Apocryphal Stories !!!

It was just in the last year that we were witness to a T20 World Cup in England. That another world cup is being held approximately nine months later can be put down to greed of ICC to encash on the T20 phenomena or as many say, just poor scheduling. Whatever be the case, it will be the players that will suffer in the long run Its an opportunity for the ICC to remove the demons from the poorly conducted 2007 World Cup. Last heard, they gave their nod to musical instruments to be bought into the stadium and also the ticket prices are not as steep as they were back in 2007 With the groupings also being a little tougher this time, its expected that T20 World Cup will be a better experience this time GROUP-A : Pakistan, Bangladesh, Australia Who would have imagined that Australis would be seeded not to go to the next round in a multi team tournament. With due respect to their record in World Cups and Champions Trophy, they are yet to solve the riddle called as Twenty20 Pakistan on the othe...

Well as with any celebrity we are very intent on knowing what they undergo, how they have to come to be the Superstars that they are. Perhaps the stars also know it, as the narrative never drifts to describing in entirety any given situation. The same is the case with Serena Williams: My Life Queen of the court co-authored/authored by Daniel Paisner. What strikes you from the chapters about her childhood is the fact that, she will certainly come out with another book after her career ends Well coming to the book itself, Serena has a habit of maintaining a match/tournament journal. She starts every chapter with one of the match entries and the common thread through all of it is the SMS language. There are a lot of things that go against the prototype we have of her. The way she describes the struggles is almost pleasure-like and it certainly would have been tougher than that (maybe as said earlier, she has stored that away for another book). The chapters are almost arranged chronologic...

hype1 colloq, noun 1 intensive, exaggerated or artificially induced excitement about, or enthusiasm for, something or someone. 2 exaggerated and usually misleading publicity or advertising; a sales gimmick. 3 a publicity stunt, or the person or thing promoted by such a stunt. 4 a deception. verb (hyped, hyping) to promote or advertise something intensively The fourth definiton seems to work for this movie, where nothing despite the presence of the actors of the calibre of Suhasini and Ashish Vidhyarthi . This is the second film in the recent past where the antagonist walks away with the piece of cake( the other one being Ek Niranjan There are two kinds of good directors. One which make the actors suit the part. Mani Rathnam , Gautam Menon , K.Viswanath to put in a few belong to that part and the other being those who select apt actors for the part. The examples of this kind being Bharatiraja , Balachander . I once remember R.Madhavan saying this about Mr.Manirathnam "Mani sir ...

Coming from a director, who has basically had only one huge hit in the last 12 years, it being Tholi Prema, the expectations on the movie- which was really huge- is surprising Darling, one of the big ticket releases this years falls flat on its face because of the lack of a convincing script and a non-moving screenplay. In fact, the first refuses to come to an end. In the past films like Vamsi, Tulasi were rejected at the turnstiles because of the exact reason of them being predictable and had a feeling of deja vu attached to it. Like Gunasekhar, who has made it a specialised craft of inserting a kidnapping sequence, Karunakaran, has made it a speciality to weave the story line around a lie by one of the protagonists Coming to the actors, Prabhas looks jaded and disinterested. Kajal reminds one of bollywood themes, where she is constantly running. The elder tribe of the actors acquitted themselves well Scenes to lookout for The thread between the hero and the heroine's brother wo...

Every player who hits a six and a four is said to be the new superstar. Ian Bishop the other day committed the biggest blunder when he said that the fielding standards have dropped! Come on Ravi Shastri and Sunil Gavaskar, please carry your weight around!

Back in January, in the third Test of Basil D'Oliveira trophy after Collingwood had completed another rescue act, the joke going around was that the next act would be repeated in Chittagong against Bangladesh. There was a logic to it and it precisely was this- Collingwood was a major factor in pulling off draws at Cardiff , Centurion , and Cape Town . Few cynics also suggested that Collingwood be the first choice for games played at these venues and they suggested that Calcutta and Colombo retain their old names! Well coming back to this series, it got off to an inauspicious start in the media with the withdrawal of Andrew Strauss and Cook was drafted in as the skipper. Adding to Cook's woes was the poor form of Pietersen. Coming back in the series against South Africa, he continued his poor run into the series against Bangladesh. His form was so poor getting into the first Test that he scored 69 runs off 111 balls in 7 innings. It was so poor that a bowler called Allaudin Ba...

