Mother Pious Lady

April 15, 2013 Leave a comment

Mother Pious LadyMother Pious Lady: Making Sense of Everyday India

by Santosh Desai| 380 Pages | Genre: Short Essays| Publisher: Harper Collins India | Year: 2010 | My Rating: 8/10

This book, a collection of essays from Desai’s column ‘City City Bang Bang’in The Times of India is all about the quirks and essence of the Indian middle class. India having a heterogenous society with deeprooted parallel cultures across its regions and religions have common binding factors too in our peculiar tastes and ‘sab chalta hai’ (everything works..) attitude.

The name of the book comes from a typical matrimonial ad in the english dailies, “Status match for a very pretty, very fair, Brahmin girl. Decent marriage. Father Govt servant, Mother Pious Lady…”, is a witty take on Indian society who’s obsessed with fair skin (Unilever’s Fair & Lovely sells like hot cake around the Country fuelling dreams of the middle class and filling coffers of the company), and arranged marriages offer such an insight into the psyche of Indian society and social structures.

I laughed throughout the book as I could relate to the stories being a part of both the pre and post economic liberalisation of the Indian Middle class. A must read if you enjoy humor and want to learn about the real India beyond glossy mags and bollywood.

This fantastically witty and hilariously delightful book is my “Read of the Week”.

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Loot

April 15, 2013 Leave a comment

Loot1LOOT and other Stories

by Nadine Gordimer | 237 Pages | Genre: Short Stories| Publisher: bloomsbury | Year: 2004 | Rating: 9/10

Nobel Prize winner Nadine Gordimer explores tragedy and opportunity through the lives of a town’s survivors of an earthquake through the story ‘Loot’, which has the most lyrical narrative among the rest. Loot explores the greed and avarice of people when the ocean bed is bare with treasures, and people are ready to go to extremes to possess others memories. In the end the story takes on a political undertone setting the mood for the entire collection of stories.

My most favorite story in the collection is ‘The Generation Gap’, a sexual allegory of romance and responsibilities, youth and age. It has four grown-up children srambling the lives after their father end the relationship of 42 years and leaves their mother for another woman their age. What follows is an upheaval of the dynamics of their old life; familiar roles and definitions are changed, relationship lines are redrawn. I liked its almost-detached reportage quality of narration, an outsider’s view of a very personal matter, and  that the story never declines into melodrama despite its very nature.

The other stories that I truly enjoyed are ‘Karma’ and ‘Look-Alikes’. This uncomfortably beautiful and wittingly startling book is ‘My Read of the Week’.

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The Photographer

April 15, 2013 Leave a comment

9781596433755The Photographer: Into War-Torn Afghanistan with Doctors Without Borders

by Emmanuel Guibert, Frederic Lemercier and Didier Lefevre
267 Pages | Genre: Graphic Novel | Publisher: First Second | Year: 2009 | Rating: 8.5/10

In 1986, French photojournalist Didier Lefèvre documented the efforts of Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) in Afghanistan, which was torn apart by a war with USSR. This graphic novel is a record of his arduous journey along with the Doctors across Afghanistan and presents a powerful story of a mission dedicated to mending the wounds of war. I like the presentation style of using real B/W photographs and comic book illustrations & dialogues by Emmanuel Guibert based on the notes taken during the journey.

This incredibly brilliant graphic novel is my “Read of the Week”.

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Almost Famous

April 15, 2013 Leave a comment

famousGenre: Drama| Year: 2000 | Duration: 122 mins | Director: Cameron Crowe| Medium: DVD (BIG Home Video) | Trailer: HERE | My rating: 4*/5*

Fav Dialogue: “William Miller: I love you. And I’m about to boldly go where… many men have gone before”

This movie views the rock scene in in 70s through a nostalgic lens, yet not a hitting expose` or a tell-all story of the music era. The story is inspred by Cameron’s own experiences as a teeage music journalist, is about a 15 years old boy, willim Miller (Michael Angarano, and later Patrick Fugit) in 1973 going on a road trip with an upcoming rock & roll band, Stillwater.  For William, the trip with the band is about exploring his sexuality and learning how to live outside of his mother’s protective umbrella. In the process, he loses his virginity, rejects the drug scene, forms a few lasting friendships, and saves a life. He falls for a band groupie, Penny Lane (Kate Husdon) who already has a ‘thing’ going with one of the lead singers of Stillwater, Russell. The film’s ecstatic atmosphere is only briefly interrupted by the sense of longing that is associated with first love and the pain that accompanies the inevitable separation between a child and a parent.

Almost famous with its sheer exuberance is my ‘Movie of the Day’.

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The King Maker

April 15, 2013 Leave a comment

kingGenre: Drama| Year: 2005 | Duration: 100 mins | Director: Lek Kitaparaporn| Medium: DVD (Magna Home Video) | Trailer: HERE | My rating: 1.5*/5*

Among the awful movies, The Kingmaker set another standard of low in quality and story telling or direction. Period drama does require brilliance in direction, which this movie clearly lacks and is excruciating throughout its 100 minutes. One has to be a diehard lover of films to sit throughout the movie without dozing off or instead change to watching news!

The film is set in 1547 Thailand (Auytthaya Kingdom), when a Portuguese soldier Fernando de Gama (Gary Stretch) washes up the shores of Siam due to some ship-wreck, and is captured by slave traders. The beautiful Maria (Cindy Burbridge) takes fancy and buys him and introduces to her father, Phillippe (john Rhys-davies) whom Fernando recognises as the killer of his father.

Fernando joins the armies and eventually promoted as the personal bodygurad of King Chairacha. Queen Sudachan along with her lover and Phillippe plots to assasinate the king, and eventually succeeds and frames fernando. Fernando is rescued by the King’s brother. The movie ends with the Burmese invasion.

This movie, worth avoiding, unfortunately is my ‘Movie of the day’.

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