Two Ways to Look at Mahindra Scorpio.

Many of us who watch Hindi films are familiar with a director named Rohit Shetty, who is famous for gravity-defying, flying
scenes involving vehicles (especially the Mahindra Scorpio) in almost all his movies. So, I decided to show the different perspectives of looking at the Mahindra Scorpio: The normal human perspective and the Rohit Shetty perspective. ;) . The sketch below shows that. :D

Between history and mythology - The Hindu

A well written opinion article in The Hindu by Prof. Harbans Mukha on the issues between history and mythology. The paragraph about Ram(the Sixth para) in Prof. Mukha's article does make us think carefully about Ram's existence.
The link to the article is given below.
Between history and mythology - The Hindu

An IPL-like Chess Tournament

   Had a random thought about the game of Chess(an engaging game which requires brains) going fully commercial having an IPL-style tournament held every year. So this is what it would be.  It would be called "Parle-G Indian Grandmaster League"(IGL), with its logo as shown below ;)

So, what would this bizzare tournament be like?

  There would be eight teams(having probably 2 or 3 players each) and this is what the names of the teams would be:

• Chennai Super "KINGS".
• KINGS QUEENS Punjab 
• Kolkata KNIGHT Riders
• Royal BISHOPS Bangalore 
• Rajasthan ROOKies etc. etc. 

   Before and after each match, we would have Samir Kochar(who knows absolutely NOTHING about chess) giving his "expert" opinion about the game and each players moves. Navjot Sidhu would be there on that show belting out some chess related shaayari(after all such a tournament is incomplete without the Sidhuisms ;) ), which would be something like this:

"OH GURU, AANDHIYON MEI BHI CHIRAAGON KO JALA DETA HOON
 JISKO DETA HOON, USAY CHECK-MATE KAR DETA HOON

 OHH THOKKO TAALI
 KHADAACK "

"GAAY KABHI MAAS NAHIN KHAATI
 SHER KABHI GHAAS NAHIN KHAATA
 GHODA KABHI OONTH KO KHAAYE
 RAANI KABHI RAJA KO KHAAYE!!

 OHH THOKKO TAALI
 KHADAACK"

  Before and after this pre and post-match program, you will find 8 dancers: 4 of them dressed up as black pawns and 4 of them dressed up as white pawns doing the "jumping jhapaak" dance. :P Then during the match, you will find Ravi Shastri doing the commentary. This is how the match will look:

• When a player knocks the other player's pawn off: "This pawn will be crucial"
• When a player does the castling move: "And that was a Max-Bupa Castling move by the player, this could be a crucial move"
• When the game has reached a stage where both the players have similar chances of winning: "WE COULD BE IN FOR A CRACKER-JACK OF A GAME, ALL THREE RESULTS ARE POSSIBLE", "THIS GAME COULD GO DOWN TO THE WIRE"
• When a player takes his/her ROOK from one end of the chess board to the other end to either kill the opponent's piece or Check the king: "THAT WENT LIKE A TRACER BULLET"
• When a King has been checked: "THAT'S YES-BANK CHECK"
• When a bishop moves through a long stretch of the board and kills a queen: "HE FLASHED and HE FLASHED HARD, HE CAN NOW GO FOR THE FULL MONTY"
• When a pawn ends up knocking off a stronger piece like a Bishop or a Knight or a Queen: "NOW THAT'S A KARBONN KAMAAL KILL"
• When the opponent whose King has been checked, moves the King to a safer box to uncheck: "THAT'S JUST WHAT THE DOCTOR ORDERED"  
• When a Queen finally Check-mates the King: "GONE FOR THE FULL MONTY, GAME OVER, WHITE HAS LOST"

  Apart from the Shastri-isms, you will find Archana Vijaya and Gaurav Kapur hovering around the players like vultures and trying to speak to the fallen pieces of each of the players. "Hey black Rook, how does it feel to be on Magnus Carlsen's side, what do you think are the chances of him winning?" Also, every time there is a Check or a piece being knocked off, you will find cheer-leaders dressed up as pawns(in the colours of the respective franchises) dancing to the IGL tune. :P This IGL will have loads of sponsors and this is what the chess-boards used in the games will look like:
     

