Fanspeak: Luck by Chance

Had Zoya Akhtar written Luck by Chance as a speech, this is how it might have sounded:

This is us! We have images and we have realities. Sometimes they coincide, but more often they don't. Yes, we have the actresses of yesteryear who were forced into acting and forced to sleep with producers. Yes, there are those who never make it big. Yes, there are those who rise through sheer calculation. And yes, there is a remarkable link of coincidences that shape this business. There are promises made. And made. They don't always work out. We, the industrywallahs do get tired. And we do pretend. We can be double-faced.
I'm not offering excuses for the way we are. I don't want us to be like Hollywood, in fact I'm tired of the term 'Bollywood.' We are a mish-mash of glitter and covers and hard work and dirty politics and a lot of love. And I'm an observer who figured we're one big story that needed to be told, and I've had fun telling it.
That's all.
Both Akhtar kids have perfected the art of subtle, understated scripting. Luck by Chance is driven by its characters and their detailing. The star kid who assures us that being the progeny of the famous is anything but easy, the dominating diva of old-time cinema who works ferociously on her daughter's image...they are all somewhat steroetyped, but very real-life characters of the industry.
The dialogues, as with most Excel Entertainment productions are pretty non-filmy. Farhan Akhtar is known to want his characters to talk 'like people talk' and LBC is no exception, except in some scenes where it only just stops short of being preachy.
Konkona is good through most of the movie, except in her last scene with Farhan, where I feel she could've been more spunky. Dimple Kapadia does a wonderful job. She manages to be insecure, enjoy the attention of a young actor and be determined to remain important by taking over her daughter's career completely. One doesn't know whether to drown her or feel sorry for her, which I think is exactly what the director wanted.
Farhan...(sigh sigh sigh...see, there's a reason I called this Fanspeak and not a review!)...he's definitely grown as an actor. In Rock On, he was essentially a passionate music-lover who lost himself half-way. In LBC, he is selfish, lovable, calculating, cool and utterly focussed. He gets hurt, he sheds tears, he charms his leading lady and her mother to bits, he falls in love, but ditches his girlfriend without a second thought when it comes to getting what he wants. Farhan has the most shades in LBC and he pretty much pulls it off. His dialogue delivery could be better, but he plays Vikram the flirt, Vikram the starry-eyed newcomer, Vikram the calculating user and all the other Vikrams with proficiency.
All in all, if LBC swings on the strength of its cast, with Farhan leading the way. Zoya's done a good job of ensuring that her main characters have purpose and are well-rounded, despite there being so many of them. I'm glad LBC happened, and not just because I got to see Farhan getting out of a swimming pool and to observe that he has a dolphin tattoo on his bicep!
All good wishes to LBC and Excel!

Of Glumstones and meeting-rooms

Vocabulary: Glumstone (noun): a metaphor for the emotional heaviness that occurs when he leaves , the cigarette packet is empty, the 'fat days' and other such life-threatening disorders. Created by: Liquifier

Lots has been happening. Work is becoming increasingly hectic and I am learning to cope with rush and daily pandemonium and return willingly the next day for more. I went for a meeting for the first time in this job today, and it wasn't half bad.

I don't like meetings in meeting-rooms and conference-halls, I've always though them to be stuffy and suited-booted, places where I wouldn't be able to say 'but that's not cool!' tnt meetings usually happened outdoors over ice-cream or chai, or they were one-on-one sessions with Boss which I totally loved.

Today's meeting was supposed to be a full-on blasting session for all the deskies, but somehow it turned out rather nice. The meeting-room wasn't very stuffy, we all trooped in, sat wherever we could and aired out a few issues.

I'm not doing great at work, but I'm improving. I'm reminded of my first 2-3 months at the Store when I would overcharge customers on the card-machine and didn't know how to reload the stapler. I am proud to say that two years after having quit my daily shift routine, I can handle the till and customers pretty well. I'm hoping it'll be the same with this job.

It's like A says, work is work, and whether you're hungover, stoned or heartbroken, you get in on time and ensure the breakfast muffins don't burn. Or in my case, ensure the headline balances and the page is checked, proofread and sent to press by 9:30 pm.