Looking at Yousuf's ton yesterday, this question does spring up in the mind. Well for a batsman not crossing 59 in 32(international) strikes at crease, he saunters to the crease and unleashes the second fastest T20 ton. One resemblance from his Deodhar trophy heroics - both ended up in losing causes. Rayudu plays a bold hand in raising Mumbai Indians total in the innings but does not seem to posses the same resolve, when it comes to playing for Hyderabad in the Ranji Trophy! Maybe we can attribute it (comfortably indeed and thereby increasing the legend) to being with Sachin Tendulkar in the same dug-out!!

What happens when you have given a hit like "Happy days" in your last outing? What happens when as a production house, you are making huge revenues by making movies like "Sivaji", "Ayan" ? What happens when you are the flag-bearer of the third generation of the biggest production houses in the state? - Expectations build up and with those expectations came AVM's "Leader". Leader was supposed to be Diwali but various non-filmy reasons led to its postponement What added weight to the movie was its positive title and it releasing in the time of a political maelstorm adds to the gloss of the movie. A movie can sustain itself only when it has some story happening on a nice thread. Leader does that - atleast for me! With the insurgent demand for a separate state, it was hoped that "Leader" would have a few words on the issue. It veered clear of this issue and came out with a protagonist, who looked the perfect fit for the role ****** It d...

Definition of greatness is 'Very large in size' or ' Remarkable or outstanding in magnitude, degree, or extent'. Now can we with conviction name a player, who qualifies to the definition above? The only two people who come closest to the above definition in ODI terms are IVA Richards and SR Tendulkar. I would put Viv Richards on a higher perch (yeah! even after yesterdays 200) because of the fact that he has won a WC final, with a century coming from his bat. If mere numbers indicate the greatness of a player, then Desmond Haynes has to be the greatest ODI player before Sachin Tendulkar took over the mantle of highest century scorer from him. A player's value in a team cause goes beyond mere numbers, which is the reason we don't tend to remember players like AB Agarkar. Coming back to Tendulkar, he would certainly sit on top of the pile if he wins the WORLD CUP for India in 2011, which, presumably is his last chance to do so Now 17,598 runs at an average of 4...

Now I would certainly start talking about movies and cricket ....

After all those talks of gaining psychological advantage and moral ground and etc, we got down to real action on the Boxing day Test at Kingsmead, Durban. Having rained in the last few days, the air was heavy and it looked certain that the team winning the toss would certainly choose to field but flowing away from the stream Smith won the toss and elected to bat on what looked a clear day Anderson, England's best bowler in conditions prevailing started off in a positive manner by getting Smith to edge one to fine-leg and beating Prince all ends up off two consecutive deliveries. The way he beat Prince was an education to every budding bowler as he got it to pitch on the middle and made the ball to swerve away across him. Onions who shared the new-ball with Anderson showed the way to bowl to Smith as he pitched it on the good length and got the ball to move away and by the end of two overs South Africa looked like they had a task on hand. Anderson having softened Prince in the firs...

Release date : Jan 1st 1983 Star Cast : Kamal Hassan, Jayaprada, Sharath Babu, SP Sailaja Director : K Viswanath There are some movies that tend to leave a permanent mark on us. As in other fields, greatness is a virtue gifted easily to people these days. Back in those days one man whom we consider a legendary actor now and a director, who already carved a niche for himself collaborated on a movie called "Sagara Sangamam". Any movie-buff would answer in affirmative if asked about this movie. The viewing experience is such that we would grudge Kamal for being such a genius and feel relieved that we are not him because of the way nature cruelly plays it's part on him Well even though my taste lies in the jhatka and matka songs which have come to define this decade, the songs of this specific movie never fail to enthrall me. It would be almost sick of me to get into the story details and analysing the acting of the protagonists. Simply said a Telugu speaking pers...

