Slumdog Millionaire : Movie Review

Slumdog Millionaire , a wonderfully entertaining movie . The story is about how Indian teen Jamal Malik participate in the contest " Who wants to be a Millionaire ? " to prove his love for Latika . Much of the movie drama takes place on the set of the game show hosted by Anil Kapoor.

Story begins in the slums of Mumbai and ends up on the shiny set of the show "Who wants to be a Millionaire ? ". Jamal Malik is on the verge of answering the final question that will win him 20 million rupees a whopping amount and the entire nation is watching television to hear his final answer.

Jamal Malik , a chai wala in a BPO company , who is uneducated answers some of the most typical questions in the show to become a millionaire . Well what is wonderfully done is the way each question is related to his life and he knows the answers , because life has shown him the answer of each question. Pay attention and life will tell you all you need to know !! Danny Boyle director of the movie has depicted a picture of childhood exploitation , racism , jealousy , voilence and survival . Each question is some how related to the life of Jamal Malik and it is shown how he recalls his childhood experiences to answer the questions. The film is humorous in chunks , specially the role played by the small kid who represented the childhood of Jamal and that sequence where the small jumps to the pool of shit just to get the autograph of Amitabh Bachan ...ah that was really hilarious !! The story uses flashbacks and three set of actors are shown to represent the ages of Jamal Malik , his brother Saleem and Latika .

Danny Boyle has depcited the past of India , from the slumps of Mumbai to the Taj Mahal in Agra to the most popular dhobi ghat of Uttar Pradesh ... ya even that old Allahabad bridge was shown... which just refreshed some of my memories. The sound track is also great specially that last song "Jai ho" is really good.

An absolutely heart-warming film that Hollywood cannot produce nowadays. Fortunately there is Bollywood! Don't miss the movie of the year. As for my part I have to see this again soon !!

Animal Farm : Fairy tale

Animal Farm -"it is the history of revolution that went wrong" is a beautiful novel , it is a caustic remark on the corrupting influence of the power . Power corrupts but absolute power corrupts absolutely. It is a good story and it shows that it is the human nature and the diversity which restricts humans to be equal and happy.

The story is set on the Manor Farm, owned and operated by Mr. Jones. But One night the oppressed animals rebel and drive out Jones of his farm and decide to run the farm themselves.
The animals decided on set of rules where each would work according to his capacity and respect each others and all animals will be equal. And then there are the seven commandments, the things that separate animals from tyrants, that make all animals equal.The initial chapters of the novel are very humorous , where the animals sing songs against the humans "Beast of England" , and some catch phrases are used by the animals against the humans. Like sheep's are always saying "Four legs good two legs bad !!"

The revolution brought by the animals was doomed from the beginning there were some of the idealistic motto's like no animal would hurt other animal , weak or strong all are equal , but it all failed as the pigs being most intelligent reversed all the commandments that were set initially and established their rule under the leadership of Napolean. Slowly over the course of the novel Napolean becomes a dictator and all other animals follow his orders by heart and changes all the commandments one by one which were the core principal of the Animal farm.

Orwell has shown how the power turned the pigs from simple friends to the dictators and by the end even pigs walk on two legs , the story is shown as the warning against the political power games and in the end a group of human farmers come to see the farm, they quarrel with the pigs over a game of cards - and the animals discover they can no longer tell which is human and which is pig.

There are many humourous intances like when human attacked the animal farm and animals fought bravely and won the war in the end they decide to create a military decoration called as
" Animal hero First class " and named battle as " Battle of Cowshed " .

Overall its a beautiful novel and a small one around 90 pages. Read and enjoy !!

~Apurva

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year..

I wish all the readers and other bloggers a merry christmas and happy new year ..enjoy !!

Iphone Nano !!

Yes there is a rumour of Iphone Nano ... way cheaper than the Iphone launched in Jan 2008 by Apple. There is this pic going about and it looks like Iphone Nano is going for real !!


I hope this rumor is true. It'll be the iPod family and the iPhone family only this time spawning little touch-screen semi-smart phones. Sounds sweet !!

Road Trip to Nagarjuna Sagar Dam and Ethipothala Falls !!