I am also learning that there are some Glumstones that even Meg Cabot and Lays Magic Masala cannot dissolve. Trust me, this was a shock. No matter how tragic my life was looking, Helen Fielding, Betty Neels, Meg Cabot and The Nanny Diaries go a long way in making me feel that I am a total sex-goddess and I will lurch off into the sunset with a half-empty bottle of pink champagne. But there are Glumstones that stay lodged just above your ribcage and deep in our gut. And sometimes you have to take a reluctant peek inside and have some conversations you'd rather avoid to get rid of the damn things. I think it's called growing-up or something equally heinous....

Antaheen

Antaheen releases today!. Go see the website for more details. Yay for my mashi and all at Screenplay :)

I got

pwetty earrings and a bag for my stepmum. Picked up apple and cinnamon agarbattis (I light at least 4 a day now).
I wandered dazedly around bookshops, managed to read an entire Farhan Akhtar interview without buying the magazine (thank you Manney's!). I mean, not that he didn't look totally cool wearing Dunhill or whatever but not even for my future co-writer am I paying 100 bucks for GQ.
Got a manicure and pedicure. My nails are now so glossy that I could use them as mirrors if my face were a leetle smaller.
Picked up Bhumika and an Arabic movie called Caramel to watch tonight.
Maybe I should've thrown in a visit to the Store, scheduled a laughter session with some of the girls...basically covered all my bases.
Because I still feel like shit

ouch-ing

....and that is why I'm sticking to Slash, Mr Darcy and E. The only men who have never let me down!

Goodbye

Gee, I never thought the first wedding I'd shed tears over would be one I was told about second-handedly 6 weeks after it was over.
Akash has never figured on this blog, for all that I've known him for over two years now. He was one of the chief Attention Givers of my life, that's the best I can describe him.
The first time I met Akash, he took my chin in his hand, looked at me closely and went 'theek thaak hain, thoda damaged, but theek thaak.' He loved pink. Once when we were meeting after a long time, he ran across the Store in slow motion (very SRK style) to hug me.
I'd tell you all about how he started working at the Store yada yada and how nice and interesting he is and all, but it all sounds very inane.
Akash-who-I-knew and Akash who-is-now-married-and-never-bothered-to-tell-me seem to be two entirely different people. Oh, I'm sure he still loves pink and is as interesting and nice as ever, but...well, now there will be boundaries. And I'll freely admit I'm jealous that I won't be the object of his attention anymore. Not in the same free-flowing way. Now he has to consider other people before he meets me. And spoiled little brat that I am, I hate being second to anyone in importance!
I feel like Winona Ryder in Little Women when she goes ' Oh, why must we get married at all, why can't things just stay the way they are??!!'
Things don't, and the very very small part of me that is mature and wise and all things nice gets that. The rest of me is plotting to kill Akash with my bare hands for not telling me. If I ever talk to him again that is. Not that murder requires speech, but still.
We probably would never have dated or anything. And it is horrible of me to want to hang onto someone because they so unconditionally took note of me. But I don't want to be the bigger person right now.
So, Akash, in a few days, when I can say it truthfully, I will send you good wishes and plenty of joy. Right now, I'm just going to say goodbye to the you-I-knew. And I'm awfully glad I did.

Outburst

It was in the song you played, and that you let me steal
a t-shirt from you.
It was in that you wouldn't give up.
No matter how distant I became, you never pushed, you just stayed. It was in that you
never hid that you were sometimes
confused, that you felt it when I didn't call back. There were times when we
would look at one another...and I would
look away
in a hurry.

I didn't want to encourage our eyes.

I was so sure you could never be anyone.

You broke through that certainty.
You didn't develop wide shoulders or a great muscles,
you didn't stride into the room to the sound of a soft orchestra like they do in the movies

in fact you weren't there at all.

It was in our voices, in the moments we both knew

we were smiling together. It was in that you were the first person

I shared a glass with, and it didn't

seem casual.

I'd say thank you, but I'm afraid because that sounds like an ending.

Congratulate us! We got our first gun!

