Big Little Lies

Much bigger than the lies which we tell are the lies which we live. 

Big Little Lies is a stunner. It tears into - and through - gorgeous facades, perfect husbands, beautiful children, ideal housewives and an idyllic little town, to reveal what is virtually a secret-riddled sordid collection of mortals. Oh, ordinary lives, you know. 

Reese Witherspoon is Madeline, for whom everyone's business is her business, whose passion to do the right thing is only matched with her utter helplessness as to what to do with her rebellious cynical teenager daughter. Nicole Kidman is Celeste,  an ex-lawyer, with a beauty which could crack mirrors, and a young husband good enough to eat, struggling with her feelings to get back to work, but mangled up in the dark deep secret of her family life. And then, there is Shailene Woodley as Jane, the single mother who has drifted into town, whose past has a haunting  pain and whose six-year old son, in no time,  is accused of being a bully. 

And into this volatile mix are an ex-husband, a  gay cafe owner, a gorgeously talented new-age wife, a mother of a bullied little girl and a successful business owner who is the cynosure of a myriad jealous eyes, a theatre director whose puppet show has puppets making love, and a school teacher who is struggling to do the right thing with children who want to do what they want. 

The trouble with perfection in life is that life itself is a messy bitch. When everything is going right, you have a fight with a spouse and meet a soulmate, when your career is soaring you have a child who thinks virginity is a commodity, when you have a husband who is the finest dad you can think of to your children he turns out to be a clinging jealous monster.

The very word perfection is a facade. And it's desire or very existence is antithesis to the nature of relationships. 

The intricate geometry of ties and circumstances in Big Little Lies is laid on the spine of a murder - who's or why is revealed only in the end. But the menace in the ordinary, the growing politics in school happenstance, the chasms between the closest, as incident upon incident piles on, always predicates something which can't end well. And it doesn't. 

Reese Witherspoon is at the heart of the film. Shailene provides its strange mystery. But it is Nicole Kidman, with her cool allure and her slow decomposition and breakdown who cuts the soul apart. Her sessions with the therapist, with or without her husband, are an insidious and incredible testament to our self-denials, our refusal to let ourselves reconcile with the muck inside our lives, in spite of the fact that it might be destroying us. 

Beneath all the drama of a story which Big Little Lies brings, are the startling and undeniable truths of married - and so-called ordinary - lives. We present our ideal sides but inside we foster ugly truths, until we ourselves forget where our reality ends and fiction starts. It is in the nature of our being - and the half-lives we live.

The bliss of a complete life can only happen in half-measures in the form of a life well lived, through acceptances, giving (& getting) spaces and proactive action. Life always comes around and catches us with our pants down when we least expect it. We have to face our truths at some point or the other, however much we may run away from them. Karma finds its balance by confronting us, or confronting all that we hold dear, with our misdeeds and alienations. There is no right way for life or living. But the search for truths about ourselves might be a good place to start. Alas, that is never a given. 

Rake

Rake is outrageous. Cleaver Greene, it's protagonist, has, in a moment of rare perspicacity, called himself a 'fucking fuckwit', which is as close as one can get to what the serial is all about. And we can only find joy in that. Because Cleaver is a clever lawyer, and is shameless, inventive, and the rallying point for all lost causes and souls. 

So, his CV includes successful defence of, to name a few, a cannibal, a 'dog-loving' couple (oh I wish I could tell what that means!), a polygamist, a masturbating paparazzi,  a criminal with 750 charges of rape, murder, extortion et al, and so on and so forth. And he does his thing with a rare pizzazz and a scruple-less effortlessness. 

As a character, Cleaver is a miracle. He's obnoxious, but completely lovable. He is uncontrollable with his basic instincts, is highly successful in pushing away everyone he loves, but is the one everyone in trouble turns to. He is deep trouble himself, but is the beacon for everyone desperately looking for an outre solution.

Needless to say, his personal life is a gargantuan mess. He goes from one affair to another, leaving only anger and despair in his wake. His iffy commitment levels are forever impinging on his work, and his profane-littered litanies in court and off it are a legend of cringe-worthiness.

And to top it all, these are his nearest and dearest - his ex-wife is an ex-but-reconsidering lesbo, he is in love with a prostitute, his son can only fall in love with women much older to him, his secretary is marrying a guy who refuses to have sex with her till they get married, so she has an affair with a colleague who's wife has just had an affair with Cleaver. And this is just for starts!! 

After establishing Cleaver and his family and his closest mates and colleagues, the four-seasons masterpiece engages us in his legal battles, his outre and unhinged connivances, and slowly sucks us into his personal life and his struggles with straightforward engagements.

Nothing is simple in Cleaver's books. And what gives the series depth is its clever and continuous commentary on the inequities and contradictions of the legal and political firmament. 

It's pretty well established that this serial is a watermark in Australian television. And we can't reiterate enough the blessings of Netflix. The access to unreachable, often unknown, quality serials and documentaries, is a boon like no other!  

