Boredom

The one thing people have come to identify me with in last three years is my love for picking up the fights and exaggerations. Friends, enemies, frenemies; no one has been spared. I have fought these battles for my own and others who mattered though I cannot really say whether I mattered for them. It was all extreme, no quarters given, none expected and I never LOST, NEVER. But I have lost many things. People of all three kinds mentioned above. Health, yes, quite a bit. Reputation, cannot really say. Some still admire me and at a given point of time, only these 'some' matter. Regrets, oh Come on, NONE. I watch House of Cards ( and Kevin Spacey in it) for God's sake. Then what's that troubling me that I'm saying all these things again in a hyperbolic fashion? Look, a person has got only too many fights left in him and with my interiors, no one was expecting me to come this far. I mean, some people really hate me and I'm taking all this heat and giving them mani...

Let's move on.......there is something infectious about Bollywood that gets to you. For me, it's the portrayal of human emotions and I believe they do it best in entire world. I never saw a critic writing in his report that he cried and wept his eyes out while watching a movie but it happened to Ms. Anupama Chopra of NDTV, one of the bravest and most emotionally restrained personalities while watching NEERJA. Well, I cried too for it was a genuine weeper. And it's not that Bollywood is only trying to make us cry, it made us think too with its 2015 offerings in Haider, Piku and Badlapur. Bollywood is turning 'ambiguous' and it's a real, gigantic leap forward for we praise HOLLYWOOD for the same reason as they always lets and most importantly makes us decide who was right and who was wrong. I first got to taste this novelty in Onir's I AM where characters of Juhi Chawla and Manisha Koirala were miles apart in their fundamental thinking but they were both right...

When I started reading Sandeep Sharma's second book, Let The Game Begin, it instantaneously reminded me of Surendra Mohan Pathak's work. Commercial fiction at its 'boorish' best. Mr. Pathak has been penning novels at a breathtaking speed for last 30-odd years and so far, the count is somewhere in the vicinity of 300. He is credited as the undisputed pocket book-king of India and I wouldn't go as far to say Sandeep is matching his aura here but he is certainly trying to match his style, unknowingly. He has added one more dimension to his second book which Pathak's works always lacked; yes, a tinge of mythology, a favorite writing-genre of writers of today but not yesteryears. But I shouldn't really be comparing his works with Mr. Pathak's, I must rather do it with Sandeep's first book: Hey Dad! Meet My Mom. It was a terrific debut work but can I say the same for this one, I seriously doubt. Whereas HDM3 was a flawless piece of work from every literary...

WWE once again botched up the handling of one of its most naturally gifted superstar in Cody Rhodes. In case you don't know him, he is the son of Legendary Wrestler Dusty Rhodes and baby brother of another legend, 'Goldust'. WWE released him from his contract with them couple of days ago. His tag team days with Ted Debiase which were his early days too in WWE were pure gold. They made a formidable team and matched each other's talent, physique and persona with impressive maturity. It's pretty sad that now both of them are not with WWE. After their Golden days, WWE couldn't put them (call it their stupidity or lack of good storylines) in right places and after scratching their ways through sorry, witless and pointless gimmicks, matches and storylines, they quit. Frankly speaking, they did it for good. Ted isn't with WWE since quite long and now his partner in crime has said goodbye too. They won't be facing the visibility issue thanks in no small parts t...

This IPL season might be dubbed as 'Kohli's IPL' in years to come. He is unarguably the best exponent of white-ball batsmanship going around. However, for someone like me who places a great emphasis on longest form of Cricket i.e. Test Cricket, until and unless he proves himself in seeming and swinging conditions of England and New Zealand (I believe in him and thus shall wish him luck), I shall still rank him behind Kane Williamson and Joe Root. Just to make sure I'm impartial to this debate, I put my favorite cricketer of all time i.e. Sourav Ganguly behind Sachin, Sehwag, Laxman and Dravid when it comes to rank him in FAB FIVE of Indian Batsmanship because he simply wasn't as good as them in test cricket. Many call him a very good test cricketer and maintaining an average of 40 in test cricket from the very beginning till the very end signifies their reasoning but still, he fell short of 45/50 that makes a batsman statistical behemoth in purest form of Cricket. ...

