans embarked on their typically rumbustious rejoicing, and then Aleem Dar decided to have a bit of fun with the rule-book, going up to a delirious Ponting to inform him, quite like a stern parent would admonish a misbehaving child, that the match was not over yet! Dar then proceeded to shoo off the staff making preparations for the presentation, ordered Glenn McGrath to put the stump that he had yanked out in jubilation back in its place and decided, after talks with the two captains, to resume play on the agreement that Australia would only employ slow bowlers. The looks on the faces of the Australian players said it all. So back came Lasith Malinga and Chaminda Vaas to take guard against Michael Clarke, and everyone who was watching was quite sure that Aleem Dar, and perhaps even Steve Bucknor and Rudi Koertzen had lost their minds. Apparently, the umpires were convinced that the Lankan tailenders facing 3 overs of gentle spin bowling in a hopelessly lost cause would bring thrills of the most electrifying kind imaginable to the millions of viewers. Either that, or they really did forget the rule that a match could be ended by the Duckworth-Lewis system once the minimum 20 overs a side had been bowled, and that there was absolutely no need to resume the match the next day to play out the 3 overs. The match referee, at any rate, wants us to believe that it was a simple matter of poor memory that caused such an indescribably horrendous farce. Mark Nichols, the TV commentator, went nearly apoplectic with rage and outrage at the remarkably deranged behaviour of the officials. He wasn't the only one.

So was this the worst World Cup ever? The tragic murder of the Pakistani coach Bob Woolmer bang in the middle of the tournament certainly makes a very strong case for that kind of statement. Then, of course, the sheer number of one-sided games right till the very end of the tournament tilts the balance even further. The security was inadequate, the attendance at the grounds poor, and even nature was not on the tournament's side, with many games being affected by rain. Captains complained thunderously about the poor training facilities in the Caribbean, and the crowds complained about nearly everything, right from the high ticket prices to the ICC's ridiculous restrictions on the weapons of mass destruction that are musical instruments, and the shockingly dangerous Mexican wave. Moreover, there was never really any competitive tension in the tournament, what with Australia reducing everything that came in their way to pitiable dust.The rest of the teams, left to merely squabble amongst themselves like a pack of hyenas and identify the team least likely to be humiliated by Australia, often employed petty tactics like deliberately 'resting' their premier players against Australia in the hope that their confidence wouldn't be shattered by the walloping they were sure to receive at the hands of Ponting & Co, which only resulted in even more one-sided matches. Phew, the list of negatives doesn't seem to end.

Sure, there were a few unforgettable moments to savour. Lasith Malinga's 4-wickets-in-4-balls burst was a truly magnificent spectacle, as was Herschelle Gibbs's astonishing 6-sixes-in-an-over butchery. Inzamam-ul-Haq bid a tearful farewell to the one-day game after Pakistan's rather humiliating early exit, and Glenn McGrath finished his international cricket career like only an Australian cricketer can, with jaw-dropping success, clutching the Player of the Tournament award and surrounded by euphoric teammates. But perhaps the most enduring and endearing moment of the World Cup will remain Brian Lara's farewell lap around the Kensington Oval ground at the end of his last international match followed by a sensationally regal retirement speech, coming at the heels of yet another inglorious performance by his team. There was never anything even remotely inglorious about Lara though, and he made sure that his end will remain forever etched vividly in every cricket follower's mind with a single line, "Did I entertain?". There are many who will testify that they never saw a more passionate response given to a cricketer than the rousing reply given to Lara's query, but there are also some who will admit that they couldn't stop the tears at a moment so poignant and evocative. Lara was special, right till the end.

After analyzing all the pros and cons, I'll have to agree - this was the worst World Cup ever. The ICC should have mass sackings for the excruciatingly long debacle that they thrust upon the cricketing world. Well, as long as I'm wishing for impossible things, I may as well wish for Lara to come out of retirement. Or for Sourav Ganguly to go into retirement. Or for Kevin Pietersen to go back to South Africa where his talents will find much more support than in the woeful team that is England. Or for Sony Max never to telecast any cricket match again. Ok, I'll stop now.

Red Alert! Close Matches in Danger of Extinction!

2007-04-26T12:59:00.000-07:00

Graeme Smith has got plenty of explaining to do. For the past one year or so, he's talked about his team's 'strength of character', he's talked about the new brand of cricket adopted by his team which is both 'brave' and effective, and he's talked about how his team ruthlessly 'demolished' their chokers' tag. He's pretty much exhausted the supply of English words in trying to showcase the supposedly gritty and combative nature of his team, which we all expected would find dazzling expression in the semi-final against Australia. We expected a close match; heck, we deserved a close match. If only someone had told that to Ponting and his men. One look at the steely stares on the faces of nearly all the Aussies as they took to the field was enough to remind us that the phrase 'close match' doesn't figure in the mindset of any Australian cricketer at the moment, not even remotely. What followed was 40 overs of the most cruel and demoralizing walloping imaginable, even if the scorecard doesn't say so. Graeme Smith owes us a semi-final. Perhaps he should spend less time with a dictionary and more with a trainer, preferably a therapist, because this South African team needs help.

People have found it hard to come up with new adjectives to describe the mind-numbing dominance of Australia thus far in the World Cup. Australia haven't just beaten all of their opponents on their merry way to a fourth consecutive World Cup final appearance; they've totally, mercilessly and brutally pulverized them. Some people have criticized the 'run for cover' tactics of Stephen Fleming and Mahela Jayawardane in shielding their best weapons, Shane Bond for New Zealand, and Muttiah Muralitharan, Chaminda Vaas and Lasith Malinga for Sri Lanka, in their respective matches against the Aussies. But in all fairness to these two fine gentlemen, they had to think of something to pull a fast one on the rampaging juggernaut that is the Australian team, hadn't they? It's another matter that these questionable but potentially-effective tactics resulted in two crushing defeats for the innovative captains. Perhaps they were expecting to be pummeled in any case. Ponting would whole-heartedly endorse the latter view, and with a broad, supercilious smile to boot.

Australia are currently on a 21-match winning streak in World Cups that stretches back to that glorious semi-final (ah! the days!) against South Africa 8 years ago. Erm, why haven't the rest of the teams died of shame yet? Three batsmen of Australia have scored over 400 runs this tournament; two of them have scored above 500. Three of their bowlers have taken more than 20 wickets, which is a stunning statistic no matter how you look at it. They've piled up more than 300 in every match that they've batted first, and bowled out the opposition inside 50 overs in all matches save for the one against Bangladesh which was a 22-over game. Every single thing that Ponting has touched in the last 6 weeks has turned to gold - when Symonds was inured, Brad Hodge filled his shoes and smashed a blistering century against Holland; when Symonds returned he promptly made a brutal half-century against England. The reserve bowlers - Mitchell Johnson and Stuart Clark, haven't warranted even a side-ways glance, so good have been the frontline ones. When Glenn McGrath has opened the bowling, he's routinely snaffled a bunch of bemused opposition batsmen before you could say 'accuracy' or even 'retirement'; when he's bowled first change, he's twice picked up a wicket in his first over. Mike Hussey, that ridiculously prolific batsman-machine, hasn't had to arrive at the crease before the 30th over in a single match, which renders his modest numbers so far almost completely insignificant. Has there ever been a more imperious performance by any team in any tournament ever? Honestly, if Australia go on to lose the final, it will probably be the greatest injustice in the history of the sport.

Mahela Jayawardane and his band of infectiously enthusiastic men will, however, have other ideas. Everyone who saw Jayawardane's innings of 115 against the Kiwis has raved and ranted about the incredible polish and awesome effectiveness of his batting. He's an extraordinary leader, that man, and it may just be possible for him to dig out some massive reserves of pluck and spur his talented team to come up with a truly special performance and upstage the Aussies. For that to happen, however, a certain Muttiah Muralitharan will have to be at his magical best, spinning out outrageous offbreaks and bewildering doosras in generous doses. And of course, the rest of the team will have to push the boundaries of their endurance and stamina to the very farthest, and put on a show both heroic and epic in equal measure. Or, they can just hope for Australia to have a stunningly horrible day. The frightening thing is that even if all these fascinating things happen, Australia may still emerge winners. Talk about depressing odds.

The Man Who Could Make Time Stand Still

2007-04-22T12:54:00.000-07:00

When you hear deeply agitated fans whine about Kevin Pietersen’s lack of ‘sportsmanship’ in throwing down the stumps to bring the career of Brian Charles Lara to a premature, run-out induced end or express disgust at Pietersen's ridiculously long-drawn celebration at Lara's fall, you know you're talking about a man truly remarkable. And I’m not talking about Pietersen. That Lara's last innings had to end in a run-out was, in many ways, a perfectly symbolic climax to a quite special journey. For one thing, the fact that no bowler could get him out in his last innings reaffirmed Lara's complete and utter dominance over the best bowlers in the business through the years. For another, his teammate Marlon Samuels's very questionable call for a run which clearly didn’t exist was a painful reminder of the lack of support Lara has received from his compatriots throughout his career. And, perhaps most poignantly of all, Lara's controversial dismissal gave the millions of viewers something to talk about, awakening us quite emphatically to the simple truth that all that Lara really stood for during his entire career was entertaining the masses.

I must admit that I didn't quite think of all these things the moment that Lara got out. Right then, all I could think of was how truly horrid a person Marlon Samuels was. The fact that run-outs like the one to have struck Lara today are quite commonplace in cricket or that Lara himself may have been responsible for many a teammate's demise through bad calling didn't quite register in my mind. Nothing else mattered then, except that Lara was out, never to return to hold a bat again. The packed stands gave him a resounding ovation as he departed, but Lara was clearly furious at not being able to produce one more of his magical knocks in his final match. This was hardly a surprise, considering his amazing ability to rise to the special and most significant occasions, an ability that he’s demonstrated with astonishing ease so often in his career.

To say that Lara made batting look beautiful would be saying the obvious, and the oft-repeated. The thing that has always struck me as odd about Lara is that when off the field, his body movements seem a little uncoordinated and disorganized. Even his stance is a little peculiar, a little crooked, with the feet much too close together. It's almost as if his body was made for the cricket field, because the same disorganized frame suddenly acquired a grace that was almost balletic when he held a bat. This may have been repeated a million times before, but Lara's strokeplay was indeed absolute eye-candy - the elegance that he brought to a simple cover drive or the poetic artistry of his movements when he came down the track to the spinners was, there's no other word for it - breathtaking. Even his leaving of the ball was lyrical, as were his defensive blocks - batting looked more like exalted dance than a humdrum matter of scoring runs when he was at the crease. And yet, the power and momentum that he packed into most of his shots would have made Mohammad Ali proud; perhaps this had something to do with that extravagant backlift or the whiplash motion of his wrists, because Lara was anything but raw muscle while batting. No, raw muscle was for mere mortals, not for the colossus that was Brian Lara.

There have been many who have pointed out that Lara was nowhere close to a flawless genius. His mood swings, lack of discipline, arrogance, disdain for rules, and most importantly, rather poor captaincy skills have invited as much scathing criticism as his batting skills have earned awed praise. But what his detractors don't get is that when gifts as extraordinary as Lara has been blessed with find expression in such rapid and spectacular manner as two monumental, record-breaking innings of 375 and 501 mere weeks apart, and that too just 3 years into his young career, it becomes almost impossible to lead an uneventful life. Lara couldn't possibly have discarded his innate flamboyance and penchant for the impossibly glorious in exchange for a disciplined, run-machine career. And he didn't. But we must only be thankful for that, because I scarcely think any cricketer, with the possible exceptions of Shane Warne and Viv Richards, has inspired as passionate a fan following that cut across lines of culture and country as has Lara, which had as much to do with his logic-defying ability to win matches single-handedly as his refusal to conform to norms and follow the straight path. His indescribably brilliant innings of 153 against Australia at Barbados may be remembered for many centuries to come, but so will his child-like knock against Kenya in the 1996 World Cup that prompted calls for his head from many. It takes the good, the bad and the ugly to make a legend, and Lara made sure his mesmerized audience witnessed it all. His incredibly inadequate leadership skills perhaps diluted some of the joy that cricket followers all over the world, and particularly in the Caribbean, derived from his career, but genius must be granted its excesses. Besides, there are some who believe that the reason Lara failed so abysmally in arresting the decline in West Indian cricket through any semblance of inspired leadership is that he could never quite come to terms with the less prodigious abilities of his teammates. A classic case of extraordinary talent being surrounded, even overawed by mediocrity, something which could never really have been experienced by the great captains of history, the Clive Lloyds and the Steve Waughs. Raw, untamed, unfettered genius like Lara's comes only once in a century, but such remarkable flair doesn’t always translate into great team-management prowess, especially if the team you’re asked to manage is abysmally insipid. Ask Sachin Tendulkar.

