A tribute to Yasmin Ahmad

Malaysia had only one excellent film-maker. Only one. No diplomacy from me this time, I am going to be blatantly honest. That is as much as I could give to Yasmin Ahmad as she passed away yesterday night. Of course, the country does have few more credible film-makers, but if any of our film-makers were going to travel abroad to larger and more demanding film industries and make their cut there, the only person who will make that cut is Yasmin. Hollywood calling? She could even manage that pressure. Thats how good she was.

Yasmin epitomized and easily revolutionized the Malaysian cinema scene in a way no other film maker has done before locally. She epitomized the spirit of essential Malaysian cinema and threw out of the window the idea of a secular Malay, Tamil or Chinese film, which had been the trend up to then. She was someone to look up to. Yasmin was something special not just for her films but she was indeed an inspiration for bidding Malaysian movie makers like me; because she proved that all is not lost in Malaysian cinema, that the industry is not as crappy as people make it out to be, that despite the limited resources, you could still make a world-class film (e.g. Sepet, Gubra, Muallaf).

Any person who has studied films and worth their salt in this industry and knows quality when he/she sees one would readily admit that Yasmin possesed qualities that would impress not only in Malaysia, but qualities but would take Malaysian cinema to larger global canvas, something that other film-makers in this country have dired to achieve. One breeze through the amount of international awards her films have won are a great proof about her abilities.

Malaysia has lost its finest film-maker. How will the industry cope with this?

Yasmin wasn’t only a fine film-maker, her life had its own story to tell. Many have judged her for changing her gender by choice, but she took all that criticism on her stride and kept going. Today, she is fondly remembered for the fine female film-maker that she was, and she has indeed travelled a long way in order to achieve that. A true inspiration for fighting against the odds and setting the trend.

But nevertheless, I am still saddened with the fact that many Malaysians are still ignorant about who Yasmin Ahmad was. Any Malaysian who do watch movies regularly, of any industry at all, should mourn the loss of this piece of jewel which was atop the Malaysian film industry frame. You deserved more appreciation that you received, Yasmin.

This is a funeral commercial directed by Yasmin, what I perceive to be her best commercial work, and nothing fits more than this video to pay tribute to her departure.

Thanks for everything.

Yasmin Ahmad (1958-2009)

Punch, Drunk...Love!

Ahhh. Here we are. Love. Delightful and painful in equal measures, old and new in equal measures, same old same old. For us Indians, love is a major problem, yes, a very major one at that. Just take a survey if you want on how many people lose directions in live once their love affairs do not turn out to be have a happy endings. Forget the stacked amount of suicides, even I had a dear friend to assumed right over his own life partly because of the turbulunce of his love life. It’s been almost two years now since he departed.

Think about many others who give up, who make up a sad story. For another friend, her love was one-sided, unrequited in return.

What don’t I have?

What do I have to change?

Am I not good enough?

These were her questions. To herself.

For some reason, most of us find it embarassing to be involved in an one-sided love affair. We can’t bear the thought of us falling head over heels and repeatedly thinking about one individual whom we do not know thinks even a pint about us in return. In equal measures are break-ups, a party ends up feeling cheated, and sink themselves deeply into the sea of misery for a long, long time. For them, its perfectly fine to be miserable. Why are you miserable? I just broke up! Why are you miserable? He/She doesn’t love me. Its only me!

They say love is a beautiful thing, why then does it become the very excuse for so many people to bathe in pain? An excuse for us to take our lives away. An excuse to feel pity for ourselves. I can only say one thing- stop feeling sorry for yourselves. Because you do not know love enough if you think its fine to be sunk in misery when something fails.

Many years ago, I was in love as well, and yes, it was a failure too. But for some reason, I did not cry. Many thought I’m hiding my pain. Look at that poor thing, so much pain inside pretending to be strong- they’d say. The first thing I came to terms is- theres nothing to be embarassed about. Thinking about someone who doesn’t think about you in return? Whats wrong with that. I was very young when it happened, I was finding for a calling card that would point me which direction to go in life. East, West, North, South, where’d I go? Then love came, it broke barriers, for the first time, you feel different from the world around you. You experience sensations that only you would know, its your own world. Love is a beautiful dream to live. Anaticipation, yearnings, everything about it transforms your world drastically. Then the glass broke. But I continued, I continued loving whom I loved, for two full years, until the feeling waned away.

