Naadham en jeevanae... 2

After a much heavy philosophical topic, i am back to my prayer. I am painfully aware of the fact that this post bears a ever higher risk of stating the most obvious. So once again, let me say this post is not going to add anything to whatever you might already know. After all, every prayer does the same: repeating the omnipotency of God that everybody supposes to be knowing, but in varying colours. Now that i have established my music credentials in the previous post on IR, let us get straight to the point.

No composer, i think, would have so much to his credit.

In recognition of the futility of this whole exercise of translating my love in to words, i think i would better wind up with just a few more observations. Probably they might help you enjoy more the next time you happen to hear IR.

Leave alone the subjective issues of quality. Just look at the mere volume of the creative output of the maestro. They say about Bill Gates' wealth: if you stack dollar bills, equal to Bill's net worth, one over another, it would reach the moon (well, i don't personally vouch for the veracity of this story!!!). Likewise, if one were to play illayaraja's songs back-to-back without repeating any of them, I think it would last for a lifetime... (ahem! now you math geeks out there, don't take out your calculators...) And the success rate in terms of song recall (hehehe like the 'brand recall' as the ad guys use) is simply amazing, given this huge a volume.

Spice

The variety of IR's output, in terms of the emotions and music styles, is just mind boggling. He can make you laugh your heart out, prance around with joy or get down on your knees and cry: all with a single violin. He can make you feel lustful with a flute and with the same piece of bamboo, take you to the God, whom you would not get to this easy. He can arouse you with a 'urumi' melam and put you off a classic composition on the veena. I seriously doubt whether any one else would be able to create the romance of a "Valayiosai" (Sathya) or a Vaa vaa anbe (Agni Natchatram).

And apparently, there seems to be a notion of Carnatic-Western fusion being a new idea. The so-called Indian-Western fusion has so much jarring pieces of sounds from different styles that all you see is a coarse mix of chalk and cheese. Just listen to the interludes of IR and you will see, how IR makes exactly that chalk seem so natural a part of cheese. Just listen to Oru siriya paravai, apparently 'just another' IR song from a flop flick 'Antha oru nimidam', IR takes you on a wild, winding safari through the music scapes of carnatic, western classical, pop, and what not. If this is for just another song, what can i say about Kadhal Oviyam (Alagial Oyvathillai), Nizhalgal songs, Kan Malargalin Alaipithal (Thaipongal) and many others. My memory is so utterly inadequate to recall each of the song i enjoyed.

A few pointers that might be of help:

• Listen to the way IR blends, swaps layers of male and female voice one over the other at the same time. E.g. the evergreen "Poomalaiyae" from Pagalnilavu
• Listen to IR's guitar compositions especially the way he uses bass guitar. For instance, "Vaanengum thanga" from Moondrampirai (i'm sure not many of you would have heard about this song)
• Focus on the way IR blends pucca western classical notes with our folk music and lyrics. E.g. Listen to the classic violin prelude in "Pothi vecha" from Man Vasanai
• Any IR+SPB+SJ combo is a feast in itself.

Mind you, all this doesn't require any musical knowledge, whatsoever. Just a pair of listening ears is more than enough. The cheapest ticket you can ever get to heaven.

BGM Badsha

One in a million chance for anyone else to beat IR on BGMs. I seriously doubt whether even Hollywood or any other filmdom would have had so much spice in their back ground scores. So many films wouldn't have been what they were without IR's bgm. Take Aanpaavam, not exactly a musical film. But still I am crazily in love with the bgm from Aanpaavam. And i dont think there is a need to comment on the pathetic bgms that we hear these days. And of course, when you can't expect really great bgms every time even with the great ARR, you know who the biggest culprit is by now. Harris. No prizes for guessing.

There seems to be no IR vaarisu as such in tamil films, ellaarum deva vaarisungala irukkaanga. There is a ever bigger dogfight nowadays as to who gets to the latest hip hop hits faster than anybody else. And the crown undoubtedly goes to Harris. Though AR Rahman and Yuvan also lift some songs, they do come up with some scintillating original scores once in a while. But i am completely clueless as to why Harris Jeyaraj, the most undeserving among them, is so successful. "Suttum vizhi sudare - Ghajini. ok, bearable. Partha muthal naale - Vettaiyadu Vilayadu.... sari polachu poguthu... ithu pathaathunnu athayae vidaama... unakkul naane - Pachaikili Muthucharam layum athu yenda yerkanvae setha paamba thiruppi thiruppi intha saavadi adikkireenga..." But, there is no point in blaming him alone, it all because of the tamil fraternity which has undergone mass STM loss like Ghajini, ironically the beginning of this episode.

All said, enlightenment is not something that can be shared. After all, how can one explain the inexplicable? Of mystics, they say "Those who speak, don't know, those who know, don't speak." I think it is high time i stopped doing the talking.

kadalai kasakkuthayya...

Enna ithu vara vara post title ellaam tamil layae vekkireengalaennu neraya peru kekkaraanga. Padathukku tamil la per vecha incentive tharra maathiri blog postukkum tamil per vechaa tax incentive tharuvaangalonnu oru chinna nappasa thaan. What actually happened was i came to like the titles used in Sara's blog (the only part of his posts that i can really understand), but I was really finding it difficult to think of titles like those. Then i stumbled upon usha's blog and got inspired to name my posts in tamil. Tamil vaazhga!!!

I reckon this is going to be the most informative post i have ever written. Before we begin...

Important Disclaimer
By kadalai, the author hereby refers to the widely prevalent practice of conversing with the opposite gender for humanly impossible long hours, with absolutely no transfer of knowledge, whatsoever. The title of this post and its content thereof is by no means a guarantee that the author intends to reduce the intensity or completely stop the concerned practice in the foreseeable future. The author wishes to thank one and all for providing him with such a deep understanding of the above-mentioned process.

Kadalai is more of an art, that too a very delicate and the hardest-to-master one at that.

A sack of peanuts and frying pan is sufficient, but certainly not enough. More often than not, guys (not gender specific) tend to overdo it. Sometimes, you fry it so shallow that it is disappointingly tasteless; sometimes, it gets fried deeper than it ought to be and then leaves a very bad, bitter taste that lingers so long in your mouth that you need even more fresh peanuts to flush it down.To get it perfectly fried, you need not only an expert chef's culinary knowledge and skills but also the perseverance and detachment of a Tibetan monk.

Kadalai has much in common with meditation than anything else. Both have the same goal: losing oneself. Or realizing oneself, whichever way you want to put it. This need sits right up there - on the top of the top of the pyramid of needs proposed by Abraham Maslow. I am sure i don't have to submit proof for this; many of you would already have lost yourselves several times in such manner or if you are at the lower rungs of the needs pyramid and not so much interested in self-realization, you would have at least witnessed many of your friends deep in such team meditation.

Unlike your acads, which sharpen your concentration, kadalai increases your awareness. It is very important to understand the basic difference between concentration and awareness. Concentration is inherently one-dimensional. It focuses all your energy on a single thing at a given time, leaving you at a disadvantage. On the other hand, awareness is multi-dimensional or no-dimensional, as you want to see it. It acknowledges and embraces the existence in its totality. Awareness conserves your energy and applies it only when it is really necessary. Thus, kadalai helps you stay alert, energetic and make the most of your miserable lives by increasing your awareness levels.

Come to think of it, kadalai is more efficient than meditation on many counts. While meditation consciously sweats towards reaching the realization goal, with kadalai, the process just happens in a jiffy and so effortlessly.

Well, i know it is not as easy as i make it out to be. A lot depends on the IQ (the lower, the better; as you very well know two wise people can't be friends), GQ (Absolutely needs to be high on this scale, need i emphasize more?) and EQ (better be low to keep you both together and sail through the hardships of the kadalai process) of the partner(s) you have. But, the heartening fact is that with kadalai, you have more than enough operational freedom: if one conks out, you have the ample freedom to resume with another asap. And the best part is, with the ownership and commitment being so low, it doesn't leave you feeling any worse.

And the goodies just doesn't end there. Exactly as it happens as you go deeper and deeper into meditation, with kadalai too, you realize the meaninglessness/ meaningfulness of life. It might be a bit confusing here. How can the same thing lead to totally opposite ends i.e. meaninglessness/ meaningfulness of life? Let us try to understand it. It might help to draw a parallel here with something we have assumed to have known all along. Shaiva and vaishnava philosophies. While a shaivaite goes on denying existence (why do you think then he wears ash on his forehead and his deity Shiva is depicted to be living in the burial ground?), a vaishnavaite revels in festivities (think of all the beauty you see at Vishnu temples and the tasty dishes that you get there) all through his life. It is similar to the cliched half empty/half full, optimistic/pessimistic views. Despite the popular theory that the negative, pessimistic view is inferior to the positive, optimistic view, both are right. When you say it is half full, you essentially imply that it is half empty. Only difference is the focus or the point of reference. Just like that, both shaivaite and vaishnavaite reach the same ends but take different approaches. In a similar vein, with kadalai, no matter what, whichever conclusion you get to at the end, you are absolutely right.

Fine. Enough for today. Time to meditate!!!

Note
IQ: Intelligence Quotient; GQ: Glamour Quotient; EQ: Emotional Quotient

Naadham en jeevanae... 1

Nowadays, i m getting too religious. And the religion is Illayaraja.

I think that should give you at least a faint idea about how utterly biased this post is going to be!!! ;) In a way, this is just another hymn on the Raja. Of course, this post is not going to add anything. In fact, I still wonder if i have anything to add. It is just that I wanted to reflect on my rediscovery of Illayaraja. And what a discovery it has been!!!

Before i get too prayerful, let us get some facts straight.

My knowledge of music is zilch. In fact, only now I am trying hard to learn to distinguish between different instrument sounds. And I don't really intend to learn any music.

As any average 25 something tamilian, I too grew up listening to IR right from my nenavu therinja days. And as happens to folks coming from other parts of Tamilnadu to Chennai, once i was in Chennai for my B.E., i too was very much into listening engileesu songs, partly out of my curiosity and partly out of necessity. After all, one's music tastes is more a matter of life/death than just personal choice: apparently you got to know at least a couple of lines from popular english songs or not even a single gal would bother to have a second look at you.

And just like any self-respecting guy, brought up on the heavy dosage of 101 Sure Ways to Get a Girl, tried and time-tested by each and every hero in tamil-film history, I too set up on the Mission Mr.Peter. Ethana padathula paathurukkom: Paattu paadi paalum karappanga, appdiyae ponaa poguthunnu micha timela sidela nikkara figarayum madipaanga. So, armed with such deep knowledge of the female psyche, there I was among the many poor souls who spent more time listening to the incorrigible english songs more than to our lecturers. That those lectures were even more mysterious is another issue anyway. Boys la varra Bob Gaali (played by Barath) maathiri oru koottame suthittu irunthuthu. I am quite positive that you can find such souls on any planet, any time.

