Mr. Smith goes to Washington

Whenever I think a movie was the movie I've ever seen, there is something sooner or later, something even better comes and surprises me with ingenious film-making. Life is Beautiful, Schindler's List, Saving Private Ryan, Shwashank Redemption, It's a Wonderful Life... the list keeps growing. Now, here comes a movie that I believe one of the best ever I've seen. I know a lot of people might not share the same passion as me for this, as it is about democracy and America, still not as much appreciated by many people. But, Frank Capra and James Stewart will not make anything less than an extraordinary movie. And Jean Arthur caps it like a cream of the cake. And, Harry Carey who acts as the President of the Senate brings a highly respected and esteemed impression for his character, though he is not properly credited for this.

The film is about how a young, simple minded Midwesterner from Jackson city, Mississippi is selected for the American senate to be a honorable stooge of a corrupted businessman to replace a recently passed-away senator and how he fights the very own corrupt machinery that had engulfed the principles and ideals of America. The young man (our great James Stewart of "It's a Wonderful Life") loves and believes every patriotic ideal and adores his fellow senior senator and all gungho for this great job of law-making for this world's greatest democracy. When he first sets foot on Washington he loses his mind just watching the Capitol dome and loses time in the great memorials of Washington and Lincoln. His innocent mannerisms and plain patriotism is initially ridicule and mocked at by all those whos-who of Washington and even his secretary Clarrisa (the lovely Jean Arthur) is initially annoyed at baby-sitting this "cocky" new Senator.

The senator has visions of building a great boy's camp in his own state to teach and grow up boys with American ideals, but little does he understand that his bill to create this national camp is on the same land where the corrupt Mr. Taylor works up the nation to build a dam for his own interests. When the interests collide, Taylor tries to break up our man with allegations and when our hero has almost lost, he rises up extraordinarily using the Senate provisions (that allow for filibustering) and makes up his case. You have got to watch this, as I don't do justice for this great act, by explaining all this in a sentence.

We have all seen such stories where a lone man fights for a lost cause among the villains backed by politicians, their stooges and businessman with deep-pocketed connections in the press and other public media. But, this movie is extraordinary and puts America both in a positive light and also points out to its deficiencies. It points out to the concern of how the different estates of public sphere - lawmaking, business enterprises, media and the executive machinery have to be independent and impartial. It reminds people of their responsibilities of this democracy in selecting their representatives and keeping track of the various estates of the society. If people are not going to pay much attention to politics then the corrupt elements will, and instead of representing the will and ideas of the people, the government shall represent the vested interests of the few. Then politics and Presidentship will not be decided in the fields, factories and offices of the common man but at the expensive cocktails, conventions and conferences in New York, Chicago and Los Angels. What is said in 1939 is even more true today, when America is more and more becoming plutocracy far away from the dreams of its creation in 1776.

And it reminds the people of the great dream of its forefathers - the visions of Jefferson and Franklin in the declaration of independence, the Philadelphia bell and Statue of liberty standing to represent the freedom and liberty to all men and women, the words of Lincoln that urges us in protecting the sovereignty and maintaining democracy and the Washington memorials that stands tall to represent the ingenious ideas of this young nation. The singing of star spangled banner (the national anthem of US) during the senator's election and dramatic portrayal of various symbols of American entity is simply wonderful in this movie.

I hold a lot of personal emotions for this movie in that it points to what we have lost in politics. I always get emotional when I visit the great memorials of the Washington, the great Washington's pillar, the majestic statue of Lincoln, the great World war memorial and most importantly the capital dome viewed from the Union station just out of Amtrak, from the air taking off from Reagan airport, and from every road leading to it. It is the place where laws are made that governs the working or atleast affect it for most parts of the world. Seldom do people understand how important an institution it is, how much they really care to affect it.

