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Showing posts from August, 2014

The wonder that was

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Let us start by watching pAttum naanE. Why would I tell you why yet, this is enjoyable enough for me to not have to bother telling you why. Yet. Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BAVFuEqqV-k If you didn’t like that, you probably shouldn’t read further.

The Jig

No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style. …. Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art.   -           Oscar Wilde (Preface to ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’) This film is a hit or miss. One ought not to talk about its sequences, references, camera, sound and what not,  on even terms without addressing the elephant in the room – the complete abandonment midway of what the central character was thus far. The film’s “descent” into the absurd, the farcical shift in tone – can make or break the film. It cannot be talked of as a minor point, say a mild niggle and shift over to appreciating some nuances in the film-making. You either buy it as a deliberate choice of an artist or a facetious irresponsibility of an amateur, who is learning the ropes. And all evidence of the so-called ‘new wave’ of young filmmakers do urge one to side with the latter. However, I think there is reason enough to believe this