Inspite of all that I told till now, my music tastes were quite exotic, at least it appeared so to me at that point of the time. I have had my own share of rock to heavy metal, carnatic: Sudha Ragunathan, Bombay Jayashree, world music: from Peter Gabriel to Yungchen Lhama, instrumental: Yanni, Joe Satriani, Kenny G and Indian maestros like Zakir and AmjadAli Khan, pop: MJ, Dr Alban and all those bands of boys and gals, Enigma, Snap etc. Ok ok avlo thaan niruthitten... ippo kooda ithellaam sollalaenna epdi!!! ;)

So, ippo naan enna solla varraennaa... "Yaamarindha mozhigalile tamil mozhi pol inidhavathu engum kaanom" nu Bharathi sonna mathiri, "Yaamarintha isaiyinile ilayarasa pol inidhavadhu engum kaanom". Ithukku thaan avlo buildup.

One might argue all this craze for IR is just classical conditioning, just like the famous case of Pavlov's dog. "You hear so much of IR's music that you associate parts of it with events in your life. It is this associative process that makes you identify yourself with IR's music and therefore love it." Some Freud disciples among you might say "The root of your love for Illayaraja is in your disturbed ;) childhood" and try deconstruction. "It is a process of slow hypnotism: the more you listen to it, the deeper it gets into your subconsciousness. Your love grows from that subconscious association."

Though all this and a bit of nostalgia might play a part, the reason is much more than just a rusted memory playing back the notes heard long ago. It is not out of a dark, hidden pit of subconsciousness that my love for IR grows, but it springs out of complete awareness and bliss.

Like Krishna says in Gita: all you need to get to God is to remember, one fine evening, I started remembering. And finally, I ARRIVED, as the mystics say, and I found that my long and tiring journey had ended exactly where I started - Illayaraja, the treasure in my own backyard that I had forgotten and lost in my vain search for The MUSIC outside.

Once I reached home, I find no need now to look outside. By saying this, I m not trying to belittle the skills of the so many musicians that i have come to really enjoy all along the way. It is just that now i am indifferent to others. Now, I have IR, nothing else matters.

If nothing else feels like coming home, then listening to IR is coming home for me. Now, tell me where your home is?

P.S.
Naadham innum olikkum.... ;)

salangai oli...

Just the other day, thanks to my fever, I was at home bunking office and I happened to watch Salangai Oli by K Viswanath. A great film, mind you it was dubbed in tamil from telugu (well i am not really sure about this), with exceptional performances by Jayapradha, Kamal Hassan and even his torn shoes. It is one of those movies that unfailingly make my eyes moist at least once before it ends. Most often (as with most of the audience I am sure), it is the scene where Jayapradha gives the national dance festival invitation to Kamal. Or the scene in which Kamal meets his dying mother. Or it might be even one of those scenes where drunkard old Kamal talks to Sarathbabu or his wife.

The immense strength of the film’s emotion comes from Illayaraja. Who else can possibly do that, if not the Raja? K Viswanath’s direction is just brilliant all through. And gosh!!! Jayapradha looks so divine. No wonder Satyajit Ray adorned her so much.

By mere coincidence, on the same day, I happened to read a review of Cinema Paradiso in an old issue of Anantha Vikatan. It is supposedly one of the greatest movies ever made on this earth. Is our own Salangai Oli any less? A Big NO is my answer.

If the western dickheads and those that are born in India who ape them don’t think so, I would give ‘em the middle finger! You might call me an emotional idiot. May be I am. May be not. I jus don’t give a damn! And most of the Indian “elite” that I have met just shove aside Indian films such as this as “tear jerkers” in the likes of Karan Johar (without him no discussion of Indian cinema would be complete, right? At least that’s what the national news channels make me think. Whether Karan Johar makes good films or not is another issue anyway.)

What is realism in films? Most often, we, the elite, tend to consider Hollywood as the god-sent standard with a totally unjustified reverence... So if you underplay like they do there, we have no qualms accepting you as a good actor. (i think this deserves another lengthy post!!!)

Most often, these “elite” friends of mine say they feel like fools when watching films like Salangai Oli. These films make you cry, so what? It is probably the unconscious resistance to show one’s “weakness”, if a heart (kind or otherwise) that identifies itself with a third person be it on screen or off screen, can ever be called a “weakness”.

Or it might be even our fear of emotions, either ours or others’. Probably it is a symptom of the fact that we are losing our skills to deal with emotions. And this argument seems to have a high chance of being true. With so many of us getting educated and becoming intelligent?!, we are capable of confronting violence or answering many intriguing puzzles of nature, but not our own emotions.

We have become so impervious to emotive stimuli (forgive my technical language!) that today we have to have blood spattering gruesomely on our faces to stir our animal instincts and make us understand that the actor is under pain. In the name of reality, all that we are doing is to provide sadistic pleasures and satisfy the bloody animal within.

It seems we are losing our understanding of the subtle language of emotions.

Matrix... Unloaded

I have always wanted to write something about Matrix. One of my all-time favs. Not often we come across such a cult movie. I think the first part is the best of all and i think most of you would agree. This post does not have much to do with the film per se. But it takes on from the theme of Matrix... Are you in control or not? Determinism or free will?

