Delhi Belly - Dotted as anything

1. It’s an evolution in bollywood that has constantly been building up movie after movie. The evolution is about “rejecting the dialogues” and catching up the lines that we speak in real life, But do we speak what Delhi Belly guys do ??. Does anyone disagree? Delhi belly uses expletives in canter, such is the abundance that every second sentence deals with an F word, and even F words are used in different tones, conjugated with different other abusive words to show different emotions. You see, “a fucking chut” is a way of calling a room mate, “fucking rent” is way of expressing rage, “a naked woman lying on a naked man, is called fucking” is a way of taking potshots at friend’s silly queries.

2. There’s this “Hindi going of the boil” and “English coming to fore”, and then its “Hindi back into the thick of things”, brings me to another evolution in current bollywood, which you could label as a brand new garment of new Amir Khan Production mill. Since “Dhobi Ghat” we could see how these two languages are used as if someone is taking trial of Kurta and T-shirts and not at all happy in either way. You see, three roommates talking in English to each other as they come from different parts of India, their Times of India Pal Maneka speaks in English generally but in Hindi with the Hotel maid, the local goons in all mixed up mode, the down-the-ladder-in society Jain family prefers in Hindi, but inspires their child to speak English, though has enough knowledge to pick the fault in a construction of an English sentence, and shows an article is missing.

3. As the title of the movie and the popular tag “s#!t happens” suggest, the movie has a lot of shit and toilet comedy. The obsession to the private areas of the body is so strong that it comes too frequently. Unhygienic Tandoori chicken seller scratches his private, the person who buys it develops a loose motion and washes his ass with Orange juice, the land lord reads blackmail letter sitting on commode, gangster is threatened with a fire cracker in his butt, the police is shot in his butt. Then there are lot of fluids going around- Loose motion, Orange juice, Crows shit, Green chutney. And lot of sounds to back it off – Bullets, Farts, cracked up roofs, and the foot tapping Bharat Natyam [Oops Katthak]. Even the Sky does not let the chance to go off the hands. He pees on Aroop [Vir das] on his break up. Another frequent framing I forgot to mention. The tangled up electric wires over the poles.

4. The sound guys who devised the variety of fart noises – a Bow down from me with no wrong intentions.

5. Speaking of the shit, just go back few years and remember the great “Pushpak” again. Forget slangs, keep in the mind they did not even need any dialogues, to keep it edged in your memory till date and still so much happened over a packed shit.

6. It’s all what you see, is what you get kind of movie. The knocking down of rear view mirror of the car has got nothing to do “no looking back”. Or you could say, if you do think so.

7. The crossing of the t’s and the dotting of the i’s, is so prominent in Delhi belly. Every little detailing of the previous cut is kept in mind. See Maneka says she is lesbian, so she smooches when the partner is in Burqas, the land lord gets the roll of the films, because we were shown that the photographer prefers films over digital. The banana that irks Vir Das so much is actually split over by Shehnaz over the plate. Then Imran getting the idea of Burqas, from a sting of a Burqa clad women passing them.

8. It’s tough to pick a wrong foot in between a laugh riot. Parents meeting girlfriends parents and Vir das boss asking the Banana to be seven percent sad are few scenes that don’t go well. But then there are dialogues which bring you back to what Delhi belly is. “When a donkey f**ks a Rickshaw you get a santro Xing “[SRK not happy?? Oh he is into i10 these days], “Did they shave your head before hangings” are some of that collection. [Nitin Recollecting the “Mill on the floss” reference in the Car, to refer a tonsured head makes it all the more funnier]

9. Vijay Raaz- a Genius. Remember the scene, where he sees shit instead of diamond over his well placed, clean red piece. No angst, No outburst of rage, No Disgust- just a face of a philosopher. He is so experienced in this goon business that nothing bothers him, totally unfazed even in the shittiest situation. Imran is a disaster. Maneka speaks your heart out, when she asks Tashi, “You should loosen up”. The role of Kunaal is the best of lot, just the way he shows how much he gets annoyed when the stomach aches again.

10. Can some one give me one “cha se Chinese noodle” T shirt? Or did they console "chutiya" ?

11. It’s a first try of a bold Adam Sandler-ish comedy in bollywood. But is this what Youth is today in India? The point I want to make is that this brand will take you to no where, which a “Wake up Sid” or “Dil Chahta hai” or “Yuva” could do.

Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam : A Salam !

These days when I read those forwarded mails subjected as “50 reasons not to marry a Bengali girl”, I do a chuckle and feel pity for the lack of imagination of post 60’s bollywood that has mainly been the reason of curving the niche of Bengali men as anything but henpecked. But the thing is, that’s not been the case over the years. When I started watching all those Hindi movies that showcased Bengali lifestyle in celluloid, I not only experienced some avant grade directorial brilliance but also discovered some striking research work of “Babu culture and its machismo”, that had gone in to produce those films. One of those films should be “Shahib Biwi aur Gulaam” directed by Abrar Ali, produced by the legend Guru Dutt [Many feels the movie is actually Ghost directed by Guru Dutt only].