E just got back from a week-long vacation to Mumbai. He's been home only a few hours and I'm realizing that I'd kind of missed being a parent.
The first thing he showed me was a new dart-gun he managed to coax our aunt to buy. It's called the Maverick-something-or-other, and it's hideous. It's the first toy of its kind he's got. We sternly discourage anything resembling a weapon in this house.
He was so excited about it, he went on about how he and his friends had a 'war' - which a friend's sister started (typical! blame the woman!) and how his gun was powerful enough to break down their 'base' and how they had makeshift sandbags 'just like they did at the Grand Hyatt in Mumbai...'
It's silly to go back to my own childhood when I try to understand him. Every generation has its own nightmarish experiences that later become part of history.
E's talking in military terms, his slow shift to thinking that to strike out at another is strength...all of this upsets me. But...I wonder if maybe it would be more nurturing to let him learn everything, and teach him to use it positively. Yes, there are bad guys in the world...in fact there's a friggin large number of them! E needs to learn to handle them.
These days...nobody uses the phrase 'too young' anymore. No one is too young to do anything, it seems. Watch a terrorist attack live, have a baby, smoke a cigarette, start earning...
I know so many parents who take their kids to movies that I would balk at letting E see. I don't like video games and PlayStation because they zombi-fy kids.
But our not liking it doesn't really mean E does not have access to it. It's the same with the dart-gun. E would never even have asked for it here in Pune. But he's got that boy-thrill at having it, at the feeling of power one gets from being armed for the first time.
I don't like it. But I don't want his eyes closed against it.
Ah parenting...how I have missed your worrisome, complicated self.

Up the rebels!

Ok....so, my day was spent trying to figure out my reimbursements, staring incomprehensibly at a tax worksheet that some poor sod who thought I would understand it sent me, missing out on pizza because I went to withdraw money that hadn't yet reached my account and being certain I was going to get my butt kicked for not being dramatic enough with my work.

At least my job's not boring! And I can still come home and laugh, albeit tiredly.

The Working Life

The work culture is creeping up on me. Claiming reimbursements, setting up a salary account, wondering how much I'll be able to save and so on. Or maybe that's the money culture. At the end of it, that's probably the only reason I'm doing what I'm doing. I like the work, I have become better informed about a lot of things in the last month than I have ever been before. Basic language skills have come back strongly. But I think my main aim is to work my way to financial independence. Yesterday, a co-worker was telling me that no matter what other job she goes to, she knows she will eventually always return to the news room.
I wonder if I'll ever be that certain about my work life.
I am lucky, though. Nobody shoved me into becoming a software engineer or a doctor. I just happened to be talking to a neighbour who put me onto the paper, I went in for a 'chat' next day, and they thought I might do.
I am having to be far, far less snobbish about writing. I edit and re-write news that I might never have read in earlier days. I make it accessible and make it sound interesting. At least I'm supposed to. And all this must happen before 9:30 pm sans any errors.
Writing, making movies and all that jazz I want to do require one ability above all...that of being able to stick to it. Of being interested in every little bit you create. And that is what my work will teach me.

Crack a little, let the light in

I come from a multitude of families. Whatever kind of growth I have had has been inspired by their breaking away, their coming together in a new way, their healing, their anger and ultimately their (and my) acceptance.
It is a said, written and much mulled over theory that kids from 'broken homes' have difficulty forming relationships. I think forming relationships is difficult for anybody. You could have had the most wholesome family as a child and still be uncertain about closeness, bonding.
Keeping up with families in the plural is difficult. There is resentment, bitterness, a desperate guarding of one's own space and place in the familial structure. But what is possible is genuine affection, inclusion and greater care in navigating your way through different relationships, blood or otherwise.
I have shed tears and bitten my lip to keep from saying anything potentially destructive. And so have a lot of my families. I listen to stories from friends and colleagues, about strictness and discipline, about the subtle hierarchy that exists between parents and children, the older and the younger etc. And I am grateful for the complete equality I share with both my parents.
I think of how I would rather be home spending time with E, than anywhere else. Even if spending time means telling him to eat his vegetables and not gape at the TV. I think of how wonderful it is have everybody out of the house on my day off.
Distance and space, keeping up with one another, having enough softness to yield to the new, and being solid enough to assimilate it with what already was, taking responsibility for a relationship you have no idea what to do with...all of this came with the breaking of a whole and the forming of new ones.
Most of all, there are stories I would never have thought of telling, had there not been fractures and healing in my life.

