Comic = Comedy ?

Saw a recent article which says Tamizh comedy actor Vadivelu, will act as Spiderman !!

While most bloggers who have reacted to this have expressed shock or have questioned if Vadivelu would actually be funny as Spiderman(warning X rated link!), they have left out one obvious fact!

Vadivelu, has pre-qualified for this role!! What is the one biggest thing which differentiates an ordinary (or "Saadha Man" in Tamizh) from a superhero-man a.k.a. (super, spider, bat, X, etc.) man?

Every 4th grader knows this joke!

"saadha" ordinary men wear pants over underwear
Super-men wear underwear over their pants!

Have you seen the way Vadivelu ties his dhoti (or lungi) ? His dhoti line is always above his underwear line!! Normal people would wear their dhoti (the variety of cloth refered to as veshti, lungi etc.,) so that it comes till your knees when folded. That way your underwear is still protected from public view! Not Vadivelu. Recently, at a special gala thrown by the movie industry for the CM of Tamizhnadu, he did a skit and even there he tied up his silk dhoti almost to his waist, exposing his boxers! He should have no issues with the spiderman costume!

This opens up other important questions. Does this mean Vadivelu will have a monopoly on all superhero movie remakes in Tamizh ? The answer my friends, is a resounding NO! Another Tamizh actor by the name of Vijaya T. Rajendar (the T stands for Teddy), can give vadivelu a run for his money. He could probably do the role of the Beast or Wolverine in X-men, without any make up!!

As an added bonus, he can rhyme and limmerick his way into the hearts of superhero lovers by saying things like :

Naan dhan da beast-u,
unakku vekkaren da feast-u!

(I am the beast, I am going to give you a feast!)

Can Kelsey Grammar top that?

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Mozhi

Last week, same time, I was finding the best seat in a near empty theater to watch Mozhi. It was a very well made movie in a great theater with a big screen. This theater usually plays English movies that have been taken off the mainstream theaters for lower fares. Now that they are screening Indian movies here, it is quite a blessing. Nice seats, relatively kid free! audience, great sound, not to mention super toilets! I am seriously considering watching more movies in theaters, after this experience.

This is one clean movie. No violence, no double meaning dialogues, no crude humor! Well, you probably got all that from the movie review pros! However, I couldn't help notice the similarities in some of the situations between this movie and "Children of a lesser God", something that was not mentioned in any of the regular reviews! I had no idea what Mozhi was all about, but within the first 20 minutes, I could guess how many of the scenes were going to end.

I guess "Children of a lesser God" was probably not a popular movie in India. It came out in the late eighties. I watched it on cable (in bits and pieces) when I was in grad school. Got to watch the full movie only a few years ago. But it is one of my favorites of all time. I just can't forget Marlee Matlin in that movie. She was gorgeous and she could speak with her eyes. Later when I learnt that she is deaf in real life, I probably felt something along the lines of what Prithviraj feels in the hospital lobby in Mozhi!!

The catch though is, if you liked "Children of a lesser god" , you would definitely like "Mozhi", but not vice versa. The english movie has some nudity and strong language. So, wouldn't exactly call it a movie that you can watch with the whole family. It is a very serious movie compared to Mozhi, which has you smiling for the most part. You have to watch this movie. It got a best actress oscar for Marlee!

Now back to Mozhi! I have really taken a liking ot the soundtrack of this movie. I must have heard the song "Pesa Madandhaiye" a dozen times!! Had actually closed my eyes for a second just listening to the song. Well written, well sung and nicely directed! I did feel that it was a cross between "Deivam thandha veedu" from the movie Aval Oru Thodarkadhai, and "Evano oruvan" from Alaipayudhe. Again, I was surprised to find out that the singer is not KJ Yesudas or his son, but Madhu Balakrishnan. Let's just say that Madhu has a new fan!

If I have heard this song a dozen times, then I have been listening to "Sevvanam .." a few dozen times. Just love it. It is also Jr.'s current favorite song ("in the whole world" if I might add!). The funny thing is that when I listen to songs where I have heard the song for the first time while watching the movie, I tend to get the movie when I close my eyes and picturize the song. I get to do my own choreography in my head if I have heard the song without seeing the movie! Yes, I am actually doing the dancing. This song however is unique. For some reason, I get San in my vision instead of the heroine!