Like most of the Guru Dutt movies SBAG too is a chiaroscuro meditation on time, memory, and social and personal injustice, all falling on the same string of classical tradition of Pyaasa and Kagaz ke phool. But there’s an exception here. For a change SBAG pivots around a female character played by Meena Kumari as Chhoti Bahu. Chhoti Bahu’s character is somewhat ambiguous. The shade of the character is sketched so neatly that you could take both sides of the coin. She is perceived differently in the film too. While the voluptuous sister in law of her thinks she is foolish woman who has not learned to enjoy her new status and wealth; her husband [Chhote Babu] thinks, as she is born and brought in a poor Bengali family, all she needs to do is to care for him and regard him as god. While Bhoothnath, the character played by Guru Dutt sees her as an ethereal being who is beyond any imagination or comparison.

Well, SBAG holds a large array of feminine nature across its span. While the Badi Bahu is half mad and deranged so much in her moral sense that she washes her hand 63 times to be auspicious, Majli Bahu has succumbed to the hands of brothel-prone masculinity of this chowdhury family, that teaches her to be happy in breaking and recreating jewelries.
Chhoti Bahu rejects to be typecast. She is ready to cross any mile to get her husband back in home. She is ready to try her hands in “Mohini sindoor”, a vermillion that claims to keep the “suhaag” in tact; and when that attempt falls apart she is even ready to sing and drink wine with her husband like a courtesan does. Going farther down the line of jeopardy, we see a character played by Waheeda Rehman as Jabba, who is young, likes Bhoothnath from the word go and flirts openly with him continuously. Her words and action both show extreme freedom throughout the movie. She will not take the fact that her father has fixed her marriage with a guy whom she does not love, so she squelches the marriage after her father’s death. A striking maturity of Jabba is exposed by this denial as she was shown as an adoring daughter, but she knows her mind well.

Cut back to the narrative of male dominance we see the commentary on Bengal's decaying feudalism. Its presiding males, two Chowdhury brothers who occupy themselves with such traditional aristocratic pursuits as pigeon-keeping, elaborate “marriages” of pet cats, and drunken nights in high-class brothels, regularly abuse their tenants, servants, and wives. On the other hand, Mr.Suvinay, the owner of “Mohini Sindur” factory is the face of Bengal’s rising “Brahmo-samaj” [which was influenced by Protestant ideology and which sought to “purify” Hinduism of “superstition,” “idolatry,” and customs such as sati or widow immolation]. Suvinay’s house is designed with its upright piano, lace curtains, and mythical figurines in European porcelain, shows the conceivable encapsulation of bourgeois Brahmo syncretism. Then there’s a character of a lunatic Timekeeper in Zamindar’s house who thinks all these aristocracy of the Haveli will end one day. Probably a poetic justice of the fact, that he knows it all and world thinks he is insane.

The whole plot is unfold by Bhoothnath and Servant Bansi, who chronicle the history of the family and witness the ravages of time and changes that took place in haveli

Like all other Guru Dutt movies too, the cinematography and work of light and darkness is to be seen in SBAG too. Even some subplots of the story are so deep that it leaves you spellbound. Though Guru Dutt and Waheeda Rehman were in full throttle of affair in their personal life, the movie repeatedly and significantly defers their union to unfold other more important parts of the movie. The song “Meri baat rahi mere man men — “My unspoken words lie sealed in my heart” on the lips of Jabba tells thousand words of her helplessness as impeccable pictirization repeatedly plays a game of daylight and darkness on Jabba’s face. Even the brothel song Saqiyaa, aaj mujhe nind nahin aaegi — “Friend, tonight I shall not sleep” is brilliantly choreographed and consoled with verbatim expressions. You just got to see how its picturized; as the patron moves from the ceiling the shadows of the co dancers move, yet they all are in perpetual darkness; a striking portrayal of concealed and revealed feminity.

I will not ponder too much on “Na Jaon saiyan” as the world knows all about the masterpiece number, but surely about “Piya aise Jiya me”. You Just got to see Meena Kumari’s acting prowess in the number. Just by her facial expressions and tricks of eyes she portrays the female desire so amazingly.

Then there is a scene where the Majli Babu is shown sitting in the room alone and a triangular shade of light falls on him and rest of the room is darkened. It is again a sharp [triangular] visual that denotes the fast decaying aristocracy; which is soon on the verge of finish.

In a short span of time, the movie shows so many facets of life, that it deserves multiple viewing to grab all. I would regard SBAG as a Hindi substitute of Mr.Ray’s epic work in “Jalsaghar” and recommend all to see this classic if they haven’t seen it yet. Its a movie that Rocked me BIG TIME !!

