my soliloquy

A comet is on its way to hit the earth and wipe off the entire life or civilization, or whatever we call it. Now think of this – that precisely is the broad theme of a 2 hour long comedy, of all things.  The expected collision is to occur in 6 months and a few days. Considering it's Hollywood, that is a tight timeline. It is supposed to get heads rolling, or so as Leonardo Dicaprio and Jenifer Lawrence opine. But what actually ensues is a far cry from the expectations of these two ‘science people'. The world is obsessed about two pop stars breaking up, the Government is busy with 'other important matter' at hand and in the officialise of some higher ups and powers-that-are, "Let's not get too dramatic about it" and "Let's sit tight and assess." And Lawrence's boyfriend thinks it's her excuse to avoid meeting his mother (which I somehow felt legit).   “Don't Look Up” is a well told story of the frustrations of the ominous voices le...

It was the summer of 2010 when I first met Balram Halwai. I reached hostel three days before the classes were to start. It was the penultimate year of a tepid four year long education, and I had got a room for myself on the top floor. When I entered the room, I found that it was barren. It's previous inhabitant - a fat guy who was known to carry out fermentation experiments in that room - had left nothing except for the bed and a broken table. I dropped my hold-all on the ground and pressed all the switches on the switchboard...nothing. Electricity had always been a problem during summer. I felt tired for no reason and longed for a nap. But the thought of unfolding my hold-all and taking out the mattress seemed laborious enough to kill me. I walked across to the decrepit table and wondered if it would be of any use. I pulled open the drawer in hope of finding nothing at all, but did expect to see some loose change. And that’s when I saw the tiger. The White Tiger. I was told that t...

  At first, the shoulder-length hair made more news than his unorthodox cricketing shots. But with captaincy, the long locks were gone (he did mention in an interview that he would soon revert to the previous hairdo on the request of his female fans – but it never happened, ladies). He almost went bald the next morning of the World Cup 2011 win. Mahendra Singh Dhoni has had his share of good and bad hair days. Soon his hair began to grey, so did his beard. And people started saying things - this and that - more ‘that’ than ‘this’ – that he has lost his spark, that he is not the strength he once was. I was often around these armchair experts (they are everywhere), but I never weighed in with my opinions – MSD would have reacted the same way, I would tell myself. For me, MSD has been more than a cricketer. And I cannot explain that.  The day when he scored 183 against I don’t remember whom, I had missed that match. But after that, his meteoric rise has been unmissable.  ...

First the movie. Then his speech. Both remarkable in their own ways. The one thing that was clear from Joaquin Phoenix's Oscar acceptance speech was that he is a man of compassion. And why not? The odds he went through in life, the death of his brother River Phoenix, his fight with alcoholism and anxiety, the point when he had almost given up acting. His idea of 'fight against injustice' was the most impressive takeaway from his speech. Phoenix's example of forceful artificial insemination of cows and then using her milk and calf for selfish human needs is one of the most insightful things someone has spoken on a big stage in a very long time. The same notion of 'fight against injustice' alluding to environmental degradation and man's exploitation of resources brings to mind Leonardo DiCaprio's ‘not taking the planet for granted' speech during his Oscar acceptance a few years back. Phoenix completed his speech on an emotional note as he read out a li...

Today is just another day I am watching a movie. The same movie. Again. The thing about a Christopher Nolan movie is that everytime you watch it, it has something new to offer. It makes you ask questions you usually don’t, and enables you to find joy you usually didn’t notice was around. Nolan’s movies are more than what meets the eye, or the intellect. Interstellar was not just about time travel. A Father-Daughter relation which transcends both time and space (“I love you forever, and I am coming back”), dust and blight which does not cow down the human spirit, survival instinct...you name it. The world has been telling us about the power of dreams. Inception puts dreams on the dissecting table and awes us with the nitty-gritty’s. Therein again lies a man’s longing desire to unite with his children, a loving wife who was long gone from his life but not from his dreams,  the value of team work and improvisation, a dying father’s love for his over-ambitious son (“I am disappointed t...