With so many of its dialogues, especially those between Neo and Morpheus, borrowed from hundreds of years of zen tradition, it might seem to talk all about Order and unbreakable rules. In my opinion, the whole movie is about the triumph of a few souls with free will over a decaying deterministic system. And there are some who don't think so. Enough, now, lets get down to business...

You take the blue pill, the story ends, you close this page and believe whatever you want to believe.
You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.... Remember, all I'm offering is the truth, nothing more....

The question is quite simple: do you do what you want to do? If you do what you want to, is the very act of choosing true or is it just an illusion? Are you just having an illusion of choice - choosing only what is already determined?

Life is what we experience. Remember the words of that German scientist with a weird hair-do. Everything is relative. What we feel depends a lot on what we are. Essentially, we choose, most often unconsciously, what we feel. And then choose what we do about what we feel - the action we choose in reaction to our perception of the stimuli. More often than not, we make the choices out of either laziness or just fear. Mind you, Newton's famous third law is only for things with lesser intelligence. (and the pity is that many in the human race too are among them!!!) It fails when it comes to describing human reaction - which almost never is equal and opposite. So life is all about the sequence of choices we make from moment to moment. And the question is whether we make these choices or somebody else makes them?

A deterministic system essentially implies a lot of rules and relationships set by a central body and many restrictive assumptions that go with it. To restrict the paths available to an individual in a system, first of all, all the possible paths have to be mapped and then somebody got to devise a mechanism to make the individual take only those predetermined sequence of choices. If you think the whole process of choice is an illusion, just try to calculate the number of alternative paths available to any individual in the system at a given moment. The choices are limited only by the imagination of the individual. And given that it changes from moment to moment, even the calculation of the number of alternative paths is beyond our arithmetic. And leave alone manipulating the individual to take a predetermined path, just mapping all these paths is not within the reach of man or all the computing power he has created till now. So a deterministic system essentially requires a super being who sits somewhere high above (it also could be a bunch of funny looking aliens floating in a planet with some unpronounceable name, thousands of light years from our dear mother earth) with the ability to put the thoughts that we think we have into our brains and plays with our lives just for his own fun. Sounds too complex to be true, huh?

Is it then just free will? I think a lot of confusion has been due to the lexical grandeur of the very word "free will". Free will is not about infinite choices or getting your way all through. It does not imply omnipotency. But it is about the control of your choices. It is just the ability to choose. It is just enough if there is atleast one alternative. Mind you, it takes a lot of intelligence AND courage to be 'free will'ed: Intelligence - to create the choices and expand the possibilities (if you dont create your own, somebody else is going to force theirs on you) and Courage - to make the choice and stick to it.

You think your choices are too limited. Think again. The problem is not much about the absence of choices as it is about the ignorance of choices.

On the face of it, there are three choices before you when you finished reading this post (probobality of which is quite low): hate me, like me or just be indifferent and forget the whole episode (which has quite high probability given that you had the patience to read on till the end). Thats it? NO, there are too many possibilities in the continuum between these choices. I will just list a few.

• You might want to discuss more of this with me and mail/meet me
  
• You might just wonder at my genius and start a fan club for me
• You might even become my disciple and leave your estate to me so that I never have to work anymore and can start an ashram to make a "Better World"
  
• Or probably, you might dislike me and start a "I hate SK" community in Orkut
• Or even worse, you might just kill me

Extreme choices you might say. Do you really think there needs to be a reason for every choice in the sequence. You are free to choose whatever you want. You might just go on and create so much love for me that you can leave your estate to me. Or in a similar vein, you can create so much hate towards me that you can kill me without any guilt. But the most easy choice available is to forget it. That is again for the laziest of us.

Again, free will is not about results. The results of our choices are very much dependent on the characterisitics of the system in which we exercise our choices. And the choice we make now need not be dependent on the results of our past choices. An intellect is always limited just as his tools of existence are. But, throughout his life, he tries creating new tools and sharpening his old ones: to expand his choices. Meanwhile, the lazy go on and on in predetermined patterns as they have nothing else to choose from. Freewill is for the thinker while fate is for the lazy. That helps us understand the stories about vastly different reactions of people put to similar conditions.

To control man is easy. Just dont let him create choices, make him lazy and dont let him think. And to think we are not in control is absolute laziness to think and cowardice to choose. Only fools resign themselves to fate out of fear or laziness. Those who choose are condemned to be free.

Now it is your turn to choose: determinism or free will. Quite ironical, huh?

I'm trying to free your mind, Neo, but I can only show you the door, you're the one that has to walk through it.

Tailpiece:
No amount of such intellectual masturbation and the online exhibition of it is going to help anyone reach anywhere. At least, it will help us to realize the futility of talking about life instead of just going ahead and living it.

oh GOD, what art thou?!

After a couple of movie reviews, I am back to my pet topic. what is life and who is God? This time around, I am going to make use of two busy, insightful years that I spent at one of the premier B schools of Tamilnadu getting intensively and extensively trained as a manager. And instead of making any use of the little shreds of common sense that I have, I would go on beating around the bush and come up with a four-by-four matrix to capture the definition of the Almighty Himself! And state just what you already know, with the expertise that you can find only in a management consultant, and successfully refrain from making you any wiser than you are right now! God help us all!!! ;)

Note: in this post, from now on, 'he' refers to the entity that has the potential to be God.