My life was engulfed by the boredom and the laziness.. and it was time I hadn't any outing for quite a time ... so we decided to go out some where and we landed on Nagarjuna Sagar Dam.

We hired the ac cab and started our journey at around 7:30 am in the morning.We started our journey on one of the worst road to Nagarjuna Sagar. It is one road with big curves and turns , but still the road journey was great with all the beautiful songs being played by the driver ...those old songs just refreshed my childhood memories. We did the stretch of 160 km in just a little over than 3 hours.

Nagarjuna Sagar Dam

When we reached the dam we inquired about the tourist places around . We came to know that there is a buddhist monastery and a museum on an island near the dam , Ethipothala waterfalls where there is a light show , in the evening. We headed for the island , we had to take a jetty to reach there and it took forty five minutes. Before going there, we had snacks and took pictures.
On the island we visited the museum , we were not much interested in museum so we moved out quickly and started exploring the island , the island wasn't really that great but there were some monuments where one can take good photos. We returned from the island at around 5pm , were a bit late so we had to miss the buddhist monastery , we headed towards the Ethipothala falls , it was around 16 km from the dam.

Ethipothala Falls

We decide to stay for the light show and it was worth it . After this we headed back to hyderabad and had a great dinner. Overall it was a good outing and worth visiting one time.

Trivia: It is the largest masonry dam in the world. It has 9 gates for irrigation, 11 for power, and 26 gates for the reservoir.

~Apurva

Inspired ...

"A failed entrepreneur is one who quits and goes back to a job. If you're not a successful entrepreneur - it just means that you are not successful - yet! " -- Sanjeev Bikchandani (CEO naukri.com)

There are many times in one's life when one is inspired to do something different , sometimes that inspiration takes us to the greater heights , sometimes we are not able to achieve what we set for , but our thoughts does change in the end. It's said change your thoughts and it will change your life.

Yes currently I am deeply inspired after reading the book " Stay hungry Stay foolish by Rashmi Bansal" . The book has nothing to do with the phrase " Stay hungry Stay foolish given by Steve Jobs" It is a book about the 25 young and old entrepreneurs from the IIM-A. The book consist of 25 chapters the interviews of these 25 people , their stories of how they overcome their hardships and became successful enterpreneurs.

The one thing which I liked about the book is that of all the 25 people selected , each achieved or became successful enterpreneur in their own way. Some were young , some were old, some started their company right after they passed out of IIM , some worked for 15 to 20 years and then quit their job to became successful enterprenur , some even lived on their wife's income , but all these could not really stop them doing what they wanted. This self belief in them created companies like Makemytrip.com , naukri.com , Subhiksha and many more.

Personally I liked the story of Sanjeev Bikchandani the CEO of naukri.com , the first dotcom to IPO on an Indian stock exchange.

I will suggest all to read this book , buy it and keep this book.

~Apurva

A small good story read and enjoy !!

A conversation between a boy and his father in a restaurant. The son asked if he could say grace.
As they bowed their heads he said, "God is good. God is great. Thank you for the food, and I would even thank you more if Mom gets us ice cream for dessert. And Liberty and justice for all!
Amen!"
Along with the laughter a woman remark, "That's what's wrong with this country. Kids today don't even know how to pray. Asking God for ice-cream! Why, I never!"
Hearing this, the son burst into tears and asked me, "Did I do it wrong? Is God mad at me?"
Father held him and assured him that he had done a terrific job and God was certainly not mad at him, an elderly gentleman approached the table. He winked at the son and said,
"I happen to know that God thought that was a great prayer."
"Really?" my son asked.
"Cross my heart," the man replied. Then in a theatrical whisper he added (indicating the woman whose remark had started this whole thing), "Too bad she never asks God for ice cream. A little ice cream is good for the soul sometimes."
The father bought ice cream at the end of the meal. The son stared at his for a moment and then did something that the Father will remember the rest of his life. He picked up his sundae and without a word, walked over and placed it in front of the woman. With a big smile he told her, "Here, this is for you.Ice cream is good for the soul sometimes; and my soul is good already."

