Thavamaai Thavam Irundhu - A poetry on silver screen

By a stroke of luck, was able to watch this movie during my trip to Austin 2 weeks back. Luck bcos this movie would have never made it to the theaters in Seattle and I would have probably had to wait a good 2-3 months before the DVD gets released.

I am trying not dwell too deep into the merits and de-merits of the movie - something that has been done in pretty fair amount around the blogdom (If I were to write a full-fledged review of the movie, it would look something like what Balaji wrote here). So, let me be crisp - the movie was very good and easily walks away with the best movie of the year title (I haven’t seen Kanda Naal Mudhal yet). The biggest plus point of the movie of course is the fact that Cheran has shown what happens in most of the households back in India. That is probably his biggest strength – everyone who watches the movie will be able to relate to each and every scene in the movie, either bcos they themselves had experienced the same in their lives or someone they knew had a similar experience. And if you are one of those few guys like me whose dad had to put in a lot of physical work, I bet you would have been able to appreciate the nuances of the movie better. There were at least 3 times in the movie when I was unable to hold back my tears and this has not happened to me in a long time (the last movie that made me cry that many times was Mahanadhi).

Performances-wise as every review has pointed out, Raj Kiran is truly out-standing. I have always believed that he is a very good actor, right from his En Raasavin Manasile days. But then, during those days, he was playing the hero in rural based movies, which clearly were his strengths. It was only when I watched him in Nandha did I come to know of his versatility in doing a convincing job of any role given, no matter what theme the movie was based on. Pandavar Bhoomi only went on to confirm this. So, Raj Kiran's excellent performance did not come as a big surprise to me. But what surprised me was that debut heroine's performance. Though she was kind of struggling in those scenes where their love blossoms during their college days, she was amazing as the movie went on and in fact outdid both Raj Kiran & Saranya in many of the scenes in the 2nd half.

Cheran as an actor has definitely improved from the Autograph days. Though there are scenes where his shortcomings did come to the fore, in many scenes Cheran, the director, has stepped in for Cheran, the actor. Like the scene where he faces his father when his father comes in search of him after his marriage, that was obviously a very crucial scene where one's acting abilities will be put to severe test. Cheran, probably knowing fully well that he might spoil the essence of the scene, conveniently makes Cheran the actor cry with his hands hiding his face and crying in the arms of his father, thereby making sure that his shortcoming was not exposed while at the same time, maintaining the tempo of the scene. That, I thought was a very smart move on part of Cheran.

Though the songs tuned in by Sabesh – Murali were surprisingly good (Unnai Saranadaindhen & the Enna paaarkkirai are top notch), I thought they could have done a much better job in the background score, bcos there were so many times in the movie where you could feel the disappointment deep inside you that the background score could have lifted the mood of the scene much more. I firmly believe that only the Maestro could have done justice to a movie like this. This is a movie like Azhagi which will have the imagination of the Maestro flowing.

Since I knew beforehand that the length of the movie is the biggest drawback for the movie, all through the movie, I was trying to figure out if there was any scene or portions of a scene that Cheran could have cut to reduce the length of the movie. Though there were definitely some scenes in the movie where he could have either cut them or shortened their length, I could fully understand his inability to do so bcos when the subject you are dealing with is so close to your heart, I don’t think any creator will have the heart to cut short those sequences...

The experience of watching this movie reminded me of my experience of watching movies like Lakshya, Swades and Passion of the Christ. The one thing I had in common while watching these 4 movies was that all these movies got so close to my heart. The one complaint against Swades was that it was way too long and in a way, took the preacher’s spot, slightly going about how living abroad is missing an essential part of you. Same with this movie too (actually with all of Cheran's movies). If you thought that Swades was preachy stuff, then chances are that you will feel the same about TTI too.