So that's how the tournament will be. :P

  Then there is the Final match would be between Chennai Super KING Vishy Anand and Magnus Carlsen of Kolkata KNIGHT Riders with a generic closing ceremony, like that of the IPL, with PitBull dancing with people dressed up as Chess Pieces. :P :P

  Well, the IGL would be incomplete without some errrr....controversy. The game-fixing controversy. In the later seasons of this extravaganza, a player would be caught fixing games. Fixing a chess match?? How?? A bookie would pay the player for not moving his knight(which is at b1 or g1) till, say the 34th move and in the 35th move, move it to a box, at which it can be killed by a piece of the opponent. Guess, who is alleged to be the bookie? no prizes for guessing, it is Gurunath SHURVEERappan(owner of Chennai Super KINGS). :D :D He later changes his twitter/fb info from team owner of CSK to "Chess afficionado" and no prizes for guessing that, that player gets banned for life at the end of all this drama. The IGL goes on despite all this and at the end of it all, the Indian Chess contingent for the world tournaments has 6 players, three of whom are from CSK. ;)

Ennore

Ennore is an industrial locality around 18 KMs north of Chennai Central station, it has a big Thermal Power plant and has the factory of the commercial vehicle giant, Ashok Leyland. In between all these is a fishing hamlet called Thazhankuppam, which has a clean beautiful beach and a broken pier. A great place for photography isn't it. I made two trips to that place.

This place has been featured in several movies(Tamil and non Tamil movies). The climax scene of the 2003 Blockbuster "Kaakha Kaakha" starring Suriya was shot here. More recently, a few scenes from the 2014 Hindi movie "2 States" were shot here.

First Trip, September, 2013

This was my first trip. In this trip, I could walk towards the pier, under it and take some shots.

A close look at one of the broken pillars of the old pier

An array of pillars under the main pier

On top of the pier

 After capturing the shots above, I decided to have some fun ;) by going under the pier, putting my camera on the tripod to get this shot of the sea-water gushing through those pillars.

Gushing water under the pier

Second Trip, March 2014

I enjoyed my first trip to Ennore so much that I decided to go there again. But this time, the water had swollen up and thus the pier was surrounded completely by the water and became inaccessible. I then decided to just enjoy the sea breeze and the water hitting my feet. But I took these:

The full pier with the beach.

The full pier with the beach again, but a closer view.

Pillars, pillars and more pillars

Little rocks at the beach with their reflections.

Disney Characters in a Madhur Bhandarkar Film

Most people who watch Hindi films know that Madhur Bhandarkar picks up a random topic and shows the "underbelly" of it and shows how terrible it is.
What if Madhur Bhandarkar made a film about cartoons? I imagined Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse, as characters of that film doing drugs, and drew sketches of the two characters doing so:

So we have Mickey Mouse snorting cocaine. 

Mickey Mouse snorting cocaine
Sketched this using pencils

 And Donald Duck smoking up.

Donald Duck smoking up ;)
Sketched this using a pen

"Kukur-Charitra" aka "Ramu ke Hain Kaun" - Ram Gopal Varma's Hum Aapke Hain Kaun

In 1994, Sooraj Barjhatiya made a loud goody-two-shoes movie, Hum Aapke Hain Kaun, which starred Salman Khan(yyeaaahhh bro *in Salman's accent*), Madhuri Dixit and Sanskaari Alok Nath. A movie in which the ridiculously colourful characters (much more colourful than the ones in Ram Leela) broke into song and dance at the drop of a hat. Then I thought, "what if somebody else directed it? say Ram Gopal Varma.".

So, I imagined Ram Gopal Varma making this movie and here is what it would have been if he made it.


