My Valentines Day special song was an entry to the Desicritics V-Day contest. The results have been announced and I got an honorable mention. Thanks to DC and Templestark for his kind words. This is what he had to say:
Honorable mentions:
Joseph Thomas (Jo) for a song – yes a song!!! (Valentine Day’s Song – Let Them Sleep – that he arranged and sung himself. Top effort. It’s not quite my speed of music but inspiration clearly hit him right between the ventricles.
These predictions are based solely on my intuition, as I have not watched some of the nominated films this year. So these predictions may or may not represent what I think the best, and it’s mostly based on what I think the Academy would choose for the Oscar awards. 🙂
Performance by an actor in a leading role: Richard Jenkins for “The Visitor”
Richard Jenkins has done his role in The Visitor simply and superbly. He portrays a widower who has been caught up with the routine life and pretends he is busy and finally finds something which interests him, that is music. Richard’s acting in this movie is very realistic and with very subtle expressions and he masters the whole thing excellently. Sean Penn and Brad Pitt were superb too, but I think the Oscar should go to this underdog. I haven’t seen the performances of Frank Langella or Mickey Rourke yet. But Sean Penn (movie: Milk) will definitely make it a tight competition for Richard Jenkins. So I would predict it is either Richard Jenkins or Sean Penn.
Performance by an actor in a supporting role: Heath Ledger for “The Dark Knight“
I haven’t seen Robert Downey Jr’s or Michael Shannon’s performances, but I think Heath Ledger should win. He is such a talented actor who gave a totally different dimension to The Joker, a role which was portrayed by Jack Nicholson earlier, and I must say he has done it way better than the legendary Jack Nicholson himself. More than that, the actor has a world-wide sympathy over him for his untimely death and I have a gut feeling that the Academy will consider that. A close competitor would be Philip Seymour Hoffman for the film Doubt.
Performance by an actress in a leading role: Kate Winslet for “The Reader“
I want Kate Winslet to win this award. That woman has done an amazing performance in The Reader. She has been nominated six times for Academy awards and has never won. I hope this time the luck and Academy favors her. The ever amazing Meryl Streep gives a tough competition to Kate Winslet and I wouldn’t be disappointed if Meryl Streep won the best actress award for her performance in Doubt. So it is either Kate Winslet or Meryl Streep.
Performance by an actress in a supporting role: Taraji P. Henson for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
Taraji’s talent is proven in this movie where she portrays a woman in her young and old ages. She has given a good performance and I think the Academy would see that. A second choice would be Amy Adams for her role in Doubt. She portrays an innocent young nun in that film and she handled it very well.
Best animated feature film of the year: Wall-E
The positive edge that Wall-E has over the other animated feature films is that there was a big challenge involved in making this film. There is no conversation for a long time in the film and main characters of the film are robots and to have them express emotions are tough. But the ever amazing team at Pixar has done their magic again and it needs to be recognized.
Random prediction continues below:
Achievement in art direction: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Achievement in cinematography: Slumdog Millionaire
Achievement in costume design: The Duchess
Achievement in directing: David Fincher (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button)
Achievement in film editing: Slumdog Millionaire (Slumdog Millionaire)
Best foreign language film of the year: The Class
Achievement in makeup: Greg Cannom (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button)
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score): Thomas Newman (Wall-E)
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song): A.R. Rahman (Jai Ho)
Best motion picture of the year: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Best animated short film: Presto
Achievement in sound editing: The Dark Knight
Achievement in sound mixing: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Achievement in visual effects: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Adapted screenplay: David Hare (The Reader)
Original screenplay: Milk
[Nagesh will be remembered as one of the most talented comedians in Tamil Cinema, says KK Moidu in today’s guest post].
Cyril K Nagesh, popularly known as Nagesh, has left a void in the Tamil cinema industry. The death of the septuagenarian on Jan. 31 due to complications related to diabetes and heart ailment put an end to an era. The 76-year-old actor is survived by three sons, including actor Anand Babu.
