Blog Posts – Page 2 – Beyond Four Corners

Asuran and Kaithi – Talking Tonal Shifts

A few weeks ago, I had watched Vetri Maaran’s Asuran. And as I sauntered out of the theatre, I knew I had to write about this film. I had this explosive urge within me to talk about the film, my fingertips quivering like freshly made jelly. Yet, I refrained. I felt that I needed a companion film that I could prop alongside Asuran, to see whether it gave birth to any fruitful contradictions that can be expounded over the length of a single blog post. Along came Lokesh Kanagaraj’s Kaithi, and I could immediately see some potential, and hence settled on the idea of intertwining both these films in a single post. Also, during this brief period between both films, I had imbibed many opinions, notably Baradwaj Rangan’s take on both Asuran & Kaithi, which helped me see these films either from a different viewpoint or with some more clarity and I shall continue to allude to them as I go about. Now that I have got the campy formality off my chest, let’s dive straight into it.

Firstly, Vetri Maaran’s Asuran. The film is based on the notable Tamil author Poomani’s novel titled Vekkai. Although I haven’t had the opportunity to read the novel yet, I shall endeavour to do so, but from what I gathered from interviews with the author, the novel is, in essence, the reminiscences of Chidambaram, a boy who has committed murder, and how a cycle of violence has uprooted the tranquillity from the lives of both son and father, set against the backdrop of oppression and power. However, Asuran, is told with Sivasaami/ Chidambaram’s father, as its focal point, which has been portrayed by the brilliant Dhanush.

The film opens with son and father treading lightly, in the midst of a thick forest, with a sizable bounty on their head for the act that the former has committed. And as they set down to inhale and exhale, the voice-over streams in and we flow back in time. We are introduced to the Sivasaami household. A doting uncle, a fierce yet firm mother, two sons and a daughter who take after her as their uncle mentions. However, their father, seems to be on the other side of the hatchet. Unlike his children, he is fixated in this constant state of fear and trepidation. He drinks away and mumbles to himself. He isn’t brave nor stout, he isn’t brazen nor bold. When his son commits an act that brings shame, he still doesn’t impose himself. He implores the village officials to absolve his son, and even bows down at every door that the oppressing hand points to. Even after all this, not an ounce of rage festers or seethes within him. He is slapped down by his wife, and still continues to babble incoherently. BR (Baradwaj Rangan) even points out that this particular scene shatters a thousand macho clichés widely spread across the gamut of Tamil cinema.

That brings me to another interesting juncture. Dating back to the release of Selvaraghavan’s Thulluvadho Ilamai, which marked the appearance of a young, lissom Dhanush. Ever since then, he was not viewed as the prototypical Tamil hero, largely owing to his slender appearance. He was subjected to a lot of mockery, but nothing deterred him. The steadfast ideals of a certain kind of machoism didn’t help him climb up with ease. The ideals that a man must be strong, boasting a tough, stout outward appearance, and having a piercing gaze that would strike a great deal of fear in the antagonist’s heart, and also the ability to knock down doors as if they were pieces of chalk. But after putting on a show of sanguine defiance for nearly two decades, I think everything that has come his way and is yet to come, is a worthy prize for the stellar performer he is. I would like to think that Asuran is the epitome of everything he has done hitherto. His character breaks the taboo yet again, but in the fiercest way possible.

Coming to the nub of what I set out to talk about, Asuran, as a film, pitched against the rest of the lot, so to say, is a commendable attempt at bringing under the fold of one film, the elements of both substance and heroism. But these two things that I have presented before you, are not always the best of pals. At the halfway mark, Sivasaami becomes the man that he was hiding within him, breaking into a frenzy and slashing his attackers. But as BR points out, this sudden explosion of rage onto the fore, is directly in contrast to the man, who was so feeble in the earlier stages, that this outbreak, seems rummy. Just so you don’t mistake me for being too credulous or gullible, I had, so to speak, thoroughly rooted for this man when he picks up the hatchet, but that was because I was less proactive in placing the same in context. When I went into the theatre, I was expecting a film that would be faithful to the novel, which could have been too much to expect in a transitionary stage for Tamil cinema. Owing to a seamless narrative, even this outbreak seemed fairly enjoyable. But after the film, the question kept lingering in my head. Would the film have been something different, and much more intriguing had it sacrificed this hero service that it happens to pick up with no foreshadowing? I would like to believe so, since it has the astute Vetri Maaran at its helm. This was why I found myself disposed to accept BR’s take on this as well.

In an interview with the latter, Vetri Maaran talked about how certain aesthetics and nuances of the literary medium cannot help when the same subject is being projected onto the celluloid, and have to be cut out, however dear and near they maybe. Asuran had completely changed the focal point of the story, from son to father, and also incorporated a few elements of heroism, to make it much more appealing to the masses. What is actually commendable is that this heroism has been used sparingly by the director, and hasn’t been bloated to the extent, where it becomes stuffy. The tonal shift from a solid family drama to become an action drama is not entirely convincing but it still is marginally, so as to give due credit. I still feel this isn’t the best work in the director’s oeuvre or even a stellar addition, but on its own, is very much engaging.

On the other hand, I had most recently watched Kaithi, helmed by Lokesh Kanagaraj. In his earlier film (and only film), Maanagaram¸ the course of events are spread over one fateful night. Even in Kaithi, the film is set on the events that take place over the course of one night. As soon as the film begins, Lokesh wastes no time in setting it up, and amps up the narration a bit further, that we already know all the details of the story, and our wait is to see how they pan out.

As the story pushes into the first gear, we come to know that there has been a massive drug bust, and that all hands in the city are trying to get a piece of it, with some heavy bloodshed indicated. Flash forward to a few scenes later, we see that a squadron of officers gathered at the Inspector General’s house all succumb to a heavy sedative, which causes them to fall head first onto the ground, and has been cleverly mixed by some malignant elements. The tone throughout these opening stages is as gritty as it can get, and Lokesh has done a fantastic job to keep it lean and compact, establishing each cog in the framework. After this gritty sequence, we are introduced to our seemingly sainted protagonist, who has more than judiciously applied the holy ash on his forehead, going by the name Dilli. But yet, when you see him, he resembles a volcano waiting to erupt, but keeps stalling the outburst.

Slipping into an excursus yet again, I’d like to allude to BR once more, who mentioned that this was a purely physical performance. And Karthi, with his physique, brings that air of machoism straight off the bat. His demeanour is more than convincing, to say the least. Be it him mangling the cooked meat, or looking at those poised against him, he strikes one as a more ruffian version of Ben Affleck’s Batman. This is in stark contrast to how Sivasaami was in Asuran before he breaks free from the chains of restraint. Dilli, however, doesn’t free himself from the chains, but rather takes it with him, literally.

But, I would have not had the idea whatsoever, unless it came directly from the mouth of the director himself. In an interview, he mentioned that he had initially written the film envisioning Mansoor Ali Khan portraying the character of Dilli, and upon questioning said, the film hadn’t changed when a hero, such as Karthi, had been roped in. I doubt the treatment would have been the same, as Karthi, from the start, is poised as someone who defies all odds and stops at nothing to lay hands on what he sets out to achieve.

In both these films, there is a specific moment that defines how the narrative changes, even though the degree of change varies. That tonal shift from telling this gripping story to becoming a display of heroism. In both these films, these moments don’t seem forced. Be it in Kaithi when Dilli gets down from the truck to whip the thugs that are charging at him or in Asuran when Sivasaami becomes the ‘Asuran’ to save his son from the clutches of goons. But, here is what differentiates them. After that particular showdown, Asuran simmers down and becomes this steady story, although the narrative after that seems rushed, the events are grounded to an extent. But, after the halfway mark, there are nearly three set-pieces, which are fine, but still overlong. As Dilli fights his way, wave after wave, I began to question myself, what happened to the air of grittiness that was established early on. The lack of tension and conflict becomes more profound, although these fight scenes, are to an extent, entertaining. To make it clear, I’m not against set-pieces, because after all, it is an action drama. But, with some overtly superhero moments, as when Dilli is injected with a thousand shots of adrenalin upon hearing that the earrings he bought fondly for his daughter have been smashed by the antagonist, and wakes up blood-hungry. It was almost as if I was watching and Ajith or Vijay film, where these kind of scenes, wouldn’t have affected me much, but did so largely in Kaithi. I found myself in the dilemma that I had with Asuran. Would the film have been different, more grounded, and tenser, had it pruned these overblown moments. But is that even possible when a star such as Karthi is around, or is that only possible when someone like a Mansoor Ali Khan stars in such a film. I’d like to think not, because, Karthi himself, has done a more grounded film in the form of Theeran Adhigaaram Ondru.

Theeran has its own set of problems when looked through the glass, having an absurd love track, but overlooking that, the film is a solid venture, as it manages to build tension, with set-pieces being used only when required. It is still bogged down by commercial elements such as songs and love interests, unlike Kaithi, which is a brazen attempt against conventionalism. But speaking purely in relation to the action, Theeran is objectively better in building and unravelling tension. And on the whole, I would still claim that the earlier venture proved more engaging in what it was offering. Karthi, as a cop is extremely believable and real in Theeran, whereas, I doubt the same can be said for Dilli in Kaithi.

I’m not taking anything away from both these films. Asuran is a strong attempt at bringing a novel to a graphic medium, and Kaithi is purely entertaining, but that little wish for an even better film without these frills is something that cannot be done away with.

El Camino – A Fitting Finale for Television’s Finest.

At the start of the movie, you have Jesse and Mike, on the banks of a river, staring straight at the mountains parallel to them. Jesse tells Mike he’s out, and asks Mike, if he were as young as Jesse was, where he would go, to start fresh. Mike replies, he would go up, all the way to Alaska. Jesse likes the idea of it, repeats it to himself, and says he would like to put things right. Mike turns around and says “Sorry kid, that’s the one thing you can’t do”.

When El Camino was announced, and Vince Gilligan’s name was displayed in bold letters, I let out a sigh of relief. A week after the gargantuan mess of Joker, I cannot fathom going through yet another haphazardly handled film made by a director who is forced into making a film for all those who worship at the altar of Walter White. Vince is an astute man, and I was happy because he was going to treat the remainder of the story sagaciously. What happens afterwards, through the eyes of Jesse Pinkman, and Jesse Pinkman alone.

Although, I should think I was fearfully out of touch with the proceedings of the show, having binged it early in 2015, when I was still quite young, not grasping all the nuances of what Gilligan intended, I happened to coast through El Camino, without tumbling on any plot snags at all. I sifted through my mind, mapping faint memories with what was going on, while at the same time keeping a wary eye on the events. And by the time I finished, I felt I had gone through all 5 seasons, within my mind, with the final piece unraveling before my eyes, as the title card flashed and the music rolled in.

Gilligan does a beautiful job of making sure that the continuity of the show does not drip from memory. Back to the end of the conversation between Mike and Jesse, the scene rapidly cuts to where the show ended, with Jesse bleating out his angst, as he makes his getaway in an El Camino. Cops head towards the spot of the shootout, racing past him. Jesse gets away, reaches out to Skinny and Badger, before crashing out on their bed. He utters little words of explanation, still believing he is a captive, within his mind.

It’s amazing how films make you feel nostalgic about places you have never had the opportunity to call home at any given juncture. Gilligan’s wide shots establish Albuquerque to kindle emotions as if you had just returned after a brief sojourn overseas, despite never having set foot on those streets, nor having the pleasure of conversing with its inhabitants. This world that Gilligan pieced together, meticulously, seems to have imbibed you as one of its own.

Not to be misconstrued, El Camino, at the outset, may seem like a movie that is going forward. But in truth, it’s not about what Jesse Pinkman does after all these years. It’s about going backward. The entire purpose of the film, is to bridge the gap about what happened to Pinkman all these years. Was he tortured, if yes, how? Did he have any experiences, if so, what? It’s a movie about answering those questions, and it does so, beautifully. It’s a movie that reminds you how wonderfully human Jesse Pinkman is, and what is going to happen to him from this point onwards. It’s not relentless, nor is it gritty. It’s straightforward, and honest, about an extremely nuanced character.

Throughout the film, Gilligan cuts back and forth, using a series of intercuts. But none of these flashback scenes are used to foreshadow what is to happen now. They take you back, along with Jesse. When he stands in the shower, we see him get hosed. When he wakes up, he sees the sunlight, shimmering off the cold steel of his captive enclosure, instead of a normal, blue ceiling. All this while, you keep going back, back to where Jesse was left off in the show. Only by placing that piece, can Gilligan complete the story, once and for all. Even in a later sequence in the film, Jesse with Todd in a flashback, visits Todd’s apartment, and to his surprise, he is lugged into the miasmic affair of disposing a now decedent maid who Todd killed with no forethought. He staggers to the ground, but eventually regains his senses. And flashing back to present day, Jesse sneaks into the now cordoned off Todd’s apartment, pending further police investigation, to uncover Todd’s ‘stash’.

The entire film is extremely grounded, because it deals with many events that are not so important in themselves, but more important to the character within them. Everytime Jesse sifts through his memory, we make the journey back in time, learning about his exchanges with his captors, and his other past experiences. It reveals his character more, while he recollects and we learn. And throughout both the past and present, a vital cog, in the Pinkman arc, keeps paying repeated visits. And these repeated visits, are nothing but choices. Choices that define who the character actually is, giving substance to him.

Although I aim to condense more with each blog, trying to cut unnecessary corners, I try to constantly rationalize a digression here and there. But I guess, it’s natural, and if I have knack to digress, I shouldn’t think, that a little bit could do much harm. Being garrulous and all the sort of thing, I’d like to talk about the choice to kill and how vital it is, not just to Jesse, but throughout the Breaking Bad series, as a whole.

I’d like to think, and think to my fancy, that in some way, Walter’s arc and Jesse’s arc are overlapping. But not in the normal, clockwise way, but rather, Jesse’s being anti-clockwise to Walter’s. I could be heaving in a wild conjecture, but I’d back it up in another few sentences. Whether the justification is acceptable, is at the decrees of the reader. And this is something I’d explain with a little, compact example.

Let’s say, you wake up, groggy and unsettled. You have a bad premonition that the world is going to end tomorrow. A cataclysmic event that would end humanity. Plagues, natural disasters, meteor strikes and all that sort of rot. Choose any one, according to your fancy, it doesn’t really matter. You have been tormented by your neighbour, who is a normal part of your life, and has made life synonymous to rotting in hell. You cannot harm him, because such an action, would face stern legal consequences. But now since you know the world is ending, you pop off at the poor blighter’s place, and put him to rest. And suddenly, the guilt kicks in, and you wonder, what could he have experienced had he lived? Could he have redeemed himself as an individual? Could he have seeked forgiveness? Did he have another side to himself?

This guilt nibbles away at you, and you find yourself wallowing in such thoughts. But you only have half a day, you believe you should not waste the rest of it. And hence, to justify your act, you say, he would have ruined my only last day, soon forgetting the incident, and living out the rest of your day with much exuberance.

Now switch that someone with Walter White. An ordinary teacher of Chemistry, lousy students, mediocre job, and the inability to do anything to those who treat him badly, due to moral dilemmas, pondering about whether he’s equipped with a good enough reason, or even deterred by the intervention of law, adjudication and punishment. He would eventually stave off any reason because the guilt and fear kick in beforehand, and he would reason not to. But, if he were to be put in an extreme situation, as with Emilio, he would have to kill, for self-protection. And then again with Crazy- 8 and so on. He would feel guilty for his acts, depending on his direct involvement. But the reason of self-protection, would soon broaden, and become self-preservation. The mere possibility of another individual harming or impeding his life, would soon become good enough reason, and it would become more and more trifle with each passing murder, each to fuel his own selfish desires. Even the law doesn’t seem to deter him anymore, because, if he is going to die soon, they cannot do anything to harm him any further. His opportunity costs with time as his currency have dwindled, and he does not contemplate about using his time for other purposes. Yes, I fear that I must apologize for bringing in a bit of spiteful economics, but that’s what fits the explanation the most.

As the show progresses, Walter is often trying to distance himself from the murders, not being the guy who pulls the trigger. But in some cases, he is forced to. By getting more and more distant from the murders, and at the same time using trifle reasons to circumvent the guilt, coupled with the reason that he is going to die soon due to his ailment, his ability to rationalize his actions, has now subsumed him completely. From being a conscious, rational man, who realizes the consequences of a grave act, he has just become insular to an irreversible extent. That is the end of Walter’s Arc.

Jesse on the other hand, is fairly dithering. In the early stages, he appears as snobbish, irrational, querulous, and loud, rubbing off as someone who doesn’t care. However, he isn’t completely insular to his actions. He makes drugs and sells them, but is in no way close to being a murderer. He is, at the start, on the other side of the spectrum, in comparison to Walter. And maybe that’s why Gilligan didn’t kill him off at the end of Season 1. He could see that Jesse had a human side, despite being reckless. He is someone who feels guilt abjectly, and someone who contemplates about a life taken. Gilligan realized that this character could walk his path, the other way round.

Across the show, Jesse faces choices, and he takes a course of action. He kills Gale, being manipulated by Walt. He is directly involved in the act, he pulls the trigger, as an innocent Gale pleads for his life. This affects him. He gets caught in his thoughts about what Gale could have done, had he spared him. In other events, he even stands witness to these acts, and they again force him to take choices, and he ends up doing what he doesn’t like due to a dominant Walt. This is directly in contrast to Walt, who rationalizes his actions for himself, when in reality, they are truly horrible acts, as envisaged by Jesse. He ultimately decides to take his own decision, which is to get out, when Todd kills a young witness after they rob a train. He directly challenges Walt’s character with this decision, being more rational, staring at the hard facts of a cold-blooded murder for what it is.

In El Camino, Jesse is repeatedly faced with decisions, both with events in the past, and events in the present. To escape from Todd, he is faced with the choice to kill him. Yet again, he proves his resolve, by handing over the gun. In another scene, he is faced with the choice of killing two false cops, and he again, gives in by surrendering. Jesse constantly walks a tight-rope, where he holds firm in his resolve, that he would not become Walt, and murder is only justifiable to him when it is purely for self-protection, and not self-preservation.

In a Sergio Leone-esque modern day standoff, Jesse is forced to shoot the two imposters mentioned earlier. But this again, was not a conscious, premeditated decision or an action arising out of an impulsive urge. He was put in a situation where he had to defend his life. He had asked the imposters, with much politeness as I could see, to lend him $1800 and write it off, post which he would walk away forever, albeit sharing a bitter history with them. He was coerced into such a ghastly circumstance, and he was not the orchestrator with reason. If it were Walt, he would have gunned down all men present, in a fit of rage, and justified it to himself later.

For a film that was made a long time after the original series ended, it’s so well made, and I say this because of the profound attention to detail. Even after a brief gap of 3 or 4 years, it’s refreshing to know that Gilligan remembers exactly what Skinny Pete would say. In the early stages of the film, Skinny blurts about his collection of toiletry, and can’t help but mention his special Tommy ‘Hilfinger’ collection as well. It shows how much a good writer pays attention to while creating his characters to seem as real as they could be, regardless of their screen-time, and that to me, is extremely warming.

El Camino, or Jesse Pinkman’s getaway, when you look at it at the end, is not really, a getaway. It’s his rediscovery and redemption before he walks away forever. It’s paced perfectly, and doesn’t skip a beat to reach anywhere in a rush. It takes its time to bridge us and Jesse, take us through his memory, and help us understand better how far he has come. And that’s what makes the ending, extremely plausible, and immensely satisfactory. As Mike said, Jesse gets away to a detached Alaska, laden with snow and fir, and drives away. Its character exploration is as pure as the Methamphetamine they made, if I could take the liberty to add. It takes you into the minds of one of Television’s most iconic characters, before delivering that closure you had been yearning for years as an ardent patron.

The Joker – A revolting piece of rubbish, dished out with a good paint job.

The Joker, the most anticipated movie of the year, much to my surprise, made it to screens here in India, a day or so earlier than the global release. And so, I toddled off to the screens, with much vim and anticipation, given the fact that the film had won the Golden Lion at Venice earlier in the year. But, at the end of it, I was enraged at the fact that Todd Phillips has not only made an absolute bloomer in regard to the clown price, but also gotten away with a ghastly piece of filmmaking that’s generating massive Oscar buzz. The entire purpose of this blog is to vent out my frustrations on both aspects of this farcical attempt, digressing here and there. So to notify the readers in advance, brevity is not exercised.

The film is so shambolic, that I don’t know where to begin. I don’t mean to batter the film entirely, but the whole concept of giving such an enigmatic character an origin, at the outset, seems very promising. But at the same time, when you don’t have substantial base material to build upon, it begins to emerge as a more daunting task. You can either curvet past it, choosing the easy way, or make the strenuous journey, to climb uphill. And it clearly seems to me, despite all the perceived efforts that have been poured in, the former had been collared upon first sight.

The film opens with our protagonist, an estranged Arthur Fleck, toying with his cheeks, looking gloomy and forlorn, as the radio harps about the woes of an increasingly sordid and wry Gotham City. A few cuts, and we get to the scene where Arthur is bullied by a bunch of kids, left grabbing his groin, in the midst of an alley, before nightfall. And then, the rather ugly, big title card is slammed onto your face, as if, if it were any less, the emphasis would trickle away. Up until this point, I had devoted my attention as sternly as I could.

The thing with the Joker throughout the years is that, his presence is always felt, like eyes and ears lurking in the dark recesses of Gotham. But his history, is a myriad of tales, and giving credit to one, is akin to pinning down a single straw of hay. Be it the loss of his wife and child, paired with a devastating chemical accident, conjured by Alan Moore in The Killing Joke, or Heath Ledger’s deceitful anecdotes of an abusive parent in The Dark Knight, all seem to allude to a justifiable account that could have incited such gruelling acts of crime. In Todd Phillips’s version, we see Fleck get abused, rampantly by malignant agents of society, from all directions. We see him eye his boss, squarely, with a good deal of loathing and hatred, waiting to spill, and in another scene we see him viciously biffing trash bags in an alley. But, these little acts of venting, seem far too trifle in building a motive for such a magnanimous character.

When the first plot point comes about, Fleck cracks, pulling the trigger against three young men in the subway, before he trickles into a public washroom, for a little ballet on his own in front of a foggy mirror. I was completely jarred with the pace and disorientation of things, and I felt that this explosive moment, should have been foreshadowed by much more intricate scenes, spread out properly, with a cohesive and connected narrative, and the trigger being something far more worse. I’m not trying to belittle the events that take place to Fleck, but when you are watching the origin story of such a prominent character, you would expect something far more substantial, yet tranquil, that really takes you into the mind of a pure anarchist. And when you have proposed theories in the past that seem far more plausible, you would at the least expect, a deeper dive into this constant social abuse, instead of shallow events and random actions, slapped together in a haphazard fashion. Ladled with some lousy dialogue, the whole thing gave me a headache, half an hour through the proceedings.

I rattled my head to make some sense out of Fleck’s motive, but the events up until this point, didn’t seem to rankle him, rather, it merely pleaded to the viewer to view him through a charitable lens. That brings me to another point that I would like to state. A lot of news, from pre-screenings around the world, expressed distinct apprehensions about the visible glorification of Fleck’s acts in the movie, fearing a real life response of the same nature. It may be true, but incidents can be sparked by any form of art or elements of society, and rectitude in cinema halls is not something I advocate for fiercely. I do ponder about the effects it has, but I don’t wish for morally responsible films, because that defeats the purpose of an auteur’s creative license. Shelving that debatable topic aside, I didn’t expect any rectitude from Todd either. But I was disappointed because, the Joker, as a character, is someone who was constructed to contrast Batman. His actions, were always to be ruminated upon, by placing them against Batman, not to be celebrated. The one bad day giving birth to two men who gradually reach two ends of the same spectrum, is what stimulates thought. This is probably why, I felt unsettled, throughout the film, that Todd Phillips’s narrative, more or less, projects Fleck as someone who went through depression and social trauma, constantly trying to evoke sympathy for him. Leaving aside moral questions, it completely derails from the canon, although I understand it is a standalone attempt to reimagine a character, but trying to change the crux of what the character resembles, is dissatisfying at large, for me. It transports the Joker from being a thought provoking criminal to a messiah of the oppressed. After the release of The Dark Knight, nearly a decade ago, Ledger’s performance garnered him worldwide acclaim, and I believe this was a ripe reason to make such a disoriented film to reach out to those audiences, trying to show this iconic character, through the lens of everyday life, changing the perception towards him furthermore.

