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Rabble Rousing Random Ramblings by S Jagadish is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License.
"K TV" telecast 'Mouna Ragam' last week. I love watching it every time it shows up on TV, but unlike some of my other favourites, I don't actually watch it to discover something new all the time. I always do that with say 'Michael Madana Kama Rajan' because I'm absolutely sure that despite having watched it more than 50 times, I will still find something new to laugh about.
I watch 'Mouna Ragam' because I can track a sort of metamorphosis in me.
I may have first seen it when I was 11 or 12 years old, around 6-8 months after it was released in 1986. Despite liking movies, our parents weren't the sort of people who would make it a point to catch all the new movies that showed up in the theatres.
So it is quite possible that we saw it on video tape or when Doordarshan showed it on TV around a year later. Contrast this to today's TV channels that scream out "திரைக்கு வந்து சில மாதங்களே ஆன புத்தம் புதிய திரை படம்" warning viewers that they would be telecasting a movie that 100% of the Tamil movie watching public was blissfully unaware of.
As far as I can remember, the first aspects of 'Mouna Ragam' that blew me away were the frivolous and fun-filled nature of the Karthik-Revathi romance scenes. For evidence, see these clips.
Over the next few years, whenever I saw the movie, I went 'wow!' at Karthik's wooing style and Revathi's cuteness. "If ever there was a way to fall in love and express it, this was it."
I suspect a lot of the [then] young boys and girls who saw it also felt the same way.
Sooner rather than later, the focus gradually shifted from 'falling in love' to the music.
'Mandram vandha thendralukku' and 'Pani vizhum iravu' blew me away, especially the usage of the violin, guitar, flute, trumpet & drums in 'Mandram vandha' and 'Pani vizhum iravu'.
Finally, I settled on the background score, and am tempted to call it the most awesome one ever.
Labels: film music, ilayaraja, mani ratnam, metamorphosis, mouna ragam, movies, tamil
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This is a sort of update to my longish post on my Facebook account early February in relation to 'Thumbi vaa', 'Sangathil paadadha kavidhai', etc.
A new Hindi movie, Paa, scheduled to release sometime next month, has Amitabh Bachchan, born with a progeria condition, playing Abhishek Bacchan and Vidya Balan's son. The movie is directed by Balki, who made the extremely enjoyable 'Cheeni Kum' a couple of years ago. The music, as was the case with 'Cheeni Kum', is by Ilayaraja, a perennial favourite of mine.
As with Cheeni Kum, mottai has liberally used / borrowed from tunes he had previously created 'down South'. "Mudi mudi", especially the starting bit, sounds very familiar to a humming I've heard him do at a concert shown on TV. The song, if I remember right, starts off with something like 'Paada cholladhum paatu dhaan'. 'Halke se bole' is 'Puttham pudhu kaalai' from Alaigal Oivathillai.
The interesting part about this album is how he has re-introduced, in Hindi, 'Monday tho' (Aur Ek Prem Kahani - 1996) as 'Gumm summ gumm'.
The tune, by itself, has a fair amount of history. The tune first showed up as 'Thumbi vaa' in Olangal (a Malayalam movie *ing Amol Palekar & Poornima Jayaram, which was remade by Shekhar Kapoor as Masoom). The music was by Ilayaraja.
Olangal got dubbed into Tamil (not sure what that movie was called). So there was a Tamil version of "Thumbi vaa". Later that year, the same tune was used for Aakasam enaatido in 'Nireekshana', a Telugu movie *ing Archana.
Nireekshana was dubbed into Tamil at some point of time, and we got "Neer veezhchi thee mootudhe" (I haven't found a video online). "Auto Raja" (*ing Gabtun) was made sometime in 1983. Auto Raja's music was scored by the Shankar-Ganesh pairing. But the director got Ilayaraja to create 'Sangathil paadadha kavidhai', a song that you watch at your own risk.
A couple of years later, Balu Mahendra remade his first ever movie (Kokila, a Kannada movie *ing Kamal Hassan) as "Aur Ek Prem Kahani" (*ing Ramesh Arvind, Heera & Revathi). That movie had the 'Monday tho' song in it!
Maybe 10 years later, the same tune would have travelled across half-a-dozen more Indian languages, and we'd see a Malayalam version of the original!
Update on 25 June: I located what I believed to be the original of "Mudi Mudi" - Paada pirandhadhu paatu dhaan.
Labels: film music, ilayaraja, paa, tamil
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How the collective wisdom of our leaders gets exhibited
In the past 2-3 weeks alone, there've been 3 instances where the wisdom of our political leaders has been exhibited in all its glory.
- DMK demands that Sri Lankan Tamil refugees be made permanent residents of India.
- Spend nearly Rs. 10 crores to sterilize 70% of all stray dogs in Delhi ahead of the Delhi Commonwealth Games.
- Karnataka government decides that the best way to send out an environment-conscious message is to force auto-rickshaw owners to paint their autos green!
Labels: commonwealth games, karnataka, politics, refugees, sri lanka, tamil
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Last year, the Tamil Nadu government decreed that the first day of Thai would be the first day of the new year based on 'consensus amongst almost all Tamil Scholars' (sic). Of course, that announcement was challenged in court. I'm not sure about the current status.
What gives a government the rights to decide the date on which people speaking a language or following a culture will celebrate a new year? Is the decision restricted to the government holiday list, or is it enforceable? If the decision is made to overturn a Sanskritized/Brahminical calendar that has existed for so many years, and the new Tamil calendar will be based on the Thiruvalluvar era, that's pretty ironic coming from a DMK government because the very first Kural of the "Thirukural" has a reference to a deity!