We, the common people, have shrugged from our responsibility towards politics and treat it like a nasty art little realising that it is the thing that moves and works us. What is true for America holds true for most other democracies including Britain and India. Back home in India, we have left politics to rot. The great halls of Rashtrapati Bhavan where doyens like Sarvappalli Radhakrishnan and Abdul Kalam have grazed their presence, is just a ceremonial entity that overlooks a chaotic Sansad Bhavan where goons and criminals represent us and enact laws for us. More than the Americans, we have shrugged our responsibilities to elect responsible representatives for the nation and then just bitch about the poor state of the nation.

I wish movies like these come in India and other democratic nations, and more people get into the working of the beautiful web of democracy.

A Critical analysis on Hollywood, Hindi & Tamil Movies in the last 3 decades

Introduction

Movies are a source of fun for many and a source of inspiration for few. But, to me it is one of the best indicators of the society on a given period. It is one of the best voting mechanisms where millions of voters around the world pay to vote for a concept, an idea and an art. In an individual sense, tell me the movies a person watches, and you can tell the character of a person. Well not exactly. If you take an individual movie there might be a lot of deviation due to the personal qualities of the actors, director etc. But, if you take a list of movies over a huge sample set in an era those personal qualities could get flattened out and what emerges out is a picture that speaks of those who lived that era, their tastes and their mentality and even their history and demographics.

Conversely, movies of a particular era shape the thinking, style & culture of an era. Thus, there is a heavy correlation between movies of a particular era and the contemporary society. Why Americans loved War movies during 40's and 50's (including the all time top - Casablanca), why they loved science fiction in 80s (Terminator, Back to the future) or fantasies in 2000's (LOTR, Harry potter due to a greater purchasing power of teenagers and young adults), why Indians loved religious movies till 50's and romantic movies in the 90s reflect the contemporary society and demographics (in the last case due to the greater power of teenagers and young men). For the purposes of this paper, I would like to take the two of the biggest film industries in the world - Hollywood & Bollywood (Hindi) along with a regional film industry in India - Kollywood. There is a strange correlation between the first and last, while the middle one seems to have a converse relationship.

1970s

Late 60s to 70s represent a new era in American and world society. It is the start of the baby boomer generation (people who came after the war had more number of kids and started building up the society) and the presence of so many youngsters started influencing the music and movie industries. Elvis, the Beetles and dozens of other pop, rock music guys changed the total atmosphere of the soft & serene western music. Counter culture develop and hippy became fashionable. In a lot of ways, the movies reflect this contrary & counter culture. While the preceding era had some stunning concept movies like Casablanca, Citizen Cane, Gone with the Wind, To Kill a Mocking Bird, this era was famous for its darker movies closing on underworld and darker human aspects - movies like Godfather (1972) & its sequel (1974), Apocalypse Now (1979), Taxi Driver (1976), or even the dark humor M*A*S*H (1970) defined the tradition. Later in the era, new generation of movies started to sprout reflecting the scientific advancements of the era that led to the 1980s style. Some of the samples in the category include the Star War & Start Trek series of movies.

While, Hollywood film industry was limiting in its dark hits, Hindi film industry was in its peak with its lively bright movies. It defined one of the greatest era, with the new booming generation of actors that broke the tradition from the past. Amitabh Bachan, Dharmendra, Rajesh Khanna, Zeenat Amman and the young Kapoors took over the rein of the old Hindi cinema and brought life to it. All time hits like Sholay (1975), Andaz (1971), Aradhana (1969), Bobby (1973), Don (1978) & Dewar (1975) appeared in this period and Hindi songs showed a marked difference. Inspired by their western counterparts and some original scores, Hindi films stunned Indian cinema (and most parts of West Asia) with their songs. And a lot of people believe that Hindi Cinema never ever reached back its zenith as that era.

While Hindi movies were reveling in its great heights, the southern film industry of Kollywood, followed the tradition of Hollywood. While, its 1950s & 60s movies produced a great style and bright concepts, the 70s era was a peak for darker concepts. Actors like Rajni Kanth, Kamal Hasan began their career with darker and psycho concept based movies directed by Balachandar. Movies questioned the individual relationships and pondered deep on concepts like love, family, etc. And a few movies were remade from Hindi film industry and the music quality was going down.

