A book and two movies – views

I picked up “All the Good Parts” by Loretta Nyhan because of its reviews and I wanted something for the journey and leisure read. Finally, after 3-4 days, finished it yesterday. It was surprisingly good. It was more realistic except for maybe the final chapters. It wasn’t the usual romance story that I get to read. The story line was different. I am not sure how people will like the religious parts of it. But I really enjoyed this good novel.

After a long time, I watched movies on the flight. One of them which I found so entertaining was ‘The Grand Budapest Hotel‘. It was on my list for a long time but never managed to pick it up. When I saw that on the list I decided to forgo my sleep and tick that off my list. What a lovely and very entertaining movie 🙂 I did not know that it had such an extensive list of known actors in it.

‘Me before You‘ – I almost didn’t watch it. When we saw the trailer earlier, it was too cheesy and my husband said that he wouldn’t watch it ever. So I decided to give it a try during my flight so as to not torture him. It was OK, not something I would enjoy much but realized that the trailer portrayed a totally different story line when compared to the actual one. And hey, there is Neville Longbottom in there. How grown up does he look in that 😯

Rajasthani Cowboys!

And here I thought that Cowboys didn’t belong in India! 😆

Pride – Colorful

I am in a writing mode today. Just completed cataloging down my recent travel. Since I am in the flow, let me finish off with the movie I watched today. Pride (2014), a movie I was supposed to watch with a couple of my friends, but then I was feeling too sick (flu and fever) and I needed some cheer me up. First and foremost, I just loved the movie. Just loved it. The Wikipedia doesn’t say much about the movie and its story line. So here it is for you. But before that Spoiler Alert 🙂

There is a group of Lesbian and Gay activists headed by Mark who collect money to support the Miners strike in Britain in 1984. Not many among the LGBT group wanted to support this cause of collecting money for Miners because they have enough problems to solve like fighting for their own rights. But then this small bunch go ahead and call themselves LGSM (Lesbian and Gay support the miners) group and collect enough and try to find someone to donate it to. No one wants to be associated with the LGBT group, except for one small town who thought that L stood for London 😉 When the committee member finally meets them, he is quite surprised but is also very accepting and thanks them for their efforts and invites them to the small town of Onllwyn. This town is surprised to see them as they are surprised by the welcome of some members of the town who are very supportive and appreciative of their efforts. They have difficulty in getting through some members who are totally against them. But then slowly they gain the confidence of the people and keep helping them even though each of them have their own set of problems to address (for e.g. one of them isn’t out to his parents and keeps his association with the LGBT community a secret). Even though they lost the miners fight , they realize that their coming together as a union is the biggest achievement of all. And the miners union comes to their help when this group needs their support.

It is a very heart warming story which finally made me shed some tears. The concept of shaking hands symbol which is used by the Union is strongly emphasized in this movie at all places. You help me ; I help you, no matter who you are. That message is conveyed throughout and done very well too. There is a line which Dai says when he talks in the Gay bar ‘When you’re in a battle against an enemy so much bigger, so much stronger than you, well, to find out you had a friend you never knew existed, well, that’s the best feeling in the world.’ I liked that. It is not just about Lesbians or Gay’s. It is about being who you are and owning it up and living it. Mark says in a scene to Jonathan that instead of running away from himself and his parents, he should face them because life is too short. The old people of Onllwyn are so cute 🙂 especially Dolores Umbridge, oops sorry, Imelda Staunton. They have some of the funniest moments in this movie. She reminded me of Lady D in the Julia Quinn’s book series ‘The Bridgertons’. The messages that they convey through some brilliant lines are very subtle interlaced with humor. There is a political agenda mixed too but I am not that interested in that angle anyways.

All in all, it made me laugh, it made me cry, it made me feel good and it made me feel positive. A definite must watch.

Big Hero 6 – Cute

Big Hero 6 – This week’s Saturday movie combined with our customary brunch. The only pain point for me was that it was a 3D movie. I hate 3D’s especially when I was having constant headache due to the sinus and all. But then the movie made up for it, so I can’t complain much. As soon as we entered the theater we saw that it was almost filled with kids of all ages. From almost 3/4 to teen, fully equipped with balloon and talking constantly, arguing. It made the theater very lively. Even before the movie started, they showed another short animation called Feast, which confused us because we thought there was something wrong with the screening of the actual movie. But it was a very cute one.

Again, I am not going into the movie and the story behind it, but if you like animation movies and combine it with some super hero stuff and a big soft bear like robot called Baymax, you have got a winner in hand. All the kids behaved well in the theater and even though there were a few moments where the reaction of the kids made us chuckle and even laugh out loud, it was very cute. I loved the movie and the song Immortals by Fall Out Boy which is played in the movie. It has action, adventure, emotions, humor, comedy, villany everything. As soon as the microbots were introduced, there was a moment we remembered the Tamil movie Endhiran. The robot there too had a chip similar to the one in Baymax and there were scenes which resembled the microbot action sequences. I loved the Big guy Baymax. Wish I had one for myself 🙂 He is so cute and so endearing.

All in all a very enjoyable movie. Kids sure will love it more.

On Repeat

This video, forwarded by my friend, makes me laugh every single time. My dad used to tell me all about juke boxes in his time in Chennai where he would play old English classics with his friends.

It also reminds of a similar incident that happened in my office. I have a very close friend who has this habit of listening to a song, after it has become out of touch, i.e. to say that she would like it almost after 5 years since that movie / song was released. And she maintains that habit till now. This incident happened almost 5 years ago, if I am not wrong. There was this Tamil movie ‘Pithamagan’ and it has a very beautiful melody in that ‘Illangaathu‘. That was a hit at that time. But almost 3-4 years after the song had come and gone, she found out that this song was awesome and decided to play it without the headphones in office. I was sitting right opposite to her and two of our other friends on either side of the cubicle and since we all know each other for quite some time , even though the other two are not Tamilians, they are used to our quirks so they wouldn’t mind if she played it a little louder. But that day she decided that she just loved that song and she had it on repeat. And this started at around 10 am in the morning. And by afternoon, even though I know the song by heart, I was getting a little uncomfortable and thought that before we break for lunch she would give it up. But nope, it got played on and on. And after lunch, I thought that she would definitely switch to some other song at least now and as soon as she started playing the same song again, I just couldn’t resist. I got up  (there was a separator between us) and was about to beg her to change it but then saw that she had her eyes closed and she was enjoying that song with utmost sincerity that I have ever seen in her. I couldn’t help but laugh out loud. I didn’t know what to say. The guy next to her looked at me and was like ‘hey, at least you know what the song is all about, I don’t even know the language and I am listening to it for the whole day now’. Poor guy. We couldn’t hold it in after that. We almost woke her up and laughed for quite some time and begged her to please please consider the poor souls next to her. Even now, if she asks me for a particular song in a movie and as soon as she says that she loved it, I know, just know that it will be played non-stop in her playlist. Thank God she is in a different floor now.