Taxi driver : A loner's view on Urban culture

“I don't mind this empty room, and I like it when I'm alone,
I'm trying not to think about you, I'm
Not waiting by the telephone,
I'm watching a late-night movie, where the lovers say goodbye,
And it's really getting to me, and tears are in my eyes,
But I'm not crying, I'm not crying,
I'm not crying over you, I'm over you;” – I am not crying over you by Chris de Burgh


“Ei ekla Ghor amar desh, amar ekla thakar Obbhesh
Vabi Kichutei vabbona tomar kotha
Boba Telephone er pashe boshe
Tobu Gobhir Raat er Ogovir cinema e
Jodi Prem chay natuke Biday
Ami achhonno hoye porechi abar
Dekhi chokh bhije jay kannay” - Ekla Ghor by Fossils

The reason I have started this article with these two different songs coming from two different ends of earth with absolute identical meanings, is because I believe loneliness is an universal term and Martin Scorsese’s Taxi driver is only made to project what loneliness does to a human being than to expose alienation in urban society of New York City or anything else, as it comes directly from the screen play. I have never been to New York City, and I am hardly accustomed to what a Yankee does to live his/her life. But like me any one could connect to this master piece across the glob, is because there are no different types to loneliness. But with friendliness, yes, it comes in all shapes and sizes. As different sex you indulge more, you could impure it with love, which can drive you to a kiss, and a kiss could drive you to bed. Or on the other way around you don’t indulge more, keep it simple, meet twice or thrice a week, check with each other about, how life is going on , if possible play in grounds together, chat if both comes online simultaneously; you still may refer yourselves as friends. But at the end of the day, no one knows what exactly a friendship is. The bottom line is friendship comes as disease to extrovert nature, while an introvert believes, either he is too naive to meet with others, or he is too superior to loose his piousness,time and value with jerks all around.

It explores the psychological madness within an obsessed, twisted, inarticulate, lonely, anti-hero cab driver and a Vietnam War Veteran (De Niro as Travis), who misdirectedly lashes out with frustrated anger and power like an exploding time bomb at the world that has alienated him. To prove my point about an introvert, here comes the tagline of the movie as Martin say’s “On every street in every city, there's a nobody who dreams of being a somebody.”

Well, loneliness is something like water. Its pure, its tasteless, its life and beyond everything you put it in any bowl, it will take the bowls size. Loneliness gives you satisfaction that you are different and no one is like you, you can also grief and repent on it as everyone has someone to look for, I have none!! You can add value to loneliness at whatever way you can, negative or positive, which friendship can never pull off. That’s what Travis is. He is an insomniac; he does not know what to do at night, so he drives a taxi, roams around the city. He goes to see porn movies at night, and that’s the only type of movie he knows. Interestingly chir de burgh’s song some how speaks the same shade of loneliness. About his loneliness, Travis ponders “Loneliness has followed me my whole life. Everywhere. In bars, in cars, sidewalks, stores, everywhere. There's no escape. I'm God's lonely man”

Travis has a very definite mindset to what’s right and what’s wrong. He does not follow daily news, but he takes no back gear to shoot his answer to the next probable minister Senator Charles Palantine; and I quote “Whatever it is, you should clean up this city here, because this city here is like an open sewer you know. It's full of filth and scum. And sometimes I can hardly take it. Whatever-whoever becomes the President should just [Travis honks the horn] really clean it up. You know what I mean? Sometimes I go out and I smell it, I get headaches it's so bad, you know...They just never go away you know...It's like...I think that the President should just clean up this whole mess here. You should just flush it right down the fuckin' toilet.”

There’s two or three ways of looking into this movie. One, the definite decay of urban culture across New York. Two, what a fun loving guy does at night, which is of course the majority or three, seeing this society through the eyes of Travis a loner.

Being an extrovert you may question, why I should see through his eyes. Sometimes it sparks from Travis’s comments that he is jealous about people meeting up, having sex. Travis can work on Jewish holidays but that does not mean that every one should be like that. He can not even cope with actors making love on television, he breaks it. In every scene, it comes out that loneliness brings you to that level of fidelity, that your thought process becomes darker; you feel the whole living around you is sheet.

People say and it is widely believed that Love brings the rebel out of you. Taxi Driver shows the real side of Love, when love rubbles you. A break off is a more productive industry or factory than Love is. A break off makes you more attacking, more rebellious than ever you were. You feel like what ever you could have, is no more with you, and no more will ever be. So the game sums up like you have nothing to loose. You just don’t care. Same happens with Travis too. Travis felt there’s some kind of resonance between him and the blond beauty Betsy, who works in Palantine’s vote campaign. He meets her in a coffee shop and expresses his feelings about her. Betsy says that she feels, Travis is like Kris Kristofferson's song “Pilgrim chapter 33” where the lyric goes something like this "he's a prophet and a pusher, partly truth, partly fiction. A walking contradiction". So loyal he is, Travis readily rejects the compliment and says pusher part was not for him. On the contrary few minutes ago he had cracked a joke to Betsy that he needs to be more ORGAN-EZIEZD. He believes Betsy and his thinking is of same lines, because according to him Betsy is also a loner and looking for some fun, which he could only belt out. Not that he wants to sleep, but he takes her to a porn movie. Betsy comes out of the theater and regrets Travis after that.

