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Showing posts from 2011

The Australia I love

On a fateful day in March 1992, few hearts were broken and a lifelong relationship for a young kid started, with a team that scraped through with the skin of their teeth. It was the second one-run win for the team against their opponents in a World Cup setting I was too young to realise the vagaries of the rules in the rain-hit matches. They favoured Australia more than India in that game. What I realised, though, was the importance of the game. It was one of those days where my father put a stop to the ad-guess game, as we called it. As my father sunk into despair after the match, I found a new hope- Australian cricket team. It didn’t matter to me that they were out of the tournament before the semi-finals Cricket is a team game but there are individuals whom you find yourself drawn to, more than the others. From that day on, I had at least one person in the team that I looked up to. Mark Waugh, Steve Waugh, Shane Warne, Ricky Ponting, Damien Martyn, Adam Gilchrist, Michael Clarke,

Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol

BREAKING NEWS: Allu Arjun and Ravi Teja from Telugu movies make a fleeting appearance in Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. Doesn't matter that they appear in a TV footage in the movie From the time it was announced that Anil Kapoor would be a part of the Mission Impossible franchise, it was marked as an awaited movie in India. It was widely anticipated that he would play a major role in the movie. Though he serves as a major connecting link in the movie or rather the main reason, why the movie moves to India, he is projected as a lusting billionaire One of the very good things about the movie is its humour content. There are a lot of subtle one-liners by the guy who operates the computer and is the technical guru in the movie. The movie is about an evil mind getting his hand on nuclear warhead and the mission is to stop a full blown war between USA and Russia There are a lot of things that are interlinked in the movie. For example, at the beginning of the mission when it’s sa

Panjaa

What does a person do when he/she has tasted success in life? Look to better it obviously. What if the success has resonated for a period of time? That’s when the person grapples with questions in the mind. Whether to succumb to the need of people who have gifted the success or to satiate the urge within Ten years ago, after his biggest hit, Pawan Kalyan, was compared to Rajnikanth by AM Ratnam (the producer of the movie). He said that these were the two actors that knew the public pulse very well. Ironically, after Khushi there is not one movie that Pawan Kalyan can remember with fondness When confronted by similar questions, Mahesh Babu, went for an overhaul in his image and came out successful with Dookudu. One can’t expect Pawan Kalyan doing a similar thing because the carefully cultivated image might go for a toss In his initial movies, he tasted success through remakes and there is no harm in actually doing the same now. That his next movie is a remake might provide the emotio

Australia V New Zealand- 2nd Test, Day 1

A rain truncated day will be remembered for three reasons- uncertainty about DRS, Pattinson’s second five wicket haul in his second test and the mental disintegration of Phil Hughes A few days ago Dhoni said that he would want the pitches in India to turn from first day. Players and critics were quick to pounce him and speak for the so-called betterment of the game. If seen in the same light, the pitch and it’s maker will be under censure in the coming days. He prepared a green top, which made the decision for the captain winning the toss, easy Taylor couldn’t call correctly and Clarke had no second thoughts about inserting the opposition in. His move paid off 2 overs into the day as Siddle induced a drive from Guptill. The ball straightened after pitching and found the outside edge. The next two dismissals shifted the focus onto the new baby of cricket- DRS. In case of Ryder, it wasn’t clear if the ball thudded onto the pads after an inside edge. Hot Spot which facilitates these de

Mayakkam Enna review

The two movies of Selvaraghavan that I have seen turn after a death scene. Mayakkam Enna is no different. It turns after Richa suffers a miscarriage. Credit to the director that he dared to delve into a lot of emotions in the movie and put a full stop to each one of them Selvaraghavan always has the protagonist as an errant individual. In this movie, there is a slight deviation. The protagonist has creativity and is mightily confident about it till a certain point in the movie. What lights up the movie is the individual sequences in the movie. I don’t recall carrying back so many sequences in my head from a movie There are so many good scenes in the movie. If forced to pick two or three of them, my choice would be as follows 1)     The scene where Richa questions Dhanush’s profession and advices him to look for something more viable. Dhanush on the way back gets an old lady to pose for him and surprises her and her husband with the inherent beauty of the lady. The phone conversati

Clarke's graduation to a big dog

Imran Khan once said that if cricketers were to base their self-esteem on the comments made by public, it would be stupidity. He said that people tended to lift you, when you performed well and hurl abuses when you failed Michael Clarke has just gotten himself into that place where he can say that he has seen both the sides of the coin. He was one of the failures in the Ashes and was rightly castigated. His place in the team was under scrutiny, both from the public and selectors alike After the 168 that he scored in New Zealand, he endured a rough patch till the second innings century in the final Test of the Sri Lanka series. It was in Sri Lanka that a lot about Michael Clarke was unravelled. For starters he was the Man of the Series in the ODI series and found that responsibility bought to surface the bubbliness that made him an exciting player to watch before Ashes 2005 The sixty runs that he scored at Galle in the second innings were crucial to the team’s cause as he stood stro