1980s

The 1980s was a markedly different style in that it was subdued and the movies were light. The movies and people still showed the reminiscences of Beetles-Boney M culture that reflected in their trousers, their hair-styles and even the back ground music of the movies. 1980s in Hollywood followed the late 70s scientific era with its own good movies like Terminator (1984), Back to the Future (1985), ET & the most of the Star Wars & Star Trek series. Except for these occasional hits, this era is almost forgettable from a collector's perspective.

Hindi & Tamil movies in the era continued their bright nature movies and brought more comedy into the system. Tamil film industry particularly brought its peak in humor with all the major actors bringing their own variety. Rajnikanth with his Thillu Mullu (1981) and Guru Shishyan (1988) was in his highs only to be beaten by Kamal Hassan bringing his best humor performances in Aboorva Sagodarargal (1988), Pesum Padam (1988) and Michael Madana Kama Rajan (1990). But, in terms of concept and magnificence this era was a passable one for all these film industries.

1990s

90s marked a significant and the greatest era for the Hollywood industry. It brought the greatest concept movies like Swashank Redemption (1994), Shindler's list (1993), Forrest Gump (1994), Saving Private Ryan (1998), Cast Away (2000), Braveheart (1994) & late in the era movies like The Matrix (1999), Gladiator (2000) & A Beautiful mind (2001) - extending into the millennium. Some of the all time block blasters like Jurassic Park (1993), Titanic (1997) crowned while interesting action movies like Speed (1994), Mission Impossible (1996), MIB (1997), T2:Judgement Day(1991), True Lies (1994), The Mummy (1999), Charlies Angels (2000) and total humor like The Mask (1994) & There's Something About Mary (1998). The extraordinary variety, stunning concepts, crowning actors (Cruise, Hanks, Crowe & Schwarzenegger) and directors marked this greatest era for Hollywood film industry.

While, Hollywood was peaking, Hindi industry was almost tanking. It was a bare shadow of its earlier past after the great actors & music directors left. The movie industry now started focusing purely on romance & family centric movies. Some the greatest in this era include Hum Apke Hein Kaun (1994), DDLJ (1995), KKHH (1998) & KKKG (2000) and they were all romantic movies. There were not many concept movies or awe-inspiring block busters.

While Hindi was tanking, Tamil cinema rose to its peak just like Hollywood, in its own style. The humor of 80s were given way to concept, action and block buster movies. Director Shankar produced three of the all time greatest concept movies in Tamil - Gentleman (1993), Indian (1996) and Mudalvan (1999) followed by Mani Rathnam's Roja (1993), Alai Payude (2000) & Bombay (1995). Actor Rajni Kanth produced two of his sensational movies Dalapathy (1991) and Badshah (1994), while Kamal Hassan produced 3 great movies in a sequence of 4 years that were nominated for Oscar foreign film official entry from India, including Devar magan (1992), Kurudi Punal (1995) & Indian (1996) and then later for Hey Ram (2000), apart from his great action in the remake of "Mrs. Doubtfire" in Hindi & Tamil. From the middle of decade, an upcoming actor Vijay produced some of the best romantic movies like Poove Unakaga (1995), Kadaluku Mariyadai (1997) and Tullada Manamum Tullum (2000). The movies were also in spectacular style, color and awe-inspiring settings like those of Kadal Desam (1996), Minsara Kanavu (1997) & Jeans (1998). Inspired by the scores of the great music director A. R. Rahman and some great concepts, Tamil cinema for the first and only time dominated the Indian film industry and dozens of its music and movies were remade in Hindi and other languages.

Current Era (2000-2007)

Current era starting from the millennium marks a considerable difference to the earlier era for Hollywood. The rise of technology and teenage kids gave way to immature teenage fantasy movies to take center stage in this era. Movies totally divorced from reality like Lord of the Rings series, Harry Potter series, Charlie & the chocolate factory and slightly more sensible Spider Man series & Pirates of the Caribbean started to dominate the era. While the sequels for Mission Impossible, X-Men, Terminator and film adaptation of The Da Vinci Code were totally disappointing, movies like Crash could have been made better though it stood out a lone concept movie of the era. Though, we are just halfway through the era, it has already started to tank and the quality of movies have reached the nadir with directors focusing on teenagers & immature young adults to produce their blockbusters. Samples like Lady in the Water (2006) showed how worse a movie could be made.

