Of missed chances & wasted opportunities

They say Opportunity knocks only once and just like how it has been proved in all of our lives, this has happened to our actors/ actresses too. There have been so many occasions before when a role in a movie was supposed to be given to an actor/ actress but was not done eventually bcos that actor/ actress did not want/ could not do the movie due to various reasons, both known and unkown. This has happened to my knowledge both in Hollywood and in our own Kollywood. I have always wanted to blog about this but I have never been able to gather many instances of when it happened to get a decent list of such occurrences. Anyway, I thought I will write down the ones I know of and then leave it to you guys to enlighten me with such instances that you guys might know of. Now on to the list that I know of.

Mudhalvan - The moment I thought about writing about it, Thalaivar's reluctance to do Mudhalvan came to mind almost instantly. I always call that as Thalaivar's biggest mistake to date. When the movie was released and I heard the storyline, I was so mad that Thalaivar did not it. And just bcos of the fact that Thalaivar was supposed to be the one who should have acted in Mudhalvan, I did not want to see the movie and I didn’t do it until some time last year. And when I did see it, my frustration only grew bigger. When Mudhalvan with Arjun could become such a big hit, I wonder what would have happened if Thalaivar had acted, as originally planned. Easily the best missed chance as far as Thalaivar goes. Its not that Thalaivar’s stature would have grown if he had done that movie but still it would have satiated many Thalaivar fans' wish of having him do a high quality movie. My only wish is that Thalaivar and Shankar make up for that loss in Sivaji.

Marumalarchi - I have read reports that Thalaivar & then Vijayakanth were asked (in that order) to do the lead role in the movie, which eventually went to Mammootty. This was one movie I really liked and the role would have suited Thalaivar perfectly. But at the same time, I will have to say that this would have suited him only during the days when Thalaivar acted in movies like Ejamaan. His stature has grown many a fold since then and thus I am not sure how it would suit him today. But I would have loved to see Thalaivar play the Rasu Padaiyaachi character.

Ghajni - Ajith was supposed to act in Ghajni. Though not a good movie by any stretch of imagination, it could have done wonders for Ajith's struggling career. I am pretty sure that Ajith would have found it hard to match what Surya was able to perform in Ghajni. But since it was Asin’s role and the songs that made the film a huge hit, it would not have mattered anyway. I would have been happy if Ghajni rather than Paramasivan was the movie that sort of resurrected Ajith's career.

Kaadhal - Looks like Dhanush was supposed to act in Kaadhal but couldn’t do it bcos he was busy with other movies. This again is a very crucial missed opportunity since inspite of his good showing in Pudhupettai, he is still struggling, after his dream start of 3 consecutive hits. Contrary to what many feel, I have always thought this guy has the necessary acting skills to make it big but only that he has to take extreme caution in picking the roles/ stories that suit him. I thought he was pretty good in Adhu Oru Kanaa Kaalam and thus on the same lines, a movie like Kaadhal would have been perfect for him, to prove both his detractors wrong and also helped him by a big commercial hit. In fact, if Dhanush had acted in Kaadhal, he would have fitted the role of a young mechanic better than Bharath. Bharath has this slightly sophisticated look to him while the pedestrian looks of Dhanush could have come in very handy. Though his performance in Pudhupettai has come in for appreciation all around & the movie has gone on to become a decent hit, I still maintain that this is the biggest missed chance/ blunder of Dhanush.

Aayitha Ezhuthu - Shaam is one actor who has got all the right ingredients to be a successful actor but somehow success has eluded him, even after him being around for more than 5 years in the industry. And he could have had his big break if things had worked out well bcos he was the original choice of Mani for one of the characters in Aayitha Ezhuthu. I am not sure what was the role that Mani wanted him to play (I am guessing it should have been Madhavan's) but whatever role it was, missing a Mani Rathnam movie is a cardinal sin. You don’t get calls from Mani Rathnam every day. I don’t remember the reason why he couldn’t accept the offer but whatever it was, that surely ranks as one of the worst missed chances that somebody like Shaam who is still trying to get a foothold in the industry, should have grabbed with both his hands.

