Philosophy of My Favorite Movies

Little over a week ago, a good friend of mine nominated me on Facebook to identify my top 10 favorite movies..one per day. I usually avoid taking up any challenges on social media because they are rarely challenging, and worse, often self-aggrandizing. The current challenge also had the danger of being self-aggrandizing: "Look, I am so cool to have watched these cool movies that you probably haven't!" However, after a little hesitation, I did take up the challenge, because it would give me the opportunity to reflect on the movies I have watched.

We do a lot of stuff in life, reading books, watching movies, meeting people, working on our jobs, and so on. However, we do not spend enough time reflecting on them. We quickly move from one activity to another, rarely ever pausing to reflect on our actions and experiences. I think this is a tragedy because when we don't reflect, we bereave ourselves of the opportunity to learn and gain insights.

So, I decided to take up the challenge of identifying my top 10 favorite movies, but instead of simply posting the posters of my favorite movies, I also decided to explain why I loved these movies. And this process of reflecting on my favorite movies has indeed been an illuminative and insightful experience for me. In the current post, I re-list the movies I had posted daily on Facebook, with some additional comments. In the interest of readers' time, I have tried to keep my reflections short. I hope people still find some value in these short notes.

My Top 10 Movies

10. Predator

My first movie on the list was the Predator, the original one from 1987. For those who know that I am a fan of the action genre, this selection may not be surprising. However, I must also admit that there are many better action movies than the Predator. The reason Predator ended up on my list is that I had watched the latest installment of the Predator series the same day. So comparisons between the two were inevitable.

While the new movie was spoilt by the inclusion of some very unrealistic characters  (for example, a woman scientist whose physical prowess were better than that of trained soldiers) influenced by the radical social justice movement recently plaguing Hollywood, the original was not. Worse, in the new movie, many of the characters fighting the Predators did not seem to have any fear. In contrast, the first movie, despite being full of tough guys, showed them as vulnerable. Specifically, they were scared shit of the unknown danger in front of them. This vulnerability made them relatable to the audience. The problem with a lot of action movies these days, especially in Indian cinema, is that they make their heroes completely invincible.

I think another reason why the original Predator movie worked so well, despite its many flaws, was that it didn't show the body of the predator until much later in the movie. I believe this is what made the movie so scarily thrilling. When you don't see the monster, you imagine the worst. The fear of the unknown puts the imagination on an overdrive and makes the movie scary and thrilling. This is also the same reason why the first Jaws movie is such a classic, but all the later shark movies, despite their higher production values are just jokes.

9. Die Hard

Die Hard is another great action movie. It was directed by John McTiernan, the same guy who also directed the Predator. I think Die Hard is an absolute masterpiece when it comes to action movies. No wonder its formula (Man accidentally in a bad situation trying to do his best to cope with the challenges thrown at him) has been copied over and over again in the action movie genre: e.g., the other movies in the Die Hard series, the Under Seige series, White House Down, The Rock, Home Alone series, Cliffhanger, the Speed series, Passenger 57, Mall Cop, and many many more. Some of these movies were also good action thrillers. However, Die Hard was the first movie to experiment with this formula or at least the one to do it effectively.

The character of John McClane in the first Die Hard movie is not a hero with "superhuman" strength or skills. He does have some skills as a cop, but he is not invincible. He gets badly beaten and injured as he tries to overpower the villains of the movie. He just barely survives the ordeal with some ingenuity and luck. The main thing in his favor is his strong determination. He is a man who won't give up easily. No wonder we root for this very human-kind of superhero.

I think the reason most action movies don't work as well as the first Die Hard is because the movie makers seem more invested in showcasing the muscular power or the martial arts skills of their hero than his vulnerabilities. They forget that no amount of action and visual spectacle can equate the power of human emotions.

8. The Matrix

The Matrix is usually remembered as an action movie. However, I love the Matrix because:
1) It had a lot of symbolism and deep philosophy (especially from the Bhagavad Gita) seamlessly integrated into its science-fiction storyline. I think no other movie has ever presented the idea of mukti (liberation) as effectively as the Matrix did.
2) The screenplay of Matrix was also absolutely brilliant. I still remember being surprised so many times throughout the movie.
3) Most importantly, the Matrix urged men to see reality the way it is, and free themselves from the shackles that were binding them. The symbolic "Red Pill" from the movie has literally saved countless men from becoming mental slaves or giving up on life.

Coming to the action sequences of the movie, yes, it did have some spectacular action scenes. These scenes also completely revolutionalized the action-movie genre in the post-Matrix period. Unfortunately, a lot of directors (especially in India) continue to make slow-motion, gravity-defying action scenes in their movies. They don't realize that such scenes worked in the Matrix because such fights seemed logical in the world of the Matrix (the fights were happening in the matrix and not in the real world). But when directors insert such fights in stories that are supposed to be happening in the real world, they just look ridiculous. God save us from stupid imitators!

7. The Godfather 1 & 2

The Godfather 1 & 2 are among the best movies ever made. What can I say about these movies that haven't already been said? Probably nothing. So I'll just start by noting that these movies were much more than gritty crime dramas. If we strip away the crime part, I think these movies were essentially about the ethics of relationships. If anyone wants to understand and appreciate the masculine view of personal and work relationships, the movies in the Godfather series are the ones to watch.

The Godfather series also provides great insights about how to conduct business. I believe director Francis Ford Copolla had himself once said that these movies were metaphors of how capitalism operates. Unlike the other movies that I have identified so far on my list, the power of the protagonists in the Godfather series comes less from muscle or gun power, and more from intelligence. The Godfather movies are intelligent movies. They did not contain cheap twists in their stories but had the best character development that helped us realize how the power of the brain is much more superior to that of the brawn.

6. Schindler's List

The horrors of the Holocaust have inspired the creation of numerous cinematic masterpieces. For a long time, I was literally obsessed with watching these movies. I think this was my way of trying to make sense of why do people do evil things and how do the victims cope and overcome the horrifying challenges thrown at them.

