Love in the time of Cholera

I was browsing through some videos when I came across one of the movie Love in the time of Cholera. I just finished reading the book a few weeks ago and by the looks of the trailer and the star cast it does seem to be something to watch out for. I would want to see how the director has recreated the beautiful imagery painted by the words of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

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Emotionally sterile

" U R the reason from my stress. U R emotionally detached and R sending me mixed signals..... R U playing....?"

This is a SMS that I got from a special someone today. Anyone who has read this blog would know my immense hatred from the players so being called once took me by surprise. I have never believed in playing games in a relationship but somehow with each passing relationship I have started to build a wall around my heart which I try not to let down soon lest I get hurt. The problem with doing that is that my guard coupled with my growing cynicism with each failed relationship has in a way made me emotionally sterile.

Here I have the most perfect person who I am attracted to physically like WOW but I make it a point to keep pushing him away with my indifference and nastiness while all I want to do is just accept things without creating boundaries around me. I am caught in a situation where I want to be with him and I know that with each passing moment I am getting to like him even more and that scares me so I turn into the ice princess.

After reading the SMS I was a but disturbed but decided not to do something impulsive and therefore decided to watch some telly to numb the thoughts running around my head. I caught "Before Night Falls" on one of the channels and started to watch it midway through. It is based on the autobiography by the same name of homosexual Cuban writer Reinaldo Arenas played by the very talented Javier Bardem, Johnny Depp and Oliver Martinez. It is a beautiful movie and I'd want to rent a DVD of the same in case it's available here. The last scenes of the movie are very powerful and moved me to tears. That's when I decided to write this post. The Dervish is kinda retrospective and lonely today after a long time....

My Lover Sea

I am that child
with the round, dirty face
who on every corner bothers you with his
“Can you spare a quarter?”

I am that child with the dirty face,
no doubt unwanted,
that from far away contemplates coaches
where other children
emit laughter and jump up and down considerably

I am that unlikeable child
definitely unwanted,
with the round dirty face
who before that giant street lights or
under the grandams also illuminated
or in front of the little girls that seem to levitate
projects that insult of his dirty face

I am that angry and lonely child of always,
that throw you the insult and warns you:
if hypocritically you pat me on the head
I would take that opportunity to steal your wallet

I am that child of always
before the panorama of imminent terror
imminent leprosy, imminent fleas,
of offenses and the imminent crime.

I am that repulsive child that improvises a bed
out of an old cardboard box and waits,
certain that you will accompany me

- Reinaldo Arenas

Before Night Falls

Video Credit : Neandertal
Picture Credit : Mragrimm

Edith Piaf

I discovered Edith's music when I accidentally downloaded one of her songs. Ever since I wanted to buy a CD but couldn't get my hands on one. Last year during one of my trips to Delhi I bought one of her CD which also had some notes on her life on the CD jacket cover. She had a very sad and difficult life and through it all sang some really beautiful music. Below is one of her song and the trailer of the movie La Vie En Rose (La Mome in french)based on her life.

Edit Piaf - Mon Manege A Moi

La Vie En Rose Trailer

Video Credits : CafeDaria, PicturehouseDF

Cidade De Deus

I saw the movie 'City of God' yesterday and I must say it is very interesting. It is really well directed with some great performances. Usually I don't enjoy movies about gangs and violence but this was an exception. It seem like a documentary and the actors are simply superb. It is based on a true story and still it is fast moving and keeps you interested until the end and that is what I liked. The narration and how the movie moves between the past and the present and the inter relation between the different stories of the characters is amazing. Even really young actors who maybe 5 or 6 acted really well. There is a very moving scene where the youngest member of the gang is shot in the foot and he starts to cry. It would remain fresh in my memory for a long time. You get a taste of the life of the people in those shanty towns and all the violence there. This is the second movie directed by Fernando Meirelles that I have seen after 'The Constant Gardener' and I am really impressed.
I had seen a piece on BBC a few months ago how the governance of the ghettos is in the hands of the hoodlums and how they are in some way the protector of the people there from the atrocities of the police. The DVD had an interesting documentary as a part of the special features about the view of all three sides - the police, the dealers (hoodlums) and the dwellers. The movie comes highly recommended. And all you Latino fans there are lots of shirtless Latinos displaying their amazing bodies.

