I can’t wait to spend some time tinkering around this problem.

Finally someone who can see (and show us) the forest without getting lost in the trees. Hope to read the full book someday…

Fresh! After a while, something original and out of ordinary from Bollywood. Story of Auro, a witty naughty 12-year old with progeria, ie a rare genetic disorder in which body ages 5-6 times faster than normal. Despite of his disease, Auro is so full of life and radiates such positivity that he strikes you as the happiest character of all, even after you ignore his precociousness.

Excellent performance by Vidya Balan, posing as a gynecologist single mother, and the kind who can raise an exceptional child like Auro. When an average mother would get stuck at showering pity and blaming planets, Vidya effortlessly sees beyond Auro’s illness and finds enormous love, joy and happiness that Auro brings to the world of everyone around him. One dialogue is still ringing in my ears. She is watching Auro play in the playground while a curious woman inquires about Auro’s “condition”. She explains A-G-T-C base-pairs and genetic codes by a concise one-liner, and then there is the punch line (hoping my translation doesn’t diffuse it): “when one out of 3 million genetic codes is altered, we call that Auro <pause> a lucky boy indeed, isn’t he?”. Here is another punch from her: “Just because you gave him your bloody sperm doesn’t make him your bloody son!”.

Satisfactory performance by Abhishek Bachchan as well. Portraying a young and innovative MP, he immediately connects with the Indian youth, and captures their imagination of a progressive politician. His motto is to convince people that politics is not a bad word. But Abhi is at his best in the second half — humbled by his mistakes, delighted to know he has a son, and eager to be a family guy.

Paresh Rawal is entertaining with lots of humor as usual. Will never forget his impeccable delivery of  “Amol, are you gay?”

The movie’s novelty has somewhat natural grip without any sex, violence, or strong melodrama. Although you feel something lacking, as if there is still significant room of improvement. Perhaps its the direction, or the stretched ending, or something else — I don’t know. I think it will appeal deeply to a niche audience, but I doubt if it will be as widely received as Taare Zamin Par, although it was also a novel plot without sex, violence, or strong melodrama.

Well, also watched Chokher Bali yesterday; so the two movies made a nice thought provoking weekend. In fact, the one that brought the first snow of the season

Have been thinking of starting a blog for a while, what could be a better day!

For those who would like to know what Diwali is about, President Obama presents it in a much better way than I could do: