December is a very special month throughout the world. In west it’s time for celebration, vacation,snow and fun. In Chennai it is the season for arts. You can find all music lovers in some sabha or the other to catch their favorite singers live. Everywhere you can find celebration. For me it was little different because of Chennai International Film Festival. I was so happy and enthusiastic from the month starting. This festival is organized by ICAF, Indo Cine Appreciation Foundation. I went all the way to its office in Parsen Apartments to get passes for the festival. To my surprise they asked me from which college I was. I said I am working… I was very happy still I look like a college student. Later I found out that they had issued free passes for them.
I was so thrilled to watch the films. I got special permission from my reporting manager Prasanna to bunk office now and then to watch films. Thanks Prasanna. But all my thrills and expectations turned out to be a big disappointment. This was the 5th year I had attended the festival, I am sorry to say but this was the worst of all. The standard of movie screened every year is going down drastically. You could say only very few movies were good. Out of 120 movies screened I would say not even 20 movies were worth watching. Though story was horrible few had beautiful cinematography. Retrospective movies of Kim ki duk were good. These movies also fall within those twenty movies I mentioned.
2nd International film Festival was the first festival I attended. It was organized in collaboration with NFDC, National Film Development and Corporation. They got extraordinary movies then. In that period hardly twenty movies were not worth watching. They could never get back the standard again. NFDC didn’t take part in the later festivals.
This year Tamil Nadu government had given 25 lakh for the festival, each delegate had paid 500rs and a member paid 300rs to watch movies. Above all they had got hell a lot of sponsors. With all the fund raised they failed to bring in good movies. Movies from France and Germany dominated the festival. Other countries had hardly 1 movie just for the sake of having the count of the countries. To my surprise only 2 Iranian movies were screened.
Movie screening happened in woodlands and woodlands symphony with a time difference of 15min. digital screening was going on in Film Chamber. First people used to sit for the first movie. Within 15 min they realize it’s not worth imme they move to the second movie. I always tried sit there in the hope to learn something. Most people inside the theatre doze off and you could hear people snoring. When you walk out of theatre after the movie you could see lot people waiting out for the next show. They found the second movie was also a waste. In short people sat outside the theatre hoping to see a good movie than inside watching.
The organizers of the festival apart from enjoying the money they receive. They should also concentrate on movies which are being screened. I don’t know on what basis they select the movies for screening. They can organize a committee to select the movies to be screened. In that way they could increase the standard of the festival as such and also a satisfaction to the viewers. Everyone makes it to the festival in between their hectic schedules with lot of expectations. It’s the duty of the organizers to provide them excellent movies. Hope they at least do something in the coming years. I also found the regular festival goers were missing and the response was very low from the film industry. They had tried to fill the hall by providing free passes to students. In short it was dreadful.
Monday, December 29, 2008
Friday, December 12, 2008
Another unforgettable weekend in the history of EM64...
It’s the first b’ day month for my blog. I started writing exactly a year before. Initially when I started I wrote only about movies. Movies are my passion and love. Slowly it turned out to sharing my experiences, views and lot more. I would like to thank my very few handful readers who found time to read the crap I scribble and comment on it... Lot of things has changed in my life for the past one year except me and my friends who I have always been proud of.
I am an electronic media student from Anna University. It’s a 5 year course after you finish your 12th and we were the first and biggest batch in the department with 64 members in class. We were always referred as the 64 batch by all the staff members and even juniors. When we completed our course we tagged ourselves as EM64. Like everybody else in the world my happiest days were college days. I used to go to college even if I am not well because I might miss the fun happening there. 1st year of my college life was little dull or standby for me. It was very difficult for me to get used to the new atmosphere, friends and people who were grown in different atmosphere. I had studied in same school from my 5th standard we were in same culture. College was big change. It took a lot of time for me to get used to it. Once I got used those were unforgettable. I changed into a new person.
Our class was like what you see in movies. People used come late and walk straight into the class even when lecturer is standing. When a b’ day boy or gal steps inside the class, the whole class starts singing happy birthday when the lecturer would be lost teaching the subject. It would take a few minutes for him to understand or realize what’s happening. One good thing was we never used to bunk classes to go to a movie. We used to cancel the classes the classes to go to movie. We didn’t have worries, pressure, problems, commitments, duties and money… Still we had the best time sitting on the Anna University pavements, red platform, kutty suvaar, canteen, gallery, gurunath and every other place.
By the time we finished college we were like a family, so attached to each other. We wanted to make sure all of us meet at regular intervals though people moved to different cities and countries for job, studies and few got married also. We meet at least once a month to celebrate b’ days and also when people come down to Chennai from other places. Every 6 months we try to go outing for 3 or 4 days. This weekend was one such occasion.