At the end of the match, some of the English fans in the stands began to shed tears. No, England didn’t lose the match – they actually won by 1 wicket, but this day, all emotions were for Lara. Time seemed to stand still, as it did so often when he was batting, as he walked around the ground, waving to the spectators, shaking hands with the English players, wiping a stray tear or two off his cheek. His grief seemed a little incongruous at such a momentous occasion, but after a moment or two of reflection you realize that it was only appropriate. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that it is Lara who has been defined by the game of cricket, and not the other way round, and that it must have been terribly hard for him to let go of the one thing that roused his passion and emboldened and inflamed him to attain heights dizzying, dazzling, delirious. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that it was not cricket that lived for Lara, but Lara who lived for cricket.

They say that Lara’s most outstanding achievement remains, to this day, his reclaiming of the record for the highest Test score in an innings, exactly ten years to the day he first created it, on the same ground and against the very same opposition. Indeed, this is one feat so awe-inspiring that it is difficult to imagine anyone doing anything to even come close to matching it, ever. In fact, when Matthew Hayden had held the record for a brief while, I remember thinking how frightfully dramatic it would be if Lara were to regain the record, and then brushing the thought off as impossible, even for Lara. I need hardly mention how completely stunned I was when Lara actually went out and shattered the record only six months after Hayden’s feat, with all the poise of an indefatigable champion. And yet, statistics and great cricketing moments mean so little when you talk about someone like Lara. He is one sportsperson who has truly transcended his records and emerged as a legend so full of mystique and wonderment that it is beyond the realms of any kind of numbers. He is the man who, when in the mood, could do anything. And I mean anything. He may have been nicknamed ‘Prince’, but he was more majestic, more glorious, more splendid, more sublime and more imposing than any emperor could ever hope to be.

School Shootings: For Some Reason, Exclusively American Disasters

2007-04-18T13:02:00.000-07:00

Towards the end of the Harry Potter series, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry is threatened with closure because parents start worrying too much about the safety of their children to allow them to go to school. If yesterday's massacre at Virginia Tech University in the US is anything to go by, parents in the real world should start worrying about sending their wards to school too. Schools and universities, at least in the US, are suddenly terrifying places. They have become the quintessential modern hotbeds of blood-spilling; so much so, that Quentin Tarantino might just be tempted to have his next flick centered around an American university. That's right - if there's any place today more likely to attract gunfire and violence than a crowded locality in Iraq, it's got to be an American school. Sounds ironical? Not nearly as ironical as it would have if Cho Seung-hui, the perpetrator of the Virginia Tech slaughter, had been a native of North Korea rather than South Korea.

What comes across as an oddity, though not necessarily a surprise, is that school shootings are almost exclusive to the US. Of all the instances of gunfire-involving violence at educational institutions that have been reported in the last 30 years, nearly 90% have taken place in the US. So does this point to something inherently unstable about American youngsters? I wouldn't quite go to that extreme, but there's no going around the fact that the rebellious culture that has been prevalent in America has made picking up a gun and deciding to kill anyone who annoys you a lot less frightful than normal. Cho Seung-hui, a loner, had no apparent grouse with life other than 'rich kids', 'debauchery' and 'deceitful charlatans' on campus. Perhaps it is unfair to draw conclusions about the causes of these mishaps based on the unconfirmed emotions of a reclusive, possibly deranged student. But it is pertinent to note that there is an undeniable connection with the excesses reportedly observed in American universities and the angst, sometimes religiously motivated, that drives most campus killers.

There are other possible reasons for such shootings, of course. The most obvious among these would be that educational institutions, being invariably packed with a wide assortment of people, offer fairly irresistible attention-grabbing potential to the attention-seeking shooters. Then there's the inescapable fact that getting hold of handguns is remarkably easy in the US. In Virginia, for instance, any legal resident who is 21 years of age or older is eligible to purchase a handgun provided he or she has not been convicted of any felonies. Ridiculous? You bet. I wonder how the US lawmakers, in all their glorious wisdom, thought it fit to allow blatant selling of guns to every conviction-escaping potential criminal with such gleeful indifference. There was a movie adaptation of the John Grisham book The Runaway Jury some years back that changed Grisham's original cigarette/lung cancer plot to a courtroom brawl that had at its heart the prevention of indiscriminate trade in weapons. Though I was mightily annoyed about the change of plot, I couldn't have agreed more with the idea that handguns should NOT be sold without the strictest supervision and control. But that's just plain old common sense! It's amazing how notions of free trade and capitalism can sometimes blind one so completely to the benefits of basic reasoning.

The US needs to clamp down on such horrific incidents, and fast. After all, Mr. George W. Bush is out to reform the world and bring all savage (read: non-democratic) countries to American levels of civility and honour. It'd be a poor lookout for him if his own countrymen kept trying to drag American society into the revolting realms of barbarism replete with gun-toting madmen and tragic deaths of innocent people. Time for some soul-searching, Mr. Bush?

Batting Elegance: Soon to be a Lost Art?

2007-04-13T12:13:00.000-07:00

When the brilliant fade away, the mediocrity of mortals begins to look distasteful. The Super 8 match between the West Indies and South Africa was, perhaps, a lesson in the importance of discipline and efficiency in modern one-day cricket, but it was also a bleak reminder of how much poorer the game will be when the current vogue of robust ball-thwacking inevitably pushes the virtuosity of the artists into the sidelines. Or one particular artist, to be more precise. We all knew that Brian Lara was going to retire from the one-day game after the World Cup - everyone was sad about that; but to see him confirm it with such pitiable defeat written all over his face was positively depressing. The most painful thing about the entire episode was not the fact that Lara's team got more insipid as the tournament progressed or that the captaincy skills of Lara himself suddenly and alarmingly reached rock-bottom; what was most sad was that cricket, at least one-day cricket, is on its way to saying goodbye to one of its most celebrated maestros ever with so little grace.

I'm not talking here, of course, of any lack of respect on the part of any cricketing figure towards Lara; the people all around have been most courteous and deferential, and rightly so. What I'm talking about is the manner in which physicality and brutal strokeplay are rapidly taking over the game. South Africa's explosion towards the end of the match may have had quite a lot to do with Lara's potentially-legendary (and not in the right way) decision to delay the third Powerplay till the 45th over, but it was the ruthless savagery of Mark Boucher and Herschelle Gibbs that effectively ended the game as a contest. And this has been the trend for quite some time now - Australia-South Africa matches are the best examples of the new cricketing dogma that power is joy, and even New Zealand have been turning to this unpleasant mantra through its McCullums and Orams. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those stuck-up purists who would rather see a batsman play out ten consecutive maidens with 'grit and patience' than hit a series of spectacular sixes. But I do believe that tearing into bowlers without the least hint of subtlety or elegance is more than a little disturbing, if not annoying. And sadly, with the exit of Lara, and the imminent retirement of Sachin Tendulkar, there won't be too many in the cricketing world to stand up to the unrelenting wave of ugly but effective ball-pounding that is threatening to turn cricket into a slower version of baseball.

Coming back to Lara, it's amazing how so many people brush off his one-day career as 'average' or 'nothing splendid' just because he's played very few games and scored no centuries in the last two and a half years. Most people tend to forget that Lara had semi-retired from the one-dayers two years ago and only returned as a regular member of the team when he was made captain. Before his hiatus, he had been as thoroughly proficient a one-day player as any, and certainly a lot more destructive in his approach and style of play than he is now. And his stats up to the year 2004 will happily confirm that. However, ever since he's entered his third stint as captain, he's largely tried to stay away from the spotlight and give his lesser-known colleagues the chance to become match-winners of their own, albeit with incredibly poor results. That the likes of Chris Gayle, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and most infuriatingly of all, Marlon Samuels, have been unable to respond to Lara's pushes and prods (I'd perhaps leave Gayle out of this list - he was, after all, the Man of the Series in the Champions Trophy), is an apt reflection of Lara's entire cricketing life, both in Tests and one-dayers. He's never really had anyone to support, or even comprehend, his immense genius, and he has an astonishing tally of heartbreaking losses to show for that. Whether he would have been the greatest batsman of the post-Bradman era if it hadn't been for the remarkable incompetence of his teammates is perhaps too futile an argument. However, the fact that he has, in spite of the ruins around him, managed to carve out his own glittering place among the pantheons of cricketing greats is testimony to his incandescent brilliance. And besides, there's one thing that no one can ever take away from Lara - when he was on song, there wasn't a single batsman in the very long history of cricket who could match the sheer splendour of his strokeplay. Which is saying quite something.

Anyway, I think I should go back to watching the Australia-Ireland match. It's turning out to be quite ridiculously one-sided. I love supporting the Australians - it feels so much better to be rooting for guys like them instead of the appallingly pathetic West Indian team (save for Lara, of course). Ah, the Australian innings is just about to get underway, which means there'll be plenty of monstrous ball-thwacking from Hayden and Co. We'll miss you, Brian Charles Lara.

The Chastening of Chappell and other Cricketing Crises

2007-04-04T12:05:00.000-07:00

So, Indian cricket is in serious turmoil after after a particularly appalling performance from its too-old-to-train team. The deluge of demands for mass sackings simply refuses to stop, and the bosses up at the BCCI seem completely cowed down by the frenetic outrage in all parts of the country. Familiar story? Well, not quite. For starters, the Indian team hasn't performed so poorly in a World Cup for, as has been well-documented, 28 years. This is actually quite unknown territory for the average tempestuous Indian cricket fan. More importantly however, there's the inescapable fact that Pakistan have been bounced out of the tournament in just as humiliating a manner as India (well, perhaps just a little more humiliating), they have had to deal with the added trauma of a murdered coach, and yet, the situation in Pakistan can hardly be described as anything close to tumultuous or outraged. The Pakistani players have taken the humiliation of defeat and the tragedy of death in their grieving yet composed strides, the fans let out only minor jeers at the arrival of their disgraced heroes, the Board has quietly gone ahead and appointed Younis Khan as the new captain, and all is calm and quiet, at least for now. Considering Pakistan's famed volatility, that's saying something. Frankly, in normal times, if the two loving neighbors were faced with such eerily similar situations, one would expect the uproar in Pakistan to completely overshadow any hint of commotion in India. Disturbingly, that isn't happening right now. So this distasteful episode may be a lot of things, but familiar it is not.

As every single Indian knows by now of course, Greg Chappell has resigned from the coaching job. I can't really say I'm surprised by that, but it is perhaps significant that Chappell chose to make this announcement just a day after being called a host of unsavory things by the much-derided 'seniors' of the team. 'Seniors' actually may be a misleading term here, because the only person from whom most comments seemed to have come is Sachin Tendulkar. And that is really shocking, knowing as we do how dignified and graceful Tendulkar normally is with such things. Quite frankly, most of Sachin's 'exclusive' comments to a certain newspaper made him look like an overgrown spoilt child. Chappell hadn't even named Tendulkar in his dreaded list of 'uncooperative seniors', for crying out loud. One would've expected Tendulkar to show some restraint and not be reduced to wailing about his 'commitment', 'heart', 'soul' and plenty of other dramatic qualities in reaction to a few unconfirmed rumors. And coming as this does on the heels of some very unflattering calls for retirement, Sachin's timing couldn't have been more wrong. So was Chappell's resignation hastened by Sachin's outburst? No one really knows right now (except for Chappell himself, of course), and I suspect no one will really ever know, unless Chappell decides to write an autobiography some time soon. And boy, will that be a bestseller!