The Tamil movie industry in its marked correlation with Hollywood is also digging its grave in a stark contrast to the earlier decade. Totally rubbish new heroes and actresses who know the least of acting started to dominate an era of imbecility and stupidity. The occasional concept movies like Autograph (2004), romance like Roja Kootam (2003) and action like Ghilli (2004) have yet to cause a considerable shift in the era. Great actors like Rajni kanth, Kamal Hassan, Vijay and legendary directors like Shankar have rubbished themselves with some utter senseless moves in the era.

While both Hollywood & Kollywood have totally fallen off, the silver lining is seen from the rise of Bollywood, in its greatest era. While the earlier era were pure romantic movies and cheap thrills focusing on the local audience, Bollywood of the current era rose to satisfy the intellectual aspirations of educated guys both in India and abroad. As an example three great movies of Hindi history - Black (2005), Paheli (2005) & Swades (2004) competed for Oscar entry last year, just like what happened in 1994 in Hollywood - a virtual clash of the Titans. Swades was one of the most perfect movies ever made in Hindi should rub shoulders with the likes of Shwashank Redemption & Casa Blanca, led the pack though it was surprisingly let down by its audience. However, two of the other greatest movies that were also made in the era - Laggan (2001) and Rang de Basanti (2006) got great approval from the audience and showed how good movies could be made. The humor mixed concept movies like Munnabhai series (2004 & 2006), Salam Namaste (2005) & Dil Chahta Hai (2001) showed the new face of Hindi cinema with its dazzling colors. Some cool block busters like Dhoom (2004), Loc:Kargil (2003), Banty Aur Babli (2005), Don (2006) and soft romantics like Veer Zaara (2004), Parineeta (2005) gave color while Fanaa (2006) was a letdown - though well made, was illegal in its concept.

Summary

Film industries show what an era of people like and an indication of their tastes. Like business cycles, movies too have their high and low eras, sometimes coming alternatively. Movies of an era (roughly a decade) have some global similarities and eras could abruptly start and end with some stellar era leaders. And there is also a great correlation between movie industries, the complementary relationship between Hollywood & Kollywood and their converse relationship with the middle guy - Bollywood.

Guru: A film & economics review

(Disclaimer: I'm not here to comment on how the songs were, how the this & that pinky minor details were... search some other blog for that. I'm not gonna talk about Mani Rathnam or AR Rahman or even Rajiv Menon. I felt most other reviews were pathetic in that they totally missed the whole point. I'm here for the story and story alone, what it means.)

Oh boy! what a week of movies... This whole week I had been spending watching some of the best movies (apart from doing my day job) included one of the best movies of all time - "Life is beautiful" (that got me to spend most of the tissues in my house) and the first day of this Hindi movie - "Guru". I loved it so much that I didnt even talk coming out of the theatre with my dozen frens and drove the car without switching on the music. I wanted the film to settle in me and blogging as soon as possible. This is my review based on my experiences with both investing & films and ya... ATLAS SHRUGGED. Kindly bear if dont talk about AR Rahman at all (the music director) as I'm someone who believe that most films dont need songs and in this film most of the songs were out of place (but you know I loved the Mallika Sherawat's song ;)).