Cidade De Deus original Brazilian Trailer

Video Credit:Missjojo08

Diamods are forever

Maharaj Yadvinder Singh of Patiala wearing the famous Patiala necklace designed by Cartier

It's strange that of late there seems to be an unintentional theme running through the movies that I watch. A few weeks back it was China when I saw 'The Last Emperor' and 'Kundun' and now my DVD rental company send me movies from my queue which are based in Africa. I saw 'Blood Diamonds' today and I still have the DVD of 'The last king of Scotland' with me. So here I am sititng writing this post playing the CD 'Africa Calling - Live 8 at Eden' which forms the perfect background to the thoughts in my head. I remember watching a story on CNN a few months back covering the trail of Blood Diamonds from Sierra Leone to Liberia and finally to the markets in the west. It was really disturbing and quite an eye opener.
And while I was thinking about it all I also remembered the most beautiful jewelery collection that I have ever seen. It is the "Jewels of the Nizams". Before diamonds were discovered in Africa most of the diamonds came from India and Golconda in Southern state of Hyderabad (now Andhra Pradesh) was the major mining area. Many large and famous diamonds like the 182 carat Darya-e-Nur, 105 carat Kohinoor (now a part of the Crown Jewels), 140 carats Regent Diamond are believed to have been excavated from these mines. I have also seen a documentary on the history of some of these famous diamonds and how they are believed to bring bad luck!!

A Sarpech (turban ornament) from the Nizam Jewel Collection

Indian princely states were know for the excesses and many famous jewelers like Cartier made some outstanding pieces of jewelery for them. One of the Prince who was notoriously famous was Maharaja Bhupinder Singh of Patiala who was known for his antics like his motorcade of 20 Rolls Royce and many exquisite pieces of jewelery like the famous Patiala necklace made by Cartier. He was banned from coming to Simla (the summer capital of the Britishers in India) because he once tried to elope with a British lady at the point now known as the Scandal point. Later he formed his own summer retreat at a new hill station called Chail.
But no one was as famous and rich as the Nizam of Hyderabad who was on the cover of Time in February 1937 when he was declared the Richest man in the world. The Nizam had to surrender his state when he was attacked by the Indian Union after Independence. Mukkaram Jah, the grandson of the last Nizam moved to Perth and later to Turkey. The famous Jewels of the Nizam which are believed to be a fraction of the Nizam's actual wealth were bought by the Indian Government for a sum of US $70 million in 1967 and consists of the 185 carat Jacob Diamond, 25,000 diamonds weighing over 12,000 carats, 2000 emeralds weighing over 10,000 carats and innumerable pearls, rubies etc. The present worth of the collection is valued at about US $ 6 billion.

The eldest son of the last Nizam in all his royal regalia

I agree that the monarchy has it's share of problems but at the time it served the purpose well and it gave birth to and formed the patrons of most art forms like architecture, music, literature, crafts and jewelery etc. The study of the erstwhile princely states is a wonderful trip into the glorious days gone by.

Photo Credit : Kalle Anka

The lost memories - Alzheimer

I saw 'Iris' the movie about novelist Iris Murdoch and her battle with Alzheimer today and was moved. The only other movie about Alzheimer that I have seen is 'The Notebook'. It is one of the movies that make you think and I started to wonder how would it feel if one day after spending a lifetime with a person you felt that thee person no longer recognized or understood you. That all you were to them was a blur.
Would it feel like a rejection and would love be strong enough to keep you going in those moments when all that loved in the person would be dying a slow death? If someone leaves you and forgets your existence because they find someone else it is still easier because then you can start to hate them and the hate and anger may provide some solace but how can you be angry at someone who are themselves slowly moving towards the darkness. I am fortunate enough to never have had anyone in my family with Alzheimer so I guess I'll never know.
Both the movies come highly recommended and I love the character of John Bailey in Iris. What a sweetheart!! The next movie on the Agenda now is 'Vertigo' by Alfred Hitchcock.

