Thursday, July 26, 2007

Where is my leg space?

Flying business class for 10+ hours is tough, the kind of frustration which creeps in knows no bounds at all. The problem with such flights is that you know there are lots of people who are flying with you are trying to be nice to one another and worst the flight attendants are also too helpful. Now, who is going to take the burnt of the bad leg space or hardly any breathing space available or arm place etc., - ah. Yes, it is you and you start grinding the teeth and hope the 10+ hours will end quick. Worst if in the name of flight entertainment, one gets to see sub-standard movies then god help us all!

Zindagi ne Zindagi

Classy song this from the movie 'The Train'. Probably the voice made all the difference, for a moment thought it was Atif Aslam, but it appears that the singer is Mithun. I thought maybe I need to read the lyrics, but the moment I start reading the lyrics I feel I am no longer bothered about deceiphering the meaning/my interpretation of the song, which will immediately make me lose interest over the song. So stopped reading the lyrics and started listening to the song.

Kind of reminds of a Ruskin Bond story 'The train stops at Shamli' in which the protagonist wanted to propose to a beautiful vendor at the railway station. The protagonist finds her beautiful but always worried to go ahead to her and propose to her fearing failure or worst fearing the future. The theme sounds so real !

Hi There

If words can lose any purpose, here it is when you hear a stranger telling you 'Hi There' or 'Are you okay?' or 'You alright?' or 'How are you doing?'. In India, when you hear these words from a stranger the first thing you ask yourself is 'is this person alright?' or 'what is his problem?' cause these greetings sounds so phoney.The problem in such greetings is that they hardly get to the next stage of any intimacy or even to start a simple conversation. Thus, 'Hi There!' sounds terribly absurd cause the person who greeted you is not keen to get on a conversation with you. 'Hi There' is more like a fence or shield i.e now that I told you 'Hi There', you either greet him/her back and then buzz off is probably the likely meaning.Anyway, I guess it takes great courage to still say 'Hi there' to a total stranger, cause there is always the chance of being ignored or worst insulted.

Mistake - whose stake is it anyway ?

There are so many times we volunteer to point out a mistake of someone's of course! And this seems so easy to pass the buck/blame, though it feels like doomsday when you are at the receiving end.

If a person 'A' blames another person 'B', does it make 'A' a hero ?
Hmm.. Listening to A's, 'I told you then,... ' or 'I wish you had done this way .... ' or 'You should have asked my help .. ' is probably one of the most nauseating experiences for 'B'.

I think if B commits an error/mistake 'E' and 'A' is able to point the mistake 'E', then 'A' by default becomes a stake-holder in this mistake 'E'. Thus, the moment 'A' identifies the problem he is also part and parcel of the problem and there is no way 'A' can play the holy ghost by lecturing that 'this could have been done that way'.

Movies by Weekends

HotFuzz:

One of those British comedies similar to 'Borat' which kind of fails to understand whether it is going to be an out-and-out spoof movie or an original comedy movie :-( The final product is more of a parody which is just ordinary :-(

Insomnia:

Saw this Al Pacino, Robbie Williams, Hillary Swank what appeared to be a total waste of the talent. Maybe the plot was too weak, though the part on how Al Pacino loses sleep cause of the sun-which-never-sets in Alaska was well thought out!

Notorious:

This Alfred Hitchcock movie was fun to watch, typical story but nothing really special about it though.

Bheja Fry:

Somehow the story does not suit the Indian context, so never really liked this movie.

Hideous Kinky:

The storyline is fascinating i.e how Kate looks all around Morocco for finding herself, but always misses the part that she can never find herself in Morocco cause there is nothing to find. Life just moves on, cause there is no 'destination'.

Stranger than fiction:

Too good a movie. The stars really lift the story and the plot speaks volumes for itself.Must see!

Oceans 13:

Fun movie to watch. Though the screen looks too over-crowded with so many actors (thirteen is too many, cause of that many hardly get a screen presence at all)

Goal and Goal II:

Typical feel-good movies, some of the shots are breathtaking i.e roping in so many football stars and getting some beautiful clips on screen.

The good shepherd:

Decent movie. De Niro's debut into direction. One dialogue between Joe Pesci and Matt Damon was really the pick of the flick in which Matt Damon tells Joe Pesci that his(cuban immigrants views) or Italian-Amerian views or Irish views etc., do not matter in this country(USA), but only views like his(English Protestant) matters cause they are the true patriots. Joe Pesci's role was a good cameo.

Birds:

Really good movie this. Only Hitchcock can scare the viewers with even harmless innocent animals like sea gulls or with other birds. Seagulls seems to have earned enormous respect from me !

A Good year:

Drab movie this, surprising how Russel Crowe picked this role :-(

A Simple Plan:

Creepy movie this, not sure I enjoyed it anyway

Rogue Trader:

The story of Nick Leesing, somehow it appeared to be more of a documentary rather than a movie, not enjoyable of course!

Airplane:

Typical Leslie Nielson movie, enjoyable !