~Apurva

Catch 22 : Part 2

"A. Trust me, the next thing I say is true.
B. Okay.
A. The last thing I said was false. B. Umm..."

Catch 22 is a common idiomatic usage meaning " no win situation" . The novel has really turned my head .. up and down. The novel is about the absurdity and self-perpetuating insanity of bureaucracies. There are many themes depicted in this novel like the only way to survive in an insane system is to be insane oneself, the other one that bad men rise in ranks and gain money!!

In the initial chapters ,we come upon a number of Air Force officers in a hospital . Every chapter in the novel tells us about each character and its important to relate each and every event to understand the idea behind. We come across Captain John Yossarian, who is in this Italian island (Pianosa) during World War II and is desperate to stay alive , while many of his fellow officers are not worried at all about there survival. There is always a seen of confusion prevailing in the hospital where each character is shown to behave stupidly.

Well in the novel, the innocent are targeted and there is no proper justice . Yossarian's squadron is forced to fly more than double the number of missions prescribed by Air Force code.
In the whole novel , story revolves around the Yossarian and how he is the witness of the destruction of all his closest friends, until finally his fear of death becomes so intense that he refuses to wear a uniform. After this , Yossarian's logic becomes so pure that everyone thinks him mad, for it is the logic of sheer survival, dedicated to keeping him alive in a world where everyone is ready to kill him.

Often I would get bored reading it, but the book is worth reading .Novel is written in a very confusing way , there is non-linear ordering of the story, and the reader must pay close attention while reading to understand the order of events there are many flashbacks , and story again reorient itself without a notice.

~Apurva

Illusions... are you watching closely ??

" The world is simple. It's miserable. Solid... Solid all the way through. But if you could fool them, even for a second......then you could make them wonder. And then you... Then you got to see something very special " that's the way the illusions are produced , but the clues are all there , the key is to watch carefully , the trick is to show the clues , distract you and never put the clues together .. never makes two and two together !!
Every illusion has three parts ... 1 . The Pledge ( show something ordinary ...) , 2. The Turn (change ordinary into something extraordianry ...) , 3. The Prestige ( where something impossible happens ..you go for answers but you cannot find one and that's were you are fooled ..) ... well that's the magic or the illusion !!

Citizens for Peace !!

Enough is enough is the new catch phrase for the Indian public after the terrorist attack at mumbai. Mumbaikars prepared a massive protest at the Gateway of India and a similar was launched in New Delhi at India Gate. There had been many terrorist attack but this time it looks like a wave is going through the whole nation as if time has come .... and some hard steps have to be taken.
Well we believe in peace, but we also want justice . The time is now for India to deliver justice to all victims of terror. There should be a reform .. political reform , police reform ensuring that no terrorist gets out easily. This terror strike has jarred the Indians in a way that long history of terror bombings and violence never has before. I believe the tipping point has come , we should wake up as we have the influence and the ability to make up.
But what change can be fashioned at this moment is still unclear . Its like a jumble of frustration and anxieties , but we should be focussed on the country's problem ... otherwise we don't have the right to blame any one else but overselves !!

Repercussions...

We have directed our anger and criticism towards the political leaders after the attak in mumbai as their ineptness was to a good extent responsible of this terrorist attack. TV channels are outpouring their venom against the ruling Congress party and opposition Bharitya Janta party. What followed is the resignation of the high profile ministers from the government , but does this solve the purpose ..
Well Indian govenrment has shifted the blame on the Government of Pakistan , though I think that govt of Pakistan should be held responsible for this , but we should also keep in mind the blatant failiure of India's intelligent service. The Mumbai attack was a repercussion from events that have taken place in different parts of the world. The attack clearly indicated that india does not have the fundamental security system and people of India are paying for this negligence with their lives.
The repercussions can be many , but here are some what I think.
1. BJP uses this to win the sympathy vote and wins the election.
2. Intelligence agencies get funded to fight against the terrorism . Hope the money goes in the right direction .
3. Proofs are there that Pakistan is involved ,India gets ready for a full blown war . India attacks on the eastern part of Pakistan and US on the western part and squeeze the Pakistan to the point of chocking !!