The Pavarotti of Persian classical music

I saw the movie Amadeus yesterday which is about Mozart's life and his music. For the first time I was able to enjoy Western Classical music. I haven't heard much of the genre but I used to play it in the background while reading and used to find the music unobtrusive and soothing but to see it from the point of view of the artist and understand what goes behind a composition or an opera takes it to another level.
I have a bias towards Persian Classical music which I think is simply divine. But it's just a personal choice. I think some of it is also to do with how beautiful Persian and Arabic sounds to me, the instrumentation and also the Sufi connection. I agree that music piracy is wrong but through 'Lime Wire' (I subsequently deleted all the pirated music I had on my laptop) I 'discovered music that I would never have found out about otherwise and it is there that I found beautifully composed Persian music by Shahram Nazeri. The first time I heard it I fell in love with it. Later I dated someone for a while who was very passionate about music too a little too much I'd say and he introduced me to Shajarian, Mohammad Reza. Some of the classical Indian musical instruments have been adapted from their Persian counterparts with Sitar being the most famous. But there is only so much that one can talk about music some things are to be experienced and not to be talked about so I am posting 2 amazing clips by the artists that i just talked about. I hope to hear your comments about the music.

Shahram & Hafez Nazeri at Kodak Theater December 2005

Faryad - Shajarian - Bam Concert

Video Credits : 81ley, Wellgard
Painting Credit : Capitolletter

The blunder called a cake

Today was an eventful day by my standards i.e.. I go up late as usual after a late night of reading 'Cod'. When I got up in the morning for some strange reason I felt like having some cake but the thing was that I wanted to bake it myself!! I have never baked a cake before except for a time I made something that could remotely be called a cake at Mr Big's home, it was great fun though baking with Om and the kids. I am a decent cook but I suck at baking. Today I was all by myself so to start with I called my sister who makes excellent cakes. I took the recipe for her scrumptious Chocolate Cake.
Unfortunately I have this weird habit of not being able to cook by measuring the ingredients for the recipe. Like most other things in life it is hard for me to 'walk the line' and follow the rules. I have to rely on my judgment and luck. That's exactly what I did. I added a few personal touches, for starters I didn't use any cocoa instead I used lots of cinnamon, orange marmalade (as I didn't have any fresh oranges) and organic demerara sugar to make the orange cinnamon cake a little more organic and 'special'. My sis said that the cake should be ready in about 25 to 30 mins at 180 degrees. I think I used a little too much butter and way too little flour and hence my cake took an hour or so and wasn't 'perfect'. Mum enjoyed it though so nothing was wasted as such. I guess after having massacred a cake or two I should be able to perfect the recipe. Well I hope I do!!
Then after lunch I saw a hindi movie called 'Jhoom Barabar Jhoom' which was fun and after the movie I didn't feel like sitting at home. I called a friend of mine and we went out to eat at a new cafe that opened in town. The food was nothing to write home about so I went to my favourite cafe in town 'Mocha'. While having coffee we decided to go for a late show of 'The Bourne Ultimatum' and luckily we got to the theater in time and got the tickets too. The movie was really nice and fast paced.
The weather is changing here so there is a slight nip in the air these days. Just to enjoy the beginning of winter (my favourite time of the year) I went around town with the car windows rolled down and experienced the cold winter breeze for the first time this year. The roads were all empty with little traffic as it was rather late and hence it made up for really nice drive and a perfect end to an 'eventful' day.

