99 - Review (dont miss this experience)

i saw 99... i don't know if u have heard about it...its a Hindi comedy movie. Starring Kunal Khemu, Cyrus Brocha, Soha Ali Khan, Mahesh Manjrekar and Boman Irani. Its a very refreshing movie, with some slice-of-life sense of humor. I really liked the film. If u have enjoyed watching Khosla Ka Ghosla and Bheja Fry, you would appreciate the beauty of this movie as well. There is so much untapped real life humor in and around our lives that most of bollywood has never used, for they have created their own damn world. Movies like this bring out that slice of daily funny culture that we all live, notice and associate so well when someone makes a movie around those. There are some writer/directors who have realised that the real humor lies in noticing those simple nuances that are unique and integral to our mixed culture, humility, unpreparedness to handle the west, selfishness etc. This new wave of Hindi "multiplex" movies remind me so much of the entertaining Malayalam cinema that i have grown up watching and wondering why don't Hindi cinema make movies like them. Though in that sense I would say there is miles to go before Hindi can match that kind of cinema. And thanks to the deteriorating Malayalam cinema quality, there will not be much of an inspiration left. But movies like 99 stand out, for their essence, detail, simple portrayal of characters, and reactions that play in your mind more than on the screen. I heard the most heartiest of laughs around me while watching this movie. What more can you ask post a stressed day at work. The tickets are cheap (being weekday) and the movie is, in one word - fun. I will give it a 4 star. And i can watch it again. Sadly, there is not much of a word going around about the movie's popularity, so i would presume our "cinema viewing system" will ensure that such efforts get discouraged enough to not be made as often. Sad. But i would do my bit on promoting it through this blog . Lets hope rest do it too.

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional

I am back at it. A half marathon, an inspiring book and 4 months later, i am sure i want to do it, but i am not entirely sure if i can. I have to leave that to my undiscovered will , to complete a Full Marathon, in an acceptable time, or better.

Being out of touch shows. I went for my first few runs. And while i was not entirely disappointed with how much i lost for not having run for the past few months, i could see an in-satisfactory difference. Given the task this year is doing the double of what i am otherwise used to preparing for, it puts me back much further from my goal. Well that's one reason why i started much earlier. A 21k would not mean training beyond three to four months at best, and that too a very self pleasing training.

41km is a process, with no short-cuts or loose-ends.Given my life and job, it will only mean a greater effort.But it is this very life and job that inspires me to try it.

First step is to build up stamina and consistency, before i subscribe to a program which will shape the rest of the preparation.

It would all get slightly more mechanical and routine-filled than what i would want, for running to me is being in the center,my comfort zone, being where i desire or regret the least,where every will finds a way or every way fits the will. Equilibrium.I mostly expect a thoughtless experience (when i run) but cant help thinking good. Am clearly against running to escape stress or toning health.They are the fall-outs, of doing what you like to do.And its running for me (so far/ right now). I was reading about Murakami(famous author & runner)loosing his will to run for a long time after he finished an 'Ultra'-marathon. No business wondering how it must be for a 100km (ultra marathon)road to make you trail it first and then drain you of any desire for it again, or any road.

I do agree that toning health and freeing stress are great reasons to go active (running or anything).........in fact i have on many days killed last evenings beer with next mornings run (same for last evening's fight). Well if you can, you should right :) ?

But marathon is more than any regime that has a purpose. Marathon is the purpose.And so is for me.

Details of this -
Event : Mumbai Marathon
Date : I guess 17th Jan 2010
Time left : 8 months
Expectation : To finish it
Dream : Finish in under 5hrs
Facts : 1.)Ran a 6km in a fair time yesterday 2.)Have ran a half marathon in under 2hrs.

At a current physical condition that helps me only finish 6km with reasonable comfort and a history and passion for running, its a mix of odds.I certainly feel more confident about it when i think than when i run. I hope to lessen this gap.

And every athlete who has ever ran one will tell you, it always seems impossible. You always want to give up. You always fall short of what you expect.Its a race against yourself and there are no fall-outs but you, and no gains but for you.And its always about will.And like Murakami said about running - Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.

So i would just let my will take over.

cinema that leave a mark…

I am writing this after having gone through one of the most disturbing experiences in my life which did not involve me in any sense. A movie. As simple as that, but one of the most difficult one to sit through. I have a habit of exaggerating myself into feeling too much, of another persons’ experience, well told. But anytime you watch a movie that has been adapted from a true incidence, a struggle that ends in victory inspires you. And a struggle that displays pain, bothers you, the most, like in this case it has. A true incident of a girl being tortured endlessly without reason, by the most unlike of humans around her.

