A Day in May, a Common Man

Are you an Indian? Do you remember 11 September 2001 (and yes, that is the structurally correct order)? Sure you do. What about these other dates, like, oh... off the top of my head - 14 February 1998, 13 December 2001, 11 July 2006, 25 July 2008, 13 September 2008, 27 November 2008, and the list goes on. Not so much, eh? I thought so. Honestly, I didn't remember either. Well, let us refresh our memories together - in the order listed above, Coimbatore bomb blast, New Delhi parliament attack, Mumbai trains blasts, Bangalore serial blasts, New Delhi serial blasts, Mumbai terror attack. There have been 24 reported terrorist attacks in India in 2008 alone, and many thousands have died.


The authorities and the media have come up with fancy nomenclature for these things - serial blasts, synchronized bombings, simultaneous bomb blast, etc. but they fail to call it the one thing it is - the willfull violoation of the fundamental right of a human being to live - not by the terrorists, but by the Government of India and the people of India.

For that is what it boils down to. When a succession of corrupt, senile, obese and spineless parties take power at the center with no cogent policies to tackle the terror threat, no mechanism in place to protect the lives of the people and with not even a pair of sponge balls to deal with the terrorists and the the instigating countries, that is what you'll get.

And why are you and me as culpable as those eunuchs at the center? Because we voted for them - atleast those of us who "exist" as per the voters' lists, and those of us not lazy enough not to get off our sorry behinds and go to the polling booths. And we forgot about the countless lives lost, the myriad dreams crushed, the thousand gentle smiles plucked off the faces of innocent children. And we continue to forget. And we'll keep forgetting until it happens to us. And then, time will heal that personal wound also, and we'll rest easy in our collective amnesia. Our nation's very own clinical disorder - advanced parkinson's syndrome - we all suffer from it.

There's also another reason why we forget, and why our government is happy with the status quo. Anything in copious quantity becomes commonplace. Mind numbing ads that tell you to use this soap or that shampoo, characterless cars that all but look alike save for the marquee, the everyday grind of life, and the certain knowledge that the human brain cannot deal with the recurring sadness of terror strikes. Terror strikes that have become the cover story of every tabloid and fodder for every news network that runs a breaking story about one on the big screen and a simultaneous scrolling marquee about Kareena Kapoor's latest zero size dress on the bottom. Our forgetfulness is not of the sensational, it is of the mundane.


Every man, woman and child alive and calling himself an American knows about "9/11" and mourns for the innocent lives lost. As they should. Every person with access to a television or a radio or the newspapers or well informed friends across the globe knows about it, and sympathizes with Americans. As they, ofcourse should. Why? Because it happened once, and for all of the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld crimes, for all of its pseudo imperialistic expansions accross the globe, and with all the Al-Qaedas and Talibasn and Hezzbollahs and Hamases of the world, it will never happen again. American lives hold some meaning to the American people, and those elected to office understand the moral responsibility of protecting them. Not so in our sad little poser of a country that sends a lunar orbitter up, but is too docile to hang Afsal Guru.

But, what if there was one man who fought back? What if this one man decided that enough is enough and deal with the terrorists himself? Because he knew that his people are numbed and that his government is quadraplegic when it comes to dealing with terror. That is the subject of "A Wednesday" and "Unnai Pol Oruvan" (remake of the former). Our very own Tiananmen Square Tank Man, alas only a celluloid version.


