Twitter, the ever brimming cesspool of world events, constantly brings up one issue ailing Telugu cinema, the lack of proper film critics who stand against the waves of Telugu movies released each year with nothing remarkable to write home about. What ends up as film criticism is marketing, where the critic functions as another arm in the hype machine to pull precious eyeballs to the screen. As a critic's ability to survive in this cutthroat business depends on the acceptance of the power centralization in the Telugu Film Industry, there's never any dissent heard from them in any of the major issues that audience find in the movies. Instead, they ensure that the fans are never too rattled and thereby insulating themselves against further criticism and sustaining their career for another season.

The fact is, critics are the bottom-of-the-barrel scuds in the whole film tapestry, they're distillers of culture that other people have written, produced, directed and acted in, they are elevated filmgoers with a megaphone but apart from this they're indistinguishable from the rest of the audience. For people working within the film industry the critics are an necessary nuisance, no one knows if the critics can influence the Box Office future of a film but it's a chance that'd not be considered especially when the probability of a hit is so low.

A critic needn't SJW warrior through the politics of a movie but needs to have the spine to call out bad acting, writing and any other pet peeve technicality they might have a super focus in (and my working hypothesis is that the best critics turn out to be the best directors). But this is already too much to ask – check the number of times a Telugu film critic called out a major male lead for bad acting in the past years, even though these actors are typecast or sleepwalking through their roles, the critic needs to pay lip service to the fans or have their social media walls vandalized. This doesn't even consider the umpteen times that male actors have glorified sexual harassment, colourism and choosing to not pair with older actresses on screen.

In a society where politics and film converge, it's worth noting the similarities between attitudes towards political dissent and film criticism. Freedom of thought and speech relegate themselves to idealist visions and there's a top down enforcement of power. Can't say much about how that fares for politics but atleast in art, that doesn't bode too well for the long-term.

#criticism #cinema #Telugu

“It is worth serious consideration how great an amount of time—their own and other people’s—and of paper is wasted by this swarm of mediocre poets, and how injurious their influence is. For the public always seizes on what is new, and shows even more inclination to what is perverse and dull, as being akin to its own nature. These works of the mediocre, therefore, draw the public away and hold it back from genuine masterpieces, and from the education they afford. Thus they work directly against the benign influence of genius, ruin taste more and more, and so arrest the progress of the age.” – Arthur Schopenhauer

Is it the end of cinema as we know it? Doomsday predictions say it is, cinemas have been shut for over a year and lockdowns around the world have made us accustomed to an endless stream of content from news cycles to Netflix. We are being exposed to large amounts of content making us tolerant to the pangs of drama and thrill, each new iteration demands that we get something more potent than the one that followed.

We are saturated with information now, twenty years ago watching the movies meant going to the theatres or watching something on the cable in the evenings. Now, every waking minute can be occupied from gifs to never-ending soaps and all the ancillary gossip/marketing material that follows with it. In this sense movies are almost obsolete, they cost a lot to produce, and they have to resort to the same gimmicks to keep audience hooked.

In this milieu come the Oscars, the long-standing global tradition of ranking which movies are the “best” in the past year. For all non-Americans they remain as the widely recognized benchmark of great cinema, the currency of pride and knowledge. But the Oscars in themselves are purely an American tradition, except for minuscule nod for foreign films that have found American audience or is adherent to American sensibilities. As international audience we are what our role relegates to, hawing over the gala as spectators. Take a look at this year's Oscars list, it shows a growing acceptance to diverse cinema, in tune with the diversity that America wants to show it is a flag bearer of. It is not a ceremony that bothers as a reflection to large parts of society, but the pontificating effort of an American few to keep the tradition rolling.

Cinema was once a sanctimonious affair, going to a dark chamber and gnawing on salted cardboard and getting our minds ready for the rush. It was a public act; we went to movies with others. Now fragmented in our homes, we nibble through cell phones, smart TVs, and laptops. the act of viewing is reduced to the act of consumption, we are users not audience. But what has remained the same throughout is the commercial interests of cinema, which unlike writing or painting had to happen in the finely oiled mechanisms of local and global commerce. The Oscars represent the pinnacle of this delivery machinery, anointing new winners and legitimizing our compulsion to watch these movies. The new Buddhas of the medium generated each year, a pickling process for maximum preservation.

But do these movies really stand the test of time? Almost all the movies nominated this year were forgettable without any visible merit. They will only be remembered for being a part of this pomp but nothing else. In the test of time these Oscars will mean if anything, very little.