As I reflect on all the movies I have watched on the Holocaust, I think Schindler's List is the greatest movie made on the topic. I admire this movie because I think it was more rooted in reality than others. Movies tend to show that the good, hardworking, brave man always wins. We like such movies because that's what we want to believe as well. However, Oskar Schindler could save over 1200 jews from certain death, not because he was the proverbial "good man". He could save these people only because he had been an asshole...a greedy, war-profiteering Nazi party member. We like to believe that good always triumphs over evil...this is certainly what I believed for a very long time in my life. However, the reality is that good usually gets trounced by evil. This does not mean that we become evil, but that realizing our inner asshole can actually help us fight and win the good's eternal battle against evil.

5. Jagten (The Hunt)

The next favorite movie on my list is Jagten (or The Hunt), a 2012 Danish film. But before I describe why it is, let me discuss the current event of US Judge Kavanaugh being accused by a woman (Dr. Ford) of having raped her some 32 years ago. Prima facie, there are a lot of holes in this accusation. However, a large section of the American population has already declared him guilty. At a press conference, Senator Mazie Hirono even asserted, "Not only do women like Dr. Ford, who bravely comes forward, need to be heard, but they need to be believed. They need to be BELIEVED! ... I just want to say to the men of this country: Just shut up and step up. Do the right thing for a change."

Yes, according to Hirono, not only is Kavanaugh guilty without examination of evidence but so are all the men of USA for not blindly coming to the support of the accuser. Our society is such that we easily believe women accusers. The man is almost always considered guilty until proven innocent and sometimes seen as guilty even after proven innocent. It's as if a woman can do no wrong, and a man can only do wrong.

This is broadly the theme of the movie, Jagten. The protagonist of the movie played by the great Mads Mikkelsen is a simple, good human being, and works as a teacher at a kindergarten school. One little girl falsely accuses him of sexual molestation (Yes, even little kids can lie! And this is very delicately shown in the movie). Then we see how the protagonist's life crumbles because of this false accusation. In the end, he is proven innocent, but unfortunately, that is not enough...

Jagten is an extremely sensitive and brave movie! The makers of the movie touched upon a subject that is rarely ever explored in movies, except probably in cheap psychopath thrillers. My hats off to the makers of this masterpiece.

4. 1947: Earth

1947: Earth is an Indian film that was released in 1999. Similar to my previous favorite movie, this is also a disturbing movie. It brings us face to face with the fact that the threads of sanity and friendliness that hold our society together can sometimes collapse in a snap and lead to unimaginable horror.

The Indian film industry is the largest in the world, and I grew up enjoying Indian movies. However, '1947: Earth' is going to be the only Indian movie on this list, because I have come to recognize the subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) Hinduphobia in these movies. In Indian movies, Hindus are often depicted as narrow-minded, prejudiced and discriminating. In contrast, non-Hindu people are always good human beings, even when they are from an "enemy nation". Professor Dheeraj Sharma from IIM-A has documented this phenomenon well.

Non-Hindu characters in Indian movies can do no wrong. On the rare occasion that they do anything wrong, the movies try to evoke sympathy for these characters by showing them to be helpless victims of circumstances or the system.

To the best of my knowledge, '1947: Earth' is the only Indian movie to show a Muslim protagonist committing some extremely heinous acts, specifically that of betraying his friends that lead to their rape and/or murder. He is certainly influenced by his personal loses during partition. However, his horrifying actions are shown as cold choices and not as compulsions of his immediate circumstances. That's what makes this movie so important in the history of Indian cinema. It is a rare movie that did not play it safe and stayed true to its source material. Deepa Mehta has to be very brave for producing and directing this film.

3. 12 Angry Men

'12 Angry Men' is a black-and-white movie that was made way back in 1957, but it is easily one of the greatest movie ever made in entire cinematic history. I saw this movie a little before my 30th birthday. I am glad I came across this movie not too late in my life because it did have a profound influence on me. According to me, if there was one movie that should be made mandatory viewing for everyone today, it would be this one. The reason I say this is because we the people often get carried away by others thoughts and opinions. We don't use critical thinking skills to properly evaluate the merits of people's arguments. This especially happens under certain conditions. I can't detail them here because that would go into several pages of discourse, but needless to say, our agreeable gullibility can have devastating consequences. You should definitely watch this movie (if you haven't yet), and you will learn a lot about critical thinking, leadership, persuasion, and more.

2. The Shawshank Redemption

The Shawshank Redemption is a 1994 movie that has won the hearts of many. This is may perhaps be true for many people, but if there is a specific movie theme that I love watching the most, it is that of people overcoming insurmountable obstacles. There is something compelling about people who succeed in pulling themselves out of deplorable conditions. They may or may not have directly caused their initial misfortunes, but I can't help admire people who by their sheer grit pulled themselves out of misery. And there are numerous great movies with this theme (e.g., the original Rocky, The Pursuit of Happyness, Homeless to Harvard, Cinderella Man, Breaking Away, and many many more). However, the movie that had the strongest visceral impact on me was 'The Shawshank Redemption'. I have only watched this movie once, and that was at least a decade ago, but there are numerous scenes from this movie that still remain firmly etched in my mind.

(An Interesting Coincidence: It turned out that this movie was released the exact same day (Sept. 23) I posted about it on Facebook.)