Love was never pink for Travis. It always came in whites and red in dark of late night New York, as he writes on his diary “Each night when I return the cab to the garage, I have to clean the cum off the back seat. Some nights, I clean off the blood.” He has seen a frustrated husband as his customer, who sits in his taxi only to see his wife making love with another guy’s apartment and like a hopeless expresses his anger to him by saying, he wants to shoot his wife by a magnum .44 gun. He feels he is not the only loner in the city.

He sees whores, skunk pussies, buggers, queens, fairies, dopers, junkies, sick, venal all come out night animals and he prays that one day rain will come and remove all these dirt away from the city. Betsy’s going away, was a turn around. Travis lost his faith and hope on Rain.

Its enough to be sitting around and seeing all these happen around you. Now its time to do something. Its time to get every muscle to be perfect, its time to be the strongest. He chooses to save beautiful little Iris from her promiscuous career and the pimp named Sport. To see what he does next and what happens to him, you got to see the movie.

Taxi Driver is schizophrenic, and it’s too dark and uncomfortable at times. But that's all you see in everyday's newspaper, you can never hide that truth.Take the lid out of the manhole, the dirt flows beneath. The Manhattans and the sky scrapers give a different story though of urban triumph. Having said that, it’s the story of an extrovert majority. When an Introvert loner pulls the lid off the face of the whole, his words no more sound “Square”, it’s a “Hole”. Take what ever way you want, Martin Scorsese has given the Loners view, how weird it may be.

Pune the way it is

When you shift your base from one city to another, the inherent tendency that comes out stronger first in most average human being [Like I am] is comparing between the past and present. After my long stay at Kolkata, as I had no other option, I had to move my ass to Pune, in search of some bucks. Frankly speaking when I got the offer letter from my college, neither I was too much excited of my migration, nor was I repenting like an average Bengali, because I had to leave my hometown.

Coming to Pune, the first thing that hit me is how it rains here. It has a very slow, sluggish pace, and it’s hardly cats and dogs here. The one adjective that you can never put ahead of a Pune rain is torrential. The color of sky, when it’s gloomy here, is extremely toxic. As if it has a platonic relationship with “Old Monk”; and the cheap, hard hitting, Rustic rum is only made to sleep with Pune when it rains here, asking you to “Gheun taak” three pegs and memorize those cunning lines of Emran Hashmi in Gangster; ”Barsaat ki Mahine mein Naag Naagin ke bina Nahi reh sakta…” . I am glad to have a room mate like Guha [Subhadip], who had the capacity to grab the shuttle change of nature and respond to it; and I always obliged. Load shedding is the best scenario, and even it was not there, we used to put off lights, dragged the bed near the large window, and sat with glass of Old Monk in our hands. Guha used to play best of his Rabindra sangeet’s collection one after one, and Pune’s rain just absorbed them in its every drop of water. As each rain drop trickled on the greenery, in shame of molestation the new grown leaves got greener, our conversation rocketed to childhood days. Frantic “KalBoishakhi”, like a “Cradle of filth” song, was already embedded in our memory; through Pune’s rain we knew what a “John Denver” number is. Truly, the creator of Byomkesh Bakshi had to live here. Truly, Pune deserves to be the backdrop of Anurag kashyap’s first movie “paanch”. Truly, the greater Maharashtra holds her head high in every scene of Vishal Bhardwaj’s “Kaminey”

In Most cases Bengali’s do have a tendency, to go in to deep of things; dig up angles even if it does not exist. What should be named as the derivative of “Rock-Thek-adda” of Kolkata, in most cases by mistake called as product of “Culture”. Dragging of the ear as pride in Culture, finds its head in Education and after coming to Pune, a Kolkatan quite astonishingly sees that there’s more college in a street of Pune, than it is there in whole Kolkata!!

More Colleges; more Students; more Outsiders and of course more outsider girls. Pune Girls are basically a perfect balance between a usual Delhi girl, who could really take a dig at you masculine confidence on going fetish in lingo you speak and a Mumbai girl, who has got the most perfect dressing sense. Girls here are deceptive. I guess, the fast dying species called typical “Marathi Mulgi” is still living its last breath in Pune. Don’t go by their simple salwars and an average priced bag hung up on the bag. Your usual cajoling “hi hallo” can take an all time down, if they start to shoot. Girls do fast here religiously, and I think it’s a conscious divine effort to touch Kareena Kapoor. I am saying this because; couple of thin Rotis and proportionate sabji and a glass of juice would be more than enough in lunch for them. Most of the girls don’t bother touching their money bags for food in weekends, because boys religiously take onus to do so.

Yes, probably in Pune the Girl-Boy ratio is the best. Almost every boy has one girl, and I have not heard or seen any clashes between two guys for a girl here. Even it is there, it is no where near compared to Kolkata. I stayed a long time near a Girl’s college in pune and the place is called Karve Nagar, named after the famous woman educationist of India, Maharshi Karve. I named it as “Curve-e-Nagar”. The place is full of girls’ hostels, and boy-girl ratio of that zone is astonishingly low on boys favor. On weekends you just got to be near the “Chauk” of that place, Its literally a “Penalty Corner” zone, where a string of hunks are waiting with Bikes to woo or get hold of girl and from three different roads torrent of girls in all shapes and sizes, wearing as less as they can afford, are flooding in, only to follow the last root to shoot off for a night out with a guy.

