Movie Star in Town. I'm Swooning.

It's not unusual to see a film crew in San Francisco. Rare, but not unusual. But you don't usually see a major movie star at the center of the set. Spotted at the 280 on-ramp at 6th street in the city:


Sharukh Khan.
He's in town with Kajol. Jimmy Shergill. and Director Karan Johar (Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham)

Pics from a Market Street shoot at Asian Outlook.

The movie, My Name is Khan, has Khan playing a Muslim man arrested as a terrorist in post 9/11 America for is odd behavior-- turns out he has Aspergers syndrome.

Translating the analogy

Tim, writing from the second leg of his India journey:

Autorickshaws in Chennai : autorickshaws in Delhi :: Asteroids : Sinistar

For those too young to remember, or who were busy with an actual life in 1982 to have been playing Sinistar at their local Golfland, I've provided a helpful visual translation.

In Asteroids, players control their ship with short bursts of thrust in an environment approximating zero-gravity physics (in two dimensions). Motion continues in a straight line, and even slows to a stop (as if there were somehow friction in space).

The asteroids you are attempting to destroy/avoid are also moving in straight lines at constant speeds. When they disappear off the edge of the screen, they reappear at the opposite edge (180° opposite), continuing to travel in the same direction at the same speed. The challenge is that as you shoot the larger, slow moving asteroids, they break down into smaller asteroids, now moving in new trajectories at quicker speeds.

At the start of each level, it is easy to sit in one spot and rotate your ship to shoot at asteroids passing by. As the level continues, you are forced to continually adjust your position with short (or long) bursts of thrust to avoid the paths of an increasing number of asteroids traveling at varied (if constant) rates of speed. The video below is illustrative (you do not have to watch the whole thing):



YouTube link

While unrealistic, the physics of the game are extremely predictable. When your ship is eventually destroyed, there is a sense that had you only done a better job of anticipating the various trajectories, you could have escaped your fate.

Sinistar begins cosmetically the same. You pilot a triangular ship in two dimensions, attempting to break apart large asteroids.

But unlike Asteroids,there are multiple things flying at you, in variable trajectories, at variable (non-constant) speeds. Worse still, one cannot control the acceleration of the ship with controlled engine thrusts. In Sinistar, THERE IS NO STOPPING.



YouTube link

Add to that the screaming Sinistar (skip ahead to 1:30 into the video), and a game of Asteroids begins to feel like a spa day in comparison.

Which is simply to say Tim's had an exciting first day in Delhi.

Solla Solla Enna Perumai

An unforgettable--really, I mean UNFORGETTABLE--clip out of India. But not from Bollywood or Tollywood, but Kollywood--the modestly-sized Tamil-language movie industry centered in Kodambakkam, Chennai.

The film is called Ella Inba Mayam, and--despite the terrible quality of the print--dates to 1981. The movie, according to comments found here, is intended as a Peter Sellers-style comedic romp, but I'd call the star (Kamal Haasan) more of a Tamil Mike Myers, at least from what I can see here.

Groovy, baby.



Link

Thrillermania: Not "Thriller", but an incredible simulation

Boing Boing and Spectacular Self-Indulgence pointed us to the mass dance phenomenon of the week: hundreds of prisoners in a Philippine prison recreating the dancing from Michael Jackon's "Thriller" music video (as seen in a single wideshot).

Remind me when I'm convicted and sent up the river to find a jail with THAT kind of activities director.



Of course the YouTube "related" list sent me straightway to the Tollywood (sic, see comment below) "Thriller" ripoff, which I'd not previously had the chance to see.



And for those who missed it in 2004, a shot-for-shot Lego stopmotion recreation of the ENTIRE thirteen minute Michael Jackson video.



BONUS: Apparently there is a whole subculture of people dedicated to recreating Ok Go's backyard and treadmill dance videos using lego people and stopmotion animation. How would these people ever connect without YouTube? Link

Warrants Issed for Richard Gere and Shilpa Shetty

via The Associated Press

NEW DELHI -- A court issued arrest warrants for Hollywood actor Richard Gere and Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty on Thursday, saying their kiss at a public function "transgressed all limits of vulgarity," media reports said.