I am not going to discuss the plot here as it will take the fun out of watching the movie. Both are superlative efforts with the message being clear. The interplay between protagonist 1 and protagonist 2 in that order, Naseeruddin Shah and Anupam Kher in the Hindi version and Kamal Hassan and Mohan Lal in the Tamil one is fantastic. All four are very gifted actors and more importantly, exponenets of acting and not overacting. The emotion Naseeruddin Shah and Kamal display when they talk about the tragedy they witnessed, or their frustration with our goverment are real. Because they are Indians they can associate with them. That makes the roles of Anupam Kher and Mohan Lal all the more difficult, because they have to be a foil to a man with strong emotions and an even stronger agenda. They have to play the "bad" guy who is only so because the law of the land is bad. And they have to be seen to be more emotionally stable than their nemeses which restricts their exploration of the emotions associated with those characters. I think in that respect Mohan Lal did a better job at playing the frustrated police man. Much as a fan I am of Kamal Hassan, he blew my mind away when that single tear fell out of his eye while describing the young girl who had been unprintablelized. Naseeruddin Shah also displayed superlative acting skills, especially when his voice quavered as he spoke about that boy who died in the train blast. Top notch job by the leads.


What about the extras? The lazy policeman, the young and eager officers, the Chief Minister of Maharashtra and the secretary to the CM of Tamil Nadu were all played by actors who knew their parts and did just enough to make the whole thing look polished. They never came out of the woodwork, but were always part of the notching that gave it its oaken glory.

This movie is dark with its sepia filtered lenswork, intense music, urgent scenes and subdued acting. It is almost as though the people involved in all areas of the production to let their emotions on the subject flow and then make what comes out of it. It is also very visually appealing. The "war room" at police headquarters, for instance is state of the art and beautifully laid out - functional and modern. As are Kamal or Shah's control center with their modems, routers and cellphones all hooked up to a single laptop. And I have to digress here to point out that in scenes like these, the movies give the audience its due. For example, in the movie 1977 starring Sarath Kumar, a similar state of the art computer not unlike the multi-touch one seen in Minority report is shown. Sarath downloads "secret" files, and a dialog box pops up with these idiotic words: "Downloading Secret Files." I mean to say, which operating system in the world will tell you that a file is "secret" when you are downloading it? Sorry for the interlude... back to shop.

The Tamil version one-upped the Hindi version when it came to explaining the background stuff. For example, its not clear how Naseeruddin Shah had the technical knowhow to mask his cellphone traces so artfully, but there is a reference to Kamal hassan being a communications expert in the Tamil version. Secondly, Kamal is shown during the opening credits to be making the bombs with easily available materials and tools, which is a lot more convincing than Naseeruddin Shah just planting them at different locations. And the scene when the computer geek and policeman change their minds out of new-found respect for the "common man" has better dialogues and clearer motivation for their actions than the Hindi version. But then, same diff.

Unfortunately, there is one area where the movie failed. You see, there is a face to terror, and there is a religion to terror. International terror today is largely delivered by Muslims. Islam is not to blame, and millions of muslims are not to blame, but the fundamental elements of that faith are to blame. True that in a country like India, there are localized pockets of violence like Hindutva groups and Naxalites, but terror in India, especially that associated with coordinated bombings is conducted by muslims. The movie takes the safe route that world governments take and refuses to put a face on the terror. This is my personal opinion, and probably not one I would shout out in public. I mean no offense to my muslim readers (I hope there are some), but facts have to be faced. And its no reflection on Islam, or its diaspora that a few crazed zealots have taken up arms against humanity in a filthy Jihad.

I really enjoyed both the movies because not only did they have strong messages to deliver, but also because they have done their part to elevate the quality of the bilge that is spewing out of Bollywood and Kollywood. They respect the audience's intelligence, they do not pander to anyone. There is no glamor in the movies. There are no songs. There is no separate comedy track. There are not fights, no stunts. There isn't any big budget on location shots, no helicopter camera angles. No gaudy costumes. Everything about them is commonplace, yet they are both rare masterpieces.