By the way, Bike is the most important pre-requisite to woo a girl here. It’s easier to hit a six than a boundary in Chinnaswami stadium in Bangalore and similarly it’s easier to get a girl in pune with Bike than with a car. A four wheeler man might be devoid of a girl friend here, but an enthusiastic bike man will never be.

0.3% of India’s GDP is contributed by the scarf of the girls in Pune. Yes it’s the second best industry after IT in Pune. Girls put on scarf’s of seven different colors on different days of a week ranging from baby pink to shocking blue, and you can never get hold of the fact that, is this the girl whom I had seen with this boy yesterday and now I am seeing some one different riding the bike today. Probably I could If was an Afghani.

Ok, to close the girl’s chapter, one last gyan. That is: For each city girl, the meaning of the phrase “fun” is different. “Do you wanna have fun” could mean nice couples pass in INOX for a Kolkata girl; same could be an brave Idli Dosa lunch on “Banana leaves” in Chennai. Be very careful, before you say the same here in Pune. If the listener obliges, “Beta teri toh Raat ban gayi”, but if she does not, get ready to touch you chick.

You just got to booze in Pune. Pune is made for Boozing and Boozing whole night. For proof, here, van of spared Bottle buyers carry more beer bottles than of any other type. Discover each and every Bar, make Bhai Bhai relationship with every waiter out there, or even you can go alone and get in to a nice conversation and exchange contacts with loner like you sitting on the opposite chair. The ideal situation could be to get on to the roof of an 8-9 storied flat at night, Booze whole night and see the beauty of this City as the gentle cool breeze caresses through the city at night and titillates the “Nasha”. You don’t need to be a Devdas to booze in Pune, though you have every chance of getting converted to a prototype, if you are the statue of fidelity here. And Guess what, people launch firecrackers here at night without any reason!! It adds to your entertainment without any VAT; you can enjoy your booze like a King.

Autowalas in Pune knows how to make fun. I doubt whether they got pissed off in Chambal and came all the way to Pune and but could not get rid of the inherent dacoit attribute. They simply negate all basic knowledge of mathematics and ready to challenge you on any multiplication even if you carry more than 80% is 10+2 math’s. But one thing I have seen common between the Taxi drivers near DumDum airport in Kolkata and Auto drivers here. Taxi drivers near airport in Kolkata will simply bash Subhash Chakraborty for introducing Special Buses, as it affects their business, same goes for auto drivers also here as they can’t withstand Girls roaming around Bikes after falling into a relationship and completely forgetting them. By any chance if you see a Girl getting into an argie bargie with an autowala here, you will find that the girl has to pay every word of her. Autowala’s have both sides to them. They are as abusive as one can get in anger and as polite and friendly when you are eager to communicate with them. Once an auto driver said he has an Orkut account with a DP of him standing beside his auto. H also said and all of his girls and boys are working in IT only,
If girls are scratched out straight from the pages of “Vogue” here, then Autowalas must be from PC games. They take pride in over taking Cars on over bridges and breaking dividers and lanes, whenever they get a chance to do so. Being an autowala here, If you don’t over take any vehicle after 3 minutes of kicking off, you are a Dud, and you should be thrown out of Pune autowala union.

If one thing I do hate about Maharashtra, is it Bus service. It sucks big time. PMT Buses are “Baaper sompotti” [Father’s treasure] for them in raw Bengali. I don’t know what would happen to these Bus conductors in Pune, if they are shifted to Kolkata. They won’t last for more than one week I guess. The behavior is extremely rude and in most cases they just hate to speak in any other language other than Marathi. I just cant take the fact in Mani Ratnam’s “Sathiya” that Vivek Oberoi and Rani Mukherjee rides a PMT bus after getting married in the movie, last thing I would do in my life after marriage.

Even if Pune had thousands of more attributes like this which could have oozed hatred, I won’t bother, because of my darling. That’s Pune’s weather. Uff, Pune’s weather is Madhubala's eyes, Kylie minogue’s buttocks, Rekha’s hair, Madhuri Dixit’s smile, Merlyn Monroe’s boobs, Angelina jolie’s lips and Sharon stone’s legs and Maria Sharapova’s moaning. You just can’t ignore and stay stubborn not to fall in love with it. Love of weather, brings love in the air. Loves in the air, brings hang outs where you can have fun. Pune has plenty to it.

No, Pune’s love is not like those marathon walks of Kolkata, where couples walk for ages holding each others hands as if they are participating in a procession only to end up underneath the streetlight pole whose blub is broken and end up in strictly followed romance or quarrels like “ami ekhon biye korte parchina” or “tumi ekta kichu koro, na holey amake chharo”. Here its rash driving, Girls bighting the ear out of BF, if not in scarf’s, or stretching the hands on loin of BF, which could be ended as “I love you too” on next day’s early morning near the gate of girls place. Here hardly any one bothers a break up, have fun as long as you are buying from my store. That’s it !!