Contenders to my most favorite movie:

Before I share the top movie on my list of top 10 favorite movies, I must acknowledge that I struggled a lot to decide on my most favorite movie. There were several worthy competitors. All of these contenders could easily have fit into my list of top 10 movies. The only reason they did not is that the selection method of my favorite list was an organic process. While the first movie on my list (i.e., Predator) was pretty impulsive, the latter selections were more thought out. So before I share my top favorite movie, let me share some worthy contenders to that position:

• Forrest Gump

Forrest Gump may not have the kind of high ratings as The Shawshank Redemption, but in my humble view, it is an extraordinary film. Both the movies were released the same year in 1994. It was Forrest Gump and not The Shawshank Redemption, that took away all the important Academy Awards that year. I think Forrest Gump was a better-made movie than The Shawshank Redemption. So it deserved all the Oscars it won that year. However, over the years Forrest Gump fell out of favor from the critics because it espoused a perspective that isn't appreciated well enough in the West.

The paradigm of Forrest Gump is the exact opposite of The Shawshank Redemption. In the world of Forrest Gump, you don't have to have goals and plans to succeed in life. This is metaphorically shown in the famous opening scene of the movie where the camera follows a feather lazily drifting in the wind. The character of Forrest is shown as achieving a lot of great things in the movie despite being a person of low IQ. He did not have the goal of achieving these things. He just did his best in every situation, and "God" took care of the rest. As Forrest's mother advises Forrest in a scene, "You have to do the best with what God has given you. Life is a box of chocolates, Forrest; You never know what you gonna get."

This is a paradigm that I believe most people have difficulty understanding. It makes them think that Forrest was simply lucky. However, according to me, the reason Forrest achieved what he did in the movie is not because he was lucky, but because he was completely involved in whatever act he engaged in. He didn't care about goals or plans, and just involved himself completely with whatever was in front of him. He still achieved big things in life, because that is the power of sharanagati (loosely translated as surrender) as described in the Bhagavad Gita. 

Forrest Gump could easily have been my topmost movie, but the reason it did not is that it had the implicit message that sharanagati is only possible for people who are too dumb to have goals and plan for themselves. The reality is that the real power of sharanagati comes when it is a conscious choice.

• The Big Lebowski

When I watched the 1998 cult-classic The Big Lebowski by the Coen Brothers for the first time, I found it too weird to enjoy it well. Only when I watched it again several years later did I appreciate the symbolism and philosophy of this movie. In a way, The Big Lebowski espouses the same philosophy as the Forrest Gump: live life as it comes without worrying about the future. Since Lebowski is not dumb like Forrest was in Forrest Gump, we can say that he chose this way of living consciously. No wonder, he appears as this cool dude who abides. The character of Lebowski is so cool that it has inspired the formation of a new religion called Dudeism. According to Wikipedia entry on Dudeism, people believing in Dudeism try to live life by "going with the flow", "being cool headed", and "taking it easy" in the face of life's difficulties.

Because taking life as it comes is a conscious choice of Lebowski, I think The Big Lebowski does a slightly better representation of sharanagati than Forrest Gump. However, sharanagati is not just about accepting and surrendering to what happens in life, it is also being completely involved with life, which the character of Lebowski is not. That is why The Big Lebowski is not my topmost favorite movie. Lebowski is essentially a loser. He may be happy, but to me, his "taking it easy" approach to life borders on inertia (tamasic nature), which is not a desirable attribute. The world needs more self-disciplined and hard-working individuals, not cool lazy bums.

• No Country for Old Men

No Country for Old Men is a Coen Brothers' crime/suspense movie that was released in 2007. I had watched it within the first couple of weeks of its release. I had found the movie thrilling but the ending was unsatisfying. It seemed like all the suspense in the movie ultimately amounted to nothing. I was disappointed. I had even written about it in a blog post then.

However, a couple of years ago, when I rewatched the No Country for Old Men, I realized what a brilliant movie it was. Not only did I notice the significance of many important scenes that I had missed before, but I also began to appreciate the reason behind the weird ending of the movie. Life is just not always fair. In life, bad things often happen to good people, to the extent they may also get killed meaninglessly; bad people also sometimes walk out scot-free. What the movie depicted really well is that there is no divine-justice in real life, and that's what made it so upsetting. Paraphrasing Nietzsche, it’s not human suffering that bothers us, its the pointless suffering.

No Country for Old Men is an outstanding movie, but it is not on the top of my Top 10 list because it is just too dark. The nihilism so well depicted in the movie may be very close to reality, but nihilism is still just a paradigm of negation. It has no motivational value, and is more likely to create people like Lebowski in The Big Lebowski whose acceptance is more a sign of they having given up on life than feeling motivated by their surrender.

1. Cool Hand Luke

From the poster of Cool Hand Luke

The 1967 movie, Cool Hand Luke is my most favorite movie, essentially because it shows a resolution to the question posed by the extreme paradigms of the Forrest Gump, The Big Lebowski, and No Country for Old Men. The resolution is not perfect, but it is closest I have seen a movie achieve. 

Cool Hand Luke is the story of a man named Luke. [SPOILER ALERT AHEAD] Life hasn't been fair to him. He makes some wrong decisions and ends up in prison. The prison system tries to break his spirit. He decides to escape the prison. He plans and executes an escape, but gets caught. He does it again and fails. And again, and fails, this time causing him to lose his life. But the entire time that he is in the prison, escaping, getting caught, and finally getting killed, he retains "That old Luke smile." Now that is true sharanagati: You know that life is unfair, that it is pointless. That doesn't prevent you from setting goals and planning to help achieve them. As you have goals, you also take life as it comes. You have complete sharangati (equanimity coming from surrender) to whatever happens to life. So you succeed in retaining "That old Luke smile" regardless of your life-conditions.

"A man's just gotta go his own way."

Women Empowerment in "Kong: Skull Island"

Today's post was supposed to be about the lessons that we can all learn from the numerous "mythological" stories of different Goddesses in Hinduism. I was writing the post in context of the recently concluded International Women's Day. However, as I started deliberating on the topic and writing my post, I realized that the topic is too important and complex to be relegated to one or two blog posts. So I decided to write a full-length academic article on the topic. Of course, that will take a little while to materialize, so I decided to take the relatively easier task of finding lessons related to women empowerment from a movie I watched last night: Kong: Skull Island. Yes, for better or worse, even guilty pleasures like monster movies can teach us some interesting lessons about leadership and management. We just need to be on look out for those lessons.

