WHERE I BECOME MY OWN

Sometimes we sleep open-eyed, thinking of what is to come, or what may have been.Sometimes we listen to words of a poet, and fall in love with him unknowingly--not because of what he is,but what he thinks.Sometimes we fall like torn out pages from the book of an unforgiving author,and we lie crumpled, abandoned, silent..., yet unfinished.Sometimes, we wait for every passing second and by then,we're too old to even love.

FILM REVIEW-MAN BITES DOG

Recently I saw two films: Man bites dog (Dir: Remy Belvaux) and All about my Mother (Dir: Pedro Almodovar). Since the first one is less well-known than Almodovar's creation, and because it's one of the most weirdest, but most unconventional films I've come across so far, I take the discretion of writing on Man Bites Dog.

Man Bites Dog is a crazy, whacked-out, unusual Belgium film, (or rather a documentary), made on a serial-murderer (Benoit Poelvoorde's ) who agrees to take an almost amateur film crew (a small group of 4) along with him, every time he decides to inhumanly kill someone. His favourite victims are the mailmen, but also enjoys killing old people, as well as other age-groups every now and then. His ruthless acts are brilliantly intermingled with classical instrumental music and visuals of old architecture which lend a jarring tone to the entire film. The film works on the lines of a dark comedy. Initially, I was pathetically lost within the first few minutes of the film, trying to untie all the strands of the film from the start. First thought that entered my mind was that it's a grossly sick (!) film. However, once you figure out the actual rhythm of the movie and swallow the idea that there will be gross murders in front of your eyes--you begin to enjoy the film--particularly for it's originality, I suppose (as well as for Benoit Poelvoorde's contribution to the film). Belvaux's team initially stands outside the diameters of Poelvoorde's job (I call it 'job' because this is Poelvoorde's way of earning his livelihood--he murders people and then takes their moolah). Anyway, soon a friendly (and ironically 'human') relationship begins to build between the team and the murderer, so much so that the team actually begins to "help" Poelvoorde with his "accomplishments". One of the interesting scenes in the film is on Poelvoorde's birthday, which is held at his best friend, Valerie's house. Belvaux's team, Valerie, her boyfriend (who apparently treats her badly) and a few others attend the small get together. Belvaux gifts him a gun pouch. Poelvoorde's is extremely thrilled, and he puts his gun in the pouch, hangs it on his shoulder, and tries to see how he'll look while taking the gun out. The mood at the party is jovial, and the camera locks on to Poelvoorde as he practices taking the gun out. Soon we hear a gun shot and we know Poelvoorde has just shot his next victim. The camera pans only to discover that it is Valerie's boyfriend who has been shot right in the head. Valerie sits still, aghast, looking at her supposed best friend, with her boyfriend's blood all over her face and body. It's a crazy moment in the film, trust me!--and you'll come across more of such once you're into the film.

You need a strong stomach to watch the film, of course, but if you like to experiment a bit with your taste, you must watch it! It gives you a different perspective towards many things, as well as almost an insider-look in what goes on in the mind of a psychotic serial-killer.

Enjoy.

Walk in the park

So I was the youngest kid in the family of seven--dad, mum, brother, grand parents and dog.
Grew up with my tying my pig-tails with pink ribbons, wearing pink shirts, and devouring on gems packets. Barbie dolls became my plastic room-mates. Thought make-up was the best way of 'looking good', so tried convincing my ma to purchase a box of cosmetics, along with a new pair of pink high-heels ever year. Of course these demands were conveniently ignored. 

Evidently, I was the child of the commercial age. Mind you, my parents never encouraged any of it, but what did weave my notion of conventional good-looks and cosmetics, was the pure and simple lineage of advertising.

I brought myself up on a strict diet of television entertainment--obsessed with watching Bollywood songs and Khiladi dance numbers. At the age of four, I would sit cross-legged in front of the television, eyes glued on to everything that encapsulated within the four corners of the television screen, showing off my polka-dot panties off to the world with little care, and sucking on two thumbs. I was the zombie-kid.

Modelling became my ultimate goal in life (yes, I was sincerely very naive), since I thought that was all there was to life. Acting was my second option. Or reverse--either which way, you get the point. Of course all these goals soon were deconstructed, underwent a harsh series of experiments, and eventually (and thankfully) changed--but that's for later. 

