Aalavandhan and Raktha Charitra-Part 1

Watched to very contrasting movies last week end, Aalavandhan and Raktha
Charitra-Part 1.
Yes, Aalavandhan after more than 10 years I guess. Never got to watch this
movie for some peculiar reason. The same is the case with Guns of Navarone
and Mackenna's gold, both I always wanted to watch on the big screen and
never could. Anyways, coming back to these 2, while Aalavandhan is a
superbly crafted piece of work, RC1 is a pathetic excuse of a movie. Given
that there are not too many story lines in the world that can involve
corrupt politicians, angry young men out for vengeance and docile women, it
was completely unnecessary for RGV to make the movie so damn predictable.
To quote a few, the scene in which Vivek kills Kotta in his house in the
guise of a police man, the elaborate dialogue between Kotta and the other
policeman where Kotta demeans the police force is quite unnecessary and by
the time they are half way into it, you are pretty much clear that Vivek is
going to kill him disguised as one. In the scene where Vivek invites all
the goondas of Andhra and asks them to stop goondaism, even the dialogues
were predictable. Why RGV why.? Why do you insult movie goers
intelligence.?. To write more about this movie would be a complete waste of
time.

On the other hand, Aalavandhan, just makes you understand why Kamal is the
real Aalavandhan( the one who came to rule) the south Indian cinema. His
mastery of screen play (I will tell you why), the characterization of each
character, the way he plays a paranoid schizophrenic who lives in his own
illusional world is just near perfect. The way he has mixed the characters
emotions with that of one who has taken 'ecstacy", the drug, is simply
superb. I can not proceed without explaining about the screen play. This
was given by KB the great in an interview about Kamal himself. Perfect
screen play is one in which each scene has a beginning, a middle and an
end, with the end leading to the next scene. In this manner, right from the
first scene to the last scene of the move the continuity and wholesomeness
of each scene has to be perfect. I watched Aalavandhan with this newly
gained knowledge and it gave me another perspective to watch the movie. And
did I enjoy.?? Absolutely. I was not able to find one fault in the movie.
Even the sceen where the half wit from the local community comes to meet
Major Vijay and then exits without a word and the scene where the Major
goes to see the same person the next day. All of them have a connection and
that makes it a beauty to watch. Enough said, I am going to watch it once
more. In case you have not so far watched this movie. Please do. The story
line is simple. One wicked step mother, one toss of a coin and one of the
twins escape the torment to become a Major (Vijay) and the other, continues
to be ill treated and turns out to be Abhay the psychcologically distrurbed
twin. When the Vijay falls in love and wants to marry Raveena Tandon
(Tejaswini), Abhay relates the situation, that she is pregnant, to the way
the step mother entered their world and believes that Tejaswini is the step
mother and wants to kill her. How Vijay thwarts the attempt is the story.
Simple story line. Extremely well told.

Inception - Review

Inception

The dream is true, reads one of the by lines of the movie. So true, so
true.

Those who have watched the Dark Knight will know what to expect from this
one. Nolan exceeds my expectations. Clearly better than The Memento and
Dark Knight. Both of which I feel were great movies on their own.
The plot of the movie is simple. so to say. One person creating situations
and beliefs in another one's mind to ensure that decisions he/she takes is
beneficial to the person manipulating. Confusing, ought to be.

Inception centers on a team of individuals led by an "extractor" named Cobb
(Leonardo DiCaprio) who, through the use of a special device, construct the
dreams of a target and use those dreams to implant an idea so that the
target will make a decision beneficial to the individual who hired the
team.

The film layers dreams on top of dreams to the point where a unique
keepsake called a "totem" is required in order to inform a character as to
whether or not he or she is still dreaming. Then you have people in
particular roles like "The Architect", "The Forger", and "The Chemist" in
order to pull off the job. These dreams have rules: dying in a dream
forces the dreamer to wake up, delving too deeply into a mind can cause an
eternal slumber called "Limbo", using memories to construct dreams is
dangerous because it can blur the line between dreams and reality. In
addition, intruding in the dreams of another will cause the dreamer's
"projections" (human representations created by the dreamer) to attack the
intruders like white blood cells going after an infection. And these
explanations only represent a fraction of the terminology, rules,
exceptions, or details that are necessary for creating the world of
Inception.

