Where Have All The Good Films Gone?

Watching television at someone's place yesterday, hoping to see some exciting new movie trailers, and all I could see was Salman Khan's constipated-looking face across most channels. That guy needs to either retire or start playing roles which suit his age (preferably the first) instead of doing stupid dances and looking so pleased at being flanked by 20-something year old girls.


Really, what's happening to the industry right now? Haven't heard of a single good film in the past three months. This year hasn't brought with it too many movies I've really felt like watching, let alone a single movie I've watched and rated as good. Hindi films seem to stupid to be watchable. Check out some of these:

  (I'd need to have an extra-crazy family to voluntarily watch that)

Unfortunately, I did watch this, thanks to mom's enthusiasm. Needless to say, the movie was stupid. Madhavan and Kangana Ranaut have never been more annoying!

LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME!!!!!!!!! Looks like it could be soft porn, but it's probably worse.

The poster with the random people says it all, if the name hadn't already done the job.

Thank you mom for not making me watch this!

This was actually one of the more interesting looking films, but I heard it's terrible, so...

Please! The very title is off-putting

Wow, this actually looks more classy than the poster in the cinema hall near my house. 

With the number of dumb people out there, this might actually do well.

I wonder how Dilli Chalo is. It looked not too bad, and at least it has actors I like. Heard that I Am is good, but I don't see it in theatres anywhere.

All the new English movies I hear of seem to have doomsday themes - Battle Los Angeles, Black Death, Thor, etc. And really, who wants to watch The Hangover Part II? Didn't even like the first movie (excuse me for not being that crass) and the second one is apparently exactly the same, but in a different location. 
How many Pirates of the Caribbean movies can one watch? Oh wait, this has Johnny Depp AND Penelope Cruz. Okay, I might watch that. Thank goodness Kung Fu Panda II is coming up soon!


To all my friends who have given me movies, I love you. It's thanks to them and my laptop that I manage to watch some good movies in bleak times like these. For example, yesterday I watched No Reservations, and loved it! Then again, how can you not love a movie with brilliant Catherine Zeta-Jones playing the lead character, against a backdrop of food? Aaron Eckhart was charming, and Abigail Breslin was surprisingly sweet. Nothing revolutionary, but a heartwarming story well told. 

Watch the trailer: http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi295567641/ Then watch the movie. Because feel good films rule!

Entrance Exam Blunders - Part II

I don't even want to start on the grammar part, so I'm going directly to the essays about reactions to the death of Osama Bin Laden. They're not all huge blunders, but they're quite funny. Here are a few of the responses we got: 

"Osama Bin Laden!!! Wow!!! great topic!! Ok.... all I know is..."

"Osama bin laden is one of the most famous terrorist who is known for the 9/11 crash or the world trade centre crash."

"The way the 7 wonders of the world are famous in universe, in the same way Osama Bin laden was famous for terror."

"I honestly care a damn for him."

"He is one of the major antisocial element of all times." 

"The President of USA Obama, has given the information that Osama is a terrorist he killed many lives if he is still alive he may kill people around the world."

"He used to hide from everyone as he was scared from the death."

"It looked, as though, he would survive for 100 more years."

"OSAMA-BIN-LADEN was shot dead wright in the head, the very fact gave and set in new spirite of joy and happyness among us."

"Looking at the response of the people all over the world i had goose bums." (Hee hee!)

"Should I rejoice or have my head banging with several questions like How? When? What?"

"I honestly was neither happy nor sad, because when Osama was at his hide out, I was least bothered out to google him out. But you never know, just like Sadam Hussain had 8 replicas, and Osama is far more shrewd then Sadam. I wonder how many he would have! LOL!"

"When I got this news I was very happy as Osama is killed by the Americans as he had only destroyed the World Trade Center in Year 1999."

"Its kind of terrible feeling we get when we hear such news. But then terrorism is increasing, and hopefully now after Osama's death it gets decreased."

"I am very delightful and feels save that the most wanted criminal is dead."

"I felt satisfied at my sole because many souls were rest to peace. The one who does evil, evil comes to him."