Television constructed an ambiguous, ill-defined and unreal perception of reality in my mind, and I grew up ignoring and detesting news channels, being completely disengaged with other crucial issues which plagued the world. I was the anonymous product of the dumbed down era.

Up until the age of 20, I lived in my comfortable bubble--where men, music, poetry, literature, weight, clothes and telephones, superseded other issues in life. Pink however, was no longer my colour. My existence was terribly narcissistic in character, where I was happily disconnected from the world. Elections, politics, covert media messages, natural calamities were not of importance to me. I had poverty in information and knowledge.

Though brought up in a family of scholars, and surrounded by a plethora of books on science and history, I gifted no importance to them. I had intellect, but chose not to practice it. There were times when I brought myself to question certain things, but always suppressed them, thinking that even if I did actually think about them, what good could it bring about? I always thought news was passe (as ironic as it may sound), and an element which formed a dominant part in the lives of those who had passed the age of 40.

Reading the newspapers, I believed, was boring, ineffective and 'oldish' in nature. I was young, I wanted to live young, and thought that drooling over Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise was what was 'hip'.

Mistakes. We all make them.

v. al. r. im-perfect.

Life at 21 changed. I decided to move out of the cocoon of my home and create my own nest elsewhere. Mumbai, I thought, was the best place to do that. I wanted to be independent. I was sick of parents literally breathing down my neck and controlling everything I did or say. I was a rebel (evidently inspired by James Dean). I wanted to break-away, thinking it was 'cool'.

What I got, was a kick-in-the-butt.

I reached Mumbai to do a post-graduation course in Mass communications, where pink transformed to black and white. I was forced to open the newspapers (much to my disinterest) and reality, not milkshake, was literally forced down my throat. I was given a different perspective to life. Films, theories, news reports, books dominated my life. I was forced to think. Forced to practice my brain, forced to question and challenge theories, concepts, norms, notions.

It was a good kick-in-the-butt.

Men lost their importance (not that I've changed my sexual orientations or anything, but love-affairs just didn't seem to matter so much anymore), my tastes in television viewing changed, I began taking interest in politics and issues that concerned the world. I became more passionate about films, and my ideologies steered towards the left.

Change is the only constant. Bring it on.

Senselessness in Sensibility

Inkstains creep on the paper:
Blots of imagination,
and wreathes of scribbled emotions,
Speak in curves and motions,
Of fictional characters that chatter in my head.

The windows clatter,
Reality shatters,
Idealism bleeds,
Words become avant-garde.

*

Voices. voice. vice. ice.

Lost. Losing. Letting go.

I sip my wine, unwind on the bed:
Lie on the bed. Lie on you. Lie to you.
Lovers lie. Liars lie.

I am one of them.

*

The Legacy of Malthus and Something Like a War

Man’s vocation, according to the essay, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, has two real alternatives—humanization and dehumanization. However, while humanization is an ‘inescapable concern’, those who are economically and socially powerful, usually take to exploiting, oppressing and debasing those who are in a weaker position. Dehumanization therefore, manifests itself in an oppressor-oppressed equation, where the oppressed seldom speak out or voice against their ruthless abuse.

The relationship of the oppressed-oppressor can be identified between the first-world countries to the third-world countries (America waging a war with Iraq, purely for the greed of oil), master-servant, and employee-employer, of man-woman, student-teacher and landlord-peasant.

Deepa Dhanraj in her film, The Legacy of Malthus depicts how the landlords (rich) victimize the meager-waged farmers of Rajasthan. She draws parallels of their predicament, with the ruthless exploitation of the peasants in Scotland, by the landowners during the 1800s.

The film is woven by narrative voices of women peasants, narrating how through ages, the rich Jats and Thakurs have lived on the grains produced by the farmers, while the farmers themselves, have starved. In the entire village, there are 20 rich houses belonging to the landlords, while 400 huts are below poverty-line—their wells remain dry throughout the year.

  The system of oppression becomes more haunting when Gora Bai (peasant), describes how the landlord pulled out the seeds the government gave her, from the land and forcibly argued that it was his land. When she revolted, he threatened to shove her head into the ground. Two levels of oppression come into being here, first, of the master and servant (due to economical disparity) and the second, of man and woman.