Sethu - Actor Vignesh was supposed to be the one who was originally approached by Bala for Sethu but he refused it to some reason I don’t remember. Isn’t this amazing? This is probably THE biggest missed chance of them all bcos we all have seen what the movie has done to Vikram’s career which had never really taken off until he did Sethu. I am not sure how much talent that Vignesh has. Soori which was supposed to be the movie with his career defining performance didn’t impress me at all. Though we should be happy that the role went to Vikram and made his career click, Vignesh will rue this missed chance forever.

Now, over to you - Is there any other such missed chances that you guys are aware of and I am missing in this list?

Priceless

US Visa application fees – 4,800 INR
Visa issuance fees at the Chennai consulate – 2,400 INR
Flight tickets from Chennai to Seattle - 60,000 INR
Having your mother visit you in the US - Priceless!!!

Every desi guy's dream just got true this past weekend. I am so excited :)

Trip to the 2006 US Open

This past Labor day weekend was the time for me to cross one more item from my check list of sports events to attend in person. Attending the US Open was one of the very first things that came to my mind when I got to the US. But it has taken 5 long years for me to be able to do that. 2 years ago, I was in NY during the US Open but did not get a chance to see the tournament. So, like always, here is a small narration of my trip to New York city to watch the 2006 US Open.

1) Since I took really long to book the tickets, by the time I looked for tickets online, I could get tickets for only one session during the weekend. That being a long weekend, almost all the tickets were sold out well in advance. So, I made the trip to the US Open with tickets for just 1 session. With the tournament organizers not publishing the playing schedule until the day before (due to which you don’t know until the day before as to who is playing in your session), we were keeping our fingers crossed hoping to see some big name players in our session. Finally, we found the day before that Nadal and Serena Williams were scheduled to play during our session.

2) But then it was Ernesto's turn to play spoil sport on the scheduled day. Due to the tropical storm, the entire day's play was washed out and there I was standing after having traveled 3000 miles from Seattle, only to find my session canceled. The tournament organizers offered 2 options - we can either get tickets another session during this US Open or hold on to the same tickets for next year's US Open. Fortunately, for me the next day's evening session tickets were available and we readily grabbed them with both hands.

3) I observed a very heart warming gesture during my flight journey into NY. There was this guy who was seated right in front of me. I did not notice him when he got into his seat. When the airhostess came around serving the usual snacks & drinks routine, after serving him, she said "Thanks for serving". I was obviously puzzled and when I peeked around, it was then I saw that he was dressed in the army uniform and looked like someone who was returning from active duty. And when the flight landed and as everybody was disembarking from the flight, the sounds of "thanks for serving us" and "Thanks for your service" filled the air, with almost everybody getting out of the flight taking their time to thank the overwhelmed marine. I was immediately taken back to how we react to when we see someone from the military back in India. Though we have always had high regard for them, may be the next time we meet someone from the army back in India, we should take a moment to thank them for serving & literally protecting us.

4) One of the interesting incidents to narrate - On the day when the tropical storm was playing spoilsport, me and my friend were both bored to death and were just wandering about the USTA premises taking pictures of the whole area. When you get off the subway train, the US Open premises is to your right and the Mets (baseball) stadium is to the left. Since we were bored, we walked our way to the other side of the subway to take some pictures of the Mets stadium. While we were at it, two men approached us and flashed their badges to us & said "NYPD"! For a second, I just froze and I thought to myself Oh...oh...This is not happening to me. What wrong did we do?. Then the officer proceeded We have been noticing both you guys for a while and the pictures you were taking. It looked a bit suspicious. Can we take a look at the pictures you took? It was then we both realized the pictures that we were taking - the Arthur Ashe stadium, the subway trains, the rail tracks, the general crowd and the Mets stadium and it all made sense - no wonder that they stopped us. They said they wanted to run our names against their database to see if we were having any pending arrests against our names. While one of the officers was doing the same, the other one (he was a perfect gentleman) stuck a conversation with us and soon we were discussing about college football, bcos the officer was a big-time Notre Dame fan, something I noticed it from the hat he was wearing. It really helped that I follow college football madly and he was pleasantly surprised that we knew so much about college football. As expected, the search came back empty and they wished us good luck in getting some tickets. Overall, it was all such a good experience.