Catch this boon!! 

The Fall - light in the shadow of depravity

(Please do not read this meditation on a Netflix TV crime pshychodrama - if you dont like things rambling. The write is long and unstructured and written for myself and has spoilers. It's here so it doesn't get lost! Just know - if you can, don't miss this incredible drama.) 

It's startling how dangerous stillness can be. And when there is much of it, how violent it can get. Facades convey nothing of the turmoil churning inside. There is a thin line which separates the ones who then let the violence spill out of themselves. 

That's the line which separates Stella, an investigating officer, from Paul, a serial killer. And The Fall examines their lives in parallel, and how they converge metaphysically first, much before they do physically. And how each person handles the black holes inside themselves.  Paul lost his mother and exploded. Stella lost her father and imploded. And beneath their immaculate masks they both lived lives of seeming normalcy. 

The difference between their trajectories was the touch in their lives of fortune or depravity. But both used people for their ends, and brought doom and destruction. But whilst the essential goodness brought redemption in one's circle, there was only death in the other.  

We all have circles of influence. We don't even know where it extends to, whom it seeps into. But we are all agents of change.  We are all capable of influence. We are all connected. So what we do with this power often defines our place in the world, and the world's place inside us. 

Stella goes to talk to Katie, a 16 year old who is in love with Paul, and is ready to produce false alibi to save him. In correctional detention, she self-harms herself. And has this conversation with Stella.

Katie Benedetto: My father killed himself. 
DSI Gibson: I thought it was an accident. 
Katie Benedetto: He chose to ride a motorbike. Even though I worried about him every time he went out every night he was late home. He loved the bike more than he loved me. Loved the thrill of speed more than he loved his only daughter. I don't call that an accident. 
DSI Gibson: Is that why you're throwing your life away? You know you can't get him back. No matter how hard you try. 

We all have those voices in our heads, that tell us we're a disappointment, that tell us our work is insignificant. That it's not good enough, it takes too long, it's too hard. But when times are tough, we need tough dreams. But real dreams, not lies. Not an unreality like Paul. You need to fight for yourself, Katie, because right now you're in danger. 

We all need love and we all need nurture. There's too much death and destruction. But friends who love you should warm you like the sun. Make you feel good about yourself. Not freeze you in their contempt and in their hate. Anger corrodes our belief that anything good can happen to us. Paul's been destroyed by his anger, his rage. And you, you hurt a friend, to impress him. But he doesn't care. He doesn't even know you exist. 

It's almost as if Stella was speaking to herself.  

In the final interrogation scene, Paul speaks of alienation and loneliness and the wretchedness of his childhood. And then he says- 

We're all wearing masks to some extent. You certainly are. There are memories, thoughts that feel like memories that are starting to come back to me. 

There's a voice. There's a voice saying, "We're losing him, we're losing him."So, there must have been at least one person who cared whether I lived or died. 

DSI Gibson: That was me. That was my voice. And I *did* care. I thought death would be too easy for you, too easy an escape. And I didn't want you to cheat the system. And I still don't. I want you to be punished for the crimes that you've committed. Rose Stagg was so right about you. She saw right through you, your infantile desire to have a captive and captivated audience. You just want to be noticed, you want to be the center of attention, to have special treatment, to make your mark. But it's all just a performance. All of it. You perform for me, for your solicitor, your doctors, your nurse, your psychiatrist, even your family. It's all just one big performance as protection against the dreaded black hole of your heart. Well, guess what, Paul, it's time to grow up. It's time to take responsibility for what you've done. Let's stop this pathetic charade. 

The only sliver of hope he had, suddenly collapses. And sets the tone for the calamitous denouement.  

In a small heartbreaking scene Paul's daughter opens her arms  and embraces Stella, after she gets to know the truth about her father.  The youngest and the most influenced rejects the dark side and moves towards light. 

The story lingers with every character, and their arcs and their relevance and their lives spanning out because of the effect Stella or/and Paul have on them. The dead, the living, the barely-living, the survived. 

Each of the three seasons, which can be seen all at once on Netflix (such blessings are due to them!), addresses different aspects of the relationship - first, the crimes, then the chase and then the conjoinment.

In a world where fulfilment is a pursuit beset with moral landmines, and happiness is often at the altar of innocence, there is still space for goodness. Even in the heart of pure evil lies the echo of something quintessentially pure. Nothing can ever take away the essential loneliness of life, but we can leave signs of our mistakes for people to pick up. We all have cemeteries ready for us at the end.  Can we make those into signposts? 

La La Land

This is definitely going to be an all time favorite film.

I'm so jealous of youth.  And starry-eyes.  And the slow flush of fresh love. And the beauteous search for meaning. And how love often means nursing your lover's dream, even as life chips away at it.

But here's the what-if twist - whither ambition when love is at your heart-step?

