Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Help me with my open source research project....

Hope you are doing good. Well to begin with I am pursuing a part time MBA and as a part of our research project (for which I have taken up the topic of Open Source), I require your assistance in getting a small questionnaire filled up.

The questionnaire should not take more than 7-10 minutes. So request all of you to fill the same which can be accessed via the following location. (If possible, you could also refer some of your friends to fill this survey)

http://www.myjavaserver.com/~coolviki/
or
http://opensourcesurvey.vikramkumar.org
Once again thanks, and your help would go a long way in assisting me to complete this course.

Monday, January 15, 2007

Guru Movie Review - Abhishek excels in a demanding role.

Movie - Guru
Director - Mani Ratnam
Producer - Mani Ratnam, G Srinivasan
Music Director - A.R. Rahman
Actor - Abhishek Bachan, Aiswarya Rai, Mithun, Vidya Balan, K Madhavan
Date of Release - 12th January 2007

Maniratnam, A. R. Rahman, Gulzar , Rajiv Menon and a lot of hype had really raised my expectation from this film. In addition after Abhishek's performance in Dhoom 2 he really needed a platform to prove his mettle, which he got and delivered in a way no other could.

The film from the starting to the end belongs to Abhishek Bachan, and you never know but this could become one of the best performances of Abhishek's career and may even ring the box office registers. The movie begins with a shot of Gurubhai (Abhishek Bachan) standing in a huge empty stadium saying that "Bapu kahete hain ke sapnay nahi dekhne chaihe"..... flashback 30 years before where Abhishek is shown as a young teenager migrating to Turkey to work as a delivery boy in a oil company. Seven year later hard work, intelligence and luck is earning him a fat pay package and a promotion. The entrepreneur bug inside Gurubhai prevents him from working any more for anyone else but rather starting his own "biziness".

Landing back in India he decides to marry his friend's sister Sujatha (Aishwarya Rai) for dowry which would enable him to start his own business. Together with his wife and brother in law he heads for Mumbai where he starts off as a textile trader. In the beginning of his career Maneck Dasgupta(Mithun Chakraborty) who runs the "Independent" paper, acts as a mentor to him.

Few years down the line Guru manages to build up a big empire (Shakti Enterprises), but has that been done in an ethical manner ? That's the question which troubles Nanaji for which he assigns Shyam Saxena (Madhavan) the duty of exposing the real insight of Shakti Enterprise , and how it might be growing expsing the loopholes of the laws or by bribing various officials. What happens next is a cat race between Madhavan and Guru is quite an experience to watch. Madhavan is hellbent on exposing Guru whereas Guru seems unfazed by the same. Some of the confrontations scenes are really a delight to watch esp. the scene in which Vidya Balan (Don't know what's she doing in the movie) is kind of stuck between the Nanaji and Guru based on their ideologies.

The climax of the film is definitely one of the highlights of the movie in which he delivers and the audience is spellbound. The voice at times resembles to that of Amitabh Bachan and the performance is also nothing less than that. Without revealing much about the end Guru is sure an enjoyable experience.

The highlight of the movie is undoubtedly Abhishek Bachan who has shown his real class in the movie. Aishwarya has also done a great job though her role was not as demanding as that of Abhishek. Mithun comes up with a good mature performance showing the class he is made up of. Madhavan also does a good job though he does not get a chance to offer much. One of the surprise of the film was Vidya Balan whose role was not that significant but still I guess any role in a Maniratnam movie is not to be missed.

A.R. Rahman does a great job for the background music. In spite of being a great fan of A.R. Rahman the songs definitely do not match his high standards though they have been picturised to perfection. "Jaage Hain" and "Guru bhai.." are positioned as the theme of the movie and are really a pleasure to listen any number of times. One more song, which plays in the background for Vidya Balan is also hummable but for some strange reason was not present in the Audio CD(like the Guru Bhai.. song). Most of the other songs has not been played to their full length and hence does not hamper the flow of the movie. Gulzar saab's lyrics are great and so is Rajiv Menon's work.

Finally hats off to the great man Maniratham for extracting so much from Abhishek Bachan and giving us a pleasurable movie experience. There are quite a few scenes in the movie which Maniratnam has crafted beautifully and probably like no other could have. The starting of the movie, the climax and the confrontation scene between Mithun and Abhishek to name a few.

All in all Guru gives a great start to this new year and definitely not a movie to be missed.

Rating 4/5

Friday, January 12, 2007

Guru Movie Review.....

Guru Review #1

Planning to watch Guru on Sunday Evening. Till then would be linking to the various reviews I find in the net
http://www.naachgaana.com/2007/01/11/guru-movie-review/

Enjoy.....

Guru Review #2
http://www.ibnlive.com/news/masands-verdict-thumbs-up-for-guru/top/31056-8.html

As for the music, what can one say about A R Rahman's score that hasn't been said before, except that he seems to reserve his most
versatile best for Mani Ratnam

Rating 4/5

Its celebration time ...............

Saturday, January 06, 2007

Museum ke Ander Phas Gaya Sikander - Movie Review

Movie - Museum ke Ander Phas Gaya Sikander (Night at the Museum) Cast - Ben Stiller, Carla Gugino, Dick Van Dyke, Mickey Rooney, Bill Cobbs, Jake Cherry, Robin Williams
Director - Shawn Levy
With a name like this, and with my past experience of dubbed movies, I didn't had too much expectations going into this movie, but quite pleasantly I was wrong. The movie is about good-hearted dreamer Larry Daley (Ben Stiller), who is not successful in both personal and professional life is in a dire need of a job. He manages to land up in a job of a security guard in the night shift at the "Museum of National History". What happens next is worth a watch when in the evening everything in the museum comes alive till dawn early next morning. How Larry handles the situation is worth a watch, and the dubbed Hindi dialogues are really funny at times.
Of course the movie also has it's own share of villains who try to steal off some valuables from the museum, but are stopped by Ben Stiller with the help of everyone kept in the museum who come alive passing on the message of "United we stand, dividend we fall.". Kids are sure going to enjoy this movie as it contains everything they could ask for.
All in all a good clean entertainer which is definitely worth a watch.
Rating 3.5/5

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

"Kuch Sawaal Zindagi Badal Sakte hain" (The new KBC ad featuring Shah Rukh Khan)

I wasn't too excited by the fact that SRK was replacing Big B for the hugely popular gameshow Kaun Banega Crorepati. But nevertheless I did get a chance to have a look at the new KBC ad featuring Shah Rukh Khan. The ad has a really cool concept.. just check this out...