The climax was one of the most memorable I have ever seen in an Indian movie - almost like Heat or the new Star Trek movie where the protagonist and antagonist have played a riveting zero sum game throughout the whole affair, but meet face to face just once... at the end. That is ultimately, the nub of the issue. The faceless mass of the proletariat condenses into one angry man. His plan culminates in one final confrontation with his nemesis. We as a people have been made to live in fear by the terrorists, not knowing if we will live or die when we go to work, or go to the shop tomorrow. We are in a constant battle with that nameless, faceless nemesis - the terrorist, but his face becomes his handiwork when at that one moment, we see the explosion or feel the bullet that sends us to our maker. Shouldn't the terrorist be afforded the same courtesy?

Punch Dialogues - Summa Adhirudhu Illa

"Neenga nallavara kettavara? Theriyalaye paa"
"Naan oru dharava sonna, nooru dharave sonna madhiri"
"Naan sollardhadhaan sieven, seiyyardhadaan solluven"
"Yen characteriye purinjika maatengaringale"
"Por! Por! Veeravel! Vetrivel!"
"Odinen, odinen, Kumari munai yellai varai odinen"

And many more. What is a punch dialogue? When was the first time a punch dialogue ever uttered on screen in mainstream Tamil cinema? Which actor was responsible for starting this Freudian over compensatory trend? And finally, is it important today, and if so why? To quote trick questions in exams, "and if not, why not?"

First of all, a punch dialogue is any line that when uttered even once in a movie, implants itself onto the collective memory of the masses. It is a line or monologue that defines the character that is being portrayed by the actor who voices it. It may or may not necessarily contain a social message, but it is one which will evoke one of the following strong emotions in anyone who hears it: awe, anger, frustration or resolve. It is a dialogue that, for the better or for the worse etches the character, not the actor, the dialogue, not the scene, the theme, not the movie into the masses for an eternity.


What about the history of punch dialogues? I am not sure about its origins on its progenitor, but I can say with assurance that its been around for a while. In the early days, in movies such as Parasakthi and Nadodi Mannan, punch dialogues were specific to the role and even required by the storyline. For instance, the famous courtroom scene in Parasakthi in which Sivaji puts society on trial is one punch line after another. MGR and Karunanidhi successfully used punch dialogues to espouse the cause of the downtrodden and further his political agenda. For example - in the movie Ayirathil Oruvan, MGR says "Namadhu thevaiye pirarudaya nanmai dhaan." This is a classic punch dialogue because it extols the virtue of the character and at the same time delivers a strong message about him. Also, at the time it came out in 1965, MGR was a major political player. Cho's political satire Muhammad Bin Tughlak, for instance has a bevy of punch dialogues such as "The previous administration made government an ass ... I will make it a pig." The emphasis in these early incarnations, however, was not so much on the delivery as it was on the line itself.


Later, with the advent of directors such as K Balachander and T Rajendhar (people who know anything about Tamil cinema will be cringing at the mere mention in the same sentence of these two opposite corners of the talent polyhedron), the punch dialogue focused on the director and the scene rather than on the actors themselves. This is also true of directors such as Visu. A classic example which my mother mentioned is a line that closes a scene of estranged lovers meeting in an office in which one of the characters is searching for a file - "Naan thulaichadu file mattum illa, yen life" - note the permutation of the word file into life.


But these early examples are distant cousins to the flamboyant ones we see today. And the template for the modern version was probably introduced with the advent of Rajnikanth once he reached superstardom. The one liners devised for them are too numerous to list here, but rest assured that during the eighties and early nineties, nearly every other scene in a typical Rajnikanth movie had a pithy one-liner. And that set the trend for things to come with guys like Vijaykanth, Arjun, Sarath Kumar Vijay and Ajith. To be fair to Rajnikanth, the directors of the movies he starred in created an aura around him because he was stylish and had a rebel image. So, punch dialogues enhanced his image and made the scenes memorable. And the ploy stuck because for the first time, an ordinary person like you or me could repeat these one liners with ease and sound cool - what's a better hardsell than that?


