Nerve Endings Firing Away

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It is summer time and apart from the warm weather and skimpy clothes, it is also a prime time for Hollywood to showcase their blockbusters. The end of semester and a relatively light summer makes for an ideal time for movie-watching especially in a town that let you buy discounted movie tickets for $4 (although Ash pays the full adult rate….heh! rich irony, I know). Also, the Blockbuster queue can be dealt with quicker too. So naturally we have been watching quite a few movies. Detailed movie reviews are passe now so I’ll just expand a little bit more than my occasional one-line review on the ‘Movies I’ve Watched’ sidebar widget.

Spiderman 3: Clearly one of the most awaited movies of the summer especially since Spiderman 2 was and did better than the first one. However, the temptation to pull a Titanic and go the Bollywood way in terms of filling a comic-book movie with oodles of melodrama was too much for Sam Riami to resist. Too predictable and insanely incoherent given the multiple plot lines and more than one bad guys. Mary Jane in spite of all her successes and failings always has to be dangled atop a high building in order to lure Spiderman out for a abrupt finish.

Pirates of the Caribbean - At World’s End: Come on, do you really expect more than popcorn fun from a movie that is based on a theme park ride? I enjoy the Pirates movies although hated the To Be Continued end of the second movie (or probably I had to pee real bad and was waiting for the movie to end). This movie definitely was more tightly narrated and definitely had a better plot line instead of the various different diversions in Dead Man’s Chest. Admittedly, Pirates is a big screen movie and probably watching it on DVD doesn’t do it much justice. For one, the climactic battle scene is worth a watch considering all the CGI effort that went into it.

The Namesake: We missed watching this movie when mom was here because she really wanted to see it. She did finish reading the book so the movie would have been a perfect complement. Never before has a diaspora movie seemed so identifiable with both generations of Indians i.e. the ones that stepped off the boats and those born here. Ash even shed a few tears at the end of it. The movie effectively conveys the haunting nostalgia and the longing for home that Jhumpa Lahiri weaves through her book. The movie also successfully overlays the cultural mix that is so typical of the United States. For e.g. the hip hop music playing in a African American barbershop as Gogol is getting his head shaved to mourn the death of his father. One common act of shaving ones’ head that is interpreted so differently in two cultures. Kal Penn is perfectly cast and we hardly see hints of his more famous character Kumar or Taj in this movie. I simply cannot imagine seeing Abhishek Bachchan, the rumored first choice for his role. But Irfan Khan and Tabu steal the show. They are arguably one of the finest actors in India today. Overall, The Namesake is a fulfilling cinematic experience. The critics may have nitpicked it but Ash and I enjoyed it.

Knocked Up: Judd Apatow’s first movie, The 40-Year-Old Virgin was hilarious in a nerdy and subtle way. His second attempt at comedy, Knocked Up is even a better movie. Relatively unknown stars in the movie world, Seth Rogen and Katherine Heigl play a mismatched couple that deal with an unexpected pregnancy. When I call this movie the funniest movie this year I hope I can convey the fact that this brand of humor may not be palatable to all. It has the rough edges that maybe only guys can relate to (of course, I heard many girls laughing their asses off too) but while not being crass in an American Pie-like manner, it has the typical funny moments that an HBO sitcom would have. Sexual humor if done well can be unbeatable and Knocked Up does it extremely well. You wouldn’t want to watch this movie with your parents or kids. Let yourself go, don’t be afraid to laugh at its sexual jokes and trust me, you will have a great time.

These are just some of the movies that I have seen in recent times but I’ll probably continue on the others later and just might have more to add. Summer is just getting started.

by Patrix | on Wednesday, June 13th, 2007 at 11:19 am | Movies, Personal . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.