Now if you haven't watched the movie and are planning to watch it, don't worry, there are no major spoilers in this article. And to put things in context, here's my one-paragraph synopsis of the movie:

John Goodman plays the character of a US government official determined to collect evidence about the existence of large monster-like creatures on earth. For this purpose, he puts together a team consisting of soldiers headed by a colonel (played by Samuel Jackson), scientists, a retired special-forces guy turned tracker (played by Tom Hiddleston) and a journalist-photographer (played by Brie Larson). They set out to explore an unexplored island in the Pacific ocean called the Skull Island, where of course, King Kong lives. The rest of the movie is about the adventures and misadventures of this group on this island.

The Lessons:

1) Follow your passion, not the position: Early in the movie, we learn that the character played by Brie Larson, journalist Mason Weaver got the job of being on the expedition team perhaps because she was mistaken to be a guy from her male-sounding first name. We also learn that she forsook the job opportunity of being the cover photographer for the prestigious Time magazine so she could be on the expedition team to the Skull Island. I thought these are tidbits in the story provide important lessons related to career success and satisfaction.

When we are striving to make a name for ourselves in this competitive and sometimes unfair world, the temptation is to grab the first prestigious job that comes our way. Even people in later career stages find it difficult to let go the lure of big brand names. And this is partly understandable, because such jobs are often more lucrative than their non-glamorous counterparts. However, more name and money may not be the things that give us meaning and happiness. So if we can afford it, we should choose jobs that are going to aid in the flourishing of our passions. We might feel more successful through association to a big-brand name. However, to make a lasting difference to our professions and live a joyful life, we have to follow our passions, not positions.

2) Dress as per the demands of your work, and not based on societal expectations for your gender: One of the things I liked about Kong: Skull Island was that the female characters in the movie were all appropriately dressed. When a movie is about trekking through tropical jungles, then the women should not be wearing short and skimpy dresses with high-heels. And thankfully, Kong doesn't stoop to such objectification of women.

Now, I am not a prude. In fact, I am okay with even complete nudity in movies, as long as the scene legitimately demands it. What I am against is the typical sexual-objectification of women in movies, where you see female characters always half-naked even when they are dancing on top of snow-capped mountains (as happens often in Bollywood, though it wasn't always the case) or fighting off villains (as in Hollywood). In fact, before starting the movie, the theater showed the preview of Ghost in a Shell, a movie where Scarlett Johansson is seen jumping out of skyscrapers and killing dozens of "bad" people all the while being in flesh-colored tights that makes her appear completely nude.

The point is just this that women should dress to the demands of the occasion. You don't trek through tropical jungles and/or fight wars in clothing that makes even the models trip on flat fashion ramps. Many people in the movie business have the delusion that they are the most liberated human beings on this planet, but reality is that they are worst offenders (and perhaps promoters) of sexism and racism.

In context of the workplace, this means that women may have to resist the implicit and explicit pressures to dress in ways that continue to objectify them. Instead, they should wear clothing that is comfortable and shows that you mean business. You may ask what is the problem with objectification. It is simply this that it equates a woman’s worth with her body’s appearance and sexual functions, which in turn has lot of negative psychological consequences on women (e.g., appearance anxiety, reduced experiences of psychological flow, body shaming, lower self-awareness, and even anxiety about personal safety).

3) Avoid Workplace Hook-Ups: Another common feature in most Hollywood movies is that the male and female protagonists working together inevitably develop a romantic/sexual relationship. So I liked that the main protagonists in Kong: Skull Island did not end up sleep with each other or develop a love affair.

You may ask what's wrong with love affairs? Aren't they natural part of human life? Yes, love and sex are natural parts of life? When we spend large amounts of time together at work, it is indeed natural that some romantic relationships may develop. However, movies tend to glamorize workplace romances, whereas the reality of workplace romances is that they are complicated and often create some major problems, especially for women. Studies show that people engaged in romantic relationships are often perceived as less credible and trustworthy, and such perceptions are especially harsher against women. Sure studies also report some advantages of workplace romances (e.g., dating somebody at work may be safer than trying to look for romantic interests at bars and clubs), but workplace crushes and romances--especially when extra-marital or between people of unequal power--can have lead to accusations of ethical breaches, favoritism and sexual harassment, and can literally spell disaster for the workplace.

The use and misuse of "creative license" in movies

Today's post is a continuation of the discussion that I started on the incident of filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali being slapped by some members of the Shri Rajput Karni Sena for the suspected inappropriate portrayal of Rani Padmini in his upcoming film Padmavati. While the last post focused on the question of whether that incident could be consider terrorism, today's post attempts to explore the limits of artistic license. More specifically, I share my thoughts on what forms of artistic license are appropriate and not appropriate.

Artists have high levels of artistic license when they are working on projects that are completely fictional. For example, no one cares much if the hero in a fictional movie defies all laws of gravity and common sense. Artistic license helps bring interesting variety to characters. For example, aliens in movies have been conceptualized in wide variety of forms from tripods to octapods to shape shifting creatures and machines. They have been conceptualized from being malevolent to completely benign. They have been thought of as super-intelligent creatures to ones with more like reptilian-brains. The point is that all of these different forms of aliens are valid, because after all they are products of creative imagination and have no basis in reality. It is only when a certain filmmaker starts adding elements into the aliens that have parallels in reality that the ethics of artistic license comes to play. Let's take a hypothetical example of a Sci-Fi filmmaker who always depicts his his malevolent aliens as black in color and his benign aliens in lighter shades. Let's also say that his malevolent aliens always (or mostly) speak with African-American accents while his good aliens always (or mostly) speak with English accents. This would make us suspect that our Sci-Fi filmmaker is a racist. We would then say that the filmmaker is mis-utilizing the creative freedom given to artists. The filmmaker may still get away with it from a legal point of view, but would still be considered a racist.