And I realized something then that most people fail to realize nowadays. Love is an energy. An emotion of superficial power. Happiness, Sadness, Madness, Anger, Insanity, Delight, Ecstasy, all these feelings and emotions are embroiled together under the coat of Love. Its a gift if you have this energy inside you. Use it the right way, and the results would be wonderful, maybe not for your love life, but the quality of your life overall could improve the moment you realize that you can actually channel all the love you have inside you to different directions. Once I learned to channel my love, I found my enthusiasm, I loved life completely, nothing was ever mundane or peripheral again, I understood my purpose, discovered the writer inside me, discovered the storyteller inside me. Rest is history.

My dream started with love. The kind of love that the society would brand as a failure. But they can’t say so now, because I determined for myself whether it is a happy tale or a sad tale. Unless you start taking charge of your emotions and know how to use each of them to good effect, you will allow the emotions to determine the direction of your life- and they will only point in different directions- North, South, West, East, all convoluted at different times. And before you know it, you will be falling of a high cliff.

You know you need to snap put of it, you know that every negative event can be turned into a positive cornerstone, but many of us lack that essential drive to wake up. As they say, its always easier to talk than to put into motion. When it comes into transforming our words into action, many of us fail. That what differentiates the man who has conquered the tall mountain and has etched his flag at the peak and become a legend, and the man who sits at the foot of the mountain, cursing his luck and saying ‘life is so cruel to be’. If you let life’s smallest details to take charge, then yes, life will hit you hard, it will seem like everything is falling from somewhere in the sky, hard on you.

Afterall, love’s biggest details are life’s smallest details.

Yet love is the biggest detail of your life.

That’s the irony that life presents you.

“Life is not about how hard you can hit or punch, it is about how many hits and how hard a hit you can take and still manage to wake up and continue.”- Abhishek Bachchan.

What is novelty?

I had always believed in the idea of doing something significant and highly original is the exemplary way to go in life; not only to serve for one's own pride or motives or fame, but also to be able to attain the fulfillment of contributing to the society.

And thus I recall the life is of Robert Kearns, the man who invented the intermittent windshield wiper which has been used in the automobile business since 1969 up till date, the man who invented the wiper system which had enables all of us to have variable speeds on the wipers that we are using in our cars today. He may not be a famous name to all of us, not as much as Alexander Graham Bell who invented the telephone or Einstein's discoveries, but nevertheless he is an inventor who fought for the right of his invention.

Kearns won a highly publicized lawsuit against the Ford Motor Company back in the 70s for infringement of the wiper patterns that he had created back in 1964. Throughout the trial, the motor company had vehemently denied that Kearns is qualified to call himself an inventor, as he has, according to them, simply 're-arranged' the pattern in a new way and that it isn't actually ground breaking or inventive or original.

However, there was a wonderful response by Kearns in regards to these claims. During the trial, Kearns (who is representing himself) asked his son to bring Charles Dickens' novel A Tale of Two Cities to the court, and asked the witness in the stands (a Ford employee who made that statement of Kearns not being an inventor) whether he had read this book. After confirming that he had, like most people in the court have, Kearns recited the first sentence of the book, and then took up a dictionary and checked up each word in that one sentence. He asked the man in the stands that since all the words in that first sentence are words that come from the dictionary, would Charles Dickens' novel be considered a copy or a non-original work? Would it not make Charles Dickens an inventor? All the Charles Dickens did was, afterall, to arrange the words that were available to him in a new pattern to create this novel, and the work was definitely original. Why then, is Kearns' invention being rendered as not original enough?

Kearns added that an inventor is whichever person who manages to use what tools are available to him/her, and create something new using the tools. And in Kearns' dictionary, the bars are not too high to become an inventor- just look around you, make best use of the tools that are available, find what is your specialty and gift, and you might one day become a creator as well, and more than that, you might become a person who contributes to the society, and you would earn yourself the license to live a fulfilling life.

Robert W. Kearns won 18.7 million US dollars in that lawsuit against Ford. A 2008 Hollywood movie called Flash of Genius documents his travails in his fight to earn his right as an inventor. He rejected a 30 million US dollars out of court settlement despite his divorce and his flaundering career- just because Ford would refuse to damage their company's reputation by admitting they infringed his patterns.

He died in 2005 of brain cancer. He was 77, and dies was an inventor, a contributor to the society. Look at your windshield wiper, and this is the man who created the pattern that enables you to vary the speed of your wipers according to the intensity of the rain.