அகர முதல எழுத்தெல்லாம் ஆதி பகவன் முதற்றே உலகு.What is interesting though is that if the first day of Chithirai (traditionally the first month of the Tamil calendar as far as I know) isn't a big deal, then why are there so many promos on Sun TV and Kalaingyar TV, both part of the DMK propaganda machine (except for a detente of around a year when the Marans were thrown out from the DMK), announcing special programs to herald the onset of Chithirai? In fact, Sun TV is proudly claiming its 16th anniversary (launched in 1993 on Tamil New Year's day).
So will the DMK government be kind enough to let us know the additional information that has been obtained by scholars in the previous 15 years (between 1993 when Sun TV was launched and 2008 when the new year was moved) which has been the basis for moving the date of the Tamil New Year?
In addition, I'm fairly sure we keenly look forward to Sun TV and Kalaingyar TV also telecasting special programs on the first days of Vaigasi, Aani, Aadi, Avani, Purataasi, Aippasi, Kaarthigai, Maargazhi, Thai, Maasi and Panguni!
Labels: culture, dmk, language, new year's day, politics, tamil
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Less than a month after I wrote about Apoorva Sahodarargal, the superb actor Nagesh died a couple of days ago.
I can never forget his ability to have the audience in so many moods perhaps in the same scene. He could make you laugh (several!), cry (Edhir Neechal), enjoy (his dancing) and reflect ('Server' Sundaram).
I guess an indication of how enthralling I found him is that he's one of the few actors in Indian cinema whose scenes I stop & watch, dropping just about anything I'm doing. This, mind you, is even if I've seen the same scene dozens or hundreds of times before!
There are probably around a dozen other Indian movie actors who make me stop & watch them in action (listed in ascending order of first name) - Aamir Khan, Amitabh Bachchan (1970s-1980s), Kamal Haasan, Manorama, Mohanlal, MR Radha, Naseeruddin Shah, Om Puri, Paresh Rawal, Savitri, Sivaji Ganesan, Smita Patil & Utpal Dutt.
I'd say Nagesh is no less than any of the other names on that list!
Labels: death, movies, nagesh, tamil
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Re-viewing Apoorva Sahodarargal
I just finished watching Apoorva Sahodarargal on TV. Twenty years have passed, but it remains such an entertaining movie, although some of the stunts do look tacky now. Hackneyed plot, but superbly executed thanks to the director (Singeetham Srinivasa Rao), writer ('Crazy' Mohan), the actors (Kamal, Srividya, Manorama, Gautami, Janakaraj, Nasser, Nagesh, 'Delhi' Ganesh, Jaishankar etc.) and great music (Ilayaraja).
I guess it was one of the earliest movies featuring the Mohan-Kamal-Rao combination which also gave us other brilliant stuff like MMKR and Magalir Mattum (maybe I left out some other movies). I've seen this movie so many times, and but as it happens with the Kamal-Mohan combination, I still found a new wisecrack/pun to laugh at. A few months ago, I'd bought the MMKR VCD and I discovered new things to laugh at - this when I thought I knew every dialogue!
As for Apoorva Sahodarargal, it was the first time I realized that the one commonality to the deaths of 'Delhi' Ganesh, Nasser, Jaishankar & Nagesh is that there was no evidence in the form of finger-prints.
Labels: kamal haasan, movies, review, tamil
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Raj Thackeray wants "classical language" status for Marathi
First, there was Tamil, four years ago. A week ago, it was the turn of Telugu & Kannada.
Given this, can Malayalam be far behind?
I'm not implying that Kannada, Telugu or Malayalam don't deserve the tag while Tamil does. What's the big deal about that tag? The same grants, research chairs, etc. could have been instituted without the need to have even created that separate category called 'Classical Languages'.
The decision to grant "classical language" status for Tamil was a political one, a needless and ridiculous one at that, merely to ensure that the DMK supported the UPA.
Very soon we'll have claims from each language's representatives insisting that they also deserve the 'classical language' status. What next? Sun Music anchors claiming "classical language" status for the language that they speak? Raj Thackeray leading an agitation to claim "classical language" status for Marathi?
The UPA, and all future governments, will have to get used to requests from all and sundry, perhaps including NASSCOM demanding that status for C, C++, Java, etc.
Labels: chauvinism, kannada, language, malayalam, raj thackeray, tamil, telugu
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With Tata Motors announcing that it would be relocating its Nano car project from Singur despite the attempts of the Bengal government, a lot of states have now jumped into the fray to get Tata Motors to move the project to their state.
The list of states vying for the project is pretty impressive, but Tamil Nadu's absence is a little odd, given that so many of the world's leading automobile manufacturers have plants in the state.
The jostling for the project though reminds me of a scene in the 1992 Tamil movie Singaravelan (Kamal, Khushboo, etc.). Kamal goes to Madras from his village and is immediately surrounded by dozens of auto-rickshaw drivers, each of who wants Kamal to be his savaari (customer). Ultimately, one of them throws down his trump card, and claims that Kamal is his maamool savaari (regular customer). The scene, and the movie in general, is an absolute riot!
See the video (piracy alert!). If your browser (or feed reader) can render the embedded image, you can also see the video below. The scene begins around the 24th minute.
Labels: comedy, kamal haasan, movies, singur, tamil
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