If convicted, Gere and Shetty could be fined, jailed for three months, or both.

Sure, it's news, and they scooped the Bollywood fan sites on this one, but the AP totally missed out on this: Aishwarya Rai will take her husband's surname to be known as Aishwarya Bachchan.

And this: Bollywood is planning to "remake" Charlie's Angels.

Gere kiss sparks India protests

Protestors are burning Richard Gere in effigy, after he publicly kissed Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty at an AIDS awareness event, in a recreation of one of his moves from Shall We Dance?

More conservative Indians, no fans of Bollywood to begin with, are burning Shilpa Shetty in effigy.

Shetty, no stranger to contreversy, is not only a Bollywood actress, but the winner of the UK's version of Celebrity Big Brother, as well as an activist for HIV/AIDS awareness and PETA.

Although Ms. Shetty is a fixture in the celebrity "news" each week on "Namaste America" and "India Waves," we've seen none of her movies, including the notable release from 2004, Phir Milenge, a remake of Jonathan Demme's 1993 Philadelphia. The film featured Ms. Shetty in the role originally taken by Tom Hanks and future Mr. Aishwarya Rai, Abishek Bachchan (the Big B's son), in the Denzel Washington role. But with all references to homosexuality removed. And the requisite musical numbers thrown in (more video montages than dance numbers, though).

Gere has apologized profusely for any embarassment he's caused Ms. Shetty, and for his own cultural blunder.

I was going to enter a joke here about waiting for him to apologize for one of his lame movies, but I really haven't seen any of them.

Colbert: Bollywood Feud, Part 2

(from The Colbert Report, January 18)
Stephen Colbert follows up on the celebrity feuds from the previous week, including the spat between Shahrukh Khan and Amitabh Baachaan. (Includes a favorite Bollywood clip of Ronan's).

In the interest not getting our news entirely from Comedy Central, I tried to find via Google the actual details of the feud in question. However, though Google sources quite a few Indian media outlets, the fact that Colbert was giving this feud play on American television is bigger news than any actual feud.

In any case, the Bollywood news and gossip cycle has already moved on its next big item, the upcoming marriage of the Big B's son to sometimes co-star and former Miss World Aishwarya Rai.

Stephen Colbert Weighs In: The Big B or SRK?

(YouTube link)
From The Colbert Report, January 7, 2007. Colbert's "We the Mediator" segment weighs in on celebrity feuds: Rosie O'Donnell v. Donald Trump, Angelina Jolie v. Madonna, and of course:


Shahrukh Khan v. Amitabh Baachan

Clooney Is The New Khan

Here's a movie ticket I'm willing to buy.

Indian pop jukebox

Ronan's teacher Amena says this is the place to be for non-stop Hindi pop music and miscellaneous bits o'culture. Also available in Tamil, Telugu, and Malayalam.

Hemachandra

According to Wikipedia, Hemachandra was an 11th century Jain poet and scholar in Gujarati, who we remember mostly today for discovering the Fibonacci numbers fifty years before Fibonacci did.

But that's not the Hemachandra you'll find on YouTube

This Hemachandra is a college freshman in Hyperabad studying Animation and Multimedia, and more importantly, for YouTube users, the 2nd runner up on Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2005, an Indian reality TV show kind of like American Idol (Although Sony and Fremantle media do run Indian Idol in India, and even though Sa Re Ga Ma Pa looks like a blatant rip off of Idol, it's actually a re-brandingof a singing contest that's been running for 13 years). The producers are trying to position the show as a search to find new talent for the film industry... and not a pop music poster boy.

So Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2005 really is a singing contest, searching for excellent playback singers (who won't appear onscreen after this show), which means "Chandu" (his nickname) and his competitors really have to nail the vocals... and apparently having no stage presence whatsoever is not a liability.

Watch as the camera pans and swoops and cuts to the excited audience and Hemachandra sings one of the big dance numbers from Main Hoon Na while pretty much not moving.

FYI: Debojit Saha and Vineet Singh were the final two contestants (Debojit won). I haven't had time to check them out on YouTube yet. All three finalists are under contract to Zee TV for three years. Chandu, a former wedding singer, now has three films under his belt, two in Telugu, Vamsam and Premante Intena, and one in Hindi, Dil Diya Hai (opens August 25!).