Now things become more complicated for projects that are based on historical or real-life cases. My friends know that I am fond of such movies. That of course, doesn't meant that such movies get their facts right. In fact, almost all such movies get something or the other wrong. But that is not necessarily a bad thing, because movie makers often have to take some creative liberties to fit complex events into the format of a 2-hour feature film. For example, in the recent movie Patriots Day, the character of Sgt. Tommy Saunders played by Mark Wahlberg wasn't a real person but a composite of several police officers who had immediately responded to or investigated the bombings that happened at the Boston Marathon of 2013. You overlook such inaccuracies in the movie because you understand that such artistic liberties need to be taken to simplify a complicated investigation process. Peter Berg, the director of Patriots Day, was still criticized for not crediting a brave Black cop named Dennis 'DJ' Simmonds who suffered brain injury when one of the terrorists hurled a bomb towards him; DJ died a year later, and his death was linked to the injuries he had suffered during the blast.

The point is that artists can take less creative liberties when it comes to projects that they claim to be based on real historical cases. Again, it does not mean that they cannot take any creative liberties, but that their choices will be evaluated with more critical lenses. For example, the movie 300 which was based on the "historically inspired" comic book by the same name had many factual inaccuracies. Frank Miller, the creator of the comic said this about some these inaccuracies:

The inaccuracies, almost all of them, are intentional. I took those chest plates and leather skirts off of them for a reason. I wanted these guys to move and I wanted ’em to look good. I knocked their helmets off a fair amount, partly so you can recognize who the characters are. Spartans, in full regalia, were almost indistinguishable except at a very close angle. Another liberty I took was, they all had plumes, but I only gave a plume to Leonidas, to make him stand out and identify him as a king.

I think any reasonable person wouldn't mind these inaccuracies. However, some of the other "creative liberties" taken by the makers of 300 generated valid criticism. For example, some historians criticized that the Spartans were actually a slave-owning society, although they were projected as a culture that valued freedom the most. Similarly, the Persians are shown as an "incarnation of every Orientalist stereotype imaginable: decadent, oversexed, craven, weak, spineless," which naturally wasn't taken positively by people from Iran.

Coming back to the case of Bhansali's Padmavati, I don't know the kind of artistic liberties that he has taken, simply becauAse I haven't read his script. But given Bhansali's history with mangling historical facts, is it not natural for the Rajasthanis and all Indians to be apprehensive about the way their beloved legends have been depicted in the movie? By the way, before I proceed further, I must say that I have loved many of Bhansali's movies. I think some of his initial movies, such as Khamoshi: The Musical and Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam. I never saw Devdas, primarily because I am not fond of the idea of glorifying a depressed drunkard. I did watch Black, a movie that was praised to the skies because of its novelty and sensitive portrayal of different forms of disability. But frankly I was heavily disappointed by Black, not because it was a badly made film--it was actually very well made--but I abhor it when filmmakers plagiarize a movie and don't give credit to their source of "inspiration." I had seen and loved the 1962 Oscar-winning movie, The Miracle Worker, from which Black had been copied (including frame-by-frame reproduction of some scenes), so couldn't appreciate what was touted as an "original" movie.

People--including many of my friends--went gaga over Bhansali's last movie Bajirao Mastani, but I hated the fact that Bhansali reduced the story of the great warrior Bajirao I to that of a lunatic love story. Bajirao I, the man who challenged the reign of Mughals and never lost a single battle in his military career of 20 years, was shown dying a depressed and delirious lover. The warrior whom the British Army Field Marshal, Bernard Montgomery, had described as "possibly the finest cavalry general ever produced by India" was shown to be a man who easily gave up his fight against the "discriminations" that he received within his own society for having taken a second wife who happened to be partly Muslim. Instead of celebrating the Hindu culture that helped let a Brahmin (priest) emerge into the role of a Kshatriya (warrior), the movie took a lot of pains to show the Marathi culture of the 1700s in poor light. The mother of the great Peshwa was shown as an evil person who was ready to sacrifice her own son for the pride of her Hindu-Maratha culture. By the way, I am not claiming that the Hindu and Marathi culture of those times were all perfect, but I would have appreciated it if Bhansali had at least put in a little effort to highlight the reasons behind the Maratha's antagonism towards the Muslims. The Marathas after all had been the strongest resistors of the Mughals for over a century. It is well known that the Mughals, especially during the reign of Aurangzeb, had not only demolished countless temples but had also committed immense atrocities on the Hindus and Sikhs of India, literally killing, raping and forcibly converting millions of the population.

In summary, I have two points with respect to artistic liberties. First, artistic or creative license is not a license to falsify facts and depict historical characters and cultures based on our own whims and fancies. Second, creative license is not the same as not having any responsibilities towards one's society.  For example, creative license does not mean we should be including an item number (that objectify women) in all our movies just to titillate the audience. Hollywood makes tons of movies based on real life but almost all of them celebrate the inherent goodness of the American society and the American military. America is always saving the world in Hollywood, be it in works of pure fiction or movies based on some real incidents. Yet, in India, filmmakers seem to take immense pride in showing only the dark sides of the country. Again, I am not saying that India doesn't have any dark side or that those dark sides should not be shown, but no society becomes great by only pointing out faults in it. For a society to become great, you have to celebrate it, and you have to take pride in it. If filmmakers want to become instrumental in the building of a great India, they should make at least one positive film on India for every negative film that they make. Always pooh-poohing the society may make you appear liberal and cool, but you effectively do a great disservice to the society. To be fair, Bhansali is not the greatest offenders of the misuse of creative license--in fact, his offenses are pretty tame in comparison to others--but I hope and wish that the quality filmmakers of India also make historical movies that fill the people with a sense of pride about being Indian.