I bet not many of you could claim to watch Gulshan Devaiah's Hunterrr starring also the ever-so-magnificent Radhika Apte. Like many of those great, misleading movies, it also gets categorized wrongly, an adult comedy (Thank your Gods and Indian Censor Board for at least calling it THAT) precisely whereas if you would ask me, I shall simply like to call it an 'adult drama'. It's undoubtedly hilarious in many parts but if a comedy makes you cringe in your guts, what would you call it? It also made me sad at various moments and then let me empathize with its lead characters in Radhika Apte, Gulshan and his friend Kshitij. Let me go one better: It's a very serious film that discusses the concept of perverseness and sexual mischievousness explicitly through its protagonist, Mandhar. Mandhar is a VASU, apparently a some type of sect that tries to hit on girls and women repeatedly without really committing to a long term relationship or letting itself fall in LOVE. Success...

I was watching Highway upon its release in one of the last remaining single screen theatres of Karolbagh and it was a surreal moment. Location had something to do with it definitely but it had to do something Randeep Hooda and Alia Bhatt as well. Probably, that was the moment when I started imagining Alia peeping Parineeti out on the finish line in next decade. But hasn't Alia already done that? Parineeti, still my favorite, is nowhere to be seen. But what about the Burly Hooda? Through his sheer hard work and all the qualities that make a man of iron, he has crafted a niche of his own. Highway was a high point in his career but nobody really talked about him. Just one month ago this year, Laal Rang followed. He does Indie films like Junkie and very often, he helps them to uplift their portfolio. Now Sarabjit is coming out and once again, Indian media is talking not about him but Aishwarya Rai Bachchan. He shall not only surpass her but that powerful actor in Richa Chaddha too, I...

Hi, Following are the titles that I found totally mind-twisting-and-bursting: a) Requiem for a Dream (Darren Arofnosky), b) Trainspotting (Danny Boyle), c) Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (you all must have watched it), d) Shutter Island (Martin Scorsese), e) Irreversible (French production, Monica Belucci), f) The Tree of Life (Terry Gilliam), g) Cloud Atlas (Tom Hanks et al.), h) Brazil (Terry Gilliam, again), i) District 9 (Mind-blowing too), j) Martyr (French production), k) Oldboy (South Korean Production), l) The Ring 1 & 2 (You must have watched it), m) The Prestige (Nolan), n) Inception (probably the mother of all mindf*ck of a movies) o) Se7en (David Fincher, Kevin Spacey, Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt) I hope you would contribute massively in expanding this list. Thank you.

It's been a long while since I wrote anything of note about the game I love the most. Yes Cricket is what I am talking about and going to talk about in the following write-up. I had couple of topics to start with: the resurgence of English Limited Overs Cricket and the status of Ahmadi Muslims in first class and international cricket of Pakistan; but I had to abandon them for times to come because something very tragic took place today in the morning and being a passionate follower of the game, the incident swept the floor beneath me feet. Tony Cozier, the voice of West Indian Cricket and international cricket at large for last 58 years, left us for a better place in the morning. Many legends instantly started paying their condolences to this iconic, colossus figure of World Cricket but hardly any of them were finding the right words to compensate for the loss left by his passing. Michael Holding came probably the nearest in assessing his contribution to West Indian Cricket as he e...

I have found many critics pointing to the title of this book and calling it 'trite'. Perhaps it's a tad long, perhaps it's befitting but let me tell you that this 'title' must now dissuade you from giving it a try. Pravin R. Rathod is an MBA graduate and this book is the fruit of his maiden effort at writing something. Chetan Bhagat is an IIM-taught management professional too and there is a simplicity to his books with subtle sense of humor and enviable dramatic flair. And if I have ever come closest to finding a book as simple and funny as his while keeping its dramatic content poised, it must be this debut title from Mr. Rathod. I can say it with full confidence that it contains the only believable love story that an Indian with average background could hope for and even it's sad ending has got an honest moment. The verbs 'confuse' and 'interest' appear twice in their adverb, gerund and participle guises in this book title and they pretty ...