However, I would have been content with a different view of the character, had it been constructed and executed properly. But the film was, by and large, a shambolic mess, with no clear purpose for scenes, and certain interpolated material that made me let out a mirthless laugh. On a personal note, I felt the entire Bruce Wayne sequence was, leaving aside technical handling and all that sort of rot, a completely unnecessary and cringe-worthy mix into Fleck’s story, just so there could be a connection forged between the clown price, and the future caped crusader. The repeated scenes with Zazie Beetz’s character being explained by showing Fleck having the case of psychosis and a dashed attempt to reveal an abusive relationship between mother and son, really could have been expounded with more screen time, rather than drawing down the curtains with some loud music as he tramps out into the hall.

What really fudged it up for me was when Fleck thrusts the scissors into Randall’s neck, and blood splutters on to the scene. After which, the midget man and Fleck exchange a duologue, which provoked laughter amongst the audience in my hall. It was almost as if Phillips’s shades of Hangover were beginning to surface. I was dashed annoyed that such a pivotal scene, had to house humour at the wrong time and place, becoming flippancy, placed out of context. And then, we see The Joker, no longer ordinary Arthur Fleck, descend down the stairs, dancing to an interpolated piece of rock music, which I felt to be a complete misfit, causing a good deal of scorn.

Am I saying the entire film is a botched attempt? Maybe not. There were shades of good scenes, with good build-ups. The defining scene with Murray Franklin, was definitely well shot and staged, but I felt that the scene, viewed separately from the film, can be lauded, as it had managed to engross me in the proceedings. But, with all the disorientation in setting up Fleck’s character previously, this scene doesn’t bloom as it should. And with all this disorientation in character and events, I felt that the final act would be the last straw, which should provide some clairvoyance, and, some much needed relief. But, it didn’t.

Complete mayhem breaks out in Gotham, with its underbelly following the footsteps of The Joker, setting on fire public property, shattering glasses and all that sort of thing. After being escorted from the sets of The Murray Franklin Show, the Joker looks on, as the entire city is being set alight. Amidst all this, we can see Thomas Wayne, shunning his wife and child from the violence, trying to escort them to safety. And in a wayward scene in a back alley, the defining moment in Bruce Wayne’s life takes place, as both his parents are shot. I honestly couldn’t put two and two together. I mean, the entire proceedings were against Thomas Wayne, but he saunters out in public, unprotected? Dashed confusing. Pardoning that, the scene of shooting, didn’t even pack any emotional weight, as compared to that at the start of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. I mean, if it is going to be included, it cannot be brushed aside swiftly and carelessly, in a way that’s almost insulting. After a crash, The Joker is dragged out of the police cruiser, and as he stands on the vehicle, smiling at his supporters, I felt that his smile was, not so much as sinister, than confusing, just like the rest of the film. I really felt the film should have been ended here, but I couldn’t piece out the meaning behind the asylum scene, with him murdering his interviewer, and then prancing back and forth.

As I stated at the very beginning, the whole idea has a fruitful promise, but was completely squashed by the end of it. The film is a technical marvel, with the colour tones set to perfection, the production design being brilliant, and the camera work too, oddly satisfying. Of course, there are moments were to give a 70’s feel, Send in the Clowns by Sondheim were chucked in vainly to give it some background and context. But what I believe is far more intimidating and painful is that, if a film is just merely good on the technical front, it can rub off as a masterpiece, with no real substance behind the veil. And many films these days are celebrated for being visually stunning, and not visually engaging. A lot of spite has been directed at the critics for slating the film, but I feel that they are right in rallying round to pitch in their rightful opinion. Of course, they may not always be right, but that’s due to being subjective on content material, but I feel this time, it’s more on the lack of substance and clarity at all in the first place.

Probably, one could say I’m being too opprobrious, but I’d still stick with my opinion. Maybe I am slating the film more than what it deserves, but from whatever I saw, I was dissatisfied. Another watch, I believe, can help me put forth more details, but I’m not too sanguine on my opinion changing altogether. However, with all the Oscar Buzz, I do feel a more worthy film should clinch the prize. I have nothing but respect for Joaquin, whom I have admired as a wonderful actor, in P.T Anderson’s The Master and his appearance as the cold eyed Commodus in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator. His body of work aside, I believe the film is not worthy of all the encomiums it’s garnering at the moment, and validating it, would give rise to serious questions on film making.

Garden of Words – An Ode on Seasons.

There’s something about the rain. This evanescent feeling that it bestows upon you, albeit it being momentary. Something that wouldn’t whiz past your stream of thoughts on a normal day, but when you look at it retrospectively, it’s a gift. A gift that has been with mankind since the first daybreak of the first ages. It’s the only thing that links man and sky. That momentary feeling, of walking, untrammelled, amidst the clouds. The feeling that even the sky isn’t too far away, reminded by a downpour here and there. And this feeling, carries with it, the scent of the sky, which soon percolates the ground, filling your nostrils with what is a moment of indulgence in this heavenly gift that treats you without prejudice or bias, without indiscrimination, without hate. And before you know it, the evanescence re-inserts itself, and you find yourself back on the ground, yearning to go on the journey again. And this yearning of Takao, gives us a gem, in the form of The Garden of Words.

The title, which is aptly concocted as The Garden of Words is probably Makoto Shinkai’s finest hour. I usually take a while to gestate the crux of what I would like to convey over a post, before I even begin typing it out. The process of collecting thoughts is rather structured, and it could sometimes become a convoluted procession, which invokes boredom. But this particular film, which has a runtime of a mere 40 minutes, was like a free-flowing sonnet from the Victorian Epoch. Or rather a Florentine riddle. It gushes like a stream, which flows without bends, and the only sounds that reverberate around the banks arise when the untenable current caresses the rocks. Allegorically, the film itself, stops only when words pierce through the silence of images. Maybe that’s why, I too do decided to give structure a day off, and let my hands glide across the keyboard.

Probably the first thing that my thoughts rekindled were how true this little work of art, which kindly borrows your senses for an odd 40 minutes or so, is truly a tribute to true cinema. Many films, and filmmakers, stifle their own creations by choosing the verbose path, which inflates their films, and makes them voluble beyond necessity. Somewhere in the recesses of my mind, I could feel this old adage knocking on the door. When words are spent frivolously, they should be kept within the confines of literature, for film is a visual platform. When too many words are crammed within a short window, it becomes this boring lecture. Yes, the very lecture we dread in college. The lecture conducted by a lifeless chap, who feeds you like a new-born infant, depriving you from the beauty of imagination, without any time for retrospection. And by the end of it, the only thing that can save you from an impending explosion within the walls of your mind, is the momentary lapse, where you slip into warmth of your secretive, guilty penchants.

The Garden of Words revolves around seasonality, and how each season, represents something for everyone. For Takao, the rain represents shelter from the monotony of school, and the repetitive nature of classes. His ambition to become a shoemaker is akin to having a secret pet, one which you shield using a veil from the disapproving eyes of the world. He abstains the subway and its exodus, seeking comfort from the park, set amidst the urban sprawl. And under a wooden shelter, he meets this woman, who piques his interest, appearing to be both beguiling and bizarre. Sipping beer and eating chocolate on a normal working day, her gaze fixed on the rain. This routine continues, until the ice is broken, and they both shed a shared feeling of alienation. But the woman continues to hold back, almost pretentious, while an unknowing Takao carries on.

Kanto’s rainy season is officially over, and Takao no longer has an excuse to run away to the park at his whim. Summer arrives, and life moves on. Takao works odd jobs, saves money, dreaming to attend a vocational school to become a shoemaker, but his thoughts digress. At the tender age of 15, he develops feelings for this woman, who in his perspective, is an enigma. Living with an amorous mother and his brother, Takao could never really confide in anyone. And with his brother drifting away to live his life separately, this absence of the woman in the park creates a rift.

