D: It is written

Slumdog Millionaire. The most talked about film of the day. Inspired from the novel Q and A by Vikas Swarup, Screenwriter Simon Beaufoy wrote the script for the movie and presented it to production companies, who later invited an impressed Danny Boyles to bring it to life. The flabbergasting screenplay, impressive camera, and the well-paced editing complete the film's 'hats off' list, with Dev Patel's (Jamal Mailk in the movie) acting, Freida Pinto's (Latika in the movie) subtle beauty, Anil Kapoor's crispness and Irfan Khan's eyes in the onscreen league. A special appreciation to the childhood actors of Jamal Malik and his brother who stole the show with their performance. I guess the casts' perfection in their roles is attributed to Loveleen Tandan, the casting director of the movie, who has played a major role in visualizing the India that is portrayed on the screen.

The sound tracks by ARR have proven to be a unique milestone in not only his career, but for the country as well. He has brought the picture to life with his astounding notes. With the movie's popularity spreading worldwide, the golden globes would just be the beginning of a long list of awards yet to be won, including the 10 oscars that it has been nominated for.

Centred around the state of poverty in India, the movie has worked the energy and vigor
present within the slums of Mumbai in the way an artist uses colors on his portrait. But some Indian critics feel that this is just an act of selling the plight of Indian poverty to the West. Get a life ppl.. When education is being traded for money, selling poverty only does a lot more justice. More like an oxymoron actually. Selling Poverty. Well, the movie did openly screen certain negative aspects of the country. But, reality being portrayed so bluntly, u just cant go against it. Rather, u admire the way in which several story tracks have been woven into a single narrative. 

With the premieres in India on 23rd Jan, the Indian crowd is eager to receive and garland this "Slumderful" contribution to the world.

Tata Nano - Or is it The New Mitsubishi i

India's hottest topic at present in the automobile industry seems to be the launch of the new tata nano - the world's cheapest car. There hav been many successful small cars such as d smart, mini, etc. Yet, tata stands out considering the cost of the car. But how much credit can tata actually carry for dis revolution..?
Covering the basics, the nano has a 2 cylinder 623cc engine with a 4 speed transmission and a 15L tank (A Honda Unicorn can carry more fuel than dat). The people's car boasts of roomy interiors, tubeless tires, low carbon dioxide emissions n wat not. The official site (http://tatanano.inservices.tatamotors.com/tatamotors/) has d following lines on it.


"People world over were keen to see what Tata Motors' People's Car looked like, and know more about it. The Tata Motors website saw nearly 7.9 million hits on January 10 (the day the Nano was unveiled), while the Tata Nano website saw 4 million hits in 30 hours, making these sites among the busiest in the world."


If u ask me, ppl really didn't hav to wait so long. Instead they could've js checked d Mitsubishi site for d 'Mitsubishi i'. From d shape of those head lamps to the small protruding line in front, both cars seem to have Siamese twin-like character. Wat a coincidence!!
Now, js imagine raising d windshield, pushing in d wheels closer to d body wid a few minor tweaks n voila..!! There u hav it...
Well they r technically pretty different though. Dis one has a 2 cylinder 659cc engine with a 4 speed automatic transmission n offers both rear n four wheel drive options. N dis 1 has a 35L fuel tank (Phew..). D Mitsubishi i wud be a wonderful car to buy for city roads in India had it not been for d price (8999 UK pounds). N of course, its not for sale here...

On d whole, I'd like to 1st congratulate d nano team for trying something new. But they seem to hav concentrated 1ly on d budget n missed out on many features. Its a brilliant vehicle dat can substitute a Rs. 65K bike for an Indian family wid an average salary. But it'd only be those despos waiting to get their hands on a 4-wheeler who'd be their buyers.

Windows Vista - The New Coke

Referring to the article on The Hindu on 27.07.2008, Forrester Research Inc., has concluded from a survey that 87.1% of the computers still run on Windows XP while only 8.8% have migrated to Vista. This is opposed to Microsoft's claim stating that they have sold 180 million licenses for their new baby. From the looks of it, users are actually reverting back to XP, while Microsoft has announced that XP will get service packs till 2014 and is also trying in vain to convince dissatisfied customers abt vista.

Now this reminds us of one of the greatest market fiascos ever pulled by the US soft drink giant Coca-Cola. On 23rd April, 1985, New Coke was rolled out with all fanfare and prime TV ads claiming that it was "smoother, rounder yet bolder" making it sound more like some vintage wine rather than a flavored soda. But customer response was so adversarial that on July 11, 1985, the company made a red-faced about-turn and the old coke was back under the moniker "Coke Classic", thus leading the company to where it stands today.

New Coke was actually sweeter than the original product and had blue shades added to its ads in order to attract pepsi consumers as well, but resulted in losing its own. What Microsoft is trying to do sounds similar, considering the fact that all it has produced is a heavier, slower and flashier imitation of the Mac OS. N it doesn't look like the Mojave Experiment is helping it any further. Btw, I js couldn't help noticing that the site (http://www.mojaveexperiment.com/) runs on Flash rather than its own SilverLight :-). Looks like its gonna be a uphill battle for Microsoft to make Vista the true successor of XP rather than an addition to the growing list of 'Greatest Blunders of the Century'..!!

Song Review

I'm sure all the Tamil song lovers out there would've come across the song "Nakka Mukka" from 'Kaadhalil Vizhundhaen'. But most ppl forget dat its part of a movie n not js a hit single. Nyway there's dis other song titled 'Unakkena Naan'. Its got a gr8 tune n wonderful lyrics. I suddenly became dis ardent worshipper of Vijay Antony n praised him all over. But recently, I happened to come across d song "Unfaithful" from an album 'A Girl Like Me' by Rihanna. N boy oh boy..! Was I in for a shock!! I'm pretty sure dat Rihanna never much bothered herself with tamil music. So it must've been the other way around. Beat by beat.. Atleast its better than 'getting down' to a bsb...

N my heartfelt appreciation to Thamarai who has done wonders wid her pen... The song's got a beautiful meaning dat has been perfectly sculpted into the notes thro Ramya's voice. Many ppl think her voice is too rough for d scenario. But she's got dis high sounding bass voice (or however u describe dat voice) dat makes the song so perfect, I just dont understand y its taking so long to catch up.

To recap on the above comments, I'd just tidy up by saying that the Ramya-Thamarai-Rihanna team has definitely worked out...