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PITHAMAGAN RELEASED

Topic started by SIVA (@ 203.195.184.205) on Thu Oct 2 05:03:36 EDT 2003.
All times in EST +10:30 for IST.

THE MOST AWAITED MAESTRO'S PITHMAGAN RELASED NY FIVE STAR AUDIOS Y'DAY.

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Responses:

• Old responses
  
• From: sabesan (@ 65.166.51.6) on: Mon Nov 10 19:14:54 EST 2003
  
  AS - agreed..... except this "professor" did not have any other "professor" for him as example.....
  
  but yes, i agree, that Kamal took it to the next level, and for sure there are lots to follow (thank god, its not Ajith :-))....
  
  
• From: V (@ 24.59.74.246) on: Mon Nov 10 19:58:52 EST 2003
  
  Mr. Whatever
  
  Let me make myself clear here. It is good to cast dark-skinned not-so-beautiful heroes for films. In fact it is representative of all of us common men!
  
  We all do not look like heroes anyway. So for a film about a mechanic or rickshaw guy casting a dark-skinned hero is good thing! My concern is, Why not a dark-skinned heroine for the movie? We have seen movies where Rich hero falls in love with poor heroine. Even in these cases the heroine we see are fair (or atleast made to look fair in make-up!).
  
  Please re-read my post. I am even against Kamal(a fair-skinned actor) acting with heroines and dancing and all that s-hit. I am just saying that we have to be even broader and accept dark-skinned and ordinary looking heroines and we must make them act with people like Vijay, Vikram, Ajith etc. The true character of these guys and also the guys who make films with songs like "karuppu than enakku pidicha coloru..." will come out.
  
  Haha! These guys say dark skin color is no reason for prejudice and write half dozen songs for Rajini where female in Duets praise his dark color. However they always cast a Bombay import or a fair-skinned girl as heroine. This is what I am against!
  
  Hmmm ok... let a CM's daughter fall in love with a rogue like mechanic. We have had enough of those trash. For once why not a dark-skinned heroine who is a servant-maid in the film?? Why not??? Because we dont want to accept dark heroines on screen. We must have fair thala thala bombay heroines but we will write songs hailing dark skin. What nonsense!
  
  Ask them to make movies where characters look realistic. Not one where an auto driver wears Reebok shoes and wears ray-Ban sunglasses. It is mere mockery of the proletarian population!
  
  
• From: Whatever (@ 203.131.109.66) on: Mon Nov 10 20:20:49 EST 2003
  
  V, what about actresses like Saritha and Archana? What about Jaya Bachhan nee Bhaduri? They were all dark.
  
  The 'mere mockery' phrase sounds impressive but it is just hot air. Why should characters look realistic? And why is it not realistic? There are exceptions to everything and why don't you take it as the movie maker's way of portraying that exception. Twain said, "Why can't fact be stranger than fiction? Fiction after all has to make sense". :-)
  
  An even more important question to me is, why should movies always portray realism. There is a place and a niche for those kind of movies; there is another for the movies where one can suspend belief for the 3 hours or so. We have directors like Ray, Mrinal Sen et al to make the kind of movies that you are talking about. Why not let the others just entertain without worrying about whether it is rational or logical?
  
  One last comment. If your grouse is against the directors who actually produce movies for sheer entertainment but wear a holier-than-thou-I-am-a-serious-moviemaker cloak, I am in complete agreement with you. That is my point in my previous post. It is, to me, a healthy discussion, not an opportunity to throw mud. I am happy to see that you too have kept it that way.
  
  Naaz, wordplay will get you nowhere. :-) Good point, except that I think you have missed the woods for the trees.
  