The film deserves repeat viewings, but from your first viewing you can
grasp the events on screen and how they interact with each other as long as
you force yourself to be an active viewer. But with set pieces so
intricate, so jaw-dropping, and so breathtaking, you'll find that there's
no exertion needed to stay focused. You'll already be swept up in the
whirlwind.

Inception features one of the best fight scenes of all-time. Take a moment
to consider that: in the entire history of cinema, of every fight scene
that has ever taken place, the one in this movie is among the best.
Watching a fight without gravity is incredible. It's not like in The
Matrix where a character can defy gravity if they choose. The fight scene
in Inception has no gravity to defy and Arthur (played by Joseph
Gordon-Levitt), the team's point man, has to figure out how to achieve his
objective while fending off projections. I can only hope that someday in
the distant future, when people with free time are on a space station in
zero-gravity, they will re-enact this scene. In the meantime, Nolan's
spectacular visual effects will have to suffice.

The action scenes in Inception are spectacular. Visually lush and
imaginative, Nolan transforms car chases into countdowns, fistfights into
puzzles, and shootouts into…well, shootouts. There's a mission on a snowy
mountainside that doesn't work as well as the other set pieces because
there's a poor sense of location, a lack of visual diversity, and sloppy
editing. But that doesn't really halt or hurt the film because Nolan
brilliantly placed the car chase, the fistfight, and the shootout on top of
each other. You would think this would cause action fatigue, but by
cutting between three set pieces and having what happens in one set piece
affect the others, the action climax of Inception isn't exhausting—it's
exhilarating.

"If you're going to perform inception, you need imagination."

With Inception, every character not only has a particular skill and task,
but has a personality that mirrors their job description.

The physical scope of this movie is astounding. Worlds fall on top of each
other, a freight train can burst onto a city street, hotels can lose all
gravity, and everything that we know is impossible appears completely
natural. It's not enough to say that the cinematography is gorgeous, or
that the sound design is sensational, or that this is one of composer Hans
Zimmer's all-time best scores. There aren't "supporting" elements in
Inception. Just as the film layers its narrative structure and thematic
subtext, so it does with its technical elements. You will notice the
cinematography and the art direction and the sounds and the score. It's
like hearing beautiful solos mixed together in a glorious anthem.

"Dreams feel real while we're in them. It's only when we wake up that we
realize something was actually strange."

The comparison between Matrix and Inception are inevitable. Both movies
deal with the nature of reality combined with pulse-pounding set pieces
that will be included in any action-scene highlight reel. But The Matrix
is a freshman level course compared to the doctorate held by Inception, and
it has nothing to do with how far special effects have come in ten years.
It's about taking multiple genres, settings, ideas, emotions, and questions
and weaving them into a rich tapestry that will have folks talking long
after the credits roll. But then you throw in those advanced special
effects and you have a summer blockbuster that will blow your mind.

You've never seen anything like Inception, and you'll want to see it again
and again.

My Ratings

Wanted to do this a long time. See what you make of it.

Title	My Rating	Comments
Pasanga	****	Absolute fun movie.
Unnaipol Oruvan	****	Aayirathil Oruvan
Vennila Kabadi Kuzhu	***	Miracle meets PDR
Naan Kadavul	***	God walking on earth.?
Yavarum Nalam	***	Fresh take.
Ayan	***	Commercial mantra.
Kanthaswamy	***	Our very own Tamil Super hero
Eeram	***	Not the dry run-off-the-mill.
Peranmai	***	1 hero. 5 ladies. No crass.
Dev.D	***	Abhay
Kaminey	***	Cheeky
Wanted	***	Salman, stunts, six packs
Padikathavan	**	Easy going aggression
Siva Manasula Sakthi	**	As easy as SMS
TN 07 AL 4777	**	Aathi chudi
Newtonin Moondram Vidhi	**	Novel attempt
Sarvam	**	Easy narrative
Achchamundu! Achchamundu!	**	Fresh take.
Ninaithale Inikkum	**	Songs, college culture
8 X 10 Tasveer	**	Framed
Love Aaj Kal	**	Its different
Naadodigal	*	Odi poividu
Modhi Vilayadu	*	Kabadi
A Aa E Ee	*	School syllabus
Villu	*	Vijay wasted
Kadhalna Summa Illai	*	Everyone wasted
Laadam	*	Better than most 1
Thee	*	Burnt
1977	*	Is as old
Thoranai	*	Vishal drowns in style
Kulir 100°	*	Chk Laadam
Mayandi Kudumbathar	*	Ruffians coming of age
Maasilamani	*	Funniest movie. Could not understand
Muthirai	*	Padhikkavillai
Vaamanan	*	Kurangu koothu
Malai Malai	*	Brother brother
Aadhavan	*	Surya wasted
Kanden Kadhalai	*	Kaanavillai
Adhe Neram Adhe Idam	*	Never there, never again
Chandni Chowk To China	*	Joke

