Sneha Jaiswal's Blog, page 281

Petromax Review – Madness

I have suddenly gained a new sense of respect for those who write movie description for online streaming sites. Because if I had to pen a synopsis for the 2019 Horror comedy film Petromax, I would have scratched my eyes out. It’s a maddening mess, which is absolutely hilarious in parts, but also mind-numbingly boring and idiotic in large chunks.

The south-Indian film is about Meera (Tamannah) who lives with her foster family in a beautiful bungalow. The owner wants to sell off the property but finds it hard to do so owing to rumors that it’s haunted. Rest of the film is spent in four idiots spending a few nights in the bungalow to prove it has no supernatural residents.

There is a neat little twist right at the beginning, after which we get background stories to the four men. Their tales were cliched and unnecessary. I managed to survive the 2 hour 30 minute madness because I was watching it with family at home and we could chat among ourselves and bitch about the plot.

“Looks like the director just picked off random people off the street and decided not to do any re-takes for the scene,” one of us laughed and said. Basically – the casting is quite shitty.

The thing with Petromax is, it did have a good plot, but it’s stretched so much, that the story gets lost in all the extra unfunny chaos that’s stuffed in. Had director Rohit Venkatesan had the heart to tell his editors to chop off at least 45 minutes off the film, it could have been a memorable horror comedy. It takes an hour for the film to finally get funny & interesting. Not many viewers have the patience to wait that long.

Aftermath – Poetry Book Review

Finished reading book number 63 this year. “Aftermath” by Tanya Parker suprised me by the sheer number of poems it packs in. There are over 100 poems, ranging from short Haikus to longer ruminations. I am guilty of enjoying some of the insta-style quick poems, which otherwise am very dismissive of. Sample these lines from one titled ‘Raging Artistry’ –

“There was beauty
in her vulnerability.
Her poetry was honest.
It came from years of silence.”

It’s short but philosophical, very relatable for creatives who find solace in the written word. Maybe that’s why I liked it so much.

With 100s of poems in the book, some of the themes do become slightly repetitive. As far as the style is concerned, there is no distinct pattern in the poetry but I liked that bit about the writing. As you flip pages, you are not sure what to expect – it could be a brief four line love note or a forty line lament that resembles a diary entry. A lot of them seem deeply personal, while others might appear to be general observations associated with heartbreak.

I found Tanya on Twitter and she regularly posts poetry on the micro-blogging site too. She is a contemporary voice worth exploring if you want to read new poetry.

50 Ways in Which ‘A Suitable Boy’ Series Differs From Seth’s Book

The much talked about series directed by Mira Nair – “A Suitable Boy” is finally streaming on Netflix this month. While I saw it in August, here’s me re-sharing a comparison between the Vikram Seth book and it’s onscreen adaptation.

Let me begin by saying that I enjoyed watching the series but felt it was a little too rushed and needed a few more episodes. Here are just some of the changes (both big and small) I noticed —