5) The problem with scheduling of games at the US Open is that all the popular players play in either of the 2 big stadiums - the Arthur Ashe stadium or the Louis Armstrong stadium to which getting tickets anywhere closer to the court side is next to impossible (unless if you are willing to shell out 300$ per ticket). That just means one thing - that you will never get to see the popular players from up close. And there are 17 other courts inside the complex and is in these courts that you get to watch the players from really close quarters. It was in one such court that we were able to get a really close view of Mary Pierce and my friend got to watch Sania. (For Sania fans out there, check her pictures here)

6) Due to the change of schedule due to the weather, we got to watch the Sharapova - Likhovtseva game, followed by the James Blake - Carlos Moya game. The Sharapova game was a big disappointment bcos Sharapova finished off the match in real quick time & so didn’t get much time to drool over her. But from our seats which were way above in the stands, it was anyway not possible. The one thing that is hard to miss while watching a Sharapova game is the grunting that goes with her game. Even with ourselves sitting way up above in the stands, we could clearly hear her grunting. Has there been an official comparison of the grunting levels of her with Monica Seles? I am sure that would be one interesting comparison. But the Blake-Moya game was a treat to watch. The action is more pronounced and it was fun watching the game, with Blake, being the NYC local he is, getting tremendous support from the partisan crowd.

7) Our travails with NYPD didn’t get over with that one incident. On our way back to my friend's place, we got stuck in the elevator. Since the supervisor of the building wasn’t there to attend to the emergency situation, the NYPD had to called in, who in turn called the FDNY. We were put up inside the elevator for about 60 minutes before the FDNY folks got us out. The worst part about getting stuck in that elevator was that we were like a few inches away from the floor where we had to get off. We could hear what everybody was talking outside and rather than getting scared of claustrophobia (we were 5 in a really small elevator) or something, we all were joking around.

8) It was real hard to get tickets to that Agassi - Becker game (Agassi’s last game as a pro). We tried our best to get some tickets at the last minute but did not succeed. We were waiting outside when the match ended. When it was announced that Andre had lost, there was a collective sigh of disappointment that went through the air from the hundreds of spectators like me waiting to get inside and was followed by spontaneous ovation for the man who was one of those rare sportsmen who was able to combine style with substance. It was particularly overwhelming and spoke volumes about the man’s popularity that there was such a long applause from an audience which did not even get to watch the man play.

9) My return journey from NY to Seattle will be something to remember bcos it took me more than 18 hours of total journey time. With 18 hours, you could have easily caught a flight to India and landed there by then. My flight back to Seattle was from Philadelphia at 5:40pm and since I was put up in Queens, NY during my trip, I started from my friend's place in Queens at around 11:30am. Caught a subway to the Penn Station, then a NJ Transit train from there to Trenton in NJ, from there another train to downtown Philadelphia and finally, another to the Philadelphia airport. Got to the airport at around 4:15pm. But delays at both the Philadelphia and the Atlanta airports made sure that I got to Seattle only around 2:30am PST (5:30am EST). Phew...that was one long journey.

Apart from the Sania gallery, check out the general gallery too for other pictures.

Movies that I am looking forward to

I am sure at any given point of time, we all are looking forward to movies that are in various stages of production for a variety of reasons. And those reasons are usually the track record of the artists - be it the leading actor, the music director or the director in many cases - involved in the making of the movie. While I was thinking of such movies that I am truly looking forward to, there were just too many movies I am looking forward to and hence thought I will post the top 10 movies as an entry.

10) Dasavatharam - This movie has the number 10 in its name and has Kamal donning 10 roles in it and hence I thought 'OK...let me give it the 10th slot in this list'. I don’t understand why Kamal fans are placing their hopes on this movie, as though they are going to get another Anbe Sivam. Seriously, has there been any quality & worthwhile movie from the Kamal - KSR combo? I mostly think that this movie will act as a sort of propaganda vehicle to show off Kamal's acting/ film making/ make-up skills. A rapidly declining Himesh Reshamiyya as the MD surely appears to be a misfit. I still can not understand WTH is he doing in a Kamal movie?

9) By2 - The beautiful music is the sole reason for myself looking forward to this movie. Another reason would be that the entire movie has only 2 characters in it. Sounds a hell lot interesting...