Before we begin on this great quest, we need decide on two coordinates that we would employ in the creation of the trap. To do that, we got to identify what he can do and why he does that. More often than not, we worry about what he can do. And tend to look over why he does what he does. Mind you, both these coordinates represent a continuum of two qualities - Ability and Intent: from the ability to do nothing (which I think cannot be clearly defined as the true zero as we have on kelvin scale) to everything and from utter selfishness to total absence of self whatsoever. Now, it is child's play. God is the one with ability to do everything for the betterment of everyone. Now you can go on and do the exercise of defining the Devil. If you feel this matrix is too simple, it is because of the genius who made it possible.





The root of problems with God, as we know it, is the personification of God. For me, God is the not the creator, He is the very process of creation, which can never cease. The problem is more lexical than ideological, for Gods of almost all our religions are qualitatively very similar. If we were to believe what we have been taught, they are there, with their omnipotent skills, to praise you for the good you do and reprimand you for your bads. More like a kindergarten teacher!

It is us who have 'accepted' God as "the one who created the world one fine day and then rested", which has been propagated over centuries for the convenience of a chosen few. That way, they can go on with their lives without really bothering about Him as well as us. In a rather convoluted way, this has helped us too. By banishing God to some place high and far away, we have given ourselves the comfort of thinking about Him only when we choose to. Can God be a thing of the past and the distant? God is always the present. For me, God is more of a quality rather than a person. Being God is being above Self.

All beautiful things are essentially simple. But can we keep our God simple? G O K!!!

Note:

My purpose would be defeated if you feel any wiser after reading this.

Heil My Führer!

Thanks to Pure Cinema by Satyam Cinemas, I was able to watch Der Untergang (The Downfall) directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, at Six Degrees, on a big screen with superb sound effects. But the announcement made just before the movie began really tested my patience. The voice of that female making the announcement made it sound even worse. "Those of you seen using your cellphones or heard having loud conversations during the movie would be asked by the management to leave the hall. Your tickets won't be refunded". I was expecting her to go on and ask us all to keep our fingers on our lips. Thank god!!! She didn't. And guess what, they repeated the announcement right after the interval too!!! Just in case any STML (Short Term Memory Loss) guys all of a sudden remembered their history lessons and decided to watch the downfall of Der Führer!

Unlike my previous reviews, I won't be able to rip apart this movie, for

1. those movies were of the kind that had no need for a really intelligent mind either from the audience or the creator

2. I severely lack the knowledge of WW II history (wonder how i passed out of my school!). All that I remember are some exaggerated stories from the comics that I read during my school days. One was about Himmler being a look-alike of Hitler and that there were even more Hitler look-alikes used to fool the Allies. Another was about the Allied Forces finding the art treasures supposedly hidden away by Himmler. And of course, I have even heard about a compilation of Hitler's romantic missives to many of his love interests across the country.

The whole movie revolves around the emotions of Hitler himself and those around him, as they get ready to face the end of their lives with the impending annihilation of Berlin by the Soviets. And with that, the ultimate downfall of the Third Reich. Faced with inevitable defeat and death, Hitler goes from heights of completely unjustified optimism in one moment to suicidal depression the next moment. Meanwhile, his ladylove, Eva Braun, tries to keep the spirits up by partying and dancing amidst the music of artillery explosions. And some Hitler loyalists, including the narrator, Traudl Junge, Hitler's personal secretary, decide to stay and die with Der Führer. And, Alexandra Maria Lara, who plays Traudl Junge, looks like an angel amidst all that dust, blood and death.

There is no dearth of emotions throughout the film from unflinching belief in Der Führer that the SS troops have to the betrayal by Himmler, the most trusted aide of Hitler. Ironically, in the end, I could not help feeling a strange kind of belonging with Der Führer, whom I know to have sanctioned the death of about 62 million people, including his own countrymen.

The film superbly brings out the human side of Der Führer and at times, leaves one wondering whether this man could really have done what we have heard he did.

"Hitlerae! neenga nallavaraa?... kettavaraa??"

Sappunu oru kadhal!

I watched SOK (sillunu oru kadhal), the day it got released, of course too expectant for a cool romance after so much of bloodletting by dada and gangster heroes in recent tamil films. The whole movie was way too dry, no jillu at all, in fact hot after the intermission, Damn it! they switched off the ac at Sangam (Probably they didn't see the need for ac when they were showing such a jill movie).

The film started on a promising note with Jo and her friends, who are totally against arranged marriage, planning to fall in love. I expected some interesting tussle between Jo and Surya, who get forcibly married to each other. But the director decides to play God and ignores my wishes; cut from the marriage scene to Mumbai, 6 years later, we see Jo and Surya along with their cute daughter happily whistling to each other busily right in the morning when the neighbours are tensely fighting on their way to their offices. How else on earth can you make the dumb audience understand that Jo and Surya are a happy family! On the way back home from office, in the metro, a gal just droools over Surya with Jo listening nearby. No comments. The director has had the good intentions of showing a happy family, but he overdoes it. Being the genius that I am, I devised a plan to deal with the boredom; I started counting the number of times Surya calls Jo as jillu. God! all the 18 years of my education proved to be of no help and I lost the count. Probably that explains the reason behind the title of the film - Jillunu oru kadhal, later changed to sillunu oru kadhal, thanks to tax cuts for tamil names (i think it is high time we had reservation and incentives for people with proper tamil names!) and a quick economic thinking.