The other usual complaint that you hear Cheran's movies that there are no subtleties whatsoever in the way he handles a theme in his movies and that he tell things on your face (The accusers are mostly Mani Rathnam fans. I am one Mani fan too but I am not against this on-your-face stuff). That is where my comparison with the movie Passion of the Christ movies comes in. Mel Gibson had stated long before the release of the movie that the primary reason he was making the movie with all those explicit scenes (like the scene where the skin & flesh is shown peeling off Jesus' back) was bcos he believed that it was only when showed like this would people actually fully understand the sacrifice that God has made. And the unparalleled success of the movie only confirmed his belief since that was not the first Hollywood movie that was based in the Bible but POFTC received a response never seen before for Biblical movies. I have been a Christian all my life but believe me it was on the day I watched the movie did the actual magnitude of the pain He must have gone through as part of His sacrifice dawned on me. And in no way, you can call that the movie had subtlety. If at all anything, it was as un-subtle as it could get but it drove home the point. So Cheran actually gets it right by being non-subtle (if I may coin that word)

When the theme/ subject that a movie deals with so close to your heart, you tend to overlook the shortcomings & faults in that movie. By no means is Lakshya or Swades or TTI a perfect movie. But just bcos of the reason mentioned above, we overlook the faults and appreciate them immensely. And that will be the reason I will cite while passing on the easy judgment that Thavamaai Thavam Irundhu is by a long way the best movie of the year and the best we have seen since Kaadhal, another movie that portrayed sheer realism on-screen.

p.s: Seems like TTI follows the path traveled by Sethu & Kaadhal – in that, all these 3 movies were released during the fag end of the year (both Sethu & Kaadhal were released in the month of December in 1999 and 2004 respectively) but went on to become the best movies of that particular year.

Weekend movies - Aaru and Nandha

Aaru - Before entering the movie hall, I bet you will be expecting the following from the movie just bcos it is directed by Hari - the whole story will be set in a town/city, references to routes & roads only familiar to those living in that particular city will be made, lot of fast camera movements to the extent of dizziness and umpteen number of tires screeching scenes. Aaru fully lives up to all these salient features of a Hari movie but still falls short of becoming an exciting movie that one can take home some memories with. Surya as has become the norm now-a-days has given a very convincing performance. Vadivelu does provide with some hearty laughs but again nothing you can narrate to your friends outside the movie hall (something we can do with a movie like Chinna or Winner). Nothing special to write about Trisha except the fact that it is high time she learns how to dance. Hari could have well avoided many disgusting scenes without which this movie would have been much more enjoyable than what it actually turned out to be. The scenes in the police station (particularly the one involving the lady policy constable) were downright cheap & disgusting. Someone has to tell our directors who use Aishwarya to ask someone to dub for her. Her voice is so coarse (manly would be a better word) that it is such a pain to sit through the scenes with her irritating voice.

The problem with Hari's movies is that they are getting very monotonous. While they can be in no way termed as bad or less exciting at the same time they can never be termed great by any stretch of imagination. To rephrase the often used ‘blessing in disguise’ cliché, Saamy has become a ‘bane in disguise’ for Hari. The fact that he hit his jackpot way back in Saamy has made things very difficult for him with that movie in itself becoming a sort of become a benchmark for his style of film-making. People expect a racy entertainer like Saamy from him every time he makes a movie. None of his movies after Saamy (be in Arul, Kovil or Ayya) have been bad efforts but they did not do that great in the BO bcos of the sole reason they could not measure up to the quality of Saamy. So, in order for Hari to give another monstrous hit, he will have to come up with drastically different from his earlier attempts, a task which to me looks impossible as of now. Until then, all we can expect from him are average movies like Aaru.

Nandha - Had been wanting to watch this movie for a long time. Not that I haven't seen the movie. I did see it when it was released but wanted to re-visit this movie now that Bala has become one of the hottest directors in Tamil cinema. All I remembered before watching the movie was its tragic climax where the mother kills her own son by poisoning him. The other thing I remembered about the movie was the fact that Bala had placed his faith in Yuvan for scoring the music for the film at a time when Yuvan had not proved himself. I also have always believed that Nandha was the least best of Bala’s efforts. But watching Nandha last night did not make me feel so. Though it was not definitely as gripping as Pithamagan, Nandha was still a good watch. It had the trademark tightly knit screenplay one would expect from a Bala movie along with some memorable performances from the entire cast (Karunas makes a tremendous debut in this movie). RajKiran delivers a powerful performance and looks like it again took a Bala to spot this facet of acting from RajKiran which he has taken to greater heights now with his performance in Thavamaai Thavam Irundhu.