8) Veyil - Now that Shankar's success as a producer has spanned to 3 consecutive super hits, I am assuming Veyil should be no different. Apart from the fact that it is produced by Shankar's assistant, the realistic stills that have been released so far, the presence of the versatile Pasupathy and the musical debut of by ARR's nephew, G. V. Prakash are other factors that make me await the movie’s release. BTW, I heard the director of this movie was the one who made Album. I haven’t seen the movie yet. Was that any good? Another personal reason to await this movie – parts of the movie have been shot in Madurai, just like Kaadhal.

7) Satham Podaathey - Vasanth is one of my favorite directors who has IMHO failed to live up to his tremendous potential. Sure, there has been an Aasai here and Rhythm there but he has failed to be consistent. Given his immense skills, I would expect each movie of his to be outstanding, which frankly has not been the case. But inspite of all this, I am still looking forward to this movie. Yuvan's music in this is another reason I am looking forward to this bcos the last time, they joined together they produced some mind-blowing music.

6) Mozhi - Radhamohan is director who impressed everyone with his very first movie Azhagiya Theeye, which ranks one of the best movies of the last couple of years. Inspite of his second film turning out to be not so good (the hero and his producer dad had a lot to do with that), I am eagerly awaiting this movie, now that he has joined hands with his mentor Prakash Raj again. The talented cast of Prithviraj, Padmapriya, and Prakash Raj, apart from the fact that this could be Jyothika’s last movie are other reasons which you can count on.

5) Paruthiveeran - Main reasons for looking forward to this movie would be Ameer and Yuvan. Ameer is one director who gets the best of Yuvan and being the big Yuvan fan that I am, that alone should be a big reason. But even more than that, Raam again is one of the very good movies that we have seen in the last couple of years. So, naturally my expectations went up when this movie was launched. Surya's brother who is making his debut with this movie and Priya Mani an outstanding student from the Balu Mahendra school of acting are other reasons I can’t wait to see the movie.

4) Maayakkannaadi - Alright, if you have followed my blog for a while, you should know that I am a big time Cheran fan and hence it is only natural that his latest venture finds itself in this list. Music by Maestro is always a highlight and another reason enough to expect this movie. But I have to say that the new hairstyle that Cheran is sporting in the stills looks quite artificial and naive. I am just hoping that Cheran has a valid reason to explain that.

3) Film by Balaji Shakthivel - Well, you got to look forward to the next movie from the man who gave us Kaadhal, my nominee for the best movie since Pithamagan. He has taken an unusually long time to get started on this film but the last I read was that it is nearing completion. Does anybody know if the movie has been given a title yet and who is scoring music for this movie?

2) Naan Kadavul - It is not very often that Bala makes a movie. In fact, it has been a good 3 years since that classic Pithamagan was released. Bala is easily my most favorite director in Tamil cinema right now and all these are reasons enough to look forward to the movie, though it has just been started. I am surprised by the lack of coverage for this movie from bloggers, particularly after an interesting set of shooting pictures were released last week. Then, you have the Maestro in the scheme of things. Pithamagan was just pure divine music and there is no reason not to expect anything different this time around.

1) Sivaji - Well, this should be a no-brainer. I don’t think there is any other movie that can even remotely come close to the expectation levels that this movie has, with not just me but among Tamilians the world over. I seriously doubt even if any of Thalaivar's future movies will have this kind of a buzz & hype surrounding it. Sure, each and every Thalaivar movie has its own unprecedented levels of hype around it. But Thalaivar with Shankar is what makes this movie easily the most looked forward movie in the history of Tamil cinema :) After the initial set of stills & shooting spot photos, Shankar has managed to completely shut down any information about the film to the media. From news items like ‘the song Sahara Pookkal is being shot on Thalaivar & Shreya in Spain’, we have gotten down to news like 'Thalaivar getting relief from the hot sun by standing in front of the fan!!' Shankar sure is the biggest torturer/ dictator on earth. அப்புறம் என்னங்க, தலைவர் படத்தோட shooting start பண்ணிட்டு , to say that we have to wait for 1.5 years to see it and that in the meanwhile, he will not release any other official photo / news about the movie, hasn’t he given us enough reasons to complain him to the human rights commission? :)

Am I missing any promising movie from this list? Here is a thing to ponder upon: my track record in this is pretty good :) The last time I did a similar post, I only listed 2 movies and they both turned out to be good movies which also did decent at the box office. The movies - Kanda Naal Mudhal and Thavamaai Thavam Irundhu.