To make matters even worse for the BCCI, if that were even possible, Subhash Chandra, head of Zee group, decided to have a bout of Kerry Packer-ism, and announce quite theatrically to a disbelieving media that he plans to start a parallel 'cricket league' to rival the BCCI's monopoly over cricket in India. He also declared that there'd be some Indian internationals who would be a part of this rebel league, spawning a string of excited theories about the identity of the suicidal cricketers. As things stand right now, it seems extremely unlikely that Mr. Chandra will succeed in his adventurous plans, what with all the legal troubles and the BCCI's stranglehold on everything remotely related to cricket, but the BCCI could definitely have done without this particular head sore. And I, for one, am not complaining about that. In fact, I hope hordes of rampant businessmen come out with similarly ambitious plans and force the BCCI to burn all of its funds in legally stamping out such unwanted fires. That'd serve the sorry bunch of scumbags at the BCCI right, that would.

While all of this brouhaha has been brewing, the World Cup has been chugging along serenely without its money-spinning Asian members. Australia, as usual, look set to bully their way to a third consecutive title, while New Zealand, Sri Lanka and South Africa have been notching up impressive wins in their shadow. The performances of my favorites, the West Indies, however, have been singularly disappointing, not least because Brian Lara is being unfairly made the scapegoat for all the inadequacies of his insipid team. Clearly, as I keep saying, the Caribbean doesn't deserve Lara. On a more positive note, however, England seem to be marching towards a surprise victory over Sri Lanka as I write, and that can only brighten the extremely slim chances of the West Indies reaching the semis. Hope, prayers and good performances - that's all that the Windies need to go through now. Yeah, I know, I should stop being such a hopeless optimist.

Machine and Magician

2007-03-28T11:43:00.000-07:00

First things first - the tennis world has just been witness to a shock of the most ridiculous order. Roger Federer, that man/machine who has been known to make the Roddicks and Hewitts of this world look like dazed amateurs, has been defeated, twice in succession, by somebody called Guillermo Canas. No, I did not just make up that name - Canas is actually a tennis player, a reasonably proficient one, in fact, and has been in the news recently in connection with a doping scandal. Now, however, he's got a unique, possibly never to be repeated distinction - that of having beaten Federer in two consecutive matches that were NOT tournament finals, and that too in the scary era of Total Federer Domination. I guess Federer has simply got tired of winning - and I also strongly suspect that he doesn't want Rafael Nadal to be spoken of as the only player who has a statistical advantage over him. Maestros have all kinds of quirks about them - don't ask me to give a reasonable explanation for Federer's bizarre behavior. Let's just rejoice, instead, at the prospect of a second consecutive Masters tournament in which the likely champion's name is not something that you can give mechanically if asked to in the middle of your deepest slumber.

Moving on to less shocking things, West Indies went down to Australia in the first game of the Super Eights that was spread over two days because of unfortunate weather. And for what seemed like the millionth time, Brian Lara was the only top order batsman who showed any kind of resistance to the ruthless Aussies. His innings today was typically sublime - under immense pressure, having to undo plenty of the damage inflicted by his startlingly lethargic teammates, he rose to the challenge as magnificently as only he can, standing tall amongst the miserable ruins. Sigh! If only he'd been blessed with a marginally better team, we'd have been privileged witnesses, for the last 16 years, to the unadulterated wizardry of possibly the most talented batsman to have ever walked this earth. Instead, we've been saddled with a contradictory, disturbed genius, who's probably never known what it feels like to score a scintillating double century in a match AND win the match. Greatest tragedy of our cricketing time? Without the slightest doubt.

Tragedy and Then Some More Tragedy

2007-03-26T12:00:00.000-07:00

I don't know about you, but the fact that the last week has been such a harrowing time for the ICC has certainly made me splendidly delighted. Those arrogantly untouchable bullies desperately needed to be brought down by more than a peg or two, and happily, the first round of the World Cup has just about been their worst nightmare. The one face-saving move that they could have made, which they promptly did make, was to stoically insist that things haven't yet gotten so disastrous that a cancellation of the tournament altogether was warranted. Yes, I would've almost started hopping around in uncontrolled glee at this chastening fall from grace of the ICC snobs if the extremely tragic death of Pakistan's coach Bob Woolmer hadn't been the cause of it all.

There have been very diverse reactions to the unfortunate demise of the pioneer of 'laptop cricket' - some furious, some grief stricken, but almost all horribly shocked. And the conspiracy theories began to fly around before anyone could even register the cause of the death. As of now, things stand at a poignantly murky position: it has been well and truly established that Woolmer was in fact murdered; former Pakistan players have come out with allegations that the crime was a well-plotted result of the enigmatic connections between the ICC, Pakistan cricket and bookmakers; and the Jamaican police have managed to drum up a flurry of suspicious whispers by announcing that only 'diplomatic problems' prevented them from detaining the Pakistan team in Jamaica in connection with the investigations. Just how many dreadful rumors such embarrassingly ill-advised statements are going to provoke is anybody's guess, but the stories have already started to border on the supremely ridiculous. One thing's for sure: things have now gone so bad that the terrible cliche "cricket is a gentleman's game" is never even going to cross anyone's mind in the future.

No matter how tragic Woolmer's death may have been though, the Indian cricket fan was struck by insufferable misery only after Bangladesh's not-entirely-unexpected victory over Bermuda. A lot has been said abut how fickle sub-continental fans are, which is why the seemingly never-ending stretch of bitter brickbats and, rather regrettably, some choice abuses and profanities shouldn't be wholly surprising. Along with painful disappointment, however, there has also been a sense of disbelief and incredulity about the Great Calamity among the fans. The Indian team does NOT crash out of the World Cup in the first round: that just doesn't happen. It hasn't happened in the discernible memory of anyone, at any rate - 1979 was many many years ago. For me, certainly, things do seem a bit surreal right now; I can't even begin to imagine a World Cup without India's presence for such a large chunk of the tournament. Ah well, I guess I'll just be brought back to happy reality by some strong performances by my favorites Australia and the West Indies. It feels so good to support reliable teams (Australia are, anyway). Meanwhile, we should brace ourselves for some heavy-duty slashing and chopping in the Indian team - and judging by the comments that have been morosely exchanged all over the country, there's going to be a lot of cheering at the merciless dumpings. Let's just hope there are no tears shed. Of sorrow OR joy.

Getting back to the actual cricket action, I've got to say that the Australia-South Africa match was one cracker of a match, even if it was a bit too nerve-wracking for the first half of South Africa's chase. These two teams are clearly streets ahead of the rest of the pack, and if South Africa don't manage to reach the finals this time either, as I'm predicting they won't, there'll only be yet another legend added to the 'Mysteries of South African Falling-Apart-at-Crunch-Times' collection. Maybe this is the tournament in which we'll finally know for sure just how much of Graeme Smith's aggression and apparent gumption is real and how much of it is merely pretentious/pathetic-counter-to-Aussie-arrogance. Brian Lara's West Indies, on the other hand, seem unsure as to exactly how much confidence and aggression they should be putting on display, which has resulted in three consecutive victories in the 'Group of Death' which have alternated between the furiously brilliant and the disinterestedly lacklustre. But the two teams that deserve our admiration most of all are Bangladesh and Ireland, who have ruthlessly sent the two Asian heavyweights India and Pakistan packing from the tournament. Objectively speaking, the rise of these two teams was the best thing that could have happened to the Cup, sparking, for the umpteenth time, bemused mutterings of the disgusting cliche (cricket does seem to have a lot of these, doesn't it?) 'cricket is a game of glorious uncertainties'. Seriously, if at all the ICC guys want to make themselves remotely useful, they'd do well to revamp the cricketing lexicon, it's getting more ignoble by the day.

A Real Laugh Riot

2007-03-21T10:46:00.000-07:00

What do you do when you go out to watch a movie expecting it to be something of an epic cross between Gladiator and Troy, at least in terms of class, and instead get an apology of a movie that alternates between downright hilarious and painfully taxing? Curse the voters at www.imdb.com, that's what. I know the ratings system at the "earth's biggest movie database" can be a little quirky at times, but a rating of 8.2 for something as crass as 300, spearing it into the list of the top 250 movies of all time is pure scandalous. And the movie's making all the big bucks too - having scythed a rollicking opening in the US, it's on its way to becoming one of the most successful war movies ever. Seriously, Hollywood needs to be rescued, and fast.

The problem with 300 is not so much its actual quality but its over-ambitious intent. All the makers had to do was make a big budget, visually attractive movie that did NOT pretend to be anything more than a regulation comic book adaptation. Instead, they chose to aim for Lord of the Rings-style glory, which, predictably enough, makes it laughably over-dramatized. And don't even get me started on the liberal helpings of gore and violence, which, coupled with the noir-like brown tinge present throughout like some kind of sympathetic haze, gives you a right splitting headache. The film starts off dreadfully, with some kind of barbaric ritual meant to give superpowers to the privileged citizens of Sparta that only makes you fear for the sanity of the incredibly hot-headed Spartans. And things don't get better from there; in fact, they get progressively worse. The focus shifts to a blood-thirsty king who foolishly challenges the mighty Persian army to battle the specially-designed Spartan warriors. There's a queen too, who perpetually seems to be itching to deliver some powerful lines. Cut to a scene showing a savage bunch of morally-challenged priests and a very apoplectic Oracle-girl, and the king is advised not to go to battle. If only the king had heeded the good priests' advice, we would have been spared some really wasteful shots that are filled with nothing but blood and severed heads.

Instead, the king sets out to pulverize the almost-invincible Persian army with a puny band of 300 people, because he can't engage in full-scale battle. And here's where the real comedy starts. There are so many problems with this crazy suicide warring that it seems amazing that the legend of this ludicrously impossible episode has lasted so long. The 300 warriors, all of whose profession is apparently 'Hoo hoo hoo!' (at least, that's what it sounded like) go forth with no bodily armor, and indeed, practically no bodily clothes either. They then embark on a series of loud yells and excited pronouncements of the word 'Spartan!'. In fact, the words 'Sparta' and 'Spartan' are used so often in the movie that towards the end I was tempted to keep count. Everyone mentions one of these two words in nearly every line - the king continually insists that they should all die for Sparta, the warriors keep chanting that Sparta stands for freedom, and even the queen addresses her husband, not as 'my dear', 'my lord' or even by his name, but as, you guessed it, 'Spartan'. Clearly, the makers have a passionate obsession with all things Spartan.

The appearance of horrendously mutated and unpleasantly disfigured humans and all sorts of other creatures is something of a fashion in the movie. And some of the shots showing exactly how the 300 warriors enthusiastically butcher all of their adversaries, in very graphic terms, are too gruesome to describe. I still can't get one shot, where the king stabs the eye of a particularly nasty human-demon, out of my head - it was that grisly. Meanwhile, the king's ear-splitting yells and incessant spitting-in-the-face antics seem constantly in danger of driving his followers into raging madness. Instead, they get more violent by the minute, choosing to break into demented laughs every time they seem likely to be overrun. The Persian king Xerxes, looking very much like a black Britney Spears and adorned with nearly ten kg of jewelery, makes some exuberant appearances too, and in fact, his sequences are among the funniest of the movie. Eventually, after an exasperating sub-plot involving the queen who is deceived with astonishing ease by a lecherous Councilor, the movie draws to a close, with the Spartans in exactly the same position that they were in at the start of the movie: on the verge of going to war with the Persians. Talk about a pointless plot.

The acting is bad, the dialogues embarrassingly childish, and the central idea of the importance of freedom is lost amidst the gallons of blood. The only area where the movie scores is the cinematography: the visuals are truly spectacular, and the graphic detail has to be seen to be believed, though that's one of the main reasons why it turns out to be so horrifyingly macabre. 300 is, quite simply, a disaster. But hey, if you can stand the gore and violence, you should definitely go for it: it will give you some really good laughs. And if you want to make your experience really memorable, watch it with around 10 of your friends; the comments will never stop. If only there wasn't the small matter of a hundred bucks being spent entirely on joking around with your friends; normally, joking around comes free.