If you had opted for PK instead of Anurag Kashyap's Ugly (who?) for your viewing on 25th December 2014 or following few days, I wouldn't accuse you of anything. Amir doesn't make 3-4 films a year, he does exactly it's opposite and for that matter only, his films must be seen. And that's what we did with his PK and unwillingly snubbed 'Ugly'. PK was a good film too but 'Ugly', I had my eyes set out on it for last two years and yesterday I watched it. With 'Ugly', nothing can get uglier. It's superlative in its positive degree standing. Not only its plot was twisted but its characters too and I feared watching them. One of the only few films coming out from Hindi Cinema in last two years who was so full of tension from starting to finish. If I get to remove Gangs of Wasseypur from Anurag's filmography, UGLY will be my favorite film directed by him. It received a standing ovation in Cannes and I understand why for it's realism could ...

Mr. M.C. Raj is a prolific author with various book-titles to his credit and with these labels come an aura and craftsmanship to his writing. His latest offering, The Crossbow Code is a novel that's set in the geographical locations of Vatican City (the home of Pope) and Mumbai and as exotic a location they could be, it's the narrative of the book that make them look mysteriously creepy. How many times can you possibly find The Pope talking to a commoner, that too from a Third World country like India which doesn't boast of a huge christian population either? Let me tell you from my experience that odds for that would be infinitely negative. But here we get to see one and one that's hugely engaging. It's an open secret that churches all over the world hide secrets and although many would find Dan Brown's works as heresy, they do tend to point towards an inconvenient truth. The concepts of Christianity that I have come to known thanks to the works of Kathleen McG...

While reading Sandeep Sharma and Leepi Agarwal's debut work, Hey Dad! Meet My Mom, two films crossed my mind. 'Eternal Sunshine of Spotless Mind' by Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet and 'The Unborn'. The first was a very unusual love story and second, a spooky and not-very-good horror film. HDM3 claims to mix the elements of both and till two-thirds of it, it shows spectacular results but when it tries to disclose its much vaunted secret, it slips spectacularly as well. Too many plot inconsistencies creep in and our unborn/undead child-actor Rishi too starts showing signs of fatigue. Puneet as the horror-stricken SBI manager works but as a photographer-turned-sponsor-within-hours, he disappoints and so do the authors. They just couldn't find the logic to let him settle in the subplot of BIBA fashion week. The subplot carrying Myra, Maya, Puneet's mother and Puneet himself is way too impressive for writers show their potential, unheard and unseen of their age, in...

Today I'm going to post my first book review based on my new 10-point scale. I am going to clarify the scoring system here: a) 3 Marks- For the achievement of coming up with a book. b) 2 Marks- Language Skills c) 2 Marks- Plot/Premise and Character Development d) 2 Marks- Editing and Proofreading e) 1 Mark- Book Cover, Page Quality and Blurb

At the start of last week, an icon of female wrestling and former WWE employee, Chyna died. She started her pro-wrestling career with WWE and finished it too with them. During her time with the company, she was billed as 'ninth wonder of the world' (Andre the Giant was 8th wonder according to WWE) and wrestled not only her female counterparts but male superstars too and even defeated them convincingly. An epitome of power-wrestling, she went on to hold the prestigious WWF Intercontinental championship on two occasions and women's championship once. She was a heartthrob to younger generation of pro-wrestling fans. She was the bodyguard-on-screen for Triple H and his rumored girlfriend too. So popular was she that WWE made her one integral part of their most successful and iconic tag team of all time, DX (called D-Generation X). Then she left the company in 2000 to pursue other media interests. Reality shows and various TV outings followed and then in one shocking decision (l...