Enakku oru unmai therinjaaganum saami... which girl in her right senses would do what Jo did in the film after reading Surya's diary? For just one sentence which was uttered by Surya in intense pain from the loss of his beloved? Isn't the six years of marriage supposed to have made Surya more mature? Is it like Mudhalvan and Azhagi repackaged?

With a good looking Surya and Bhoomika, we expect their love life in college to be really interesting. Something Mani Ratnam ishtyle. Never mind... that man is God. All that we get after so much promise of something like Kartik's performance in Mouna Ragam and Varusham 16 is just a beer drinking, rowdy Surya, whom Bhoomika falls for, when she had no reason to do so. Given the volume of beer that Surya gulps down in the movie, he is sure to lose quite a few moms and grandmas from his fanbase. Most often, you feel like you are watching the puppy love of a couple of school kids in their infatuation. In fact, school kids might kill me for saying that, as they woo their targets in much more style these days.

Krishna could have saved some time spent on choosing the wardrobe and spent it wisely on pepping up the movie with some interesting scenes. Santanam was the only relief. Especially, the "kaalaila antha tea kadaila vada saaptaen machi, paruppu ozhunga vegave illa" was too good.
Another one:
Surya: " enna vaandhi eduthuttanaa?"
Santanam: "illa ATM la irunthu panam edutha"

Vadivelu's comedy, if it can be called that, was too drab and did not even bring a smile. Contrastingly, the theatre was roaring with laughter towards the end when Jo wakes up from her nightmare - imagining Surya and a ravishing Bhoomika hitting the bed.

Some good music from ARR and a brilliant cinematography by RD Rajasekar would make sure that the songs especially Munbe vaa and New York nagaram very well become part of our lives for next few months. However, my personal favs are the jazzy title song and maja maja.

In the end, all that matters is money, no matter what jobless people like me who go and watch the film on the first day, feel and say. SOK is gonna see 100 days for sure!!! Wedding gift to Surya and Jo from the loving people of tamil fraternity!!!

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Life is meaning less.

Will you kill yourself for doing something that you have always wanted to do? No? Meet the man who did exactly that. Vincent Van Gogh, the artist I love the most. The man had never known success in his life. Never were his works really admired till his death.

In 1890, after painting ‘Wheat field with crows’, which is arguably the most intense of his paintings, Van Gogh shot himself, supposedly claiming that this work was his best and he can’t better himself again. He was a deeply depressed man through out his life and the argument over what his illness was still continues, even after more than 100 years after his death. That makes me think: if such a ‘mad’ man can create something so intense and so timeless, why have not we had another artist of such intensity from millions of ‘normal’ people born after him? Some say the intensity probably was because of his ‘madness’. F*** ‘em all!! To say that is just unthinkably foolish denial of the genius and passion of one of the greatest artists the world has ever produced. Then what does separate such men from us – the mere mortals?

Why do we often feel depressed in spite of all the material wealth that we have surrounded us with? Why we are so poorer in our souls in spite of the riches we have acquired? Why do we often desperately try to search for the ‘meaning’ of our lives? Are we getting our priorities wrong?

Passion. Probably that is the one important factor that sets them apart. Most of us die without ever finding something that fires us. Something that we would happily give our lives for. And then we complain about the grayness of life.

More often than not, we do things in anticipation of rewards (monetary as well as otherwise) from the outside. A double-digit hike in the salary. A small appreciative smile from the boss. A big hug from a friend. How often have we done something for making just ourselves and not anybody else happy? (I can see some sinister smiles from you perverts out there. But guys, I am talking about happiness, not pleasure – though for many, it might mean the same)

I bet you can experience such pristine happiness only when you create something. It might be building a complex, path-breaking rocket technology. Or seemingly mundane task of preparing a sambhar. So if it is not what we create, then what is that which really matters? The very act of creation. The emphasis is more on the journey itself rather than the final destination. Now comes the moment of truth. The judgment I am going to give (I know it is stupid to pass such a quick judgment on such a huge question that has plagued man’s mind since he started having one. But I have the right to be, since this is my blog!) is the most clichéd and the most easily overlooked: Enjoy every moment. Change the way you feel about what you do. Voilà! You would say “I am the happiest man in the world.” Just like Suryah in the movie, SOK (previously JOK).

Okay. It is not as easy as I portray it to be. But, that is not a reason strong enough to keep us from starting.

The meaning of life is what we give to it.

Tailpiece:
One of my aims (in fact, the only one in my life) is to learn oil painting and recreate one of Van Gogh’s masterpieces, preferably Cafe Terrace at Night or Wheat Field with Crows. I am sure I am going to fail terribly. But as I said, what we go through is more important than where we end up.

Vettaiyadu Vilayadu... a Big Joke

I remember a dialogue, from one of thalaivar’s movie, I guess – “dhrogathilayae periya dhrogam enna theriyumaa? Nambikkai dhrogam”. VV has done exactly that.

I bet you would have never seen Kamal Hasan so uncomfortable in any role. He would sure have been better off without this movie in his career. He has so much difficulty carrying his weight around in this movie. Literally. I have no problem with a fat hero as long as he is comfortable with his figure on the screen. But, in VV, unlike in PKS, Kamal is clearly not happy with his figure and he tries desperately to mask that. And meets with only failure. It really aches to see such a good actor deliver so pathetic a performance. Just think of the kind of cop he played in Kurudhippunal, Soorasamharam etc.

