Decisions – Secrets of Happy Married Life

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Once X asked Y, “What is the secret behind your happy married life?”

Y said, “You should share responsibilities with due love and respect o each other. Then absolutely there will be no problems.”

X asked, “Can you explain?”

Y said, “In my house, I take decisions on bigger issues where as my life decides on smaller issues.  We do not interfere in each other’s decisions.”

Still not convinced, X asked Y “Give me some examples”

Y said,” Smaller issues like which car we should buy, how much amount o save, when to visit home town, which Sofa, air conditioner, refrigerator to buy, monthly expenses, whether to keep a maid or not etc are decided by my wife.  I just agree to it”

X asked, “Then what is your role?”

Y said,” My decisions are only for very big issues.  Like whether America should attack Iran, whether Britain should lift sanction over Zimbabwe, whether to widen African economy, whether Sachin Tendulkar should retire etc etc.   Do you know one thing, my wife NEVER objects to any of these!!!
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It was forwarded to me by a friend. So, I have no idea about the original source of the mail.

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Evolution of the Idiot box

Have a look at this.
The previous post talked about how things have changed in the last couple of decades. But, the link mentioned above talks about how the idiot box has changed in the last century.

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Evolution – Man and the Idiot Box

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This is the effect of liberalization of the Indian economy. We have flat TV’s and also supersize fries from MacD.

Got this as a forward. So, I have no idea who the creator is. If you know the creator then leave a comment and I will add the credit.

Having a bad day in Office

Have a look at this video.
Not sure if some of the things are setup, but they are sure funny (for watching :) ).

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Jab We Met

If entertainment is the only criteria for judging movies, then this one would score 9/10. It is truly entertaining in the first half and for most of the second half. If we have to take a critic’s view then I would give it something like 5/10 as lot of things that happen in this movie, only happens in movies.

I have never liked Kareena Kapoor, but was quite impressed by her acting in this movie. Yeah, if the umpteen layers of make-up were removed from her face, she still looks nice and can actually show some expressions and act in between her blabbering. Even Shahid Kapur looked pretty good in his role. His character had to show restrained emotion and he was quite good at doing that.The movie has the predictable storyline of Boy meets Girl and in the end after the marriage everyone is happy. But, what is different here is the treatment and it is indeed a worthwhile fare. Some things wouldn’t add up in the movie, if someone wanted to just find faults, but if the intention is just to entertain people then the director has succeeded.

The dialogues are really good and especially the ones which are muttered before Kareena and Shahid reach Bhatinda are fantastic. One thing that I am unable to understand is, why do directors force-fit songs in movies? At least 3 of the songs weren’t needed.

Unfortunately, after “Jab We Met” it has been “Jab we Split” for Kareena and Shahid. Hopefully, this won’t be their last time on screen together. But, I can’t just help thinking at the idea of placing Saif as Anshuman in the movie. It would have suited the movie perfectly. (I mean he would have suited the character nicely. :) ).

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Doordarshan Nostalgia

I am pretty sure a lot of people miss those days when DD was the only channel and you had to get up on Sunday morning before 9am to catch the Disney cartoons or Ramayana/Mahabharta. Being in South India I didn’t get to watch too many of the serials which used to be aired at 9pm on weekdays, but I remember Byomkesh Bakshi. It was one of my favourite serials at that time and remains one till date.

Check this site for some Doordarshan Nostalgia. It has the title songs from some serials and a couple of ads also.

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Chak De India

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An Yashraj movie without the normal dance and songs and super-heroism. Atleast that is how I felt after seeing the movie and Director Shimit Amin has pulled off a movie which is different from the normal genre of movies that are produced by Yashraj. It neither had an overdose of King Khan nor it had the emotional package that is part and parcel of any Yashraj productions. I felt Rs.180 was well spent and didn’t go down the drain as it had happened with Dhoom-2.

The movie is about how a coach, an ex-player who was ridiculed for missing a penalty, takes the Indian women’s hockey team to World Championship glory. It is a glorified version of Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar with a dosage of patriotism. An underdog beating the world champion. But, it isn’t a Lagaan or a Iqbal for hockey. The movie is very similar to “Remember the Titans” on the aspect of uniting a set of players from diverse backgrounds to fight for a cause which will change their lives forever. (The movie is based on the story of Mr. Ranjan Negi. Check here.)