Nagesh, who carved a niche for himself, was most often casted as the man who stands next to the hero. He had enough luck to share screen space with three generations of actors like MGR-Sivaji, Rajinikanth-Kamal Hassan and the latest Tamil heartthrobs Ilayathalapathi Vijay and Ajith Kumar. Most of the people today remember Nagesh as a funny man but many don’t know yesteryear’s front-line heroes like MGR and Sivaji Ganesan were waiting for his arrival on the sets. For producers, his presence in films was necessary for commercial success. He was not able to find enough time and worked on an hourly basis on each film per day. For the last couple of years, Nagesh was rarely seen on screen and his last film was Dasavatharam, where Kamal Hassan played ten different roles. He was one of the leading comedians of the 60s and 70s during the reign of MGR-Shivaji and was a regular in their films. Nagesh, a good dancer, was praised for his pairing opposite Manorama in several films.
CK Nagesh was born as Gundu Rao in a Brahmin community to Kannada speaking Brahmin Madhwa parents in 1933. He left his home as a teenager, telling his parents that he would return only after establishing himself. He travelled to Chennai and started his career as an employee of the Indian Railways. After watching a Tamil play Kamba Ramayanam presented by his colleagues, he felt that he could do a better job. His role in a play as a man suffering from stomach pain staged at the Railways Cultural Association won him appreciation from MGR, the chief guest of the programme. Nagesh began his career as a theatre artiste by playing minor roles and finally reached stardom.
Amvizone brings you an internet based film awards program titled “AmviZone Internet Movie Awards”. They are a community of amateur film makers who create short movies based on small themes and release them online. You can check out some of their videos in their website.
They have come up with this project to find out what the normal Internet users like you and me think about movies and stars. They say that so far the space was dominated by a few media giants and now people also have a say in it. Amvizone has created a voting platform where normal internet users can vote for various movie related categories.
Blog – www.moviebuzz.org
Voting page – http://moviebuzz.org/internet-movie-awards-2008/
Current Voting Status – http://moviebuzz.org/award2008/status.php
Checkout my nominations for Music category.
I have never celebrated a Valentine's Day in my life as I am personally against the idea of such days – be it Valentine's Day, Mother's Day or Father's Day. I mean, you just don't have to wait for a particular day in the year to take your girlfriend/wife out for a dinner, or give her a surprise gift or a bunch of flowers. But that's just me and I don't go around enforcing what I like or dislike upon others. Now with the folks like Sri Ram Sene coming up in arms against Valentine's Day, accusing it as a "Christian festival" (is there any parish celebrating the festival of St: Valentine in India?), "against the culture" and stuff like that, I cannot just sit and say Aye to these goons.
So here is a song dedicated especially to Pramod Mutalik, the chief of Sri Ram Sene. This song is a poem written by the 13th century Persian poet Rumi. I chose Rumi's poem titled "Those who don't feel this Love" as I thought it would be apt for the situation. I particularly liked the lines "those who don't want to change, let them sleep".
Credits:
Lyrics based on a poem by Rumi
Song composed, orchestrated and sung by: Joseph Thomas (Jo)
(Orchestrated with Music Shake)
Download the MP3 file of this song
Those who don't feel this Love
By Rumi
Those who don't feel this Love
pulling them like a river,
those who don't drink dawn
like a cup of spring water
or take in sunset like supper,
those who don't want to change
let them sleep.
This Love is beyond the study of theology,
that old trickery and hypocrisy.
If you want to improve your mind that way
sleep on.
I've given up on my brain.
I've torn the cloth to shreds
and thrown it away.
If you're not completely naked,
wrap your beautiful robe of words around you
and sleep
PS: Excuse my accent 🙂
It’s the first blogger meet especially for all headbanging bloggers – and it comes a day before Iron Maiden rocks Bangalore.
When? Saturday, 14th February 2009 at 4:00 PM
Where? Stones pub, No.303,1st Flr,ashoka Tower, 1st Stg, Indiranagar, Bangalore – 560008
What’s the plan? Have a few beers, listen to some Maiden, and talk about blogging!
How do I register? RSVP at the official meet page, where you will find a link at the top-right to confirm your attendance.
I was looking for the MP3 files for M Jayachandran’s latest, Orkkuka Vallappozhum and I was stumbled upon another recent work from him – Banaras. I was in a hurry to catch my train back to Thrissur and I downloaded a couple of songs from that film. I was happy to find an official karaoke track for one of the songs. That song caught my immediate attention as it was a Dhandiya song. The song name is Chaanthu Thottille and it is sung by my fav singer, Shreya Ghoshal. 🙂 This must be her second Malayalam song after Vida Parayukayaano from Big B. I listened to the song multiple times when I was lying down in the train. Then I thought, why not sing a male version of the song?