Gautam seems to be a one-film wonder. (I wouldn’t dare call Minnale his movie; it totally belonged to Vivek and Harris Jeyaraj. Even Reema was not that hot, I swear!) I sincerely hope Gautam proves me wrong. If he was hoping to compensate the lack of gripping screenplay (if there is any) with lot of gory violence, he is terribly mistaken. Some of the scenes remind of his previous slick cop movie – Kaaka Kaaka. The comparison, as inevitable as it is, brings out the insipidity of the plot. As a generic rule, thrillers would have a number of suspects at the beginning, from which the detective hero would wade through a lot of clues and unexpected twists and turns to finally nab the psycho before he kills the skimpily clad heroine. Nowadays, the heroine herself finishes off the villain, especially if the director believes in gender equality and more than anything, wants to cut down the bill. After all, who wants to have a highly paid hero when the heroine herself can do the simple job of killing the villain at the end while simultaneously adding quintessential GQ and SFX (special effects… through her high-pitched squeals) to the film?

Unlike typical psycho thrillers, which play up the fear factor, VV, being a whodunit mystery type, could have had some moments of intelligence and interesting dialogues (not exactly the type of comments that Kamal makes towards the climax, about the sexual interests of the villains, even though that was exactly what was on my mind). Again the villain, played by Daniel Balaji, pales in comparison with Pandya, again from KK, played by Jeevan. Someone please ask the director fraternity to give their villains, a nice hair cut and reduce the volume when they talk. Again why did the director have to lend his own voice, at least it sounded more like Pandya's, to the other villain? Budget probably.

And of course, Prakashraj, such a great and stylish actor, has been totally wasted. The director could very well have pitted Kamal against Prakashraj, playing a suave psychotic gentleman (oxymoron?) along the lines of Dr Hannibal Lecter. (Just before the intermission, one could see the poster of Hannibal staring at you from the walls of the villains’ room – that is called attention to detail… Grow up Gautam!!) That would have made an awesome plot and could have provided scope for intense encounters between these great actors, just like those between Kamal and Naaser in Kurudhipunal.

I don’t know whether Gautam’s creativity has touched a new low. He did not even think of new names and uses the same names from Kaaka Kaaka – Maya, Ilamaran etc. He knows for sure that those names are very well etched in the memories of any Tamil moviegoer worth his salt. And gosh!! Why the hell did he have to use his own house address in Gandhi Street, Kaanagam, as Kamal’s address in the movie?

I hoped Gautam would have given some life to the mediocre songs, which should have given Harris much less trouble, given that he had so many tunes to chose from his own recent hits like Ghajini. Partha muthal naalae, the song with Kamalini Mukherjhee, seems to be the bottom of the list in terms of visualization, given that one invariably is made to compare it with “Ennai konjam” from KK. At least, “vennilave” has a moment of hilarious relief when the director himself joins the street dancers in the background.

Gautam could have better used his DVD library membership and watched a few racy, Hollywood psycho thrillers before making the movie. Or even better, his own film, Kaaka Kaaka (sure he must have a copy of it at home!)

The whole film seems to be a big compromise (nobody seems to have an idea of why they started the film), given the track record of the brilliant technicians it had – Ravi Varman, the award winning cinematographer behind Anniyan and Five Star, and Antony, the editor behind Kaaka Kaaka, Manmathan and many other box-office hits. The quality of cinematography is so “good” that it instills a lot of confidence in any first-time photographer. Most of time, the screen is occupied by the bloated faces of Kamal (with that never before, hopefully never again ‘totally lost’ looks!) and Jo.

At the theatre, I was fantasizing that somebody would wake me up and tell me that I had had a bad dream and VV is yet to be released.

They say there is nothing worse than the death of hope. (I think this is from Shawshank Redemption). VV has not dealt a death blow, but sure has cast a serious doubt on the big Brand – Kamal Hasan.

Talk Less and Talk Sense!!!

Actions speak louder than words. True. But most of the time, we are blind (deaf?) to them. Even if noticed, they finally settle down as mere sound bytes - thoughts, if you insist, inside our petty brains. How do we form the words that we let reside in our brains or let out through our never resting pouts?

Often they are from the periphery of our consciousness. Arrows without the energy of sense (logic or emotion) that never reach their assumed targets. These blind darts cause more wilderness as they hit everything but their targets.

Blame the brain for our communication voids. Yes. It processes information, not that we have too much of it or its higher cousin, knowledge, at such a rapid pace that our poor vocal strings can’t match. In a wasteful attempt to run along, our faculty for speech puts the words out as they come along, often making us sound stupid. A slower brain and a mouth that can match its pace will do us more good than the faster ones. In fact, slower brain and hyperactive vocal cords form a dangerous combination.

So? Let’s talk less. If possible, talk sense. For aspirants: if you can, think less.

Why we read Philosophy....?

Ever wondered why do we read philosophy? Why a dumb book like The Alchemist/The Monk who sold his Ferrari, which tells nothing more than god is there to help you (but not in so few words), is so much hyped up? Why so many trite books on positive thinking are bestsellers? Why there is still so many clashing ideologies and resultant confusion even after so many millennia of human existence and exploration of the Truth?