The movie begins with King Khan missing a penalty in the finals of the world championship against Pakistan and he is branded a traitor and thrown into exile by the media. A classic case of trial by media and we aren’t far from what is shown in the movie in our real lives too. Anyway, the first scene had the regular dosage of close-ups and zoom sequences of the different parts of King Khan’s body, but thankfully the super-heroism ended in the first scene itself. Kabir Khan (Shahrukh) is ridiculed and branded traitor by his neighbours and is forced to leave the locality. This is the scene where the movie moves from having a King Khan to having Kabir Khan. It moves from Shahrukh the superstar to Shahrukh the actor. No more close-ups, no more stuttering…. After Swades, Shahrukh the actor makes an reappearance in this movie. And thankfully this movie is doing much better than Swades.

The movie belongs to the 16 girls from different parts of India from this point onwards. How Kabir Khan gets the girls who are from diverse backgrounds and places to play as a team constitutes the remaining 2 hours of the movie. The 16 girls who join the camp show the typical characteristics which you will see of any female from those places in Bollywood movies. The story evolves from the introduction of the girls to looking at how they defy certain cultural traits and some traditional practices to pursue their dream of playing hockey. It also shows how some of them have to go against the norm of their families to pursue their passion of wearing the Indian jersey. A couple of interesting pieces involve the introduction of Komal Chautala (Chitrashi Rawat) and Balbir Kaur (Tanya Abrol). Everyone seems to have done justice to their roles and I wonder whether they are actually hockey players or whether they underwent training before shooting for the movie. All the actors seem to be handpicked for their roles.

The movie is written by Jaideep Sahni and Shimit Amin and they manage to keep the viewer interested even though the end is well known. This just goes to show that having a good screenplay matters more than concentrating on make-ups and shooting in foreign locations. 

The biggest plus for this story is the lack of song and dance sequences. I am pretty sure Shahrukh missed chasing a lady around trees, but the lack of them in the movie made the movie interesting. Absolutely no time is wasted with any dance sequences, except for the girls dancing to the tune of the coach during practice drills. Also, the couple of songs seem to be well places in the movie and only help hasten the pace. There is a song on the lines of Lagaan style “Chale Chalo” in this movie, but it doesn’t make that kind of an impression.

A few parts of the movie can still be shortened, but the editor can be forgiven because a superstar is there in the movie. The movie could have ended with India winning the world cup and the team returning, but adding the sequence where Shahrukh returns to his old locality was just adding time to the movie. Maybe that is the cost that Amin had to pay for having King Khan in the movie. And hopefully I won’t need to watch movies to see an Indian team win a world cup.

And a request to Amin (and all other directors): If you ever want to have a commentator in the movie, provide them some decent lines to speak. The commentator is the worst part of all the games played in the championship. One line goes like this

“The next game which is the quarterfinal is the most important for India as it will go into the semifinal, if it wins the game”. What an insight!!!!! This was the most comical moment in the entire movie and I and Ajay clapped almost instantaneously. I am pretty sure others in the theatre wondered what the two jokers were clapping for.

More info about the actors.

Deol and Dog make news


Esha Deol couldn’t get her pet dog entry into a hotel where she had gone for a shoot, but still managed to play with her dog in between shots. [Link]

Well, the movie for which she was shooting is called ‘Darling’ and you wonder which ‘Darling’ she was interested in most at that time.
And any guesses on which newspaper covers such news? Well, everyone should have got the correct answer and if you haven’t then you should either be living in some remote corner of India or should be in Tamil Nadu, where this newspaper doesn’t have a daily edition. (I am not too sure about the northern and north-east of India).

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Doctrate devalued?

Last week, I read that actor Satyaraj and music director Deva are going to become Dr.Satyaraj and Dr. Deva respectively. Well, they have done quite a bit in the cine field, but being honoured with a doctorate for that is slightly taking things too far. If this news came as a shock, the bigger shock is the news that Shilpa Shetty is soon going to become Dr.Shilpa Shetty. This is well…..

Satyaraj and Deva
Shilpa Shetty

And just read this

A leading UK University will confer on Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty today an honorary doctorate for her outstanding contribution to cultural diversity

What did she do to promote this other than participate in a reality show for which she was paid in crores? Maybe I don’t know about all her contrubutions. Maybe…….
And the other people on whom the Doctorate has been conferred by this University are Amitabh, Yash Chopra and Shabana Azmi.

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Sivaji Movie – Trailers

Some videos which have been posted on Youtube. To catch all the videos use this link.

 

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