  
• From: velji (@ 61.11.82.151) on: Mon Nov 10 22:47:14 EST 2003
  
  Hi! Kamal fan
  
  Though I do not attribute myself to the acting talents of a particular actor, I fully subscribe to your views about Shivaji. After Parasakthy and Raja rani all Shivaji's movies were trash even though they appealed to the illiterate masses. Can any one sit through "Pasa malar Now " He over, over over acted, his lip movements to songs were exagerated and even obscene! He was just an old model car , which can be appreciated only for it's antiguity. No one appreaciates an old Ambassador car in comparision to a Ford Ikon.Those were times that any movement in a cinema screen were lapped up by the audience.
  If "Mudal Mariyathai" and "Thevar Magan" were good it was because of the Directors.
  If Shivaji was celebrated in those times-there were no better actors like Kamals, vikrams, Viveks etc. It was just " Yillatha oorukku yiluppam poo chakkarai " that Shivaji was acclaimed.
  
  
• From: velji (@ 61.11.82.151) on: Mon Nov 10 22:47:20 EST 2003
  
  Hi! Kamal fan
  
  Though I do not attribute myself to the acting talents of a particular actor, I fully subscribe to your views about Shivaji. After Parasakthy and Raja rani all Shivaji's movies were trash even though they appealed to the illiterate masses. Can any one sit through "Pasa malar Now " He over, over over acted, his lip movements to songs were exagerated and even obscene! He was just an old model car , which can be appreciated only for it's antiguity. No one appreaciates an old Ambassador car in comparision to a Ford Ikon.Those were times that any movement in a cinema screen were lapped up by the audience.
  If "Mudal Mariyathai" and "Thevar Magan" were good it was because of the Directors.
  If Shivaji was celebrated in those times-there were no better actors like Kamals, vikrams, Viveks etc. It was just " Yillatha oorukku yiluppam poo chakkarai " that Shivaji was acclaimed.
  
  
• From: paran (@ 203.123.16.78) on: Mon Nov 10 23:12:00 EST 2003
  
  Did Sivaji acted in Pithamagan?
  
  
• From: Naaz (@ 24.87.30.219) on: Tue Nov 11 00:14:06 EST 2003
  
  Whatever -
  
  Nothing speaks louder (yet again) than irony, here more than elsewhere.
  You say I'll get all and nothing with wordplay, yet you finish your thought with a metaphor. Word play by any other name? :-))
  
  In honesty, I think a little bit of seriousness about criticism and its role in popular culture (such abundance of it on the IT freeways) is long overdue. I wish more people would discuss the nature and (de)merits of criticism (irony included.) whenever they can. It can only add to a better understanding.
  
  And-
  thanks for conceding the point! :-)
  
  
• From: V (@ 24.59.74.246) on: Tue Nov 11 00:17:44 EST 2003
  
  Mr Whatever,
  
  I am not saying that heroic and illogical movies must stop altogether. I am just against plain old formulaic masala offerings like Tirumalai and Anjaneya.
  
  We should have a good balance. It will be easy for me to compare the European film industry but many people will miss my point so I will refrain from doing so. I agree with you that we should not expect Reality always. But my man, I am still expecting the first mainstream tamil cinema to come out realistic. Kannathil Muthamittal was almost there but not quite!
  
  I hope you get my point. I just want atleast 10% of our movies to have some sense and not continually take us for a ride year after year with heroism dialogues and Bombay import heroines seeking shelter under a typical porukki looking hero. You may argue thats fine. But my point is let not all movies be like that! Let us have some realistic fare in Mainstream Tamil Cinema!
  
  Your point about Saritha is accepted! I consider her a wonderful actress and sometimes refer to her era as Saritha-era movies! (The ones with green ambasaddor cars and villains wearing striped coat!) But of the current bunch even darker shade actresses like Roja, Rambha are made so brght on screen because our makkal have made a system where we wont accept dark females but we will hail dark males.
  
  As you picked out and brought out Saritha and Jaya Badhuri you will very well know and accept that I wont have trouble listing the dark skinned heroes. You can literally count the dark skinned heroines with your fingers. Are you trying to convince me that there is no gender inequality in our attitude? I am arguing for the case of dark skinned heroines. We must accept them too! Thats my main point!
  
