Dr Rajkumar, Naadamaya Song, Raaga Todi and the grand Cosmic Theory

Dr Rajkumar, the versatile Kannada film thespian has sung many memorable songs, the one which stands out most in my mind is this song from Jeevana Chaitra. The lyrics goes like this... “The entire universe is one great symphony” (Naadamaya ee lokavella…)

About the settings: Set in the cosmic surroundings of the Himalayas, the echoes of Dr.Rajkumar’s melancholic voice set to Raga Todi reverberating in the Himalayas is simply mesmerizing. The harmonic tune sets the tone to the song that implies everything in the universe is a grand symphony of divine celestial music. Himalaya has always been abode of the gods for Hindus, and referred as god-souled or devatma. Great Indian souls like Sri Shanakaracharya or Swami Vivekananda found their calling here. The Himalayas are a symbol of the heights that the human soul can attain, its pristine vastness represent the human consciousness.

About the Raga : Todi raga has phrases of notes and intonation which is considered a difficult raaga to perform owing to its complexity in prayoga. This song has complex graces since it progresses with other ragas as can be found in the latter part.

About the Singer: This song proves Dr.Rajkumar’s versatility as singer with a broad range (semi-classical, devotional, sentimental and romantic songs).  He won the national award for best playback singing for this song, the only film artist to have won the National award in both acting & singing. 

On a lighter note,  dr rajkumar also propounded the Einstein’s duality of time (its uncertainty) in this song, (if you come today … la desi James bond style, full length English song in a Kannada movie!!)

About the lyricist: Chi Udayshankar, another legend in the sandalwood pantheon has nicely combined all the theories of the universe in this one immersive song. He foresees all the prevalent energies as a symphony, a unified force emerging in one super symmetry that various science theories strive to explain (wave theory, string theory & so on).

Something like putting all the four forces of nature and the two particle types found in the universe in a mixer blender into one homogeneous mixture. (The four forces in the universe are electromagnetic force, the weak nuclear force and the strong nuclear force, and gravity. All universal particles can be divided into two types: fermions and bosons)

When the song hits its ending note, one can see Dr. Rajkumar in a different state altogether, his acting is in perfect sync with his inner feelings. Only an accomplished actor who is a singer can attain this elevated state

Did you know that Dr.Rajkumar actually recorded Naadamaya song for another film earlier?

Kannada senior artist and press reporter Sureshchandra who has covered Sandalwood for many decades recently revealed in a You Tube channel that Dr Rajkumar had sung Naadamaya song for an earlier Kannada film. He says that during one of the conversation with the thespian, he revealed that it Naadamaya song was recorded for the film 'Simhadriya Simha' by music director Ranga Rao which was later used in the film 'Jeevana Chaitra'

Song credit should have gone to Ranga Rao instead of Upendra (music director of Jeevana Chaitra)

Sureshchandra rues the fact that the music credits for this song 'Naadamaya ee lokavella' should have gone to Ranga Rao and not Upendra as the song was recorded earlier to Jeevana Chaitra for another film but for some reason shelved. When it was later taken for Jeevana Chaitra, the song which went to win a national award for Dr.Rajkumar erroneously credited Upendra (music director of Jeevana Chaitra) instead of Ranga Rao.

Ranga Rao went on win two state awards as best music director for Hosabelaku, Bandhana but missed out this laurel in his credits

Star Wars - The Force Awakens: film review

‘Star Wars - The force awakens’ plot is a grand running continuum, in this episode Luke Skywalker, the last of the Jedi has gone into hibernation. He is ostensibly devastated by the back stabbing done by one of his protege-in-resistance. Meanwhile his bête noire, the evil first order has risen from total destruction of the empire and will not stop until it gets him.

In his absence his sister,General Leia Organa leads a brave resistance with the help of the republic. She needs to find Luke (her brother) and help restore peace and justice to the galaxy. She begins the search at planet called Jakku through an old supporter who has some clue to Luke's hiding place.And thus begins a grand adventure, with the evil empire led by Kylo Ren close on their heels.

Star Wars - The force awakens is a movie set on a inter galactic scale, a creative potboiler that seems to have drawn from Star Trek, Men in Black and Avatar . Its about the good vs the evil fight in a far off Galaxy, and the pursuit of order and justice spearheaded by Luke Skywalker, the Jedi and the fight with dark forces led by the first order. This sequel (which is a running franchise) is probably a staging event for the return of the Jedi in the next installment (he appears in only one singular frame reserved in the end).
 

Why you must see the movie, Star Wars -The force awakens?

1. The size and scale of imagination is awesome, right from the space junkyard with massive space ship debris to the intergalactic gun (the fierce machine) which obliterates planets in one swoop

2. The pace is riveting. One big chase between the resistance and the first order henchmen for the micro chip that will lead to the missing Jedi

3. The next-gen Hollywood talent is in the offing. With people like Harrison aging (he barely seemed to hold himself together in the movie, i mean physically though) other leading characters actors (newbies) remind me of actors like Denzil Washington, Al Pacino.

4. The thrill of space ships zooming-in 3D at fourteen parsecs, and the life size scale of the space stations are breath taking.