I still remember my first day in this city, when standing on Deccan Bridge, I said in front my three room mates in the midst of dipping twilight that I would go back to Kolkata after 3 months. The reply that I got from Rakesh on that day still pokes me. He said you can’t; Pune will get in to you. Pune has got into every nerve of mine and under my skin. Probably I have experienced the most colorful and ever changing phase of my life, where I have seen tremendous up and downs in every aspect of life. I have understood where I stand nationally, or later internationally. I have experienced new attributes of mine, broken new windows which perhaps I could never do in Kolkata. One thing I can proudly say, that Pune was there beside me in every situation, which Kolkata could never pull off, in fact it bullied.

Dhobi Ghat : A Slammer

The subsequent tapping of fingers on the frets, floating from Majors to Minors, sets up the mood and suddenly santoor jams in. You could feel the inflation of words is unbuttoning her device, to give away her flesh and rage of hormone to the ever masculine build up of acoustics. And then suddenly the lunatic guitarist strums the six of them all. Mood breaks, all that you had guessed about the proceeding gets crushed, and cuts to a scene where you see your expectations, arrogance, self-pride and your Hippocratic sensualities are not matching the reel. You sense there was enough dirt in the sleeves wrapping up your kinky and suspect-prone heart. Dhobi Ghat has just slammed that on the concrete. Yes Dhobi Ghat is more of an uninterrupted documentary course of your own introspection, than a regular movie.

Mumbai, the city that proudly says the stroke of 10 P.M as the occurrence of its evening, has been a canvas of many film makers over the years. The economic capital has so much to it, that each time you discover something new about this place. A city, where a Dhobi (Munna-Prateik) in daylight could be a rat killer at night, a married female outsider (Yasmin- Kriti-Malhotra) who once came here to build a sweet married life like any one, but ends up being cheated and loosing hope in her life ultimately suicides. Contiguously an old lady who perhaps got the shock of her life, still resisted it and persisted to stay mum and moot to everything , reluctant to respond to any thing, whatever engaging that may be or a divorced man(Arun-Aamir) who changes his place here and there, cries with in himself, lives like an open book, urges water from the raindrops to make a peg of whisky in solitude, or an Newyork based investment banker(Shai-Monica Dogra) who may be named as shai, but ironically least shy among every one around her. Irony does not stop here, as Munna the “door to door” washed clothe servant wears a T-shirt portraying the English rock band “The doors”, and seeing that shai says him “so you like doors”


Dhobi Ghat is an introspection of a person, who lives a big city life. A big city demands a lot from you, can also return a lot too, or may take away everything from you that you extracted from here. Given you don’t change with the city like a Yasmin. Here bulk could mean nothing valuable or little could mean huge. Munna safely keeps all his income inside cassette place holder and drags his softest door cover before going to sleep. Just to differ, Kiran Rao shows that in between all the gigantic Ganesh idols, the smallest of them all, is not fated to immersion. Every time you guess something, about a certain scene recollecting from your other movie experience or from your personal experience, on the contrary it wraps up to something different. Kiran as a director continuously humiliates the experience of a pro-movie audience.

Take for an example, in that scene when Munna changes his clothes in his cagey room after taking the shower near railway tracks. He drags his short up and you feel like camera is going naughty here, but no. You end up seeing a blue inner already inside!

Then, the daughter of that servant who used to work in Yasmin’s house, denies displaying her English speaking skill, though she had said a while ago that she studies in an English medium school. As an educated audience you laugh on her, guessing the little black fat child’s inability in speaking English. And, then suddenly she smartly a belts out a chunk of Alfred lord Tennyson’s famous poem “The Brook”. At the very end of the movie, you feel like Munna is about to propose his love to shai when he runs past a heavy traffic road of Mumbai, and he does the exact opposite. Like a responsible lad who keeps his word by bringing back the original color of the customers clothing even if he had done the damage, gives away Arun’s new address to shai, thinking they are best fit for each other. You could feel a Dhobi like Munna, is stronger in his heart than you, and has a more advanced knowledge about reality of future.

literally every scene is connected to each other. for example, Arun making a peg of whiskey from rain water is compared with Munna's struggle to store the raindrops in a bowl, trickling down from the roof top of his house.

Arun, the lonely painter, could feel the loneliness of Yasmin, he cries for her ill fated life. A divorced man who says Mumbai is his muse, his wh*re too, suddenly finds a muse in Yasmin. Shai on the other hand, is keener on having Arun again on bed. Like a voyeur she fixes her camera on Arun’s doing, though Munna takes the other side of coin from shai. Munna builds up love for shai, but does not quite gather enough guts to say the three word sentence. Murder of his brother Salim in gang fight brings Munna back on ground of reality. He runs away from Shai’s company. Though Shai ultimately catches Munna, and hugs him to bid adieu.