La La Land is lyrical, sumptuously accessible, filled with the cynicism and jazz-filled dream of Ryan Gosling, the liquid soul-mirrored eyes of Emma Stone. Emma embodies everybody's confusion, ambition, power and weakness. Both of them love each other so dearly that they desperately want the other to achieve. But what fuels incipient dreams also powers them to places they never thought they would reach. But then, isn't that the very purpose of life?

When both of them stop to catch their breath, to settle down to a simple meal, to figure out what their prodding the other led the other to, truths tumble out. Alas, as is the human norm, the only truth he sees in her mirror are the stories he's told himself.

Such is the persuasion and charm of this fabulous film, that in our involvement with the characters, we absorb the sublimal sub-text by almost missing it - longing for love or life can often take us to different places - both good, both compromised, both tragic, both qualifying as success. In the end, preciousness is what we have, and learn to treasure. However big the regret.

This is pure cinema, in its ambition to help us soar beyond our ordinary lives - without forgetting that the miniscule inside our hearts is an empire for each one of us.

This a movie to learn and love. One for the ages.

Arrival

To me, this is a film about choices and communication. Communication - it's lack, it's contradictions, it's compulsions, it's limitations - and what it does to us.  Subtly, slowly, the film pulls us into its myriad ironies and it's questions.  And choices - the ones we make in spite of knowing everything - because life is lived in the pleasures of the moments and not its tragedies.

The communication channels are opened with aliens, and the attempt is to garner from them their intention of coming onto the earth. And the irony is that the communication expert called in is single - and haunted by personal loss - fatal vis-a-vis her child, and vacant vis-a-vis her partner.

And as she and her physicist companion slowly unravel meanings, all around people are misinterpreting meanings. Perceptions, fear, tension - all internalise interpretations which were never there. It's the way we jump to conclusions, day in day out. Cooperation and more communication is called for - and is not forthcoming.

And as my friend Avi, explained - it is reality in its own way - it's my reality, yes, but it is also a part of the larger canvas  - the world exists because we perceive it, even though it is only as we see it.

And it's our failure to understand that these differences are all part of the same tapestry, is what causes grief.

More intense is the dilemma of choices. What if you knew the future and it's grievances - would you still live the road to surefire tragedy?

And since this is sci-fi, there are twists. And one which is sumptuous.  The emotional tug of the mother and daughter interaction, which also gives the perspective to so many of the film's philosophical underpinnings, is the way to life's many solutions.

And seeing into the future is a film plot, but pursuing your heart is life's.

Kapoor & sons - victims and survivors ~

In the universe of pain, we hurt family the most. Our privilege of having seen their souls makes it easy for us to tear into them, ruthlessly, often without remorse. We seek solace in our family, know it be our sanctuary, but have no compunction in taking it for granted: we do not think twice before burning our homes down. 

We become sensitive to every inflection of voice, every turn of phrase - and then sit back and wonder why would we be so continuously hyper about them who have no reason to hurt us?

And there lies the irony of family ties: "we will take you for granted but not have you treat me the same way."

Who amongst us is not haunted by the questions of who is mother's favorite, of why the phone call first went to younger  brother, of why he gets away for all his crimes. In the familial manure, grow our first intimations of jealousy,  privilege, discrimination, hurt. And the shadows stay inside. And lengthen outside us in those inflection points when we lose our heads and our worlds seem to be collapsing around us.

But in between are the good times. When you can be yourself.  And be given space for being yourself.  To learn to be touchy -feel with your mum, to understand the quiddities of your dad, and to discover - often with shocking results - that they are also human, and it's not strengths but frailties which make the man.

Far, far away from home, you miss your mother's admonishments, close to her you hear only the stentorian tone. You grow,  look back and realize that love for siblings can never be equal: it's not a mother taking sides, but one human being being more comfortable with another - and struggling with the choice.

Our capacity to give pain is only matched with our ability to carry it. But when there is a cloudburst, dams burst and there is a deluge. There is a purge, there is remission, there is contrition, there is realization.  There are also hurts.

And the facade of a 'happy family' melts away and the hypocrisies are there for all to see. And for people who would have sworn that they would have died for each other, the stark reality stands in front of them - they could very well have killed each other. 

Love only has victims. Family only has survivors. 

Inside Out

Joy finally gets to know something which we all know - Sadness could also bring people together.

Time and again I've written about pain and darkness. And have been asked what lies inside? Maybe at the core I'm a sad. But it doesn't mean I'm a sad person. I remember what one interviewer said of Woody Allen - "I don’t even think Woody does comedy. I think he does dramas with jokes. They’re all sad at their core." (Chris Rock in a Vulture.com interview.) Happiness has its use.  But so does grief. And they describe a person - not necessarily define her.

The complexities of our emotions is often a choice - but more often than not are they mere chemical reactions? Don't we have control over ourselves?  Of course we do. Often.  But - often not. And the battles inside us rage without us always knowing about them.