Gora Bai however, introduces a new element to the lineage of oppression: “We live in fear of both the shopkeeper and the government.”  Under Indira Gandhi’s government, India accepted a loan from the International Monetary Fund, which demanded, among other things (like increase in exports), control over population. Shortly thereafter, the United States intervened by trying to ‘help’ India reduce her population. The relationship established between America and India then, become one of the oppressor and the oppressed, where the former’s behaviour showed elements of ‘false generosity’.  

In 1974, America relied a lot on the 3^rd World countries’ resources. For this reason, the United States was interested in the social, political and economic stability of these countries, which was invertly related to population. Population stability of countries like India, then became of important concern for the U.S.—it therefore encouraged the Family Planning Program in India.

Something Like A War, a sequel to The Legacy of Malthus, begins with a group of women villagers talking proudly about menstruation and how giving birth empowers them. In the 1980s, the Family Planning Program was implemented with enthusiastic support from the central government, especially in the rural areas. Indira Gandhi’s government undertook strict methods such as withholding salaries and denying ration to villagers who refused to participate in the program.

Oppression intensified through the game of power, when the jobs of Patwaris and ration-shopkeepers were threatened by the State government if they could not bring ‘cases’ for sterilization. The Patwaris then functioned as ‘government officials’ who promised male farmers money (Rs. 500), loans, land, television sets, if they pressurized their women to get sterilized—none of which, as one woman says, “were incentives which actually benefited the woman”.

 These women became the voiceless, anonymous ‘cases’, identified with numbers pasted on their foreheads during operations, where they were operated in the most unhygienic, fly infested conditions, without anesthesia. Many of them even died after the operation. 

A simple pattern in this legacy of oppression and exploitation can be identified—a I^st world country pressurizes a 3^rd world country—the government of the latter pressurizes/oppress the rich landowners, who in turn oppress the male farmers, who oppress their wives—money here, functions as the underlying catalyst to this inhuman domino effect.

 The disconcerting visual and audio elements in the film, jolt the viewers off their seats, since for the first time they are shown the dark side of the Family Planning Program, which was otherwise celebrated by the Indian government as a mark of ‘progress’.

 In The Legacy of Malthus, the underbelly of the Green Revolution is also exposed. While the government corroborated with the U.S. and decided to incorporate chemical fertilizers in its agricultural methods, the only ones who dangled at one end of the rope were the farmers. Gyarsi Bai, a villager states that earlier they were healthier, and now: “we eat vegetables grown from fertilizers, which has made us weak.” The fertilizers destroyed the land and lowered the nutrition value of the crops, adding to the farmers’ plight, since the landowners already gave them arable land.

            Deepa Dhanraj intersperses the film with a scenes from a play enacted by actors who retell the impediment of farmers in Scotland. The ‘commons’ (which was land for all) was infringed upon by proprietors, and arable land was given to the poor peasants. Poverty ensued; the highlanders were starved to submission and forced to immigrate, in hope to find better lands for survival. She does this for two reasons: First, to justify why the poor immigrate to cities, and second, to show that the behaviour of exploitation and oppression is universal and exceeds time and geographical boundaries.

            Something Like A War, throws light on the shocking forcible atrocities the government inflicted on women in order to control the population. The rural women not only boldly discuss how they were forcibly sterilized, but also share how the government, for its selfish interests, was the least concerned for its citizens, especially the women.

National ‘development’ in its most gruesome form is the subject of Dhanraj’s films. Both the documentaries are therefore, told from the perspective of women—one who are the primary victims. Dhanraj gives the women a platform to speak, to voice how they felt during the program and the dilemma they faced between being answerable to their in-laws, who demanded innumerable sons, or to the government, which demanded not to have more than two children. Their own demands however, were never taken into consideration.

            One of the most haunting scenes in the film is that of a woman held down on a bed, while the doctor (with half-concentration) operates on her, while he speaks to the camera. Her mouth is clamped shut and her face contorts with pain and anger as she tries to beg for mercy. Gyarsi Bai leaves us with the most potent message—the government is mercilessly eradicating the poor, not the poverty.