As soon as I got a breather in the late evening on Saturday, I learned the song and recorded it. I have changed the lyrics a bit to make it suitable for the male vocals part. Let me know how it sounds. 🙂
Song: Chaanthu Thottille
Movie: Banaras (Malayalam)
Music: M Jayachandran
Original singer: Shreya Ghoshal
Download MP3 file of this song
Banaras – Chaanthu Thottille | Upload Music
(Image courtesy: IndiaGlitz)
[Today’s is a guest post by K K Moidu]. Young director Sohanlal is delighted by the overwhelming response to his maiden directorial venture Orkkuka Vallappozhum (Remember sometimes). The low-budget Malayalam film, with veteran actor Thilakan in the lead role, is bringing him laurels from all walks of life. There are more reasons for him to be happy, this is his first feature film and it has already placed him among well-known filmmakers in Kerala.
Moreover, the film has not only got rave reviews, but it also won the prestigious Atlas Film Critic Award for the director. Awards and appreciation are not new to him. He has won more than 15 awards earlier for his small-screen works. His teleserials Pedakam, Neermathalathinte Pookkal and other mini screen programmes like Sopanam, Anjali, Cinema Vicharana, etc. fetched several awards for him earlier.
Born in Thiruvananthapuram, he has a postgraduate degree in Web Designing and a degree in English Language and Literature from the prestigious University College, Thiruvananthapuram. He has been working with various television channels in Kerala. His initial years at Doordarshan gave him the opportunity to work with famed directors like Shyama Prasad. His live commentary for a programme called Veettilekkulla Vazhi (Road towards home) is still fresh in the minds of people. He has worked with most of the Malayalam channels like Asianet, Amrita, Indiavision, Jeevan etc.
His long experience with electronic media has made him technically perfect in his projects. While working with Indiavision he had the good fortune of working with the legendary littérateur and filmmaker MT Vasudevan Nair. Incidentally, MT is writing the preface for his book Orkkuka Vallappozhum, on which the film was made. A strong critic of present-day commercial potboilers, he always wanted to make good films and Orkkuka Vallappozhum proves his commitment.
Arun M, whose music you have heard in this blog earlier, has done an instrumental cover of a beautiful Hindi song. One thing I like about Arun’s style of playing is that the gamakams he play in guitar are just amazing. It almost sounds like he is playing a Veena, not guitar. 🙂 Let him know your thoughts.
Finally I have watched the much-talked about Oscar nominated movie by Danny Boyle – Slumdog Millionaire and it is a thrilling and grippy movie. Slumdog Millionaire is a good entertainer at it’s best, but not a great movie or worthy of the talks it has going on about it. Because the movie is too much Bollywood-ish in it’s story line. But it is not surprising as the director Danny Boyle has mentioned drawing influence from many Hindi films including Company and Black Friday. Priyadarshan saar – please note this, as you seem so angry at Danny Boyle, that the director himself has credited his influences before somebody else has mentioned it. Ever cared to credit One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest for Thaalavattam? Or… oops! I forgot!! There are way too many movies by you which have lifted story lines from Hollywood movies and made in Malayalam!!!
What is beautiful about Slumdog Millionaire‘s story narrative is the way the Q & A sessions connects Jamal (the lead character played by Dev Patel) back to his memories. It was a beautiful narrative to show how Jamal connected the game show questions to the events of his own life. But I think that Boyle did not need to bring in another narrative with the questioning scene in the police station. That was overdone.
Minuses and pluses
– The lead actor Dev Patel doesn’t sound like an Indian at all. At his best, he looks like an English man’s kid left at the slum in his early teenage. Dev does a horrible job of portraying the slum kid with his British accent which would not go away no matter how hard he tried (and we can see in the film that he tried hard). The movie shows Jamal serving tea in a call center, perhaps to add credibility to his British accent, but that doesn’t save him the embarrassment.
– I have one question. The youngster who plays Jamal’s brother does a good job and looks very native. Why wouldn’t the casting crew find someone of that sort? I am not blaming Dev Patel. I would rather blame it on the casting crew of the film.
– The game show’s anchor (played by Anil Kapoor) wants Jamal out of the show. For what, we do not know. We could understand if it was part of such game shows, planned by the entire crew, but the crew is actually happy at Jamal winning and the anchor is not. Why? The movie doesn’t give us a clue. And he throws him out to the cops at the end of the show. Excuse me?