One of the basic premises of psychology is that mind dislikes uncertainty and tries to satisfy itself through a self-made explanation of the situation at hand. If you cannot make it up for yourself, then borrow. The very essence of philosophy is to explain things in terms of what we know - with our limited and confusing vocabulary and experiences. That the end result is even more confusing is not surprising.

If you tell me that all these people are searching for The Truth, I am sorry. Nothing could be farther from the truth. A passable answer could be that they are trying to escape from reality as they see it.

Believe me. Philosophy won’t help in your escape regardless of whoever/whatever/how much ever you read, for the simple fact that all of these philosophers are trying to explain their experiences and thereby satisfy their own minds. And incidentally satisfying their wallets as well. I know the following statement is so trite, but I need to use it here. Each individual is unique. This calls for unique philosophical volumes for each individual. But if we were to have such volumes, one would be dead by the time one counted them. How then do we make use of the existing theories instead of adding to the confusion?

A rational approach to learning requires the student to have at least a basic idea of what he wants – what he aims to achieve through the study. An identifiable, definite goal is to make you more sensitive to what happens. To equip yourself with skills and knowledge so that you can decide what life means to you and what to do with it. After all, the meaning of life is what you give to it. Improve your observational skills by focusing on your physiological and psychological health. This helps you in becoming more receptive, free of the limitations of logic. After all, it is your happiness and not logical precision that you are after.

A recurring theme across eastern philosophical literature is that enlightenment is instantaneous. Bhagavad Gita, arguably the best piece of philosophy on the whole earth, says enlightenment is remembrance. It is like tuning into your favorite channel on your radio. The song is already there in the air. All you got to do is to switch to the correct frequency. Tuning your antenna into the Existence. This is where, I think, the western philosophy gets straitjacketed by its over-emphasis on logic. Instead of improving the sensitivity/receptivity of the student, it focuses on squeezing reality into tested and established patterns.

I would like to digress a bit (as if I already haven’t) to try to interpret the concept of nirvana/Buddha/bliss. Nirvana is a state of mind (I would rather not use ‘absence of mind’ as many Buddhists say for the simple reason that mind may still function as a faculty even after enlightenment). It is a state of mind that brings out the best in you. From this springs your attitude or bhavana (for the want of a better word), which determines how you feel about what happens to you, and ultimately your happiness. It is like carrying your climate wherever you go.

Regardless of whether you like the concept of determinism (if that sounds too heavy, use fate) or free will or a compromise of the two as The Alchemist puts it, it is your experience that matters the most. If you feel good, go ahead and use it. Don’t worry about its authenticity and popularity. As long as you get cured, does it matter whether what you had is a placebo or a regular pill?

Morality of capitalism!!

’’If you feed a hungry man with a fish, you feed him for that day; instead, teach him fishing and you will feed him for the rest of his life.’’

This assumes willingness on the man’s part to learn fishing. Have you ever wondered what would a hungry man who has neither the skill nor the intention to acquire it do? And if the world is swarming with such men and you are one of the few who can and do fish, can you imagine your plight? Can you be sure of getting your catch home safely without being plundered or begged off? What would you feel for such parasites, be they beggars or looters? What would your moral disposition be? Compassion? Hatred? Indifference?

If you can’t see the enormity of what you are facing, read Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand.

Atlas Shrugged is breathtaking in its scope and suspense, for it is about the murder - not of a body but of the soul of Man. Miss Ayn’s intellect cuts through the heavy mists of mystic confusion to expose the schemes and tools of Evil, or call them second-handers, if you will, who feed on the Creation and eventually, the Creator himself.

This masterpiece, originally titled as The Strike, reveals how the most important forces of human life - Money and Sex, have been used by the Second-handers, over the history of mankind, to keep the Creators in chains so that they can go on without ever bothering to produce. John Galt, the protagonist of AS, carefully drains the world of its productive energy by pulling out the Creators from the world into the Atlantis, a place where each lives for one’s own sake and never asks another to live for the sake of others. And for the first time in history, the Motor of the world stops, leaving the world to rot.

In a language that has a lucidity and profundity rarely found elsewhere, Ayn puts forth, with convincing arguments, the virtues of Selfishness as against the vices of Charity. However the rhetorical denigration of compassion and other similar human qualities that Ayn makes throughout the novel might get on your nerves. Not surprisingly, one finds no good mothers or family members or any heart-warming relationships in Ayn’s works. But that cannot be a worthy reason to miss this great book.

One of the reviews in MouthShut warned readers against the righteousness that they might get after reading Atlas Shrugged. I believe the righteousness of Reason is far less malevolent than the righteousness of religion or righteousness of renunciation. If the value of any idea is in its applicability, Ayn’s philosophical ideas are more valuable than most of the trite philosophy dished out today.

Brought up in a nation, which goes on living, denying existence, trying to lose its faces if not souls, with the hope of rewards far beyond in time, space and every other conceivable dimension, I find various scenes of Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead being enacted almost everywhere with the help of many Atlases who never care to shrug . One can see Peter Keatings and James Taggarts all around if one cares to wake up. And if we dare, we can find variants of them within ourselves too.

Read it. And you will begin to see. And would feel ignorance was bliss.

I chose not to be blissful.

Ironically, I am reminded of the verses from Gita, which could very well have been said by Roark or Galt.

Of lordly elephants I am Airâvata, of the wielders of weapons I am Râma, of the flowing rivers I am the Ganges, of the Pandavas I am Arjuna. I am the highest possibility of everything.