Lata, one of the central characters in the book was described to be dark. It’s something that really catches your attention because there are some snide remarks made about her skin colour in the very first few pages, like how the colour pink doesn’t really suit her. Her mother fears that she would have ‘black grandchildren’. However, in Mira Nair’s adaptation, the actor playing Lata is quite light-skinned, in fact, she is fairer than most of the other cast. It was unfortunate that Nair did not cast a darker actor to play the role, considering how Lata is said to be very attractive despite the colour of her skin.Since the actor playing Lata in the series is ‘fair’ (for the lack of a better word), obviously all the mean remarks about her skin colour do not make it to the adaptation either. Almost each time the actor appeared on the screen I would think “too fair”.Which brings me to another related disparity — her elder sister Savita is said to be fairer in the book and even more lovely to look at. That’s not the case in the series.Pran, the English professor who Savita is married to, was said to be very thin and sickly in the book. In the series, the actor looks stocky and is rather well built.I remember how there was some sort of “beauty and the beast” kind of comparison between Pran and Savita in the book. Savita is said to be light-skinned and beautiful, while Pran is dark and not very attractive. But the actors playing the roles don’t look mismatched at all.Lata’s best friend Malati was a disappointment, she was not as charming and quick-witted. Also, while Malati was said to have a better sense of dress than Lata, in the series, she is quite frumpy and Lata is dressed a lot smartly than her at all times.One of the most fun scenes in the book, the one where Maan, Pran’s younger brother is shown to go quite wild on the day of holi is given a major twist. While in the book, Maan goes to Pran’s house with his friend to play holi; in the series the holi celebrations takes place entirely at their father’s residence, who is also the state revenue minister.In the book, Maan harasses a senior professor by drowning him in water at Pran’s place on Holi day. In the series he humiliates the Home Minister instead — by drowning him in a water fountain. The incident leads to further rivalry between the two ministers.This might seem like a very minor detail, but what struck me right when I saw the trailer was that Lata constantly wears sleeveless blouses with her sarees. There is a scene where Mrs Mehra, her mother lovingly looks at her as she gets dressed to go out. But Seth’s conservative Mrs Mehra would have never approved of a skin-baring top, a little ‘too modern’ for the 1950s. In the book she was scandalized when her daughter-in-law wears a sleeveless blouse for a party.A lot of characters don’t make it to the series, which is understandable, because there would have been no time to do any justice to their arc. But one character who was undeservedly chopped off was that of Imtiaz Khan. While in the book, Maan’s best-friend Firoz has a twin brother Imtiaz, in the series, Firoz has no twin.Another character that was conspicuous by her absence was Maan’s older sister Veena. I say conspicuous because Veena’s son, the math genius Bhaskar is in the series, but his parents never make an appearance. At one point I wondered if Bhaskar was supposed to be Praan & Savita’s son in the adaptation, but that was not the case. Bhaskar was just like an orphaned child squeezed into the sets.The Chatterjee clan is also reduced to three siblings. The third brother Dipankar and the youngest brother Tapan are chopped off. I mention this because Tapan was loosely inspired by Vikram Seth’s own life and was a lovable character.The first communal riots that take place in the book are too simplified in the series. In the book, when a raging Muslim mob makes its way towards an under-construction temple, the police first shoot as a means to ensure that they themselves are not mauled to death and in the hopes that the gun sounds would scare and scatter them. However, in the series, the cops are given specific “shoot at sight” orders from the Home Minister.The Home Minister is made more villainous and conniving in the series to heighten the drama.Tasneen is perhaps 17 in the book, or at least still in her late teens, but in the series, the actor looks a little older. And visually, while Tasneen is said to have an innocent aura to her, the actor looks more sultry than the demure damsel from the saga.Saaeda Bai’s help Bibbo is described as curvy and young in the book. At one point she even manages to seduce Maan into kissing her, a scene that is missing from the series. The on-screen Bibbo is more of a matronly, heavily-built, unlike the impish Bibbo from the book.Another minor change was that Saeeda Bai, who is a courtesan, only had two accompanying musicians in Vikram Seth’s world. On Nair’s sets, she has four and sometimes even more musicians accompanying her.Also, while in the book, Saeeda Bai’s sarangi player has his own sub-plot, the musicians are reduced to mere props in the visual narrative.Meera Nair’s Lata is more decisive and headstrong than Seth’s Lata, which is probably a welcome change. She is less confused about her feelings and more confident.The character of Kuku was surprisingly plump. Perhaps, Meera Nair tried to keep up with modern sentiments of body acceptance and decided to put Kuku on the heavier side. While I can’t recall Vikram Seth ever writing that Kuku was thin, he did imply that the Chatterjee sisters were very weight conscious.Another departure from the book is the fact that the Chatterjee sisters decide to match up Lata with their brother Amit even before the two meet. In the book, they do so only after sensing that Amit perhaps likes her.A similar change — Amit begins to flirt with Lata from