Photo Credit: Seedkeeper

The sound of the Desert

Shekhawati Region, Rajasthan

I have seen so many crappy Hollywood movies in the recent past that they left a very bad taste in my mouth. I am very selective about the Hindi movies that I watch and I usually only see the ones they intrigue me but with Hollywood movies I am sometimes disappointed when I watch movies which according to me are over hyped with tons of special effects and no story line at all. The last such movie which I saw and that I can remember was 300. And then there have been so many other ones I rather not remember their names. But luck has been on my side for the past few days I have seen 4 good movies in a row.
It started with Titus which I think was beautifully shot with great costumes and acting, The Last Emperor was another masterpiece and I'd want to see more of Bernardo Bertolucci's work, Kundun was beautifully directed and I liked it much more than the other Martin Scorsese's movies that I have seen, I wrapped it up with Syriana again very thought proving with great acting by the lead star cast.
I also stumbled upon an album called Rakhi by Thierry "Titi" Robin and Gulabi Sapera. It's the marriage of sounds of the nomads from the desert state of Rajasthan called Kalbeliyas (the snake charmers) and the sound of the Gypsies. It is a really interesting sound and it is growing on me. It reminded me of a vacation I took to Rajasthan a few months ago and at the hotel there was a performance by a group of nomads. An old man was playing a local fiddle and singing along with his wife, his voice was rustic and mesmerizing to say the least. The next day there was a breathtaking performance by a group of gypsies with fire, dance and music et all.

Video credit: LaCoquelico

Breaking and Entering

It's strange how after writing about relationships and broken dreams in my last post I saw the movie "Breaking and Entering". It stars two of my favourite actors Jude Law and Juliette Binoche. The movie is directed by Anthony Minghella who also directed Cold Mountain and The English Patient. The movie was really nice one of those rare movies that makes you think and question. I am not as awfully sad as I was after watching Cold Mountain (which too I loved) but it just makes you ponder over things. I know I am not making much sense as of now so I'd stop here but would end on the note that the movie comes highly recommended.

Video credit: The Weinstein Company

Bollywood this Diwali

Deepawali- The festival of lights is the equivalent of Christmas for the Hindus. This is the time for celebration and shopping. Incidentally this is also the time that most big budget and anticipated movies for the year are released. This year Deepawali (Diwali) falls on the 9th of November and the 2 movies pitted against each other are : Om Shanti Om and Saawariya.
Below are the trailers for the two movies. Though Om Shanti Om has Sharukh Khan (the most famous Bollywood star) dancing around shirtless for the first time I have my money on Saawariya which stars the children of stars of yesteryears. The third trailer is for the movie "No Smoking" staring John Abraham.

Video Credits: Floracon, Rimal2

The pleaser

Is it normal to want a thing bad and then you finally have it to develop cold feet. I have felt this way very often. At times I feel that I am a pleaser. I have always want people to like me. Maybe it's got something to do with being ostracized as a child. I was in a boarding school and was the loner who never would play any games or get into fights. I had very few friends and if that wasn't enough there was the sexual abuse that I was subjected to. All these circumstances kept pushing me further into my shell and it took me a long time to wash away the conditioning of those dreadful years. As a result if anyone showed a little bit of interest in me and made me feel special I'd be on cloud nine. Invariably the acts weren't in good faith and there was always a ulterior motive behind people being nice.
I think I still haven't got out of that mindset. Though I am a little more cautious I don't take long to get into and then get out of a relationship. Even while I am in a relationship the compulsion of having other people to like me messes things up. I also feel that once I have someone and they like me I tend to not want them anymore and knowingly or unknowingly I'd do things that are detrimental to the relationship. There was a time when I had started to believe that I was a nymphomaniac and all I wanted from a relationship was sex. But ever since then I have been without sex for so long that I think otherwise now. But I do believe that a relationship cannot last long if the sex is bad or doesn't flow like it should.

While writing about all this stuff today I remembered these lines by Kahlil Gibran:

It is not enough to be virtuous
When nothing comes in your way,
Where from without and within
No voice of sin
Is luring your soul away;
But it is only a negative virtue
Until it is tried with fire
And the life that is worth
The honours of the Earth-
Is the one that resists desire!