To answer the last question, let's take a look at the state of Tamil cinema today. By and large, a majority of the films being made will be relegated to the crapheap by purists. They are for the most part hero-worship affairs that cater primarily to niche fan-bases, mofussul crowds and box-office requirements. Movies by directors such as Vikraman and P. Vasu, and those that star guys like Arjun and Vijaykanth are good examples in this category. There are also as many movies as there are new stars and movie-makers that are made specifically to create a brand identity for the players involved - any of Simbu's or Dhanush's movies are good examples. These are not essentially horrible and may sometimes even involve innovative stories, but are still run of the mill in terms of packaging and delivery. Finally there are movies that have star billing, and even though such movies may have a tightly woven script and good storytelling, they still need to cater to public expectations built up across several offerings spread over many many years. Rajnikanth movies for instance fall into this category.

To hide the defects of the first category, to boost the image of the players in the second and to cater to demand in the third, punch dialogues are not only essential, but can also be thrilling and fun if executed well. And I've tried to showcase here how the punch dialogue morphed from an essential element of the script or a delivery mechanism for a social message into an unforgettable or impactful line in the context of a scene and finally became something that will forever be associated with the actor who voiced it, and which is not contextual anymore. And hey, its not as though only Tamil Cinema dishes out the tacky one-liners... what do you call "I'll be Back!", "Asta la vista, baby", and "You gotta do what you gotta do and I gotta do what I gotta do"?

If you are interested in this topic, I recommend this excellent article: http://www.behindwoods.com/tamil-movie-articles/movies-01/06-05-06-punch-dialogues.html for well researched factual information on some of the most unforgettable lines in Tamil cinema.

Yaavarum Nalama?

Generally, Tamil horror flicks have tended to gravitate towards cheap thrills and ridiculous premises. They have either focussed on populist ideas such as the battle between a holy presence and an malevolent entity. Also, because the saleability of this genre is usually limited to a first and only time viewing by the audience on account of the suspense factor, these movies have a lot of vulgarity in them - sometimes in the form of several steamy bedroom scenes that leave a bad taste in the mouth, or in the mould of the typical 70s and 80s mofussal crowd pullers - a needless record dance or cheap item number. Not so in the case of Madhavan's latest offering Yavarum nalam.

Yavarum Nalam has a tight story and excellent performances by all parties concerned. A young couple and its extended family moves into a new apartment complex and all is well for a time. Then, strange things begin to happen primarily to the protagonist and an eerie television mega-serial which is shockingly parallel to their life story begins almost directly they move in. What is the connections between these supernatural occurences, the TV serial and their lives? Why is apartment 13B the epicenter of these strange happenings? What is the final resolution? As an edge of your seat thriller and social commentary on the typical urban household in Tamil Nadu, Yavarum Nalam delivers more that what is expected.

To divulge the story would do a great disservice to those yet to enjoy the flick (although the rank of my fanbase is woefully close to null and I don't even want to think about what would happen to it in an upper row echelon format), so we'll look at some of the more interesting aspects of the movie - such as how it manages to do what it cliams and its place in the horror genre.

With my next to naught knowledge of Hindu spirituality, I know that the athma or soul of a human being, or any living being for that matter is constant. The vessel it is contained in may perish, but the soul continues to exist. One widely held tenet is that after its release from the human body, the soul is restless if there is something incomplete in its past existence and tries to achieve some sort of closure. And since it is formless it cannot achieve the goal on its own accord. Therefore, it needs a medium - an impressionable entity that can fecilitate its objective. However, such entities are rare and in reality, may not even exist. But for someone who buys into the principle wholeheartedly, things like possession (the control of a human being by a metaphysical force such as an aspect of god), shamanism (the ability to be in contact with the spirit world) and seance mediation (to be a middle man between the world of the living and the world of the dead) are possible and true. This is the centerpiece of the movie. Madhavan is one such person, who without his own will, is a medium for certain restless souls seeking vengeance.