The Million Dollar Minnow Matter

2007-03-17T11:46:00.000-07:00

How infectious is cricket fever? Infectious enough to want to skip work and watch TV all day, if you ask me. And it's a different matter altogether that my work timings and the Caribbean match timings don't really clash. Ah well, did humankind ever need a reason to want to stay home from work? It's the same sad story with everyone - the early morning 'waking up' dread, the mid-morning dejection from looking at the perfectly useless but positively humongous pile of work, the afternoon frustration at realizing that yet another bunch of six hours has gone down the filthiest of drains and the evening exhaustion from, well, all the other negative thoughts that flitted through your mind all day. It's a vicious, vicious cycle.

Alright, enough of such depressing talk. Let's focus, instead, on the main subject of my post. The one word that has been on everyone's lips these first few days of the World Cup is 'minnow'. The first three days it was all about minnow-walloping and today it has been all 'minnow topples heavyweight' drama. I blame Ricky Ponting for starting this disturbing trend of social conversation. If he hadn't found the need to equate the minnows with some kind of annoying flies who do nothing but buzz and irritate, then we wouldn't have had the momentous discussions that followed about the advisability or otherwise of minnows playing in the World Cup. Barely had the disastrous comment escaped his colorful tongue than indignant minnow captains erupted out of nowhere claiming that they could 'spring a few surprises here and there' and cricket 'experts' began their drones about how the minnow matches prolong the World Cup beyond tolerance levels or conversely, how the unfortunate babes need all the big match practice they can get. Yawn. Somebody should put a gag order on the imaginative Mr. Ponting.

Moving on to more important things, South Africa's pummeling of the dazed Dutch yesterday had to be seen to be believed. Enough has been said about that over in which Herschelle Gibbs decided to check whether a bowler would break down in heartbroken sobs if forced to suffer too much violence, so I'll talk instead about the innocent-looking massacre inflicted by Mark Boucher and the composed ransacking antics of Jacques Kallis. I don't quite think I've ever been witness to a more sumptuous feast of runs. It felt like the boundaries would never stop - they kept getting bigger and bigger as the morale of the hapless Dutch bowlers kept getting smaller and smaller. That match, together with Australia's murderous assault on Scotland and Sri Lanka's clinical slaughter of Bermuda nearly vindicated Ponting's path-breaking statement, making him sound like an accomplished clairvoyant. Thankfully, however, today's events will have done enough to prevent Ponting's ever-present supercilious smile from widening further. That's because, as I write, Ireland seem to be on the verge of prompting full-scale riots in Pakistan, having dismissed them for a barely-believable score of 132. And Bangladesh seem to be on their way to inflicting some acute embarrassment on Dravid and Co., with India huffing and puffing mightily to reach a quite miserable score of 191. Bangladesh have been really robust in their reply so far, rattling away to 109 for 3 after 25 overs, and I sense that some really dark times are about to engulf the sub-continent. Don't be surprised if a few cricketers' homes are vandalised tomorrow. And Mr. Chappell, Mr. Woolmer, I think the pair of you should be packing your bags painfully soon.

Honestly though, these first few days have been really really entertaining. Barring the one languid game between the boringly efficient New Zealand and the woeful England (I guess they're back to their dark days), all the other matches have been real crackers, nasty shock or no nasty shock. I mean, come on - it was seriously good fun to watch the rampaging Gibbs clobber the poor Daan van Bunge with such remarkable disdain. And the Ireland-Zimbabwe tie, which literally turned out to be a tie, was fairly engrossing too. So things certainly are looking bright for this to end as the best World Cup ever. And that, in spite of all the garbage talk about minnows. I've always wondered though, why does everybody refer to the inexperienced teams as 'minnows'? Surely someone's got to have a better word to use? Any ideas, Mr. Ponting?

Time For Celebration

2007-03-14T10:58:00.000-07:00

A boisterous din of trumpets and drums, an admirable assembly of cricketers - excellent and ordinary, retired and playing, and a flurry of hopeful, diplomatic statements. The start to this year's World Cup in the West Indies has been something of a study in contrasts; while the media has been drumming up a maniacal frenzy, the crowds in the Caribbean seem somewhat bemused by all the seriousness and sensationalism being attached to the Cup. And the players themselves have been all grace and dignity, with every captain talking up his team's chances while admitting, very generously, that all the other teams have equally strong chances of lifting the Cup. The ICC officials, meanwhile, have been lurking surreptitiously in the background, ensuring that the Cup is actually referred to as 'The ICC Cricket World Cup' and hoping that if anything goes wrong, they can distance themselves from the entire thing and blame everything on the West Indians. Sounds like a fun party, doesn't it?

The tournament has been marred somewhat by a few unsavory comments flying around the cricketing world like nervous dragonflies. The Ricky Ponting-Sunil Gavaskar altercation has already involved physical brawls and whacks on heads, and it's only a matter of time before these two gentlemen start pulling each other's hair while screaming frantically, "YOU started it!" Come on now, I can allow Ponting a few mischievous quotes here and there - he's young (at any rate, a lot younger than Mr. Gavaskar), at the peak of his batting powers, and he so perfectly embodies the arrogant, sweep-everything-before-you Aussie mentality. But I would've expected Gavaskar, a senior statesman and one of the most respected cricketers in India, to show a little more maturity and level-headedness. Pakistan, on the other hand, have had the audacity, yet again, to inflict embarrassment of a fairly injurious degree on the cricketing world and especially the ICC, by allowing Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif to get away without undergoing dope tests. And we thought Akhtar's career couldn't possibly get any more controversial. All is not well within the West Indian cricket community either, with former greats Viv Richards and Michael Holding continuing their noble battles with the 'corrupt' Caribbean cricket bureaucracy. Hopefully these sordid situations won't spill over and affect the organisation of the tournament, because that would really be tragic.

Thankfully, not everything is in disgraceful disarray, with Brian Lara in particular exuding wonderful warmth and composure and playing the part of the host skipper with remarkable poise. Among his many well-chosen comments, the one that brought much happiness to legions across the world was his statement that he will continue playing Test cricket for at least around 2-3 years more. So I guess we shouldn't hang our heads in despair just yet; maybe, just maybe, we'll get to witness some more gems of indescribable glory from his masterful blade. In the first match against Pakistan though, he wasn't quite at his disdainful best, but did his part anyway, partnering Marlon Samuels (who made a brilliant 63) in a 91-run stand that ultimately proved crucial to the match. Pakistan never really recovered from the onslaught by the West Indian batsmen in the last 5 overs, and even the vastly experienced Inzamam-ul-Haq and the prolific Mohammad Yousuf couldn't stop them from sliding to a potentially damaging 54-run defeat. Ponting, meanwhile, seems to have been properly fired up by Gavaskar's lavish comments, hammering his way, as I write, to a frenetic 113 against a quite unfortunate Scotland side as Australia racked up 334 runs in the first innings. And while Australia have been guilty of being rather daft at defending huge totals in the recent past, the chances of them not winning by at least 150 runs today are pretty slim, don't you think?

So another 48 matches and a month and a half of this magnificent spectacle to go. Predictions of the probable winners have been flying thick and fast all across the globe, but I'd still put my money on Australia coming up trumps. And I'd give the West Indies a fair chance too. And while I'm predicting things, I'll also predict that Brian Lara, Michael Clarke, Kevin Pietersen, Shaun Tait, Shane Bond and Dwayne Bravo will be the stars of this tournament. And oh, one more thing - something will go wrong with the organisation of the tournament at some stage; I don't really trust the carefree Caribbean crew to go through 45 days without bungling anything. So let's hope I don't end up with egg on my face at the end of the extravaganza. And let's also hope that it'll be a rollicking World Cup!

The Much-Ignored Genius of J K Rowling

2007-03-10T11:00:00.000-08:00

Some people are just so abominably stupid. Take my unfortunate friend, for instance. Now HE, in my humble opinion, has been cursed with the horrible wretchedness of a lifetime of mulish idiocy. Alright, I'll elaborate a little. Obsessive Harry Potter fan that I am, I tend to keep going around lending my Harry Potter books to the less fortunate of our brethren who haven't been introduced to Potterverse yet, and I make it a point to painstakingly convince them of the sheer brilliance of books 1 to 6. So you can imagine why I nearly passed out with rage when my friend, in response to my noble attempt to bring him to the light and help him enjoy J K Rowling's peerless classics, shrugged me off with a disdainful, "I don't read kiddo books". Seriously, if I was even half as impulsive as Sirius Black, my friend wouldn't be alive today.

Okay, I know I sometimes cross the most cringe-worthy limits of exaggeration when talking about Harry Potter, but certainly, I do believe that the Harry Potter books are more than just fun reads for the children. I agree that a lot of people love them as purely escapist enjoyment, but the discerning few who love to discern things will tell you that there's never been a more entertaining message of the importance of goodness, love and pluck. The thing about social messages is that they often get insufferably boring, and an insufferably boring message can never really be even remotely effective. What J K Rowling has managed, on the other hand, is to tell the simple story of a bunch of school kids who just happen to be forced to confront complex questions of morality and integrity in an increasingly torn world. And it doesn't take earth-shattering brilliance to realize that Ms Rowling's way is far more effective than any intricately crafted sermon can ever hope to be. If only the literary critics who like nothing better than to rip apart J K Rowling's work as 'crowd pleasing bilge' could recognize this.

I've always felt that there are just too many thought-provoking parallels between the happenings of Potterverse and our real world to ignore J K Rowling's intent. Racism is a much-discussed evil in the Potter books, as is the revolting nature of politics (the Ministry of Magic is one heck of a PR-crazy government, don't you think?). The lust for power, as embodied by Lord Voldemort's thoroughly vicious acts which seem perfectly justified in his own twisted mind, runs as the common theme of the books, and its portrayal, to me, serves as a terrific lesson in behavioral psychology and the causes of evil. Then again, Harry's fortuitous run down the memory lane of the mysterious Severus Snape tells us how little in this world is completely black or white: James was as much the brutal aggressor (as opposed to Harry previously believing him to be a saint) as was Snape a victim of barbarous bullying, something which he (Snape) learns to practise with great efficiency in his later life. Speaking of Snape, I hardly think there's ever been a more enigmatic character. His unhappy childhood, tortured school years, confused and contradicting adulthood and agony at being forced to kill the one person in the whole world who didn't flinch with distaste every time he looked at him (this is, of course, assuming that Dumbledore ordered Snape to kill him) can make for some heavy-duty intellectual talk.

Love and friendship have been given great importance in the books. When Horace Slughorn, the Potions teacher, declares to his disbelieving class that unnatural or forced love can be the most destructive power on earth, one can't help but appreciate how nicely this fits in with the story of Voldemort's mother and her unfortunate struggles that may have been crucial to Voldemort becoming such a monster in the first place. On the other hand, the friendship between James, Lupin, Sirius and Pettigrew, the unrestrained and at times wicked camaraderie that existed between them and the subsequent betrayal by Pettigrew serve as a heartbreaking reminder of the fallibilities of human nature.

The tragic life of Sirius Black, at the end of which there was a lot of profuse, anguished sobbing in all corners of the world (the real one, mind you), qualifies as a brilliant example of the injustices that the world can sometimes sentence its people to. Sirius was forced to suffer a lifetime of disgrace and imprisonment, all because of the wretched treason of one of his best friends, and yet when in his later life he rightfully grieves about Dumbledore's oddly stifling orders, we tend to dismiss him as nothing more than a pathetic whiner. So much for 12 years of unspeakable misery. Another thing of Rowling's that has always stood out for me is the way she has tried to make some measure of sense out of Time Travel. There have been a lot of books and movies that have mightily struggled to get this totally impossible idea across, but none has been as successful as Harry Potter in synchronizing the phenomena of Time and Destiny so beautifully: when Dumbledore explains to Harry that the only reason he was rescued from the Dementors by his own powerful Patronus Charm was that it was pre-ordained that he would travel back in time, it becomes almost impossible to pick any loopholes in the ludicrous episode. It's another matter that not many people understood this particular point, but Rowling certainly did try her best.