I will end this post with a recent video by poet-turned-politician Dr. Kumar Vishwas where he recites a poem by Pt. Narendra Mishra on Rani Padmini. The spirit that this poem evokes should be what the filmmakers of India should aspire to evoke in their movies. Jai Hind!

Disclaimer: Although I shared the video of Kumar Vishwas here, I am not a supporter of Aam Aadmi Party. Rather I am very critical of it, especially its leader, Mr. Arvind Kejriwal.

P.S.: Please share your thoughts on the ideas expressed in the article in the comments section below. Thank you!

Midnight in Paris

Today is the last day of my month-long resolution to write a blog post everyday. Despite the discipline and effort required to abide by this resolution, it has been a very fulfilling experience. It gave me the opportunity to think and contemplate about different aspects of life. I am especially happy that it brought me into the habit of writing some non-academic stuff on a daily basis. Let's see how this habit unfolds over time.

Coming to today's post, the focus is to share my impressions of the Oscar nominated movie Midnight in Paris. I saw this movie over six months ago. So, I had to read through the plot summary on Wikipedia to refresh my memory of the movie. That does not mean that I had forgotten the movie, because it really was a delightful movie; the purpose of reading the plot summary was to relive the movie in my memory so that I could write intelligently about it.

I am a big fan of Woody Allen movies. He is probably the nerdiest filmmakers of Hollywood. Many people hate Woody Allen's work, because of its pessimistic and even misanthropic undertones. Although I don't deny that many of Allen's comedies highlight a pessimistic view of human beings, I like them because they provide a stark contrast to the typical goody-goody comedies that usually gets churned out of Hollywood. I love Allen's movies because they provide some interesting perspectives on human failings without making the movies dark horror shows.

Midnight in Paris is perhaps one of Allen's most optimistic movies. It's about a successful Hollywood screenwriter (played by Owen Wilson) but failed novelist who is visiting Paris with his fiancee to find inspiration for a new novel. His fiancee is more interested in his money than actually being in love with him or being committed to him. Wilson's character is a romantic at heart, and admires the rich cultural history of Paris. He is especially in awe of the literary scene that existed in 1920's Paris. His nostalgia for this period gets materialized when he gets transported to that era through a portal at the stroke of midnight, and meets the literary and artistic stalwarts of that era such as T. S. Eliot, Pablo Picasso, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Zelda Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Salvador Dali, etc. The movie then provides for interesting interactions with these historical figures, and the kind of inspiration that Wilson's character draws from them. I think the ultimate message of Midnight in Paris is that we should not live in the past, despite all of its romantic allure, though we are free to take inspiration from it.

The biggest influence that Midnight in Paris had on me was to read up about Salvador Dali. He is considered one of the greatest surrealist artists, but the ignorant me had never heard of him. In the movie Midnight in Paris, the character of Salvador Dali (played by the super-talented Adrien Brody) was impossible to ignore because of how affable, gregarious and funny a personality he was. So, I ended up reading more about Salvador Dali. Dali turned out to be a really inspirational personality for me. I was impressed by some of the techniques that he employed to come up with the impossible surrealistic images that he painted. For example, one of his favorite techniques was to relax his body and go to sleep in his chair while holding a spoon in his hand. He always left a tin plate under his chair, so that when he drifted off to sleep the spoon would slip from his hand and fall on the tin making a loud noise and wake him up. Dali would then immediately paint the image that would be in his head when he woke up. This helped him capture the surreal images from his subconscious mind.

However, what I found most inspirational is the fact that Dali was an extremely shy individual as a youth. According to his biographer Ian Gibson, Dali was described as "morbidly" shy by his friends and colleagues from the art school that he went to. Dali was extremely fearful of social situations and preferred to spend his time in solitude. However, on advice from an uncle, he decided to pretend like he was extrovert. So, in virtually all his interactions with friends and strangers, he pretended as if he was the most extroverted person on the earth. The result of this exercise was that with time Dali, not only removed all traces of shyness from him, but began to be regarded as one of the most entertaining and gregarious personalities of his period. Who said you can't change your personality? All you have to do is pretend that you already are that personality you want to be, and behave accordingly.

Coming back to the movie Midnight in Paris, the issue of traveling back and forth through time may seem a little odd and confusing. However, that's not only fine but extremely beautiful. In the words of Dali, "You have to systematically create confusion; it sets creativity free. Everything that is contradictory creates life." I add, "Don't resent the confusion and chaos that you have in your life. First of all, everyone has them in one form or another. Second, (as Dali points out) they are the seeds of immense creativity. However, make sure you water those seeds regularly." And that's what I was doing through my month-long blogging resolution...letting the confusions and chaos of my life sprout into something creative and insightful.

The Descendants

The Descendants is a movie that I saw, may be, about 3-4 weeks ago. It's a little strange that I still remember the names of two important characters in the movie. Usually, I don't remember character names very well. The movie must have made a pretty strong impression on me, although it didn't seem so when I watched it. This is not to say that I didn't like the movie. In fact, I liked it very much, but it didn't seem like a Hollywood production; despite having a big star such as George Clooney, the movie seemed pretty somber and realistic to me.

The Descendants is about a man who is confronted with several major challenges at the same time. His wife is in a coma following a boat accident. As he is taking care of his comatose wife and dealing with the prognosis that his wife will not revive, he is also raising two difficult daughters, one of them a teen. If that's not enough he is entrusted with the sale of a massive piece of virgin family land by his large extended family to real estate developers, which has several environmental implications. Last but not the least, he learns from his own daughter that his comatose wife was cheating on him before she was vegetated by the boat accident. You can imagine the multitude and complexity of emotions that one must be dealing with in such a situation: grief, frustration, sense of loss, sense of responsibility, anger, and more. Clooney portrays all these emotions very well in his perhaps first de-glamourized role. Although it's been a few weeks since I saw this movie, I  still remember the scenes that show Clooney behaving in an awkward-human way while dealing with the challenges life throws at him. Isn't that how we are when we usually face major challenges of life, floundering with life in the most unrefined, awkward, and embarrassing way imaginable? We may ultimately attain grace through the learning that comes from our missteps and screw-ups, but our initial reaction is not often as refined and graceful as is typically shown in movies.