 Alok Nath is a Sanskaari underworld don. Guys, here Alok Nath doesn't have much to do, except that his gun-men take aashirwaad(blessings) from him before killing someone. Salman Khan is introduced in a scene in which he runs his Maruti 800 over 3 people on a foot path. Salman's family's Pomeranian (the Chetan Bhagat of dogs), Tuffy, is introduced in a sequence in which he is seen running towards Alok Nath, carrying Nath's pistol in his mouth. While in another scene, Madhuri is shown dancing to "rangeela re".

 A few obnoxiouly boring scenes later, Monnishh Behl(salman's bhai) gets married to Renuka Shaane (Madhuri's deedee) as usual, with gun men surrounding the mandap. We see one close up at the pandit and one intense close-up each at Monnish Behl and Renuka Shaane's eyes, with aalaapish background music. During the shaadi, the moment Salman is seen flirting with Madhuri, the following plays in the background: "deewana deewana deewana deewana deewana..devar dewaaanaaaa.." (in the Govinda Govinda tune).

 After some more boring scenes betwewn Salman and Madhuri in dark sepia tones and weird camera angles, this is what happens: Renuka Shaane dies and there is that intense music (with that sad bassy aalaap) in the bg, with some 70 close-ups on Renuka Shaane's dead face. Wondering what to do now, the family members decide to get Monnishh Behl married to Madhuri. Salman decides to speak up, but before anything happens, Alok Nath's gun-men point their guns (which have haldi and kumkum all over them) at Sallu, telling him to back off.

Soon, before Madhuri gets married to Monnish Behl, Tuffy pops in with the letter. When Tuffy enters the scene, the camera pans to him with intense close-ups in dark sepia tones from some 500 different angles and with that same intense bassy aalaapish music in the background. and the movie ends with Salman Khan's shaadi with Madhuri.

Clicking long exposure photos

I take photos in my free time, which is during weekends. I always enjoyed taking long exposure shots(with a shutter closing time of 1 second and more) at night time, to get those beautiful light trails of vehicles and starry street lights and smooth clouds at night.
After joining 500px.com, I had seen some amazing pictures of the seas captured in long exposure. After seeing those pictures, I too felt like capturing some long exposure shots at the beaches in Chennai and it was fun :-).

Here are some long exposure images captured at various parts of Chennai.

Note: 

• To get shots like these, you will need to use a shutter speed of at-least 5 seconds. 
• Which means you have to use a tripod to keep the camera still.
• Now, even if the camera is on the tripod, the camera will shake when you press your camera's click button. Which will lead to slight blurring. Even the minutest of shakes can lead to blurring of some object in your photo. So use a cable release for a shake-free shot. It is a wired remote, which has a click button. A DSLR camera has slot to attach the cable of this remote to the camera. 
• These cable releases are available in any shop which specializes in cameras

Long Exposure Shots of Streets

6th Avenue, Besant Nagar, Chennai, India

Rajaji Bhavan Bus Stop, Chennai

Long Exposures at Beaches

Marina Beach

Marina Beach, as most of you know is the longest beach in India. 

Rocks at Marina Beach, Chennai

Covelong Beach, Chennai

Covelong is situated at Kovalam off the East Coast Road in Chennai. It is 20 Kilometers South of Chennai.

Uthandi Beach.

Uthandi, is situated on the East Coast road, but it is 7 kilometres north of Covelong. The beach there is one of the nicest beaches of Chennai

Uthandi Beach, Chennai

Lootera. You need to have brains to watch this film.

Vikramaditya Motwane's Lootera released in 2013. After watching the film, I decided to share my thoughts about the film:

My Take: 

Vikramaditya Motwane's "Lootera" starring Ranveer Singh, Sonakshi Sinha is one of the best movies of 2013. The film opens in 1953 in Manikpur, in West Bengal. This is the time when the new democracy of India has abolished the Zamindari system and reclaimed the princely states. Pakhi(played by Sonakshi Sinha) is the daughter of a zamindar Soumitra Roy Chaudhury(played by Barun Chanda), who lives in a protected world and well taken care of and is a budding writer. One day, while driving her family car, she accidentally bumps into a motorcycle and injures its rider Varun Shrivastav(played by Ranveer Singh). He is invited as a house-guest as he is doing excavation on the Zamindar's property. Varun and Pakhi fall for each other during that time.The encounters between Varun and Pakhi are so very well shown in the long conversations they have. These deepen the bond between them. During these conversations, Pakhi reveals her wish to be a writer and Varun(who knows nothing about painting) reveals his wish to be a painter and paint a masterpiece some day.