In the past few days I have seen 2 very intersting movies. The first was The Namesake by Mira Nair (director of movies like Kama Sutra, Monsoon Wedding, Vanity Fair and the upcoming Shantaram starring Johnny Depp) and the second was My Fair Lady. Both very a pleasure to watch for completely different reasons. I love Audrey Hepburn and had wanted to see My fair lady for a long time.

Photo credit: Hokane

Working class hero

I saw this video today and thought it was a rather nice cover version of the John Lennon song by Green Day. The video is meaningful and interesting. I see this trend of music videos with a message nowadays. There was Hey you by Madonna, What I've done by Linkin Park, Proper Education by Eric Prydz, and now Working Class hero by Green Day.
The past week has been busy but I took out some time for watching some movies. On Sunday I saw The Host which had a very high rating on Rotten Tomatoes but I was thoroughly bored watching the movie. The other movies that I saw over the past week were The Deep End, Road to Perdition, Everything is Illuminated, Elizabethtown. All the movies were good but my feel good movie (which I was in dire need for) was Elizabethtown. Next on the agenda is Dersu Uzala.
I am trying to keep myself busy to stop thinking about the disappointments and disillusionments that I am surrounded by. At the same time rather than wallow in my misery I am going about trying to make things right but it seems like a uphill task. Hope the view from the top of the hill is something to write home about.


















Video credit: Warnerbrosrecords

Will you love me tomorrow?

In continuation with the last post I found a video of the movie 'The Notebook' featuring the song "Will you still love me tomorrow" by Amy Winehouse. I saw the movie on a day that I was very low and depressed and to beat my blues away I decided to watch some DVD's and ended up watching three very romantic movies which made me feel even worst. That is what happens to me everytime I watch a good romantic movie. It make me miss the presence of that special someone in my life. Nevertheless the movies come highly recommended, preferably to be enjoyed cuddled in the arms of someone you love. The movies I watched were:

The Notebook

Message in a Bottle

Veer Zaara

Video Credits: QueenEowyn28, Vitormrpinto, NoMorning

Good cinema

                                                         

There are so many movies that I want to see but can't because they aren't available where I live. Yesterday and day before I saw two I had been meaning to watch for a long time- Ned Kelly and The Constant Gardener. Both were thought provoking. The Constant Gardener was beautifully directed with some great performances. I know most of you must have seen the movie but this who haven't it comes highly recommended. I have heard the song 'Kothbiro' by Ayub Ogada before but to see it juxtaposed on the imagery of Africa especially Lake Turkana was moving to say the least. It really is a strange world where the lives of the people who are marginalised seems to mean less than their counterparts in developed countries. Clinical trials of test drugs had been a hot topic of debate in Indian media some time ago but then it  fizzed out. The overpricing of drugs and unjust patent laws that make life saving drugs like those for fighting diseases like AIDS beyond the reach of the people who need it the most is just insane. But I don't want to sound like a preacher. I will end the post with a quotation by John Le Carre (the author of the novel on which the movie is based) which forms a part of the end credits of the movie

"Nobody in this story, and no outfit or corporations, thank God, is based upon an actual person or outfit in the real world. But I can tell you this as my journey through the pharmaceutical jungle progressed, I came to realise that, by comparison with the reality, my story was as tame as a holiday postcard." 

WOW list- Male Hollywood Actors

After all the posts about spirituality and religion I thought of breaking the flow of thought. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. So just to spice things up a little I thought of starting my WOW list. The first list is made up of Hollywood male actors that I think are devastatingly handsome. I am too lazy to hunt for pictures and some of these may not be the best quality. I will continue the WOW list and it may vary from Divas to Cars from Watches to Gadgets,Holiday destinations, Hotels to Fashion and I don't even know what else. But they would be people or things I like. Here is the first instalment.

     

Patrick Dempsey Rupert Everett

    

Johnny Depp Hugh Jackman

    

Jude Law Josh Lucas

    

Jared Leto Paul Simon

    

Robert Downey Jr. Ralph Fiennes

Rupert Graves