Musings From New York

I had quite a few discussions about the color code in Hero. According to IMDb the explanation is:

"In the flashbacks, the characters' costumes go from red (imagination) to blue (perceived reality) to white (truth). In the final flashback, the costumes are green (enlightenment/peace)."

The police are out in force today. But why are they guarding the hotels around the Chrysler? It's going to be a royal pain to get around over the next 5 days. I guess that'd be compensated by seeing Jon Stewart & company tear into the RNC.

I spoke to my father this morning. For some reason he's gotten the impression from news reports in Bangalore that Republic protestors are getting violent, and ... get this: spreading AIDS as a protest against Bush's policies.

Now I know the Republicans are a bit nuts. But so are the Democrats. But I don't think either party is this militant ... yet.

I saw a perfect movie on Saturday. Not many of them around, I can tell you. The movie was Ying Xiong, a.k.a. Hero. The movie was visual poetry, combined with a stunning score. It's the sort of movie where you'd find your jaw dropping every few minutes as you drink in the beauty of the shots. I'm afraid I just can't find words to do it justice, nor can I point to a "favorite" scene, as they're all amazing.

I went in expecting to find a martial arts movie. One of those "You killed my master. I shall train in anonimity until I challenge you 10 years from now" Shaw Brothers type of movie. But it was more of a drama ... like Crouching Tiger. For some reason I didn't like that movie - I think I shall have to revisit it now.

You know, everyone touts the movie as a Jet Li movie. I wonder if that's cos he's the most recognizable Chinese star in America. I didn't think the movie was so much about Nameless (Jet Li's character) as it was about Falling Snow and Broken Sword. The bulk of the movie is after all the retelling of Nameless' encounters with them, and of their love/hate relationship.

Nonetheless ... the movie's a perfect 10. And that's saying something - the last movie to get the perfect score was LoTR: Fellowship of the Rings back in 2000.

(Spoiler!) I also think the movie's trailer was pretty cleverly spliced together. The bit of the trailer which shows Jet Li facing a cloud of arrows was pulled together from different parts of the movie.

There's this movie called "Hero", which was China's entry to the Oscar's last year. The movie is 2 years old and only just made it over to the US. And the only way for it to remain intact was for Tarantino to put his name on it, like some bloody seal of approval. USDA Prime Approved 100% Blockbsuter.

So is it available for general viewing? Noooooooooooooo! There's only 1 place showing it this weekend, the American Museum of the Moving Image all the way over in Astoria!

And, not only is it playing in 1 museum theater 30 minutes away ... there's only 1 show! Tonight at 7:30. This weekend is a desi party with Mira Nair fest.

Agony!!

Agony!!

While I'm waiting for my brother to get off his butt and go down to the local comic book store in Bangalore for the desi Spidey comics, I came across this story on the BBC that Sesame Street might be the next Indian-ized American product.

Something that did strike me: there's no mention of what language the show's going to be in. And given that India has dozens of major languages, it'd be interesting to see what puppets they come up with. Or would there be different versions - one English, one Hindi, one Bengali, one Gujju & one Tam? What alphabet would they teach?

India Day 2004: A R Rehman (center) was the Grand Marshall (sounds like some Army bloke with walrus mustaches, doesn't it?)

Who says the brain drain is leading talent out of India? This blog got a lot of attention when it was featured in the Times of India ... at least, the online edition.

She's even got a map of Bangalore! I don't think I even knew of a map of Bangalore!

Anand & I went over to the India Day (ID15) parade and mela. There was a good turnout to both. And the food from Dimple was awesome!

Suprisingly, the weather held out too. After all those dire warnings of flash floods, torrential rains, and fringe effects of the two hurricanes, one would have thought that New York would be living out "The Day After Tomorrow". It was cloudy and dreary for sure, but it stayed mostly dry. I think there were some light drizzles for a couple of minutes now and again.

I was kind of disappointed by A R Rehman's appearance. I thought he'd have given the fans something to enjoy ... a mix of songs from "Vande Mataram" and some other Hindi film hits. But he sang for 5 minutes. 5 minutes! After we stood around waiting for 2+ hours. What a gip.

I didn't see a Karnataka float ... but I think it stands to reason that if Orissa gets a float, you can be sure Karnataka would. And since Bangalore is probably the single largest source of for-ex income, it's also safe to assume that Karnataka led the parade.

I'll post pictures soon.