Movie : An American Crime. That’s what it’s called. I would not really know what kind of an imdb rating it would fetch, for once I don’t care. It takes an exception (I really hope) for someone to behave like it has been bought out in this movie, and it takes another exception for someone to have attempted to make this movie for all to see and probably learn, oppose, protect to avoid anything such again. Suddenly the word violence has taken a new meaning. It’s a fate you will not wish for your enemy in your most sinister moment.

There are times when I have sat through conversations about cinema that brings out the craziest and scariest of fantasies, the likes of Saw (one to infinity) and their French and Japanese bothers who seem to have mastered it. I never watch them, can’t bear it. Even if I can or those who do, would somewhere have a clear understanding of it not being true. Now only if someone were to show a fact, as it happened, how will it be. And that is what An American Crime brings out. A soft and simple portrayal of a gruesome act. Its making must have been a tough act. It has the capacity of leaving a few from the cast in depression or some other trouble for sometime. It’s certainly not an effort that makes you feel like an accomplished actor as much as it makes you feel like a contributor to making people realise the need to speak up. I wonder how much help education, religion or law & order is to people if there is still a likely hood for such as exceptional act.

I may be over reacting, for there are a million crimes happening all around us of much drastic kinds, and I rarely shudder, as I have today. What worries me the most here; however, are the criminals in this case, the most unlikely of them all, children and women. The ones who stand on the better end of compassion. Or the humans who can be your neighbours. I will not be surprised if a few in man-eating tribes of the amazons traumatise over seeing something like this.

I don’t think there is any psychology that can explain this. Or if it can, it would mean these incidences are not so much of an exception. And also that education is making a few too spineless to do something about it.

You can’t give stars to a movie like this. Because that is not the point.

Saved by a thought : Anti-Library

I suffered from guilt ridden exits from bookstores off late for I end up buying books more than what I can read, and there is a bigger set of them waiting to be read at home. I am buying them because i can and because i really want to read them. Eight, is the record i recently created in a recent such trip. The differnce between the books I have bought and the once i have read are ever increasing. Even if i include the many that i have partly read.

I have though, wondered how much of a book does one need to read to have actually read it. I mean Non-Fiction here, as that's what i read unless i need a break. Sometimes its enough to read a half of it and you would get your perspective. Now if you really are the kinds who thinks you need to get the full money's/pages'/perspective's worth, you would have a guilt left, still. I would fit in there, most of the time.

I am certainly buying as much as i can afford, and have only felt convinced while doing so. That conviction!yes, that's how i end up buying at the first place! That feeling!, It is very similar to the strength of a brilliant excuse you mind gives you, to call office and make, when you are too sleepy to get up and leave for work in an hour. And the guilt that follows, if you actually happen to bunk that day.

I have sometimes forgotten about some books i bought. A casual look at the book-rack gives me a realisation of combined pride and guilt.

I have seen better reading days, cheaper too. Any book lover who has spent time long enough in Mumbai has not stopped thanking, and now missing, the days when a short walk (Flora Fountain to Churchgate station) , 150 Rupees and healthy negotiation skills would see you heading home with two or three fine titles. You would read them and return a month later to buy more. I earned much much lesser and yet i learned as much or more (and there was no google in my life then, 7 yrs ago).

Recently however i came across a point of view that somewhere rids me of a lot of that bookstore-guilt. Its called an Anti-Library, and Nassim Nicholas Taleb has put it across in his book - The Black Swan. It says that a read book is far less valuable than an unread one, for the books that decorate your shelf is a research tool. Now i may not be researching as much as much as i would be , some day, in a mood to read a certain kind of book...which still makes it associable. One will accumulate more knowledge and more books as they grow older. It would only mean i would be stacking up as many good books i think i should "have" and not necessarily "have read". With age i would have better idea of what is worth having. Concluding therefore that more you know, the more would be the collection of unread books. He therefore called this entire collection an Anti-Library. And he says, which i found the most interesting of lines i have read in recent times (and the reason for this blog) - that a library should contain as much of what you don't know as your financial means :-) ............ and i like that! And can live it for some time.

... The Black Swan was one of the eight books i bought/invested in my last guilt ridden (not anymore) trip to the book shop :)