Is shai still just a friend to Munna? Well you think so. But as Munna leaves shai, giving that piece of paper where Arun’s address is written, Shai breaks in tears.

A story which started with concentrating different molecule of characters in one single unit suddenly starts to break away in pieces. Dhobi Ghat is boring if you expect spice out of it, as it does not hurry up showing anything out of false reality. It’s what you get in real, but you don’t like to see it, are shown in reel. Dhobi Ghat lashed a bad stroke on each of them. I don’t know if I am getting too much excited and letting Mr. Ray down, but after watching DG I felt some one form India has scratched on his work, if not touched it.

Ka Ka ka Ka ...KKR

Every thing that happens in and out of KKR has a tinge of filmy touch to it. Call it the auction or the Cheer leader walk in :) or for that matter the notorious blog that stirred the cricket fanatics couple of years ago like nothing; KKR gives a tough comepetion to the likes of Parris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan each year in terms of controversies. And why not? If your frontline co-owner is the Badshah of bollytown and the skipper carries a ‘who the heck cares’ attitude on his shirts all the time, then you are bound to have symptoms like that. Filminess is not leaving KKR on the 4th version of IPL also, I doubt whether it has any chance of leaving.

Sourav is a peculiar kind of name, which has adhesiveness to it. I think Fevicol should brand Ganguly for their product. This man plays or does not play, speaks or decides to stay mum and moot; he will make his space on Page 10, 1 and sometimes on Page 3.

KKR kicked his butt this time around, so drama was on the cards, and it happened. Though Ganguly has officially spoken just one sentence in media, like ‘I am shocked’, but newspapers are not leaving him, neither Mr. Shahrukh Khan. To resurrect the outcome, SRK suddenly found a new brother in Ganguly. Ironically he has no idea what a Bengali phrase ‘Bhai hoyeche’ means. Is SRK getting sarcastically extravagant or was he taking a stringent course on Bengali urban dictionary to learn slangs or was there any high voltage “Locha” of Mr.Chandi Ganguly in the past years that we don’t know, are another string of questions, but the main Query lies in this one- ‘What is the source of this extreme energy of KKR, which encourages them to create such a havock in media all the time, but goes missing on the field?” And what would happen to this anti-SRK group (like me) when KKR starts to win like Mumbai did last year, but ultimately looses in Final. Who knows about the game played behind the game?

BCCI struggled a lot through the Modi exclusion process; they don’t want any more controversies around IPL this time I guess. If they can remove cheer leaders(i cen bet many go to ground to see these call girl turned dancers, but not cricket) and post match gala parties from the menu, then what so fuss in excluding an ageing cricketer?. They know, it’s a big fish to take out of the pond, but it also makes sure, that he will not eat up the smaller ones, at least when fish harvesting will start.

SRK is more like the character of Jahar Ray in the Bengali movie “Dhanni Meye”. Remember those dialogues “Graam er Baire shield ami Jete debona, Bole chilam na”. Other co-owners are like those pros sitting on both sides of Jahar Ray, who does not have any say or no one cares what they say. SRK is lunatic in terms of competition. He does not want to loose. It’s not in his blood. Remember how he gave his all for an Oscar entry after Aamir made it through ‘Lagan’. These three years must be very painful for him, loosing against his female counter parts who made debuts with him. That's humiliation for a character of his stature, he must be eating his nails, crecesndos must be longer and deeper on his face. Actually SRK is hardly beautiful, beauty lies on his contours of face, the carves and dips he creates on his face while talking. The super chain smoker, wanted to clear the picture in front of his eyes this time, it was getting hazy day by day. Let it be on 4th, if not in 1st, 2nd and 3rd.! But the mistake he made was he had never cared for the cushion. If he were seen declaring officially that KKR is not taking Ganguly this time, it would have surely worked like a shock absorber for many. He didn’t. Backlash was there to be taking, and he has to eat his doings now.

Ganguly on the other hand is like Neeta (Supriya) of Ritwick Ghatak’s masterpiece ‘Meghe Dhaka tara’. Finding his daughter suffering in tuberculosis, Neeta’s father asks Neeta to leave the house and says “Tui Choilla Jah Maa, Jaago Jonne tui eto Kichu korli sara Jibon, Jago Nijer paay e Dar korai li, aaj Tarai tore Koruna kore, Tui Choilla Jaa’. Sounds tragic, but only for those who see it on celluloid. There are people in this world, who does not mind getting regretted, because that’s pretty common to their living. They have seen and faced it all. I think Ganguly has seen it all too. I don’t think he is too perturbed about all that’s happening around his name. He knows no matter how many come backs he has made in his life in the past, he can’t repeat it any more. He knows the full stop has arrived in his cricketing career, so better to leave the place that he once built by his hands

Last character must be Indian public. World cup could be a spoiler for IPL. IPL4 is in a win win situation; I must say. If India looses will Indian public have enough patience to see another big tournament again? Questionable. I don’t know what would happen to the excitement of all those who are desperate(including me) to make a point against KKR and ban IPL, then :)

Digging Through the riddle of "Shasti" !!