Happy Independence Day! :)

If you've watched The Daily Show this week, you'll know that Bill Clinton & Tom Cruise were both guests (Monday & Wednesday, respectively). What struck me about their interviews was that they seemed tame!

It was almost as if they were afraid or unsure of what to say ... fear of being ridiculed later maybe? I don't know! Jon was very noticable in trying to urge them to say something, trying to keep the conversation going. It was an performance worthy of an Oscar-winning fell-good movie.

Clinton didn't know what to say. Seemed really subdued - what, was he on tranquilizers or something? Tom Cruise had trouble making eye contact ... answered almost monosylablically!

Wake up people! It's show-biz! And it's late night fringe TV!

I read a snippet about this band on the Dream Theater website. There's a link to the band's own website.

Beatallica perform hybrid Beatles/Metallica songs/parodies. Songs like "The Thing That Should Not Let It Be" and "Leper Madonna". Their albums can be downloaded via BitTorrent from their website.

The two songs mentioned above are absolutely hilarious. Check 'em out.

There's quite a funny article in today's WSJ about the 1904 Olympics (the "Deja Vu" column). It describes the farce that was the 1904 Olympics, at St. Louis. Highlights include:

- 12 countries participated (sea travel was long, and expensive)
- A marthon runner was chased off the track by two large dogs. Another marathon runner picked up a couple of apples off the orchard and was then held up by cramps! He eventually finished 4th, which goes to show you can't hold a good man (or his stomach contents) down.
- The 400m track had no lanes marked
- The Olympics also featured events for "uncivilized tribes" - pygmies, and the like. It was the one and only time such an even took place.

Aah yes, that's the America we've come to know and love. Back then they didn't need the Simpsons as a mirror to their idiocies.

This show is probably as good as The Daily Show on Comedy Central. It's funny, it's very sharp, and it's biting political commentary.

Though it should be said that sometimes, the arguments put forward by Bill Maher can be slightly ridiculous. There was this one last week where he argued in defense of this running back who quit pro-football so that he could continue to smoke marijuana (apparently to cure a medical disorder). I thought Bill Maher's arguments against that were stretching it a bit. It wasn't convincing at all.

On the whole, the show seems to be very anti-Bush, and pro-Kerry. I think that's a weakness, and that's where I'd give The Daily Show its due - it's an equal opportunity criticizer. Nobody is exempt from hazing. :-)

HBO, 11:30 EST pm Friday night

HBO: Real Time with Bill Maher

Oh this is priceless! For those of you too lazy to follow the hyperlink:

"They (our enemies) never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people - and neither do we."

BBC NEWS | Americas | President gaffes in terror speech

Reality TV a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away!

Hilarious stuff!

TFN FanFilms | Short Films | Troops

Looks like people missed Will Ferrell's Dubya send-up from SNL. Here he is talking about voting in the upcoming elections.

Will Ferrell - A message from White House West

Yes, the PC Game blamed for Columbine, and nearly all of modern teen violence, has launched its latest sequel. PC gaming magazines haven't had the time to tear themselves away from their screens to write reviews about it. Gamespot is running daily reports, kinda like a blog almost (!)

There's a funny take on the Tech TV website - accuses Doom 3 of hate-mongering (against demons!)

Will I be buying it? Well, yes I think I will ... but the word to be stressed is eventually. If I'm buying anything soon its Rainbow Six 3: Black Arrow to play on XBox Live.

My desktop speakers have a headphone jack! Who'd have thunk of that? :-)

What relief! Oh, and I can also conveniently hook up and disconnect my home theater system to my PC.

The sun is shining again!

Well Apple finally responded to a rather strongly worded e-mail from me, and basically refunded the $30 I'd bought. Well, its a solution, but I don't see why they can't send another e-mail or change the access code on the gift certificate and mail the new one to my brother ... or even to me.

For that matter, why can't they send me a copy of the e-mail they should've sent out to Kartik? That way, I can let him know what the code is.

The logic escapes me.

Well, I got caught flatfooted when I upgraded my PC's sound card with a Creative Audigy ZS. My computer's sound had been running through the motherboard, and I decided to invest in a sound card.

Only when I bought it did I realize that disabling the on-board ports meant not being able to plug in my headphones to the front-side ports. Which means that I have to plug in headphones, mics etc. into the back of my PC. I will admit I was very happy with the front-side access. Unless I figure out if I can attach an extension cable behind the comp and split the inputs between the speakers and the headphones.

Life's never easy is it? :-(