It was bakrid and our friend Jaheed used to take guys to his home town to erode, he used to avoid taking gals because most of us were veg and he thought we won’t be comfortable when the goat was sacrificed which was important event of the occasion. This time we thought we had to join. So we combined the bakrid celebration with a trip to yercaud over weekend. Monday we go to black thunder and return back to Chennai on Wednesday. We had people coming down from delhi, pune, Hyderabad and Bangalore for the trip.
As usual the trip was excellent, fabulous and it was good to be with friends and to forget every other thing else in life. It was time to fun fun fun and only fun. I was desperately waiting for the trip. I wanted a break from everything.
The trip was actually very very different. We had to walk walk and walk throughout yercaud to visit ladies, gents and children’s viewpoint. Next day we went to kilianur falls. It was like trekking but we climbed a shorter distance. It was adventurous for me. This was the second time I went for trekking. We had to walk down a narrow path similar to othai adi pathai and a small slip we might fall down. At some points it was little tricky too. Few got drenched in the falls happily. After few foto sessions there in falls we decided to get back. We were the only group with gals other people in the falls had come with beer bottles. So our organizers felt it is better to move out soon. We started to climb back.
Once we reached back to the hotel we had lunch and took vans from yercaud to salem bus stand as the buses were full. We wanted to climb down the hill in lorry together for a change. The lorry drivers were shocked and refused to take us. So we didn’t have any option we had to climb down in 3 vans. Van journey was amusing. We were rating the adult content in the songs and argued for the scores each song got out of 10. From salem we boarded bus to erode to reach my friend Jaheed home where we planned to have the bakrid celebration. As soon as we got down we started shouting Jaheed…... Jaheed……. That was the usual trend we follow when we visit one’s house in our class. It is something similar to thanking them and also to show a small trailer for our naughtiness. When we reached his home his entire family was standing out to welcome us. That crowd was literally bigger than us and we ourselves were shocked and silent for few minutes. It’s a nice big joint family with lots of kids to play.
After dinner we spoke to jaheed parents and family members, played lock and key and red letter with the kids. We explored and remembered all the games we played as kids with them... We were very tired and next day we had planned to go to black thunder. So we tried get some sleep. Kumaran had fever and he wanted to go back to his home town somehow we convinced him and took him with us to erode.
By the time we reached erode, jaheed family had got appointment with the doctor for him and they immediately arranged a van for the black thunder trip. We had planned to take the government bus initially. Next day was ultimate in black thunder. We went two times in all the rides. We didn’t know where kumaran’s fever went that day. He was literally in the water whole day. Lazy River was the ultimate. We were floating and playing around pushing everyone for almost an hour. One of the black thunder staff saw it got tensed. He came down into the water and started pushing us to reach the destination. And of course we were the last person to leave the place. Mani and satish were waiting outside for us. They had come down finishing the MBA semester exam in coimbatore Anna University to join us. We retuned back to erode tired and almost drained out. Next day we got up late and found even the youngest kid in the family was neatly dressed for the festival. After fighting laziness and for bathroom we got ready. We had a splendid briyani for lunch. We went around walking and made little shopping trying to digest the food we had. At 8 we left jaheed home with heavy heart and thanking the family members for their hospitality and tolerating our nonsense for the two days. Ashiq and Akila were celebrating their b’day that week. We had a small cake cutting celebration for them. The kids were so attached to us and they came to station with their parents to send us off.
The family was really glad to treat us guest. They were surprised and even jealous to see us all together. They wished they had friends like that too. We were very happy to hear that. We prayed that our friendship should continue forever even though we moved to different parts of the world. We reached Chennai early morning at 4.30 after playing Ass and talking all night.
The trip didn’t end there. Pain of going to office next day struck us hard. Most of them decided to bunk office. I had to go. I had work. That evening they all met in Spencer. I joined them late after finishing my work. Again with a small chat we went back home getting ready for the routine work and hoping that I will join the next trip too…
I am an electronic media student from Anna University. It’s a 5 year course after you finish your 12th and we were the first and biggest batch in the department with 64 members in class. We were always referred as the 64 batch by all the staff members and even juniors. When we completed our course we tagged ourselves as EM64. Like everybody else in the world my happiest days were college days. I used to go to college even if I am not well because I might miss the fun happening there. 1st year of my college life was little dull or standby for me. It was very difficult for me to get used to the new atmosphere, friends and people who were grown in different atmosphere. I had studied in same school from my 5th standard we were in same culture. College was big change. It took a lot of time for me to get used to it. Once I got used those were unforgettable. I changed into a new person.
