Dangal

Got the chance to watch Dangal today and was totally blown away. It has been quite sometime I saw such an engaging movie. Though I always hesitate to watch movies based on sports or biographical movies most of them have always been enjoyable.

One of the good thing about Dangal is at no point it seemed like we were watching a movie. When we were watching the matches it looked like we were watch live relay of the match.

Excellent work by the team and if all that happened in the movie are true then it was one hell of an effort by the real Mahavir.

Sridevi

Tamil Cinema and Politics

Never imagined that a day will come when we will see the last of Kamal and Rajini movies. With current path they have chosen Kamal has already indicated that Indian 2 will be his last. Rajini hasn't confirmed yet. In the euphoria of their political entry no one is actually talking about the void this will leave in Tamil Cinema. At least Rajini has been playing hide and seek about his last movie but Kamal's move was totally unexpected. We always thought he will never leave cinema.

The debate or Rajini vs Kamal is still one of the most favorite topic in Tamil Cinema but now it has to be discussed in the context of politics. Lot of unexpected things only proves that it is difficult to predict life.

Non-healing wounds

There is a saying that time heals everything but I guess even that comes with exceptions. There are indeed certain wounds which doesn't heal even after long time. Sometimes it can even become more painful. It's like once the damage is done it's permanent. Everybody gets one life and for many that is not a pleasant experience.

There's also another saying count your blessings sometimes even 1000 blessings cannot heal one disaster.

The "road not taken" feeling is for another blog.

Bhogi

While we were young Bhogi used to be more special than Pongal. The preparation for Bhogi starts few days earlier in terms of buying the best drum. Especially the Saidapet market area used to have so many varieties in drums right from the original "clay skin drum" to latest plastic ones.

Once you buy the clay skin drum the next job is to have a proper drum beating stick. It will be mostly a stick from broomstick with a ball of tar placed at the top. We used to search for tar melt it and them put it as a cap at the end of the stick. With the right size your drum will generate great noise.

Will the drum in hand we will be running around making a hell of noise.

Then comes the actual burning and heating your drum over the roaring fire and tuning it is a pleasant experience.

As we grew it became more about staying awake the entire night for Bhogi but getting permission from parents was difficult owing to the weather. Still we used to stay awake late and get up early. The thicker the fog the more happy we were. There were times when we had used "thennai olai" as material for compound wall and during Bhogi people will take away those things.

Looking at the fog outside I feel the burning factor of Bhogi remains the same but whether this generation kids will get to see the Bhogi we did remains a question.

The Dhalapathy song made Bhogi even more attractive.

Welcome Thalaiva

Being Rajinikanth

Being Rajinikanth is very difficult. Till the advent of the social media I did not see so much negativity. Every word he says and every move he makes is given a negative meaning. It is indeed surprising how he manages this and still able to work on movies. It is very difficult to ignore such negative remarks. Though it is a possibility it is only a small number voices such negative remarks but that is the only remark we see in social media. I did not see a single positive comment except from some dedicated Rajini fan groups.

Though I agree that some of his traits of not conveying what's on his mind clearly and always providing a stoic silence as his response to many of the critiques on him is up for debate I do not think that it warrants such negative remarks.

I really wish he clears all ambiguity on 31st Dec as already announced. If he again provides an ambiguous statement then it will only make being Rajinikanth a lot more difficult.