Recently, I had read about some research, according to which men supposedly take much longer to recover  from relationship related losses than women. Irrespective of whether men deal with these challenges in a functional or dysfunctional way, most movies (at least the ones that I have seen) don't make the protagonist appear socially awkward while he is dealing with losses. Instead, they make the protagonist appear very graceful. Such depictions of coping may have a strong melodramatic effect, but it makes things appear a little unrealistic to me. In this sense, The Descendants was a refreshing change for me, because it showed the emotional vulnerabilities of a man without using the personal charisma of its star.

Hugo

It's Oscar night. In a few hours, the glamour and glitterati of the Hollywood industry will walk the red carpet to participate in the biggest annual event celebrating cinema. As many of my friends know, I am a huge movie buff. Not unexpectedly, I have seen many of the Oscar contenders of this year's Best Picture Award. I loved all these movies. I loved them not so much because they were good entertainers, although most of them are, but because they provide important insights into human psychology and creativity. In the next series of posts, I plan to discuss the things I admired and learnt from this year's Oscar nominated movies. I'll start with Martin Scorcese's Hugo.

I absolutely loved Hugo. I have always been a big fan of the master filmmaker, Martin Scorcese. Most of his well known films explore darker themes. It was refreshing to see him handle a children's movie with equal panache. Hugo is, of course, a very entertaining movie that will appeal people from all ages. However, what I liked most about the movie was the ingenious way it interweaves a beautiful story with history lessons about a pioneer filmmaker of early cinema, George Melies. I had never heard of Melies before I watched Hugo. It's through Hugo that I learnt that Melies was a brilliant innovator who innovated many cool special effects way back in the 1890s and 1900s that we now take for granted in modern movies. I found it very interesting that Melies was originally a magician. Is it any wonder that he pioneered many special effect techniques in cinema? If he had been another theater personality, like many movie makers are, such innovations wouldn't have materialized, or at least, would have been delayed by several decades. To me, the life of Melies illustrates that being an odd man in any field, instead of being a handicap, can be a strength that proliferates creativity and innovation.

The second biggest thing that I admired about Hugo was the theme around clocks. This is such a powerful  imagery for the life story of Melies. Many of Melies' movies were thought to be lost forever during the First World War but were later recovered. Melies himself went into complete obscurity and lived for many years managing a small toy store at a railway station, before some journalists revived interest in his work among the public, and he got back the recognition that he deserved. This shows that time is all powerful. Time has the power to catapult us to unimaginable fame, and it also has the completely obliterate us. Time, that way, is one of the subtlest but most powerful forces in this world. As the poet Sahir Ludhianvi had expressed it so beautifully, Waqt se din aur raat, waqt se kal aur aaj, waqt ki har shai Gulaam, waqt ka har shai pe raaj...

Meditating on Hollywood

Who said Hollywood is all glamor and materialistic? Hollywood is probably more spiritual than the greatest saints the world ever had. It follows Hindu and Buddhist philosophies to the core. The biggest evidence for this are the Hollywood movies themselves. In Hollywood, stories never end. They just lead to sequels and prequels. That is life in full circle there. Every end becomes a new beginning, and every beginning another end. Then, look at those 'glamorous' actors and actresses who are reborn in every new movie with a different look and personality. If an actor is a tyrannical king in one movie (read life), in the second he may be a timid simpleton, in the third a suave corporate executive, and in the next just a lowly rat or a grasshopper. Often when in the role of an animal or insect, the actor (read soul) does some really great deeds, which wipes out his bad karma from being a tyrant in a previous movie, and he is reborn as a human being again. Of course, there are some actors who just do the same thing over and over again, but that happens in the cosmos of life as well, when some souls do not learn anything from their current births. It is no wonder then that these actors are usually the muscle rippling action stars, who do not see anything beyond their physical prowess.

Anyway, friends, next time you see me watching a movie, know I am not just watching a movie. Instead, I am meditating on the mysteries of life—mysteries which you can only hope to understand through Hollywood. Hollywood is the microcosm of life. It is the microcosm of the entire universe. Oh, but I got to stop here, because it's time for my next round of meditation. There is no point in I just preaching about Hollywood; you have to experience it yourself. You have to meditate, if you do want to get enlightened. Just remember to breathe well while you are meditating. There is no reason for any 'bated breath' here.

Growing Old is not for Sissies

Since my semester ended last week, I have watched several movies. Most of those movies were borrowed from the library, but I also watched a few new releases. The new releases were The Day the Earth Stood Still, Seven Pounds, and Gran Torino. I know what you are going to ask... Yes, I had made the resolution of watching only one movie per week, but let me explain that in my next blog. Right now, I just want to talk about the movie that I liked immensely, i.e., Gran Torino. More specifically I want to talk about its maker: Clint Eastwood.

I just find it amazing that the 78 year old man is so creatively prolific. Eastwood directed two movies that were released recently: Changeling and Gran Torino. I haven't seen Changeling yet, but after watching Gran Torino, I surely don't want to miss it. In Gran Torino, Eastwood is also the main protagonist. Eastwood again plays the role of a loner, this time as a Korean War veteran who has recently lost his wife. Like the loner of yesteryears (as in The Dollars Trilogy), he is tough and independent, though now he finds it difficult to resist the good food offered by his neighbors. Staying alone myself, I could exactly understand how his character felt, when he would have difficulty denying the tasty food offered by his neighbor. I am not a movie critic - so, I don't want to spend too much time talking about the movie. But I really enjoyed the nuanced acting of Eastwood. And the movie's ending was great - I have seen too many good movies that mess up the ending.

