Maniratnam is the Guru

Watched Guru last Sunday. Though I have a lot to say but considering that fact that I am at work and that too it's morning, I am keeping it short.

What an acting! What a direction, cinematography, music! What a movie! Maniratnam, A. R. Rahman, Abhishek Bachchan, Mithun Chakravarty... Everything is so good about the movie. A big thumbs-up to junior Bachchan and Mithun Da for their class-leading acting. I think, it's time for Mithun Da to do second-round of mind-blowing acting.

Indian cinema is growing and growing like anything. So many great movies in such a short span... Rang De Basanti, Lage Raho Munnabhai, Dor and now Guru! It seems every new movie I am watching now is making an entry in my all-time-favourite list.

I watched Guru in R Adlabs, Mulund. Happened to visit Nirmal Lifestyle too. Apart from the great movie, what amused me most was this dance event for children at Nirmal Lifestyle. Despite of the fact that photography is strictly prohibited there, I managed to click a quick snap there. :-)

Is it Modernization or Westernization?

I and Rajeev were standing on a tea-stall behind our office. It's almost a routine for me and Rajeev to visit the tea-stall at least twice-thrice a day, no matter how many teas we have in office in a day. ;-)

There is a private college with some Tilak... name. I am not sure about the courses offered by the college, but I saw MBA/MCA written below college's name on a wall nearby. Every-time I go there and see the students, I find myself thinking unnecessarily. There is always a debate going on in my mind. Topic? Westernization vs Modernization! Every student has got something different as far as looks and outfits are concerned. Take example of their pants, they wear pants those are so bizarre in looks, it seems they haven't washed them for months. They are so low at waist, it seems they can fall anytime. Underwear are apparently visible and if they bow in front direction by 30-40 degrees, you can consider yourself one of the people who got a chance to see private parts of this gentleman/lady!

One young gentleman was shouting abuses at someone on phone. His opposite-sex batch-mates were standing very close to him and were giggling all the way. This guy was center of attraction for everybody passing by. I would rate those abuses below C-grade, only a sadak-chhap drunk moron can abuse this way. We Indians use incestuous abuses and we (men) can digest them but the abuses seemed alien to me, felt like approaching the guy and slap very hard. The only thing I could think was, 'These are under-graduate students. Future of India! What happened to their manners?'

Suddenly, many questions seemed to blow up my mind! Is abusing aloud a sign of being contemporary? Wearing highly obscene/vulgar clothes a symbol of being modern? Are they modern? Or are they going Western? Or are words Modern and Western synonyms? One part of my mind says, Banwari, beta, you are too much traditional to digest this. You have come from a very small place and these young fellows have been living in the fastest Indian city for their entire life, and this makes a difference. But another part of my mind is not able to accept it and keeps me bugging, always. It says, 'Mumbai is going towards Westernization, not Modernization!' :-)

New Year, New Resolutions... New Blogger!

Another year passed finally and I am in 2007! Unlike every other year passed, this time I have set some goals for myself. There are some new year resolutions. Most of them are very much personal and I don't want to bore anybody with my personal life. One resolution I can talk about here is 'I will try to blog more. At least 5 posts per month.' Well, I seem to fail at this resolution of mine. 17 days have passed and it's first post of the year. Blogger has come out of Beta stage and have provided some new cool features (still figuring out, what are those?).

I have many expectations from 2007 and myself. Will have to try hard to live up my own expectations. So, 2007... I'm coming. :-)