their very first conversation in the series. It obviously helps save a lot of time.In the book, Mrs Mehra heads to Delhi to meet Kalpana to help her with finding a potential groom for Lata. In the series, she goes to Lucknow, this also helps shorten her India tour as both her family friends and some relatives are placed in the city of nawabs.Kalpana personally suggests and introduces Haresh Khanna to Mrs Mehra as a suitable boy for Lata. Seth made their meet accidental in his tale -Haresh makes a surprise visit to Kalpana in Delhi and Mrs Mehra takes a liking to him.Waris is very old in the series. In the book, he is young and ‘considered dashing by the women’. In the series, he is balding and in his 40s and is played by an actor who is in his late 40s.Saeeda sends a letter to Maan asking him to cut short his rural tour and come back to Brahmpur because she misses him. She does no such thing in the book. She doesn’t even write him a letter, let alone ask him to come back.In the book it is Veena who attends Pul mela with her son Bhaskar, but since Veena is not in the series at all, it’s Pran and wife that are shown with Bhaskar when he gets injured in the tragic Pul Mela stampede.While in the book, Kabir Durrani identifies Bhaskar at a medical camp and calls up Mahesh Kapoor to tell him the news. In the series, he simply finds Bhaskar and hands the little boy over to Pran and wife.Maan is unaware of Bhaskar’s injuries at the Pul Mela stampede because he was still in the Ruddhia village and nobody from the family writes to him about it. But in the series, he knows about it and is already in Bhrahmpur.The fleeting homo-erotic scene between Maan and Firoz in the bed takes place in the Baitar fort in the book. In the series, it takes place in Firoz’s Brahmpur home. Also the dialogue “you think I have planned all this” is said by Firoz in the book, but its Maan who says it in the series.Varun’s brief fling with Kalpana and his interview for the Indian Administrative service takes place a lot earlier than shown in the novel.Haresh quits his shoe job without another in hand in the series, which makes him seem more impulsive than he really is. In the book, he takes the step only after finding a better paying offer.Savita delivers her first baby with Pran anxiously waiting outside for the good news. In the book, Pran himself was hospitalized during the delivery of their baby.In-fact, Pran is so ill that Savita decides to study law, to avert the fate of being a penniless widow. This sub-plot is missing from the screen.Which reminds me of another omission, a welcome one at that — nobody in the series harps about how Savita must be pregnant with a boy. In the book, Praan is rather surprised to learn it’s a girl, since everybody kept insisting it was going to be a boy.Amit does not write “for Lata” in his poetry book. Also, the poem that he writes for her is reduced to four lines in the series.After communal clashes break out in Brahmpur again, Maan and Firoz originally take shelter in Veena’s home in the book. But in the series they head to Praan’s house.The sub-plot about Meenakshi’s second pregnancy and her miscarriage is not in the series.Also, in the book, Meenakshi only pawns off one gold medal, in the series she pawns both of them. This helps in getting rid of off the burglary sub-plot in which the other medal gets lost.Kabir (Lata’s primary love interest) is made to be a little more romantic in the series. For example — he does not go to Amit’s house in Calcutta to meet Lata in the book, however in the series he does so.In the book, all three prospective suitors for Lata’s hand — Kabir, Amit, Haresh — meet while watching a cricket match. In the series, they meet outside her brother’s house.While Maan is able to attend his mother’s last rites in the book, he languishes in jail in the series.Like I said earlier, the Home Minister is made more villainous. In the book, it is the Home Minister who voluntarily decides to ring up the cops and orders them to escort Maan for his mother’s last rites. But in the series, the Home Minister prevents Maan from leaving prison and denies him the opportunity to say one last goodbye to his beloved mother.Tasneem overhears Saeeda Bai confessing to Firoz that she they are not sisters but mother and daughter. In the book, she only finds it out through hearsay.When Haresh invites the Mehra family for Christmas lunch at the Praha club, I distinctly remember that there was no mention at the table about how much it costs. In the series there is an awkward conversation where Mrs Kapoor dramatically declares “this must have cost a fortune!” and Haresh promptly says — “Yes, a month’s salary”.After Haresh storms out after from Amit’s house because Lata calls him ‘mean’, most of their interaction is only via letters. However, in the series, he meets her in Brahmapur to personally apologise for his behaviour.Another little new twist is that Haresh sends letters for Lata in Calcutta, but Amit doesn’t pass them on to her. Leading to a minor flash-point between the siblings.Which brings me to the next disparity — instead of having Amit write a detailed letter to Lata listing Haresh’s cons, Amit is shown to visit Brahmpur. He tells Lata on her face why she must not choose the shoe-maker and lists Haresh’s rather superficial flaws.There is a rather filmy scene of Lata proposing Haresh to marry her while he is on a train to Calcutta. While it was a fun change, it was also too cliched, since a lot of Hollywood and Bollywood romances tend to have these airport/train station scenes in the climax.And the last little departure from Seth’s tale — In the novel, the Durrani family is invited to Lata’s wedding but Kabir does not have the heart to attend it. In the series, there is a rather sad scene of a wistful Kabir on his cycle spying on a happy Lata as she is married off to Haresh.