Revival

There's nothing in the following editorial that hasn't been said/written about before. But it mirrors how I feel when the house is dark and I watch the red lights on my Christmas tree. It's not a feeling I've had very often in the past few months, so I'm posting this as a reminder to myself on blue days...



Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus
By Francis P. Church, first published in The New York Sun in 1897.

Dear Editor—
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O’Hanlon

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.
You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.
No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

Tagged

Okie people, I got this from Neha's blog after she threatened to kill me long-distance if I didn't do the tag and put it up. So...put up your answers to the following in the comments section and put up the questions on your blog so I can return the favour!

1. Who are you?
2. Are we friends?
3.Something I have and you want?
4.Give me a nick name and explain why you picked it.
5.Describe me in one word.
6.What was your first impression of me?
7.Do you still think that way about me now?
8.What reminds you of me?
9.If you could ever give me one thing, what would it be?
10.How well do you know me?
11.How do you see me in the future?
12. Something you wanted to tell me but couldn't.
13.Are you going to put this on your blog to see what

Kathleen Kelly speaks...

It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees...

This time of year throws me roughly into nostalgia. It isn't memory so much as longing. Longing based entirely on strings of red lights and festive cartoons. And Mum.
We've always loved Christmas, Mum and I. Church, carols, Midnight Mass....and presents.
As long as we lived together, Mum never let me give up on Santa. I don't think she's given up even now.
It's been difficult these past seven years, more so because through Europe, we've seen everything we love about this season in the flesh.
We've had years in Calcutta, years that only we know about. Christmases where I decorated the tree alone because she was working late. There weren't presents then, but we'd go out for lunch next day. My snobbish, luxury-loving mother would ensure she worked enough all year to take me to the Oberoi for Christmas lunch.
She's been alone for six of the last seven Christmases. I'd give a lot to change that. No matter where we are and who is around us, Mum and I spend Christmas alone if not with each other.

days

The past 8 days have been stretching. New work, new workplace, new people...so much to make room in my life for. This isn't tnt in many ways. But then again, there are similarities. I still have a boss who gives me lifts in his car. I am still working with people I have already started giggling with. There are spaces where I can go and smoke.
But it is my workplace. It's business and it can and does get dirty. I wouldn't go in there and wander around to soothe myself the way I do at the Store.
I am learning to be quick, to ask for help, to work constantly under deadline and to write for a volatile audience. I am working with software and style and other technicalities.
I had gotten used to the effortless way I could work in the Store. But then it took two years, countless goof-ups and a steady focus on completing every day's tasks every day to get to that stage.
And now, I'm starting all over again.
Apart from office work, there is work needed to be done with A-and-me. We're happy, dissatisfied by the distance, but there's a seed of certainty about what we have that is taking root. I think that's mainly because I might throw tantrums, he might not call for a day, I might have issues over something he said when he was half-asleep - but at the end of it all, we're genuinely pretty psyched to have each other in our lives. Since we both started working, communication has gone down to 5 minutes of 'how was your day' online, but every little bit counts.

letter

Dear Backbone,

Today I head off to a brand new workplace. People around me are intensely excited, proud and constantly offering advice. For myself, I'm determined to handle this my way. This isn't my first job, and though the previous one was part-time and non-corporate, it was business and it was work, and I was taught to handle it that way.

So far the best advice has come from Mitul Pishi who very quietly told me, 'focus completely on your work and don't talk bad about anybody in your workplace.'

And that is the essence of any work I'll do. I know I'll resist corporate work life at every step, but nobody will ever fault me for the lack of hard work and personal dignity. I'll be making mistakes, looking blank and sponging up all kinds of information. And every time I come through fire or scale a corporate brick wall, I'll remember to give you a pat. And to say a silent thank you to people like Sumit Pipa and Trips who are convinced that you and I are awesome!

It's been you and me for many years, buddy. So here's to another adventure!