Is it possible for such a person to lead a normal life? Can someone who is your next door neighbour and normalcy itself in all walks of life actually possess such an ability? Or in classic movie extravaganza, should such a person be shrouded in mystery and darkness? This is the first major score for Yavarum Nalam. By taking the concept of a medium and applying it to a normal person with a normal lifestyle, it diverges from a formulaic approach.

Secondly, the movie is, contrary to popular opinion, not a typical haunting. One may argue that hauntings are not new. However, usually hauntings are portrayed are a group of people being scared stiff by abnormal events, or being rubbed off one by one. Its usually vegetates into either an excorcism or a last man standing kind of affair. Yavarum Nalam is about the plea for help by these restless souls, and the only way they can achieve this shout out is to do things that would pique the interest of an impressionable living medium. That is the intended objective of the haunting in Yavarum Nalam - and this fresh perspective is dealt with professionally here.

Thirdly, the idea of a television mega-serial with word for word similarity to the day to day lives of Madhavan's family is not only an excellent presentation of the plot, it is also an intentional or unintentional commentary on society. Many households are bogged down by these stereotypical mega-serials, even to the extent that normal healthy family life gets affected by the viewers being sucked into the action (or lack of it) on screen. People start associating themselves with the characters on screen and are glued to the idiot box for hours on end, five days a week. It is like a narcotic - and like every narcotic, it does not claim uniqueness, innovation or difference. Like crack, cocaine, marijuana, alcohol or tobacco, only the names such as Anandham, Vizhudhugal, Pidivaadham, Metti Oli etc. are different. Therefore ones these mega-serials get you hooked on, rehab seems to be the only way out. That the spirits in the movie cash in on this substance dependance to get their message across is a satirical take on the contemporary urban household. The sameness - oh! the sameness ...

And finally, the movie really does it for me because there are no cheap thrills. Since the story, the acting, the music and the editing are so crisp, there is no need for the sudden jarring noise, or the shadow round the corner, or the hand that slowly creeps up on you from behind. Gone also is the inexplicably stupidity of a character with a deathwish venturing alone into a dark room, or the insipid idea the haunted group gets to split up and go in search of what is most certainly their iminent doom. No, in Yavarum Nalam you get a proper mystery and the thrills are only in what direction the story will take in the next scene, and how things are going to pan out. This results in immense resale value for the movie - because you actually end up appreciating the effort that has gone into thinking this through, rahter than watching something that makes you jump everytime there a noise. The problem with the latter is, after the first time, you know exactly when the noise is coming. The difference is between reading an Agatha Christie novel and a Joseph Sheridan LeFanu type horror tale. Agatha Christie is so much more second-time-pick-upable.

So, please do Director Vikram Kumar and the entire cast and crew of Yavarum Nalam and go watch it. It is definitely a notch above the classics including Padhimoondram Number Veedu, Monalisa, Genmanatchathiram, Uruvam, Mayabazaar 1995 and so on. Since its not in theatres any more, you can get a DVD or CD (but an original one please). Piracy is a crime unless you are impecunious grad student living on the most expensive seaboard in the world!

Bommalattam - we are the puppets

Are you a fan of the novel of mystery? I am, and that's why Bommalattam disappoints. From the days of Arthur Conan Doyle's Holmes, to the queen of crime's Poirot and Marple, to our very own Byomkesh Bakshi and Feluda, a good mystery yarn has been rooted deeply in two important rules: (i) the plot must be watertight, and (ii) all the facts must be presented before the solution is outed.

Let us look at the first rule. There can be no obvious loose strings if your plot is to make sense. Usually, it is the case of committing a murder, or setting up a red herring, or creating an alibi, or some such, and in these cases, if there are glaring errors such as (i) impracticality, (ii) physical impossibility, (iii) uncharacteristic actions of the principal(s) or (iv) irregularities, then there is a leak somewhere, and on closer inspection, the reader feels let down.