But the one issue I had with the movie was that I had many unanswered questions after the movie ended with the main question being – why should his mother kill him in first place? Surya's mother who goes into these mood swings when she just hates him, seems to have reconciled nicely with her before the climax and it is in the climax where it has been shown that the reason she decides to kill him is bcos of the fact that he killed RajKiran's son-in-law for killing RajKiran. I am not sure how she was unaware of the fact that there was a valid reason behind Surya's decision to murder him in first place. If Bala had shown that she decides to kill him in a sudden fit of anger when she was in one of those mood swings when the wife of the person he murdered showered all those curses in front of their houses, then it would have made some slight sense. My friend argues that there were many scenes in the movie where the mother’s anger on his son’s brutal character is shown vividly which kind of forms the base for her unusual decision.

Anyway, other than that, I used to think the whole RajKiran episode in the movie was unnecessary. But I was proved wrong after watching the movie bcos it is this RajKiran connection in the movie that ultimately leads to his death. The background by Yuvan, though clearly not in the league of his illustrious father, was still good. It is just amazing to think that he has done this movie while he was still a teenager. The songs in the movie, as we all know, were just awesome. The way Bala sets up the Munpaniyaa song (IMO Yuvan’s best song till date) is just so beautiful. he takes it to a point where we just can't wait for that song to be shown. Truly heart warming song & apt picturization. Special mention has to be made about the photography in the movie. Each and every single shot in the movie was so good & more importantly, fitted the mood of the scene very aptly. Overall, this movie far from being a flaw-less movie (like Sethu & Pithamagan were) still is pretty damn good. My only gripe is that Bala, like Mani Rathnam, is taking lengthy gaps between his films. It has been a good 2 years since Pithamagan came and he hasn't even started his next movie yet. That is where someone like Cheran is far better, in that he has been making movies at more regular & acceptable intervals.

My new cell phone - the MOTO ROKR E1

I have been in a hunt for a new cell phone for quite sometime now. When it was time to renew my contract with T-Mobile, all they offered me was a Motorola V330 phone which is not a great phone by any means. So decided to look out for new unlocked GSM phones without any contract so that I can give the free phone from T-Mobile to somebody back in India.

The following were the features I was looking in the new phone:

1) Bluetooth - this was a must-have for me since I spend most of my time on the phone during the evenings. This becomes particularly useful when driving and also during my evening walks.
2) Camera - though not a must-have feature, I thought this would come in handy when I had to take some pictures in situations where I didn’t have a camera in hand.
3) Speaker - obviously a nice-to-have feature
4) MP3 playback - again not a should-have feature but would be cool to hear music from the cell phone. Since I have an iPod, this was kind of the last on my priority list.
5) Budget of 200$ - most important of them all

After browsing this site for such phones that fulfilled all the criteria, the only phones I liked were these 2 phones - one from Sony Ericsson and the other from Nokia. But then point 5 would be violated if I were to go with any of these 2 phones. Though they looked great, I wasn't ready to spend 300-400$ on a cell phone.

So finally after a lot of deliberation, I decided to settle for this Moto ROKR E1 phone. ROKR here is pronounced as in rocker'. The phone fulfilled all of my pre-requisite conditions. Though it is not great by the way of looks, it still is sleek and the white casing is actually very attractive and unique. And as most of you know, this phone was built with the collaboration of Apple & Motorola and thus it has the Apple iTunes in it. And the best thing about the phone - it was very conveniently priced at 175$.

I have only used the phone for like 2 weeks now but I have already started loving it. The reception is pretty good, in fact better than my previous Siemens phone which in turn was better than my Sony Ericsson phone (all this in the same apartment). iTunes is a very good add-on feature. The other day when we had to sit inside a car without the option of playing the CD player, the phone's mp3 playback feature came in very useful. The phone comes with a 512 MB card (which is expandable too) and can carry up to a good 100 songs, which is pretty nice. The camera too is not bad. The phone is very light weight, measuring less than 4 ounces. Haven't tried the bluetooth functionality yet but I have only read good reviews about the same. So, if you are on the lookout for a new phone with all the features I have listed above, then the Moto ROKR is just the right phone for you.

