Sport

So what is Sport for you?

Is it an activity requiring physical or mental exertion (or both) and competition with fellow men? or is it merely an occupation for athletes who compete? or is it just a man made opera to satisfy the man's ego for being hailed as a winner or supreme or is it just some fun?

Sport for me is triumph. Triumph not of the mind or of the body or of the game involved. For me its the triumph of the spirit.

It could sound unconventional cause sport is supposed to be played to be competitive and victorious and not just being a also ran. But at times the triumph overtakes all the other factors and all the other reasons.


Monday morning i was flipping through the TV channels and stopped at the Sydney test match being played between Australia and South Africa. Of course being a historic series there have been millions of reviews on all the cricketing aspects of it. Even though i enjoyed South Africa beating the Aussies, one moment stands out for me.

The 3rd day was about to end, the Australian openers in Matthew Hayden and Simon Katich were playing. There were around 2 overs left for the day and Australia were looking to end the day without any wickets. Katich was non existent. It was all on Matthew Hayden and his bad luck and poor form and all the stats being shown around on TV and in cricketing terms he was quite unsure and vulnerable and frankly appeared that he could get out on any ball. Still he was trying to hang in there...


In the distant in one the stands was one woman sitting alone, looking as tense as anyone trying to show a calm nerve on the outside. It was Kelly Hayden, the openers wife. She sat on a lonesome bench watching her husband fight the day. The gloomy evening was descending on the arena and gloomier things were being spoken around for the player who obviously is in the twilight of his career. There was an air of uncertainty across the stadium.

The guy in the middle was fighting it out and the lonesome woman in the stands was standing by his side. The empty seats behind the woman appeared to be the seats of well wishers who suddenly evaporated.

The end result wasn't an issue i think, it was just those few moments before the match ended for the day. I wish i had a pic of the moment but that wouldn't have done any justice perhaps.

I mean i don't know why i write this because you expect a husband to stand for his wife or vice versa in trying times even if the world appears to be against one of them or both but watching it was great.

Sometimes the spirit too runs dry, it needs fuel....

Newness?

'Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun'

So like the Pink Floyd Song, so many people celebrate the new year but how many of them realize the actual transformation or the whole point? Earlier i was also one of those people mindlessly trying to party and hoping that the new horizon would bring with it the welcome change, but how many years exchange the tears for some smiles, the hopelessness into new hope, cold silence into a warm musical?

So like yeah, New year is nothing but a technical change and should not be mistaken for a real change cause real change is beyond the realm of conventional date exchange.

But some thing in life don't change... Like what one may ask and then it would be tough to count them on the fingers.

Its been a weird kind of a year filled with empty smiles and empty hope but somethings don't change moving into this new year.

I have been watching movies of late. Some movies that i missed and some that i never knew existed and some which i always wanted to watch buy couldn't.



It all started post Jaideep Varma's Hulla which i without any bias put at the top of my list in the movies i watched in the year 2008. I don't think it brought JV the kind of audiences or fame he truly deserves but then if JV ever reads it i just wanna share Howard Roark's line When the dean of the architectural school tells Roark, "Your only purpose is to serve him [the client]," Roark objects. "I don't intend to build in order to serve or help anyone. I don't intend to build in order to have clients. I intend to have clients in order to build."


After we come out of the cinema, the move echoes in our minds for a bit, some for small time and some for a longer time and Hulla still echoes in my mind for the kind of passion the movie maker tried to project. The so called critics killed it cause they just don't know how to react to a passionate subject. Same movie, throw in some power media houses, some bigger overpriced actors, some marketing BS and the so called critics would call it a winner. To criticise a movie just cause ur a film critic is bull shit. I am no critic, i am no fan(cause this was his first ever work), i just felt vibes from his work. Critics are too blind to see it or feel it. To bad for them cause they cant spot a good movie. They'd still be critics till the end of their lives while JV's bound to go far.

Go For it JV!


Then comes Manorma Six feet Under and i was just blown away by AD (Abhay Deol's) body language and sheer camera presence and yeah Gul Panang can act. Sorry to say but she looked artificial to me in Dor while she pulls of her character wonderfully well in this movie. I watched AD first in Ek Chaalis ki last local and he was fine and then with Oye Lucky he grew stronger but i think Manorma has to be one his purest works. I hope he grows from strength to strength.


My Third Movie of the year is not a movie but the actor and the guy is none other than Vinay Pathak who should be named Versatile Pathak. I wanted to watch Dasvidaniya first but for some reasons i wasn't able to and then i came across 'Ohh My God' and the tag line Bhagwan Deta hai Par Dubey nahin leta hai is attractive and so is the neat movie with brilliant Vinay. One thing with Vinay is that you can relate to the character so closely that it gets so much simpler to believe in how the character reacts or dresses or walks or thinks or talks.

Dasvidaniya could be a rip off but the talented Vinay stands out like one above all especially the crying scene at the bridge where he moves his hands in a resigned manner and OMG Ranvir Shorey in the cameo Rocks, Apna Brand Mat Badalna, Marpok /m\, heh

If you ask me who is my favourite actor my answer is that according to me the best actor in the world is RANVIR SHOREY

although Pankaj Kapoor and Vinay Pathak are not far behind.

Ok and talking of women, i already wrote what i thought of Gul Panang but one female who is wasting her life (knowingly or unknowingly that she has so much talent in her is Neha Dhupia. I mean sham of directors who cant think beyond casting her as a pretty face or as a sexual object or more of a cosmetic thing. I think shes only touched 10% of the amount of talent she has with some of her so called off shore work like Siskiyaan where she beat all the other actors hands down. ND you cant let this happen, you've gotta reach ur pinnacle cause not many people have what u have. I'd pray that u stand on that mountain cliff a la Ayn Rand soon:)




and finally my list of things i couldn't find in 2008....

1: The mountain cliff
2: A
3: JV's Book "Local"
4: Movie "Mithya"
5: Db's OMG OMG
5: Zz
6: Motivation to write
7: The phone LED flash in the dark room signalling a msg, a call, signalling something..
8: 'THAT' one moment
9: Some Luck
10: And Yeah Myself...

So my search continues!