GAJANAN PATIL

GAJANAN PATIL
Feeling Pristine After The Ablutionary Bath At Hardwar

Monday, March 16, 2009

Scathing as always



Now there you go.. By the only decision to blog on the movie called "Slumdog Millionaire" i know i have opened Pandora's box. Why should this movie make Indians proud for anything? In first place its directed by a foreign director secondly presented by a foreign production house. Moreover the attention that the movie gets in the international film crazy people is because of the only fact that it portrays India's poverty and the unhygienic living conditions.Now if you argue that it has something to do with the actors like Anil Kapoor then i don't feel he had anything spectacular to deliver.Rather the only striking aspect of the movie that was Indian was the Actors and unfortunately nobody received any award.

If you talk about A R Rehman then i don't feel that those fools sitting there in Oscars even do have the what we call in Hindi - "Aukat" to judge his songs. He is outstanding and those songs "Jai ho" and others are just mediocre by his standards. If they listen to some of his other creations i suppose the westerners would stop having songs in their movies (as such they hardly have any). 

The big question still remains why to rate Oscars so highly when you know very well that it recognizes movies made by only Hollywood production houses only.

Also if you take a look at all the movies that have been rated as the best movies for past few years i am sure you would say that you have not seen such sadistic people anywhere. For Eg movies like "A million dollar baby", " The Departed", " A beautiful mind" and the hopeless " American Beauty". Does the Oscar jury feels that sadness is the only feeling/emotion (Ras what we call in sanskrit) that should be honored. Well don't misjudge me by no means i want to say that the above mentioned movies are not good or something but why always honor the same Ras.
In short the point i want to make is that there shouldn't be so much hype if a movie gets so many Oscars. As such Oscars are something we should not rate so highly and should not any such feeling of having surmounted the world or something. 

I would like to end this all saying that as far literary arts are concerned we are far ahead and there is no reason for us to testify ourselves on the global level. Every culture has its own tastes and onething that globalisation should not try to do is trying to unify the cultures and cultural tastes. Unfortunately we in India tend to blindly follow what ever is foreign. I fail to understand how can a person who is born and brought up in India like a song by Bryan Adams or Boyzone or so any other foreign person for that matter. This is simple foolish chasing  of anything thats exotic only to make a fashion statement which i feel is utterly foolish.

Baki to tum apne aap se puch ke dekho tum khud bhi kafi samazdar ho......... bevakuf mat bano aur mat banao... pls.


6 comments:

Aniket R Pandit (Songade) said...

Certainly it is difficult to compare two different cultures and more so to find a common thread. AR Rahman is deserving of all the honors in world music (irrespective of geographical boundaries) and we must celebrate the fact that he has got that international recognition. And about enjoying foreign music, does it hurt to expand ur horizons?? If something sounds good to the ears, why not listen?? I do that often and if I can even partly understand the lyrics then it is that much worth listening to.........!!
Theres a whole lot to be heard & learnt outside our culture, try it with an open mind (or ear) and u will find something enjoyable......!!

GAJANAN PATIL said...

Jo agyan gurudev.. i dont say that foreign music is bad or something. Not at all. They too have masterpieces but my objection to the craze that we have for it. Thats totally unwarranted.

Razzer said...

Im with u around 40%. And ya it's high time ppl stopped showing India's poverty. Man..thats sickning now.

:-)

Phaneromaniac said...

I agree with you Gaja.My little point is that when it has taken so long for us to come out of the image of "a country of slums, poverty n snake charmers", why should we celebrate a totally commercial and 'manufactured' success of a film which puts only a melodramatic and stereotypical portrayal of India on the celluloid?
Last year with 32 million TV viewers worldwide, Oscars recorded its lowest ever viewership. By the way, what is 32m or 3.2 crores for a country like India? So, I think, Slumdog can give Hollywood a convenient access to the Indian markets. The recipe? Quite simple..honor Indian crew members and the acceptance-starved Indians will go berserk. And that's exactly what has happened.
It opens a huge market for Hollywood movies.Just imagine the Galaxy theatre in Hyderabad overflowing with enthusiasts to get the ticket for the Telugu version of the next Bond flick!!!

MJ said...

Again..

Its certainly not acceptable the way India is portrayed in the movie.. so here I am with you.. :)

But mixing the various cultures, i guess its fine.. People just should take "GOOD THINGS" from everything around still keeping the origin of one's culture alive ;) We may be wearing jeans n T shirts, skirts n frocks, but still we Indians respect the saree, the navvari, the ghagra choli with bangles and a 'tikli' more than anything else, dont we??!! So the tradition is intact, its still there and will be there un-altered ;)

Moreover, We never say We are crazy for western music, we still do love classical and Indian music more than any other music. It just goes with the mood as to when which music should be heard!!

Coming to Oscars, Indian movies are rarely appreciated in hollywood, n its unfortunately vice versa here :P Even with Slumdog millionaire,the story never fancied me, wasnt so interesting except for the A R scores ;)but when an Indian is being recognised worldwide for his exemplary work, lets not make it an issue. On the other hand lets be proud, that an Indian got an OSCAR!!! Lets make it a worldwide statement, that Yess!! Even we are there ;) People out there never must have heard A R's other composition, thtz why must have loved 'Jai ho' like hell :P

Anyways.. I am toh feeling darn proud for its none other than A R, Gulzar and Resul Pookutty this time ;)

In nutshell, m not in complete disagreement with you! :P


LAterss!
Cheers!

rohit said...

I totally agree with wat you are said. Why should we be always be potrayed as poor, down-trodden, good-for-nothing, no-use-at-all types of people. the foreigners made a film n we enjoyed it.. but wat we didn't realize is that they made a joke on us .. n we enjoyed it n the foreigners were even more happy that they gave us loads of Oscars like it was some kind of vegetable product sold at a wholesale price.

and wat did we do we enjoyed watching even that n clapped n laughed made celebrations n everything.

its us who are to be blamed. we could hav banned that film to be made, actly we should not hav even helped in making that film. but we indians are crazy about nething remotely connected to films. we see it as the ultimate career pleasure...

i just feel pity on those people who saw that flm n mayed bucks just to let our heads hang down in shame...