Despite all the space razzmatazz the human element in Star Wars - The force awakens makes it so engaging; a son (kylo Ren) who has drifted into darkness (evil ) because he believes his father (Hans Solo) was weak and foolish,
an ordinary space junk collector (Ray) discovers her true potential in pursuit of the good


The dialogues are crackling too, sample this
Kylo Ren: Look how old you've become.
Lor San Tekka: Something far worse has happened to you.


Kylo Ren ( who looks like the evil Bane from The Dark Knight Rises with a costume that resembles a Nazi Black Helmet and a cloak is not dead, it remains to be seen what supreme leader Snoke trains him up to in the next episode. But the old fox Han Solo sadly will be missed as the space smuggler meets a tragic end in the memorable father-son encounter

Tanu Weds Manu Returns: When the Heroine Became the Hero

Tanu Weds Manu Returns film begs the following question?

Have you ever seen a hindi movie dominated by a Heroine? Maybe a few (in the past).Yes.

Have you ever seen a hindi movie where the heroine makes a mincemeat of the Hero and dominates every frame of the reel. Beginning to end?

If you have not - see this movie. Kangana Run out's the hapless hero in the movie. The poor hero, played by R. Madhavan, is reduced to a hapless bystander, almost like a bewildered tourist accidentally caught in a Bollywood storm. And trust me, it’s Kangana’s storm.

'Banno tera swagger laage sexy’ - is an apt tune for Kangana Ranaut's uninhibited performance in the movie

Just Watching her free wheeling baarati dances will be enough to say - Paisa vasool. There’s a moment where she’s dancing like nobody’s watching - except, of course, the entire audience is. It’s not just a dance; it’s a venting of frustration, a channeling of rage. In one such dance, she just gives vent to her frustration and if you want to see an angry young girl equivalent of Amitabh Bacchhan, those few frames will convince you.

Kangana Ranaut heralds a new breed of heroine - breaking the Stereotypical Indian female in Hindi cinema in every possible way. There is an edginess about her, a kind of gay abandon too. But what is interesting about her is that she is capable of carrying the burden of the entire movie on her slender shoulder, like she does in  Tanu Weds Manu Returns.

The Manali girl slips into a Haryanvi dame role with aplomb, the Sita-aur-Gita formula gets rehashed a bit but Kangana Ranaut is Gita-turned-Sita vs another Gita in this rollicking sequel.

In the end, Tanu Weds Manu Returns isn’t just a movie - it’s a Kangana Ranaut spectacle. Whether she’s dancing with reckless abandon, delivering biting dialogue, or breaking hearts with her layered performance, she’s a force to be reckoned with.

Django Unchained

This is one gooood MASALA movie I came across in a while. SONYPIX premiered the movie last Sunday and boy! Quentin Tarantino had me fixated on this movie from the word go. Even though i tuned in a while after the movie had started.

This is almost the flick every dreamy eyed movie-goer aspires for. A story of two African slaves (a couple actually) separated in the slavery era, Jamie Foxx plays the swashbuckling hero (Django), the eternal romantic madly in love with his wife (Broomhilda) and determined to find her at any cost.

He pairs up with  Christopher waltz (Schultz)  a German Bounty Hunter, and the two catch up on some business with the bad arses in the American badlands from Texas to Mississippi . Tarantino is a master of the bluster and the bombastic; the gun fights and the blasts are spectacularly his stylistic flourishes. The guns of the historical period depicted in the movie could have hardly reloaded that fast or were anything but accurate. But who cares as long we are on a Tarantino groovy train, right ?

Leonardo DiCaprio marks entry as a delectable plantation owner (Calvin Candie) interested in Mandingo fighters and slave trade. He has broomhilda as the household slave but does not realize that the duo have planned to hoodwink him with a plan to get her out. His shrewd butler, played by Samuel L. Jackson (his make up was pathetic i must say) soon finds it out and the plot then unfolds and races to a fiery climax.
 
A wildly enjoyable movie with crackling dialogues, remarkable soundtrack and awesome cast. The movie is wildly comical too, there is a hilarious scene involving a bunch of a negro lynch mob followers (pre-KKK) discussing how difficult it is to see out of their hoods and to ride at the same time!! In another, Tarantino comically blows out Candie's widowed older sister Lara Lee out of the frame with a mere gun shot.

Go watch the movie if you have fallen in love with oldies like "Once Upon a Time in the West" or "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" or have been mesmerized by Tarantino’s earlier flicks.

Finally a word about the director - he is the Steve Jobs equivalent of the celluloid . Reservoir dogs, Pulp fiction, Inglorious Basterds & now this …. phew!! gotta hand it to this guy.

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

Courtesy my BiL and his complimentary tickets at PVR, i saw the movie over the last weekend. The sequel to the 1987 hit was not that captivating though. Imagine ketan parikh coming out of jail, his sins pardoned, to write a book called ‘Greed is Good’ and lecturing people on how and why people like harshad mehta or ramalinga raju screwed the financial market.