Return of the King!!

Schumi makes a comeback with Merc!!!

http://in.news.yahoo.com/137/20091223/375/tsp-schumacher-to-make-f1-comeback-with.html

Wake Up Call

Personal note from me:-

In the last 2 weeks between us we have managed 2/3 major incidents spanning 48, 72 and some time more hours than we cared to calculate.
While some of us took enough rest in between, there were some of us who did not care to and wanted to do stretch just for the heck of stretching. At times we do this out of practice, at times just for the heck of doing so, and at times, let us be honest, we just do not trust the person who is going to take over from us to do as effective a job as us and want to do everything on our own. I admit, I have had these same feelings sometimes in the past.

In our situations, let us "not be proud" that we managed an incident and are also running several other calls thru the day and are able to cover 15-20 hours a day. Is all this worth the end.?
Let us be pro-active. Trust & Engage others, take enough rest and be healthy. Read on to understand.

SAP India CEO Ranjan Das Dies After Gym Workout
Ranjan Das, CEO and MD of SAP Indian subcontinent died after a massive cardiac arrest in Mumbai on Wednesday. One of the youngest CEOs, he was 42 

What killed Ranjan Das and Lessons for Corporate India

>A month ago, many of us heard about the sad demise of Ranjan Das from Bandra, Mumbai. Ranjan, just 42 years of age, was the CEO of SAP-Indian Subcontinent, the youngest CEO of an MNC in India . He was very active in sports, was a fitness freak and a marathon runner. It was common to see him run on Bandra's Carter Road . Just after Diwali, on 21st Oct, he returned home from his gym after a workout, collapsed with a massive heart attack and died. He is survived by his wife and two very young kids.

>It was certainly a wake-up call for corporate India . However, it was even more disastrous for runners amongst us. Since Ranjan was an avid marathoner ( in Feb 09, he ran Chennai Marathon at the same time some of us were running Pondicherry Marathon 180 km away ), the question came as to why an exceptionally active, athletic person succumb to heart attack at 42 years of age.

Was it the stress?

>A couple of you called me asking about the reasons. While Ranjan had mentioned that he faced a lot of stress, that is a common element in most of our lives. We used to think that by being fit, one can conquer the bad effects of stress. So I doubted if the cause was stress.

The Real Reason

>However, everyone missed out a small line in the reports that Ranjan used to make do with 4-5 hours of sleep. This is an earlier interview of Ranjan on NDTV in the program 'Boss' Day Out': Boss' Day Out: Ranjan Das of SAP India .

>Here he himself admits that he would love to get more sleep ( and that he was not proud of his ability to manage without sleep, contrary to what others extolled ).

The Evidence

>Last week, I was working with a well-known cardiologist on the subject of ‘Heart Disease caused by Lack of Sleep’. While I cannot share the video nor the slides because of confidentiality reasons, I have distilled the key points below in the hope it will save some of our lives.

Some Excerpts:

>·Short sleep duration ( <5 or 5-6 hours ) increased risk for high BP by 350% to 500% compared to those who slept longer than 6 hours per night. Paper published in 2009. As you know, high BP kills.

>·Young people ( 25-49 years of age ) are twice as likely to get high BP if they sleep less. Paper published in 2006.

>·Individuals who slept less than 5 hours a night had a 3-fold increased risk of heart attacks. Paper published in 1999.

>·Complete and partial lack of sleep increased the blood concentrations of High sensitivity C-Reactive Protein (hs-cRP), the strongest predictor of heart attacks. Even after getting adequate sleep later, the levels stayed high!!

