Box Office greens

My friend Sudhir has an interesting take on Hollywood's marketing machinery. Despite the tech sophistry, inventive film-making and adventurous producers, Hollywood still hasn't figured out how to make money out of crap movies. Sudhir points to how Ghajini has been raking in the big bucks despite being a tame rip-off. Interesting eh but then there is Quantum of Solace.

Playing his life

I sit on the pavement by his side, listening to the boy play. A little piece of bamboo with evenly spaced apertures transforms into a wizard's wand. He plays effortlessly and beautifully, notes and smile in perfect harmony. He hands me the flute with the quiet confidence of a master ... encouraging but not quite condescending. My smoker's lungs splutter and cough in protest but cannot cajole a legitimate note, much less a tune. I offer to buy a flute, if he would teach me something. Anything. The boy smiles a boy's smile ... honest and damning. As I walk away with a piece of bamboo, he continues playing his flute.

The man that time forgot

He coaxes a hearbeat
Vision, a cataract blur
His memory flickers like a truant light blub
Scraps of joy in a rubble of woe
He coaxes a heartbeat
How did it come to this
When did life pass him by
When did they stop caring
He coughs a hearbeat
The man, that time forgot

Epilogue: You can't keep a good man down? Ha. Lay him to rest.

Hell dorado

There is a traffic jam on the road to paradise today. So don't die, you may be re-routed to hell.

Life has a ringtone

I don't wear a watch because I can tell time on my mobile phone. I occasionally use it to call people as well. Was there life before mobile phones, Blackberries (plural?) and email? Yes, there was.
There was a time when you could not turn up for work and be left alone, a time when you bought Christmas cards and posted it in red mailboxes, when you arrived on time for meetings, when you visited family and friends and not made excuses via text. There was such a time when you had a life and it didn't have a stupid ringtone.

Monsieur Ibrahim

Isosceles movie alert: Monsieur Ibrahim (French).
Delightful movie this about the unlikely friendship between a sulky teenage Jewish boy and a charming Turkish emigre set in a seedy neighbourhood in 60s Paris. Omar Sharif, the old Turk, is still a raging talent and Pierre Boulanger is precocious. Watch it and sorry no refunds.

Wish upon a year

Hola 2009. It's the year of hope for most of the world and the year of the Ox in China. They are different aren't they, those Chinese. I will stick with the year of hope for now ... and so I have a small wish list. Things I don't want to see include Shah Rukh Khan and burning hotels but for the moment, let's stick to my wish list.

Rajanikant in a Quentin Tarantino movie. Tamil kungfu would clash with Pop Americana and it would be chaos in slow motion. What a prospect.
Bono singing the Kishore Kumar songbook. The world would finally discover Irish chai.
Absolut Bappi. A tribute to the original king of bling, a special gold dust edition.
Johnny Depp as James Bond. Bring back some cool. Angry middle aged men with sculpted abs and million-dollar frowns beating people senseless went out in the 90s with Jean Claude Van Damme.

Have a super 2009.