I would be putting up my choice of movies and cricket matches, complete with the best ODI and Test knocks, best spells in ODI's and Tests too. In the new year also I will try for something that I have not before- analysing the entire decade !

Haven't England perfected the art of perfect escape in Test matches? Hope this series does not follow Ashes to the 'T' !!!

This year we have been witness to some superb knocks. I remember reading a piece on Cricinfo with the same title somewhere before the 2003 WC. With 2011 WC coming up, we will have a pleothera of such characters. We have been witness to a good number of knocks this year where the strike-rate of the batsmen was above 100 and that too in Test cricket ............ cont'd

Right this has been a movie in waiting for quite some time now. Speculations were that the director and the producer were at loggerheads and producer was looking to stall the movie were unfounded. One thing that was pretty certain was that the movie would not release in the vicinity of Magadheera Arya was released in the year 2004 and was a run-away hit. People associated with the movie are not calling it a sequel. Even I buy the argument that it is not a sequel. Director has intelligently woven same kind of a script as Arya but in a different milieu. This movie has a corporate background compared to college background from it's predecessor Sukumar is like a blessing in disguise for Telugu film industry. Not only was his first movie a cult hit but the second movie, where the directors skills are put to test. Sukumar passed that test with Jagadam. He brings some techinical finesse for sure into this movie Allu Arjun's performance is worthy and adds to his growing stature and ...

Can India win ?

Maradona: "It was the hand of the god " Pele: "For 20 years they have been asking me the same question, who is the greatest? Maradona or Pele? I reply that all you have to do is look at the facts - how many goals did he score with his right foot or with his head?” Roger Federer: "I've created the monster" Muhammad Ali: “I am the greatest, I said that even before I knew I was.” Sachin Tendulkar: "???" All the above-mentioned legends have at some point of the time or the other have mentioned themselves in the third person. Not for Tendulkar is frequent referrals to himself in the third person. India, a developing nation by large has had a shortage of genuine heroes from the days of Gandhi. Tendulkar filled that void for people born in the post-independence era. November 15th, 1989 was the day prodigy set foot on the international cricket. He was popular by the time he came to international cricket courtesy his debut centuries in Ranji Trophy agains...

Swarnakamalam literally means "Golden Lotus". This was a movie directed by K.Viswanath which released on 15th July 1988. It had Venkatesh and Bhanupriya in the major roles. Savitri, Sakshi Rangarao, Sri Lakshmi were in the supporting roles. Story and it's narration were simple and mellifluous Story as was the wont in Viswanath's movies revolved around art form i.e dancing. Bhanupriya is the daughter of a famous Kuchipudi exponent, who despite being well-known is not blessed with money. So she detests the art form and grows up admiring the good life. Her sister is an exponent in singing and is in love with the son of the house-owner, who happens to be a station-master. Venkatesh who is a painter comes as a tenant in the house adjacent to Bhanupriya's and immediately falls for her. Although he loves her, he is not too impressed with her conniving ways. One day Bhanupriya to sustain her family and in her quest for good life joins a five-star hotel. As her luck wi...

One of the most awaited movies this year has to be "Leader" and the publicity is all over us now. Perhaps this is the most marketed movie of Sekhar Kammula and it carries huge expectations. Bucking the trend has been Kammula's trend till date as his previous movies clashed with the release date of a major starter always. Anand clashed with Shankardada MBBS and Happy Days clashed with Chirutha . Anand was released with a few number of prints and went on to become a sleeper hit. Godavari got a good name for Sumanth and Neetu Chandra was good in the movie. Happy Days as we all know went to achieve a cult status amongst the youth. People are awaiting bated breath for his next movie Leader as three powerhouses come together for the movie. Even though it is a debut movie for Daggubati Rana , he has a lot of expectations to live up to only because of his pedigree. AVM productions is coming of some blockbusters in Tamil, namely, Sivaji and Ayan. Finally Sekhar Kammula can no lo...