>·Just one night of sleep loss increases very toxic substances in body such as Interleukin-6 (IL-6), Tumour Necrosis Factor-Alpha (TNF-alpha) and C-reactive protein (cRP). They increase risks of many medical conditions, including cancer, arthritis and heart disease. Paper published in 2004.

>·Sleeping for <=5 hours per night leads to 39% increase in heart disease. Sleeping for <=6 hours per night leads to 18% increase in heart disease. Paper published in 2006.

Ideal Sleep

>For lack of space, I cannot explain here the ideal sleep architecture. But in brief, sleep is composed of two stages: REM ( Rapid Eye Movement ) and non-REM. The former helps in mental consolidation while the latter helps in physical repair and rebuilding. During the night, you alternate between REM and non-REM stages 4-5 times.

>The earlier part of sleep is mostly non-REM. During that period, your pituitary gland releases growth hormones that repair your body. The latter part of sleep is more and more REM type.

>For you to be mentally alert during the day, the latter part of sleep is more important. No wonder when you wake up with an alarm clock after 5-6 hours of sleep, you are mentally irritable throughout the day (lack of REM sleep). And if you have slept for less than 5 hours, your body is in a complete physical mess ( lack of non-REM sleep ), you are tired throughout the day, moving like a zombie and your immunity is way down ( I’ve been there, done that ).

>Finally, as long-distance runners, you need an hour of extra sleep to repair the running related damage.

>If you want to know if you are getting adequate sleep, take Epworth Sleepiness Test. (http://www.stanford.edu/~dement/epworth.html)

Interpretation: Score of 0-9 is considered normal while 10 and above abnormal. Many a times, I have clocked 21 out the maximum possible 24, the only saving grace being the last situation, since I don’t like to drive ( maybe, I should ask my driver to answer that line ).

In conclusion:

>Barring stress control, Ranjan Das did everything right: eating proper food, exercising ( marathoning! ), maintaining proper weight. But he missed getting proper and adequate sleep, minimum 7 hours. In my opinion, that killed him.

>If you are not getting enough sleep ( 7 hours ), you are playing with fire, even if you have low stress.

>I always took pride in my ability to work 50 hours at a stretch whenever the situation warranted. But I was so spooked after seeing the scientific evidence last week that since Saturday night, I ensure I do not even set the alarm clock under 7 hours. Now, that is a nice excuse to get some more sleep.

>Unfortunately, Ranjan Das is not alone when it comes to missing sleep. Many of us are doing exactly the same, perhaps out of ignorance. Please forward this mail/article to as many of your colleagues/friends as possible, especially those who might be short-changing their sleep. If we can save even one young life because of this email, I would be the happiest person on earth.

This article was written by one of the corporate managers.

Movies..Reviews???

It has been quite sometime since I “reviewed”, or shared my thoughts on any movies.

For sometime now, I have decided to only “list” movies that I watch. Let us see how that goes.

In the last few days
1. Trans Siberia
2. Defiance
3. The Incredible Hulk

Let me keep that list going, just to understand why my wife thinks I spend more time watching movies than with her!!!

Tasveer 8x10

After a long time I got to watch a decent movie that did not have the typical running around the trees or the tear jerkering hospital scenes so very typical of bollywood movies. It even had just one song in the movie and one as the credits roll at the end.

Plot summary - Rich father meets with an accident and dies. Everyone believes that it is death by accident, until a former cop who the father helped emigrate to Canada (where the whole story takes place) thinks otherwise. Son who has some sort of super-natural powers, where in he can look at a photogaph and visualise all that happened around individuals on the photograph, but only for a minute. The usual suspects for the son are the mother, his fathers brother, friend, who also happens to be the mother's lover (one sided though) and the fathers surrogate son. How the son uses his super-natural powers to find out the killer forms the rest of the story.

Akshay as the son has given a restrained performance, very "hatke" from his usual song, dance, fight routines. You do get to watch some stunts, but if you are looking for a hard core action movie of Akshay, this is not it. Javed Jaffrey, as the former cop who suffers from OCD impresses. I am actually beginning to like this guy as a supporting actor. Can anyone forget the cigar smoking aussie in Salaam Namaste. What?, Eeechatly!!!. Ayesha Takia.. hmm.. nothing much to say. The girl has to learn how to emote. Rushad Rana as Adit is just fine. Nothing much to give, nothing much given. The rest are all veterans who know how to act. Sharmila Tagore, Benjamin Gilani, Girish Karnad, Anant Mahadevan.

