Reel-ing

There are movies and there are movies.... Some leaves us prelexed, some elate.
They stay with us and grow with us, sometimes as constant companions and some other times as signpost's.
My journey, with and through movies have been one of the most fulfilling and facinating.
Some of them have stayed with me ever since I saw them, they just refused to go away.
One such movie is 'Anand' the 1971 classic by Hrishikesh Mukherjee. Nothing can stop you from admiring the story, direction and acting, its a tragedy which is so full of life. In 1971 the soon to be legend Amitabh Bachan is six filims old and the performance gives you a window to what was going to be the era of the 'Angry Young Man of Indian Cinema'. He performs with such intensity. He brings to screen the pain and grief any doctor would have felt in India of 1970's, the sight of a sick nation, with nothing near to a solution visible.Its high hopes after independence has't reached anywere near reality. A nation is in despair. Even Anand, played by the ever charming Rajesh Khanna is a symbol of the larger picture, inflicted with a disease which has no cure. The helplessness makes the doctor angry with grief, he is angry with himself for his own and the nations inability to find solutions to its problems. The nation has lost its hope and Anand has lost his love. He is an orphan and comes to Bombay to spend the last days of his life there in company of  friends as soon as he looses his love and any hope to life in Delhi, perhaps the most wounded city in the history of modern India.. The orphan motif is widely used in hindi cinema of the era as a symbol of rootlessness caused by partition and oher constant hardships life inflicted on the population. Its a feeling of being orphaned that is more acute rather than actually been orphaned. The journey of popular Indian hindi cinema has always been linked to the narrative of the nation by many scholars like Aashish Nandy.  Anand asks us not to loose faith and exalts us to keep the show going, for its not just a show; its life. Its the message of the greatest showman of Indian Cinema- Raj Kapoor to whom 'Anand' is dedicated. The movie asks us to hope and live on as its futile to fight life. It symbolises our best survival tactic; to internalise the circumstance and live through it rather than fight a battle which you are sure to loose. There is more than one reason that 'Anand' will remain one of my all time favourite movie.

CHIEF SEATTLE'S LETTER

"The President in Washington sends word that he wishes to buy our land. But how can you buy or sell the sky? the land? The idea is strange to us. If we do not own the freshness of the air and the sparkle of the water, how can you buy them?

Every part of the earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every meadow, every humming insect. All are holy in the memory and experience of my people.

We know the sap which courses through the trees as we know the blood that courses through our veins. We are part of the earth and it is part of us. The perfumed flowers are our sisters. The bear, the deer, the great eagle, these are our brothers. The rocky crests, the dew in the meadow, the body heat of the pony, and man all belong to the same family.

The shining water that moves in the streams and rivers is not just water, but the blood of our ancestors. If we sell you our land, you must remember that it is sacred. Each glossy reflection in the clear waters of the lakes tells of events and memories in the life of my people. The water's murmur is the voice of my father's father.

The rivers are our brothers. They quench our thirst. They carry our canoes and feed our children. So you must give the rivers the kindness that you would give any brother.

If we sell you our land, remember that the air is precious to us, that the air shares its spirit with all the life that it supports. The wind that gave our grandfather his first breath also received his last sigh. The wind also gives our children the spirit of life. So if we sell our land, you must keep it apart and sacred, as a place where man can go to taste the wind that is sweetened by the meadow flowers.

Will you teach your children what we have taught our children? That the earth is our mother? What befalls the earth befalls all the sons of the earth.

This we know: the earth does not belong to man, man belongs to the earth. All things are connected like the blood that unites us all. Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself.

One thing we know: our God is also your God. The earth is precious to him and to harm the earth is to heap contempt on its creator.

Your destiny is a mystery to us. What will happen when the buffalo are all slaughtered? The wild horses tamed? What will happen when the secret corners of the forest are heavy with the scent of many men and the view of the ripe hills is blotted with talking wires? Where will the thicket be? Gone! Where will the eagle be? Gone! And what is to say goodbye to the swift pony and then hunt? The end of living and the beginning of survival.

When the last red man has vanished with this wilderness, and his memory is only the shadow of a cloud moving across the prairie, will these shores and forests still be here? Will there be any of the spirit of my people left?

We love this earth as a newborn loves its mother's heartbeat. So, if we sell you our land, love it as we have loved it. Care for it, as we have cared for it. Hold in your mind the memory of the land as it is when you receive it. Preserve the land for all children, and love it, as God loves us.

As we are part of the land, you too are part of the land. This earth is precious to us. It is also precious to you.

One thing we know - there is only one God. No man, be he Red man or White man, can be apart. We ARE all brothers after all."

The Story Teller

madhavikutty
She taught me dreams.... (not malayalam)
it was the person behind the stories that fascinated me..
i always thought what kind of a mind spews such prose......
so i went deep into the person behind the story

i was recently watching the old national unity ad created by bharatbala
'mile sur mera thumara' (what a wonderful creation for me, but for today's kids it ll look ameturish!)
it got me thinking how those old doordarshan images shape the imagination n vision of our times of my generation.
As of how we perceive the world around us
as some one who grew up in to the fag end of that hyper nationalistic era,

where even ads had an unmistakable stamp of nationalism (remember those bajaj ad's),
times when rajiv gandhi got assassinated,
when the ambassador car carried all sorts of symbols which made no sense (now i know they were symbols of global vehicle manufacturers!)
those symbols are etched in the collective memory
they influence me as a person, as a citizen
the enquiry is not about the nostalgic value
but about how those times influence me as a person

i do wonder what images does today's kids grow up wit and how do they shape them
that's my interest in popular culture

its pre monsoon showers across kerala
the best season to be here

there r couple of books on monsoon
chasing the monsoon- alexander frater
and where the rain is born a compilation- by anita nair

i have always felt it

imagination is more important...than the knowledge or the experience..... try this....i think, thinking abt going to a beach creates more impact than physically going there

hmmmmmmmm
i saw mumbai meri jan.... its not an unforgettable movie but a good one