eat drink europe!

...so i'm off again!...this time on a travel food show across europe! what else could i have asked for ;) istanbul. cappadocia. athens, pelopenesse. salzburg. vienna. helsinki. turku. stockholm...do i see you go all green?!! heehee so am gone for about 6weeks! the show for a soon to be launched lifestyle channel here in india. dunno if i'll get a chance to update while i'm away...that would've been ideal. am armed with my digital cam n mah new nokiah n 91 which has the most mindblowing sound i've heard come out these mobile/mp3 devices AND orhan pamuk! cheers!

the blew unbrella

...now vishal bhardwaj, i'd say is among the most exciting thinking directors we got in bollywood today. my fav is maqbool no doubt, followed by makdee. it is with this v high expection i went to see "the blue umbrella" this morn...he must've known it wasn't up to his high benchmark...wondered about this delayed release, considering it was ready before omkaara. all this became clear as the film unfolded...completely lacking emotion, the story plodded on at a slow pace, punctuated with some expectedly good music tho' unnecessary song dance numbers, ruined by some inconsistent "trying-hard-to-look-good" camerawork n patchy editing. shining thru some very dark frames was pankaj kapoor...he is just fantastic...breathing n living his character (much like he wow-ed us in maqbool), getting the look perfect and the accent. and the girl! - bright eyed n cute but didn't pull on the heart-strings (like say the girl in makdee)...i'd fault the script really, not her. so net-net, all wonderful ingredients not coming together...tch tch!

happy birthday channa!

the calm before the storm ;)

oye balley balley!

chak de last night got me so excited n so happy...so what if we had to crank our necks up from our second row seats...it was just so fantastic to see hockey up there on bada pardah...the passion with the girls played, delightfully peppered local-flavour dialogues (notwithstanding some awful cliches)...a good tight script (albeit a lil predictable tho' pacy first half)...and srk! o he must've had a blast doing this film. i mean, of course there were the ickky srk moments, when his voice quivers n his hands tremble...but it worked! and how!...a full house cheering lustily to the very end, almost like lagaan! but this was hockey! and that made me all teary-eyed!... well-researched and a good bit of detailed nuances in the way the game is played. o the girls!...just fantastic, esp my fav - the impish haryanvi chautala. the tension betw the fowards so real...the locker room backstabbings...transported me right back to my inter-school matches...three cheers! and five stars!!

the worst film list!

...something new i'm on to - instead of valliantly battling bombay's insane traffic, i walk into the nearest cinema hall/multiplex n settle into a film! sucker that i am, this evening walked into the gorgeous art-deco liberty at marine lines for "bow barracks forever"...as usual, i'm anxious to get a seat plonk in the middle of the hall, the guy behind the window bellows, "arrey kahin bhi baith jao!"

all of six people in this 1000 seater!!...and i soon learnt why!...attrocious, if ever there was a film worse than this. hamming for acting, awful music, stereotypical representation, badly written dialogue repeated o so often (in case you didn't get it the first time) you want to cry, a camera so reluctant to move, a wafer thin plot...grrrr i could go on...

and captive audience that i was, stayed on till the very end!... and yes, you guessed it - nothing really happened!...

so which was your worst film?...let's compile a list!