  
  Why dont we have a "heroine" in a movie who is dark-skinned and who acts as a servant-maid or something like that? We can tolerate Vijay in a mechanic role. Why not the same attitude for females? Your answer is going to be that the people wont like it. Thats right! Our people like fair skin whatever you may say! Thats the ultimate fact. Unless we change that attitude there wont be any fairness in our picture and realism will continue to be an inscrutable concept as far as Tamil movies and makkal go.
  
  [Again, I dont mind Masala fares. I just want some realistic films too in the mainstream!. Movies like Pithamagan, Kannathil Muthamittal are too few and rare! Even in pithamagan Laila never suited the role]
  
  
• From: Whatever (@ 203.131.109.66) on: Tue Nov 11 03:09:20 EST 2003
  
  Naaz, this constant back and forth is getting us nowhere. :-) Let me say this as clearly as I can, though it might either not be acceptable to you or even logical, for that matter.
  
  My primary grouse against the critics is that most of them suffer from an attitude of superciliousness. Most things are beneath them and in their infinite wisdom and with the power of the media at their beck and call, destroy artistes. Now, a call can be made for the artistes to ignore these spurious critics, but with such a plethora of them around, it is hard to separate the grain from the chaff. There are artistes who do this well, no gainsaying that. Take Raja for instance. He does what he does and rarely gives a jot - at least in the past few years - about what the critics say. Does this confidence stem from arrogance or intense self-belief? Like someone said on this forum, there is a very thin line dividing the two. At least perception-wise.
  
  Either way, that can come only with time. Even Raja, if unsubstantiated reports are to be believe, was very hurt by the acrimonious attack by a critic on his symphony and that is the reason for its delayed release. Or so the story goes.
  
  Don't get me wrong. Critics perform a necessary function. But the function, as I have theorised :-), is to be a witness to the act of value creation. Wordplay again? Indeed. :-) Seriously, the critic, as I see it, should comment on whether the artiste was true to his vision. If he questions the artiste's vision itself, he oversteps his boundaries. This is what I meant when I replied to V about the movie maker churning out tripe (whatever that is) but claiming that it has a cloak of serious cinema (again, whatever that is).
  
  My opinion. If we can agree not to pick on each other's grammar, we could possibly have a good discussion. No acrimony. :-)
  
  V, I get your point. My answer that people will not like it is neither here nor there. There are movie makers who see the Art in it and there are those who see the money. Very rarely someone comes along who can marry the two happily. I am not saying that it is unachievable, but merely that it is quite often unattempted. Why? It is my impression that movie making in India has turned into an assembly line production system. Not because of the sheer numbers, but because of the simple formulas. To derive, or devise, a new formula means working at it for lengthy periods. During this, the cash flow is a trickle - if there is any at all - and audiences being as fickle as they are, who can guarantee what the outcome will be. Therein lies the problem. There are more businessmen than artistes in the movie making business. And that is what it is for the most part, a business.
  
  I agree that there is a definite preponderance of the dark-skinned heroes in comparison with the heroines. I am not British, though that may qualify as the classic British understatement. :-) There was some movie called Pasi or something which had Shobha cast as a servant-maid, IIRC. And there was the other one with Archana, Veedu? These movies made the attempt at serious cinema - maybe the wrong adjective and perhaps politically incorrect to call it that. From your posts, it appears to me that you are placing the onus partly on the movie makers and partly on the audience to improve the lot of the film industry. Who is to take the lead?
  
  Finally, I have not seen both the movies KM and PM. So I do not want to comment on those. And do you think all this should be in a different thread? Some people might be mighty upset:-)
  
  
• From: k_vanan (@ 202.188.53.164) on: Tue Nov 11 03:32:56 EST 2003
  
  see the cinema.com.my top ten chart - two week this film rank top 1 collection in malaysia
  
  

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