And Riley's mind is one such battlefield - as she is born,  grows, glows - and faces change. She is all of twelve years old when her parents change town - and her little being faces the catastrophes which even big beings can often not handle wirh equanimity. And inside her head Joy, Sadness, Anger, Disgust and Fear battle it out. Continuously.  And the five of them battle it out to gain precedence and pursue their own natures even as they seek to protect the little girl they love and have a sense of duty towards, in ways their nature knows best.

Calamity strikes when Sadness strikes,  and she and Joy lose their way in the mind's labyrinth. And we discover the way our inner world works. The factory of dreams, the imaginative friends we conjure in our inner lives, what inhabitates the deepest recesses of our fears, what happens to our memories when we dont dust them into remembrance enough, how our core memories - things which our hearts know are significant - make up the core of our beings, and how our consciousness is a moving train which often, oh so often, gets derailed.

This is a triumph of a film. It delights in its inventiveness, and finds humour in its darkest moments. It conjures the synapses and the interconnectedness of our emotions - how we swing from one end of the emotional spectrum  to another,  how we struggle to feel something and end up feeling something else, how our inner philosophies seem like cubist art (oh yes!) and how our inner lives determine our outer ones. 

And amidst it's adventure,  camaraderie,  road journey,  lost highways, dream factories, crashing trains and crushing losses, the movie gives its heart to heartbreak and generously allows Sadness to find its mojo, in a way in which only a Joy could do.

Detective Byomkesh Bakshy! - Dhoti too loose ~

As I walked out of the hall, there were only two kinds of comments all around - "Why did they make it so complicated?" and "I dozed off for ten minutes".  And I suddenly didn't feel guilty of nodding off somewhere in the middle of the first half. That's Dibaker's Byomkesh for you. Moody, atmospheric, stylish - and crushingly boring! And that is such a tragedy. 

In creating a big canvas, the director lost track of small things. Terrific atmospherics don't automatically create intimacies. A thumping soundtrack doesn't eliminate intrinsic somnolence. And big nation-saving stories don't create big stories. 

Dibakar seems so pleased with the budget he has got to recreate a truly beautiful period piece, that he forgot that there have to be characters in front of all the art direction who should be able to connect with the audience. And that's where all the Byomkesh films made in Bangla are far superior than this one - they connect, they hold one's attention, and they leave one rooting for the eponymous hero.  Such complete satisfaction!

And the surprise is that in such a long movie, the characters are still so underwritten. Take Swastika's Angoori Devi. This beautiful actress is the femme fatale. Her body tells of many stories it knows, and her childlike voice anticipates the tragedy of misplaced trust. But with all her talent, her limpid eyes and slow seduction, Swastika can't transcend the limitations of her poorly etched character. Or the fact that, Satyavati doesn't exchange a single coy look with Byomkesh throughout the film, and in the end is proposed to. Lazy writing and absolute balderdash.

Strangely, it is the end when the film bursts into violent life. Ferocious, fabulously choreographed, and like a page out of an Antigone saga -craft at last seems to meet purpose. Indeed, the last ten minutes are almost like a different film. And the film this film should have been. 

Furious 7: tender tinder

So there was this dude who was asked why Indians didn't do well in life in general. And the answer was that, well, because they spend most of their time watching films! This is that kind of a film. Time waste. Time pass. Whatever. And the kind you come out happy and utterly satisfied. And in spite of aphorisms of the kind above, don't make you feel wasted. 

One of the greatest pleasures of my life is of reading a thumping mystery as a Saturday evening drifts by, and I sit all alone, as the body count increases, and I turn page after page, and wonder if life could be better? I remember a Sherlock Holmes mystery where the master of the house acts as the man servant, and opens the door to a guest, and shuts it on his face, saying "Master is not in," because he was reading a book with a fireplace burning , a cigar between his lips, and a glass of something strong glistening on a side-table. And didn't want to be disturbed. Well, again, this is that kind of a film. 

And when you are into the seventh instalment of a film franchise, well, you are with family. You know the tics and tricks, that expression on the face, that reaction, the loves and fears, of each one of the protagonists. You become indulgent towards the irritating and big-hearted towards the bogus. You do this for family, don't you?

Oh and there is much to be indulgent about, what with so much cheesy splendor on show. Cars speeding out of planes, landing on highways and immediately commencing pursuit of an armored truck which has nasty guns sprouting out of every nick and corner of the vehicle. Or a billion dollar car crashing out of the airy heights of the glassy exterior of a skyscraper into another building, and then another. And a car flying into thin air to encounter a helicopter midair and blowing it apart. Oh the audacity of imagination! 

But there is a sunset feel to the proceedings. Paul Walker would no longer be there. And he would be missed. He gave a winsome vulnerability to the film amidst it's impossible heroes and heroics. There's tenderness and remembrance. And the final tribute in the film shows the warmth of this warm persona, not only with his co-leads, but with the audience. Slow or fast, life spells out the inevitability of moving on and away. 

