Talking about movies

Why the heck do people talk about their movies?

If a picture is worth a thousand words, that would be twenty four
thousand words per second, or one million four hundred and forty words
per minute, 172,800,000 words to substitute for the experience of a
two hour film. Really, what does anyone have to say that will take
172,800,000 words? And who has the patience to listen?

But surely, if you can throw at us one thousand four hundred and forty
pictures a minute, and 172,800 pictures in a two hour escape, you
should have something to say, and do it without having to yap about it
on talk shows, on promos, and you can definitely spare the print
media.

Figures apart - Do people making movies need to talk because they
forgot to say something when the movie was being made? Shouldn't the
work speak for itself? Okay, so you want to get us curious about your
film? That's what trailers are for, aren't they?

What is this whole nonsense about film makers, directors, producers,
actors, and everybody connected with a movie talking about what they
have just unleashed upon us? Usually, they're making excuses or lying
about something that is not quite so in the movie. I'll tell you why.
If it is an incredible movie, all we need is to hear that from a
friend, and we will rush to the theatres. If it is a terrible movie,
we'll get to hear about that as well.

The greatest works of art didn't have the artists promoting it all
over the world, like pimps trying to push an old hag down the throats
of sex starved men. Nobody in the world is going to die if they
didn't see a movie. They would feel horrible if they got suckered
into buying a ticket to a lousy movie, and most of the time, the
promos are trying to get us suckered.

It is one thing to splash Spiderman all over the newspaper and get you
all excited. That's okay, for the movie appeals to a lot of different
people, and we all know what to expect by the way. It's really all
about letting the kids know Spiderman is out and they should pester
their parents. To be honest, I thought Spiderman delivered on the
promise. But what I don't get is people making shitty little dramas
with confused character motivation, lousy action, and pathetic
narrative, and then actually having the nerve to use words like
"exploring the emotional dimensions of two disturbed souls...." and
crap like that.

There could be narcissicism! Of course, some directors just
absolutely love what they have produced, even though it is obvious to
most of us that the work is nothing short of thievery on people's
time. The less honest and more prevalent reason is the assumption
that most people who fall for the promo are idiots. Some just love
the sound of their own voices, and some actually believe they can
convince us a piece of crap is worth seeing, if they give us enough
intellectual spiel to masturbate over!

We know promotions work to some extent. We know they help sell
tickets. But at the end of the day, there is nothing anybody can add
with words to what is missing on the screen. If it was possible,
there should be a storybook, not a movie! Not that there are so many
great storybooks out there either, but the publishing industry is
usually a lot more honest with the material and the abilities of the
writer.

If you go to a restaurant, and the chef gives you a half an hour
lecture on how many wonderful ingredients he used, how slow the fire
was, and how deliciously coloured the spices were and what an aroma
there was in the kitchen as he cooked it, and then serves you a lousy
plate of dhal, how would that make you feel? Most Indian film makers
are very capable of doing exactly this. The lousy dhal is okay if you
could just send it away, but that doesn't happen at the movies, does
it? The thieves have got you for full whack with their talk, and then
you're screwed with the terrible movie that follows!

Dear shotmakers, you need to grow up a lot before we can confer upon
you the title of "film makers" - We don't need to be told in words
what a film is about. A film has its own wide canvas of expression
and it can talk on several levels - IF you know what you're doing
while making it. If you made a dud and you want to polish it, then
please... spare us the torture. Cinema is for enjoyment. If you have
delivered torture, go commit suicide, you intellectual freaks, and
don't talk on the way either!

The fate of being Indian.

I just returned from a death ceremony. A senior cousin of mine died
this morning. Five people involved in a head-on collision with a bus.
All dead. None of them had a chance.

It was sad seeing the community having to come together to support the
family after the loss. A father had lost one of his two sons, a son
had lost his father, and a village had lost one of its political
voices, apart from a community of chartered accountants having lost
one of their own. This is all just my cousin, mind you, and I can
only imagine what the loss of the other four lives could add up to. I
just don't know the others well enough at this point, apart from that
they were all precious in some way or the other.

It is consistently the same feeling - life is precious. Only on the
rarest occasions have I heard people actually celebrating the fact
that someone could pass on without suffering, and after having lived a
great, full, fun life. Blessed are those who get to do that, and
blessed are the ones who come to enjoy their company.

The majority of us live with health risks, physical danger, terrible
lifestyles not withstanding. These are just facts of life, and we
just don't need to add to the list. Terrible drivers are a fact of
life too. And they stand a very good chance of getting us killed.

I found a few conversations discussing fate, the inevitability of
death, and the philosophical perspectives were all well worn ones.
What frustrated me was that there were no rational conversations about
how the accident could have been avoided, so I had to investigate. I
asked the question straight - what exactly happened?