Shinkai constructs his film as a series of thoughts, imaginations, and yearnings placed into perspective. Sparse dialogue and seamless visuals make summer float by. School has now opened and Takao is back to the confines of the classroom. But his gaze is always fixed on the sky, as if pleading to the clouds to open up just once, so he can slip through and reach his secret retreat for just one more time. Loitering in the school corridor, he meets the woman again, only to know that she was a teacher the whole time, who has now quit her job. The enigma has finally got a name – Ms.Yukino.

After a brief skirmish, Takao scampers back to the park, even in the absence of rain, hoping to see Yukino again. He is successful, and their reunion is graced by a heavy downpour with belting winds, and they both rush back, against the rain that brought them together, to seek shelter in Yukino’s apartment. It’s almost too poetical and clichéd, but yet the film moves seamlessly, and you find yourself being dragged by the current, which has now gripped you by the scruff of your neck.

Both Yukino and Takao share brief exchanges over a home cooked meal, and an eager Takao confesses his feelings for Yukino. Yukino is almost twice as old as Takao, and reminds him that she is still Ms. Yukino. This familiar air of restraint is not new, and is not exclusive. Many a time’s age, religion, ethnicity, and other social constructs drive a wrench through a rather ordinary relationship, projecting themselves as an insurmountable problem. This restraint is an old friend, one who is never really there, but whose presence is still at large. It’s almost as if he watches over you, making brief appearances when the moment is ripe. But, the fluidity of the film up till this point, makes these hackneyed clichés look poignant. To pitch in further, those little pockets of resplendent silence largely make these exchanges seem organic, rather than contrived.

A disconcerted Takao storms out with breath-taking politeness, even after being dealt a severe blow. Yukino reminisces all the moments she spent with Takao in the garden, all those moments that helped her re-imagine herself, and feel alive again, and she runs out, with the rain starting to lash the Kanto region again. Undeterred, she stumbles down the stairs, and finds Takao leaning against wall, looking out towards the rain. And what ensues, is a soaring peroration that resembles an ear piercing thunder in a dormant storm. Takao, overcome with misconceptions, releases a flurry of accusations, trying to convince himself, that Yukino was not what he imagined to be. And as the rain stops, Yukino embraces Takao, confessing that his presence is what redeemed her life. The film pans out, as Takao imagines and dreams about a homebound Yukino, hoping to see her someday again, re-united by the same rain that brought them together.

And as the credits rolled by, I kicked back and reminisced my first foray into the world of Anime. My initial ventures were largely restricted to story driven series, my favourites being the staple of Japanese Anime. I stuck to Deathnote and Code Geass largely because I was engrossed by the story more than its characters. But fast-forwarding to the present, Makoto Shinkai’s Garden of Words, showed me that, through the very same medium, even the pensive demeanours of some can be captured, in a crystalline form. The nuances of character, the stream of thoughts, and the free-flowing silence, all packed into a rather simple shell, acting as its kernel.

Clichéd narratives are not new. But, they are largely accompanied by sloppy filmmaking, with a wide array of inorganic dialogue interspersed across the entire duration of the film, making it a ghastly watch. Very few times, filmmakers are able to nail them across the board. The best example that I could rattle out for the moment would be Ridley Scott’s Gladiator. The story may be commonplace, but it’s often the execution that propels the film. Convoluted storylines are no use for anybody if they fail to establish the most innate connection with the audience. By being able to connect from a human perspective, is what gives birth to true cinema. If you can craft a masterful character, then crafting dialogue would be similar to picking apples in a fecund orchard.

Wrapping up today’s share of meandering through thoughts and a string of vocabulary, The Garden of Words, may not be a perfect watch. But there’s something tantalizing within. This ephemeral air of restraint and doubt, a lingering whim to re-visit the comfort of a stranger against the backdrop of rain and gardens, is magical in itself. Its jocose exchanges, pensive thoughts, and constant yearning, resonate in some corner of your own mind. Try not, to watch it for a rewarding end, but a satisfying digression. Before I fall into a deep slumber, let me give something for you mind to chew upon –

“There is no doubt that a good story has always mattered, and the great novelists have generally built their work around strong plots. But I’ve never been able to decide whether the plot is just a way of keeping people’s attention while you do everything else, or whether the plot is really more important than anything else, perhaps communicating with us on an unconscious level which affects us in the way that myths once did” –

Stanley Kubrick to Michel Climent

Kaatru Veliyidai & The English Patient – Drawing Comparisons.

I watched Kaatru Veliyidai two years after it hit the screens. Albeit being bombarded by mixed reviews –largely negative from the audience – it didn’t deter me. My humble excuse as always was that I just couldn’t find time to watch the movie. Being a Mani Ratnam movie, watching it just for the sake of jumping on the bandwagon was not what I wanted to do. But now since I have, I believe I can share my two pennies on this highly controversial drama. As soon as I finished watching the movie, the only thing that constantly kept irking my mind was this deja vu feeling, which was strange for a film I hadn’t experienced before. But this love affair set against war, and its characters were not new. When my mind finally mapped the connection, the answer propped up. The English Patient – directed by Anthony Minghella.

I’d like to make it clear that both these films are not related in terms of their narrative. Yes, both of them are set during war, both of them have non-linear structures, both of them involve men reminiscing their time with the love of their lives, and are stories about reunion – with one reposed in the skies, while the other is on earth. But, at the crux of affairs, The English Patient is a story about a disfigured man, fighting death, in a monastery with three other occupants, during the war, narrating his extra marital affair with a British woman. On the other hand, Kaatru Veliyidai is a story about a prisoner of war, as he states in the end, crossing seven seas and seven mountains after several years to reunite with the woman he loves, shedding everything that is holding him back from being with her, through this journey. But the similarities in the more subtle aspects of character building and filmmaking are noteworthy. However, Kaatru Veliyidai was unable to engage me as a viewer, and feel its characters, which The English Patient unravelled beautifully. And that’s exactly what I’m going to prattle about in this post.

Kaatru Veliyidai, or simply translated in English as a Breezy Expanse, is a snippet from the famous Bharatiar poem – Kaatru Veliyidai Kannamma. In a classic bit of Mani Ratnam, the film establishes it’s female lead as the primeval offspring of nature, a modern reincarnation of Eve herself, dancing on the snow-covered hilltops of Srinagar. As she savors the cold wind buffeting her face, she comes across our protagonist. A pilot in the Indian air force, who never parts ways with his sunglasses that glistens under the Kashmir sun. Reckless as he may seem, he drives as fast as possible on the narrow roads bordering the cliffs of the mountain, servile to the requests of his girlfriend. When questioned about marriage, he divulges with a smirk, that it would take place only after the birth of the first child, subtly denoting the misogynistic convictions of our main man, that a woman is one whose cardinal purpose is to give birth. After sending the car on a tailspin, he is still languid with vanity on his ‘perfect landing’, before being sent spiralling down the cliff by a bus. And with that, our director sets up a potentially great romance that is to entail, one of epic proportions.

Set during the Kargil War, the movie follows Leela, a doctor fresh out of college, and Varun, a seasoned fighter pilot. After being tattered by the cliff, Varun finds himself in the same hospital that Leela has been assigned to. And by yet another fortuitous moment, Leela is now the duty doctor who is to tend to an injured Varun. Over the course of his recovery, Leela becomes attached to her first patient. After a series of interchanges, she comes to know that he needs to be shifted to the military hospital, and is reluctant to let him go. All this while, I kept pondering where the Bharatiar reference fit in and the film didn’t make me wait too long. Varun walks himself out of the hospital with the help of his now former girlfriend, Girija and military doctor, Ilyas, while quoting Bharatiar’s Maalai Pozhudil, still lingering of the image of Leela, whose face resembling Persephone, flashed itself on his pupil. A few more encounters, Leela and Varun now dance to the peppy Tango Kelaayo by AR Rahman, as he offers her to take her on a joyride over the Himalayas to thank her.