Since my childhood days I have always loved making two two’s a four; and this attribute of joining pieces together to make a complete picture came to me just because of my extensive reading of detective stories. A good example could be Ranga pishima (Played by Rakhi Gulzar) in Rituporno Ghosh’s murder mystery flick “Subha Mahurat”, where she solves an entire murder case all by her honed skill that she gained by reading detective stories in lazy afternoons.

I love reading fossils songs more than singing them as I am not a good singer. I found most of the songs written by Rupam for his band “fossils”, as one case study for me, and as soon as I hear them, I pounce on them to solve the puzzle behind it. Whatever I have listened of Fossils in these years, one thing that I have always felt is this - Rupam always consoles something behind his words, which demands tremendous attention from the listener.

Till date the song that troubled me most is “Shasti”. a song from Fossils’ second album “Fossils2”.

On the first go you feel like the author demands punishments for many culprits in the song, and he clarifies their sin one by one. But it’s so tricky to understand, actually who those culprits are?

I will go one by one. The first two sentences are the biggest and toughest riddles to pass.

“Tar Bikkhipto Baje Bakwas majhe majhe Jazz hoye jaay// Utkhipto Kono Upogroher Fere prem hoye fer radha ke Kaday”

The person who is referred in this sentence is Maqsood Haque, more popular by the name of Mac. Mac was the quintessential and talismanic front man of the Bangladesh based band “Dhaka”. In 1999 Mac’s album “RobindroNath – 2010” created a political pandemonium in Bangladesh. Political leaders accused Mac for intentionally tampering Tagore’s song, and gave it a name of “regret to the world famous poet” as the album contained a Tagore’s song “Na Chahile Jare pawa jaay” in the form of Jazz.

In a show telecasted in “BTV”, Mac sung the song “Na Chahile Jare pawa jaay”, and after that BTV banned Mac. The issue even went far to knock the doors of BBC too.





After a few days Mac was taken in to the police custody. The allegation against Mac was that he had beaten his wife Niboo Haque badly. His wife herself strongly protested against the allegation, but no one listened. Mac was tortured and beaten badly in Police custody for days.





Rupam has always told the world about how Mac inspired him as a figure to look up to.
So there’s obviously a bridge that we can draw between Mac and Rupam. I believe its also written somewhere in ROTR, a book written by Rupam himself.


Now we can get hold of the “Jazz” part here, but the question arises from where the references of a launched satellite and Radha are coming in this context? Now think again.


The show was telecasted on BTV and only after that the protesting majority became aware of the song. Now that’s the connection of launched satellite here and how the up rise of technology stepped it up to make it a hot cake as it was.

Now here comes the Radha’s part. I must say it’s really tricky and interesting too. Mac’s wife Niboo Haque was the cousin of Mac only. Niboo’s protest against the false allegation of arrest of his husband is reffered as “Radha’s cry”. But why? in Mythology Krishna is told as Radha’s maternal cousin and Mac too shared a same relationship of blood with his wife .In fact Mac himself recorded a song “Kandey krishno Mon”, which seems to be replicating his forced split from his wife.



Then “Sei Jehadi’s” Terrorist is obviously Mac. Now, remember the initial naming of “Fossils 2” was “Jihad” and it only got converted in to “Fossils 2”, because with the name of “Jihad” it was virtually impossible to master it in post 9/11 US. Mac’s songs in many ways can be called Jihad, as they directly attacked the society, the corruption that goes in it in the name of religion and politics. Some song lyrics even consisted of the name’s of Bangladesh’s political leaders too.

What ever we have read up to now are riddles basically. Thus comes these lines

“Raji Hoye path nite nite heyalir, Baji hoye ami fete gechi dewalir”

Now the song takes a new path, from the second next line.

“Cheye Dher soja Salvador Dalir chhobi Bojha”

Tell me, who is a better love in this world than Jesus Christ? I guess no one.
“St. John of the Cross” by Salvador Dali is the skeleton of love reffered as “Kono Premik er Konkal Pujo hoy kono museum e “, which is still there in a museum in New York. The next line also belongs to Jesus in the form of “Kono Nihoter naam e Khoma cheye Chithi Ashe roj Neel kham e”. In Jerusalem’s post office many letters till date are thrown away in the bin only because they have no valid address to be delivered. Why? Because they are all written to Jesus.


Just one verse ago, the author had put Maqsood (a Muslim by religion) and Krishna (The Hindu God) in the same zone. And now he is keeping Mac in the same place with Jesus (The god of Christian community) as he says “Crusade e Krooshey dey Nyay Bichar hok Nastik er”. Rupam calls him self as an “atheist” by religion too. In fact in many songs of Mac too you will find this similarity between Rupam and Mac, as Mac himself wrote many songs against organized religion.

The solving of the riddle behind “Shasti” still puts a smile of little pride in my face and a bit of relief too. I regard it as the last and the 3rd best song of “Fossils”.