Floored. Completely.

My absences keep getting longer and longer. Luckily I decided to write something today, otherwise I might have finished 2007 without a blog!! Anyway, here is something I actually posted as a comment on Aamir Khan’s website (http://www.aamirkhan.com) about his recent movie Taare Zameen Par. It is tough to do an “Eloi & Morlocks” analysis for this movie, so the comment is general. Aamir’s blog has a limitation of 1000 characters per comment and my first draft was 3772 characters long! So I decided to split it into sub-sections and tried my “precis-writing” skills. I eventually brought it down to 3 sections from 4 and posted it. Here is the content.

Aamir,
(Here is a really long comment that I have split into 3!)

Part I

My wife and I would like to first thank you for making a splendid movie. We sincerely hope that the movie makes a lot of money otherwise the message will not go to the masses. That being said, the movie set us both thinking.

I have, for the past few years, been a contributor to a group called Parivaar in Kolkata. Parivaar takes complete care of destitute and vulnerable children. Two things stand out when you visit Parivaar – the children and the administration. The children are in many ways like the ones at “Tulip”, but they are not suffering from Down’s Syndrome or autism or other congenital ailments. Instead they have been given up by parents who couldn’t take care of them. The founder is a young man in his twenties with degrees from both IIT and IIM, who chose not to pursue a life of luxury and dedicated himself to helping the underprivileged.

(Continued …)

Part II

My point in the above is that most of us lack the courage and conviction to do something so radically different. We forget that the smiles on the children’s faces are often a greater reward than any other. Why is it that most of us want our kids to grow up and become doctors or engineers? It is due to our conditioning. An average Indian is by nature more conservative and risk averse than say, an average American. Not our fault – there are more jobs and benefits available to a mediocre engineer than to a good artist. So the parents feel more secure if the child is in a low risk track. To that extent I sympathise with Ishaan’s parents – how is a child to survive in the rat race without the 3 R’s? After all, no parent wants his or her kid to do badly. It is just that in India our inherent nature really narrows down the range of “doing well” to academics. Come to think of it, even TZP’s ending shows that Ishaan has become better in academics.

(Continued…)
Part III

I think that for the movie to make a tangible impact to society, everyone has to accept that there are more choices than becoming an engineer or a doctor. Moreover these opportunities really have to be available, profitable and visible. Our taxes should be used better to build a good infrastructure for handling unemployment. Once this happens TZP can go down in history as the movie that kickstarted a progressive society.

High points:
– Darsheel. It was astounding how he conveyed so much by speaking so little. Besides the “3 x 9” sequence, I believe he has less than 30 lines of dialogue, which goes to show how well he emotes with his eyes. The scene where his mother tells him that she cannot visit was top notch.
– The song “Maa”. And the music in general.
– The script and the direction. I now fully understand your comments on “Black”
– The research. “Solomon Islands” was a gem

Sorry for the rather long-winded comment. I hope I haven’t worn you down!

Sayontan

Coming soon – a tribute to our soon retiring generation of great cricketers.