Was humming "computer kandavalo, karate katravalo" (maybe she has learnt Computers, Karate) thinking "damn, I am one lucky bastard to have married someone who knows computers and karate!" and at that precise moment San tells me: "please stop singing that song. every time you start singing it, either Jr. is coughing or the little one starts throwing up or bad things happen. That song is not good for our family!".

I burst out laughing at the irony of the situation. Considering that Jr. is the president and CEO of Virus Inc. and the litte one has recently been promoted to CTO of Germcorp, my singing has little do to with the state of affairs in the house. But an order is an order!. So, I stopped humming, we took one look at the kids, and we both started laughing!

Jokes apart, do go see Mozhi and if possible watch Children of a Lesser God too..

Language transitions.

This morning Jr. is watching PBS kids and they show a small elephant.

Jr. tells her grandma:

"I think this is just a baby elephant!"

Just then, they show a bigger elephant.

Jr. : "I think this is the mommy and I think the grand elephant lives in Bombay !"

I guess the baby elephants grandmother could be called a "grand elephant".

Jr. is always creative (guess kids are creative by default) in expressing herself. The India trip has caused an upheaval of sorts on her English, err Tamlish!

We feel that Major Sundararajan's ghost is somehow circling our house! (FYI, Major was a Tamizh movie actor who used to repeat every dialogue in Tamizh first and then in English.. He would pick up the phone and say "Hello, who is calling? Yaar pesaradhu ?". Dont think the guy had a military background. Think he acted as a military guy in his first movie and got the Major title.. but I digress as usual and that is another post!).

Just to give you some examples of how her language has changed since the trip:

Before : I ate the apple pazham (pazham is fruit in Tamizh)
After : Naan apple pazhaththa eat pannitten ( I apple fruit eat did it)

Before : I am shy
After : I am feeling shy-aa irukken! (I am feeling shy I am)

After I put the lights for her in the bathroom and wait near the door :

Before : Go away! Stand outside the hallway
After : Go away pannu. Velila poi stand pannu. (go away do it. outside go stand do it)

She even says things like "naan read panni pannaren" which translates to something ilke "I read do am doing"!

Guess the message is being conveyed. No issues with that. But she has now one upped Major ! Major used to repeat dialogues in Tamil and English. Jr. does it in Tamlish and Engil. Yes, I have coined the term Engil to complement Tamlish. It is Jr.'s second language.

Yesterday I told her :

Either say "I am shy" or "shyaa irukken"!!, and I realized that I talk in Tamlish! I should have taught her to say "vetkamaa irukku".. but I have to hit middleground with the kids who respond in Tamlish when questioned in Tamizh.

Maybe after our next India trip she will talk 30% Engtamlishil and 70% Tamengilish.

Who knows!

Beta Beta...

I am not singing the Bhagyaraj song..

Beta beta
oh my beta
en aanandham onnodu dhaan..

(son son
oh my son
my happiness is only with you!) for those who care..

I am referring to Beta Blogger.

This harmless screen that said, great things await me when I switch to the beta version by just signing up with my gmail account, turned out to be a mixed blessing.

Beta is not different from the standard version. Except the obvious "republish blog" button is not to be found..

The minute I switched to beta

1. my sidebar went nuts
2. I lost all the original buttons I made (luckily I was able to hold on to my old template and was saved, but I almost got a heart attack!)
3. Worse, my Tamizh blog became )_&)(*^R^(*#^(*^$^(*#^@8 or something to that effect.
All the fonts, the profile everything , gone.. at the click of a button..

Took me an hour last night to put back everything, that too by playing with html (because you dont know what )*)&)(^(*&%&*(^*&%$ was and )_*)(&(*^*&^$%$ was originally!!

Finally, there is some order in my blogs again. My fellow bloggers, before you switch to beta, make sure you copy old template files, especially if they are in a foreign language..

other than that, enjoy beta blogger..