And in all of this jumble, I think I'm quite forgetting the immensely tortuous character of Harry himself. One of the main reasons why Harry Potter has been such a phenomenal success is, I think, the ease with which one can identify with the protagonist. Harry is so not a regular superhero; he's an ordinary, unfortunate, not-so-gifted person whose biggest strength is extraordinary courage. In other words, his greatest power can actually be possessed by every common person who reads the books: there's nothing divine or hereditary about courage. Fantasizing about being a superhero was never so easy. In the midst of all this, of course, there are numerous storytelling masterstrokes - the revelation that the Defence Against the Dark Arts job was actually jinxed, the development of Ginny Weasley's character and the whole saga about Snape's worst memory are clearly wonderful examples of genius at work.

All of this makes me wonder why Ms Rowling is so often pummeled by the intellectual sorts who consider it to be something of a fashion to trash all things Potter. Okay, the books may just be a tad over-dramatic or stereotypical at times, but hey, they are so obviously not meant to appeal to the sensibilities of forty-year-olds. People should learn to appreciate Harry Potter for what it is: a stirring tale of good versus evil told through the eyes of a teenager. It is not a Lord of the Rings-style epic, nor is it a frothy, candyfloss Enid Blyton fable. And if you're still not convinced by all of this, then I've only got a few words to say to you: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

Ultimate Classic Not So Classy

2007-03-06T09:18:00.000-08:00

How do you prepare yourself to watch a movie that many consider to be the greatest of all time? Don't read the book that the movie was adapted from, for starters. And definitely don't raise your expectations so high that you anticipate a Steven Spielberg movie to look something like a cross between Dhoom 2 and Fanaa in your forever-enlightened future. Sadly, I didn't follow any of these two sacrosanct commandments before watching the supposed ultimate classic Gone With The Wind. This may sound shocking to many, but I didn't really think the movie was any great shakes. And considering the fact that Victor Fleming, the director, was also the man behind The Wizard of Oz, my unhappiness with Gone With The Wind puts my plans of watching all the movies of 'Hollywood's Golden Age' in serious jeopardy.

The real trouble with the movie, I thought, was the fact that the book written by Margaret Mitchell was simply magnificent. Scarlett O Hara was, and will remain, the most consistent, charming, enigmatic and electrifying character ever created. It would have been humanly impossible to portray all the facets of the character on screen convincingly enough, which is precisely why I thought Vivian Leigh doesn't do justice to Scarlett, and this, may I add, would have been the fate of any other actress who would've attempted the role. Very often, the screen Scarlett comes off as nothing more than a silly little bimbette, and while Scarlett was supposed to be a 'spoilt child', she was always a very smart spoilt child. Leigh certainly looks as bewitchingly beautiful as anyone could have imagined Scarlett to be, but towards the end of the movie, with every 'Ohhhh Aaashleeeyyy' in that exasperatingly overstrained tone of hers I was increasingly wishing for 'Aaashleeeyyy' to turn around and give her a resounding thwack on the head. There are moments when Leigh manages to do brilliantly, like the scene when she learns of her father's senility or the one with Ashley's birthday party, but those are quite evenly balanced by her unsatisfactory acting in the 'God is my witness' outburst or the botched up climax.

There are faults in the direction too; Scarlett's Herculean struggles after returning from Atlanta just aren't depicted adequately enough, nor is the undefinable change that comes in her after her episode with Ashley at Tara that steels her enough to make a fortune out of enslaving convicts. I could accept the scriptwriter leaving out Scarlett's first two children from the movie - they were hardly important to the story; but giving Will Benteen, a significant part of Scarlett's evolvement a complete miss was very nearly a critical mistake. Alright, I know the movie is already nearly four hours long, but that's the problem with reading the book first: you just cannot forgive certain deficiencies in the movie, no matter how reasonable they may be. The climax, save for the legendary 'Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn' line by Clark Gable is highly disappointing. And speaking of Clark Gable, I can't really believe that he didn't win an Oscar for his performance. I simply cannot imagine anyone other than Gable in the role - he is, there's no other way to say it, stunningly perfect. So is Olivia de Havilland as the unbelievably sweet Melanie. In fact, the two people that did win Oscars for acting from the movie, Vivian Leigh and Hattie McDaniel (as the irrepressible Mammy) aren't really the best performers in the movie. Leslie Howard as the whimsical intellectual Ashley is really good too, but failed to get even a nomination. Ah well, I suppose you can't really argue enough about the strange ways of Oscar juries.

A movie adapted from a book will always be a little iffy; there'll always be legions who completely despise the movie even if it is a cinematic masterpiece. While I certainly don't despise the movie version of Gone With The Wind, I do believe it could've been better. And since I haven't watched any of the Godfather movies yet, my opinion that the Lord of the Rings trilogy is the only instance where the movie adaptation turned out better than the book (for the record, I found J R R Tolkien's epic tremendously boring) remains unchanged. So I wouldn't mind Hollwyood doing a remake of Gone With The Wind, with perhaps Kate Winslet and Hugh Jackman in the lead (though I suppose it would be really difficult to show Winslet as a 16-year-old village belle). OK, I know what I just said may seem outrageously scandalous to most people (since, for the uninformed, most people worship Gone With The Wind as the greatest thing that ever happened to a trashy thing like Hollywood), so I think I'll wind things up here. And hope against hope that Godfather, which I'm going to watch tomorrow, doesn't turn out as disappointing as Gone With The Wind. Alright alright, stop thinking about the rotten tomatoes now. There's no way they can come through a computer screen.

Democracy and Fundamentalism: Cause and Effect?

2007-03-03T12:06:00.000-08:00

Boredom Alert: If you're too fun-loving to read about serious and/or unglamorous issues, then I apologize profusely and ask you not to read any further. If, on the other hand, you're of the opinion that occasionally striving to use more than just 1% of our brains can significantly boost humanity's chances of surviving its many self-made pickles, then I'm sure you'll love this post! (I hope you're not too confused.)

If there’s one word that the current generation can dotingly call its own, then it’s got to be ‘fundamentalism’. A decade of meticulous nurturing and careful nourishment has meant that its definition has expanded sufficiently to include anything from quoting a scripture to preaching morality. And yet, in spite of having such a strong claim to its magnificent development, we have barely come to grips with the word; a mere mention of it can still elicit an alarmingly wide array of reactions, ranging from a fearful shudder to an uncomfortable, embarrassed shrug or sometimes, even an indignant outburst of profanities. But uncertainty of the reactions it inspires notwithstanding, there’s no going around the fact that fundamentalism has, almost unobtrusively, emerged as a powerful and wildly controversial concept, a versatile instrument and a very interesting subject of dinner conversation. And not without reason either. When you consider the fact that thousands of lives, several authoritative governments and a number of key international policies, both economic and diplomatic, have and will continue to be influenced by the murky realm of fundamentalism, then you know you’re talking about something monumental.

Just how much damage has fundamentalism done to the world in the past decade? If one were to believe George W. Bush and his band of faithful cronies, then it has caused enough harm to warrant some solemn machine gun-wielding and precision bomb-exploding. And yet, Mr. Bush’s colorful plans have taken us no closer to a solution than the CIA are to capturing Osama bin Laden (which, for the uninitiated, is really really far). In fact, the problem has actually become even more acute now, if that were even possible. And chillingly, fundamentalism is no longer the preserve of Islam alone, as has been believed for decades; Christian, Hindu and even agnostic fundamentalisms have all started jostling for their share of the spotlight. What is even more chilling is the fact that the extremists have started using newer, snazzier, and rather unfortunately, more effective means to achieve their misguided ends. Honestly, I think we should all go down on our knees and thank God that we have George W Bush The Brave to save us.

Jokes aside, there’s no denying that fundamentalism is in fact a serious threat to democracy the world over. But it can also be argued that it was the less-than-immaculate nature of democracy that gave rise to fundamentalism in the first place. When the perfectly democratic governments of the UK and the US ran out of ideas to placate the hapless European Jews after the Hitler horror shows, they began championing the cause of Zionism, and I need hardly mention that that particular decision has been the primary source of Islamic fundamentalism. On the other hand, though Christian fundamentalism has been observed sporadically for about twenty centuries, much of its present prevalence has come about because of the strictly secular and at times laughably liberal Western democracy that has allowed the flourishing of a decadent culture. And we don’t need movies like Seven or Phone Booth to tell us that.

Every action must necessarily have a reason, a basic source of incongruity, no matter how depraved the action may be. For every venomous word spoken or brutal physical attack executed, there is a troubled soul somewhere in the world grappling with some kind of calamity. And unless honest efforts are made to resolve the personal, social and political crises that have given certain people reason enough to blow up hundreds of innocent humans, we can scarcely hope for any of this methodical madness to stop. Adopting the high ground and saying that the perverse evil that invariably forms the expression of fundamentalism deserves nothing more than a disdainful and ruthless hacking of its roots will get the rewards it deserves, as the remarkably inept American ‘war on terror’ has proved amply. Sure, the most devoted exponents of fundamentalism are the terrorists – we all know that; without a doubt, fundamentalism very often breeds hatred and intolerance – that’s common knowledge; unquestionably, fundamentalism has spawned some of the most despicable crimes in the history of humanity – that’s pretty much self-evident. Yet, what is even more obvious is that the people to whom fundamentalism comes as a naturally gift-wrapped aid to end their misery are, after all, people, and certainly deserve more than a cursory and contemptuous brushing off. No human, and certainly no child, picks up a machine gun for fun; by ignoring the troubles of the potential fundamentalists, and we all know where we can find those, we are only adding fire to the brightly burning conflagration.

It has been widely accepted that democracy is the best form of government that we know of; but what most people forget is that it is very far from being a perfect one. Nazi Germany was certainly a democracy in its formative years; Hitler only found a way to manipulate the system to serve his needs. The same can be said about Fidel Castro’s Cuba or Robert Mugabe’s ridiculously twisted Zimbabwe. And if someone told me that America’s democratic government didn’t practice ethnic racism for nearly two centuries or didn’t furtively extend more than a helping hand to its celebrated Mob and that India’s miserable mis-governance in the first four decades of its independence wasn’t fomented by a technically faultless democracy, then I’d fear for his sanity, or rather, his political awareness. The question whether democracy is worth fighting for has never been more debatable. And while we’re busy pondering over such lofty ideas as the adequacy of forms of government, we’d do well to remember that fundamentalism doesn’t threaten only democracy; from the looks of things, if we don’t take some drastic, but effective, measures to curb this menace quickly, we’ll be hurtling towards a surprisingly swift Apocalypse even sooner than the hordes of quack astrologers would like us to believe. And that’s a scary thought.

A Tale Of Two Awards Ceremonies

2007-02-26T10:24:00.000-08:00

Okay, so maybe the Oscars aren't so bad after all. And I say this having watched less than half of the show. Ellen DeGeneres was hilarious for whatever little I saw of her, and Al Gore's appearance with Leornado DiCaprio had me in splits. I know I may have been just a little critical of the Academy Awards in my post two weeks ago, but that was just a one-time disinterested musing. Alright alright, I know I'm thoroughly indicted by my post - the internet never lies; I was positively, passionately scathing of the ceremony, and kept repeating that I saw no point to the entire exasperating exercise (at least most of my predictions turned out to be right. Hurray to that!). But that was before I had the rather rare chance of watching the Oscars just hours after being witness to the monstrosity that was the Filmfare Awards night. And trust me, watching the Filmfares is truly a sobering experience. One learns to appreciate the good in other things, like the Oscar ceremony, for instance, or even the color of the sky, for that matter.

The Filmfare Awards lost their relevance many years ago, a fact commemorated most notably by Aamir Khan getting the snub for his breathtaking performance in Rangeela, which was followed, quite shockingly, by a dignified Aamir Khan tantrum. But this year, the Awards were not just irrelevant; they were farcical. The nominations list was an ominous enough warning - why on earth were there six nominations in the Best Film, Director and Actor categories? Were there too many filmmakers and actors to please? And why oh why oh why did Sanjay Gadhvi get a nod for Dhoom 2? That, for me, is the Puzzle of the Millennium, one that will probably never find an answer. And wait, it gets worse. I could accept Shahrukh Khan getting a nomination for KANK; he is, after all, Shahrukh Khan - getting two nominations every year is his privileged birthright, as is, it seems now, his right to host the evening year after year after year. But one of the best movies of the year, if not the best, Dor, being completely ignored, was nothing short of scandalous. Hrithik Roshan getting a nod for Krrish was a bit difficult to digest, but him getting a nomination for DHOOM 2, where all everyone had to do was look cool and wear designer clothes, very nearly made me die of shock. To top it all, Aishwarya Rai too got nominated for Dhoom 2, ( and failed to get any recognition whatsoever for her breakthrough performance in Umrao Jaan), and that was really the point when it all started to look like one, big, expensive joke to me.