Pudhupettai - album review

As I have maintained all along and probably mentioned in many of my earlier posts, the Yuvan - Selvaraghavan combo is one of the 3 best in Tamil cinema right now and that Raam is by far the best album of the year. And so when the news got around that their 4th album Pudhupet is getting released, I was all excited and eagerly awaiting to see if Pudhupet can actually beat Raam to that title. And when i did hear them, to be very frank, I was just blown away by the sheer quality of the album. I do not recall any album in TFM in the recent past which is as radically different in each of its compositions as we see in Pudhupet. Virumandi probably was the album that comes closest to this one as one of those very few albums that were composed with the motto Songs for the movie rather than movies for the songs.

The fact that only 4 out of the 10 tracks can be even called as typical songs is in itself a tribute to the daringly different path that both Selva Raghavan & Yuvan have treaded. The album consists of 4 songs, 1 remix & 5 themes. I have this bad habit of reading reviews of the album before listening to them and I usually read the reviews of these 3 folks - Yours Musically by Sureshkumar, Milliblog by Karthik (he is the one who maintains the itwofs site) and Minor Scale by Manoj. The blog by Karthik is a pretty interesting one. He writes the reviews of albums in less than 100 words, his reason being that the albums these days do not deserve more than that. But when he himself broke that norm and wrote a detailed 200 word review for this album, I knew I was in for something special. When you consider the fact that he did not spend more than 100 words for the recent Rang De Basanti album (which by the way is getting only raving reviews from ARR fans & very ordinary reviews from other sources) should speak much about the high standards he has set for his reviews.

So, it is with these high expectations that I started listening to this album and as I said earlier, I was completely blown away by the music. Every composition in the album oozes with quality and when you hear some of the songs in a good audio system, it is all the more wonderful to the ears.

To me, the pick of the album is not actually a song but one of themes titled Going through emotions. Awesome orchestration and to me, I just want to keep listening to this theme. Other than that, all the 'songs' in the album are very catchy and they grab your attention the very first time you hear them. If you are expecting another Muthe muthamma out of Neruppu vaayinil just bcos of the fact that Kamal sang that one for Mottai's other son, you will be in for a shock as this is as exactly opposite in feel as it can get. Kamal's coarse voice (like the way he sang Ninaivo oru paravai)brings out the essence of the song. The Oru naalil song is another of those trademark haunting Yuvan melody of the album. But as much a fan of Yuvan's voice I am, I still feel that this was probably not the song that he should have chosen to sing. He loses the pitch very clearly at many places that even someone like me can spot it. My only hope with this song is in its picturization where Selvaraghavan should have a good job to compensate this. But nevertheless, a very good melody (the charanams will have you humming in no time) and some very meaningful lyrics. I will have to add here that the beats & the instruments used in this song resemble the ones used by Lucky Ali in his Sifar album songs. The tune remains original though. BTW, have any of you noticed the similarity in the voices of ARR and Yuvan? Particularly, the way their Tamil pronunciation. It is not that the way they pronounce it is incorrect but there is this certain artificialness to it.

Then comes this set of 3 songs - all of them with some very beautiful beats and instantly likeable. The Variyaa song has some really cute beats. This can not be called a song per se but the beats will make you crave for more listenings. The Enga area song comes next with Dhanush crooning for himself. The choice of Dhanush is actually a very interesting one. That song is kind of tailor-made for someone like Dhanush who does not have any particular singing capabilities. Then comes the gangster rap song Pul pesum, a stunningly orchestrated song that leaves you completely in awe of Yuvan when done with listening that song.

I had compared Yuvan to Dravid in the Tamil music director – Indian cricketer comparison I did a couple of months back. I guess I should make some changes to that. Yuvraj is probably the one with whom Yuvan should be compared to since Dravid too is not getting any younger & Yuvraj is higher up on the talent level than Dravid. When Yuvraj burst on the cricketing scene with that incredible 81 against the Aussies in Nairobi, everyone’s prediction was that he was going to be the next Sachin. Though he has not gone on to translate that abundant talent of his into runs, he has been showing us all how immensely talented he is on various occasions (latest being the 3rd test against the Sri Lankans). And he is young & he along with others like Dhoni & Pathan are clearly the future of Indian cricket. Similarly, with Yuvan, we all knew that he is talented but it is only during the last 2 years that he has been showing off his talent in the form of some very good albums. And he is just 23 years of age & so he is clearly the future of the TFM field. I just could not believe that he is all of 23 years of age bcos musicians like professionals in all other fields tend to mature as they get old and I am sure that there are some great musical times ahead for Tamil film music lovers, thanks to Yuvan.

