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Saturday, December 20, 2008

Happy Holidays!!!

Friends, blogizens and readers, its that time of the year again when my favorite jodi comes to the fore – me and my holidays. :-) Yup you got it right – Old is Gold is on a Christmas vacation to the old country. And the old country sadly, isnt India this time but the UK (also known as Vilaayat in my favorite Bollywood oldies) which will certainly be a lot warmer than the arctic Calgary! Big Ben, here I come!!!
Hope you all have as good a time in your holiday season as I intend to! See you again next year. In the meantime, here’s a picture I happened to come across a while ago. Can you identify the actor and actress in the snap? Hint: he went on to become a famous Bollywood actor and she became a famous Pakistani actress.
Pran and Noorjehan in Khaandaan

Monday, December 15, 2008

Ijaazat (1987) – to like or not to like?

Ijaazat- DVD cover Gulzar wrote and directed this tale of a man (Naseeruddin Shah) torn between his feelings for two women (Rekha and Anuradha Patel). Every review I’ve read and every acquaintance of mine who’s seen it, has lavished praises on it. Still I resisted watching it, because I am prejudiced against love triangles where women come out the losers. Then I saw an interview of Naseer’s where he talked about how happy he was with his performance in this movie. So I decided to give it a try. And I am glad I did. Its a lovely movie inspite of some rather grave flaws! But thats Gulzar’s fault – he can turn the most unappealing stories into lovely and curiously touching movies (Basera is a good example)!

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Filmi professions – just how professional are they?

I’ve been watching too many old movies (is it even possible to watch too many of those?) and couldnt help but notice their take on science. No matter what the protagonists’ field of research – be it a mysterious formula, nuclear science, or medical research – the 1950s to 1970s scientist always works in a lab that looks like a shiny version of my high school Chemistry laboratory!
As a scientist myself, I am mystified by filmmakers’ strange addiction to chemistry labs that are carefully stock-piled with glassware and multicolored fluids! Here are a couple of quick examples:
A scientist trying to harness solar energy (Madan Puri in Blackmail) should not be working in a Synthetic-chemistry lab straight out of the 1920s! He needs heavy equipment and sophisticated machinery - NOT glassware.Scientist in Blackmail