Things couldn't possibly have got worse from there, but they did. The actual ceremony was a shining example of poor media coverage and tacky TV presentation. It was disorganized, jerky, COMPLETELY unprofessional, and a whole bunch of other unsavory adjectives. Shahrukh Khan as the host was moderately funny, but the choices of the jury were even funnier. Prasoon Joshi getting the Best Lyrics award for the song Chand Sifarish from Fanaa, a song which, according to my Urdu expert mom is nothing more than a collection of a few fancy Urdu words randomly put together with no rhyme or sense whatsoever, was a shocking insult to the likes of Javed Akhtar and Gulzar, of all people. Omkara, Vishal Bharadwaj's cinematic masterpiece, was fobbed off with the insignificant Critics'/Supporting Actor awards. And Lage Raho Munnabhai, one of the best movies produced in Bollywood in the last decade or so, went home with a pathetic haul of just ONE award. Seriously, are the Filmfare jurists a bunch of Yash Chopra employees? How else could one possibly explain Hrithik Roshan getting the Best Actor award for (roll the drums) DHOOM 2??? Kareena Kapoor's shimmering performance in Omkara was overlooked in favor of Kajol's less-than-remarkable turn as the blind-girl-who-gets-her-eyesight-back-in-the-second-half in Fanaa (which, incidentally, is again a Yash Chopra production). Just about the only thing the jurists got right was in giving the Power award to, you guessed it right, Yash Chopra. That's one award no one's going to grudge you, Mr. Chopra - you've definitely shown last night what real power is. And oh, did I forget mentioning Abhishek Bachchan winning Best supporting Actor for KANK? Perhaps Mr. Karan Johar should also have been given a Power award (I kinda love the flashy name, don't you? POWER award...I bet Mr. Chopra feels like the king of the world now).

Clearly, awards functions in India are nothing more than please-as-many-important-people-in-Bollywood-as-you-can drills. It's hardly a wonder then that real actors like Aamir Khan and Ajay Devgan give them a thoroughly deserved miss. I only wish Kareena Kapoor, Vidhu Vinod Chopra, Rajkumar Hirani and Nagesh Kukunoor decide to do so too, after the monumental snubs handed to them this year. And puh-lease, people should STOP calling the Filmfares India's equivalent to the Oscars.

Speaking of the Oscars, as I said earlier, most of my predictions turned out to be right. The Departed was the big winner, bagging the Best Picture, Director and Adapted Screenplay awards - a pretty neat haul! The only surprising winners were The Lives Of Others, the German movie which stole the Best Foreign Language Picture award from hot favorite Pan's Labyrinth, and the startlingly dull Happy Feet, which trumped the genuinely funny (and bigger box office success, may I add) Cars in the Best Animated Picture category. But everything else went true to form, with both Helen Mirren and Forest Whitaker, the winners in acting, giving sparkling speeches. On the whole, a well-organized, somewhat classy and very glamorous evening. How the Filmfare organizers must be ruing their decision to hold their little horror show the same day as the Oscars! You should die of shame, you Filmfare people.

If Only Plagiarism Had The Death Penalty!

2007-02-25T11:30:00.000-08:00

I just watched the Morgan Freeman-Brad Pitt starrer Seven, or Se7en, if you will, and I've only got to say this: I could crack the suspense an hour before the climax. Now, if you've ever actually watched the movie, you'd find that hard to believe, simply because Se7en is a brilliantly executed film with a wonderfully unpredictable screenplay. In fact, it has been voted as the 38th best picture of all time by the members of www.imdb.com. So what was it that enabled my amazing little brain in arriving upon the monumental brainstorm? A dash of Sushmita Sen and Samay, that's what. The climax of the 'path-breaking' Bollywood flick, Samay, has been ripped off straight from Se7en - down to the last insignificant detail - and I actually had the horrifying misfortune of watching Samay before Se7en. So you can imagine my severe displeasure at not being able to enjoy one of the finest thrillers ever made. And no, it was no consolation at all that Brad Pitt's acting in the last scene was positively cringe-worthy.

If ever there has been an example of crossing all limits of shamelessness, then it would have to be Bollywood's blissful plagiarism of Hollywood scripts, dialogues and even costumes and sets. Sometimes the imitation is so brazenly obvious that it makes me wonder how all the supposedly blood-sucking lawyers of America haven't already set up base in India, firing lawsuits by the minute and giving sleepless nights to every 'creative' Bollywood filmmaker. And this, from an industry that prides itself on its 'culture' and 'difference'. Sorry Bollywood, you're just about as creative or artistically accomplished as Mike Tyson. Maybe even less. Embarrassingly, we have actually come to the point that every time the audience watches a movie with even a remotely intelligent story, they start hunting for the 'inspiration' that must necessarily have made possible the imaginative flair of the director. And for the biggest movie-making industry in the world, that should be totally, obscenely mortifying; only, it isn't, at least not yet.

The astonishing thing is that the 'inspiration' habit doesn't just afflict the B-grade flilmmakers; most of the highly respected directors and scriptwriters of Bollywood have been known to 'pay their own tributes' to a plethora of Hollywood blockbusters. Vikram Bhatt, who seems to have made a living out of renting DVDs of Hollywood flicks, once made a staggeringly immodest Deewane Hue Paagal that was an out-and-out rip-off of There's Something About Mary. I must admit that watching Deewane Hue Paagal was my most embarrassing experience with Bollywood, even worse than watching horrors like Jaani Dushman or Rudraksh. Ek Ajnabee featured a very haggard Arjun Rampal with a weird dressing sense and a rocking dance number, but that was just about the only thing it didn't have in common with Denzel Washington's Man On Fire. Even the 'great' Amitabh Bachchan, who is so often referred to as India's answer to Marlon Brando, or maybe even Gregory Peck, Clint Eastwood and Tom Cruise, unabashedly tried to imitate every single expression that the wonderful Washington managed to put on his face. Which is just as well, considering that we'd have been calling Bachchan India's answer to Denzel Washington too, if Washington had only been a little more popular. Abbas-Mustan, that delightful director duo, are another pair of experts at turning Hollywood scripts into insufferable Bollywood melodramas, somehow managing to fit in cruel mothers-in-law and conniving over-the-top super-villains into psychological thrillers. Humraaz, Ajnabee and Aitraaz are just a few examples. And just to show that this 'inspiration' culture is a wholly acceptable part of Bollywood, even pioneers like Ram Gopal Verma and Sanjay Leela Bhansali have resorted to stealing ideas from Hollywood.

The thing that troubles me most about this mad abyss of disgraceful travesties is that Bollywood filmmakers don't seem to realize that their thievery can some day cost them big time. After all, it's only a matter of time before someone in Hollywood takes note of this shamelessness and decides to set things right. And since we've so proudly been declaring to the world how much money Bollywood films are grossing in the UK and the US of late, I'm guessing the storm of indignation and some very expensive lawsuits is not too far away. Until then, Bollywood, steal away! It's your privileged birthright! And thank God I had the sense not to watch Chocolate; I could actually watch the brilliant The Usual Suspects without having the feeling of disgusted fury simmering within me the whole time. And while I'm talking about being thankful, let's also give thanks that we have occasional gems like Lage Raho Munnabhai, Dor and Bluffmaster (although I'm not entirely sure how clean the last one is) to reassure us that all hope is not yet lost.

A Surprisingly Competitive World Cup?

2007-02-20T09:59:00.000-08:00

I need some pills to counter my depression, and fast. Just days after I had so confidently declared in one of my posts that I did not expect Australia's shocking form slump to last more than a couple of games, I have the stickiest egg on my face with Australia having crashed to another humiliating defeat against New Zealand. What on earth is going on with these guys? I thought the second match, in which they failed to defend a colossal score of 336, was rock bottom. They couldn't possibly have done any worse from that point. But guess what, they've actually managed to do just that. A team cannot lose after putting up 346 runs on the board and then having the opposition reeling at 41/4. A team like Australia definitely cannot lose from that position. And it is simply unthinkable for a team like Australia to lose from such a bullish position just two days after having suffered the ignominy of failing to defend 336 and four days after a 10-wicket pasting. Yet, Australia have done the impossible. It's not the first time in the last 10 years that they've done that. The only difference is that this time, they've done the wrong kind of impossible. Where can I get some of those darned pills?

The slimmest of silver linings that has emerged from this travesty of a series is that the Australian cricketing heads now have a clear indication of which player to keep as far away from captaincy as George W. Bush is from intelligence. Mike Hussey may be an astonishingly effective batsman in both formats of the game, but he is a terrible, terrible captain. I'm almost certain that if Ricky Ponting had been in charge in the series, Australia would not have had to face so much embarrassment, and they definitely wouldn't have lost two consecutive games after having posted 330-plus scores. Okay, I know that it was actually Ponting who was at the helm in that bewildering 400-run Johannesburg game almost a year ago, but really, that match was a freak happening, a once-in-a-generation event that doesn't afflict an ordinary, fairly efficient captain too often. Let's face it, Hussey is remarkably daft as a skipper. There may be a chance that this swift judgment, taking into consideration only his woefully unflattering yet short record as captain, is a bit harsh on Hussey , but there's an even greater chance that the Aussie bosses will never entrust him with the role again. Which is why I believe that this particular stat of Hussey's striking cricketing career will probably remain forever horribly tainted.

So where do the Aussies go from here? The good news for them is that Ponting and Michael Clarke are almost certain to be fully fit for their opening World Cup match, and considering the rollicking time their relatively inexperienced replacements have been having in their absence, I think they've got the batting department fully covered. Their worry, and a very grave one at that, is the bowling. McGrath is finally showing signs of his age, Brett Lee has only a '50-50 chance' of being fit for the Cup, and Bracken has lost a fair bit of his zip from last year. Meanwhile, Mitchell Johnson and Shaun Tait almost seem to be drooling with excitement at the prospect of playing in an Australian side, and their performances have shown a correspondingly alarming dip. The spin department is almost non-existent, with Brad Hogg and Cameron White having emerged as just a shade better than part-time. And Shane Watson, I believe, should be kicked out of the team faster than you can say 'all-rounder'. The man is NOT an all-rounder - he can bat a bit and he can bowl a bit, but he scores way too few runs and gives away way too many to qualify as acceptable in either department. So basically, things don't look too good for defending targets. I guess Ponting's best bet is to field every time he wins the toss. He might even hope to be outrageously lucky and win the toss every match. I, for one, am fervently hoping that happens.

In all the joy, shock and despair (for me, at least) at Australia's downslide, people seem to have forgotten the Kiwis. The fact that they dared to rest Shane Bond and Daniel Vettori for the final match says a lot about their confidence right now. And the fact that they managed to win despite that says a lot about their ability and form. They may be colorless, they may be awfully boring, and they may not have a single star among their ranks (I don't think Bond qualifies as one - he plays far too seldom for that label) but they've got a lot of gumption, and ever so often, gumption is all that matters. So you never know, with India, South Africa and England peaking at just the right time, Pakistan being, as always, the unpredictable potential scene-stealers, Australia seeking to desperately salvage some of their battered ego, West Indies being the animated hosts and New Zealand on an intoxicated high, this might turn out to be a cracking World Cup, pathetic minnows and all. Throw in the fact that it is going to be the last one-day tournament for Brian Lara and the last World Cup for Sachin Tendulkar, and this might just end up as the best World Cup ever. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Lo And Behold, Australia Can Be Pathetic Too!

