Weekend Lessons

Two days is not good enough time to assimilate the week gone by but its just enough to spend 2 hours watching a movie that can shape the way you think of the world. I wanted to start this one by attempting to write a review of a movie that touched me deeply. It took 3 hours of fluctuating from one football match to another. Add to it a dash of youtube distraction and twitter deluge and 3 hours quickly became 5. So here I am ready to plunge into what is going to be my first rmovie review.

I am man enough to admit that I know nothing about movies though I have had the good fortune of being with friends and family who live by the celluloid. Not to say that I cannot or do not appreciate movies, but the fact that I watch far too few of them, I am hardly an anybody to comment on one. In fact if I dig a little deeper, I do not intend to write a movie review. This is in fact another life lesson that I want to hold close to me so that when I read it years later, not only does it stick with me but adds the right perspective at that oint in life.

Kai Po Che is not only a bollywood movie that I have watched in a long time since I started beaming from a new land, but the only movie in a very long time that has touched me. If I had to sum up the movie in one sentence I would call it the most uplifting experience that a 30 year old can get. The degree of insight that the writer and director have displayed comes only with exceptional ability of observation and assimilation.

I analysed the movie from two distinct vantage points, one was cinematic and the other was life. I have seen visually brilliant movies in my recent memory, they have been a delight for the eyes - stunning camera angles, beautiful colours and phenomenal editing but I do not remember a movie in the past where just when I thought the movie was getting predictable, a completely new dimension opens up and changes the course of the movie. The film is authentic, written and shot with a precision time-piece in one hand and a pen in another and carries the stamp of deep insight and sheer hard work.

I revel in digression and before I succumb to it in this piece, I will quickly shift gears to the part that interested me the most. Life has its ups and downs, we hear that a lot only because its the single most important truth of our lives. There is nothing more frightening to know that your life is going to fall apart the next day. Nobody knows that but we all know that if we lift ourselves up and look beyond the tatters we are in, we will make it. There is another dimension to it. Our actions are not only our own, they affect the world around us that we do not understand. Not that I understand it, infact there is no documentary evidence of that happening but if we think deeply about it, this transitional act of good or bad has a long ripple.

In the movie, this was brought to life by India's test match victory after the earthquake that wrecked the small town where the movie is set. Not only did it bring back to life the town and its people but also refreshed the business for the 3 guys. Its not a  smashingly convincing argument but its enough food for thought. Good weather and bad traffic can make or break a drive but for any one of those to happen one has to set out on the road first. Just like that, help can come from any quarter, as human beings we tend to get too involved in the moment and fail to see beyond the immediate. In the name of dynamism the media is selling us the 'moment' to seize and if we dont seize it now, we will lose out in the race.

In fact this is the message I got from the movie - we live in an environment where we are constantly attracting opposites. Some of us embrace them as challenges and some disgrace our own lucks for having them. It is only those who embrace them that really make the cut. The three friends in the movie are three corners of a scalene triangle. They are connected to each other in varying degrees and are polarized in their thoughts and opinions. Not only have they embraced this and made the best of the situation, they have gone ahead and seized the day.

I am inspired.