Exodus: Gods & Kings

When someone tells me the name ‘Ridley Scott’, two movies come to mind – ‘Gladiator’ & ‘Robin Hood’. Both of them I would see any time of day and any number of times. So, when I came to know that Ridley Scott directed movie, titled ‘Exodus: Gods & Kings’, was coming to theatres soon, I couldn’t contain my excitement. Naturally, I checked out the trailer and found it stunning, I was waiting to just book the ticket and hit the theatre.

So, I went to the evening show today, dragging along my brother, who was well, not feeling well, but came along after seeing the trailer.

Characters:

Actor: Christian Bale

Past Credentials: Phew! Quite a list! Batman series with Christopher Nolan, American Hustle, The Machinist and so on

Identification of character in this movie: The guy with the beard, holding a stick and whimsical schizophrenia

Actor: Joel Edgerton

Pas Credentials: Elder brother of Tom Hardy in the movie ‘Warrior’

Identification of character in this movie: The bald guy with a good build, with an aficionado for gold

Actor: Ben Kingsley

Past Credentials: Gandhi, Shutter Island

Identification of character in the movie: The guy with the beard

Actor: Aaron Paul

Past Credentials: The right hand of Walter White, Jesse Pinkman, in one of the most awesomest series ever… Breaking Bad

Identification of character in the movie: The guy with the beard

Actor: Sigourney Weaver

Past credentials: The doctor in the movie ‘Avatar’ who joins Eywa in the end

Identification of character in the movie: One of the ladies in the palace

Plot:

The bald guy with the gold aficionado and the guy with the stick are raised as brothers. The gold guy has lots of slaves and he finds out that the guy with the stick is also from that tribe. They both take time out, go their separate ways, marry and raise a kid.

After a decade, the guy with the stick starts his schizophrenia, sees a bald kid (who looks like he auditioned for the lead role in ‘The Last Airbender’), has some alone time and self therapy sessions. During the sessions, he finds out that the kid is God who wants to free all slaves.  

The guy with the stick goes to the gold guy, warns him that God wants him to free all slaves and the request is refused. Then, all crappy things happen to the gold guy and he lets slaves go. Then, suddenly, at the mere insistence of the director, turns around, gathers troops and goes after them all for a battle.

After the chase, a standoff, happens between the gold guy and the guy with the stick face each other. In the end, patience notwithstanding, the water, in the form of waves, shuts them all up. The movie ends with showing that they both are alive and well and preparing themselves for a sequel.

Rating:

1/5

The rating one is only for the visuals and graphics, else there would have been no rating.

Parting Words:

If you have already seen this movie, I have been there and I am ashamed of myself too. If you have not yet seen this movie, go anywhere else.

Escape

I lay on the floor
My breathing was heavy and body aching
All the bruises lay open
Blood oozing out for the whole world to see

I noticed the slightly open refrigerator door
And inched towards the cold air
To numb my body from pain
With whatever I can, however long I can

Tears were rolling down
But no one was there to see
I could hear his footsteps pacing impatiently in the next room
And my heart trembled with fear

My fists were clenched with anger
To protect the last inch of my space
That very last inch, that was mine and mine alone

Rules of the society were falling away
My relationship with him now a distant memory

And then he came in
Bursting through the door
He had something heavy in his hand
That I could not see through my teary eyes

And then it hit me hard
The searing pain began all over again
I begged for him to let me go
But none of my words fell on his ears

Through the torrential waves of pain
I felt around the floor next to me
And finally found something

With all the strength left in me
I hit him hard with everything I had
And I stood standing...