Easily the album of the year in TFM by a long long way!! Yuvan is on fire here. Special appreciation to Selvaraghavan for extracting the best out of Yuvan in spite of him scoring all those other movies. Albums like these is what the Tamil film music scenario has been missing. Kamal is the only who does this but then he restricts that to his directorial attempts (he resorts to the usual commercial album for other movies). Three cheers to the Pudhupet team for travelling in unchartered territories

An 'All-For-Nothing' uproar

I don’t really understand the brouhaha over Ganguly's exclusion from the Indian team. Now, that the politicians across the spectrum too have jumped into it, the circus is getting way too funny. I simply don't get it. Just bcos he scored 40 runs apiece in his last 2 innings, do they think that will guarantee a place in the team for the 3rd test. How come they don't realize the fact that he is competing for a spot in the middle order with Yuvraj who clearly outshone him in the just concluded Kotla test. With Sehwag coming back from injury, the natural question arises - where do you fit this guy in? That is the one question to ask all those who are protesting against his exclusion - Who will they drop from the XI if they want to include Ganguly? Let them first answer that question.

For once, I could not agree more with the reasoning of the selectors - they did not select Ganguly bcos of the reason that they felt it would be too dishonorable for him to be selected in the 14 and then not actually making it to the XI. There is no way Chappell and Dravid are going to let emotions take precedence by selecting Ganguly for the middle-order slot over folks like Yuvraj and Kaif. We are in fact wasting a precious test talent like Kaif who IMO is probably better than Yuvraj when it comes to test cricket. He has the all-important temperament which is crucial in test cricket and something which Yuvraj does not have in good measure. Kaif is going to be one of the batting mainstays of the Indian team for years to come (future captain may be) and he should be given as many chances as possible. The other complaint I am reading is that you can not replace a middle-order batsman with an opener. That’s very true. But the reason they brought in an opener is bcos Gambhir has done nothing as an opener and by bringing in Wasim Jaffer, they are merely testing the bench strength of our openers & also at the same time making Gambhir aware of the fact that they are seriously considering replacing him. They did not bring in a middle-order batsman bcos of the obvious reason - we do not have any open slot in the middle-order and even if one falls vacant, there is always Mr. Kaif to fill that up. This article here in Cricinfo analyses the selector's decision in the right perspective and so when I read it, it made perfect sense.

The other note all those ex-cricketers & Ganguly supporters are singing is the fact that he should have been given a more honorable exit from the game than what was given to him. In my opinion, I feel we have already given him enough chances to make an honorable exit. He should have realized the moment he was stripped of the captaincy that his days as a test cricketer are numbered and should have taken the way traveled by Sachin before (announcing before the 2000 home series against the Proteas that he will be stepping down as captain at the end of the series) and announced to the whole world that he will retire from test cricket after the Sri Lankan series. In such a scenario, I am sure the selectors would not have taken this decision of dropping him. They could have easily included him in the squad for the whole test series and it would have been entirely in his hands to have accorded himself an honorable exit by scoring some runs in his final test. And what better series than the current SL series to give him that opportunity...

But instead, look at what's shaping up now - seems like behind-the-scene arrangements are underway to include him in the Indian squad for the Pakistan tour and also let the world know of the fact that it will be his last series as a player & that he will not be selected after that series, no matter how many runs he scores in that series. That is just bull-shit according to me. We have to field our best team possible in such a crucial series against our arch rival, who themselves are on cloud nine after a comprehensive win over the Englishmen. I mean, we just can't afford the luxury of playing a batsman who is completely short of form & confidence against an opposition that is on fire under a shrewd coach & a captain in the best form of his career & all this in their own backyard. Sri Lanka at home is such a benign series (the worst result that India can conjure up at home against SL at home would be a draw) and that is the main reason why I believe that this current series was a very ideal one to give Ganguly an opportunity to make an honorable exit.