(I originally published a version of this article on Medium, do follow me if you are there)

Unusual Tales About Women In Mythology

The Daughter from a Wishing Tree – Unusual Tales about Women in Mythology by Sudha Murty is a book best gifted to school kids who like to read. To those who are familiar with Hindu mythology, it has very little to offer in terms of “unusual” content.

As an adult reading it, I had a bad case of “expectations versus reality”. I have read almost all the tales from the book as a kid; be it the one about how Godesss Lakshmi came into being, or the one about the slaying of the evil Hayagriva or the age old fable of Nala & Damayanti.

There is no distinct author voice to the tales and felt like a team of text-book editors wrote them. Unlike a Devdutt Pattanaik who spins familiar tales from mythologies with his own little twists and refreshing manner of story-telling.

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Some of the stories were too rushed and could have been fleshed out in more pages. The illustrations however were very nice and had a lovely old-school mythological touch to them. Reminded me the regional magazines my grandmother used to read when I was growing up.

Like I said earlier, it would make a good gifting option for school children. But to those who know their Hindu mythologies, the book can be a big letdown. It’s a 3/5 from me.

Always Be My Maybe Review- Maybe Not

I’ve had my eye on the 2019 Netflix film starring comedian Ali Wong & Randall Park for a while now. Especially after I saw Wong’s two comedy stand-up specials on the streaming site called “Baby Cobra” and “Hard Knock Wife”. I would choose to see them again over this film, had I known how mediocre it was. Well, that’s the short way of summing up my review.

Directed by Nahnatchka Khan, “Always Be My Maybe” is a romantic comedy about celebrity chef Sasha who runs into her estranged best-friend after 15 years when she flies to San Francisco to set up her new restaurant. Will sparks fly between the two? Will they rekindle their friendship and take it to the next level? That’s the rest of the film.

There is a crazy cameo in the film that made me go “WHAAAAAAAAT????”, because I usually do not read up on stuff that I want to watch, so there is some surprise element left for the makers to thrill me as a viewer. But despite that advantage, this film was a bit of a predictable mess.

While Ali Wong is pretty damn good on the stage with her comedy, on film, as a celebrity chef, she is not very convincing and is unable to get into the skin of the character. You can see a lot of her real personality overpowering the role and that just does not work. Randall Park is also underwhelming as the small-time musician and just doesn’t have the charm for the bit. If you didn’t know – these guys are the producers of the film. I am saying this, because, frankly, I don’t think they would have got this job otherwise. Perhaps Awkwafina (of crazy rich Asians) fame would have made a more fun Sasha and either Harry Shum Junior or Alex Landi for the musician role.

This was a 4/10 for me and I don’t think there is anything memorable about it. It’s been three days since I saw it and I cannot recall anything worth typing down, so just gonna keep it short. If you think “maybe I should watch this film on the weekend”, I would say “maybe not”.

What is your mother’s name?

