I'd told everybody that this Alok Nath piffle will come back and kick our butts one day.
This week, the Indian Censor Board saw a change of saints, and one Rakesh Kumar announced his arrival, fresh from the shrine of Baba Alok Nath. This godly man swore to set things right, which actually means taking us back to the 10th Century BC, when running your hands through your hair was considered worth a guillotine. The man in question, a former Railway employee, had problems with everything in the films he saw. Whoa, whoa, hold it right there! This galoot is a Railway employee? Oh damn, no wonder I don't get my train pass on time. Those folks are always meddling in affairs that don't concern them.
So, I came across his interview in a Mumbai tabloid, Mumbai Mirror, and I couldn't stop laughing. The last time I had laughed this hard was when the possessory credits of Sajid Khan's bilge masterpiece Himmatwala read A Sajid Khan Entertainer, because the entertainment quotient was roughly equal to having your face splashed by ice-cold water in a Delhi winter. Kumar reacted sharply to the increasing vulgarity and violence in Hindi films, saying that an actor of Aamir Khan's stature shouldn't have produced a cussload film like Delhi Belly.
So, while I'm getting a load of the observations made by this prehistoric soothsayer, I notice that he's not too kind with anything the films have to offer. He scorns Gangs Of Wasseypur because of its terrible language, Agneepath for its gory content and Shuddh Desi Romance because his five-year old daughter chirped that it had too much love. Really, you take a midget to watch a film about consensual sex and live-in relationships? And since he's so kindly mentioned going for the drivel Yaariyan as well, I want to question him on his decision to take his daughter to a movie which had bikini-clad girls and a lot mature talk going on in the trailer. I mean, that's what trailers are for, right? To give you an idea what the film's like, warn you if Sajid Khan or Ram Gopal Varma or Prakash Jha have helmed it and you need to down a couple of shots of whiskey through your gullet to get through it if you're deciding to go for it.
You know, I have written endlessly on the need for creative freedom on this blog, and I hope the three visitors who have accidentally ended up here in search of trailers for Interstellar remember it. The Hindi film industry needs radical filmmakers, and if we appoint someone who drinks holy water for tea and was born somewhere in the 18th Century, we might as well get used to Ekta Kapoor's saas-bahu sagas.
A while back, I saw flashes of Qaushiq Mukherjee's, popularly known as Q, controversial extreme Bengali film, Gandu. Though dunked in striking imagery and explicit sexual content, Gandu was a compelling watch, an example of insurgent filmmaking trying to find a footing in a conservative country. Madly ambitious as it was, I was almost hoping that the Censor Board would concede and get it a limited release. And that would've surely meant that Anurag Kashyap, who I assume is getting through bottles of gin after hearing of Kumar's appointment, could have released his Paanch, which is still lying in cans. But those noobs are intent on killing cinema, which has long since been the hobby everyone named Ram Gopal Varma, so I don't really expect this Chief to bolster the freedom we're getting now.
I mean, really. We can't birth a few Sooraj Barjatyas, nor do I want to see filmmakers like him in the industry anymore. With those stolen wedding videos he releases as films, I don't really see them getting a good market now. But Kumar does, and he will get them released because every film will now pass under his scrutiny and those are the kind of films he prefers. Abuse of power? I'd like to think so. Take cover, chums, we're going to get hit by a load of shit now for a while.
I'm sorry, I'm not censoring this write-up. When I get mad, I speak my mind, and I'm speaking my mind. I don't give two colossal damns about this guy, but I'm dead worried that this pious agarbatti-smoker is going to doom us. Unless someone goes to him and snarls in his face, "Saale, Alibaug se ayela hai kya?"
Let's wait and watch. If not, keep DVDs of Jai Santoshi Maa handy.
This week, the Indian Censor Board saw a change of saints, and one Rakesh Kumar announced his arrival, fresh from the shrine of Baba Alok Nath. This godly man swore to set things right, which actually means taking us back to the 10th Century BC, when running your hands through your hair was considered worth a guillotine. The man in question, a former Railway employee, had problems with everything in the films he saw. Whoa, whoa, hold it right there! This galoot is a Railway employee? Oh damn, no wonder I don't get my train pass on time. Those folks are always meddling in affairs that don't concern them.
So, I came across his interview in a Mumbai tabloid, Mumbai Mirror, and I couldn't stop laughing. The last time I had laughed this hard was when the possessory credits of Sajid Khan's bilge masterpiece Himmatwala read A Sajid Khan Entertainer, because the entertainment quotient was roughly equal to having your face splashed by ice-cold water in a Delhi winter. Kumar reacted sharply to the increasing vulgarity and violence in Hindi films, saying that an actor of Aamir Khan's stature shouldn't have produced a cussload film like Delhi Belly.
So, while I'm getting a load of the observations made by this prehistoric soothsayer, I notice that he's not too kind with anything the films have to offer. He scorns Gangs Of Wasseypur because of its terrible language, Agneepath for its gory content and Shuddh Desi Romance because his five-year old daughter chirped that it had too much love. Really, you take a midget to watch a film about consensual sex and live-in relationships? And since he's so kindly mentioned going for the drivel Yaariyan as well, I want to question him on his decision to take his daughter to a movie which had bikini-clad girls and a lot mature talk going on in the trailer. I mean, that's what trailers are for, right? To give you an idea what the film's like, warn you if Sajid Khan or Ram Gopal Varma or Prakash Jha have helmed it and you need to down a couple of shots of whiskey through your gullet to get through it if you're deciding to go for it.
You know, I have written endlessly on the need for creative freedom on this blog, and I hope the three visitors who have accidentally ended up here in search of trailers for Interstellar remember it. The Hindi film industry needs radical filmmakers, and if we appoint someone who drinks holy water for tea and was born somewhere in the 18th Century, we might as well get used to Ekta Kapoor's saas-bahu sagas.
A while back, I saw flashes of Qaushiq Mukherjee's, popularly known as Q, controversial extreme Bengali film, Gandu. Though dunked in striking imagery and explicit sexual content, Gandu was a compelling watch, an example of insurgent filmmaking trying to find a footing in a conservative country. Madly ambitious as it was, I was almost hoping that the Censor Board would concede and get it a limited release. And that would've surely meant that Anurag Kashyap, who I assume is getting through bottles of gin after hearing of Kumar's appointment, could have released his Paanch, which is still lying in cans. But those noobs are intent on killing cinema, which has long since been the hobby everyone named Ram Gopal Varma, so I don't really expect this Chief to bolster the freedom we're getting now.
I mean, really. We can't birth a few Sooraj Barjatyas, nor do I want to see filmmakers like him in the industry anymore. With those stolen wedding videos he releases as films, I don't really see them getting a good market now. But Kumar does, and he will get them released because every film will now pass under his scrutiny and those are the kind of films he prefers. Abuse of power? I'd like to think so. Take cover, chums, we're going to get hit by a load of shit now for a while.
I'm sorry, I'm not censoring this write-up. When I get mad, I speak my mind, and I'm speaking my mind. I don't give two colossal damns about this guy, but I'm dead worried that this pious agarbatti-smoker is going to doom us. Unless someone goes to him and snarls in his face, "Saale, Alibaug se ayela hai kya?"
Let's wait and watch. If not, keep DVDs of Jai Santoshi Maa handy.
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