Gordon gekko does something similar but with a lot of panache and polish . His daughter in the meanwhile who has grown up to hate him for not only his misdeed but her brother’s unfortunate death whom she holds him responsible for neglect, stays with her boyfriend (Jake) who incidentally also happens to be a bright upshot on the wall street. They stay in plush apartment, buy expensive gifts and drive fancy bikes courtesy the fat bonuses Jake gets from his boss who also happens to his mentor at the Investment firm.

But it so happens that Gekko’s former bête noire (Bretton James) now drives Jake’s mentor boss (Lewis Zabel) to death when the Investment firm goes belly up.

Jake wants to bring the father-daughter together much to her fiancé’s consternation, who at one point in time tells him ‘Dont go back to him, he can hurt us’. The daughter knows the father too well and he lives up to his billing. Gekko convinces Jake to get his daughter to transfer $100 Million from a trust account in Switzerland that he had stashed in her name just before he went to jail . But instead of transferring the money to some company involved in fusion technology, which Jake believes is the next big idea, he pockets the same and vanishes into thin air (the plot seemed a bit far fetched though - imagine somebody hoodwinking the attorneys and amidst all the paper work in a Swiss bank involving a huge sum of money).

In the meantime Jake has joined Bretton and after falling out with him decides to deliver a sucker punch to redeem his mentor death. He sits overnight and produces some damning piece of report that sends this billionaire Wall St. hotshot into a legal & financial tailspin. In Quick time......Haha.

Gekko who has now turned this $100 million into billions (god knows how) has a change of heart and comes back to fulfill the broken promise i.e, transfer the $100 Million to the fusion company and bring the 2 together.

A kind of family melodrama where the son-in-law redeems himself, daughter reconciles, a common enemy vanquished & the wily gecko turning a leaf for the better. Good in parts and with Oliver stone at the helm you can expect a well knit movie with brilliant texture and feel to the film. Sonny & Wifi slept through the movie though.

Beyond Pandora: Unraveling the Layers of Inspiration in James Cameron's 'Avatar'

As the theater lights dimmed, whisking us away from the humdrum of reality, I found myself plunged into the fantastical 3D world of 'Avatar'. The children's shrieks of excitement mingled with my own wide-eyed wonder as James Cameron's Pandora came to life. The lush, vibrant Pandora, with its grizzly machines, fierce creatures, and mystical floating mountains, unfurled a canvas so vast that even the beloved Star Wars trilogy seemed to pale in comparison.

Exploring the Fantastical World of 'Avatar': A Tapestry of Myth, Nature, and Technology

Cameron's epic saga tells the tale of humanity's quest to colonize another planet, eyeing a rare mineral reminiscent of our world's oil. It struck me as a poignant reflection of humanity's unlearned lessons from history, repeating our conquests and exploitations on an interstellar scale. In this distant world, Cameron paints a universe with conditions akin to Earth's, subtly nodding to the theory of cosmic inflation.


The story, at its heart, is a classic tapestry of adventure, bravery, sacrifice, and redemption, yet it's spun around an imaginative world that draws from a kaleidoscope of inspirations. Cameron's genius lies in how he tweaks these inspirations to craft something truly captivating.

Prehistoric Echoes: The Mesozoic Inspirations Behind Pandora's Creatures

Consider the creatures of Pandora, for instance. They seem like they've leaped out of the pages of a prehistoric encyclopedia. From a panther-like creature reminiscent of the Mesozoic era's Gorgonops, chasing our hero Jake, to a Placerias-like animal with a hammerhead shark's face and a rhino's body. Then there's the Na'vi's horse, a curious blend of an antelope and Clydesdale, and the vividly colored birds, echoing the ancient Archeopteryx and Ornithocheirus.

Machines of War: Drawing Parallels Between 'Avatar's' Tech and Real-World Defense

Cameron's military machines in 'Avatar' are a testament to his keen eye for detail, seemingly inspired by real-world defense technology. The helicopters are a hybrid of the UH-60 Black Hawk and the V-22 Osprey, while the spacecraft bear a striking resemblance to the US space shuttle. It's almost as if these machines have rolled out of a Boeing or Lockheed factory.

The Na'vi Tribe: A Cinematic Ode to African Cultural Richness

The Na'vi tribe, with their societal structures and cultural nuances, seems to draw heavily from African influences. Their rituals, dialect, and even the occasional song in the movie, all resonate with the richness of Central African tribes.

From Comics to Screen: Tracing 'Avatar's' Nods to Popular Culture and Childhood Nostalgia

Cameron's nod to the world of comics and toys is unmissable, too. The concept of transmogrification, reminiscent of Calvin from 'Calvin & Hobbes', is ingeniously adapted as our ex-marine hero switches bodies between his human form and his Na'vi avatar. And let's not overlook the 'Transformers' influence in the motorized robots, or the resemblance of Colonel Miles Quaritch to the toy figure Chip Hazard from 'Small Soldiers'.

In essence, Cameron, much like Spielberg, shows his adoration for comics and toys, weaving them into a cinematic masterpiece. 'Avatar' isn't just a movie; it's a grand confluence of numerous inspirations, masterfully blended into a narrative that is as enchanting as it is reflective of our own world.