"Come to think of the several innocent lives for no particular reason he's plotted against, the number of ambitious souls he's made blinded to the future, and the number of innocent infants he's made orphans out of."

"But however, although the criminals who assisinated him soon agreed volunteerly about the murder Obama openly proclaimed that the murder was committed according to his order."

"The chaser seem very happy and pleased As the Encounter if i can say has Rest in Peace. This constant news update makes me wonder what is it that buzzing in Bush's mind happy to be untouched and unblamed or unhappy so to loose one of his products."

"I believe in 'The Almighty'. He sees and knows everything. I know and am sure, God will punish him one fine day and so he did."

"God is there. No to worries. Enjoy life in all its myriad colours."

"In my place, the mother's always tell there babies while feeding them that "Osama will Come" and the kids used to eat fast. But now I think none of the mothers will say "Osama will Come" ever again."

"The earth now is cleansed. The avenge has been taken. Osama Bin laden has tasted his own medecine this death has taught me so many things. Things like, you know: Do good, you'll get the good. Do bad, you'll get it back again."

"It was height time Osama saw Hell, for all the innocent lives he has taken away. R.I.P. Osama Bin Landen."

Besides all that, many people don't seem to know what "write in verse" means. Then there was another section where people had to identify the movie each famous dialogue belonged to. You'd think people would do well there, right? Well, you're sadly mistaken. An awful lot of people don't seem to know of any movies besides Twilight, P.S. I Love You, and A Walk To Remember. 

One thing that stood out was how several seemed to think "I'll be back" is from Titanic. Imagine this from a drowning guy:

Creepy, huh? 

Well, at least it's not from a movie about OBL!

Entrance Exam Blunders - Part I

How dull life would be if we didn't have things (and people?) to laugh at! Take for instance an entrance exam. I'm sure people who correct papers have a tough job, but I bet it's fun when you have some atrocious answers.

Woke up this morning earlier than usual (for a holiday) and dragged myself out of bed, ignoring that nagging urge to just stay there. Sure, sleep is wonderful, but what's even better is going to college and terrorizing juniors by pretending to be mean, controlling, and bitchy. 

Well, that was the plan. All I actually did was hang around and eat pizza (which took less effort and was probably more fun anyway). And of course, laugh at the answer sheets, write wacky comments and draw emoticons all over them. 

I could have taken pictures of everything and put them up, but I'm nice. So, here are some gems (the ones I remember):

President of India - Pradipa Patel

(There was also a Pranab or Pramod Patel)

Current ruling party in the USA - Republicans (BracObama's administration)

(Yes, I'm sure "BracObama" is a Republican) 

City where Osama bin Laden was found and killed 

(Got all kinds of answers for this, including one somewhere in the US. One person scratched out "city", replaced it with "country" and said Pakistan. Not a bad move, but not nearly good enough) 

Greenpeace - vegetable 

(So some people really don't know the difference between peace and peas?)

BT brinjal - vegetable 

(Oh, really? I had no idea! Thanks for enlightening me)

I was also surprised at the number of people who think Pulitzer is a fertilizer. And:

Bajrang Dal - pulse
(Did she mean pulse of the people of that group or some strange thing like that? Oh, wait... DAL - pulse. God help us!) 

Author of Pride and Prejudice - Rabindranath Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi, Anita (different people's answers)

(Yeah... no! And who on earth is Anita?)

Author of The God of Small Things - Ryan

(Ryan who? Oh, THAT guy! Yeah, I totally know who you're talking about)

Author of The Discovery of India - Shobha De

(*sigh* Nothing left to say)

In which of Shakespeare's plays would you find Shylock? - Sherlock Holmes

(What, you didn't know Shakespeare wrote a series of Sherlock Holmes plays in which the lead character was named Shylock?)

Who was the creator of Snoopy? - An American

(Come on...)

One of the contenders for Most Disgusting Answer:

An Indian who has won the Nobel Prize for literature - Chetan Bhagat 

(*mixture of hysterical laughter and banging head on wall while being worried and disturbed about the future of this country*)

More coming up soon.