For the rest of it, this is one breathless ride. The best was saved for the last. 

Insurgent: incisive.

Shailene Woodley's Tris is a character forever in an existential crisis. Her vulnerability shimmers on her face. She says "Everybody who has come close to me has either died or been hurt." The time she completely breaks down, after telling her truths under the influence of a serum, is a time where, strangely, she shows her greatest strength: her fragility. Because she can combine it with her determination, and transcend her self-doubt. 

Tris carries the guilt of her mother's death, that of her father and of personally killing a dear friend. For someone like this, the choice to give oneself up for any eventuality is easy. For her humaneness would ensure her survival - if not physically, then as the idea of her. 

But as humans we can scarcely think so far ahead. We can only be generous, humane and good. And let the Universe take care of us. 

In this outstanding adaptation of a mediocre novel, interpretations of 'the greater good' abound. Questions of slotting human beings into definitions of their primary strengths are asked. And the fight ensues. 

In a society which is demarcated into Dauntless, Amity, Candor, Abnegation and Erudite, as per a person's choice of what her strengths are, the lines have to blur. Someone has to think that they are brighter, better, more entitled to power. Humans desire peace but abhor nature's piecemeal distribution of resources. Hence trouble is forever the compatriot of peace. 

The film explodes even as its heroine implodes. It sears in it's ambition, in it's portrayal of a city getting destroyed as it's societies disintegrate. And it soars in scenes which take your breath away. And in front of your eyes you see a wisp of a girl turn into a peerless heroine.

Wild: of Cheryl who Strayed ~

Cheryl: God is a ruthless bitch

At the end of every journey you only find yourself. 

What if you are a woman, running away from yourself, from what you've become? Trekking 1100 miles, alone, with a bag so large that it is nicknamed Monster by others, someone who has never hiked before, and who gets the wrong fuel for her hiking stove. Someone who is so wasted that she cheats regularly on her husband with random strangers, does drugs, and then when separating, chooses the name Strayed, because that's what she had done.

Stacey: You get lonely? 

Cheryl: Honestly? I'm lonelier in my real life than I am out here. I miss my friends, of course but it's not as if I have anybody waiting for me at home. 

The thing which kills, on a  trail, or in life, is aloneness, the knowledge that the one you loved has been pushed back by you, and he has moved on. And now you crave his voice, the look in his eyes when he turned his head your way. Alas, often you push people away because you have been made the last priority in a world where you suddenly have no rights. And you feel - you have no right to live. Thus does self-destruction begin. 

Cheryl: What if I forgave myself? I thought. What if I forgave myself even though I'd done something I shouldn't have? What if I was a liar and a cheat and there was no excuse for what I'd done other than because it was what I wanted and needed to do? What if I was sorry, but if I could go back in time I wouldn't do anything differently than I had done? What if I'd actually wanted to fuck every one of those men? What if heroin taught me something? What if yes was the right answer instead of no? What if what made me do all those things everyone thought I shouldn't have done was what also had got me here? What if I was never redeemed? What if I already was?

And that's the mystery of journies. You can only start them, you do not know where you will end. And if you are ready to let the straying path find you, and you have the guts to let the elements take you into their random peregrinations, you will be handed with both life's mysteries and it's moments. 

Cheryl: Why are you here? 

Stacey: I don't know. I just need to find something in myself, you know? I think the trail was good for that. I mean, look. 

[They look up at the sunset]

Stacey: This has the power to fill you up again, if you'll let it. 

Cheryl: My mother used to say something that drove me nuts. There is a sunrise and a sunset every day and you can choose to be there for it. You can put yourself in the way of beauty. 

And that's the way solutions come - the way the problems do. Suddenly. When you least expect. Sometimes before you reach the Bridge of Dreams. Most often it is born in the womb of your greatest tragedies. When you choose the impossible trail, when you choose to back yourself over every possible difficulty. 

Cheryl :The thing about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, the thing that was so profound to me that summer-and yet also, like most things, so very simple-was how few choices I had and how often I had to do the thing I least wanted to do. How there was no escape or denial. No numbing it down with a martini or covering it up with a roll in the hay. As I clung to the chaparral that day, attempting to patch up my bleeding finger, terrified by every sound that the bull was coming back, I considered my options. There were only two and they were essentially the same. I could go back in the direction I had come from, or I could go forward in the direction I intended to go.

And this is the benediction we are a part of - this mysterious irrevocable sacred life.

Quotes from the film and the book by Cheryl Strayed "Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail"

Birdman: seeking significance ~

I will let you into a secret, which no one knows. I have flown. I don't mean in an airplane. I mean - like a bird. There were undulating hills. I must have been seven or eight. And the wind was strong and high, and I was left alone by adults, relieved to find me happy in my aloneness. And there was space to run. Which I did. I was small, I was light. And the winds caught me, and raised me high above. And I flew. For many many seconds. And I did it again and again, for longer and longer periods. Over the grass, and the shrubs and the long stalks of wildflowers. I've never mentioned it, because no one would believe me. It was a high point, literally and figuratively. 