#Oscars #cinema #America #covid19

Expectations vs. Reality

I was under the impression that Blue Valentine was a musical after confusing it with La La Land. For the first 20 minutes I was waiting for Cindy (Michelle Williams) and Dean (Ryan Gosling) to break into song and dance. But Dean and Cindy are in no mood to dance. Their marriage is melting, Cindy is passive and Dean does not understand why. How did this couple even get together?

The interludes from six years prior paints a different picture – Cindy goes through an unplanned pregnancy with an abusive boyfriend and Dean is smitten by Cindy in their first meeting. Cindy ignores Dean initially, but a chance meeting on a bus brings them on their course to destiny.

Blue Valentine works on contrasts. It is the earlier iteration of the Marriage Story , where the juxtaposition of the past over the present gives us the colour book and the colours. Blue Valentine gives the viewer a voyeuristic insight into noticing the “red flags” in the romance that preclude the downfall. For a film that tries to explore the depth of a relationship as time passes by, the breakdown of the marriage works if there is a believable element of love that preceded the union.

The tap dance scene outside the bridal store serves this purpose. Dean and Cindy cannot see the end yet, they have to still fall in love but for the audience the dramatic hinge rests upon this act of falling in love. The scene is combustible, it has these two raw, imperfect strangers who need each other. Dean because he is smitten and Cindy because she's pregnant with someone she doesn't trust. It lets them be without the pressing problems that wait in their adult lives. The tap dance scene can also be termed childlike in the context of their relationship because what follows after is the stuff of Agony Aunt columns. The child in a relationship grows up, the problems that force Cindy to fall in love are far removed.

This effervescent two minute scene gives meaning to the tragedy that follows. We are propelled to fill in the blanks and involve our judgement to the failing marriage. The film offers no overt narrative support but it pulls us into it through the imperfections the characters create, giving us a chance to self-reflect about our own personal tragedies. I was a bit sullen that it wasn't a musical but it is whatever it takes to make you feel.

#AnatomyofaScene #cinema #American

a song connected to an image(s) a person drained of capacity looking up a pedestal

A poet vs the other: the other is a toxic slurry of color while the poet is just a receptacle

calm choke hold, a strong hand. there's no-one to breathe, the air-con's turned off for both profit and conservation

the show’s over and it smells of popcorn that couldn’t go anywhere, droppings of cheap entertainment

#kino #cinema

or Thelma & Clyde learn about intersectionality

Yo, I was going to this movie thinking it was a rap comedy or something. I remember watching the trailer a few months ago but I didn't retain much of the information but I wanted this movie to be a comedy. The posters were also misleading, making it look like a cool-ass movie about these really hip people, but no. I see a group of women come from the previous screening and start crying after they plop themselves out in the sofa next to my table. I didn't really get their agony in German but it was something to do with the movie and this experience only raised my cortisol levels during my viewing.

Daniel Kaluuya repeats his Get Out act (or is his acting range limited?) with aimless staring and insecurity his major character traits. Jodie-Turner Smith is a revelation in her role, I went from hating her to liking and falling in love with her character in a matter of half-an-hour, which is both a feat of the writing and the acting. The characters are all relevant and feel real though some minor logical frustrations can be attributed to the dysfunctional trigger-happy American police system. Other logical frustrations however can only be attributed to the stupidity of the characters though the writing is sympathetic to the viewer's intelligence, so they can be excused.

There are intermittent scenes of comic beauty that liven up the proceedings and a delicious sex scene between the two leads which sadly is wasted because the movie wants the characters to be more poetic than they are. I understand the temptation, it is also is about race insecurity in the US but these characters were anything but. If the myth-making was to be the focal point of the story then some development in that direction would've been welcome though that part is left for the fade-to-black pause afforded to the audience.

The women from the previous screening cried for a moment, and then they left after having brief goodbyes and cracking jokes on their way out. If the net emotional effect of the movie can be boiled down to around five minutes — why be so preachy about it? Leaving the broader strokes the story aims for and focusing only on the main characters leads to a better viewing experience. I for most part was hoping that the characters would have a happy ending, having an old friend for dinner, perhaps with some Chianti and fava beans on a distant Cuban beach. In my version they still are, shot with the same skill as the rest of the film, listening to rap music and having some steamy sex.

That is the real power to the Queen and the Slim.

#review #American #cinema #berlin