Our class was like what you see in movies. People used come late and walk straight into the class even when lecturer is standing. When a b’ day boy or gal steps inside the class, the whole class starts singing happy birthday when the lecturer would be lost teaching the subject. It would take a few minutes for him to understand or realize what’s happening. One good thing was we never used to bunk classes to go to a movie. We used to cancel the classes the classes to go to movie. We didn’t have worries, pressure, problems, commitments, duties and money… Still we had the best time sitting on the Anna University pavements, red platform, kutty suvaar, canteen, gallery, gurunath and every other place.
By the time we finished college we were like a family, so attached to each other. We wanted to make sure all of us meet at regular intervals though people moved to different cities and countries for job, studies and few got married also. We meet at least once a month to celebrate b’ days and also when people come down to Chennai from other places. Every 6 months we try to go outing for 3 or 4 days. This weekend was one such occasion.
It was bakrid and our friend Jaheed used to take guys to his home town to erode, he used to avoid taking gals because most of us were veg and he thought we won’t be comfortable when the goat was sacrificed which was important event of the occasion. This time we thought we had to join. So we combined the bakrid celebration with a trip to yercaud over weekend. Monday we go to black thunder and return back to Chennai on Wednesday. We had people coming down from delhi, pune, Hyderabad and Bangalore for the trip.
As usual the trip was excellent, fabulous and it was good to be with friends and to forget every other thing else in life. It was time to fun fun fun and only fun. I was desperately waiting for the trip. I wanted a break from everything.
The trip was actually very very different. We had to walk walk and walk throughout yercaud to visit ladies, gents and children’s viewpoint. Next day we went to kilianur falls. It was like trekking but we climbed a shorter distance. It was adventurous for me. This was the second time I went for trekking. We had to walk down a narrow path similar to othai adi pathai and a small slip we might fall down. At some points it was little tricky too. Few got drenched in the falls happily. After few foto sessions there in falls we decided to get back. We were the only group with gals other people in the falls had come with beer bottles. So our organizers felt it is better to move out soon. We started to climb back.
Once we reached back to the hotel we had lunch and took vans from yercaud to salem bus stand as the buses were full. We wanted to climb down the hill in lorry together for a change. The lorry drivers were shocked and refused to take us. So we didn’t have any option we had to climb down in 3 vans. Van journey was amusing. We were rating the adult content in the songs and argued for the scores each song got out of 10. From salem we boarded bus to erode to reach my friend Jaheed home where we planned to have the bakrid celebration. As soon as we got down we started shouting Jaheed…... Jaheed……. That was the usual trend we follow when we visit one’s house in our class. It is something similar to thanking them and also to show a small trailer for our naughtiness. When we reached his home his entire family was standing out to welcome us. That crowd was literally bigger than us and we ourselves were shocked and silent for few minutes. It’s a nice big joint family with lots of kids to play.
After dinner we spoke to jaheed parents and family members, played lock and key and red letter with the kids. We explored and remembered all the games we played as kids with them... We were very tired and next day we had planned to go to black thunder. So we tried get some sleep. Kumaran had fever and he wanted to go back to his home town somehow we convinced him and took him with us to erode.
By the time we reached erode, jaheed family had got appointment with the doctor for him and they immediately arranged a van for the black thunder trip. We had planned to take the government bus initially. Next day was ultimate in black thunder. We went two times in all the rides. We didn’t know where kumaran’s fever went that day. He was literally in the water whole day. Lazy River was the ultimate. We were floating and playing around pushing everyone for almost an hour. One of the black thunder staff saw it got tensed. He came down into the water and started pushing us to reach the destination. And of course we were the last person to leave the place. Mani and satish were waiting outside for us. They had come down finishing the MBA semester exam in coimbatore Anna University to join us. We retuned back to erode tired and almost drained out. Next day we got up late and found even the youngest kid in the family was neatly dressed for the festival. After fighting laziness and for bathroom we got ready. We had a splendid briyani for lunch. We went around walking and made little shopping trying to digest the food we had. At 8 we left jaheed home with heavy heart and thanking the family members for their hospitality and tolerating our nonsense for the two days. Ashiq and Akila were celebrating their b’day that week. We had a small cake cutting celebration for them. The kids were so attached to us and they came to station with their parents to send us off.
The family was really glad to treat us guest. They were surprised and even jealous to see us all together. They wished they had friends like that too. We were very happy to hear that. We prayed that our friendship should continue forever even though we moved to different parts of the world. We reached Chennai early morning at 4.30 after playing Ass and talking all night.
The trip didn’t end there. Pain of going to office next day struck us hard. Most of them decided to bunk office. I had to go. I had work. That evening they all met in Spencer. I joined them late after finishing my work. Again with a small chat we went back home getting ready for the routine work and hoping that I will join the next trip too…
TOUCH WOOD!!!!!!!!!!!
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