I know exactly how the Birdman found his flight. And his meaning. 

But there's a BC and an AD to everything. The movie, Birdman, talks about the AD of glory. A huge star, Riggan, is in the last eddie of life. And he is seeking connection - with his family. And significance - in theatre. And his life revolves around that search.

The theatre hall is claustrophobic but it is also the place where he hopes to find his epiphany. The camera prowls through the narrow passageways of the old theatre, the way electric signals move through the nerves in our hearts and minds, seeking life and, more importantly, purpose for life. Because what does a man do when today's reality is washed out and yesterday's glory looks increasingly illusory?

And Riggan's choice of play, an adaptation of a  Raymond Carver story, is not random, because Carver finds infinity in the minutiae of love and life. And he knows, deep down, that seeking relevance ultimately starts from asking questions and seeking answers of oneself. But the journey, ah, that's another matter. It is fraught with breaking heads, breaking hearts, and finally, literally cutting/shooting off one's nose. It's an action which is rich in metaphor. Riggan gets a new nose - totally unbeautiful. But he gets his flight back too. 

In these last few months of totally terrific films, there has been none with the layers and magic and art of Birdman - and the consummate craftsmanship. 

The camera is both a seeker and a surgeon. The music is both a companion and a creator. The acting is an amalgam of regrets, realizations and resurrections. And the director breaks the characters and lets them reassemble themselves, until they find themselves anew, however imperfect that might be. 

Life's triumphs are glorious. But in an Inarritu film, life's defeats can only lead to something triumphant.

The Imitation Game: life imitating death ~

I don't know loners (caveat somewhere below). But I've read about them, seen them in films - misfits, restless geniuses - hated, ostracized, obsessed. Invariably, disliked. And achievers. The art world lends itself well to this creature. The lonely unrecognized unsung auteur working selflessly at his art and craft. They are fascinating because they defy the normal rules of working in teams, putting others before self, etc etc. 

Two of my favorite fictional heroes - Howard Roark and Lisbeth Salander - were both loners. And they were hit badly by the world. And it was only by the sheer skin of their prodigious talent that they survived. 

Alan Turing is one of them.And a real life one. Awkward, inwardly tortured because of a disastrous truth, he is completely incapable of working with others, or show finesse in his dealings with people. But he is also one of the greatest mathematicians of the time. And he is itching to crack the ultimate puzzle - that of coded Nazi war messages. But it is no mean task. As he has a team but he doesn't know how to use them. And he makes enemies very quickly. Until the ultimate truth dawns - he himself is his own first and foremost enemy. 

The battle then is severe - he has to fight himself first before Hitler can be defeated. It's truly an inside job. 

Now the caveat. There was a period, in high school, when I was discovering interests which none of my friends shared. Haunting art galleries, learning to dance kathak, taking workshops in theatre, reading in public gardens and parks, sitting inside churches. I was a loner. Alone. Friendless. But - I did what I wanted. I went where I wanted. It was scary - and liberating. No one to answer to, free. But I was also socially awkward, could write well, but went tongue tied when asked to speak. And when with my brother, who was charming, magnetic and fun, I invariably was gauche, silent and continuously putting my foot as soon as I opened my mouth. So it was torturous too. 

So it was a strange mixed time of my life. But progressively I reconciled with the fact that I walked to a different drumbeat - and I could silently ask those who commented about my obsessive need to be alone, to stuff it. 

I changed. Adjusted. Found a mean. Alan Turing is not able to. And he survives with great discomfort and pain. And it's a visual and dramatic treat to see the finely layered film span out in three time zones laying out what made the man what he was. And what made him. 

And unmade him. 

He committed suicide at the age of 41. 

Thank god, I learnt to love my aloneness less and my friends more. 

The Theory of Everything: a brief history of love ~

We all know Stephen Hawking, one way or the other. A shrunk man with a twisted face, with a permanent grimace on his face, deep inside a wheelchair, with an assortment of screens and instruments all around him, helping him to communicate. 

He is a part of our consciousness even if we are not always sure what he is famous for - something to do with black holes? A physicist? Has he won the Nobel Prize? Almost certainly we know him for The Brief History of Time, which is lying unread in our bookshelves. 

We know the challenge of being Hawking, and the triumph of a spirit which makes the mind go ahead even when the body refuses to assist. 

But you know what the other, and possibly bigger, challenge is? Of the people who dedicate their lives to such a person.

Jane Wilde and Stephen were in love before illness befell him. He tried hard to keep her away as doctors had given him a life expectancy of a mere two years. But it requires a woman in love to be ready to do anything for love. Stephen's father told Jane "This is not going to be a fight, it's going to be a heavy defeat for all of us." But she insisted, saying at least they would have two years. Jane had the courage to take this huge leap into darkness.