The Legacy of Malthus ends with a teacher in a municipal school making his students repeat the ‘benefits’ of the Family Planning Program: “The country’s population should be reduced so that people can live comfortably and the daily needs of the people are met.”—illustrating how through education alone, the mind of a child is indoctrinated with false ‘truths’. The scene in interposed with a woman villager confessing that she too has begun to believe and internalize what the landlord taunts her with: the villagers are poor because they are illiterate, idiotic and senseless.

The last shot of this film, is the view of the slums from a moving train—it is Dhanraj’s way of stating, that we have become so immune to poverty, that though we see the sight everyday, we remain unaffected. Through this film, Dhanraj successfully counter-argues Thomas Malthus’ Legacy, proving through the exploration of the rituals of the landlords and the government, that the principle reason for poverty is not overpopulation, but the inequitable sharing of land and the ghastly economic disparity between the rich and the poor.

*

Documentaries by: Deepa Dhanraj

FOUR CORNERS

You stand within the four corners, with your head bowed down, naked. And you think. It’s not a new feeling, this nakedness. You squat on the orange tiles, thinking, staring at the empty bucket: wishing, waiting, wanting to be filled, completely. And you wonder why you’re referring to yourself in second person—perhaps because, you’re your story yourself. The tiles turn yellow, to green, to maroon... and you swoon in your own emptiness, in that void of absolute nirvana, where you belong to your own nothingness; you smoke it in, swirl in it and tap your feet against that wet floor overflowing with the water that has filled that once empty bucket. Sufism, of the mind, really. My god? The nothingness I find in blank sheets of paper; on streets lit with lonely street-lights; in moths who find a purpose to their lives in those very lights; in my hands, confused with lines, speaking of nothing but age.

Here. This. This is your world; anything can be your truth. You create your truth, you believe your truth. Question is, do you believe in your own existence?
*
I exist in the city of Mumbai, within the boundaries of India, where almost every third girl in my class (as elite an economic bracket my class may belong to) has found her life partner at the age of 21, or has intentions of finding him soon. I, on the other hand, am single, which by Indian standards, is something to be worried about. Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter whether my mum is concerned that I find a boy or not, but for the neighbours, the matter is gravely important.

What they don’t know is that I intend on having lustful, dark, secret affairs with Bergman, Kurusawa, Godard and the likes. Even though they won’t probably look at me, or be interested in having conversations over smokes and coffee. I don’t smoke, so coffee maybe. I wonder what they’d think....

Here. This. This is your world; anything can be your truth. You create your truth, you believe your truth. Question is, do you believe in your own existence?

SUPER-SIZE ME

Written and Directed by Morgan Spurlock
Genre: Documentary/ Non-fiction

The documentary opens with a bunch of children happily chanting, “McDonald’s, McDonald’s, Kentucky Fried Chicken and Pizza Hut! I like food, you like food, Kentucky Fried Chicken and A Pizza Hut!”

No prizes for guessing what this film is all about.

This documentary is a shocker. If you want to know how ‘happy’ you can get with a McDonald’s 'Happy Meal', this film is a must watch! The documentary is a journey of a man, to prove to the world that eating high-cholesterol food products almost every day, is indeed injurious to health. He takes it upon himself to completely detract from his healthy Vegan lifestyle, and take a detour to the big bad world of McDonald’s.

Set in New York, Morgan Spurlock explains how obesity in America, is second to smoking as one of the major causes to preventable death and innumerable illnesses. In 2002, a bunch of Americans sued all the fast-food companies, blaming them for their obesity and related illnesses. This film is Spurlock’s experiment to find out how much role do fast-food joints (like McDonald’s) play in contributing to an individual’s body weight (and size).

Spread over a period of 30 days, the camera tracks Spurlock’s fatalistic plunge into a strictly high-cholesterol diet (eating Mc onald’s products three times a day), with absolutely no amount of exercising. It investigates how this approach to life adversely affects an individual’s work progress, his mental frame of mind, including the physical relationship with his partner.

The documentary functions as a proof to how unhealthy-eating, does (surprisingly!) ruin your body, increasing your chances of diabetes, heart attacks, liver failure, and other fatal diseases. In under a month’s duration, Spurlock had actually put on a horrifying 20 pounds, proving to the world (and to McDonald’s food joints), that their food products are not human friendly at all!

I rate this film 8/10. It is DEFINITELY, one heck of a film to see.