imeanSURAJ

A beautifully directed film by the debutante Robert Eggers, based on a script that he wrote himself. I rate it above Don't Breathe or Conjuring 2, in horror genre this year, and also above last year's debutante film from the director Joel, The Gift. This film takes time to develop its grip, which in its own way is interesting, and boy, the wait is totally worth it! One of my favorite scenes in the film is the mother breast feeding a crow thinking it’s her own dead child who's come back. Even with a plot related to witchcraft it delivers enough story to justify its credibility. The sound design, the dark sometimes dry brown shadowed cinematography is a treat to photography lovers and the end will leave you with an absolute, "WOW", moment.

Men are born with the basic motive of propagating their genes. Richard Dawkins even goes so far to call men the "Gene Machines" in his book, “The Selfish Gene”. Speaking through the context of a Lion, the only social cat family animal, will give you a better perspective. If a wandering lone Lion wants to join a Lion family, he will have to fight against the adult Lion of the family that he wants to join. Once the outsider Lion beats the family Lion (which is indicated by the Lion falling on his back), the outsider Lion will merge with the family, starting with the killing of all the cubs of the previous Lion and later mating with Lioness.      courtesy: wildencounters.net What the Lioness was looking for was, who is the stronger of the two, because the stronger Lion will be able to take better care of the family and protect them from wild dangers, than a weaker Lion. Very similar is the case of human male. The root of being highly competitive in men come...

"Smiling", like "Thank You" ( previous post ) has been thoroughly encouraged, the more the better. But there is one kind of smile that one should always avoid: the "Insecurity-Smile" (more popularly called the sheepish smile).  There is a section of people who smile all the time, and the smile doesn’t come out of a relaxed confidence self, but from a strong discomfort. These people keep smiling, on every instance. Suppose a group of people are sitting and gossiping, there will be one guy who will be 'bogus-smiling' to all the silliest jokes, not exactly because he enjoys them but because he wants to be liked by the person and the group, especially if the person making the so called jokes is of good importance. And chances are this guy is new to the group, and in efforts to win the belief of "belonging", he will keep doing it, sometimes even going overboard by unknowingly smiling to something which wasn't meant to be smiled at. Whe...

We have constantly been told how saying Thank You is always a good thing. From self-help books to our elders, they all keep reminding us the importance of saying Thank You, but is it really right saying Thank You everywhere? When you say Thank You to close friends with whom you sit and talk and see daily or stay in touch in strong terms then you push them away bringing a noticeable distance between you and the person. Because saying Thank You makes the whole deed look like it needs a repayment, the way we do to strangers or colleagues or someone who deserves a Thank You in the formal sense, in which case you become a lesser friend with him/her because till then the relationship didn't look for a repayment. Courtesy: Sean Gladwell If my friend brings me a candy bar every day and I take it without saying Thank You, it keeps the action, a deed that he should just do, whenever he's got a bar to share. ...

This post come in the heels of Markandey Katju's famously calling Keralites the truest Indians. I agree to the praises he heaped on Keralites but calling Keralites, the true Indians is a little too far fetched. Within Indian Federalism all states are equal, I understand he doesn’t really care about being politically correct. Kerala is indeed a very good state, for its discipline, maturity and high sociopolitical awareness among the population. They are highly civilized. Some of the direct impact can be explained in the following stats: · Kerala has the literacy rate of a developed nation Kerala’s literacy rate (93.9%) when compared to a country is as good as South Africa while India’s average is worse than Uganda at 74.4%. · Kerala has the highest house ownership percentage (87.5%) This is 33.5% ahead of the national average and exactly 9% ahead of the second best Haryana · A staggering highest, sex ratio of 1084 females per 1000 males Even with an already high ...

Like any DC fan boy, I was waiting for this with bated breaths. But stepping in and seeing the way it starts, kills you. The film falls apart right from the beginning: The witch and her brother who come without much background, decide to go for a demolition plan, again in a massive scale without a lot of depth to their motivation to build a machine to destroy all of mankind. We have only been introduced to how the unconventional Task Force X have a difficulty getting through, against all the restrictions from the government and just when we expect to see more of a slow elation towards the build up: finally gelling together and hitting it off, they’re brought together, just like that and made to fight against the opposite forces. Harley Quin was only as good as the trailers while the Joker disappointed and don’t pin this on the benchmark Heath set, even if we see this as an independent performance, this is shallow. It is cliched beyond understanding, it almost makes you wonder w...

Score: 7/10 The film starts off strong and intense, throwing black humour along the way (Shahid's story) but it starts getting a little too unbelievable with Kareena's story after sometime, which could have been avoided, adding layers of unnecessary sweetness and convenience in their struggle. But Shahid's as well as Alia's story keeps us captured with the sometimes too gory-sometimes fun kinda roller coaster. Alia is clearly going to go places with her slow evolution towards maturity with acting, she gives almost everything possible to the role. Shahid isn't far behind as well. The cinematography is at times hallucinatory and other times the standard casual one.

Score: 8/10 The sequel of Cloverfield, surprised me with its interestingly claustrophobic plot, which now and again makes us wonder whether it (the attack) really happened or is he just weaving story of his own (may be because he is a little twisted at his head) Even after certain revelations that supposedly should remove the doubts, we are left wondering what else does he have under his sleeves. By "He", I mean the protagonist/villain/savior/mystery. The darkness of the film may deliberately irritate one, which is exactly the motive of the director. The film is well acted and well layered, I liked it much more than many mass budgeted films this year. ( www.facebook.com/groups/YouMeFilmJunkie/ )

A Masterstroke Direction Score: 9/10 Aligarh carries a sense of intellect and understanding in the way it has been directed. It doesn't try to be philosophical or engrossing in any form, It stays raw and unfiltered letting the viewers have a first hand experience of the problems that accompany ageing, whether its the loneliness or a step down of the speed in their daily mannerisms, to decide for themselves to settle on a perception. It explores in a subtle way the life of Professor Siras, his simple tastes, listening to Lata Mangeshkar classics and having a glass full of whiskey. The direction in particular is one of the finest one may have come across in the recent past, in Bollywood. Its confident and bold. Bold because it has stayed almost entirely honest to the material instead of holding itself back fearing whether it will work right for the audience, because there are places which can make people go utterly bored or sublimely orgasmic. One such scene is when Siras...