What about Bollywood then?

The snob in me doesn’t even want to be associated with them. But really if you are objective enough then you'll see that there are good movies here also. It is just our (or am I generalizing from my experience) innate urge to criticize everything that prevents us from ever accepting that they can be good or fun to watch.

Of course, all this is the result of watching Lage Raho Munna Bhai yesterday. I wouldn’t even watch it for free and my friends had to force me to! (What are friends for anyway, if not to teach you things). And I did learn a lot. I learned that it is okay to laugh watching a bollywood comedy, that it is okay to hum a sentimental song (pal pal har pal…), that you are not cool when you criticize Gandhiji and most importantly that Bollywood movies can be fun to watch. (Also it is nice to hear Vidya Balan call "Murali..." with love in her eyes).

So that is my advice to anyone who thinks like me (and I think this applies to you), go watch Lage Raho Munna Bhai.

Sensible hollywood movies?!!

Can there REALLY be!! After watching movies like MI3 (here is what my friend thinks of the movie) and very recently The hills have eyes, you'd think VERY UNLIKELY. But joking aside, I have actually watched a few outstanding movies.

Everyone must have watched Crash by now, and if you liked that then you'll really like American Dreamz. It is a satire about America and shows like American Idol (there is also an Indian Idol now grrr...). I felt it was a lighter version of Crash and I really liked it. The other movie I really liked was Thank you for smoking, which is about the spokesperson for the tobacco industry. These movies though funny are also a little cynical and really gets the point across.

Eventhough it is not a big-budget hollywood movie and doesn't belong here, I also liked Primer. What I really liked about it is that it is about a couple of engineers, and so few movies are. It is as if WE are completely ignored by pop culture. Here is a comic from phdcomics on the topic.

Guess you get some idea about how my "research" is going now.

Development and apathy

Development and apathy are ruining India. This was what Medha Patkar said during her talk yesterday in the campus, to an auditorium filled to overflowing. But how can something like Development be bad for a country! After all, the government does claim that we have moved away from the 'food-clothing-shelter' priorities and it is time now to concentrate on international trade and globalization. We have come a long way and now have infinite choice in almost all products from soaps to cars - it is very easy to forget that 'food-clothing-shelter' is still a major cause of concern for a vast majority of people, sorry like Medha Patkar asked us to remember, to the citizens of of this country. For as she said, we do sometimes forget to consider the homeless and destitute as citizens who have the same rights and privileges as per the constitution of India as the rest of us.

The second half of the lecture was on the government's policy of creating Special Economic Zones (SEZs), special regions allocated to multi-nationals with almost complete autonomy and special privileges like electricity and water at very low cost. The creation of these special zones require land, and she said that whatever be the price, selling land is a tremendous loss. For with the land we are selling all the natural resources and bio-diversity which is often overlooked or as most often happens swept under a carpet of red-tape. This explains her stand and that of Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) on the 'land for land' policy.

But sadly after a captivating lecture of over one hour and half, the first question that was asked was about the involvement of the famous film star, Amir Khan in the activities of NBA. It really proved her point on the apathy of the general public, which is more interested in the sensational than the relevant. Like she said we are indifferent to any disaster unless we are directly touched by it.

Living in a campus, almost completely removed from the real world, it was important for all of us to have listened to this lecture.