The movie is about the story of one of the world's greatest entrepreneurs Dhirubhai Ambani, the founder of the conglomerate Reliance. To me he is much more than even Henry Ford & Andrew Carnegie (the former pillars of American economic ascendence) as he battled India's highly idiotic anti-business atmosphere and built a vast empire (from texitles to petroleum, telecom, and now retail malls & real estate) starting from nothing. He should be a hero for any Indian dreaming to do something big by the power of economics and today we are seeing the brilliant empire slowly on the footsteps of becoming a GE of the world. So, how did a guy with no political or business links to start out with, built such a magestic empire is a great legend. I once read about it again and again (12 years ago during the Indian boom) and its fascinating. And this movie brilliantly captures that (Hindi films are getting better and better in every genre) and top the director ices with the film depiction of Hank Rearden's extraordinary court scene in "Atlas Shrugged". (For those who didnt read the novel, I cant pity you for the lack of understanding of the climax). One moron writes >> he attempts to justify the man’s deeds in a weak climax which puts forward the dubious premise that as long as you bring happiness to your shareholders here
What the heck he knows about climaxes or business?

The story revolves around Gurubhai (does it sounds like Dhirubhai) & his brilliant political & business maneuvres (basically he got around India' archaic rules of milking out well-run companies and increased production enormously and fought a system by breaking all its bad rules and involved one of the biggest sharebases in the country, thereby benifitting most middle class in the country) and his pitched battles with Nanaji (Ramnath Goenka of Indian express).

Simple story: Guru fails in his exams and runs to Turkey to work in a petrochemical firm and learns in and out of business and commodities trading. He then beleives that he can do much better by starting business in India and returns back. Here, he then partners with his close friend and marries his sister (played by Aishwarya Rai) partly for the dowry with which he can open a company. He then goes to Mumbai and wants to trade in the rudimentary commodities exchange there. However, he finds redtapism there, with the President of the exchange a wealthy Mr.Contractor (Nusli Wadia of Bombay Dyeing) doesn't allow new members and extends full control over it, thereby blocking development. Guru accidentally Nanaji, a news baron, and Nanaji agrees to publish his story of how business is blocked by vested interests in the exchange. Contractor gets pissed off and using his political power closes the exchange itself in anger. But, Guru does an intelligent convincing and puts the IAS officer incharge to a great embarassment and forced to reopen.

Guru becomes a great trader, and later opens a big factory and in a path that revolutionized Indian industry, he went for an equity based approach with an IPO (that time called new issues) instead of taking the conventional debt based aproach. An ingenious decision that brough millions of commoners into shareholder governance thereby ensuring its success with politicians. He dreams of beating Burma Shell (Bombay Dyeing) with his company and does extrordinary maneuvres - creating bogus exports (Indian law then allowed teh companies to import only if they export something, so he created ghost entities abroad that bought his empty boxes) and then channeled the revenue to import a lot of capital goods (machinery). And he understaded the imports to avoid taxes and made use of teh capital gains laws to avoid most of the taxes.

An entreprising reporter in Swathanthra (Indian Express) exposes all the violations and a government commission gets into full swing. He is accused by everybody and the great company was on the verge of closing down with Ambani facing the prospect of jail (in 1980s). In the state of shock he gets a paralytic attack. In the climax court scene, he delivers a brilliant speech (exactly like Hank's speech in Atla Shrugged), where he questions the verasity of those archaic laws and doesnt hide the fact that he broke the laws. He demands whether making a prosperous business that led to India's growth and alleviation of poverty as a crime & whether making all those middleclass shareholders prosperous is a crime. A host of brilliant questions in the licence raj regime of pre-economic indepence India (got independence in 1991). The govt was dumbstruck and it had millions of common shreholders whose rights the common cannot affect. So, the government had to go back, and eventually India started its reforms (not in the movie).

The movie ends with how Dhirubhai dreamed of India to become a first world country and why chasing dreams is not bad. If it means breaking stupid laws so be it (Mahatmaji called it Civil Disobedience movement). I perfectly agree with Dhirubhai, I liked the powers of a man's dream and seeing the status of Reliance today as teh backbone of Indian economy, I cant just wonder what wud have happened to India if those stupid politicians got carried away and killed Reliance.

It was a great movie - a great lesson. Rand's lovers wud love the concept (though the songs showed typical Bollywood Masala strains) and Indian businessmen should learn a lesson or two from him.