Stadiums- Concrete Structures or failed by authorities

My favourite cricketing moment involving myself came when I was in the eleventh standard. It had nothing to do with batting or bowling. It happened at the District Stadium in Bellary The opposition’s best batsman, a south paw, was tearing our moderate bowling attack to shreds. Captain of our team thought that it would be better to get an off spinner into the attack and restrict him. Bad idea, as the bowler bowled a line that he would have done to a right hander. Easy pickings for the south paw then as he picked three boundaries, all of which sailed over my head at square leg. There was some tension attached to the final delivery as the captain had a prolonged discussion with the bowler. None of it seemed to work as the bowler bowled the same line. The batsman though erred in making room for himself and trying to slog it. He seemingly adjusted at the last moment and proceeded to force what seemed a fourth boundary of the over There were two differences though, in the way it actually

Rockstar

No I don’t know Jim Morrison No I din’t know that Ranbir Kapoor went through a lot of preparations for the movie No I don’t like intelligent cinema When is it that you can say that an ‘actor’ has really arrived? For me, it is, when the camera is fixed on him/her and the actor takes the viewer through the gamut of emotions, that his character faces. Based on that criteria alone, Ranbir Kapoor has arrived When I saw ‘Wake Up Sid’, I was shocked by the reaction of people who said Ranbir was fabulous in the movie. I felt that the director passed the mantle of handling the tough scenes to Konkona in the movie. The camera, in that movie tended to focus on Konkona even when it was Ranbir who was to express the emotions I din’t see any movie of his after that but with Rockstar, it is for the world to judge his capabilities. It might not gather earth shattering collections nor would it break even. What it does,is that, it introduces us to lot of talents. Cinematographer Anil Mehta deserve

7am Arivu

Expectations: A lot many successful combinations in the past found this barrier too tough to cross. No expectations on a movie can take the movie to the next level. Since the expectations are low, bad becomes passable, passable becomes good, good becomes brilliant and brilliant becomes genius. This is the reason for a lot of movies garnering good reviews When the same combination, comes together to have another tilt at the box office, expectations rise. These expectations arise in different hues. It gains momentum if the people concerned with the movie have grown after the initial success. Now if the people involved with the movie go on a publicity over kill, it is but natural that people’s expectations and imagination, both reach a crescendo It is natural that if the movie fails in rising up to their expected levels, it is going to crash. Muragadas and Suriya have had to swallow the bitter pill given to them by people’s expectations. 7am Arivu is a curious case as the content in t

Rafa: My Story

In the open era(till 2004) 5 Spaniards have won the French Open 6 times. Sergei Bruguera was the only man  who repeated the feat twice. From 2004 on, Rafael Nadal won the French Open 6 times in  7 attempts. No wonder he considers his game to be tailor made for the clay courts. Though he loved clay- which also explains his love for Monte Carlo- it was his dream to win Wimbledon For a person whose game is entirely based on the power that he generates from his strokes, it is natural to go for every match as though it’s his last. When he lost the 2007 Wimbledon final to Federer, he wept under the shower for close to half an hour. What does the man do? He goes back and trains even harder. His belief in training has been steadfast from childhood It was Toni Nadal, who made him revere him training with unconventional motivation. That Nadal had a no-nonsense approach towards winning helped Toni. When he saw the effort dipping, he would fire him up with more practice. Nadal remembers clearly

Australia V South Africa: 2nd T20 International

Once the think tank of Australia sits down on the table after this match, there are three points that would stand out 1) After winning the first T20 International game ever and then proceeding to lose the very next game, comprehensively. From that day on till today, Australia has neither got a stable game plan nor have they got the winning culture that they have in the other two formats 2) As much as they would deny it, the ghosts of that game in Johannesburg still remain and comes back to haunt them from time to time, when they play South Africa. Notably, in throwing away winning causes 3) Shane Watson is central to their fortunes in all the formats of the game. When it comes to Limited overs it is his bowling that stands as a differentiator between the teams At the toss, White was asked if it was individual efforts that counted in the T20 games or the team effort. His answer was “In this format, individuals can win you the match in a ball or two. When it boils down to ti

Uthappa- Forgotten Hero or Rising Star?

Do you have any memories of the man who scored 86 in his debut game against England and also had his biggest moment to savour against them? To drop further clues would mean to reveal the identity of the man In his most popular ODI innings, he bought India back from the dead to actually level the series. It was a game in which Sachin Tendulkar was awarded the Man of the match. He hasn’t played an ODI for more than three years now Now to make the identity of the player a giveaway, he bowed down in front of a packed stadium after leading India to a win over arch rivals Pakistan, in a bowl out. Yes it is Robin Venu Uthappa. After exploding into India’s collective senses in that match at Oval, he quickly slipped down the favourite charts Yet people believe that he has it in him to knock a few bowling attacks over. It must be him and Irfan Pathan, whose non-selection remains a mystery to their followers. While Irfan’s slide is mysterious, Uthappa’s is crystal clear The s