The twin Akshay's entrance was good. At times, it made me think that the movie was running in 2 dimensions actually. One in which Akshay the son wants to figure out the killer and the other in which Akshay the killer is on the loose. Nagesh sure knows how to keep one imagining what is next. Towards the end howver, the movie turns a little melodramatic, but thankfully does not linger for more than a minute or two though. Why the twin kills the oracle/tarot card reader still beats me. I felt it was totally unnecessary.

The movie opens with a young Akshay looking over a cliff at a ball that is on the edge of the cliff stuck in some rock. The parents run over, look over the cliff and then take the boy back home. The movie quickly moves to present day where Akshay is living in Canada with Ayeisha Takia in a live in with him. He is a forest ranger with the EPS (Environment Protection Society). He is estranged from his father since their ideals collide with his fathers Caniol polluting and Akshay against pollution.
We are given a feel of Akshay's ability to look at a photograph and visualise the happenings around what happened to people in the photograph in the minutes before the photograph was taken. Though it is harmful to his health, Akshay uses it to help people around.
Akshay's father meets with an accident and is critical. Akshay rushes to the spot and his fathers whispers something to him, which he is not able to understand. The father eventually dies. Akshay has visions of his father asking him to help him and is disturbed. It is at this point that "Happi", a former cop enters. He is confident that Jatin (Akshay's father) was killed. His theory is that since Jatin was an excellent swimmer, there was no way he could have drowned. His theory is that blood pressure tablets were mixed with alcohol and that Jatin was pushed into the water after he drank them, because of the BP tablets and the cold water, Jatin had a heart attack and he died. Akshay does not believe this at the beginning but then with his visions of his dad asking him to help him, goes in search of the photograph that his mother clicked right before the accident.
There are others in the boat where the accident takes place along with Jatin. His brother, friend, his wife and his surrogate son. Akshay uses his "powers" to look in to the happenings of each and everyone on the boat and starts putting things together.
In the end it turns out to be that there is a long lost twin to Akshay (Jeet) who wants to take his place. He uses Sheila (Ayeisha Takia) his lover to get into  Akshay(Jai) life and learn his habits and style so that they can kill Jai and Jeet can step in to his shoes and inherit all the wealth. But the father has a different idea. Jatin wants to give away all his money to EPS, where Jai works and win over his son. So instead of killing Jai, Jeet enlists the help of Sunder (Anant Mahadevan) and Adit to help him kill Jatin. They succeed in doing that by cutting the railing in Jatin's fav spot in his boat and spiking his drink with BP tablets. But then Jai starts his search for the killer and reaches Sunder. So Jeet kills him and then Adit, since Jai finds out about him too. All the while, Jai is unaware of Jeet's existence. He and the family is under the impression that Jeet died when he fell off the cliff(first scene of the movie). The parents move away from India and relocate to Canada and remove all memories of Jeet from Jai's life since he is traumatised from the event and that is when he develops the ability to look in to photographas and envision.
Jeet attempts to murder the mother since she wants to make the fathers dream of giving away all the money to EPS true. But only succeeds in hurting her since Jai, under the impression that Adit is the killer rushes to his mothers house when he learns that she is going to leave everything to EPS. The mother whispers "attic" to Jai as she is rushed to the ambulance. Jai visits the attic and understand that there is a twin. He visits the photograph once again and now looks at the twins face in the boat. As he wakes up, he looks at the twin standing in front of him, thinking he is dead along with Shiela, his supposed lover. Both of them think that Jai is dead since Jeet has burned the photograph, which is very cinematic, however, Jai had taken the adrenalin shot required to wake him before the burning and hence is awake.
After a tussle during which Shiela kills Happi, and Jai does a Houdini underwater, the brother come face to face with Jai ready to accept Jeet, eventhough he killed so many including his father. Sheila at this point tries to kill Jai, Jeet shoots her and in the process get shot himself.
The movie ends with the mother and son laying the photographs of the now really dead brother on a table along with other family photographs.