Also, planning to do a similar post on movies that I am NOT looking forward to. Now, that should be an interesting list.

India Trip musings

Since this trip was my second this year, I did not find any glaring differences like the way I did during my last trip to India, which was done after close to 2 years. But, here are some of my usual India trip observations:

1) The one thing I noticed during this trip (and something which I did not notice during my earlier trip) is this new habit of putting up huge banners for weddings (thankfully, there was none for my sister's :)). I did not see this in Chennai but saw it everywhere else, particularly in Madurai. And the richer the bride/ groom was, the bigger the banner was. We used to have paper posters pasted on walls for such occasions before but they were very non-intrusive in the sense that unless, you take an effort to notice those posters, you might easily miss them. I guess those posters have grown over a period of time and now have become such despicable banners. The content in the banners actually are even more disgusting - basically, what our photographers used to do with our wedding albums have made their way to those banners. Typically, you would see the photos of the bride the groom and in some cases, all the family members. And if you are really rich, you try to get these banners placed at the most strategic of locations in the city. To place these banners in front of the wedding reception hall is atleast tolerable but to have them at strategic locations in the city, is simply unpardonable. I was seriously thinking of lodging a complaint through my father against these new kind of 'encroachments'

2) Though this is my 4th trip to India, I have never flown into Madurai. I have always flown into Chennai and then taken a train or a taxi to go to Madurai. So, flying into Madurai remained one of my long time dreams. And I finally was able to fulfill that dream this time around. Of all the flights that took me from Seattle to Madurai (my route was Seattle--> San Francisco -->Singapore -->Chennai-->Madurai), it was the Jet airways flight from Chennai to Madurai that was easily the best, as far as comfort went. The service was excellent. Of course, it did help that it was a short flight and also, I was all excited as I was going to meet my family & friends at the airport. It was on this flight that I had my only brush with a celebrity (if I can call him one) - Solomon Pappiah, the noted patti mandram judge who belongs to Madurai, was in the same flight that I traveled in. Nobody seemed to have identified him and unfortunately, I was not even seated close to him bcos if I had been, I would have surely started a conversation with him.

3) On my onward journey, since I had close to 8 hours of transit in Singapore, I enquired about going into Singapore to take a peek into the country and then came across this site which had details about the free city tour for transit passengers like me, that Singapore tourism was organizing. So, on reaching the airport, I registered myself for the tour which is 2 hours long. It is a sweet little tour where they take you on a bus into the Singapore city and show you the important monuments of the city. The tour also includes a boat ride on the Singapore river, from where we get to see the skyscrapers of the city from up-close. Overall, a must-to-do thing if you have more than 4 hours of transit in Singapore. The only stat that I carried from this tour is the length & breadth of Singapore - I cant believe the whole country is just 23 kms by 42 kms big. And since the day I was in Singapore was Singapore's national day, there were extra crowd and decorations all along the city.

4) While I was in Chennai, I went to the GRT hotel and for the first time in my life, watched a BMW (and a 5 series at that) on Indian soil and I was all excited about it, which was when my friends told me that BMWs are a common place in Chennai now-a-days (my friend from Bangalore added that he has even seen couple of Ferraris in Bangalore). As if to prove the point, after my dinner at GRT, I went to the nearby Residency towers to meet some friends and guess what I saw there?! 2 more BMWs and one of them was even better - a 7 series. It was then my other friend enlightened me about how all these high end cars can be seen on the Chennai roads only during late nights and on the weekends when the traffic is relatively mild. So, if it were the Corollas and the Citys that got me excited during my last trip, it was the BMWs and the Mercedes' that caught my attention during this trip.