2007-02-18T06:46:00.000-08:00

I've always thought there's a limit to how ridiculous things can get. Sure there can be a few moments of madness here and some perverted absurdity there, but before you know it, normalcy is restored and the world is at peace. If only this statement were true. If only we lived in a perfect world. I'm sorry, but I'm a bit shaken up by Australia's shocking loss to New Zealand today. A World Champion side does not rack up 336 belligerent runs and end up losing the match. And don't even get me started on the stupefying 10-wicket loss two days ago. Seriously, how ridiculous can things get?

Mike Hussey, that admirably gritty batsman-wonder who has been handed the captaincy in the absence of Ponting and Gilchrist suddenly finds himself in a Flintoff-like position of having to answer unanswerable questions about the less-than-feisty performances being put in by his players. Thank God he doesn't find the need to put on an about-to-break-into-miserable-sobs expression like Flintoff did for much of the past 3 months. But he's been no confident charmer either; it's not the easiest job in the world to explain away your team's woeful form, and Hussey is learning this the hard way. People might point out that five of Australia's seven key ODI players have been out of the side but there's been a telling lack of fight amongst the Australians in the last 3 games, and that's a worrying sign. In the past, Australia have always stuck doggedly to their much-maligned rotation policy and they've always managed to come up trumps in spite of missing key players. This time, however, they haven't even looked close to winning. So is this the beginning of the end of a glorious era or is it a simple matter of the players being exhausted, both physically and mentally, from the effort of giving England the pounding of a lifetime? Personally, I'd say the latter, particularly since we've been hearing the 'beginning of the end' cliche about this mighty Australian side for about 4 years now, without any noticeable vindication. But if Australia have to maintain their magnificent World Cup run they'll need Ponting, Gilchrist, Symonds, Lee and Clarke to be back in full fitness and form. Oh yes they will. The new No. 1 ODI side in the world, South Africa, will definitely not be trembling with fear at the prospect of facing an Australian side without any of these players.

It's funny how quirky fortune can get. Just as Australia are being besieged with freak injuries and poor form at the most horribly wrong time imaginable, India seem to be nearing peak form with a resounding series victory over Sri Lanka. Ganguly has emerged literally from the ashes like the proverbial phoenix and is once again the imposing one-day force that he was a couple of years ago. Dravid and Dhoni have regained their silken touch and brutally violent force respectively, and the bowlers, particularly Zaheer Khan and Ajit Agarkar, have started to dismantle opposition line-ups with something of a regularity. The most crucial boost to India's World Cup plans, however, has been the return to form of Yuvraj Singh, who is probably the most underrated ODI batsman in the world. A string of spectacularly bitter and disorienting losses in his absence has probably taught everyone just how important Yuvraj is to India's one-day plans, which is why his brilliant unbeaten 95 yesterday would have brought considerable joy to every Indian supporter. Probable world champions? I don't know about that yet, but things are certainly looking bright for a 'good World Cup', as Dravid unwisely put it a few days ago (surely any team would want to win the World Cup and not just have a good World Cup?).

And while we're talking of people being unwise, how far can we really be from the Pakistan cricket team? The latest 'thing' to hit Pakistan cricket (I guess all the problems that keep pounding Pakistani cricket can hardly be described as 'scandals' anymore; they're much too ordinary and commonplace for a word as scandalous as 'scandal') is Shoaib Akhtar's allegation that the coach Bob Woolmer abused him racially. I just don't get these guys - why on earth would a bunch of players and officials perpetually keep trying so hard to destroy the morale and spirit of the team? I guess that's one of the many mysteries of cricket - probably just as mysterious as Pakistan's reputation to overcome all of their demons and put in surprisingly brilliant performances on the field. It's a mysterious, mysterious game. Let's have a toast to that!

"I Want To Thank The Oscars For Their Whole-hearted Pointlessness...."

2007-02-13T11:14:00.000-08:00

It's that time of the year again - the time for pretentious showmanship and then some more pretentious showmanship. Throw in plenty of intellectual snobbery too. And oh! a LOT of fashion-worship. Just what is it that makes the Oscars so very popular? Actually 'popular' may not exactly be the right word - 'hyped' may be a more appropriate expression. That's because no matter how much EVERYONE may bemoan the futility of the superficial, unfair and completely artless extravaganza that is the Academy Awards night, there's no going around the fact that this is the one night of the year that gets the most devoted attention of the media. And of course, the stars love it too - it's the most perfect opportunity for some heavy-duty PR boosting. So basically, everyone's interested in the Oscars - everyone except the common public.

The movies that win at the Oscars are often forgotten in all the problems of the glitz and the glamour. That's not to say, however, that the Oscar-winning movies don't deserve to be forgotten. I mean, how many of the winning movies of the past decade were actually watchable? Titanic, Gladiator, The Lord of the Rings and A Beautiful Mind are the only ones that come to mind. I couldn't even force myself to watch American Beauty, Shakespeare In Love or Million Dollar Baby. And I can't see why no Bollywood movie has ever won the Oscar if Chicago could take home the prize. I guess championing the cause of the insufferably boring is one of the liberties that the intellectual Oscar jury can take.

All said and done, however, there's no denying the instant recognition and, in some rare cases, handsome box-office returns that an Oscar award brings. So let's just take a look at the potential teary-eyed prospects this year. Martin Scorsese looks all set to finally taste Oscar glory after years of narrow misses and heartbreak. The Departed has emerged as a strong contender for the Best Picture award and is almost certain to win in the Best Director category. I wonder why though. Personally, I thought the movie had plenty of potential up to the half-way mark; but it simply fizzled out in the second half. Jack Nicholson's over-acting finally got on my nerves, and the interminable dragging towards the end really put me off. But I seriously doubt whether my disapproval is going to sway the jury, so Mr. Scorsese, I think it's finally time for you join the list of the privileged bores.

The Best Actor category is more tightly contested, though Forest Whitaker for The Last King Of Scotland is being talked up as the front-runner after bagging a rich haul at other, less important award ceremonies. Leonardo DiCaprio for Blood Diamond and Peter O'Toole for Venus stand a fair chance too. While we're on this category, I must say I can't really remember last year's winner. Was it Philip something? The Best Actress award seems to have been decided already; apparently, there's not a chance in a million that Helen Mirren won't win it for The Queen. Which means it'll be another disappointing finish for third-time nominee Kate Winslet, who I really thought deserved it in 2004 for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

My favorite category, however, threw up some pretty nasty shocks for me. I can't believe I haven't watched two of the three nominees for Best Animated Feature. Cars seems to be the likeliest winner here, though I absolutely must watch Happy Feet and Monster House. It'd be criminal for me not to.

I haven't watched Babel, but judging from the reactions of people who have seen it, it seems that it is one of those typical Oscar-nominated movies - wispy, snail-paced and heading nowhere in particular. So it's a good thing that it'll probably end up empty-handed. Dreamgirls will likely pick up the insignificant awards, but The Departed certainly looks set to be the big winner. So basically, things are in place for another year of undeserving winners. Big surprise.

Here's a fun thing to do if you manage to sit through the entire frustrating program. Count the time taken by each star for his or her thank-you speech, and then find out who the most pretentious star of Hollywood is (just for the record, that's the one who takes the longest time). And if you get bored of that too, then you can keep excited track of how many stars shed tears on receiving the award. Then compare the number with the one you get next year (or the number you got last year, if you were stupid enough to do it then). And if you're still bored, then switch off the TV. It'll help, trust me.

Surprise, Surprise. Or Shock, Shock.

2007-02-11T09:22:00.000-08:00

Ho ho. What a great, big, enormous surprise. If England's win in the first of the best-of-three finals of the tri-series in Australia could have been brushed off as a freak happening, their resounding victory in the second final today was anything but freaky. They were the better side today, no two ways about that. Barely a day after I called the English ODI side a great many unflattering names, including pathetic and uninspiring, they've gone out and done the unthinkable. Beaten Australia in their own den, not just once or twice, but thrice in a row. I have to admit, I don't feel too good about my excessive and arrogant faith in the Australian team's ability now. Maybe the Aussies aren't really all that they're cranked up to be. Maybe Andrew Symonds is an indispensable part of the team. Maybe Mike Hussey isn't as prodigious as his statistics. Maybe Adam Gilchrist is a spent force. Or maybe, the England team aren't really a bunch of miserable pushovers. I'm sorry, but I'm just not up to a decisive analysis of the game today. It was shocking, that's all. Right from the persistence of the startling run of form of Paul Collingwood to the extraordinary amount of swing generated by Liam Plunkett and coming to a head with Jamie Dalrymple's sensational catch by to dismiss Shane Watson, the day was filled with shocks. Ah well, it was just one of those days.

India, meanwhile, made a terrible mess of what seemed a straightforward run chase against a spirited Sri Lankan side. I thought Mahendra Singh Dhoni was tailor-made for situations like the one his team found itself in today. I guess I was wrong. But the Sri Lankans were truly remarkable - Kumar Sangakkara's innings was a real gem, and some of the catches that the Lankans took would've done Jonty Rhodes proud. Pakistan, on the other hand, finally got a taste of what India had to suffer on their tour to South Africa, being presented with a difficult pitch and penetrative South African bowling. And to nobody's surprise, being the sub-continent team that they are, Pakistan surrendered as meekly as a bunch of frightened rabbits being forced to have dinner with a pack of wolves.

Karan Johar's Koffee with Karan began its second second season today, and his guests were, predictably, Shahrukh Khan, Kajol and Rani Mukherjee. I must say, I've gotten kinda tired of seeing these four talk about each other. The first half of the show was pretty dull, what with Shahrukh Khan's supposedly intellectual pearls of wisdom about everything from professional rivalry to the invasion of stars' privacy by the media being perfectly matched in drabness by Rani Mukherjee's political correctness and somewhat-lost expressions. It was only the now-legendary rapid-fire round and Kajol's overdone effervescence that kept the show alive. Frankly, I think Mr. Johar needs more than a change in the furniture and the colors of the sets to maintain the popularity of the show. Perhaps some interesting guests?

You know who'd make a great guest on Koffee with Karan? Andrew Flintoff, that's who. I just want to know whether he's capable of having any expression on his face other than those of delirious joy and tearful dejection. He always seems to be in one of these two moods, and today, sadly, it was delirious joy. How depressing.

World Cup Jitters and Moronic Marlon

2007-02-10T04:27:00.000-08:00

Okay, so the Aussie cricket team is not invincible. A good catch or run out here, an inspired Flintoff spell there, and a brilliant Collingwood century somewhere in between can ensure that even an ODI side as pathetic as that of England can turn the tables on Ponting's men. Gone is the aura of irrepressible authority that seemed to have so thoroughly stunned the Englishmen (and the Kiwis too, for good measure) into submission only a fortnight ago. I guess this only goes to show just how important Andrew Symonds is to Australia's one-day make-up. And England's victory has just about set every single cricket follower's tongue wagging about how the World Cup isn't going to be a stroll in the park for Australia after all. While all of this may sound very nice and rosy, especially for all those competition-mad enthusiasts who have been lamenting the 'death' of cricket caused by Australia's ruthless domination of the sport, I still don't think any other team in world cricket have got it in them to stand up to the Aussie bullies with more than just a strong heart and a tough spirit. The ability of the Australian team remains unmatched - with a batting line-up like theirs, and a bowling attack that cannot find a place for Mitchell Johnson and Stuart Clark, South Africa and Co. will be hard pressed to hand it to the Aussies in crunch games like semi-finals or finals. And that is the naked truth, whether you like it or not. Competition-mad enthusiasts, you can take a hike.

Meanwhile, the English team is suddenly beloved again. Flintoff's cheery, casual, mischievous grin that he had so made his own last year is back, and so is optimism among the British media about England's World Cup chances. But I wouldn't get too excited too soon (not that I want to get excited - the England ODI team inspires just about as much excitement as Zimbabwe's hopes of a Test recall). After all, they're only just two Australia-inflicted thrashings away from returning to the grief stricken despair that they were in two weeks ago. Let's just wait and watch then, shall we?