The film is their story. And how he goes from bad to worse in the body, and better and better in his mind. And she goes from softness to determination to burdened to exasperation to bitterness. The arcs of life and love and passion are encapsulated in their stories. 

They were not always rich -  and the burden of Stephen, and soon their three children, began telling on her. He was strong in his frailties, and she was fragile in her strengths. Love can't be burdened too much - it breaks. And when the innocence of the first flush is lost, it is often found by someone else. And here, it turned out to be a nurse, Elaine. And she saw the essence of Stephen, which Jane, burdened as she was with life, had lost. 

The film glows and shimmers in the land of endeavor and achievements,  and then delves gently into the land of frailities like the ebb of love, infidelity, separation, discovery and rediscovery.

Eddie Redmayne is astonishing as Hawking. Nothing, nothing at all, can make you feel it is any one other than the physicist, in front of you. But it is Felicity Jones as Jane who forms the determined - and ultimately human -counterpoint around which Hawking's character is built. 

Life is stranger then fiction. After you come back from the film (and only then) read what further happens to Jane and Elaine. Life can be cruel to love. 

Snowpiercer: the unending folly ~

Snowpiercer is horror. And brutal. And cautionary. And futuristic. And probably one of the finest films of last year which nobody saw. 

The apocalypse of the Ice Age has come to haunt earth again. A bunch of survivors are in a futuristic train which is going in circles around the earth as a modern age ark, carrying within it all kinds of survivors - the haves and have nots, the privileged and not, the exploited  and the exploiters. And there is trouble a-brewing. There is resentment in the barracks (back of the train), and a plan is being hatched to take over the command center (the front). And, as expected, everything spins out of control. 

The story of the privileged ensuring preeminence, by hook or by crook, is combined with the survival instincts of a Lord of the Rings, and the war which ensues within the claustrophobic environs of the train becomes both a battle for territory and a voyage of discovery. And when the circle of exploitation closes in a stunning climax, it leaves us to wonder about man's continuous attempt to control nature: natural selection takes on a different meaning. 

Visually stunning, and imaginative even in it's violence, the film ends on the snow flake of a hope. The world has to start on a clean slate. It has to start from innocence. Before all of the old human instincts of survival and competition (and folly)  set in, and the seeds of destruction are sown yet again.

Only Lovers Left Alive: love in the time of death ~

As I think back to the film, it's haunting music, it's artful dark love, it's totally delicious slow-burning delight, I remember what someone was saying to students at the Art Fair yesterday "Every painting doesn't have to have a message. It's enough to say that it fills the senses and you feel good just looking at it."

I doubt you will ever see a film of this genre made the way this one is:style which gives meat to substance. A vampire film which is chic and full of a strange compassion and love. It's my first Jim Jarmusch and I am hooked, and all ready for his more famous films Coffee and Cigarettes, Dead Man, et al.

Tilda Swinton is the most chameleon-like actor ever (I will talk about her further in another of her performances, in another stupendous film, Snowpiercer, but that's later), and she gives her Eve a satisfied aura, a sophisticated woman you know you will be happy if she merely acknowledges your presence. It's a performance of an amazing smoothness. And then there is her lover of centuries, Adam, played by Tom Hiddleston with a tired and an almost-insolent indolence. Nobody has loved his claustrophobia and his funeral music more. And then there is Mia Wasikowska as Ava who spells trouble from the moment she walks into the twosome's beautiful life of serene darkness. She brings a dangerous disruption into the proceedings, and nothing remains the same. The BC/AD of Ava.

There is so much to love in this film. Adam's home is a triumph of pristine memorabilia, music equipment, books and a hundred artifacts probably collected over ten centuries.

 

The city of Detroit with it's ghost-like factories and inky streets. . Tangiers with it's Mediterranean-white walls, narrow lanes. There are non-seasonal mushrooms, bunches of messy wires, guitars of the most beautiful kind, conversations which go nowhere but make you smile as you listen in carefully (Eve: I'm sure she'll be very famous. Adam: God, I hope not. She's way too good for that.) and a bullet specially made. And there's one mesmerizing song, which comes near the end. And, after they discuss the lovely theory of entanglement, the final luscious choice of survival the lovers have to make. 

See the film. For the dark and love inside you. See it with all the lights off. With a terrific music system. And then let the velvety beauty of the film flow elegantly over you. 

American Sniper: toll of choices ~

You seek to change the way things are done. You change your entire life to do it. And then you are changed. And then it is out of your control.

You learn to kill something which has a beating heart. And then you learn to kill a body which has a human heart. You don't blink an eye. You learn perspective - and when to kill without compunction. The larger good. And a war which shoots hearts to silence, finds it's heartlessness seeping into life. 

The toll on you of your choices of life will always haunt you. 