Eleven Minutes

The common myth is that it takes eleven minutes for a man to experience sexual pleasure to the maximum while being with a woman. Though how much we hate to admit it, the fact is that a major part of our lives resolve in these eleven minutes- they make, break, create and destroy lives, relationships, and the walls that we build around our lives up until that eleven minutes.

And the most less-talked about individuals in this world are the women who trade their body for money, and also the men who pay stashes of hard-earned money to experience these eleven minutes of pleasure with women they have never met before, with women whom they do not know whether the enthusiasm was genuine, with women they ever talked to before. The mention of this people induces filth in at least two-thirds of major societies in the world, not to forget the fact that prostitution is, afterall, the world's oldest profession.

And yet Paulo Coelho is one courageous man, as he boldly explores all these dynamisms in his resounding novel Eleven Minutes. A strictly adults-only fairytale, Eleven Minutes is inspired by the true story of a Brazillian woman who is lured to the prostitution world in Geneva, Switzerland with the promise of great money, and narrates her year-long experience being on the job and eventually finding what she thought she'd be unable to find in the annals of this profession- true love.

Just like Coelho's 1997 work Veronika Decides to Die, which talked about insanity, this book raises various questions about life and sex, and fervently undelrines the significance of an effective sexual life in order to increase enthusiasm towards life itself, and how much those eleven minutes contribute to spiritual enhancement of a human being.

Reading Eleven Minutes is a challeging experience for any reader, it opens you up to a frenetic world where all the morals of the society we live in are simoly placed into a backburner, and a prostitute is given a voice to narrate her desires, her dreams, her strivings, her relationships, and her motivations and uncertainties and a blatantly honest manner.

And that, once again, highlights Coelho's brilliance as an author. Another inspiring and blatantly good Coelho work.

Oy!- Music Review

Coming on the back of the success of Konchem Ishtamga Konchem Kashtamga, or fondly known as KIKK, Sidhharth is quickly establishing himself as a household name in the Telugu industry when it comes to romantic entertainers. Bommarillu, NVNV, and now KIKK have all been huge hits and he is looking to add Oy! into that list. Oy! marks the debut of 'Baby' Shamili, the younger sister of prominent Tamil actress Shalini, who had gone into self-inflicted retirement since tying the knot with actor Ajith in 2001. Shamili is probably more well-known to be referred as Anjali, after playing the role of an autistic child named Anjali in the 1991 Mani Ratnam classic of the same name.

And having lured the Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy trio to the Telugu industry for the first time by having them compose for KIKK, Sid has now lured in Yuvan Shankar Raja to compose for Oy!. This is only Yuvan's second direct Telugu album after Adavari Mataluku Arthale Verule, the film which marked the directorial debut of Selva Raghavan in Telugu, which was later remade in Tamil as Yaradi Nee Mohini. After attaining great success through AMAV, Yuvan follows it up brilliantly through Oy!, making it one of his best all-round albums in the past couple of years.


Anokoledenadu

Not great, but this is nevertheless pretty good soothing number. The regular heroine introduction song, but Yuvan gives a masterstroke by having the sweet Shreya Ghosal croon for this song, and she takes the song to another altogether. Instrument use is consistent even though not spectacular, but the song is in the right mood, and light in general, so you could keep expectations a bit low, and just enjoy it as it plays. Interludes are also soothing.

This is good.


Seheri

Yuvan goes offbeat in his regular style in this hip romantic duet, and attains some excellent results on the way- Seheri is a winner. Toshi steals the show with his singing, and Priya's light crooning gives the song a great slow tone in the middle. Throw into the mix some western rapping in the middle, the changing intermittents are brilliantly handled by Yuvan, and this is certainly one of Yuvan's best compositions in recent times.

Very good.


Saradaga

Delightful. Nothing spectacular again, but its a delight once again. Yuvan keeps it simple in this romantic number, but gets his choice of singers spot on once again with Karthick and Sunidhi Chauhan getting behind the mike and you do not need to push singers of their calibre much to get a good number. This is yet another soothing number that bodes well with the romantic theme of the movie. Light, simple, and delightful.

Very good again.