You know what else is funny? Ganguly supporters crying out loud about how he has been meted an unfair treatment inspite of him scoring some decent runs in the last test. Are you kidding me? I could come up with a really long list of players (Sadagoppan Ramesh & Balaji's names comes to my mind instantly) who were given a raw deal just because of the sole reason that Ganguly 'believed' in his boys (Sehwag, Parthiv Patel, Zaheer Khan, Ashish Nehra) & he wanted to nurture them. As they say, As you sow, so shall you reap and life has come a full circle for Ganguly who is at the wrong end of the same kind of treatment he has been meting out to so much folks during his tenure as Indian captain. Just bcos he had 2 moderate scores of 40, he does not deserve a place in the XI. If he had outscored his direct competitor (Yuvraj) in the 2nd innings and carried the Indian innings, then it would have been a different story altogether & he would have been automatic selection for the 3rd test (the papers would probably have been shouting "The Bengal Tiger has roars again"). He did not do it and hence has to endure this humiliation.

So, lets all just get over it and move on. Let not a single tear be shed, for he thoroughly deserves this and something he brought upon himself. There are 2 exciting series on the horizon against probably the 2 hottest teams in world cricket right now and we definitely do not need this big distraction at this stage. Instead, there is something else to cheer about - the man who has just conquered the Final Frontier is slowly but surely getting back to the form and mindset of his hey days. (This article here is a real tribute to the genius the man is. Do check it out)

The Boss unveiled

Can't imagine how a mere still can evoke such a frenetic reaction. Only Thalaivar can create a magic of this magnitude. My immediate thoughts - Thalaivar looks amazingly smart and young. What else would I say?! This still alone gives me the confidence that Shankar has something special and incredible for all of us in Sivaji. Look at the font style of the movie. Wow... easily the best a Thalaiavar movie has had since the Thalapathi days. The problem in hand - the 11 month wait for the movie to get released. That is just too much.

To put it in Thalaivar's own words, The Boss countdown starts...

Yuvan strikes twice

Last week was a special one if you are a Yuvan fan since we had 2 Yuvan albums getting released within 2 days of each other. Sandaikozhi and Kalvanin Kaadhali were the 2 albums. Though I did not have much expectations on the Kalvanin Kaadhali album (mainly bcos of the reason that the director was a newbie), Sandaikozhi was one album I was eagerly looking forward to. Primary reason being that the director's (Lingusamy) previous films had some good music (Run and Ananadham) and I still personally feel that Run is the best album that Vidhyasagar has composed in his Tamil cinema career.

After listening to both the albums last week, I guess I will have to say that I was wrong with my expectations since it is Kalvanin Kaadhali that walks away with the honors of the best of the 2 albums. In fact Kalvanin Kaadhali is kind of on par with Arindhum Ariyaamalum, one of Yuvan's better efforts in his short career. And I will have to say that Sandaikozhi ended up as a little bit of a disappointment. Since Sandaikozhi seems to be a village based theme movie, the songs too are different and sound folkish. While Yuvan is definitely better than ARR when it comes to composing songs for a rural movie, he is still a long way short of his father's amazing skills in the same area.

Coming to the individual tracks in each of the albums, Dhavani Potta Deepavali song is easily the best of the Sandaikozhi album. Apart from that, though all the other songs sound ordinary, each one of them has a very catchy underlying beat. Even the Mundaasu Sooriyane song, which is the usual 'praising the oor naattamai' kind of song and something we would have seen in those countless K.S.Ravikumar & Sarath Kumar movies, still has a very good beat to start off. The Ennamo Nadakkiradhe song comes a close second in the album ranking. The other 2 songs will probably appeal more while seen on-screen. My rating on the songs (out of a potential 5):

1) Dhavani potta Deepavali - 4.5

2) Ennamo nadakkiradhe - 4

3) Mundaasu sooriyane - 3.5

4) Kaekkaa kodukkira boomi idhu - 3.25

5) Gumthalakkadi gaana - 3

Kalvanin Kaadhali songs on the other hand are just awesome and come as a pleasant surprise. All the 5 songs have something different to offer. I am not sure if there has been anybody in TFM who can mix stuff like the way Yuvan does. Like the Eno Kangal song which is my pick of the album. It starts off like a very slow melody and when Yuvan starts his cute rendering, I was literally instantly hooked on to. I can even bet that you cant resist yourself from liking the piece the very first time you hear it. The lyrics too add to the fun of Yuvan's nasal and husky voice. Yuvan's voice, which has drawn flak in many reviews before, is something I love so much and there is no better song than this one where one would like his voice.