American Sniper does not question choices. But it questions wars. The toll of it. And then it swings it's perspective to show a normal life's ordinariness, hark, it's uselessness. Love seems bland. Normal life leaves you nowhere. What is the worth of watching your son's basketball game, when the edges of your country are  being snipped off. 

The pace of a life at home, the glow and it's ordinary glory, sink in slowly. And by the time find it's pristine worth is found, the  karma of irony kicks in. 

There is always a price to pay. 

American Sniper is compelling, pounds with suspense, and tells how what we are good at often saves precious lives, but is not always able to save what is precious. 

From Here to Eternity: forever ~

I think six people were the luckiest people in Calcutta yesterday evening. We were the only ones seeing the filmed version of Tim Rice's Broadway hit From Here to Eternity in a 200 seater cinema hall. It was sheer luck that I saw the announcement in the morning, for the one show of this fabulous play.

The original film, with Burt Lancaster as the talented moody protagonist, is itself a masterpiece (5 Oscars) , and one of my favorite adaptations of a fabulous book. But Tim Rice (of The Lion King fame) has elevated this already strong story to another level with his stunning lyrics and music. 

The story is of a army unit in Hawaii, in the days before Pearl Harbor happened in 1941. The catalyst for the internal cataclysm is a young soldier who joins the unit, with a huge reputation as a boxer and a bugler - but who refuses to indulge in both pursuits because of 'personal reasons'. He just wants to be within himself, keep his nose clean, and eke out his army life in peace. But fortune ordains something else. He falls in love with a prostitute, befriends a loser but brave soldier, and sees every resolution of his blown to smithereens. On the other side is the lonely wife of an overbearing officer, and her dangerous affair with another officer. And weaved into this story is the camaraderie, the pettiness, the charm and the disillusionment of army life. And the impending doom of the Japanese attack. 

This is a film of live theatre. And it's been shot stunningly and sensitively. Not for a second does one get distracted to the fact that it is theatre one is watching. And for Tanu and me, it was beautiful deja vu, after seeing the best of plays in New York, London, Las Vegas and Chicago. 

I believe Nandita Das is also doing exactly this by preserving on film some of the best plays of India. This is certainly the template to follow. 

Ugly: little else ~

What is the genesis of venality? 

Like almost everything else - economic? Deprivation?  Greed? Or is there a need for freedom, without the sense that it leads to another trap?

What is the need for domination? 

Disgust? An inferiority complex? Frustration elsewhere? A depraved need for release? Or a simple pleasure to ride on one's own power, regardless of the fact that the victim is weak, helpless? 

In a world where survival is paramount, and one's own standing in one's own eyes is suspect, the economics of existence is the only worthwhile algorithm of living. Everything else is secondary. Relationships are equations of convenience. Existence is an existential state of cold-blooded logic. 

Seeking a visceral revenge on an old grouse is a mere setting right a power equation. Hating your wife is a mere extension of this. Kidnapping is a symptom of this. Friendships flounder when 'my' economics clashes with 'his'. 

And is this another world, or 'our' world in a lurid guise? Many things are extreme when 'others' do it, and are 'logical' when we indulge in them. We protect ourselves from ourselves by working out justifications for our own good. In the shadows of our bodies we hide sordid souls, which come out to play when we think nobody is watching us. 

An intolerance to suggestion, or an irritation in a relationship, or the politics of affection, are the soft manifestations of every extremity we may abhor. 

And therein lies the tragedy of our world. No crime is 'there': everything lies inside us. 

Ugly is that. And it is elemental and visceral and tragic because it is born and exists and perpetuates in our minds. And we are repelled,  because we understand it is our very own world. 

The Wonderful Now: wonderful stillness ~

Shailene Woodley (Fault in Our Stars, Divergent) as Aileen has this wonderful stillness. Not outside her, but somewhere deep inside. That's what gives her the wonder which she feels when good things happen to her. There is an aching sweetness in her diffidence. And she accepts acknowledgement of her considerable gifts as a gift by itself. But just the way she's alive to what's happening to her, she also has the depth to know what doesn't happen to her. 

And in the very moment she feels her deepest disappointment, you know she has also forgiven. That's the grace of her being. 

In our lives, we all seek equanimity, amidst all the strife and passion and heartbreaks. We want to conjoin at the very moment we want to break it all up, we want to be together at the very time we want to break loose. But these conflicts are rarely resolved. And we let the moment's tragedy flood our entire life. We lose perspective, we lose the beauty of all possibilities, we lose the blessing of an unforgettable past. 

To know that everything passes, but doesn't erase yesterdays. To know that the celebration of 'now' of our lives is what will give beauty to our 'later'. And to embrace the changes wrought by fortune with a Zen-like acceptance. And to embrace life not as a right, but a precious furry beautiful loving thing capable of giving, even as it breaks our hearts. 

Shalene is so infinitesimally subtle that you learn about the beauty of evanescence by her presence. You will be moved beyond yourself.