The Cynical one has tagged me and I am duty bound to write this. So without further ado..a recap of what this year has meant for little ‘ol me. 

1. Became a full fledged stoner. I thought I was being ridiculous last year, but fuck me I’ve graduated into a stoner now

2. Grew up. At home, I’ve become more approachable, more likely to sit down and have a chat with family than I’ve been in a long time. If ever I get caught at home for smoking marijuana, I am going to say, “Look it’s because of this I became friendlier! *smiles* See?”

3. Made my peace with Hinduism to the extent of buying some books on the subject. Might as well educate myself on the shit I never understood, eh? Never going to practice it though. If I get caught for smoking marijuana, I am going to point to this and say, “Look, I am becoming more religious because of this thing!”

4. Realized I am good at this corporate whore thing. I might not look it – ruffled hair and pubby goatee – and there are times when the lazy-bastard-who-wants-nothing-but-solitude-to-read-smoke up-and-listen-to-music in me wants to scream and run away, but it pays the bills and the people at work are some of the most down to earth individuals I’ve come across. And they mostly seem to possess warped sense of humour. That always helps <no marijuna inset here, sorry>.

5. Bought more books than CDs. Priorities you see. If ever I get caught for smoking marijuana, I am going to say, “Look this plant makes me want to read alot more. What’s so bad about that?”

6. Higher education isn’t working If I get caught for smoking marijuana, I’d be fucked

7. Today marks three years between a certain lady and I. Incredible when you think my previous ‘record’ was three months. Marijuana has played no part in this, you’ll be happy to hear

8. I can’t still drive. And I have no desire to rectify this situation. My dad is getting worried; in desperation, I think, he said he’d buy me a car a year after I receive the licence in an effort to motivate me. Didn’t work. But circumstances now are such that I might as well. Who knows, maybe I’ll actually enjoy this driving shit. If I do get caught smoking marijuana, I will say…no, fucked again

9. Got chicken pox. I could have used some marijuana during those insufferably long three weeks

Reviewing the Coen brothers’ film Fargo Roger Ebert wrote, ‘films like Fargo are why I love the movies’. While watching Uberto Pasolini’s brilliant Machan I understood why Ebert, usually so stoic in his reviews, let his guard down in reviewing that film. Fargo was a movie for the ages – a brilliant parable about people resorting to the far-fetched and absurd when they find themselves cornered and utterly helpless. With Machan, Pasolini and writer Ruwanthie De Chickera tackle similar themes in the Sri Lankan context, more precisely the lengths some Sri Lankans would go to in order to migrate to Europe in search of greener pastures. 

Pasolini produced Full Monty, a movie that made me laugh so hard my family thought I had finally gone insane. Indeed watching Machan’s first act unfold, it was hard not to notice the parallels: like Gaz and his buddy Dave in Full Monty, Stanley and Manoj are out of luck, regularly getting rejected at the embassies of nations they long to work in. Both sets of men then chance upon a scheme that, they believe, can’t fail: Gaz and Dave turn to the exotic world of male stripping, Stanley and Manoj turn to handball. What is handball, I hear you ask. In Stanley’s words: “Nobody fucking knows!” In reality it seems like basketball and football’s illegitimate child. 

The script has an old world charm, an almost Chaplin-esque sense of comedy and timing that is all too rare in this day and age of toilet humor and vomit jokes. It is also unabashedly Sri Lanka and audiences will leave the theater with a newfound vocabulary. I had no idea that so many synonyms existed for the word ‘fuck’ in the Sinhala lexicon. Parents, ye be warned. 

But what really raises this script from good to almost great is De Chickera’s complete mastery of giving each character a voice and presence regardless of their significance in the narrative. A scene involving a grave digger may go down as my favorite of the year. The scene swings from hilarious to deeply melancholic with such ease that I had to restrain myself from clapping at what De Chickera had just achieved.

The acting is top class. Some of the most storied names in Sinhala cinema and theater – Irangani Serasinghe and Malini Fonseka among them – along with their counterparts from Tamil and English theater, come together to form the ensemble. They are uniformly excellent. There is also a tangible lack of ego in the casting for this movie: the bigger, better known members of the cast occupy smaller roles while the relative new comers take on the bigger roles. Dharmapriya Dias steals the show with his portrayal as the dim-witted Stanley. 