Coming back to Eastwood, I find it really inspiring seeing somebody being able to make very good quality movies even in their "old age." In India, we have Dev Anand who at 85 years is still busy making movies. Although all his recent movies have been flops, and I haven't seen any of them to make any judgments about their quality, I certainly admire the spirit of the octogenarian. With all the wealth and fame these guys have, they don't need to be working so hard at their age, but they continue to take more challenging assignments. Sometime ago, my friend Wahi, had asked me my opinion on "life beginning at 40." Seeing how active some people are in their 80s, 40 seems like infancy. Of course, Eastwood and Dev Anand were both very successful much before reaching 40, but the fact that they are so productive in their old age shows that it is never too late to begin one's life.

For my readers who are under 40: Just because they say life begins at 40, you don't have to wait until 40 - start living your life now - just do what you love to do. Many people decide on their actions very strategically; they decide what to do based on their perceived likelihood of their specific actions leading to success. When it comes to self, I think, thinking strategically is a bogus strategy - one should just do what one loves and enjoys doing. At the end of the day, even if you are not successful (in the traditional sense), you can rejoice in the fact that you enjoyed your day thoroughly.

No Movie with Good Ending

The last posting on my blog is now over a month old. My school work which kept me busy actually got over a week back. However, I didn't want to do anything with reading and writing for at least a week, and so didn't write anything for my blog. I spent the last week mostly doing two things: watching movies and sleeping. I watched upto two movies per day and slept for over 10 hours daily. As if 15 hours were not enough, I spent even the rest of the time in a dream world. I have always been a good daydreamer but sometimes dreams can be so vivid that one is not anymore sure if it is dream or reality. I'll cut short my dreams here because today's blog is not about dreams anyway. Anybody can dream; it's making the dreams come true that matters.

Coming back to movies, the most that I watched last week were borrowed from the public library. However, I won't write about them because they were too many. I'll write about the two new movies I saw yesterday at the theater: I am Legend and No Country for Old Men. There must be a lot of reviews about these movies out there on the internet. So I won't write a full-fledged review about them. I'll just write about one aspect that I think was common to both the movies, i.e., a lack of good ending. Actually, "lack of good ending" would be a misnomer because No Country for Old Men seemed to end without an ending. It was as if the technician operating the projector in the theater forgot to play the last reel. Of course the technician hadn't forgotten anything. The credits started rolling almost abruptly at the end of a scene. May be I am just plain stupid and didn't understand the ending, because the movie was otherwise brilliantly made. I thought I am Legend was also a well made movie, but its ending was hackneyed.

Poor endings is often a problem with movies. It is disappointing when it happens with otherwise well made movies. Why do many good stories have poor endings? Perhaps it requires more creativity than the other parts of a story. How many different ways can you end a story and still be surprising? I am sure that's a tough task. Of course, all stories don't have to have surprising endings. Some stories are great because of the richness with which they explore the characters, and the vividness of the imaginary world created by them. Others are great because of how closely they portray real life. That said, I think it's high time I started working on making my dreams closer to reality. Goodbye.

P.S: Sorry about the abruptness with which I ended my blog.

Thank You for Thinking

Last Friday, I saw this movie “Thank you for smoking,” which is a satire that came out in 2006. In this film, the main protagonist is a spokesman of the tobacco industry. I found the movie interesting basically because the hero was unconventional and politically incorrect. Many of his approaches ran counter-intuitive, and were yet successful. I would agree with the makers that their movie goes beyond the issues of pro- and anti-smoking. The focus of the movie, I think, was more on the value of having a skeptical mindset. Skepticism, unfortunately however, is not too common, even among many scientists who are supposed to indulge in it. Probably, that is the reason why a lot of useless and trivial research does get published.

A lot of information and ideas are bombarded on us daily, irrespective of whether we are a common man or scientist. We often don’t question the validity of these ideas, especially when they run in consonance with our own conceptions, are popular, or presumably come from what we perceive as credible sources. The consequence is that the status quo is encouraged irrespective of whether or not it is acute, effective, important, optimal, and useful. Do I mean to say that we reject and refute every idea that comes across us? No, that would only lead to personal chaos because technically when you refute everything you also have to refute the very idea of refuting everything. Moreover, it needs to be remembered that questioning the validity of ideas is not the same as rejecting ideas. When you are questioning an idea, you are not accepting it at its face value; you are temporarily suspending your belief in it by asking questions that challenge the validity of it. If the questioning process leads to the identification of any contrarian evidence or development of alternative ideas then something valuable has been generated in the process. However, if nothing significant is found, then we can go back to the original idea and accept it on an ad hoc basis. I say “ad hoc” basis because no idea is absolute in this world.

All said, did I question anything in the movie Thank you for not smoking? Yes, many things but the one I think is most significant is about the nature of the protagonist’s job. Clearly, it is a difficult job if you have a sense of morality, but it is not necessarily as intellectually challenging as the movie makes it out to be. The hero in the movie often deflects the arguments of his righteous opponents by putting into question their motives. This form of questioning though might be needed sometimes, is nevertheless a rogue method. It is easy to question the credibility of anyone because no one is perfect, and it is definitely not the same as having the courage to take an idea head on. To be fair, the protagonist does address arguments directly sometimes, however, he is nothing beyond a critic on these occasions. It is much easier to be a critic, because the burden of proof lies with the person making a point and not with the critic. As a critic all you have to do is question the validity of claims and nothing beyond. The protagonist’s job would have been much more difficult if he tried to convince people to smoke through his speeches and arguments, however, all he does is rebut the arguments of his detractors thereby putting the ball back into their courts. That said the lesson of today’s blog is that it is not just enough to question the validity of ideas. Skepticism is only the first step of thinking productively. The next step is to come up with better alternative ideas – that is creativity and the most stimulating job in the world.