Cheers!

Wishlist

I want a vacation filled with bookshops, long browses, sleep, writing, movies....and absolutely nobody I know around!

Orange blossom, roses and being a non-tourist in Paris

I anticipated trouble this time at Charles De Gaulle. I figured it was easier than to be surprised by it. About six hours into my plane ride, I looked out and espied a lone star looking back at me. So I asked it to please ensure that my journey was smooth, and my trip fruitful.
And it appeared to wink at me and do just that.
I wasn't arrested, photographed or even looked at suspiciously. My passport was stamped, my luggage came through and I was out of there in less than five minutes.
Since Dear Old Dad believes that his children must be Super Independent, I bought myself a bus ticket to Porte Maillot and made the trip to the hotel by myself.
The first night is a frenzy of cold air and posh French food. DOD and i ate our way through scallops, snails, foie gras and finished a bottle of rather good red wine between us. I must tell you, that to see my hard-nosed, dark-rum-drinking father swirling the wine in his glass, tasting it delicately and instructing his provincial daughter on how a wine-glass should be held was tres funny.
The next morning began with an enormous breakfast. Meat, cheese, meat, cheese, meat, cheese...oh and some yoghurt for good health.
Paris on a Saturday morning is sleepy. The newspaper kiosks were open, a few florists were open (it is perfectly possible in Paris to have a sudden craving for roses at 9 am),but nobody began business till 11 am.
While walking off our breakfast, I looked at the Parisiennes. Their shoes shone, their coats were of perfect length, they walked in four-inch heels as though they had been born in them (which is very possible). I had a feeling if they were pricked, they would bring forth gushes of Chanel No.5 rather than blood. I could not imagine them breaking into a sweat, or having wind-blown hair.
Maybe it's just Paris. I mean, you're living the standard of world fashion rather than living upto them...
We had another enormous meal in the afternoon....more meat, more snails....sigh. Then we stood out, leaning against the wooden tables and smoked. In my long, felt coat, pointy leather boots, with cigarette in hand...I might have felt worldly and European...but I was too busy feeling full of food and sleepy.
Paris was a whirl this time. The few journeys I made alone...walking out at 7 am to buy postcards, the bus ride to the airport, the orange blossom shampoo that stayed on my pillow...this is what I remember best. Paris is designed for travellers, loners, lovers, gypsies. In less than two days, it gave me aching feet, cold fingers and took my breath away...
The visa officer was highly disapproving of the fact that I was travelling alone to Paris, that I had no planned itinerary for my stay. Dear sir, I wish you two weeks in Paris. Try getting lost, try gazing out at nothing and make yourself some new secrets.

....so are our talks.
Language so filled with desire it forms in your brain
and transforms into an ache deep in your belly,
dark red and overbearing,
filling your body with secrets

Return

I know I know...I haven't been writing in here at all. I is sorry :( But..I have been positively swamped! Writing, getting paid for it a little bit, trying to decide on that big step of moving out of home....and trying on a new relationship for size.
Now, most of you already know about this since I am pathologically incapable of keeping such big news to myself! In fact, there are at least five people I have to tell right away when something Big Deal happens.
The truth is that it is big news for me. I am taking an old friendship off the shelf, dusting it off and looking at it anew. And I have been wonderfully surprised at what I am seeing. What is even more surprising, and leading to palpable irritability, is that it is happening long-distance. Trust me to respond to somebody only after they move to the southern hemisphere! But, truth be told, it could not have happened sooner. We both needed to go through a lot of brick walls in order to become the girl who can respond, and the guy she could respond to.
I freak out over these happenings periodically, but despite this, and the distance, we are managing to communicate a LOT. The good thing about the distance is that it means the going is slow. We have time to savour, to think (in my case, to obsess.) Oh, it drives me crazy a lot of times, but it is forcing me not to rush, to actually cultivate patience. (Aren't you proud of me Boss??!!)
For now, I am hummingly happy, enjoying being showered with liking and affection and silly arguments. I will get sordid and cry buckets and have nasty doubts clouding this light, but you know what, I think I can pull this off. I think we can pull this off.
Amen.