Even the peripheral characters – the policemen, the “foreign cattle”, and Stanley’s carefree, race horse-betting aunts (Serasinghe is absolutely brilliant as one of them: she dismisses her nephew’s complaints about the suddenly missing roof by saying, ‘But now I can see the stars and it is cooler too!’) are beautifully fleshed out. If I had to nitpick, I’d just say that Gihan De Chickera wasn’t the most suitable choice for Manoj. While his performance was solid, he wasn’t as convincing as the rest of the cast. 

None of this would have been as effective if the film was shot in some swanky studio set. Pasolini instead opts for the most realistic setting and you are left with moments of intense humor juxtaposed with silent social commentary on the rampant poverty that drives people to such audacious scheming. Therein lies Machan’s brilliance: It is at once a feel good story, a laugh out loud comedy and a social commentary, and remarkably scores high on each of those counts. 

To the cast and crew behind Machan: a sincere thank you.

I’ve been quiet for sometime as far as blogging goes, but decided to write post today on account of Cerno’s desktop screenshot festival. I don’t know if it’s the surpressed geek in me or if I have cyber voyeuristic tendencies, but I love looking at desktop screenshots. Weird fascination right there.

Anyhoo, me desktop in all its glory:

A shitty way to begin a week: George Carlin, comedian extraordinaire, satirist and social critic passed away due to heart failure. Rather than mourn his death, I am going to share this little gem:

The most unfair thing about life is the way it ends. I mean, life is tough. It takes up a lot of your time. What do you get at the end of it? A Death! What’s that, a bonus? I think the life cycle is all backwards. You should die first, get it out of the way. Then you live in an old age home. You get kicked out when you’re too young, you get a gold watch, you go to work. You work forty years until you’re young enough to enjoy your retirement. You do drugs, alcohol, you party, you get ready for high school. You go to grade school, you become a kid, you play, you have no responsibilities, you become a little baby, you go back into the womb, you spend your last nine months floating…

…and you finish off as an orgasm.

Aye, brilliant.

I was tagged by Dili so here are ten things that make me happy.

1. Music – Ambient/atmospheric black metal/death metal/technical death metal/jazz fusion/folk/neo folk/acid folk/hard rock/carnatic/romantic/baroque/’world music’. Sorry for the list and all, but I am a genre nerd. Discovering new artists in these genres is always a pleasure.

2. My favourite writers and poets – Willy Shakespeare, Anthony Burgess, George Orwell, Arthur C Clarke, Mark Danielewski, Toby Litt, Martin Amiss and many many more.

3. Brian Lara taking guard makes me disturbingly giggly and excited. Imagine, if you will, how I react when he plays that awe inspiring cover drive of his or when he charges down the wicket. My world stops spinning when Lara is batting.

4. A certain Cynic. Enough said.

5. Friends – From the guys in school to the Cynic and Pissu Perera Gang, and the buggers in 891. Love ‘em all.

6. Nick Drake – For Pink Moon: saved my sanity (and probably a lot more) when I was on the verge of losing it

7. John McLaughlin – For Shakti and short-circuiting my mind with his guitar playing.

8. Wolves in the Throne Room – For Diadem of 12 Stars. What I would do to relive that moment when I first heard this album.

9. Roger Wootton – For penning those amazing lyrics on First Utterance.

10. Sanath Jayasuriya’s (now sadly infrequent) moments of madness when he becomes a freight train without a break.

Anthropologist/metalhead Sam Dunn’s follow-up to to his groundbreaking 2006 documentary ‘Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey‘ will be coming out soon, and I am excited as a teenager on the brink of losing his cherry to his favourite pornstar.

The new documentary titled ‘Global Metal‘ takes a look at the extreme metal scenes outside traditional metal hotspots in the US and Europe.

Friends of mine who were at Iron Maiden’s show in India last year were lucky enough to meet Dunn when he mentioned the idea for the follow up documentary. They were in awe, buying the bugger beer and whatnot. I was a tad envious as you can imagine. Seeing his documentary was inspirational; it was when metal became a full blown passion in my life. Hopefully, one day the man visits our little isle and savours our own metal scene.

Oh and here’s the trailer:

Quotable quote:

Tom Araya: ‘Slayer in a Muslim country’ (smiles).

PS: I should also add that the girlfriend has the biggest school girl crush on Sam.

Truth be told this is not how I envisioned spending my twenty fifth birthday, but, as the eternal optimist in me keeps reminding, it could have been a whole lot worse; I have more or less recovered, after all, and I no longer resemble a goblin (though my face looks like a dartboard but I digress). That’s the good part. Even better, I have a chance to get some studying and reading done now that the backaches are gone.