Povodhae Prema


The pick of the album! The sad pangs in Yuvan's voice reminds you fondly of the masterful 'Oru Naalil' number from Pudhupettai- this meanwhile is a song about the separation of love. Yuvan uses a western theme for this song- which heavy usage of rock band styles of electric guitars, yet the the song retains the appropriate mood, and Yuvan's minimal usage of instruments allows him to expose his low-toned voice excellently. Largely effective in bringing the sad mood.

Excellent.

Oy Oy

The title number of the album, and it is Siddharth crooning the song by himself. Yuvan goes innovative once again, and brings out a hip, peppy number, but the lyrics could have been much better, and could have done without the repeated 'love at first sight' lyrics, which were simply un-poetic at the first place. There is a heavy usage of English words in the song as well, but Siddharth modulates well in singing this with panache.

This is good, enjoyable.

Waiting for You

Give an emotional love song to Kay Kay and he knows what to with it. The second best number of the album, Yuvan and KK almost reach the heights of 'Kathal Valarthen' with this number, though the English lyrics of 'I'm waiting for you baby' seems a little out of place in a largely well constructed poetic Telugu song. KK is simply brilliant and Yuvan knows how to use instruments to effectively compose an emotional song and he does it with total panache.

Excellent.

Overall album rating: 8/10


This is one of Yuvan's best albums in recent times, given the fact that it has been sometime since he last gave a good all round album, all the songs in Oy are worth repititive listening and grows well on any listener. Nothing spectacular, but its a very effective album that will definitely raise the anticipation for the romantic Oy! when it does come out.

Siddharth does seem to be a defining factor in extracting good music from composers who compose for his films. After bringing out a great album from SEL in KIKK, he seems to have been able to make Yuvan hit near top form in Oy!.

The Observer- Episode 6

Pride and Vanity

It was yet another day in which we had finished our squashingly fun Mrs. Nagappan tuition at Methodist High School (MHS). We threw insults at each other in our regular process, went through the majority of the class Not paying attention to the teacher's lessons- Umesh had his fair bit of 'treatment' from us as usual that day- it was all in all a regular brat day we had in tuition, and it was time to go back.

My cousin brother was at Sitiawan as he studied in MHS to repeat his Form 5. so he too was attending Mrs. Nagappan's tuition classes, so that allowed me to coax my parents into giving us the bike so that we could go to tuition (I didn't have a license, so I technically couldn't and shouldn't be riding). And that was a glorifying day for all our bike riding panaches.

As my cousin brother is riding the bike, a fellow tuition-mate passed us by on her bike. HER. So it was a girl. And our pride got hurt in it, not ours, but technically, it was my pride which got hurt- 'why do you even let a girl pass you like that?' I asked him. As silent and non-responsive he was to my question- the next thing I knew he was sprinting the tyres off in overtake the girl in return, and I must mention here the girl in question wasn't an easy spring either, she was literally sprinting her way back home. Once we passed two traffic lights and still found her some good ground ahead of us, I decided to call it quits- but I wasn't the one riding the bike.

My cousin was too far immersed in it that he did not want to call it quits when it looked like an obvious 'defeat'. As if magic struck, she slowed down just before the corner to our housing area arrived. But she wouldn't slow down for no reason wouldn't she? There was a Transnasional bus which is making its way back to the road after being parked at the roadside for sometime, and she had slowed down to allow the bus to take its place. My cousin brother however kept going. I figured he must know what he was doing- he had a license afterall. But that was when I understood licences are nothing- it was too late by the time urged him to step on the brakes. He rammed his enthusiasm straight to the back of the girl's motor, but largely thanks to his pysichally tall figure, he got our bike under control, but she definitely did not share our luck. I looked back at her as she tumbled and screeched onto the road, but my cousin was too panicked to bother, he simply overtook the bus and landed me straight at our house withoutthe slightest of stops.

That is the first time I genuinely felt like a criminal. Have we killed her? That was the question which was raised in my mind. The next day, I received a phone call from Dayalan and he told me the girl has identified who had hit her, because I turned around and looked at her while she fell from grace to the tar floor. She was his friend, and she knew that he is my friend. My cousin brother was too nervous to do anything that he just blatantly handed over RM100 to me and asked me to settle with the girl. And I met her the following day, and she demanded RM50, and I was the most relieved person in the world to see that she has sustained minor bruises here and there and thats about it. However, called her a 'vanity brat' and that ringed up the compensation charges straight up to RM100. Two words later, and the compensation charge was a good RM50 more expensive. Enough said.

