A new genre?

After a long time, wife insisted I get out of the house and watch a movie on Friday night.

Guess the gray hair and visually obvious stress was a concern to everyone at home. So off they sent me to watch a new release Tamizh movie called "Sarvam". Did not understand even the title or the context, didn't know who was acting etc. etc.

Went to watch with the cousin and MIL. Before the movie started asked the cousin "so what is this movie about?" and the answer was "romantic thriller".

I was stumped. Romantic thriller? Did not know that there was a genre of movies like that.

In any case, the movie had a romance section in the front half and a disjoint supposed thriller section in the second half. It was a crying shame that the songs were done so well, with fantastic picturization and special effects, although in one or two places the locales and backdrops were so good that all the hero and heroine had to do was walk gracefully to carry the song and they screwed it up with some real bad dance moves. If you have seen the movie, you know exactly what I am talking about.

Sometimes you can give an architect the greatest of Italian Marble, Venetian stained glass, ocean floor sandstone, Burmese teak wood, etc. etc. but he could completely blotch it and make a freaking random heap of rubble out of the whole thing!

Sarvam brings to mind an old grandma adage "kurangu kayil poo maalai" (give a flower garland in the hands of a monkey). The monkey does not know how to appreciate the flower garland and will eventualy rip it to shreads. Someone gave this director a lot of beautiful elements to piece together or he did create a lot of beautiful pieces himself and he eventually......

made Sarvam out of it!

It was good that we went with no expectations. The first half of the movie was entertaining enough to compensate for the second half.

This movie is not just a romantic thriller, it also belongs to another genre, a nonthrilling thriller.

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Bharatanatyam

Jr. went on stage for the first time today. She did a great job and did not show stagefright. We were all very happy with her performance.

Another summer day spent driving around in the hot sun and the adults health is going for a six. After watching the performance, the little one is trying out some freelance moves which reminded me of the old days where my brother and me would try karate moves after coming out of a Jackie Chan movie. Some of the little one's self concocted moves are really amazing. Hope to sneak up and catch it on video one of these days. She cannot wait to be six so she can also learn dancing..

On another note, the kids have picked up some slokams from daddy over the recent weeks. Finally managed to slip in a Sri Rudram CD into the van and displace Slumdog Millionaire from the top slot. At first there was the usual stubborn refusal to change the CD.

Now that they hear daddy sing along with the CD and they find it so amazing that daddy can recite minute after minute of what seems to be an endless tongue twister, they asked me "how do you remember all that? Can you teach me how to sing it?" Have patiently broken down the first Ganesha slokam and they so excited that they can sing along too!

Do not know if they will continue on, or this will be it. If anything learning slokams will improve their ability to memorize things, which always comes in handy in any education system. So far so good....

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Cake

Went to a birthday party today. It was an outdoor party and that meant staying in a park from noon to 2:00 on a very hot day. Not a good idea to improve your existing cold and allergy symptoms. Still had to be done because Jr. just did not have the mind to skip this party..

The cake took its time to come but what a cake!

Apparently, this monster vs. alien movie is a big hit with kids! Haven't taken Jr. to see this movie yet inspite of her pestering. The cake did present the parents with some cutting challenges. Someone offered the "eye" to a bunch of kids and Jr. ran away from the party after that.

It was the most creative cake we had seen in a long time.

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