The Kudakkooli song which was rumored to be a Nethu raathiri remix doesn’t actually turn out to be so and the Nethu raathiri yamma line is just used once. But nevertheless is a very interesting song and again with some superb catchy beats. ARR had tried a similar sensuous song in Ah Aah but this one beats it just hands up in spite of the other song having SPB singing it. Yuvan's forte is his melodies and he does not disappoint us with the only melody of the album - Uyir Piriyum is a very soothing number and Ranjith deserves all the credit for a very good rendering. My ranking of the songs here would be:

1) Eno kangal - 4.5

2) Uyir piriyum - 4.5

3) Kudakkooli - 4.5

4) Taj Mahal oviya kaadhal 4.25

5) Ivan kattil naattu mannan thaan - 4.0

One will have to give Yuvan a lot of appreciation. Just look at the list of movies that he has come out with during this year alone:

Raam (IMO, the best album of this year in TFM)

Arindhum Ariyaamalum

Oru Kallooriyin kadhai

Daas

Kanda Naal Mudhal (Yuvan's most complete album of the year)

Kalvanin Kaadhali

Sandaikozhi

On top of all these albums, he has 2 big ones coming up very soon, 2 albums with his most favorite directors - Vallavan for Simbu and Pudhupet for Selvaraghavan. The Yuvan--Selvaraghavan is one of the 3 best combos we have in Tamil cinema right now, with Harris Jeyaraj--Gautham Menon and ARR--Mani Rathnam being the other 2. But, in spite of these 2 good albums, I still feel that Yuvan has to cut down on the number of albums he is committing to compose. He still has about 10 albums in the pipeline. At this rate, Yuvan might overtake ARR in the number of albums in another 2-3 years. ARR has a total of 51 Tamil albums in his 13 year career and Yuvan already has 32 albums in his short 4 year career (if you are ready to ignore his break after his first 2 albums). Just imagine this - If he had not done albums like Daas and OKK and instead used the good numbers in those 2 albums in other albums like Sandaikozhi and Kalvanin Kaadhali, we would have got 5 complete albums from Yuvan in 1 year, something really amazing. Another good thing about Yuvan is that most of the films that he composed songs for, are doing good at the box office. Among his releases this year, Raam, AA and KNM have been declared good hits which actually goes a long way in sustaining the interest of the listeners in the songs.

Bottom line - The father's genes have surely rubbed off in a big way. Yuvan rocks, totally!!

The story of Coach Weiss and a promise kept

Outside the lines is a program which is featured as part of my favorite TV show, the Sportscenter on ESPN where they do an in-depth analysis and cover in detail either a touching incident that has happened in the life of a player or the history of a team and not on the actual game that had happened on that day. So, me being the very emotional guy, eagerly look forward to that part of Sportscenter. I had even blogged about one such incident a long time ago. You can read it here.

The incident that was covered last week was a very special one in many ways and hence this post. So, here is the story - Notre Dame is an University which is traditionally famous for its football team and its accomplishments. Many NFL legends have graduated out of this University and prime among them is Joe Montana who is considered by many as one of the best quarterbacks ever to have ever played the game. As a side note, you should watch the movie Rudy, which is an inspiring story of courage about how a below average college student with no talent whatsoever gets to play for the University of Notre Dame football team, through his sheer determination and his resolve. Many feel that this is the best sports movie ever made (though I beg to differ bcos I believe that ‘Remember the Titans’ is the best sports movie that has been made to date).

