The Sane Lunatic

After roughly two hours of special effects, crazy action sequences and badass fighting music with a few heavy lines every now and then, I was pretty much thinking just one thing: I should have brushed up on my Assassin's Creed game story history. While there is an apprehension towards movies based on successful video game franchises, with good reason, Assassin's Creed attempts to leap clear of the usual traps but doesn't quite make it. We get an all-star cast, that truly deserved a deeper script, has some intense moments usually followed by long moments of CGI and bloodless battles. The plot in this one revolves around Callum Lynch (Michael Fassbender) who is a direct descendant of Master Assassin Aguilar, who was the last known protector of an ancient artefact known as the Apple of Eden, over 500 years ago. Callum is shown to be receiving the death penalty for the crime of murder, but he his saved from his sorry demise by a CEO of a mysterious company, Alan R...

We try so hard. Everyone for different reasons, sure, but we all try so so hard. Try hard for what? To be better? To be bigger? To be smarter? To be faster? To be richer? To be more something something. To be the best at something something. And that's fine. You know, for a lot of people, that is the motivator. That gives them the satisfaction. That drives them, to be the best at something, or be more something at something than a lot of other people. But the key line there, is that it gives them satisfaction. And if we throw aside the smiley and colourful imagery associated with being happy, we can say satisfaction and happiness are pretty darn similar. For many, the definition of happiness is defined by what we were told. By what we grew up thinking to be the goal that would give us happiness. And then we believe in it and that is also okay. We try our hardest, and some of us even achieve it. And by then, for many of the few who make it, a lot of time has passed. And for fe...

This post has been a tad overdue, I know, and I've just been caught up in work and sleeping, but now it's here, and I hope you enjoy reading it. Since the last ep, I have spent less time exploring places to eat and more at the nearby cinema, and at work too. While doing so, I found myself to be spending more time outdoors after nightfall, and in a city that likes to have its landmarks well lit, it's a fun thing to do. There was a full moon just over a week ago and I spent a good amount of time by the sea wall, looking up at it. Thinking I had had a pretty good day, I returned to my bed at the room, wherein I encountered my roommates heading out for some sort of excursion. Upon inquiry, it turns out they were going for a lil bike ride, as in, cycle ride. And then they asked me if I'd like to join them. About 2 mins later we were all waiting outside this cycle shop that rents out cycles even late at night, like we were, close to midnight. His collection wasn...

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I. Don't. Like. SUVs. In. The. City. I don't! And then there's all these dabba cars, or 'compact sedan', which is basically a hatchback with what looks like a botched-up cosmetic job on its arse! I'm talking about the ugly sights like the Maruti Swift Dzire, the Hyundai Xcent, the Volkswagen Ameo, the Honda Amaze, the Ford Figo Aspire, and the sort! Yes, I know its because of the taxation policy for cars that are road taxes less than 4m long, so carmakers aim to offer a three-box car for less money, but please fucking don't!! If I can't afford a proper saloon car, so be it. I'll go for a premium hatchback or something, as should everyone else! The reason I'm saying this now is because I was looking at upcoming cars and there's reports about a 'Chevy Beat Essentia' and a 'Tata Kite 5' which are of similar build. As if there weren't enough depressingly ugly cars on t...

  Director Damien Chazelle returns to the scene with 'La La Land', a big-screen musical for the first time in a long time. While the bollywood audience may not find it as strange that crowds of people suddenly burst into song and dance, it is something that hasn't been seen in mainstream Hollywood for some time now. And I am happy to see it again, very happy. The film is based in contemporary Los Angeles but everything else about it is rooted in the past, the heart, the soul and the characters. Our two central persons : Sebastian (played by the gorgeous Ryan Gosling) is a jazz pianist, smooth but a cranky purist about what he listens to, plays and where he plays it; and Mia (the uber-cute Emma Stone), an aspiring actress and playwright smitten by the magic of movies, who works as a barista on the WB lot while rushing between auditions. It has the predictability of the romance that buds between the two characters as they sing and dance through different stages of fal...

Everyone suffers loss. For some the loss comes as a bigger tragedy than most others. How we as individuals cope with life after loss, differs, but we share the same three abstractions of life : death, time and love. That's what 'Collateral Beauty' tries to explore and explain. Tries to. Will Smith plays Howard, an ad exec whose six-year-old daughter died due to a rare ailment, and he hasn't been able to pull his life together in the last couple of years. His friends and partners have tried to reach through to him but to no avail, and now their company could go under. They have a way to save it, but it's a deal that needs Howard's signature, and if they can't get him to even talk to them about it, they will have to wrest away his controlling stake by proving that he is unfit to make those decisions. Some friends eh?  Of course, the friends have their own battles and sense of loss they are fighting too. But it still makes it hard to fully get be...

This movie is a lesson on how to put together a filler story to cover the gaps in the main story. I don't even know what to call this non-canon story given the already confusing chronological order of the planned nine-part series. Let's just simplify and explain that 'Rogue One: A Star Wars Story' tells the tale of events that take place between Episode III: Phantom Menace and Episode IV: A New Hope. Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones) is the daughter of Imperial scientist Galen Erso (Mads Mikkelsen), one of the main brains behind the Empire's greatest weapons. We are introduced to Galen working as a farmer when Imperial Director Krennic (Ben Mendelsohn) arrives to collect him to resume work on the Death Star. In this face-off, Krennic shoots Galen's wife while little Jyn sees the whole incident before escaping to her hiding spot. From thereon, Jyn plays the pivotal role in the events that unfold, after she gets rescued by Rebel Alliance forces from an Imperial...

So...it's been a while. And a lot has been going on. In terms of things that piss me off, and a lot of other people as well. In the country where I currently dwell, and in the world at large.   There is the humanitarian crisis that the people of Aleppo are currently facing, what with the rebels and the army and the Russians hashing it out. They're actually sending out 'final' goodbyes through tweets and short videos on social media. I say 'final' because I hope a lot of them do survive to live another day, but still, many probably won't. And these are just those with access to smartphones and internet. In a war-zone that people know of thanks to media. One of the many places where such crisis' are probably as frequent as the rain in Bengaluru. *sigh* Then there is the mainstream news of the cabinet appointments being made by President-elect of the United States of America, Donald Trump. I have no understanding of the details of how their politic...

When I saw that email in my inbox at around 8:30 PM, almost a month ago, I actually shot out of my chair and jumped around my room. The office I had applied to had said yes. I'm definitely not one to be defined by my job, but when its a company you really want to work with, doing what you want, and would like to keep doing, I'd say its a moment worthy of that reaction. There was one, small, catch. I had to change cities. To my regular readers, this may not seem like a problem considering how I had come back to Delhi after a 10-month stint in Bengaluru, but I would like to add that I was being hosted by my relatives, which meant I never really had to deal with any of the grown up stuff. I was basically living with family and all was taken care of. But for this job, I was going to have to move to Mumbai and this time, I don't have those advantages. Sure, I do have a family friend and a cousin staying here, but in a city where living space comes at a ridiculous premium, the...