A part of this movie is adapted from O Henry's short story, "The Last Leaf" and it has been very well adapted. Watch the movie and you will know.

Good attention has been paid to minor details,(like the telephones, the lamps used, the cars, the spects the characters wear), so that everything looks exactly like it was the 50's.

Talking about the acting, first the minor characters: Barun Nanda is brilliant as the zamindar, Vikrant Massey is cheeky as Varun's Dev Anand-obsessed friend, Adil Hussain is smart as the cop, who is chasing a criminal on the run. About the leads: Sonakshi Sinha has acted very well as the vulnerable Pakhi and is good with her expressions. This is her best and the most sensible role she has played. Ranveer Singh gives a good performance as the soft speaking Varun. 

But my pick of the leads is Sonakshi Sinha. This movie belonged to her. Sonakshi Sinha, I would love to see you playing more such roles and perhaps some more strong characters. You have shown your true ability as an actor in this film. 

After watching Vikramaditya Motwane's previous movie Udaan, I expected this movie to be really good and yes it was good. I would give it a good 4 and a half out of half. Definitely it is one of the best Hindi films of 2013(Bombay Talkies and Lunchbox being the other best movies of this year)

About the music: Amit Trivedi has given some pleasant tracks for the movie, which described what is going on in the protagonists' minds pretty well.

The tracks "Manmarziyan" sung by Shilpa Rao and Amit Trivedi, "Sawaar Loon", a 50's style sung by Monali Thakur is a subtly sweet song and "Mujhe Chhod do Mere Haal pe(Zinda)" sung by Amit Trivedi himself are the best tracks. 

My take on a shitty Bollywood film.

Warning: This blogpost has strong language in some paras. 

There was this movie called "CockTail" starring Saif Ali Khan, Deepika Padukone and Diana Penty. Here is my take on the movie.

My take:

Cocktail: A Shitass movie, with SHITTY songs. The movie has a plethora of stupidity. I guess the director of the movie wrote the misogynic script of the film on tissue paper while catching a dump. The script, it is so damn juvenile (even a juvenile wouldn't write such a script) and hare-brained.

Saif Ali Khan looks so damn tired of playing the same Play-boy type of a role the millionth or the zillionth time.

Dimple Kapadia and Boman Irani, what the hell were those oldies doing in that film? They have been wasted in thankless roles.

Finally the female leads, Diana Penty: Who gave her the role of a pseudo-Sati Savitri in the film, she was dumb (albeit as dumb as Arjun Rampal). Talking about Deepika Padukone, which mutton-headed critic said that she acted well?? Do you call that acting? She overacted to the max. By just shouting like a donkey and acting drunk, she is not going to become a so called "actor".

Talking about Padukone's character in the film, the hare-brained director resorted to the cheap tactic of slut-shaming her character, and the forcing her to change herself for a spineless pig (Saif's character) who himself disrespects women. That is the most pissing of part about the film. 

Well, it could have gained 1% of respect had they let Padukone slap Saif black and blue(or smash his ba**s) at end of the film for being such an arsehole.

The script of the film THOO. CHHEE! Dirty misogynist script.

And the music. Don't ask! The songs are as bad as loud FARTS  except for Honey Singh's "Main Sharaabi". Pritam Chakraborty, you SUCK man, you totally SUCK TO THE CORE.

I would give a generous 10 ROTTEN TOMATOES for such a spineless movie. 

Arnab Goswami as Chai-Coffee wala

Most of us who watch English News are familiar with the name of Arnab Goswami. The insane journo., that he is, he screams and never lets anyone else scream, goes berserk more often than not. I had this crazy thought, in which I imagined Arnab Goswami as a tea/coffee-seller in a train.