5) The wedding went on very well. Big crowd, much more than what we expected. But what I wanted to write here is how exhausted the process of organizing a wedding makes us. Prior to my departure, all my friends who had undergone the experience of arranging the weddings of their siblings talked in length about how tired the wedding would make us, particularly if you are from the bride’s side. (Like one friend told me that, when he went to bed on the morning of the day after his sister's wedding, he slept for nearly 30 hours at a stretch). But inspite of all this, I was completely unprepared for what actually happened. I can easily say that I have never felt so tired in my life before. I mean, when you go on hikes, you do get really tired but you recover pretty quickly (usually a night’s sleep is sufficient). But here, the after-effects were felt till the last day I was in India. And all this, with me who just went 5 days before the wedding and had very minimal work to do, like handing invitations to my friends’ families. I just could not imagine what my parents should have gone through in arranging a wedding of such a magnitude (more than 3000 people attended in 2 days) within a span of 3 weeks. My mom, in particular, looked like a super mom to me, for having pulled off the wedding preparations in such a short period of time :)

6) An India trip musing post would be incomplete without a mention about the traffic that we experience back in India. Though I did experience the full force of the Chennai peak hour traffic (I rode my bike from Velachery to Sathyam theaters, at 8:45am on a weekday), I wanted to write more about the understanding between the drivers back there. As many of them do not obey the traffic rules, they have this unwritten agreement between themselves while driving on roads. For example, we all would have seen this - when vehicle A is trying to overtake vehicle B and the driver of B which is going in the front helps the driver of A out by signaling whether it is safe to overtake or not. Now, they have gone one step further and have found a signal for doing it - the driver of the vehicle in the front uses his right indicator to indicate to the driver of the bus trying to overtake to indicate if it is safe to overtake. That I thought was pretty cool and one of many reasons for the relative harmony on the highways, inspite of drivers liberally flouting the rules.

India trip movies - Thimiru, Uyir & Aran

Thimiru - Was easily the best of the three. Vishal is turning out to fit the role of the next angry young man hero we have so often seen in Tamil cinema. Another movie based in Madurai and Thimiru has been able to continue the trend of films being shot based in Madurai making it big at the BO, following the success of movies like Gilli, Kaadhal and Thavamaai thavam Irundhu. I guess the first thing Vishal books on signing a movie is the stuntman bcos like in Sandaikozhi, the stunts in the movie are a highlight. It helps that he is tall and well-built, so that in scenes where he hits the baddies, it is really very believable. But his expression-less face in some scenes were a big minus. He needs to work on that. His dancing is solid, though. Reema Sen looks jaded and does not have much of a role to play. The scene stealer is of course Shreya Reddy. I am not sure if the role is worth all the praise she is receiving but it is definitely a notable performance. She is supposed to be obnoxious and she delivers just that. Yuvan's songs were perfect for the theme and mood of the film and he has another winner through this movie's box office success. Background score is competent (when has Yuvan failed in that aspect before?) and suits the flow of the movie very well. The Maana madhurai song has been picturized energetically but Kiran has little to do. I don’t understand why directors go in for some popular actress for these one-off item numbers and don’t use them fully. Like in this song, Kiran was completely unnecessary bcos it was Vishal's dancing prowess that was being projected to the core. It was a surprise when I saw that the Goppurane song was allotted for Vadivelu. It was then I realized the choice of Gangai Amaran as the singer of that song. A Vadivelu of the Bharathi Kannamma days would have done much better justice to the song than what he was able do now. Some of the trademark Vadivelu's steps have slowed down over the years, with him putting on too much weight. But the comedy in the first half was very good. The dialogue Mundhi ellaam adippaainga. Ippo ellaam kadikiraainga. Trend maathikitte irukkaangappa dialogue still evokes a laughter from me. In short, if you liked Sandaikozhi, then there is every chance that you will like this one too. But Vishal has to think of doing more different roles after this one. I guess Sivappathigaaram (with Karu Pazhaniappan) might just do that for him. We will have to wait and see.

