Entertainments galore

We are nearing the end of Inspector Lewis. Already on to our 9th season. Wonder what we will do after it is over. Mr. M is already having some withdrawal symptoms 😉 And surprises in Death in Paradise. Out goes Humphrey and in comes, Jack Mooney, played by the Irish actor Ardal O’Hanlon (Mr. M tells me he is from Father Ted…I have seen only two episodes of it so far…so couldn’t really place him). I am sure lot of us would be feeling a bit weird about it, but the transition was smooth, unlike the last time when Humphrey was pulled in because Poole (played by Ben Miller) died. That was a huge change. But I am enjoying Mr. Mooney as I did the other two. Common Sense, a BBC series where a select people from the public all over the UK discuss the weekly happenings, is another series that we are watching regularly. This is very different from the others as this involves real people and how they feel about important issues that were in the news every week. They are really very funny and honest. I like the butcher couple a lot. I am still keeping a tab on Taboo, with all its gory and blood and grime.

Watched a couple of very good movies. Old ones but golden ones, I should say. The first one was 12 Angry Men. If you haven’t watched it, and if you like crime drama, you should try it. 12 jury members of a murder trial are the main characters in this movie. They are sent to discuss the fate of a young boy who was accused of killing his father. They reconstruct the whole story piece by piece. It is a very interesting screenplay. You start with a mindset and slowly and steadily each one’s motives for their decision is questioned. I really enjoyed the movie.

And yesterday we managed to catch up on To Kill a Mockingbird. I haven’t read the book, wasn’t really sure if I would like it. But I enjoyed the movie. I don’t have to tell you much about it because I am sure it is one of the must-see movies of all times. And I am sure it makes sense even in this day and age. Gregory Peck is amazing. If you haven’t watched it either, give it a try.

Another 3-hour long movie we watched a while ago was A Passage to India. Again, I haven’t read the book, but the movie was nonetheless different and managed to hold my attention for all of those three hours. I am not sure I would have had the patience to read the book. But the dynamics of the varied characters are quite intriguing in this one. It could have had some editing done to it, but then the character’s depth would have taken a beating.

We also had been to a couple of museums. Will get around to copying those photographs sometime next week. I am being lazy over the weekend and not participating in the weekend prompts as of now. I hope to get back to it soon. Until then, I do hope you enjoy my photographs and random TV and Movie updates. And I could definitely use another extra day for the weekend. Don’t you? 😉

 

Updates on TV Shows

(Inspector)Lewis: Completed 4 seasons or so. Was surprised to see Hathaway a bit grown up with a funky style to him. (I am a fan of Hathaway actually!) I can’t imagine Lewis without him, just like Sherlock and Watson.

The Wrong Mans: We just finished the first season of this. It is hilarious. I didn’t know James Corden produced and acted in this. Those two protagonists are very good.

Taboo: I have started to watch this on BBC Weekly now only because of Tom Hardy. It is going OK so far. Let’s see if it manages to hold my attention for the whole season. Mr. High Sparrow from Game Of Thrones is up to no good in this one heh! He usually isn’t in any series/movie.

Shooter: I loved the Mark Wahlberg movie and I really like Ryan Phillipe. Those two reasons are enough to make me watch this series weekly on NetFlix, even though I still think it should have been just left with a movie version.

Sherlock: Of course I have started watching them. But only two episodes completed. We wanted it to be our Weekend Watch program instead of spending an hour and a half during the weekday evenings. Mr. M’s first foray into modern Sherlock wasn’t up to a good start. Thankfully the second episode made up for a tepid first one.

Death in Paradise:  Another one of our Weekend Watch program. I have absolutely loved all the previous seasons and was so glad when they came up with the new season. Again, the first episode wasn’t too captivating with its story, but the second one was good. Welcome back Dwayne 😉

Selfridge:  Just as a break from Lewis we started on this one. We are only one episode old, but it looks very grand doesn’t? The jury is out on this one. Too early to judge.

 

 

 

Magizhchi!

I did mention on my SoCS post that I will be watching ‘Kabaali‘ movie with my friend. We did. Even though I was shocked to see only 5 of us in the theater in Boleyn Cinemas I am not sure if it should be attributed to the success or failure of the movie. There was a news that the movie was leaked online a day prior to its release. And Boleyn Cinemas was not a well maintained movie theater, sadly. The only saving grace was they had the subtitles for my friend, who otherwise would have had a very bad time trying to understand. Heck, I needed those subtitles for some parts of it because the slang was very Malaysian Tamil and I didn’t understand most of those words. And according to my friend, the subtitles were very well done (as opposed to some of the ones he had the pleasure of seeing in Bollywood movies where he had to focus hard to ignore the grammatical errors 😛 )

So what did we think of the movie? I am a Rajni fan, but not to the extent that I have watched all of his movies. I haven’t watched his last two movies because I knew, even from the trailer that they would turn out very bad and it did not give me the ‘you gotta see this’ vibe. But ever since I watched Kabaali’s trailer I wanted to see it. And there are a lot of good points that I really really appreciated. He isn’t romancing the heroine who is almost half his age. The romance angle was very subtle and also it shows more of when he is old and still in love with his wife and is searching for her. He plays his age. He has some scope to act when compared to his last 5 movies. It was a gangster movie. When I heard the songs separately, I didn’t quite like them, but in the movie most of them were in the background, so they went well with the story line. This was a big deal for me. I wanted a commercial entertainment movie and that is what I got. And interestingly my friend also liked it for its commercial value.