Consider for example the following scenario - Mr. X needs to establish an alibi for his activities on the night of the murder. He thus claims that he was in Bangalore during the event. However, it later transpires that he purchased an airline ticket from Chennai to Bangalore at 6:43pm, boarded the flight at 6:45pm and landed at Bangalore at 7:08pm. He then proceeded to his office in Whitefield and was seen by the guard there at 7:30pm. Now, unless there is a prepped and ready rocket jet waiting to take him to Bangalore, and there is a super expressway linking the airport which is someway off to his office, this falls outside the realm of Physics. If later, the claim is made that the alibi is false, everything is "oojah cum spiff." But, if the author claims this alibi is true, then the reader is unaware of some new warp technology for sure.

Now, the second point - a good mystery is one in which everyone including the reader has an opportunity to think objectively about what has happened and arrive at a conclusion. If we are smart, we may hit the correct sequence of events, and guess the psychological tapestry to a nicety. The prowess of the author is then to show us that he or she is more devious than we are. For instance, A, B and C are in a room, and C has been murdered. So, the logical conclusion should be that either of A or B have committed the crime. But, if at the end, the author reveals a person D out of the blue who actually did it, then its no longer a whodunit, but a whatthehellisthis?

Unfortunately for Bommalattam, the movie fails on both counts. Without revealing too much of the plot, suffice it to say that impracticality, time dilation, new character introduction and physical impossibility have all been used in this movie.

But, I would have been willing to accept these major story faults, provided the direction and editing were top notch. Sadly, the movie fails to impress here too. The criminal investigation carried out by Arjun seems to be haphazard, and lacking in order and method. The investigative process is not at all showcased, and results seemingly appear out of thin air. Another way of looking at it is that this is a case where the investigator has a surmise, but he lacks solid evidence to prove it, and is forced to use unconventional methods. However, if this were the case, it is not portrayed logically. Sequence seems to be lacking.


While there is a surfeit of suspense, and the finger points to all the principals at one point or another, there seems to be a lack of interest in exploiting this element. For instance, I suspected Arjun himself at one time, but the motivation for him is built up in a single scene and then forgotten.

The psyche of the director and the heroine of the movie within the movie is delved into deeply, and clearly, it is Bharathirajaa's desire to make this the story's centerpiece. But this relationship is given to us not from the perspective of the principals, which would have been a position of strength, but as a series of conjectures and surmises by the bit players around them. This makes the whole endeavor seem a bit artificial.

But I will take my hat off for the plot twist at the end though. It is completely unexpected and new to Tamil cinema. But, for a mystery relying so heavily on the climax, this could have been integrated into the story in a different manner at a much earlier stage. Revealing more of what I have in mind would be telling all. Ask me in private if you want to know what I think!

And a bit about the editing. The movie moves so slowly in places, especially during the bits about the movie shooting, and the interrogation sequences, that you can cut the silence with a knife. This tends to ease the tension and loosen the grip in places where it is needed most. And whatever happened to the lip sync and the dubbing I will never be able to say. It was like watching a Hindi movie dubbed into Tamil. Totally unprofessional sums it up.


As for the acting, a weak rendition by Nizhalgal Ravi takes the intensity away from Nana Patekar's acting. Lackadaisical performances from Vivek, the heroines, and Arjun seem to indicate that the director has put his entire weight behind the story and has lost it everywhere else. The music, as is the usual Himesh Reshamiya fare, is nothing to write home about, although the BGM's were quite impressive, especially during the investigation sequences.

The puppet master is able to make dolls dance to his tune. Sadly here, although it is clear in the end who the real puppet is (which is a bit of an unexpected shock really), the audience have been made the puppets by being kept in the dark, and by having their intelligence assumed to be sub-par. In all, therefore, Bommalattam fails to impress and really has too many glaring flaws for it to be a good mystery yarn.

By the way, the reason this review may seem cryptic is because I don't want to reveal anything. After a decent amount of time has passed (once the movie has run its course), I will explain each aspect in an addendum.

