Perspectives

At times you wish monday to be part of weekend holiday, you can have fun on saturday and sunday, relax on monday.  There could also have been times where you had nothing to do in the weekends and felt sitting in your office cubicle was better.

I had to experience the latter this weekend as literally I didn't have anything to do. I spent the full saturday watchin movies in a row. Rashomon, and Vantage point were among them, though i have already known the story of vantage point I was totally unaware of Rashomon except for the fact  that Akira Kurasowa was a great director.

Perspectives

Anybody would agree for this page title if they have watched Rashomon or Vantage point.
Rashomon - This is my first kurosawa's movie and its definitely a masterpiece. The film is about the murder
of a Japanese samurai in a grove while he was travelling with his wife. The opening scene itself sets the mood of the audience for the movie as the woodcutter and priest explains it to a stranger on what a strange and horrible murder it was. The plot is - murder of the samurai by a bandit, the bandit kills the samurai in the attempt to rape the samurai's wife. The characters, I can count my fingers straight away that there's not more than 8 in the movie.


Considering the fact that the movie was produced in 1950's, people must have been surprised by the kind narration the director gave. It's the first of its kind. The Bandit, the wife and the samurai himself (through a medium) testifies on how the murder happened. All three versions are different, though the bandit accepts that he murdered, he doesn't give the true version of what happened. So is the wife and the samurai himself. The wood cutter who witnessed the murder gives us the right version of what happened.

The movie may start with the plot of a murder, but in the end it's not the murder that bothers you, but you are left to ponder on why the three main characters did not share the complete truth. The director also leaves a behind a strong message on how the world and we the humans have turned selfish.

A must watch for those who enjoy good movies.


Vantage Point

While Rashomon attempts to show three different perspectives of an original scene, Vantage point attempts to help the audience visualise 8 perceptions of a murder. (I did not actually count if they were really 8 or not).  As a matter of fact Vantage point is supposed to be inspired for Rashomon (as read in the wikipedia). To me though Vantage point was completely entertaining, I wouldn't compare it or analyse on par with Rashomon.


It's a typical commercial flick with all those gun shots and car chases and a stylish editing of the scenes. If you actually get into details you may have to compromise on the logic in the movie. One of the example would be on the security arrangements in the hotel where the US president stays. Some one just like that gets on to the elevator with a gun to the floor where the president stays. And  I would say that at one point of time  you tend to forget that you are trying to visualize different perceptions and there's not much of a suspense element. 

Though there's something new that you come to know each and everytime the clock rewinds back, they are actually to help the people understand the plot and nothing extraordinary.   

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Kerala Travelogue

Image
Whilst 2009 has been an year to be remembered for the bitter and sweet experiences in my personal and official life (who would forget the recession), 2010 though not even 2 weeks old has been filled with special moments till this minute as i write this blog.  I welcomed 2010 at the god's own country Kerala with my 4 other friends, I purchased my personal laptop, I used my DSLR to capture few photographic moments and most of all this blog which am gonna publish for the first time. The Trip After quiet an analysis and planning we settled for a trip that would cover Allepey,Adhirapalli and Cochin in Kerala. Starting off from Tiruppur, the travel to Alleppey by car was 7 hours, but our initial guesstimate was to reach by  4 hours. We reached there by 7 pm on the 1st of Jan (friday). Though we had our apprehension of not finding a room owing to the long weekend coupled with new year, fortunately we were able to find a pretty cheap and decent hotel with the help of a localite
Read more

Singapore Blues

Image
I was to Singapore recently on an adhoc personal agenda. It was a very very short trip of not more than 2 days, still I managed to meet couple of my friends for a 'mini' rendezvous and click few photos. Based on my very short experience, my short description about Singapore would be 'Impeccable'. The reason I say impeccable is because no body faults in keeping the city clean, the city is clean as hound's tooth. Out of my limited globe trotting experience I have never seen any place as clean as this (considering the fact that Singapore has more immigrants, especially from India ;-) ). Some of the clicks!!! Of course, how can I not capture a sky scrapper in Singapore!! :-) Recently constructed Marina bay towers.  The Singapore eye in the night My first tilt shift experimentation. Other Random shots. And finally I bought a tripod and lens filter for my Camera, none of these above were taken using a tripod anyways.
Read more

Book Review - The Japanese Wife (Kunal Basu)

Image
Though my reading habit is 7 years old, I have never opted the short stories. Short stories, may be short but the experience and thrill is no lesser than what you get out of novels. Of course novels have their own interesting elements. Anyways coming to the point, I happened to choose this collection of 12 short stories ”The Japanese Wife” (- written by Kunal Basu) on the recommendation of my friend. The first story itself is titled the Japanese wife and the rest of the stories doesn’t have any relevance to Japan or its wife and i still can’t decipher why the book has been given the title. Nevertheless, when i finished the first story I knew that the rest of the stories are something not to be missed for sure. The moment I finished one story, I would smile, relish the ending and can’t wait to open the next one. All stories are about the un-expected, the author surprises you at the end no matter how he starts the narration, it may be featurless or spicy in the beginning but you got t
Read more