We both were a little confused with the Malaysian politics and how people kept backstabbing each other. But after some time I got the hang of it. My friend struggled to get that part especially in the first half. It is based in Kuala Lumpur and about two gangs there. Unless we are aware of what had happened with Malaysian Tamils over there, I don’t think we can appreciate it. But I am glad that someone made an effort to shot an entire movie (except for a small part in Tamil Nadu) in KL based on the life there. I have no clue why there were so many bad reviews for the movie or why Rajini was criticized so much. He is criticized not matter what he does, so I shouldn’t be bothered. I don’t really care for his or any of the movie star’s personal life. That is their own. As a profession, he, the director promised me a good time in the movies. And they kept their promise. That is all that matters to me. Magizhchi! (Cheers!)

As long as they enjoy it

I am in for a surprise every time I visit my brother. My first niece always has some or the other movie that she wants to see and if she knows that I am visiting, she would wait for me to take her to that movie. Last time it was a stupid Tamil horror movie (the one genre I usually avoid watching) which I avoided, thanks to my brother who watched with her. But this time, it is ‘The Jungle Book‘. I remember watching that series when I was a kid. Especially the song ‘jungle jungle baat chali hai‘ (in Hindi) which was a huge hit. Now the same song is used in the recent movie too, which is good. But I am going to be watching the Tamil dubbed version of the movie and I am not a big fan of dubbed movies. I always get a little unsettled with the lip un-sync (is that even a word?). But they (nieces and nephew) wouldn’t understand it in any other language other than in their mother tongue. So Tamil dubbed version it is, as long as they enjoy the movie and are happy watching it. I might update the post later after watching the Matinee show with them 🙂

Update after the movie :
I enjoyed it, in spite of it being in Tamil. Nieces were scared because of it being 3D. Nephew enjoyed it. Overall it is a very good movie. Worth watching it for the pleasure of watching a very good animation.

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Post for this week’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt.

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “ha.” Use it as a word, or find a word that starts with those two letters. Enjoy!

 

SoCS Badge by HopeFloats@ My Leaky Boat

The Wire

I know I wrote all about the adventure and all just recently when I watched the movie ‘The Everest’, so I ain’t going to be writing more about it. But today, since I was feeling like it, I decide to masturdate (wait…..read that word slowly and carefully…don’t jump to conclusions…this word is different , yeah! ? OK, now let’s go ahead)

The one movie which I wanted to see but haven’t yet was ‘The Walk‘. You all know my fear of heights right. So obviously I wanted to watch this in IMAX 3D. And do it on my own 🙂 Booked the ticket an hour and a half before the movie and just went before I could change my mind and take complete advantage of Sunday Funday. I should say that I enjoyed it very much, even though I did sweat a lot even in that air conditioned theater. Some scenes where they show the heights and the depth, I felt a pain in my legs as if I was the one standing on that edge. The guy Jeff, who has the fear of heights, whenever he is shaking with fear, I can feel myself shaking too. Jeez. Since you can read all about it in Wikipedia (even though I would suggest to watch the movie just for the fun of it) I ain’t going to the story. But technically it was very well done. I don’t appreciate watching movies in 3D because I get headaches mostly after using those glasses and most of the movies don’t usually need a 3D and they do it just for the heck of it. But this one definitely needed to be in IMAX and 3D. It was truly amazing. The visuals were so amazing and stunning. I especially loved the sunrise (duh!)  It might bring back memories for people who have seen the Twin Towers during those times. The art direction was also good. I wonder how much of the jugglery that Joseph Gordon does were graphics. I loved those earlier scenes where the scene is in B & W but one part of it (like the apple or a fruit) is in color. Ben Kingsley! Yay!!! Been a while since I saw him 🙂 Charlotte is as cute as ever. Acting wise, everyone has done their part. I am not good with the physics of how this was done and whether it was possible or anything. But if that was a true story then it is freaking amazing. I bow for Mr Petit’s bravery. The scene where the wire is shown as if it is going into oblivion was so AMAZING. I was so mesmerized.

Glad that I watched it before it was taken off from IMAX. Truly enjoyed it, even though I had to close my eyes and peek through my fingers in some scenes (shhhhh….don’t tell anyone yeah!?)