These early encounters, filled with chirpy yet memorable exchanges that you can find only in a Mani Ratnam films, do well to set the story up. But things quickly escalate, as if a few pages were jumped across to come to the crux of the issue. Our lead characters are already in love, and Mani Ratnam moves to address the problems that arise in this chauvinistic man and compassionate woman relationship. Both Leela and Varun fight, largely due to Varun’s sententious behaviour, and his insolence to her needs. He constantly treats her as a pet which can be summoned at the first whistle, and can be dismissed with the wave of a hand, which she states at a later point in the film.

Something that felt odd about the film is the lack of proper embellishments to the characters themselves, before a relationship is formed. They begin to quarrel, and only when they quarrel, does the layers of their temperament come off. In his review of the film, Baradwaj Rangan states that Mani Ratnam, over the course of the years, has become increasingly restless in creating characters arcs, but when you have an inscrutable lead, it becomes vital to explain him. After all, Varun, or rather known by his unfailing sobriquet, V.C, is an enigma. He is a fighter pilot. He dances to the tango. He has outbursts of anger. Without giving a ‘why’ to all of this, the more the character slips away from the narrative. As he reminisces his time with Leela, we expect to see his own reflections of the most intimate moments they shared, the moments that made him fall in love with her, moments where he lost himself in her gaze. But the movie sails across the timeline, being cursory for most parts, and the ability to connect this to an odyssey of a man back to the woman he loves, falls apart. A thought that kept crossing my mind was the laid-back nature of the romance between two characters, in a period of war, was largely portrayed as a 21^st century romance with quirky interchanges that didn’t suit the context. It was almost as if Mani Ratnam tried to pull off a magnanimous journey like Kannathil Muthamittal, bundled with a breezy romance from his recent O Kadhal Kanmani.

The major reason as to why I even pulled The English Patient into the picture was to highlight Minghella’s ability to showcase a romance that was unconventional, and not commonplace. It is incited in the Sahara, not in a coffee shop or a library. It was between a Hungarian cryptographer and a British woman. A married woman. The precarious nature of the relationship had to be treated with persistent care. Based off the Micheal Ondaatje book of the same name, it follows the lives of four individuals, where-in the life of Almasy, our Hungarian cryptographer is merely one, but yet the most ambitious story around which the film is structured. As he is attended to by a compassionate nurse after suffering from burns inflicted by a plane crash, he reminisces his time with Katharine.

Almasy’s relationship with Katherine doesn’t ignite the moment they set eyes on each other. She is accompanied by her husband, and yet she finds the cryptographer on this mapping expedition to be intriguing. They slowly get acquainted with each, share moments with brief pauses, after a bumpy start. Minghella takes his time in letting the characters change through interaction. Only after they ease past the initial friction, do they become intimate. Katherine is slowly drawn to the beguiling Almasy, before their relationships catches fire and turns into a full blown conflagration.

Kaatru Veliyidai, in its early stages, does well to shed light on the relationship between Leela and VC. Leela’s late brother was VC’s partner in the IAF. Ever since she was in her 12^th grade, she has been reading about VC, making her want to meet the man she knew only through her brother’s words. With a bit of classic Mani Ratnam dialogues, they share a few intimate exchanges, which is momentary before they touch the ground again. As VC drops her back at her place, he states that they shouldn’t meet again, feeling that they are treading on a dangerous path. This scene, was exactly where I felt that Karthi wasn’t the right fit to play VC. Although I admire him for the other performances in his career such as Theeran Adhigaaram Ondru or Madras he just doesn’t make the cut to be a dashing fighter pilot who can express yet conceal. His countenance appears as placid more than beguiling in a moment that demands the most from his character. And his underperformance in such moments leaves a huge dent in the effect of the scene.

On the other hand, Ralph Fiennes as Almasy is candescent in every sense. In a scene that takes place in a sweltering Cairo on christmas, his face against the rails, he expresses to Katherine his inability to think, write and function. The taste of her mouth has driven a wrench into his thoughts, and he is frozen. With a Christmas cap on his head, he asks her, with a childish desire, to swoon, so as to be obliged from Christmas duties so that they can share a brief moment, hidden from the sight of others.

Kaatru Veliyidai loses out in a lot many places because of the inability of sequences to connect with each other. When Mani Ratnam flashes back to the present, he shows Karthi expressing his desire to get back to Leela. But this desire he expresses is predominantly vocal. He only yearns through words. He busts out of jail, and keeps reminding himself that once he reaches the Khyber Pass, he will reach the love of his life once again. Although the film is about two contradicting individuals, the film couldn’t show moments in the flashback that truly made VC shed his supercilious self, to be left dazzled by Leela. It’s largely a detach and re-attach relationship that has fights on failed promises, femininity and masculinity, and outbursts of VC’s anger. However, these scenes etched in the flashback portion, don’t exactly justify VC’s yearning, or atleast in the way he describes her during his imprisonment. I couldn’t find one scene where Leela levels VC, causing him to feel madly in love, caged in thoughts, living in a world without days or nights. Yes, he does sing Nallai Allai, filled with brilliant verses, to win her trust again. But the scene still doesn’t describe how much he loves her, which is largely due to Karthi’s inability to express and his incessant confessions of endless love, which is only vocal. What happened to him during the interval they were separated is completely overlooked. He just came back, stood on the top of his car, and sung a song to win back her love, claiming his endless love for her, without any scenes to back such claims. This would take me back to my earlier claim that VC as a character was not given the treatment he deserved to justify his erroneous and erratic actions.

VC and Leela have a brief stint in Delhi with VC’s parents and family over the wedding of his brother. She gets to know his family as he walks her through, but in a later scene set in the hospital, the dysfunctional family enters into a quarrel, where VC is stand-offish with his father for behaving rudely to his mother. But at the same time, when Leela reiterates that he is shouting in a hospital, he asks her to shut up. These outbursts are not given proper explanations. I believe Mani Ratnam was able to imagine these characters in his mind, but he ultimately left the plotting work to the audience, which was more than handful for the viewers. And the interruptions of songs such as Vaan in the middle, albeit being beautiful, did not bolster the existing narrative.

I don’t mean to completely launch a polemic on Kaatru Veliyidai. It has its beautiful moments too. Moments that are often trite and overused to exploit maximum emotional appeal in commercial films is tackled laconically, through visuals. Mani Ratnam handles them beautifully, and I felt that when watching the movie. For instance, when Leela reveals to Varun that she is pregnant, she doesn’t tear up. She asks him to feel it. And lets him know it’s been two months. Those few moments without dialogues are a testament to the raconteur that Mani Ratnam is. His storytelling isn’t conventional, that involves evoking the same response from his characters. They respond differently to conventional situations in all his films.

In the end of his journey, after weeks of searching for Leela, he finally finds her, in a desert, helping people through the Red Cross. Something that you would expect from the compassionate character that she is. She sees VC, sitting distantly from the camp, and makes her way towards him. In what is supposedly the most powerful moment in the movie, the reformed man reaching his shrine, which in this case is the woman he loves, and the exchange that follows couldn’t match the greatness of the scene. VC comes to know he has a daughter, and tells her ‘Kittathatta ezhu kadal, ezhu malai thaandi vandhuruken’ (I have nearly crossed seven seas and seven oceans to get back to you) which refers to the same line that Leela tells V.C during their tango dance during the opening stages of the film, when asked what would take for her heart to accept him. Although a symbolic touch, the ending ends in a flurry of tears, with Leela embracing Varun as the camera pans out.

I felt the ending in The English Patient was far more graceful. Although both the scenarios were different, it is still something that deserves a mention. Minghella flashes between the present and the past, with Hana, Almasy’s nurse, administering a fatal shot that would send him to sleep forever. She reads Katherine’s final letter before her death, which was addressed to Almasy, as the monologue voices over both the past and the present, engulfing the emotion of both Hana, and Almasy, as he carries Katherine after she passes away peacefully. And when she finishes narrating the letter, she realizes ‘The English Patient’ is no longer with her. And as she vacates the church, Minghella shows Almasy and Katherine flying over the Sahara, now reunited in the heavens. And Hana leaves, having cured her own self through her stay in the monastery.