But what I saw the following week was a blossoming romance between my cousin (the hitter) and the girl (the hitten). And as always, I have become the negotiator for it, though this time in different dynamics. The romance did not last long though, soon enough we all went in our own ways. And we still have a laugh about what happened back then.

From then on- I dropped my own pride, and disclaimed women with an ounce too much of vanity. However cheapfully fun they may sound, both could make you hit and could make you fall (literally).

And there ended my sexist pride, when I was only 16. Now all my pride resides in who I am as a human and what I am doing to better myself. My gender is just an existing fact, I do not use it as a measurement tool of better or worse.

Love Aaj Kaal- music review

Imtiaz Ali and Pritam are at it again. Bollywood has hit a dry spell of late due to the strike which was caused by the misunderstanding between multiplex owners and film producers. The much-criticised strike has finally ended, and one of the biggest releases lining up for the theaters now is 'Love Aaj Kaal', featuring Saif Ali Khan and Deepika Padukone. The film is written and directed by Imtiaz Ali, who wrote and directed the delightful 'Jab We Met' back in 2007 with Shahid Kapoor and Kareena Kapoor. And combining with him again is Pritam Chakraborthy- who gave what I personally rate as his best album to date in Jab We Met; so the expectations are pretty high for this film.

Twist

Who can forget Mauja Hi Mauja from JWM? Many think that is one of the best fast-beat feet-tapping numbers to have come out in Bollywood in past few years, and if there is any combination could better Mauja, it has to be the same people responsible for making Mauja. And Twist IS better than Mauja. Unlike Mauja, which was more straight-to-the-beat fast number; Pritam this time around gets much more innovative, using different interludes and great catchy music to compose this. As usual, Neeraj Sridhar who sings almost all of such feet tapping numbers composed by Pritam (including Mauja) does a great job in modulating to ooze superb energy to thos song. Classic Bollywood club number!


Ye Dooriyan

Well, this falls on the same lines as 'Tum Se Hi' from JWM, which was my favorite number from the JWM album, and is also one of my most favorite tracks of all time. And it has the same singer, Mohit Chauhan, who is now a oh-so-popular name is the industry after crooning 'Masakali' for AR Rahman's 'Delhi 6' album earlier this year, which turned to be immensely popular. This song, however, doesn't quite get to the heights of Tum Se Hi, but still it is a delightful song that is wirth listening to. Only that Pritam and Imtiaz have set such a high bars with numbers such as 'Aao Milo Chalo' and 'Tum Se Hi' previously, and Yen Dooriyan doesn't reach to that level, but it is good nevertheless. A lack of innovation in the intermittent portions of the song are probably the downside.


Chor Bazari

I can't remember the last time I heard a love duet as funky as this. An absolute winner all the way, Pritam's innovation once again oozes through with great results making this such a delight to hear. To opening tunes are great all the way, and once again, its Neeraj Sridhar crooning with oomph and accompanied by the energetic Sunidhi Chauhan, this number is so feet tapping it makes you feel really eager to see the picturization. Wonderful!
Main Kya Hoon

Kay Kay croons for this lightweight romantic number without attaining any much great results, its fair to say that the song is good enough just because of Kay Kay's voice and the way he sings it with typical panache. Passable.


Aahun Aahun

Wow. Thats how I reacted after listening to this song. There is Neeraj Sridhar once again, and this is simply masterful. Great usage of guitar strings mixed with a blues concept, and add to that typical Bollywood beats, and you get nothing short of a full flow flooring song. Pritam definitely is one of the best out there in creating feet tapping numbers, and in this album alone, he creates three great ones, Twist, Chor Bazari, and now Aahun Aahun. Watch out for Neeraj Sridhar's chaging modulations in this song. Perfect.

Thoda Thoda Pyar

Sunidhi Chauhan sings this number, which, in many ways, is all to similar to Yeh Ishq Hai from JWM. However, just like how Ye Dooriyan fared in comparison to Tum Se Hi, this sing failed to replicate such heights of Yeh Ishq Hai, and we end up getting a good and decent but ultimately unpectacular number.

Verdict: Watch out for 31st July, 'cause this film has the potential to rock. JWM will still remain Pritam's best work to date in my eyes, and had the melody department been improvised better, this album could have outdone JWM. However, this album is phenomenal taking into count only its fast numbers, with all three of them proving to be great winners.