He let out a scream and went down
He moaned in pain and then went quiet

A shriek broke the deafening silence
Turned around and saw my neighbour
Staring through the window, horrified

I didnt care
I went back to sitting on the floor
Next to the refrigerator
Trying to numb down the pain

After what felt like ages
I heard the screeching sirens
At last, someone had heard my cries of help
I stood up with what I had left
And went outside the door

There were so many cops outside
Standing safely behind their flashing cars
Their guns all aimed at me

I didnt understand and my brain went numb
I am the victim, I cried
But alas, they were not ready to listen

I turned around and ran
And they came after me
Laws of this earth were closing in on me
For I had done nothing wrong

My legs were failing me
And my body was giving way
I saw the open ocean below
The moon was shining brightly over the waters

I ran toward the rails and I jumped over
Crying all the way into her arms
For some solace at last
And everything went dark

Interstellar

Space, Time, Worm Holes, Black Holes, Singularity are all extraordinary concepts and the widest food for an imagination. Combine that with one of the master storytellers of our time and the boundaries of imagination are stretched.

First, the negatives.

The movie Interstellar is almost 3 hours. It is quite lengthy considering Nolan brothers’ reputation to keep screenplay tight and keeping audience continually engaged.

One must not go in with any expectations whatsoever. Especially, Nolan diehard fans. Interstellar cannot be compared with other movies of his like Dark Knight or Inception. Interstellar is a movie of a completely different dimension. And those who have seen this movie, you will agree. J

Few dialogues, mostly while Mathew McConaughey was still on Earth, sounded more like bumper stickers. Not of the usual Nolan quality.

And lastly, few characters were not allowed to essay much scope in this movie, especially, a versatile actor like Casey Affleck.

Now, for the positives.

Plot: The story revolves around a final space mission attempt to find habitable worlds for the future of human kind. Now, although this plot can be attempted by any director and any actor. This could be a Singham 3 script for Bollywood and for Kollywood, Vijaykanth would be the ideal candidate.

But, this is Christopher Nolan.  Naturally, it would be a whole different breed.

The movie is visually superb, just incredible. Top of the mind, would be the visualization of black hole and showcasing time as the further dimension was a superb treat. The second world that they visited was also superb. Although, similarities could be drawn between this and the stunning visuals of Alaska shown in the movie Insomnia. The robot TARS is also definitely worth mentioning.

All the characters in the movie have acted incredibly. And just when I searching for Nolan’s usual stamp of grey, Matt Damon and his role in the second world that the crew visits provided just that. It was really nice to see Matt Damon don a darker role than his usual characters in other movies of his.

And the last but not the least, the concept in itself is definitely worth pondering upon. Gravity cutting across space and time. What would a black hole look like? What would be like to go through it? Powerful stuff indeed.

Summing it up, if you are a dreamer, a thinker and a wanderer, Interstellar is definitely worth it!

Copenhagen Consensus Centre

Just now listened to a Freakonomics podcast titled ‘Fixing the World – Bang for the Buck’. In it, Bjorn Lomborg, a member of the Copenhagen Consensus Centre, when asked what the Centre actually does, started with the following example,

If, $1000 is the cost for curing malaria in one patient, and $10000 is the cost for curing AIDS in one patient, then it can be translated that for the cost of curing AIDS in one patient, 10 cases of malaria can be cured.

He further explained that what the Centre works towards is for cost estimation and doing a cost benefit analysis for any program or initiative. This is done by commissioning top economists and field experts to do studies based on facts and figures and estimating the probable benefits and assigning a figure for the same.

While doing the Cost Benefit Analysis, at the rudimentary level, is assigning a real world value to a vision or a dream. It is definitely worth being part of a discussion than doing a discussion without it. As the speaker illustrated with an example, imagine sitting in a restaurant with all the items listed but with no prices against them. Now, the activity that the Centre does is like assigning a price for each item. Though you may end up ordering the champagne, you will at least understand the balance you may have at the end of the champagne for ordering dessert.

The Millennium Development Goals is an initiative by the UN to list down action items for a 15 year period and then tracking progress. Countries around the world use this as a fulcrum to design their long term initiatives and take them forward. The last set of goals was designed for the period 2000-2015 and they included Eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, reducing child mortality, Improving maternal health and 5 others. With 2015 around the corner, it will be interesting to see the next set of goals for the year 2030. Definitely, sustainability, renewable energy, reducing carbon footprint, climate change will be among the contending topics. 