Technically, I wouldn’t strip an ounce from Kaatru Veliyidai. It is a visual marvel due to the work of Ravi Varman, coupled with a scintillating set of tracks and backgrounds scores, owing to the genius of A.R Rahman. The Sarattu Vandiyilla song set amidst the colours of Holi, is pure eye-candy. I couldn’t take my eyes of the screen just because the song was a mix of brilliant colours, set-designs and costumes. In all verity, I still believe there isn’t a director in India who can highlight the cultural nuances of the country across states better than Mani Ratnam. I may be wrong, but hey, an opinion is an opinion.

Drawing to a close, Kaatru Veliyidai, in its nascent stages, houses all the promises of a great romance that transcends barriers. But as the film progresses, instead of taking off, it engages in a conundrum of take-offs and landings, that contort the entire storytelling process, deceiving those who harbored huge expectations. Yet as a Mani Ratnam fan, I still wanted to see more even as the film drew to a close, almost as if I couldn’t believe that the film couldn’t fulfill what I had in mind. It mounted a film on epic proportions, but failed to surmount the bar it set for itself.

La Strada – The Road of Life.

La Strada is as true as it can be to its title. In Italian it means ‘The Road’. And the movie is as simple as its title is as well. It starts on a beach, with a woman dressed like a hermit, waddling towards the sands, and ends on a beach, as a grown man clutches the wet sand in despair. It’s a road that begins and ends at the same point. There are no artistic convulsions, no backhand tricks, no rapid cuts and no fabrications. Fellini has laid out human emotions, raw and unseasoned. And that is precisely why La Strada will forever remain immortal. Because it didn’t change the characters according to the story, the story changed as the characters changed.

Oddly enough, soon after I watched the film I listened to Nadhiye Nadhiye from Rhythm (2000). And as the lines ‘Thanneer kudaththil pirakkiroamo, Thanneer karaiyil mudikkiroamo” (For we are born in a womb filled with water, with our existences (ashes) finishing on the shores of the ocean) unfurled, my mind made an instant connection to the establishing and final shots of La Strada. The film is a tale about the ‘in-between’, but not in the literal sense as the song may state. And once I placed that piece in, I could immediately see that the beach Fellini adored so much as he grew up in Rimini, wriggled its way into his major works. The final scene of 8 ½ and La Dolce Vita, the opening sequence of I Vitelloni. These tiny shards from his life, make up the mirror we end up looking in. And that stands true for all auteurs, whose films always contain their strongest emotions, inseparable from the mind.

La Strada follows the journey of Gelsomina (Giulietta Masina), a childish woman born into poverty, and Zampano (Anthony Quinn), a brute who puts on the cloak of an artiste, surviving off the gracious nature of those who can spare a penny for his act. The film, in the nascent stages, shows these two characters in separate frames, and separate shots. If we unwrap our mind from the visual aspects, it seems that both these characters are polar opposites. A brute whose love is confined to the tip of a cigarette and the comfort of a woman, and a woman whose love is for everything under the sun. Both of them are in some way true archetypes. A free-spirited woman that is forced to be submissive and an aggressive man. Gelsomina, due to her impoverished state, is forced to replace Rosa, her deceased sister who was Zampano’s assistant for a long time. And as she bids adieu, their journey together begins.

This is not the first time in cinematic history that this typical dominant man – passive woman relationship was inserted into a story. However, in mainstream films at that point in time, the relationship itself is merely a faint undercurrent in the larger scale of things. It’s merely a glimpse in the traditional protagonist vs antagonist structures, or the three act structures. The woman either leaves the man, or gives in and the protagonist seems to move relentlessly towards his goal, and in the end the treatment of the relationship is just a hash. Like a man coming back to smoke a stubbed cigarette, as if the relationship was nothing to him. Only towards the late 20^th century and the early 21^st have people started to establish these relationships, explore them as realistically as possible in full-fledged ventures. Fellini stated that he wanted to show the effect of a relationship in the most realistic way possible on the screen. And maybe that’s why the film is guided by emotions, and not any underlying goal. He puts two polar opposites together, just to see the effect they have on each other. On one hand, a man if given a diamond, imagining all the pleasure that he can get through it, and on the other a woman who merely admires the stone, for, it too is a gift of nature.

Zampano, based off a pig castrator that lived in Rimini during Fellini’s childhood, is a chiselled man who pulls of his classic chain trick to convince his audience into sparing some change, while Gelsomina acts as his assistant. However, during the course of things, Gelsomina falls in love in Zampano, because he is everything she has. Albeit an inveterate womanizer, she still pledges herself to him. About halfway into the film, Gelsomina is fed up. She decides to leave when Zampano, then turns back in a classical fashion, and wanders off on her own into town. All along her way, she is fascinated by everything the world has to offer. She doesn’t view anything with prejudice, and offers only her truest self. She dallies into a bustling crowd, gathered to see high-wire artist and clown, who leaves her speechless, at the end of his act. Deep into the night, she scampers across the street, still lingering off the act, subjected to mockery by a few Italian soldiers. A few moments later, Zampano comes back, and drags her with him, questioning the onlookers whether they have any objections.

At every instance, Fellini tries to reiterate this completely repelling relationship that constantly forces itself together. Zampano could have let Gelsomina go, find another side artist or do the act on his own. After all, she is a waif who cannot comprehend everything with ease, and her meandering state does not help the affairs at hand. But the point of the entire story is to see a story of two individuals, who are in every way similar to earth and sky, continue on a road, in this case Fellini’s road, to remain unchanged or to change in the process. Funnily, it’s almost as if their relationship has no purpose, but they keep going on, like Woody Allen says in Annie Hall, decades later – “They’re (relationships) totally crazy, irrational, and absurd, but we keep going through it because we need the eggs”. These eggs, are our incessant need in this case, to belong with someone, for solitude is not a forever solution. The need will never cease to exist, for it is a human tendency too.

A day later, Gelsomina stumbles into the high-wire artist, played by Richard Basehart, at a circus where Zampano is due to perform. A comic by nature and profession, his name suitably kept as The Fool, his unwavering charm keeps surprising the waifish Gelsomina. In a scene where The Fool steps out of line, he provokes the wrath of Zampano, leading to a near murder in a cat and mouse chase, where Zampano is arrested, only after putting up a fight. Furious with both artists, the circus owner sacks both of them. As night falls, the roadshow comes to a halt, and all artists cleanse their pretentious makeup, The Fool makes up his way to a woebegone Gelsomina, lost due to absence of her aggressive, but only companion. After a few words are exchanged, Gelsomina questions her existence, which provokes a rather unusual and wise response from a comic, who uses his laugh to protect his comely reserve. His idea of even the smallest of stones having a purpose, anchors itself in Gelsomina’s mind. When The Fool mentions that Zampano is fond of her, but is unable to express it, she takes it to heart, for she now firmly believes she is destined to be with him. If the little stone serves no purpose, then nothing in this world could serve a purpose as orated by The Fool.

The entire interlude between these two characters is staged beautifully, with Fellini’s mise-en-scene being as realistic as possible. These are two characters, who albeit extremely different, are both questioning existence. In the end, they discard the question, claiming the answer for this conundrum is only in the hands of the almighty. It’s a pivotal moment for Gelsomina, for she believes her purpose lies with whom she belongs with. These little handcrafted exchanges, perched in-between scenes such as these, are little scraps of the writer’s outlook. Gelsomina now finds her way back to Zampano, who she believes is fond of her, but struggles to express it, although given the option to travel with the circus.

However her ascetic state embedded with love doesn’t last long, when at a later moment in the film, a chance meeting with The Fool and Zampano leads to the comic’s tragic death at the hands of the strongman, leaving her crestfallen. Unable to deal with the withdrawal as they pull into the snow-laden mountains of Italy, she keeps reciting the details of the incident, like a priest who preaches a sermon with rosary beads in his hand. Terrified, Zampano abandons her, fearing her inability to move past the incident and the constant fear of apprehension lurking in his mind.