Now, back to the incident - Montana Mazurkiewicz was a 10 year-old kid who was named after the legendary quarterback Joe Montana and who grew up idolizing Notre Dame football. But the terrible news about the kid is that he was affected by an inoperable brain tumor and he was counting the last days of his life. So, as one of his last wishes before he dies, the kid had hoped to meet one of the players from the Notre Dame football team. Somehow this word got around to the folks in the Notre Dame football team and the head coach of the team Charlie Weiss himself decided to make a visit to the kid’s home. The boy was just flabbergasted on seeing the coach of his favorite team by his bed-side. Here I will have to add that the coach of a football team is held in much high regard than you would see in any other sport, reason being that it is the coach who designs all the plays in this game. Some even go to the extent of comparing the game of football to the game of chess where the coach is compared to the chess player whereas all the real football players are like the various chess pieces on the board who implement the coach's plans & strategies.

Before proceeding further, I will also have to mention the fact that the coach’s 10 year-old daughter was suffering from a brain development delay and may be that was one reason he chose to come in first place bcos he can clearly understand the pain that the kid and his family were going through. The coach spent a good amount of time with the kid and he narrated a few incidents involving him & Joe Montana, after whom the kid was named, since himself and Joe Montana shared the same room in college. The coach also handed out a football signed by all the University of Notre Dame players. The boy was so happy on all these gestures and his mom revealed that she had never seen her son happier before. Finally, when it was time to leave, the coach asked the kid if there was anything else that he can do and the boy goes "I want to call the first play of the next game". The coach agreed and the boy asked the coach to use the "pass right" play. But the inevitable happened even before the game when the boy died the night before the next game that Notre Dame played.

So, on game day, the coach is all determined to fulfill his promise and the death of the boy only made him more resolute. The game in itself was special in its own way. Notre Dame was playing against the University of Washington (which is situated here in Seattle) which is coached by Tyrone Willingham, who was fired as the coach of Notre Dame football team just last year. So, though Notre Dame was ranked notches above UW, nobody was willing to bet its money on Notre Dame mainly bcos Tyrone Willingham had a point to prove. Prior to the game, the coach told the players about his promise and told them that he is going to fulfill his promise. As expected, the game started tightly. And on any ordinary day, implementing the play that the boy had asked would have been an easy thing to do. But something happened which made calling that play a very tough proposition. Notre Dame got the ball after a fumble by Washington on their 1 yard line. Usually on such a situation, the coaches 99 out of 100 times, choose a running play since in case you select a passing play, you face the obvious danger of ‘getting sacked’ in your own end zone which would result in giving up a ‘safety’. But our coach had to fulfill his promise and so he told the players that he has no option than to use the play the boy suggested. And incredibly, the risky play went on well, with the wide receiver gaining a good 13 yards on the play. Charlie Weiss says in hindsight that he felt as though the spirit of the boy guided the play where the receiver made a crucial jump over the rushing defensive lineman and completed a good 13 yards.

The moment I heard this story in the show, I was so moved and I decided I should write about this. Incidents like this is what watching & following sports such an enjoyable and heart warming experience. It is one thing to promise and another thing to live up to it. And when that living up to involves a as huge a risk that the ND coach was facing, it is all the more praiseworthy. Charlie Weiss emerged a winner not only from the game (yeah Notre Dame won the game) but also in all our hearts for such a noble gesture. The day after the game was over, the boy's parents received another surprise in their mail – the ‘game ball’ signed by all the Notre Dame players.

p.s.: For folks who are not familiar with the game of American football, here is a quick Football 101 which should help understand the coach's act better. The game has mainly 2 types of plays - rushing or running play and passing play. As the name indicates, running play is where the player (usually the running back) carries the ball and runs through the defenses and tries to gains yards whereas in a passing play, the quarterback who in most cases is the leader of the team, throws the ball to wide receivers who in turn try to gain yards. There will be end zones on both ends and the aim is to move the ball to the opponent's endzone whcih fetches you points. Sacking a quarterback means getting your hands on the QB while he still has the football and something what the defense tries & loves to do. And when the QB is sacked in their own backyard (end zone), it results in a safety, meaning 2 points to the opposing team. And when you are starting from your own 1 yard line, you usually start off with a passing play. If I have to draw a parallel from cricket, it would be something like you starting the first over of your bowling with a spinner on a seam-friendly pitch with the field restrictions on, something which captains never do. Game ball is the tradition of the coach giving the football that was used during the game at the end of the game to the most valuable player on the field that particular game.