West Indies cricket and Marlon Samuels, on the other hand, have managed to find yet another way to plunge into darkness and misery. Exactly how darned stupid Samuels would have to be to have allowed himself to get caught on tape having a conversation with a bookie, or a friend who sounds very much like a bookie, is beyond my comprehension. And from the looks of things, Samuels will be taking Chris Gayle down with him too. Honestly, I cannot believe this guy. For six years I have been tearing my hair in frustration at the incandescent talent of Samuels and his woeful inability to convert that talent into anything significant, and just when things were finally appearing to be falling into place for him with a century against Pakistan and a brilliant 98 against India, he goes out and shoves himself into this depressing mess. I'll just pray that Brian Lara doesn't lose his mind completely, seeing how determined his teammates and the West Indies cricket board are to ensure that he never brings back any semblance of dignity to West Indies cricket. Sad. Really, really sad.

What was not sad was the sensational batting exhibition put up by South Africa in the first game of their 5-match series with Pakistan which was followed up by a Pakistani assault in the very next game. If for South Africa Mark Boucher was stunningly effective and Jacques Kallis willing to show he can whack a cricket ball with all the savage force of a Lance Klusener, then Shahid Afridi was absolutely brutal and Mohammad Yousuf clinically classy for Pakistan. Clearly, 350+ scores are going to become much more commonplace in ODIs now. Which is simply terrific news. And cricket pundits who can't stand big hitting and would much rather watch quality bowling, you can take a hike too!

The Most Important Day of the Year

2007-02-02T09:27:00.000-08:00

21st JULY! 21st JULY! WOOHOO!!!! No, I haven't lost my marbles just yet. 21st July is the date when Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be released!!! And that, my friends, is big news. Gigantic news. Enormously colossal news. Heck, it might even be the be the most significant news of the last one year. And no, I'm not even remotely exaggerating. Consider this: for the next 168 days 55 minutes and 44 seconds (it wasn't me that calculated this - that credit goes to www.mugglenet.com), a sizable portion of the world's population will think about 21st July, 2006 with a fairly desperate sense of anticipation and feverishly wish the days to speed by faster than a Firebolt. Who cares about Hilary Clinton's presidential campaign? The world has Horcruxes and horrifying deaths (fictional, of course) and getting hold of the book not a nanosecond later than the precise moment the book is first made available to worry about.

I must confess that I was a little ashamed I didn't get to know the momentous news until almost a day after J K Rowling announced it on her website. I had decided to take a break from the Potter fansites for a few days and de-Potterize my mind a little (trust me, it does you no good to meditate on a particularly ridiculous Potter theory moments before going out to give a job interview). And look what I missed! An entire day of excited frenzy! I must have been crazy to have even thought of such a scandalous idea! OK, I think I'm going a little overboard now. But really, this IS great news for all Potter fans. I had been preparing myself for a September-to-December release date, considering the timings of Rowling's announcements at the time of The Half Blood Prince. That time, she had given the release date a full six months after she had declared the title, so I had suspected she would announce the release date somewhere around May. Also, I didn't think she would have risked cutting into the business of Movie 5, The Order of the Phoenix, by releasing the book anytime near the movie release date (which has been officially put as 13th July). But guess what, Rowling does have a humane side after all! I think the despair, despondency and depression of Potter fans was too much for her to bear. All the better for us!

Seriously though, I don't really think it was the wisest of moves to have the book and the movie releasing so close to each other. The movie's first week collections will of course be fantastic, but once the book releases I doubt many fans will want to return to the scene of Sirius's death or Snape's worst memory, particularly since there might be much more pressing matters to contemplate, like the possibility of Dumbledore making a smashing comeback or dare I say it, the devastating death of Harry. It just makes no business sense, if you ask me. Unless, of course, Rowling manages to convince Warner Bros. to delay the movie release by a bit, or even more cleverly, creates an intermingling connection between the events of book 5 and book 7, making it imperative to read or watch Phoenix again. Now wouldn't that be a masterstroke! And judging by the happenings in the first 6 books, there has been something of an inter-relationship between alternate books of the series - books 1, 3 and 5 follow vaguely similar paths, and the same can be said for 2, 4 and 6. So basically, that's just my cue to start reading books 1, 3 and 5 yet again.

I have been so caught up in the brouhaha of all of this that I have almost forgotten the Harry Potter-related news of two days ago that was nearly as significant as the release date news and certainly a lot more shocking. Daniel Radcliffe's very questionable decision to act in the controversial play Equus where he will shed his innocent schoolboy image in favour of a decidedly adult one has left me a little disturbed. Now don't get me wrong, Radcliffe is fully entitled to act in whichever play or movie he wishes to, but I just thought it would've been a bit more prudent for him to wait until the series was completed before venturing into such audacious projects. Why? Because however much we would like to shout out to the world that Rowling's creation transcends the boundaries of age and appeals to everyone aged from 5 to 60, children still form the most devoted fan base of Potterverse. And Equus is definitely not good news for children. Just something for Mr. Radcliffe to think about.

A Bucket Load of Movies

2007-01-31T08:24:00.000-08:00

Is Chris Nolan one of the finest directors of our times? I was hardly done with gushing over Batman Begins, in which Nolan did the almost-impossible job of bringing back some dignity to the Batman franchise (those who've watched the George Clooney/Michael Keaton horrors that almost irreparably reduced Batman to a laughably childish piece of trash would know what I'm talking about). And now, after watching The Prestige, Nolan's latest offering, I can't help but feel that here is a director who's well on his way to Spielberg-ish legendary status. Hugh Jackman is simply brilliant in the movie, Christian Bale is remarkably efficient (though I do wish he'd mumble a little less) and even the relatively unknown Rebecca Hall turns in a sparkling performance. The sets, the photography, the editing, the dialogues - everything is absolutely top-notch. Though the sci-fi bits are a little difficult to digest, the way the writers manage to turn the 'magical' machine into the vehicle for carrying forward the basic idea of the movie - the futility of jealousy and obsession - is truly spellbinding. In fact, so polished is the execution of every single aspect of the movie, that one almost lovingly forgives Scarlett Johannson's daft turn as the confused vamp. Did the Oscar jury somehow forget to watch this movie? Now I can't wait to watch Memento, another supposedly virtuoso creation by the master filmmaker.

So my movie-watching spree continues. The Prestige was only one of the slew of movies I've watched over the past couple of weeks, and sadly, was one of the very few that actually left any sort of impact. Meet Joe Black, boasting such big names as Anthony Hopkins and Brad Pitt and such a riveting little concept as the personification of death, was a dismal disappointment. Why on earth the makers had to drag the flick into a 3-hour long exercise filled with abstract pauses and presumably thoughtful silences is beyond comprehension. The acting, save for the ever-dependable Hopkins, is abysmal (Claire Forlani, as the perennially teary-eyed damsel in distress is particularly awful), and don't even get me started on the ridiculous plot and ending and meaningless dialogues. And to think most people on www.imdb.com liked the movie! At least the movie taught me one thing - never to trust the opinions of internet movie fans. No wait, that very important lesson was taught me by another Brad Pitt monstrosity - Interview With The Vampire. Exactly how the producers managed to convince such big names as Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and Antonio Banderas to do a movie that basically only contained a string of disgusting sequences involving biting and drinking the blood of all sorts of creatures - rats, dogs, humans, etc. - will perhaps remain the most mysterious event in the history of the movies. And the rat/dog/human biting has been shown quite in quite graphic terms too - GROTESQUE!

Most of the comedies that I watched were predictable and boring. Adam Sandler has truly lost his touch - Click was just about as funny as Daniel Radcliffe's decision to give up his innocent schoolboy image and instead go for a shockingly adult one in his new play Equus. The same goes for You Me and Dupree, a rotten exhibition of how not to make a comedy movie (which probably also applies for Wedding Crashers, Owen Wilson's stupefyingly successful comedy from 2005). Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, however, was a refreshing deviation from the run-of-the-mill, and yes, a very surprisingly sane performance by the ever-maniacal Jim Carrey goes a long way in making the movie strikingly memorable. The movie's confusingly wonderful twists and turns and the very weird plot and editing make for one wondrous joy-ride, and Kate Winslet's shimmering performance as the two-faced love interest make it clear why she got an Oscar nomination for the role, though not quite why she didn't win. Jim Carrey, however, was back to his usual self in Fun with Dick and Jane, which wasn't quite as dreadful as Click or Dupree, but wasn't Carrey's best work either. And considering the measly handful of Carrey's flicks that were actually enjoyable (Liar Liar and The Mask are the only two that come to mind), that isn't saying much.

Alright, that's a lot of opinions for one day. I'll put off my evaluations of the rest of the movies I watched for another day, another post. In the meantime, let us all try to live life to the fullest and find that special something that makes living worthwhile, that momentous purpose for which the most devoted dedication would not be rewarding enough. Ah, seems Hollywood's hopelessly mundane, over-dramatized dialogues have got to my head. I really need to get myself some fresh air.

A Cracking Tournament, and Time For A New Favourite Player

2007-01-28T10:12:00.000-08:00

I've just realized that I've been singing too many hosannas about Roger Federer the last couple of weeks, so I will not say anything complimentary about the man today in spite of having been witness to yet another scintillating performance by him in today's final against Gonzalez. Maybe I should only talk about Gonzalez. Fernando Gonzalez had a brilliant run to the final, beating the likes of Lleyton Hewitt (I'll get back to that tragedy later), James Blake, Rafael Nadal and Tommy Haas, all very convincingly, and one of them (Haas) with ridiculous ease. He played a very good match in the final too, but was consistently outplayed by his opponent. Alright, maybe he did make a lot more unforced errors than in his previous matches, but those were necessitated by the tremendous reputation and sheer shot-making ability of his adversary. By the time the third set had begun, Gonzalez had been totally taken apart mentally, and you truly had to feel sorry for a player who had worked so hard and had the ability to match that hard work. If Gonzalez had had to play any man other than the one he actually did, he would have won the match comfortably, but sadly for him, that was not to be. There! I went through an entire paragraph without a single plaudit about Federer. Isn't that a relief?

On a more serious note, this year's Australian Open was another thoroughly entertaining affair; tennis seems to be getting more competitive by the year. Third round clashes produced classics - the Safin-Roddick match was truly one to savor, and 3 of the top 4 seeds failed to make it to the semi-finals. Fernando Gonzalez was the story of the men's tournament, as was Marcos Baghdatis last year, but really, that was just because we've got so used to Federer regularly dismantling his opponents that it has become almost boring now. Nadal was a big disappointment, and seems to be on the decline after just two years in the top bracket of men's tennis. I suspect, though, that it's too early to begin writing him off just yet - he definitely has that 'fighting spirit' that I keep talking about, and the clay season is just about to start, so he may yet put together another stunning sequence of wins. Lleyton Hewitt was another big let-down, and frankly, I don't know how much longer I can put up with his lack of fitness, off-court problems and less-than-splendid form. I think it's time I chose a new favorite player, and Andrew Murray would be a very good candidate for that post, if his match against Roddick is anything to go by. He was definitely the better player for the good part of that match, and he also does have the honorable distinction of having beaten Roger Federer last year. For once, British enthusiasm about its young, emerging sporting hero does not seem misplaced or exaggerated.

Serena Williams's triumph in the women's section was astonishing for a lot of reasons - she is undoubtedly a great champion, and all those who've been doubting her abilities and mental strength (I can happily say that I wasn't one of those) should take a long, hard look at themselves, and perhaps die of shame. Maria Sharapova had a brilliant tournament until the final - clearly, she has all the makings of being a consistent champion, and hopefully, her modeling assignments won't derail that possibility too greatly. Nicole Vaidisova, Anna Chakvetadze and Lucie Safarova all firmly established their credentials too, and are only helping the new wave of Eastern European domination of women's tennis. America, however, had the last laugh this time round, and this was greatly helped by the fact that when Serena Williams is on song, there's not a single player on the women's tour who can defeat her.

So now it's time for the North American hard court season, followed by the extremely long clay one (you can almost see Nadal rubbing his hands in glee). Personally, I'm not too great a fan of clay court tennis, and I'm just hoping that Federer completes his career Grand Slam (and perhaps a calendar one too?) this year so I don't have to bother watching it next year. And I also hope that Murray breaks into the top ten in the rankings quickly. Just in case Hewitt adds another problem to his burgeoning list. Just in case.