Slumdog Millionaire - My wonderful India

Just finished watching Slumdog Millionaire. I know that its an English movie, and what's more, set in Mumbai. But still, I thought I might say something about it, because it resonated with me. It is one of those rare things that happen in life. You suddenly find that a third person has made an observation about you that revelas something about you, and that helps raise your own self beyond what you are presently. Like what this guy Danny Boyle did in this movie - made a statement about my country, a good one, atleast personally to me.

By the way, there are no spoilers here, so watch the movie, and then read my blog.

What a movie!!!!! Everything about the movie showcases the level of sophistication that Indian Cinema has to reach. That a beautiful story like this was told about Indians by a Britisher is most ironical. Why? Because the one tenet of India that the movie showcases more than anything else is the resourcefulness of a nation in conflict with itself, and the root cause for that conflict was the British occupation.

When the British came and wiped out our industrial might (India had a share of 34% in industrial exports in the world pie in the eighteenth century) of a proud nation, and made the disparities hit hard home - on the stomach, they left behind the morass of babudom and corruption, that led to millions of slums and rampant crime in every major city. They left behind a communally divided India, in which followers of one faith pit themslves against those of another faith just to wash the bile in their bellies, if not for anything else. But this movie is about how even the lowliest Indian, and not just the IT techie fights in life to make something of himself.

The tragic life history of Salim (yes, the brother blackguard), and the cute love story were just trinkets on the visage of the fight for life. Nowhere more in the movie is this more visceral than in the scene when the young boy Jamal jumps into the open defacation pit in order to run upto and get an autograph from Amitabh Bachan. In my opinion, that was the moment when the movie for me, transcended the screen and became a monument to the Indian power of will. The power of will, that is and always will be our great nations's mightiest attrribute. It is probably also our Achilles heal, because when anything goes to an end, that only produces more Jamals and Salims.

So, that one scene was the most well conceived one, because it makes a huge social statement about our psyche. We will survive, no matter what the odds, and we will also do anything it takes, no matter what. So, there is a society that is divided by a thin line between what is right, and what must be done - a society where Jamal fight against all odds to make a life for himself; a society where Salim will do whatever he must to make a life for himself. The difference becomes blurred, and good and evil are both in a race for survival. Caste, religion, language and all else is secondary. And finally, the backdrop of the KBC program was just brilliant. Because it underlines the film's fundamental argument. In an impoverished nation like ours (and yes, we are sadly, still impoverished), that thin line becomes a note, and the struggle for the note is the struggle for life.

There were two other scenes, both part of a minor story arc, that were meaningful to me. The first one is when an American tourist couple feels compassion for Jamal when he is unjustly beaten by a policeman, and gives him a hundred dollar bill. The second is when Jamal sees a blind beggar in a subway, and gives that boy the same bill. In a land blessed with plenty, and where its leaders strive for a compassionate society, that compassion is easy to trickle down and easy to express. But, even in a land ravaged by selfishness, there are pockets where the same compassion is evident. This to me, was a significant statement about the values of our people.

Thalaivar Rahman's background score was totally unbelievable. If it were left to me, for the sheer powerfulness of the BGM's, I would give him an Oscar today. But to talk about his music would need a separate essay for itself.

Slumdog Millionaire shows up India for what it looks like - a sham, a lie and a facade. The reality is the urban agglomeration, the slums, the beggars, the exploitation of the meek, the millions of focusless and jobless youth that are driven to crime for a roti in their stomachs, the evils that happen behind the veils of social mores, the open disparity between the rich and the poor. But it also shows our country for what it really is - a nation of hope, of resourcefulness, of infinite patience, a land where life will find a way. That is why Slumdog Millionaire tells us that for all its perceived faults and contradictions, India will be the powerhouse of the future - from the bottom up.

Watch this movie, please. And for many Tamil and Hindi directors out there - racy musicals can sentimental dramas can also be made this way.