I See You

I watched Avatar and 3 idiots like everyone else in the fourth week of December 2009. Enjoyed watching both. But procrastination led me to write about them in the third week of January!

James Cameron's movies have always had the 'something else' quality to them. His last movie, Titanic is one of my favourite movies. (I can watch it innumerable times.)
And Cameron, it seems, holds 'I see you' close to his heart.

Rewind to 1999, first half of Titanic, the scene on the deck, where Rose thanks Jack for his 'discretion' the previous night. (The previous night Rose was hanging off the stern of the Titanic, contemplating suicide and Jack convinced her not do it. She had slipped but Jack had managed to pull her back and save her. When people asked about what happened, Rose made up a story,wanting to keep her suicide attempt a secret and Jack went along, not giving her away.)
Here Rose pulls his art book and starts flipping through his sketches and remarks, "This is exquisite work." and then goes on to say, "You have a gift Jack, you do. You see people."
Jack replies, "I see you."
Rose asks, "And...?"
Jack says, "You wouldn't have jumped."

To Avatar,
Avatar, in terms of visual quality and 3D effects has set different standards altogether. It has its share of I see you's too, I see.

The ruthless quest for 'unobtanium' (quite significantly called so) has a strong anti war message. Also the movie strongly endorses non violence, sapience and harmony with nature. The underlying ideology was consistent with the idea of our relationship with our ancestors. See http://shailysahay.blogspot.com/2009/09/our-traditions.html.
I found the visuals perfectly enthralling. The lush, blue and bioluminiscent Pandora flora reminded me of lovely underwater videos shown on the Discovery and National Geographic channels, so one could connect with the alien world. The movie's cinematography seamlessly weaves fantasy into sci-fi.
However, apart from the strong messages, beautific cinematography and special effects, I found Avatar's story simplistic. Enjoyable, yes, but it suffers from the stereotypical 'good guys - bad guys' storyline. Also the second half could have been crisper. The war sequences were quite long.

Admittedly, the 3D experience was amazingly in line with the cliche 'living the movie'! Even in its 2D form, Avatar was entertaining, futuristic and fantastic.

Mr. Cameron, I (hope to) see you (soon, again)!

New Year Wishes and Season's Greetings etc.

Wow, we glide into yet another year! Two thousand ten AD. Have been thinking hard, trying to make meaningful and noble new year resolutions etc...phew. Didn't work. So thought of taking a bird's eye view at the year that went by.

Economically India saw good industrial growth and a stabler stock market and real estate sector though inflation continued to rise. As a pleasant surprise, the GDP of Bihar was over 11%, only a tad behid that of Gujrat! Some companies began hiring too as Times Ascent lost it waif-like appearance. A positive trend was clearly established by December 2009.

Barack Obama's victory in the US President election marked a huge paradigm shift in world politics as the first African American entered the White House. In another historic political event, Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir was appointed as the new Prime Minister of Iceland, becoming the world's first openly lesbian head of government.
Indian politics saw general elections being held in April and May. Congress remained in power as Manmohan Singh retained the PM office and Sonia Gandhi continued to be the most powerful Indian woman.

Indian sports entered a new era as the Indian Cricket team bagged the first rank in Tests and the second rank in ODIs. Saina Nehwal was awarded the sports person on the year, which I feel was long overdue. She has been ranked 6 by the World Badminton Federation.

Entertainment and Indian film wise, 2009 looked like a drag. There were few good grossers like Love Aaj Kal, Wake Up Sid and Paa. However, it ended with a bang as 3 idiots set the screen on fire and broke all records! Internationally, there were some great movies like The Reader, Fast and Furious 4, Angels and Demons, 2012 and Inglorious Bastards among others. Fantasy films like Harry Potter 5, Twilight and New Moon made spectacular business. Also, the 3D trend was marked firmly throughout the year with animation films like Up, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and G-Force; but Avatar took world cinema into an altogether new dimension, quite literally.

Apart from this, we mourned the loss of Michael Jackson just before he was about to start a world tour, This is it. He passed away in June.
In December, we lost Dilip Chitre, Indian poet, artist and film maker. He was suffering from cancer.

Lots of other things happened, some memorable and significant, others not so much. Now let's wait and watch what 2010 has in store.

As I, with my sister and friends welcomed the New Year with a lavish buffet spread at the Coffee House, O Hotel, we hoped that 2010 brings good surprises and lots of cherishable moments for all of us.

Wish you and your loved ones a Happy 2010!