Uyir - A movie with a controversial theme and expectedly, lots of noise surrounding it. I hear that the movie is a decent hit back in India but this movie would have been a bigger hit if this had been released before that insipid Kalaaba Kaadhalan. Since Kalaaba Kaadhalan was kind of the first movie in its genre (of the woman lusting behind the man), Uyir, it appears, only follows suit. But the theme has been handled way better in this movie. Each of Sangeetha's actions has been thought out pretty well by the director, in that at times it even looks perfectly justifiable to us. But I thought the director went slightly off-track at the very end where he deals more with Srikanth's problems with the heroine than with his troubles with Sangeetha. Even in that, when the movie ends, you are convinced in that the director, apart from handling the adultery theme, also has successfully conveyed a message about suicide not being an option for lovers who face failure. Sangeetha was pretty impressive but I still would not put this performance of her on par with her performance in Pithamagan. Srikanth just goes on to prove my feeling that he is an actor who is good at nothing. Seriously, he looks decent and that is all to him. I am really surprised that someone like him with so much experience (strictly going by the number of movies that he has acted in so far) still finds it hard to emote properly. And the award for killing one of the best songs of the year should go to the director of Uyir. The Aanum pennum song which is easily the pick of the Uyir album has been atrociously picturized by the director. Poor Joshua Sridhar, all his songs have been wasted in the movie. The background score was OK and adequate. Overall, a decent movie, with a controversial theme handled in quite a convincing way.

Aran - I really don’t understand why Mohan Lal chose to act in the movie. Remove Mohan Lal from the film and you have gotten rid of the only point of interest in the movie. When a highly rated actor like him does not do the dubbing for himself, then the role completely loses soul. That is what happened when Aravind Swamy dubbed for SRK in Uyire and that is what happens here where it is worse with Rajeev dubbing for Mohan Lal. The movie completely put me off, right from the beginning with those scenes involving Jeeva and Gopika. Except for a very few scenes which show the director's work experience in the army, most of the scenes have been pathetically shot. I mean, Jeeva is wearing a Nike cap in one of the scenes in the movie while he is on a mission. The comedy and the item number does not do any good to the already sagging pace of the movie. There is just no reason for those 2 in a movie like Aran. Inspite of such an abject bad movie, what is hard to miss is Mohan Lal's performance. There used to be a time when I questioned his acting abilities, asking if the way he acts is really the way a great actor does (basically, fed up with overdose of Kamal). But I simply loved his performance in this one, all this inspite of him not dubbing for himself. Jeeva only strengthens my belief that he is an actor to look out for. He is getting better with each passing movie. Finally, the other thing that I cant understand is why or how Anandha Vikatan gave 42 marks to this good for nothing movie. Just bcos somebody makes a patriotic movie or just bcos the director of the movie is an ex-army man, we should not be blindly handing out the accolades. I would suggest Major Ravi to stick to consulting other film-makers on army related scenes and just stay out of making movies. That way, he can walk with his head held high.

Monthly Sports Round-up - August 2006

The way I usually do these posts is as the month progresses, I keep writing about sports events which I think should find a place in the month-end post and if the list becomes too big at the end of the month, I delete the not-so-important ones. But this time around, I was in India for the most, with not a chance of catching up any sports events. So, I am just listing down the main sporting events that I am able to recall with whatever little news that I was able to get to during my hectic trip. So, you guys are most welcome to add on to this list.

August 5 - The dreaded news came early on Saturday morning as Floyd Landis' sample B results came out and they too confirmed his worst fears. Once the results were out, he was stripped of the Tour De France title and the title was handed over to runner-up Spaniard Oscar Periro. The sport which had already reached a low before this year’s tour actually began (when many favorites from Spain were suspended on doping charges) further loses its credibility with this historic incident.

August 14 - The Unitech cup - Of course, this should not technically be in the list but it is bcos of the 3 balls that Sachin faced during the brief play that was possible, I decided to include this in this list. I was all excited that day, watching the man play 3 balls before play was called off due to bad light. Though it was a mere 2 ball stint, the tournament officially marked Sachin's return to the international cricket and hence finds its place here in the list. I can not remember the last time when a complete tournament has been scraped off without a ball being bowled (or has it even happened?) The only good thing they did is that they called off the tournament right after the second ODI was cancelled, instead of waiting till the 3rd ODI too was rained out, thereby giving our players some extra time to rest before the next series.