Krrish!

If your whistle was wet by the NYT article from last month about the new Bollywood superhero movie Krrish, you'll enjoy even more this review by media theorist and fanboy Henry Jenkins.

Much like the original Superman, he covers vast distances through long leaps but doesn't actually have the ability to fly. He can scale a mountain peak as if it were a series of stepping stones. He can run faster than the local horses. He can reach into the river and yank out a fish with his bare hands. And he can speak with the animals and get them to do his bidding. And, in several sequences, he demonstrates his superiority, Gandhi style, by withstanding enormous physical and emotional abuse without resorting to violence.

Sadly, it doesn't appear to be playing in California. Yet.

But trailers and song clips are available at the official movie website.

Pretty Woman (Remix)

Kal Ho Naa Ho - Maahe Ve

Bhangra remix of Roy Orbison's "Pretty Woman," featuring Sharukh Khan in, of all things, a Fourth of July parade.

With Spanish subtitles.

Taal

Apparently Roger Ebert got as big a kick out of Subhash Gai's 1999 hit, Taal, as I did, although he didn't have the benefit of subtitles. He likens Bollywood musicals to those of Doris Day... although I have to say, I've never seen a Doris Day musical.

Of course, I didn't have the benefit of Ebert's review when I walked into Reel Video. I chose it by the DVD cover. There's dancers on the cover. That's a good sign. A.R. Rahman's name is on the cover, that's a good sign (he's the gold standard for Bollywood songs). On the back, Alga Yagnik's name. She's the lead female vocalist. This could be a good sign, except I always get her mixed up with Asha Bhosle. Also, I look for cases from Eros International, which sticks to blockbusters and crowd pleasers. I don't want to accidentally bring home an art film.

For pure spectacle, I'm sorry to say, that Kuch Kuch Hota Hai and Mohabbatein spoiled me. They're much more clip-worthy, and their internal milieus are more consistent.

The story in Taal is great musical love story fun: City boy (son of a multinational's CEO) meets peasant girl who teaches yoga. Girl follows boy to Mumbai, family quarrel separates them. She gets discovered as pop star by Mumbai's hottest DJ/orchestra conductor/producer/rapper and wins MTV International star of the year award.

But the effort to distinguish the two worlds of the country and the city are pretty jarring: the countryside scenes are nice, filmed on location, but apparently all the pop stars in Mumbai in 1999 were dressing like it's 1982, in spandex and leg warmers. If you don't want to sit through a three hour long subtitled musical, YouTube gives you the highlights. Here's "Taal se Taal," with Aishwarya Rai dancing to the country version and Anil Kapoor rapping the
Western remix.

Only clip that wouldn't invoke total guffaws from an audience unfamiliar with the genre might be the song "Ishq Bina," essentially the love theme from Taal. It's the requisite pre-wedding party song (I swear, there's a wedding party in all of these movies) and again, YouTube's got the clip, sans subtitles, of course.

YouTube: "Indian Beatles"

via Boing Boing

From 1965, a two minute clip from Jaanwar, featuring four musicians in Beatles suits, singing a Hindi cover/rip off of "I Want to Hold Your Hand."

The comments note the title in Hindi is "Tumse Hai Dil Ko," but most other references to this cover song (on sites that cover either the Beatles, cover songs, or that track Indian film music plagiarism) call it "Dekho ab to."

Bollywood + Narrow Gauge Railroad: That's Entertainment!

(YouTube alert: mediocre video quality)

What's more fun that Shahrukh Khan leading adorable moppets at summer camp in a musical number? What could be more fascinating than being introduced to the Hindu festival of Holi by Sharukh's "Dead Poets Society" homage?

A playback song on top of a moving train, that's what.

Check out the shot about 4:55 into this video where the camera moves into the lead couple, goes around them, and backs into the chorus dancers.

From 1998's Dil Se, directed by Mani Ratnam. Song by A. R. Rahman. The combination of electronic beats with the traditional instruments was new at the time. This song appeared again in the musical Bollywood Dreams and in Spike Lee's 2006 film, Inside Man.