Rang de Basanti in Action

For those of you who thought that the events in Rang de Basanti are impossible, think again. There was a peaceful procession of medical students in New Delhi and the Delhi police used lathi charge and teargas and violence to ward them off. The protestors were for a cause and their methods were peaceful. Like RDB, the villian is a cabinet minister. And the police were indiscriminate. Time is soon running out and at some point we have to fight the locusts who have managed to control India for the last 60 years. But, we should do much more intelligent work than the innocent youth of RDB. We are not having a single enemy. The thing that stands before us is a heinous system of reservation that has brainwashed people enough that most people just fight on its implementation and forget its unjust concept. The system of quota is against the spirit of Indian Constitituion's Article 15 (equality and non-discrimination based on birth) and is also against the spirits of democracy worldwide (US and European courts have illegalized quota systems)

References:
Students protesting story

Rang De Basanti

Today, I saw the movie Rang de Basanti, a story about how 5 happy-go-lucky Indian youth get transformed into fiery revolutionaries and finally give up their live for a cause.

It left a deep emotional scar on me. It brings back the question that I keep asking me often.

What does freedom mean for a nation, where a girl gets raped every 4 seconds, a child is forced in slavery in work and taken away from education, where a person gets traped in bonded labor and a person is discriminated by untouchability and poverty? What does prosperity mean for those people who doesnt even have access to basic necessities food, clothing & shelter and where thousands die of hunger and malnutrition and totally avoidable diseases everyday? What does development mean for a nation where hundreds of millions earn less than $1/day and 400 million people can't even read or write any language? What does equality mean for those people, who cant draw water from the well, due to their lowly birth? What does opportunities mean for those people who dont even send their kids for primary education?

How do we attain Azadi for the nation of India?

Whom are we going to get our freedom from? Is it going to be from the foreign powers that imperialize(d) us? Is it goin to be from those worst criminals who rule us under the guise of politicians and make laws for us? Is it goin to be from the totally corrupt beurocrats whose misplanning kills our nation everyday? Is it goin to be from those law enforcement persons who commit as much crimes as those, from whom they are supposed to protect us? Is it goin to be from the govt. officials who badly enforce all of the governmental measures? Is it goin to be from the caste and religious leaders who seek to whip up the emotions of the people and gain sadistic pleasure? Is it goin to be from those poor-quality teacher, killer doctors who do false operations, deadly engineers who design those collapsing bridges .....

We have thousands of people from which we need to get freedom from, and this we use as an excuse for our inaction. We hide behind the walls of coverdice, by blaming everyone around us. We hide behind our silence that veils our impotence. If there is something that we need to get freedom from, It is WE whose coverdice and impotence sustains the despots. It is our silence that grows the clutches of violence. IT is our inaction that puts our nation in peril. If we watch a crime happen before us, and dont stand up to it, we are as much part of the crime. In this way, every one of us are CRIMINALS.

We need to change ourselves. We need to wash our sins of inactivity and corruption. We need to feel guilty of every minute we waste, as we lose a chance to save someone from violence. We need to feel guilty of every resource we waste, as that could have been used to save hunger and death. When there are people who commit suicide for Rs.10000 ($200) of their agricultural loans, unable to raise their family due to drought and famine, we need to know the preciousness of what we have. It is our success and prosperity that we are goin to work on and channelize them for the growth of everyone of us, not by the stupidity of communism, but by market prosperity and entrepreneurship skills.

We need IAS officers, professors, engineers, scientists, lawyers and social thinkers who can set our economy and society on a roll. We'll solve the problems of society by our collective will and potential. If every educated youth, taught an illiterate to read and write a basic script in a year, within 5 years, we can wipe out the whole problem of ILLITERACY. If each one of us could just share our success to a rural kid and motivate him/her and provide them basic information, we could wipe out the whole problem rural in-development. And We need the revolutionaries whose thoughts can set the society on fire and whose ideas can inspire whole fields of thought.

Everything is in the realm of us, but still we find it comfortable to be stupid, loser, cowards who grumbles against everybody else. It is WE who are going to change....

INQUILAB ZINDABAD