As it turns out, the Scorpio was driven by a 19 year old with a
reputation for rash driving. He tried to overtake a bus at speed,
thought he could muscle his way before the bus from the opposite
direction could come through, and all five on board paid the ultimate
price. It also turns out the 19 year old did not have a driver's
licence.

There you go, I pointed out - no fate, no inevitability of death, and
no God's wish. Just plain stupidity, bad driving, bad judgment, plain
old Indian incompetence. I wonder why people have to be so
incompetent even while having an argument, so much so that they cannot
differentiate between someone trying to get a point across, and
someone showing disrespect. It just doesn't matter, they said, it was
fate that made them let the kid drive!

It is interesting that everyone in the Scorpio had gone to send off a
political figure and were all active members of the AIADMK. To me, it
doesn't matter what party, but I could not help but think our
politicians are not even capable of being responsible about their own
safety and behaviour, so what the heck are they going to do about the
nation.

People, it is time to move away from dogma. It is time to rudely
shake people out of their stupor, for the time is gone when other
people's stupidity affects only them. It affects us all. It is fate,
I am willing to concede, that we are Indian. It is impossible to
choose where we are born. That is simply not in our control, so it
just could be fate.

What we do have control over is the Indian trait of blaming fate for
all our follies and failures. It wasn't fate that hundreds of people
lost their lives in Mumbai on the 26th of November last year. It
isn't fate that thousands of us die in road accidents every year. By
no means is it fate that our children are malnourished, badly
educated, and many of us are living below the poverty line. We need
to get this act of being Indian together, before we lose all semblance
of a rational existence. At the very least, those of us who are
rational deserve our chances of surviving against this dogmatic
incompetence that is uniquely Indian.

Controversy's children

It was only a matter of time before it happened - Deepa Mehta and
Salman Rushdie coming together for the mother of all controversies
designed from scratch - a movie called "Midnight's Children".

Salman Rushdie didn't do the world of literature any great favour by
writing "The Satanic Verses", but the silly narrative gained a lot of
traction by courting the unmistakable ally of poor art - controversy!
It was no masterpiece, but it got plenty of publicity, by getting
banned, criticized, and by managing to get the author a fatwa from the
Islamic world!

Deepa Mehta made a lousy film called "Water". It should have been
called "Drain" for what it did to the viewers, but it picked up
plenty of controversy along the way, and it is really only poor art
that CAN pick up this kind of controversy, because people who react
quickly and take to the streets by perceiving an attack on their
culture aren't going to fall for sophisticated points of view that can
actually be thought provoking.

So, it is perfectly expectable that terribly overrated artists would
provide enough ammunition to start the next controversy, and please
don't be surprised that such controversy is easier to kick up in the
Muslim world either.

If you are a fairly neutral consumer of books, you will see no great
literary value in The Satanic Verses. So, the best way to sell the
book to you is to get you really curious through controversy. Deepa
Mehta is a perfect ally to Salman Rusdie now with Midnight's Children.
For an author who is reasonably good at best and a film maker who
can't tell a story to save her life, a venture of this nature was
inevitable.

Don't show them any sympathy, but know that a paucity of creativity
can be exploited and substituted by an abundance of controversy - as
far as the marketplace is concerned. It is one thing when a work of
art aims to debunk theories humanity has subscribed to, asks questions
that make us examine our convictions, and provides perspectives that
shock us out of our stupor - that is the power of art. The
controversies that follow such works are a fallout of the effort and
merely a part of the journey.

It is entirely another to NEED a controversy in order to bring some
sort of recognition to an effort at art. Those are the props true
artists should never have to have. Whether it is a Danish cartoonist
or a pretensive Indian painter, their expressions are not richer for
having controversy carry them to recognition. Know the difference!

Here is the prediction - clear as day. The moment this film goes on
the floor, and you bet it will do that in India - there will be a
protest against it. And from then on, Deepa Mehta will continue to
roll the dice exactly as terrible artists are prone to - focus on
everything except on her lousy film making ability. In Water, I still
remember with disdain the scene where the long yearning lovers finally
come together before their flight into the promise of the unknown -
the birds being released from the cage. And they came together like
two dead bodies, bereft of all emotion, and made me wonder what
unfeeling, soulless creature would create a mess like this!

The same creature is about to unleash another rotten stink upon the
world of cinema, and it is called Midnight's Children. She should not
be stopped, definitely not for any fear of her great art influencing
anybody's thought process or culture. She is nowehere near capable of
that. That dopey Salman Rushdie should not be stopped either, for he
is, just like her, a child of controversies, and nothing more.