August 19 - The World Basketball championships begin in Japan. This was something that was given wide coverage here in the US, long before the tournament actually began and the main reason for that being the more-than-the-usual efforts put in by the US team to put behind them disappointments from these championships & the Olympics in the past few years and thus regain basketball glory. The US team duly obliged the coverage it has received and made it to the semi-finals without breaking much of a sweat. But the Americans were brought crashing down to earth with a 101-95 loss to the reigning European Champions, Greece today. So, looks like they have to wait for another 2 years (till the Olympics) to regain that elusive world basketball title. All that talent in the world (which included the Class of NBA Draft 2003 – Lebron, Carmelo and Wade) could not still buy a world championship title.

August 20 - Hair controversy - well, he is at it again. The most controversial umpire in the game's history does it again, as he first penalizes the Pakistanis 5 runs for alleged tampering and then awards the test to the Englishmen after the Pakistanis refused to come out to play after the tea break on day 4. No wonder, that this has now become a part of the cricketing folklore, as arguably the most controversial decision in cricket's history what with this becoming the first test match to be conceded in the history of test cricket. IMHO, I though his awarding the test to the Englishmen was according to the rules which state that if a team does not come out to play, then the game should be conceded to the opposite team, which is what exactly he did. I fault the Pakistanis who continued playing the game even after the penalty was awarded. If they had not played right after that, Hair would not have had a reason to concede the test match to England. I don’t even want to get into the most sensational part of the whole morbid story - that of Hair offering to resign if given .5 million USD. My only comment would be that it was way too small amount to be claimed as compensation :)

August 20 - Tiger continues his dream run with his second major in 2 months, winning the PGA Tour Championships in the Medina Golf course, near Chicago. That leaves him just 6 short of the all-time majors record of 18 titles held by Jack Nicklaus. To me, the one thing that has fascinated me about Tiger is this fact - looks like, of all the times he has gone into the final round with atleast a share of the lead, he has made sure that he comes out on top. It is the final round that usually has all the tensions to it and it is amazing how time and again, he delivers. I was in Madurai during this tournament but I was able to catch all the action on ten sports channel. It was a pleasant surprise to see the amount of golf coverage we get back in India. And after the win at WGC Bridgestone invitational a week later, Tiger now has won 4 tournaments in a row, something he has repeated after a gap of 7 years.

August 27 - Felippe Massa wins his first career Formula 1 victory at the Turkish Grand Prix in Istanbul. In a close fight for the 2nd spot, Alonso pushes Schumacher to the 3rd spot, thus increasing his lead over Schumacher in the driver's championships race to 12 points. 4 races remain and it is going to be one uphill battle for Schumacher to catch up with the defending champion. All eyes on the Italian GP on September 10th.

August 28 - Agassi's swan song tournament (how else to call this year's US Open) begins and looking at the way he struggled to overcome Pavel in the first round, he might not survive the second round or in other words, before this post sees the light of the day :) That was what I had written before yday when I had originally decided to publish this post. But Andre just refuses to go away, coming out with a hard fought 5-set victory over 8th seeded Baghdatis, in a match which many thought would be his last. Apart from the Agassi angle, the way Nadal dismissed one-time power played Mark Philippoussis, suggests that we are on course for the battle royale a.k.a the Federer-Nadal final. Yours truly leaving to NYC in a few hours from now and hopefully get to watch some games over the weekend. I have tickets to just 1 session during the weekend and planning to get tickets for the other sessions, at the venue. Any readers with previous experience of going to the US open, please do throw some light on the ticket availability at the venue.

Best sporting performance of the month - Given the too little sports action that I was able to catch during this month, Tiger's performance at the PGA Championships IMO deserves to win this. So, here's to Tiger recapturing his best form, after a brief slump following his father's death.

Best Sporting event of the month - This again involves Tiger and happened during the final round of the WGC Invitational gold tournament which Tiger won, the week after winning the PGA championships. Stewart Cink and Tiger were tied at the end of the 4 holes and what followed after that was some very exciting action. The play-off went on till the 4th hole when Tiger finally finished off with a birdie and Cink could only watch it. But the scenario was entirely different during the first 3 rounds of the playoff hole where it was Cink who had the upper hand and Tiger was haplessly watching, from the green. But you don’t waste 3 opportunities against Tiger and still hope to win. It was a nervous and closely fought playoff, albeit with a familiar result.