The Hindu reports that President Kalam has stated that he hasn’t watched a movie in the last 50 years:
President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam has not watched a movie in the last 50 years as he was literally wedded to his scientific research. “You won’t believe it but it is true,” Mr. Kalam told Radio Kashmir’s news editor Gurjeet Malik in an informal chat here.
I pity the great man, for he has missed quite a lot of stunning movies made in this country. A fine example of which is Kannathil Muthamittaal, which I saw for the nth time yesterday (n > 30).
Kannathil Muthamittaal, made is 2002, should rank as one of the most wonderful films our country has produced. Set against the backdrop of crisis in Sri Lanka, the movie weaves together multiple themes of terrorism, adoption, love and motherhood in a fantastic visual spectacle.
It is the kind of movie you can feel proud about, that it was made in our country; the kind of movie which makes you want to rank Mani Ratnam alongside Hollywood greats like Spielberg, Scorsese, Kubrick and Coppola.
Taut screenplay, excellent, measured acting by everyone (Madhavan was so good; Simran with her best performance; Keerthana who won a National Award), and terrific score by A.R. Rahman, who also won a National Awar, lend weight to a brilliant script. Not surprisingly, at the National Awards for that year, the movie was adjudged the Best Picture.
The irony, though, is that the movie was not India’s nominee to the Oscars. We sent Devdas — yes, Devdas! — to the Oscars, and it turned out to be such a huge flop! Terrorism and adoption were the issues du jour then in America. And we chose to showcase a mediocre display of grandeur instead of true Indian masterpiece. Sad. And makes us wonder if Murphy’s laws about committee’s are indeed true.
Links: The Hindu Friday Review, Wikipedia, IMDB, Madras Talkies
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One of the most beautifully made movies. Had the maniratnam touch in it, in every scene. Sad it didnt get its due credit. The list of movies chosen for Oscar Nominations is rather awful. As u mentioned Devdas was chosen that year, then Paheli was chosen ( i still wonder why), Autograph was ignored. It doesnt end as long as bias and politics play a part.
With all due respects to Hindi speaking people, their movie taste sucks. I have never heard of a good hindi movie for a long time, the last decent one was ‘black’. RDB was only slightly better than a run-of-the-mill tamil movie.
Selva, I didn’t intend it as a commentary on Hindi movies. I hardly watch any.
But the selections are definitely dubious. I know a lot of people (of whom, quite a few were Hindi-speakers) who flinched when Veer Zaraa was given the National Award for “Best Entertainer”.
I don’t know if you follow national awards correctly.Anyway your concept of good films are not entirely right.
Firstly Kannathil muthamittal has not got the national award for the best picture. In most of the time best film awards are given for deserving films. mani’s film is indeed a better film .It excells in technical aspects with excellent camera by Ravi.K.Chandran,music by Rehman which you already mentioned and good art directions.
Similarly Devdas too.It’s also an adaption of a classic .By agreeing Kannathil muthamittal is a better movie ,I Can’t agree that it’s one of the best movies made in India.
Infact santhosh sivan’s Terrorist deals with the issue more convincingly.Mani’s film also has it’s own commercial ingrediants like peppy songs and all.
That’s why mani is not considered in the top leauge of indian directors like Mrinal sen,Satyjit rai,Adoor gopalakrishnan,Girish kasaravalli,Rituparno ghosh,Budhadeb das gupta etc..
There are lot’s of good movies are coming in the languages of bengali,malayalam etc.In kannada also directors like girish kasaravalli,kavitha langesh,girish karnad are there.sadly there is none in tamil.Tamil film has always been market oriented.
and hindi is producing the best now.You have films like page3,Iqbal successing in the box office.More intellectuals are coming into direction(like Rajat Kapoor and amol palekar)
So don’t raise regionism in cinema.Oscar entry is not considered as a serious award for an Indian film (Ignore the hype made by lagan.Oscar is only an american national award).
There are better awards in other international festivals like cannes,venice etc. Let’s wait for a tamil film winning any of the se prestigious awards.
Autograph!!! how could you able to consider it.It’s a good film to watch with the family ,that’s all.Perhaps,it may be a better movie made in tamil.
But before following the commercial cinema please do watch some serious films made in tamil.I will mention a couple.I don’t know you ever heard about it.
Malli and Terrorist by Santhosh sivan.Navarasa by Santhosh sivan.
Oorukku nooruper by Lenin. Agraharathil kazhuthai by John abraham.
If you see bengali films there are 100s of beutiful films.
Knnathil muthamittal is a film which tells the multiple temes in a sweet wrapper with peppyy music,fast editing,exaggerated and unbelievable story sequences in order to tell the story.Mani has made a film which is infact truely commercial.
But a true good film will haunt you with the subject,the question which have been raised etc.As in Mani’s film they would not include unwanted people in the plot or they wouldn’t sugarcoat the whole issue inorder to cater their films to all kind of audience.
Do watch films of Akiro kurosova,Magic majidi,Kristof krislovski or atleast our satyajith rai,Adoor gopalakrishnan,Mrinal sen,Rituparno ghosh.
Son’t forget to watch Adum koothu by T.V chandra in which Cheran plays the lead role.He’s indeed a far better director than ManiRathnam
First of all let me tell you all that, being a kannadiga myself (and coming from a coastal city of Mangalore – where Tamil is not better known than a greek) I am a great fan of Tamil films. I love the film music and A M Rajah is one of my all time favourite singers.
Coming to movies, Tamil industry is always on the forefront of producing technically sound films compared to other regional (most of the time even better than bollywood) In recent times I liked films like Autograph, Pithamagan, Terrorist, Gajini and a technical masterpiece Anniyan.
Tamil industry has a very good band of film directors belonging to different generations from the veterans like Mani Ratnam to the new generation directors Bala, Selva ragan and Santosh Sivan.
But when it comes to realistic cinemas I dont see much contribution from the Tamil industry where as Bengali, Kannada, Malayalam and even Hindi directors are consistenty producing good cinema based on starc reality.
Coming to the controversy of Devdas. The question of sending it to Oscars is secondary. Let us see whether it was so pathetic film? I have watched this movie and I enjoyed it very much. To understand this movie we should know what a film adaptation is? Devdas is a novel and when you adapt it to the silver screen you should be faithful to the novel and that’s what the director did. Usually I dont like lip sync songs in movies. People percieve that these type of films dont get noticed in Oscars. But hollywood films like My fair lady, West side story, Fidler on the roof or Greese fetched oscar and also attracted western audience inspite of having songs in it.
Hindi audience and their film industry is growing commercially and intellectually as new generation of film makers like Nagesh Kuknoor, Vishal Bharadwaj, Sanjay leela Bhansali, Rakesh Om prakash Mehra are giving niche films.
Stupid films are there in all the languages (even in Tamil industry big time) Our duty is to encourage good cinema irrespective of its region or language.
astroshiva.. VEry sensible comment.and gud to know that we still have sensible audiences left..i wud like to recommend 2 of my favourites….1) Life is beautiful
2)shawshank redemption
Now…guys, I think Devdas deserved to go to Oscars and actually win it as well. The way it was directed, written and how the actors performed…just OUTSTANDING!
Paheli also deserved it.
On the other hand, Veer Zaara…it was a nice entertainer, but, not the best. I would’ve chosen one of the following:
Main Hoon Na
Dhoom
Khakee
Lakshya
Hum Tum
Hulchul
Those were the best entertainers of 2004. Still Veer Zaara was very nicely pulled off!!!
Hi,
Would you happen to know where I could get access to a high quality version of the movie with English subtitles? Is there any site where I can loan the movie online?
Thank you