TIME!!

Watched The Time Traveler’s Wife yesterday and have been t

hinking about it ever since. I have put off watching this movie for a while as I assumed it was a movie adaption of yet another love story with “Oprah book club”-ish sadness and torment and the pain of lost love. I was true to some extent but it was worth the tears.

The movie is a good adaptation of what I can only imagine must be a dark and intense book. Not having read the book itself, I feel like I cannot do justice to it, so I will stick to the movie version here. This is not so much of a review as a reflection on the ideas floated in the movie. Would I call it a science fiction movie? No, it is a love story though and through. A story about love intense yet flawed in a very human way. A story about loss and man’s instinctive need to live. The movie tries to delve into these deep issues but the restrictive nature of the medium itself stops it from doing justice to the theme. Exploring the need to love and live is the central theme of the story. What makes it the consummate romance story is that even though Henry travels back and forth through time, the story is not muddled by the presence of extra characters. It involves only the people and relationships that are central to his life and the story is explained and explored through them. The pivotal scene to me that captures the existential and nostalgic mood of the movie is when an adult Clare post two miscarriages, is visited by a Henry from the past, from the beginning of their relationship . This is right after she has found out that Henry has undergone a vasectomy in order to prevent any more children from being born as they may turn out to be time travelers. It is a very short but well executed scene where the intensity of her love for him, the earlier Henry, before life has taken its course, come shining through. She also acts on her primal need to continue life by having their child by making love to him in the care. It is a reflection of the sentiment everyone feels, yearning for a past when things were better, life was easier and the world was full of possibilities . Throughout the story the feeling of yearning for the past is a constant presence and given the fact that Henry can go through the past, reliving it, though totally out of his control, makes it even more unfair for Clare. The sense of loss – of love, of time, of life – is so intense that it begs the question, would you really want to travel in time, past or future if you knew there was nothing you could do to change it? Would you want to know how you die, when you die and would death then be any less painful for your loved ones? Would going back time and again to a point in the past that was pivotal and excruciatingly painful help you deal with it any better? The one thought that echoed through my mind while watching this movie and after too was to live every moment to the fullest, as if was your last. For you never know and even if you do, there is nothing you can do to change it.

WALL-E

The good people at Pixar have done it again. Just when the dust was settling from Cars and Ratatouille, here is WALL-E. Though not as thrilling, fast and exciting as the former or sophisticated and story-oriented as the latter, the slow pace and the impassive "faces" of the characters make it easy to imbibe the spirit of this movie. A very strong message is highlighted by carefully though out details like the dark, dull color of earth instead of the usual green as seen from space, the dark oceans, the space junk, slush river and the omnipresent trash compared to the sanitary and robotic yet "peaceful" existence of the people aboard the space cruise liner.
By far the steal of the movie is the adorable Wall-E. It doesn't have the spunk or charm of Lightning McQueen or the rustic hillbilly enthusiasm of 'Mater but the almost expressionless binocular eyes exude pure innocence - almost like that of a newborn baby. Contrast it with the "know-it-all" aura surrounding his friend, EVE, and you have yourself an irresistible pair.
The storyline could have been developed a little more and the pace is slow, but the effort is valiant and so is the theme. My 4 year old son stayed up way past his bedtime to finish the movie and that is a big indicator of the charm of this movie to an audience that does not really get the save-the-Earth message.
A good watch - 3.5/5.

Wild hogs!

Just watched "Wild Hogs" starring Tim Allen, John Travolta, Martin Lawrence, William H.Macy and others. It is an outrageously hilarious movie, an unpretentious commentary on the proverbial "male midlife crisis" and a very down-to-earth response to it. It is certainly a biker movie, with shades of a Western to it, but at heart it is a feel-good comedy with anyone can identify with. The casting is excellent as each character is brought to life especially by the 4 lead actors. I particularly enjoyed the excellent timing of William H.Macy as Dudley, the Geek who gets his fairly tale princess at the end. Also Ray Liotta as Jack "Del Fuego" personifies all the stereotypes that pop culture has set on "biker dudes". A brisk pace, witty dialogues and beautiful picturisation of the open road and the heartland make this movie extremely enjoyable. It even has its version of Mayberry - Madrid NM (pronounced May-drid) complete with the predictable Chili festival, a sheriff who doesn't carry firearms and their favourite pastime, bull-slapping!
The piece de resistance - other than the stunning Marissa Tomeii - is a glimpse of William H. Macy's pale, shrunken, naked butt!
Highly recommended to drive away all your workweek, hard day blues. Definitely a must-see!

Awesome Movie.

Just finished watching an extremely interesting movie called - What the Bleep do we know? Thank you, Mr.John G. Roberts for recommending this movie. It is very good.
I cannot claim to have understood everything that they talked about in the movie. After all, the people featured there were specialists who have come to their conclusions after spending lifetimes in this field. But whatever I could fathom, is sure to make me think about every action that I take. Maybe not every time I do something, but only when I am sitting by myself, quietly thinking or doing the dishes and thinking etc etc. My mind is racing right now with a lot of thoughts and I do not think I will be able to form a coherent critique of the movie. Suffice to say that the only thing I thought was a little out of place is how they started off with something as deep as quantum physics and moved on to something as commonplace as controlling your emotions. If you have watched the movie, you are probably screaming at the screen right now - " But that was the whole point of the movie!!" I know, I already said thatI did not understand everything they talked about in the movie. The part that I did was how ultimately your reality depends upon the choices you make about your actions based on the control you have on your emotions. What I need to understand is how this relates to quantum physics. And that will be my quest.......(if you think you can lend me a hand in my journey.....post your comments..what are you waiting for?)