The past fortnight has been an eye opener of sorts. I’ve always been a sucker for privacy and there are days when I loathe having to interact with people – be it family or best friends – face to face or via phone and the plethora of communication means that are at our fingertips now. On such days, I have to resist throwing the phone out, locking my room or, worse, let out a few choice words and hurting people.

Time for a change perhaps. I now have this craving to be in the midst of people and, as short-lived as the craving may prove to be, I intend to enjoy the company of people more as soon as I am able to get out of the house.

For the time being, I intend to enjoy my solitude. Today will be spent in the company of my record and book collection.

On other news, I’m hoping to go watch Iron Man at MC this Saturday. I can’t say I am a huge comic book buff but Gwyneth Paltrow is looking all kinds of delicious in the movie. Don’t believe me? Look for yer self:

Yummy.

Obnoxious Weeds: In happier times

I’ve been indifferent to T20 cricket from the very beginning, apathetic even, unbecoming of my self-professed love for the game. But then, I am a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to cricket; give me test cricket any day. Hard grind, survival of the fittest and all that nonsense that seems so ill-fitting in this day and age where everything has to be packaged, branded and dumbed down to make it marketable.

The Indian Premier Leage (IPL), its rival Indian Cricket League (ICL) and the much talked about English Premier League (EPL) bore me to death. I couldn’t care less if Punbab XI get the better of Chennai Superkings or whatever the hell they are called. The Bollywood element has taken the vomit factor to unbearable limits as far as I am concerned. So, for the past fortnight, I was busy paying as much attention to the circus in India as I do to chaps in small cars racing around in circles at over 200 mph: which is around 100 points below zilch. I didn’t even visit Cricinfo during that time .

Until this who Slapgate incident came out.

I don’t know how late I am on the ball here, but I laughed when I saw that the two main protagonists were none other than the two most annoying cricketers I have ever had the misfortune of seeing. Both typify the new India beautifully: loud, brash, uncompromising yet little talent to speak of (with due apology to Mr Sachin Tendulkar, Mr Rahul Dravid and Mr Anil Kumble).

Okay so Singh once had the Aussies tied in knots, but Sreesanth’s greatest claim to fame was slapping (pardon the pun) Andre Nel for a massive six and doing a ‘pelvic thrust’ (to quote Sunil Gavaskar who had Harsh Bogle in stitches when he used that term) in front of the man (incidentally Nel gets the vote for the third most annoying man in cricket).

During last summer’s tour of Australia when the so-called Bollyline controversy exploded, Harbhajan was left facing a ban after he supposedly used derogatory language towards Andrew Symmond. Only the Board of Control in India (aka the richest most power hungry bunch of number crunchers in cricket) rescued their star with a combination of political bargaining and outright brinkmanship.

The rest of the world was ready to side with the Indians then, not interested in learning the facts of the particular episode. For this was, after all, a case of an Aussie getting sledged back and crying foul, surely?

This incident comes a mere month after Scyld Berry, editor of Wisden, wrote in his editorial notes that a physical confrontation in cricket isn’t too far in the future. Prophetic words they have proved.

The slapgate has shown that neither Harbhajan nor Sreesanth – for he is no angel despite his cherubic appearance -have the maturity to be involved in the highest form of the game. Happily, this happened in the midst of a circus and not during the hallowed proceedings of a test match. If it did, nothing less than a ban from all cricket would suffice. Right now, they are both laughing stocks of the cricket world – the Aussie media, as you can imagine, are having a field day at their expense – and so they should be. Hopefully, it serves them both a lesson.

It’s time to shut up and play the game. If you want to be melodramatic, I suggest Bollywood as alternative careers to both these obnoxious weeds.

Slapgate

Three days since I got this damn thing and the depression is beginning to kick in.

When I got the chickenpox, I reasoned that the time off would be an ideal way to catch up with uni work and assignments, get some quality reading done and perhaps even devote time to practicing guitar. But alas. The backache that was symptomatic of the ‘pox has only gotten worse, meaning that I can’t sit or lie down for long periods.

On the brighter side of things, friends from work call from time to time to check on my state. R, the guy who was down with the pox earlier this month called and apologized profusely for infecting me with the illness. I told him to forget about it. He then offered some tips to get through the nightmare including this not-so-subtle warning: “Machang, just remember one thing: don’t, err, play with yourself for the next two weeks. Trust me. It won’t be pretty.”He was on speaker phone when he said that.

All I needed at that time was a mental image of R, blisters and all, dancing with himself.

Dammit.

On a weirder note, my parents insist that I’ve gotten the pox before. Is it possible to get it twice? What are the chances?