Here's how it would be.

Arnab Goswami selling Tea and coffee in a train: 

Arnab, the chai-coffee wala clad in the red checked blue-collared shirt with blue trousers is in coach number S-12 of the Hussain Sagar Express and shouting as usual in the NewsHour style, "CHAI, COFFEE, THE NATION AND THE WHOLE BOGIE NEEDS SOME CHAI AND COFFEE".

   A lady passenger sitting in a side-lower berth calls him, "Excuse me!!". He then asks her, "WITH YOUR PERMISSION PASSENGERS, MY FIRST SALE IS TO THE LADY IN THE SIDE LOWER BERTH, Excuse me madam, WHAT DO YOU WANT? DO YOU WANT A CHAI, OR DO YOU WANT A COFFEE? THE NATION NEEDS AN ANSWER!!!".  Just then a young lad in the upper berth asks him for coffee and he quickly shouts back at him saying "NOT YOU YOUNG MAN, YOU CONTINUE LYING UP  THERE!! I WILL TAKE MONEY FROM THE LADY HERE AND GET BACK TO YOU...". He replies "lekin bhaiyya.." then Arnab shouts back "DON'T SHOUT LIKE A MANIAC, WAIT FOR YOUR TURN!!!!!!!!" He gets back to the lady who asks for two coffees. He replies "YOU ARE TELLING ME, THAT YOU WANT 2 COFFEES! that will be 10 bucks, THE WHOLE of S-12 DEMANDS 10 BUCKS". He is given a 50 Rupees note, and she asks him: "chhutte hai ky...." just then he gets mad and interrupts, "YOU ARE TELLING ME THAT ALL YOU CAN GIVE IS 50 RUPEES, PLEASE GIVE ME SOME CHANGE, S12 DEMANDS SOME CHANGE. YOU BELONG TO THE CHHUTTE GANG!!". Unable to withstand his madness, the lady SCREAMS at him like how some people on the NewsHour scream at him and he finally softens and says slowly, "Here please take your 40 Rupees madam". After that, he shouts out loudly(like he does at the end of his debate shows) "THAT IS ALL WE HAVE FROM S12 THIS morning, DO JOIN US IN S-13 in 10 MINUTES."

An observation of wanna-bes, both on and offline

Shady things used by shady people in general:

1. LOLZZZZZ(one 'z' is ok, but 2 or more 'z's, is outright fuddu)

2. KEWL(a NOT SO COOL way to say "cool")

3. MAH( for "My")

4. BEKHIZ(The most pathetic and the most "Wanna be" way to say "Because". Even British and Americans don't say 'Bekhiz')

5. ROKZ( for "rocks")

6. They "like" their own posts on FB.

7. Some of them write like this and think they rock: "hEy, I aM sO kEwL."

and Cheesy pick up lines like these:

8. "u must b tired of running in mah drms all nyt", "So wt els do u do apart frm killing ppl wid ur luks

Hey "Wannabes", show-offs, and "STUDS, that aren't",

I have a few things to tell you:

WHY? Why on earth are you spoiling these poor words?

Why are you filling the air with the filthy odour of your "wannabe"ness and shadiness?

Here are some facts about you, you shady people:

Your shadiness makes George W. Bush look "INTELLIGENT"!!!

Your shadiness makes the movie "DESHDROHI" look like an "amazing" "classic".

Your shadiness makes Himesh Reshammiyya's music sound "nice".

Your shadiness makes MAYAWATI's statues in Uttar Pradesh look nice.

Your shadiness makes SAAS-BAHU(mother-in-law -- daughter-in-law) serials on STAR PLUS and the other Hindi channels "watchable".

Your shadiness makes the GHMC(Greater Hyderabad Municipal Coroporation)'s trucks and garbage bins smell "less bad".

Your shadiness makes Chetan Bhagat's books(puke puke) look 'readable' >:( 

I think this much is enough for you "gentlemen"!!

(without)Regards,

Uday Bhaskar