It will be even more interesting if the aforementioned Copenhagen Consensus Centre is part of this discussion to gravitate the achievability of probable topics that are currently being discussed for finalizing Action 2030.

Quoting from an excerpt from an article in the Tribune on August 8th, 2014, by Dr. Pervez Tahir,
"The selection of goals and targets for 2030 needs to be more focused than they were for 2015, with prioritisation of key areas of weaknesses. An example of this has been provided by the Copenhagen Consensus Centre by prioritising the possible goals on the basis of cost-benefit analysis. It recommends only five goals - nutritional supplements, expanded immunisation, anti-malaria programmes, control of intestinal worms and the prevention of tuberculosis."
Let's wait and see the Millennium Development Goals 2030.

Purattasi Sanikazhamai

Waking up at 4 am, we were dressed and out of the door by 4.45. The roads were totally empty, except for the usual one or two vehicles plying at this hour, and the crescent shaped moon that was shining in the black sky. We entered T.Nagar in a quarter of an hour, and as we entered the Venkatnarayana Road, the whole scene was different than the one we started from and the ones we travelled through. The Venkatachalapathy Temple was beautifully lit with the words “Om Namo Narayana” visible from either of the street end. And so begins the first Saturday.

For those who do not know what the title means, Purattasi is an important Tamil month usually from mid-September to mid-October, the prime deity being Lord Venkatachalapathy (Yes, the Dude in Tirupathi). Temple going on Saturdays (Sanikizhamai) is auspicious during the four weeks in this period. And if, the temple is stamped by TTD (Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam), then it takes the endorsement to a whole new level. But, these Saturdays, are a gold mine for the silent observers, as a whole plethora of characters and idiosyncrasies are always in store.

Anyways, so we reach the temple, and its bustling with activity. Police personnel are everywhere, police cars are parked on either side of the road, with those red and blue lights blinking non-stop to turn a passerby blind. Barricades are lined up, and the people on the side of the barricade, stretched the queue away from the main road, into Ramanujam Street adjoining the Oxford School. My parents hopped off, I parked the car at a point further away and walked back to join them in the queue.

Many types of people can be found here – ardent believers, disheveled souls, charioteers and the crowd in the queue was a healthy mix of them all. Husbands who parked their bikes away were trying to find their wives in the queue with newly bought flowers in plastic bags for offering to the Lord and the wives, adorned with sarees, with washed hair neatly tied up and jasmine flowers pinned, were shouting out to their husbands to make recognition more easily possible. The queue started moving only after a good 15 minutes.

As we reached the main Road, and inched our way ahead, more sights awaited us. People were standing in the middle of the median, putting the elevated platform to good use by getting a darshan of the Lord. This middle standing crowd mostly involved the active morning walkers, who probably were not in a mood for an early morning bath and will probably visit the temple later in the day. And then the bus no. 13 from Triplicane made its way slowly through the Road, promptly stopping in front of the temple for a few good seconds, as the morning travelers peeped through the window for a glimpse and murmur of prayers. And then there were the flower sellers, the slipper safekeepers, and then the guy who sold coffee from his parked bicycle.

As we made our way inside the temple, ‘volunteers’ neatly dressed in pattu veshti and pattu sattai were guiding the crowd towards the exit, who were more interested in getting more of the Darshan, rather than walking towards the Exit.

After the darshan, as we made our way out, the overpowering smell beckoned. The laddus from Tirupati had arrived and were being distributed. Promptly, we bought our packets and moved out. As we were walking towards the car, my mom nodded satisfactorily and said “Very good and satisfying darshan” and my dad, the dutiful husband agreed. The words cheered the charioteer. We got to the car and drove away from the building up traffic and the never ending queue and the Temple.

One Saturday down, Three more to go… Happy Weekend Folks !