Memories

The further behind I leave you,

You return with more vigour.

Though I never want you to return,

You keep haunting.

And when you decide to stop haunting,

I come behind, begging,

To haunt me,

So that,

I never forget you!

Its Twilight Now

Yeah, it is the Twilight mania for me now. I can't put down the book without wanting to take it up and start reading again. I don't want to go to sleep, instead lie down and read and read and read. I just want to finish of my cooking and other chores so that I can just indulge in the pleasure of reading. Its real fun now. Seems like I have got back that pace of reading I used to have back in my college days. And as the thickness of the pages on the left hand side, while reading, increases, I am more motivated to keep reading.

I plan to write a review about the series. I have already completed the first two of the series - Twilight and New Moon. Started on with Eclipse. It is a pretty thick book and the last one - Breaking Dawn is even thicker.

Okay no more time to write. Need to catch up with my reading now.

Sometimes....

... it is so lovely to sit all alone,

When it is raining heavily,

Watching the drops falling one after the other,

Shedding a tear or two thinking of the past,

But still with a smile on your lips!

Manikyakallu

Year: 2011

Genre: Drama

Direction: M Mohanan

Cast: Prithviraj and Samvrutha Sunil

Rating: Good

Watched the movie this Friday. I felt that it was worth a watch. Unlike other movies released recently, it was not with high hopes or expectations that I went to watch this movie. But indeed, the movie is a worth watch. When compared to the recent disastrous movies, Manikyakallu is conventional malayalam movie with a decent star cast, story, and a message.

The story is a usual one and we are sure to have watched stories similar to this in the past. Though it was more like the old wine in a new bottle, the new bottle was really good. Prithviraj seemed a normal human being and far better than what he portrayed in Urumi. All the characters, did commendable jobs, in the small roles offered. Samvritha had a new look and mannerisms, which she did with extreme effortlessness. Nedumudi, Jagathy, Salim Kumar, Indrans, and the entire cast was good. I would say that the cast itself seemed like a reason for a good watch. The children who played the student cast also were too good. It never seemed as though they were enacting, but just seemed like normal school students. There were no unwanted romantic scenes, supernatural stunt sequences, or exotic locations. Everything seemed perfect and just what a normal Malayalam audience can relate to.

The camera work also was commendable. The beauty of the locations stood out in many of the scenes. The characters also fit in place with the locations. The songs may not linger on after you leave the theater, but were apt for the situation.

All in all, a good movie and a perfect one for a thought.

Animated Movies!

I have been watching a lot of animated movies recently. It all started with Tangled. Before watching Tangled, I was not very fond of the animated movies. In other words, Tangled inspired me to go forward and watch all the good movie out there.

So to list all what I watched over the past few weeks:
- Ice Age (Dawn of the Dinosaurs)
- Ratatouille
- Finding Nemo
- Wall-E
- Monsters vs. Aliens

Well, to tell you the truth, I have been blown off my feet. I never knew I was turning myself away from such lovely movies. The stories are good and characters, awesome. Even after watching some of them, they linger on for a long and keep appearing in front of my eyes. Wall-e was one such character. I am highly impressed and loved the character to the core - his eyes, hands, and even the sounds he makes. Similarly, Nemo, Dory, and Marlin from Finding Nemo - all of these are wonderful characters.

And I still have some more movies to watch on my list now:
- Cars
- Up
- Sleeping Beauty

Will definitely keep you posted on how each movie is.

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

Year: 2010

Genre: Fantasy and Action

Direction: Mike Newell

Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Gemma Arterton, Ben Kingsley, and Alfred Molina

Rating: Good

The movie opens with some nice golden shots showing the deserts of Arabia and some narration. Well, the shots really made me interested in watching the movie. As I said the shots are basically in a golden yellow tint and are absolutely lovely.

The movie is the story of an adopted Persian Prince (Jake), his invasion of the city of Alamut along with his foster brothers from the royal blood, the discovery of a divine dagger, some other revelations as time passes by.

The princes are made to attack the city by their uncle (Ben Kingsley), who misleads them to believe that the city served for the making of weapons and selling it off to Persia's enemies. They attack and win over the city. The Prince gets a dagger, which is a sacred dagger, which when used properly has the ability to reverse time. This dagger is what leads the story. It further shows the adventures and journeys in the life of the Prince, along with the Princess of Alamut and how he finally saves it from falling into the wrong hands.

The movie is wonderfully shot and keeps you interested throughout. Shot in Morocco, the movie is definitely worth watching.