What is your mother’s name?
You roll your father’s name off your tongue like it is your own name
You proudly say you are the daughter of a Mr
But you are not
The woman who gave birth to you is reduced to a nick name
Maa, mom, mummy
You sometimes call out to her in a language older than you
Aai, amma
But what is her name?
You pick up phone every night and type M, select mom and dial
You buy her a cake for her birthday and when the shop lady asks you what should be the wish
You proudly say, “Happy birthday mummy”
But she was a shashikala first named after the moon
Or may be an Usha for the morning sun
Or may be she was called Nancy because her mother loved the detective series
Or she was a beautiful Neelima or a Mamta, Seema, Nagma, Sandhya, Iram or Faiza
May be she had a nickname as mundane as Pinku
And was teased by her classmates and called, Regal, for walking like a Queen
Or may be she was a Queen
With an invisible crown
But for nine months after she carried you in her belly and nine years and thirty decades later
She turned into Maa, mummy, aai, amma.
Her name, her nickname, the smile when someone called out her name buried under your birth.

Here lies a tombstone,
Made of love, kindness and secret recipes
Of Maa
Her name cut and thrown
With the umbilical cord
Of her child.

Nivedita

Harry Potter referencer | Law Grad | Journalist | Fact Checker

instagram.com/bombaybombil/

Feel The Beat Review – Bitch Gets Feels in the End

“After failing to find success on Broadway, April returns to her hometown and is recruited to train a misfit group of young dancers.” – This is the Netflix description for the 2020 dance film ‘Feel the Beat’. That’s pretty much it.

Directed by Elissa Down, this film uses every done to the death cliche in the story-making book to show your typical “loser to winner” kind of tale. Sofia Carson who plays the lead April is actually very good as the protagonist, the only problem is – April is not likable AT ALL. She is a total fake smiling bitch who is trying to make it big as a dancer in New York. She spectacularly fails at it in the beginning by unwittingly pissing off a big name in the dancing field. Broke and rejected, April heads back to her small town & then behaves like a total dick to people around her. For no damn reason. When her old dance teacher asks her if she would like to train kids for a competition, April arrogantly turns down the offer. Only after her father points out that it might get her a chance to dance in front of some big names does she agree to take up the challenge.

You can guess the rest of the story for yourself. Mean arrogant teacher + bunch of clueless kids + a big competition that can turn all their lives around = teacher & kids bond, become best friends and cross expectations in the competition. Lol. Or should I sigh? I sighed a lot during the course of the film. “Should I stop the film?” my movie partner asked me at least three times and I said “hey, can I not express irritation if I find something annoying, doesn’t mean I don’t want to watch it”.

Why did I even watch it to the end? Only because of the very cute kids in the film. Two the the kids are so damn adorable, that you might want to adopt at least one of them. If not for the talented little children in the cast, this movie would’ve been absolutely unbearable. Unfortunately my favourite ones haven’t been billed in the cast anywhere, so I am just going to drop a picture with them marked in it. These two were the youngest and provided the most laughs and smiles with their endearing performances.

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For a dance film, the choreography wasn’t all great. Even the numbers with April (Sofia Carson) weren’t impressive. The last group dance number she performs with the kids onstage was heartwarming, not because of the choreography, but because of their backstories. The romance sub-plot about April & her ex-boyfriend (Wolfgang Novotgratz) was absolutely unnecessary & only adds sentimental crap value to the plot; although Wolfgang is a handsome devil, so he might make the ladies happy for adding aesthetic value to the screen.

Like I indicated earlier, it’s a stale tale. April’s back-story is just not convincing enough – the kid growing up without a mom. I mean, is that reason enough to be an heartless asshole who hurts people close to her & leaves them with abandonment issues?

Honestly, there is not much else to say about “Feel the Beat”. The kids can’t feel it at first. But April trains them hard and the viewers get to see them grow from bad to decent. The climax has a super delightful dance with the under-9 kids and I absolutely loved it. If you are having a hard day and just want to watch a simple, predictable film with cute kids, you can pick this one. Or skip it. I would give it a 5/10, an extra one point for the charming children.

