In 1979, Basu Chatterjee made Baaton Baaton Mein and unobtrusively brought to us the dating and courtship rituals of a community that was till then either caricatured or just overlooked in Hindi cinema. Nancy Perreira and Tony Braganza…
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Matriarchal manipulation in a patriarchal world is depicted unsparingly in Usha Priyamwada’s Pachpan Khambe Laal Deewarein (Now playing on Prasar Bharti). The mother resentful of her lecturer daughter’s comfortable life in her college residence because the younger daughters…
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“Start with hope..always start with hope. We went from being a shitty team to become one of the biggest dynasties in the sport and all it needed was one match to light this fire,” says Michael Jordan at…
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In 1947, my grandparents brought three children and the remains of an uprooted life from Pakistan to India in a train. One of those children was my mother. I grew up hearing a lot of stories about the…
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Three documentaries streaming right now show the ultimate culmination of the Bois Locker Room culture. And what happens when one gender is taught to mistrust its instincts of self-preservation and the other does not even learn something as…
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In Sudip Sharma’s Paatal Lok (Now streaming on Amazon. Co written by Sharma, Sagar Haveli, Hardik Mehta and Gunjit Chopra. Directed by Avinash Arun and Prosit Roy), India’s disowned inhabit the headlines we turn away from. A young…
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How can pain be forced to move down Away from the eyes So that it’s just a burning hole in my stomach? How shall I stave all thoughts of her voice As she peremptorily Walks in the house Bell a-jingling Down the spiral staircase From the neighbour’s roofs, the driveway In through the gate Rusty self […]
My father-in-law passed away in relative peace on January 23, 2011 after suffering horribly for the past three odd years from Alzheimer’s. His death set him free and I want to believe he is in a better, happier place, because that will help me sleep better. I do not want to think of his soul suffering innumerable atrocities, passing […]
She grew up amid the quiet backwaters of Kerala. Born in a staunch Roman Catholic household, as the last born child, she was showered with love and affection from her siblings and parents. Her childhood though marred with difficulties, was filled with contentment. Though life was a struggle, the desire to win and work hard […]
Life is short and there is so much to do. Life, like a lover, is drawn towards death. But there is so much that I need to do still. I need to restart that painting which I had left half done and I hope to write a couple of poems after having returned from the […]
“See, Rani, your uncle has become a face on the wall,” my aunt said with a wan smile as I walked into my uncle’s house and hugged her. This was the first time I was going back to my uncle’s house after he died last year. I’d been dreading this knowing it would be difficult […]
The other day while watching Kalpana Lajmi’s unsung, little cinematic ballad Ek Pal, I was amazed at how seamlessly Bhupen Hazarika’s voice wrapped itself around sprawling tea estates, gracious bungalows and the heart of its protagonist Priyam (Shabana Azmi) as she falls into a self-destructive passion for the frivolous Jeet Barua (Farooque Sheikh). Hazarika’s voice […]
Dear Capt Rowe, I was shocked when I heard you were no more. On the threshold of Diwali, you have gone away quietly, leaving tears in my eyes, without letting a soul know what you were feeling. Probably, you knew it was time …do we all know when ‘the’ time comes? I often wonder. Honestly, […]
I am a procrastinator by nature and at all given times I live with the stress of having to do too many things which I have pushed aside with the gentle stroke of one excuse or another. While I do take credit for all the good things that happen to me, I also blame my own self […]
Like initial euphorias, there are initial griefs and then a deeper sadness.. Yes, am sad – 56 is too early.. But then I wonder, how much more this genius could have been. From that ‘Open Schematics’ company to a centrally controlled, controlling, censoring conglomerate.. From the garage to subcontracting to Foxconn with its 34 hour shifts […]
Time takes away the beauty of all Gross living and subtle It takes away The charm of youth The riches of the rich The will of the strong and The ‘I’ of the ego Nothing remains; all perishes Time is the killer Time the killed In ephemeral.. lies the truth Eternal beauty underneath Time is […]
In the 80s, when you opened a film magazine you came across Gautam Rajadhyaksha’s name pretty often. I still remember one shot of Tina Munim curled up on a sunny window ledge with a cup of tea, smiling into the camera as if she had just woken up and found a friend. I remember cutting […]
When the National Gallery of Modern Art in Delhi had hosted a retrospective exhibition of Jehangir Sabavala, one of India’s most distinguished figurative artists, in 2006, the 84-year-old had regaled his audience with a fabulous one liner: “There was a time when I was paid a few hundred rupees for my work and that too […]