Memoirs of a Geisha

Year: 2005

Genre: Drama

Direction: Rob Marshall

Cast: Zhang Ziyi, Ken Watanabe, and Michelle Yeoh

Rating: Good

This is a serious, yet touching and memorable movie. Now, how I came about to watch this movie -My colleague gave me the book to read. It was not with any great interest that I started reading the book. And even after I started reading, there was nothing too exciting that kept me reading, yet there was some curiosity that made me continue. I would not say that the book is a great literary piece of work. It seems written in simple language without any great elements involved. But yes, the story is a peculiar one.

Chiyo, belongs to a very poor fisherman family, where her mother is on her death bed. She has an elder sister too. The girls are sold to a wealthy man, who inturn sells them again. Chiyo is sold to a Geisha house. For the first few years of her life, she cries, tries to run away, is harassed by another Geisha, and suffers a lot of pain. But eventually we see, how she keeps her will-power and goes on to become one of the most popular Geisha in Gion.

The journey is amazing. In the book, the journey doesn't seem that interesting as there are many incidents happening in between. But the movie has the flow and the visualization is wonderful.

The movie has quite a lot of breathtakingly wonderful shots. The shots are such that you seem to notice nothing but the beauty in it. Be it the shot where little Chiyo runs through the Orange gateways to put the coins which the Chairman gave, or the cherry blossom, or even the flowing water with the bleeding colours of the clothes.

The book was written by Arthur Golden, published in 1997, and is fictional. The movie was based on the book and directed by Rob Marshall in 2005.

Finding Nemo

Year: 2010

Genre: Comedy and Animation

Direction:

Andrew Stanton

Voice: Albert Brooks (Marlin), Ellen DeGeneres (Dory), and Alexander Gould (Nemo)

Rating: Excellent

Phew, I wonder how I could miss it all these years! Such a lovely movie. I loved it from shot 1 to the very last shot. An extremely awesome and thrilling movie. What if it didn't have any humans to take the movie forward. Nemo, Dory, and Marlin were superb. It would be mean if I miss out any of the characters. All were cute and lovely.

Finding Nemo (2003) is the story of a single parent-a clown fish, Marlin, who raises his only son with extreme care and love, only to be taken away by an underwater diver-dentist to Sydney right in front of Marlin. This is how the movie begins. The rest of the movie shows how Marlin, who as Nemo says, is afraid to come out in the ocean from the coral reefs, swims across the ocean, miles and miles, to Sydney, to rescue his son. The journey is interesting as Dory joins (Psss, Dory is a sweetie with ahem, ahem, short-term memory loss - pretty interesting?). I loved the moments when Dory keeps referring to Nemo by names like Bingo, Fabio, and the like. I am highly excited as I write each word about the movie.

The animation is excellent. The fine details, vibrant colours, and the ease with which the characters move as in real life, is amazing. The voice overs also are commendable. I loved the attention given to each sound in the movie. To point out, each time Nemo kept fluttering his 'lucky fin', I could hear the fluttering. I mean, isn't that amazing? Well yes, I am a lot excited having watched this movie.

The movie went on to receive the Academy Award for the Best Animated Feature.

I loved the theme of the movie. To me, it was such a striking plot. It is easy for us to imagine and feel empathy towards a human losing his child and going all over the places, knocking doors in search of the kid. But what about a fish? Just imagine, swimming miles and miles underwater, to find his lost kid. I think it is a brilliant plot and was really touching as well. I really loved the way how emotions were portrayed by each of the characters.

And finally, I chose the poster for this post, so that it had almost all the characters in the movie. But I could not find Nemo in it. Can you find?

Tangled

Year: 2010

Genre: Animation

Direction: Nathan Greno and Byron Howard

Voice: Mandy Moore, Donna Murphy, and Zachary Levi

Rating: Excellent

Have you watched Tangled? No, please go and watch it. A complete entertainer. Based on the fairy tale of Rapunzel, the movie is put in a rather entertaining and comical way. It is an animated movie and kids would love it completely. Not only kids, even adults would, if you have a liking for fairy tales or animated movies. I am a complete lover of fairy tales and thus went for the movie. I was very excited right from the start till the end.

The movie is directed by Nathan Greno and Byron Howard. I am not sure of the actual cast or anyone who worked behind the screens for making the movie a great one. Rapunzel as well as Flynn Ryder were interesting. But what interested me the most were the characters, Pascal, the pet chameleon and Maximus, the royal horse. Pascal was really adorable and sweet. Maximus stole the limelight with his mannerisms and wit.

The movie is a musical and a total entertainer. You wouldn't even realize when the movie gets over. I just wanted to see it over and over again. It was a lovely watch. I loved how the lanterns were raised into the sky, how Rapunzel managed her hair and performed stunts with it.

Go watch it! :-)