Travel Anxiety

I am going to be travelling for the first time since March this year and for the probably the first time in many years, I am experiencing very slight anxiety over it, especially due to the pandemic and all the new measures. Thankfully, the excitement of meeting my parents and brother makes it all the worries take a backseat. I haven’t seen them at all this year! At least that’s going to change soon.

My folks live in a state where the liquor business is regulated by the government, so you get only mediocre/shitty brands. So I went to a liquor store after a long time, to get some nice alcohol for dad and saw a Jhonny Walker statue that made me smile. It was masked up.

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Murder Mystery Review

Unlike most film enthusiasts, I tend to research on movies after I watch them. So after I was done streaming “Murder Mystery” starring Adam Sandler & Jennifer Aniston, here’s what I found out – it was the most popular film on Netflix in 2019, according to the company.

Is the comedy really that good? Directed by Kyle Newacheck, it’s definitely very entertaining. And manages to get enough laughs out of the viewer, even if most of it is “what the fuck, this is so silly” kinds. Sandler has this brand of man-child comedy that can either be risible or repellent. This one falls in the former category. Jennifer Aniston has a typical Rachel like role, so no challenges there. The two lead actors play an American couple Nick & Audrey Spitz, who are on their European honeymoon 15 years after their marriage. Audrey bumps into a charming handsome man called Charles Cavendish (Luke Evans) on their flight and he kindly invites the couple to the family yacht owned by his billionaire uncle Malcom Quince (Terence Stamp). What could have been an idyllic getaway takes a strange turn when the old rich man is murdered on French waters. The needle of suspicion immediately falls on the Spitz pair and they try to crack the case to prove their innocence.

The movie has a zany Agatha Christie novel vibe, where there are multiple murder suspects and the one with the least obvious motive turns out to be the killer. Unlike most mystery films, this one is not very easy to predict. There is so much happening in the film, that instead of trying to guess who the murderer is, the viewer is engrossed in the madness unfolding on the screen. Each character is almost caricature like, you have a beautiful gold-digging Asian (Shioli Kutsuna) who entraps a wealthy white man; then there is a “Maharajah” from Mumbai who loves living it large; also onboard is a Colonel with an eye-patch who seems like a mean dick… so on and so forth.

Sandler & Aniston have an easy camaraderie that helps steer the movie smoothly. Writer James Vanderbilt has done a pretty cool job, despite using some tried and tested tropes. Since it’s set in Europe, the film is visually very aesthetic and makes the viewer want to dash off to take their own European vacation.

“Murder Mystery” may not be nail-biting thriller territory, or even “laugh your heart out” sorts of comedy, it’s definitely a good pick for the weekend to while away time, especially for a movie-night with friends.

Paani Puri

It was September 4. I was experiencing the Bombay rains after two years of having lived away from my beloved city.

For reasons unbeknownst, I had decided to go to work. A journey of 40 minutes from my house had taken three hours. “Mumbai Darshan hogaya yeh toh”, my cabbie had joked. The return was more adventurous. Finding streets not waterlogged and flyovers not packed with stationary cars, my taxi finally reached a junction four kilometers away from my house. And then we were stuck. Bonnet touching bonnet, vehicles stood still. Nobody honking, nobody cursing, just waiting.

After half an hour of staring at the vehicles around me, I decided to walk home. Half an hour into walking, my lazy self who doesn’t walk even to the local grocery, gave up. It let out a huge growl, which if not for the rains, could shake the pillars of the monorail above me.

And right there, I saw you.

Chopping onions, arranging sev and mixing the ragda. Like a multitasking God.

You smiled at me. I smiled at you.

I walked over to you. No words were exchanged.

A plate was handed over. I said, “medium. Teekha thoda zyada”

You nodded like you knew.

You adjusted the huge rainbow umbrella to protect me from the rains. I smiled.

And I had two plates of piping hot Panipuri.

I paid you and adjusted my bag to brace the rains again. When you said the magic words, “Madam Sukha puri lelo”

Nivedita

Harry Potter referencer | Law Grad | Journalist | Fact Checker

instagram.com/bombaybombil/