La Strada, is a film which is based on rather simple set of events, free from extravagance and dreams, but mounted on a larger set of emotions that is experienced by the human mind. It tries to explore our need to belong, to love or to hate, to laugh or to repress. It’s a collection of human emotions, and how they are interlinked to each other. Zampano’s hate and repressed nature end up turning him into a murderer and Gelsomina’s austere beliefs turn her into a woman blinded by love and purpose. It’s these two individuals, who are embodiments of human experiences and beliefs, placed alongside each other, to exhibit the effect they have on each other. Fellini does all of this in the simplest fashion, through moving images, abstaining from haranguing conversations.

A few years after their separation, Zampano hears a tune that Gelsomina played on the trumpet. He expects to see her, but finds out that she had passed through the town, repeating the same tune, unable to swim out of the shocked state, before her tragic death. Later that night, Zampano wrestles a few men in the bar, before he is flung on to the streets, and in a fit of rage and anger, proclaims he doesn’t need anyone, before he wanders on to the beach and crashes into the sand, in tears.He did love Gelsomina, but could never express it.

The film as a whole, begins without any prior explanation to the past of these characters, or what they have experienced. Zampano, in particular, is never shown as a man with a past, and his behaviour is never explained. He is merely an aggressive ruffian, who uses force as his way to negotiate with society. But this could not be attributed to a trouble childhood, a tragic loss, or humiliation that could have incited his anger and impregnable nature. The director only presents a man and woman on the surface, and their relationship together. We, as viewers, are to assume or relate to them, for what they may have experienced in the past. That is exactly why La Strada resonates with those who watch it, because it does not peel the layers of a character in an effort to spoon-feed, but assumes that justification for their behaviour, lies within the audience.

Fellini’s later works, including 8 ½ and La Dolce Vita are considered to be modern ventures, unlike La Strada and his other neo-realistic works. However, as the case maybe with any film of the raconteur, La Strada too is a slice of life, from a humane perspective, on all the qualms related to existence and love, served with a bit of melancholy in the end, something which is to be pondered upon. The entire experience of life, in between conception and closure, still remains one to be relished at any point in time.

La Dolce Vita – Denizens of Decadence

There is no shortage in Fellini’s orchard. The pickings are always rich. But the question then arises – Where does one begin to describe his experience?

I was torn between Gelsomina’s candour in La Strada, Moraldo’s humble reserve in Il Vitelloni, and Guido’s never ending conundrum in 8 ½. I finally chose to settle on Marcello, the relentless journalist who thrives off perpetual controversies in Rome, serving as the protagonist for Fellini’s polemic on decadence in La Dolce Vita.

La Dolce Vita merely translates into ‘The Sweet Life’. It follows the life of a middle-aged journalist, wandering aimlessly from nightclubs to mansions in search of news-worthy affairs to feed the masses. In an age where there are no venetian blinds, no curtains, or even windows, the term ‘privacy’ is no longer sacrosanct. Almost everybody is kept in the loop, the most squalid details being proliferated to reach distances that cannot be fathomed. Trapped in quenching this perennial thirst for scandals, skirmishes and affairs, Marcello gravitates around a center that is apocryphal.

Laconic and wry, the character is portrayed by Marcello Mastroianni. He courts Maddalena (Anouk Aimee), a rich heiress who craves for new sensations, while also accommodating his partner, Emma (Yvonne Furneaux). Amidst this, he is also smitten by the tantalizing actress, Sylvia (Anita Ekberg), for whom his admiration has no bounds, which he expresses as he dances with her in the Baths of Caracalla. Fellini structures the film as a series of 7 nights and 7 dawns. This structure may draw several analogies, but in effect, it helped him shape each episode with a definitive beginning and end, as he follows his protagonist.

Born on the catholic sands of Rimini, stretching across the Adriatic Sea, Fellini’s childhood was one that revolved around school, soda shops and bakeries. His idea of ‘The Sweet Life’ is confined to his modest and demure relationships with his companions as he scampered along the coastal line of Rimini. Post the war years, Italy was subjected to periods of intense modernization, with development on all the frontiers. And the eternal city of Rome, was the beating heart of all the economic and cultural convulsions that were to follow.

La Dolce Vita, as a film, portrays the ‘Sweet Life’ as what the people of Rome looked up to or rather were made to believe through parlaying media outlets. Abundance, extravagance, endless indulgence and to never feel deprived of comfort. But what if one had achieved these perceived ideals? This is what the film tackles, and the audience, see this through the eyes of Marcello.

Marcello is in no way a deprived man. He is wealthy enough to make ends meet and even go the extra mile to afford what a normal man couldn’t. He drives through the night alongside Maddalena, who has graciously offered to drop a prostitute at her home. During this ride, she questions Marcello if he would ever share a bed with the woman that they have offered to drop off. He responds with a little smile saying no. When asked why, he says sometimes, but then reverts back to his usual self, with his motives always unclear and cloaked. The next dawn, he comes to know that Emma has overdosed, likely due to his absence, and he rushes her to the hospital where he professes his endless love for her. Almost immediately after this fiasco, he calls Maddalena.

From this episode, it is clear that Marcello is a man who tries to align himself with these symbols of importance and indulgence. He roams the streets of the eternal city, relentlessly hoping to be at the center of things and to feel associated with fame, traversing on a path to ‘The Sweet Life’, or at-least, the fabricated path conjured by society to achieve the ideal life, one that is devoid of problems. He travels with Sylvia, the dazzling actress who has been signed for a major Italian production. Besotted by her beauty, he has been tethered to her leash, following her across a myriad of Roman structures. She is ever fascinated, with her attention never tending to attenuate. She jumps from one thing to the next. An exhausted Marcello chases her, as she finally enters the Trevi Fountain. As the moment becomes tender, Marcello is interrupted by the break of dawn. He realizes that Sylvia is in every sense different from an actress, who will always be distant as she pursues life’s intricacies, but never too distant to don her cloak to captivate her audience, and hence be a symbol. Her enigmatic nature, leaves Marcello confused and jaded in the wake of a new dawn.

In another scene, Marcello comes across his acquaintance Steiner (Alain Cuny), a wealthy man who is distant from lascivious callings, whom he ardently admires. He looks up-to Steiner because he believes everything that Steiner has embodies success. He leads a wealthy life, an apartment filled with artwork, and is gifted with two beautiful children. Invited to a part which includes a cliquish set of individuals, whose unfailing passion for art, has united them in Steiner’s living room. What follows is an esoteric conversation on art, life and the true woman. Marcello, who witnesses all this, is fascinated by the erudite thoughts that spark conversation, and believes that this state of intellect would provide his life meaning, and confesses his admiration to Steiner himself. They then converse as Steiner kisses his children goodnight. As he retires near a window, he states –

“Sometimes at night the darkness and silence weighs upon me. Peace frightens me; perhaps I fear it most of all. I feel it is only a facade hiding the face of hell. I think, ‘What is in store for my children tomorrow?’ ‘The world will be wonderful’, they say. But from whose viewpoint? If one phone call could announce the end of everything? We need to live in a state of suspended animation like a work of art, in a state of enchantment. We have to succeed in loving so greatly that we live outside of time, detached….detached”

At this point, we too, view Steiner from Marcello’s eyes. He has everything that contributes to a supposedly good life. His house is a refuge for patrons who share an undying passion for nature and art. He has two beautiful children, and a wife. His life is consummate. But then Fellini beautifully tackles this ‘complete’ life through Steiner himself. This cocooned existence which he has carved out for himself, is merely a cloak. A cloak in which he evades the void of meaninglessness. But this cloak is not impregnable, and the constant fear of being forced into the void, for the anxiety of losing his family, his children, his wealth and liberty, haunts Steiner’s consciousness with each passing moment. Amongst all the things that La Dolce Vita tries to convey, this is truly a pivotal moment.

Fellini’s narrative also has a strong undercurrent, throughout the course of the film. The film is a series of seven nights and seven dawns. But it is not necessarily a continuous exhibition. The film follows Marcello through this structure. He enters a scene and we do not know where from, and he exits a scene and we are made to ponder where to. This strong undercurrent of emotional detachment is pervasive. We only see what happens to the characters. As Film Formula states, the detachment is strong because Fellini’s characters are focused with the need to be revered or associated, and in their pursuit, they fail to facilitate room for emotional exchanges. As Marcello escorts his father after he suffers a mild heart scare, he urges him to stay back and spend time with him. But his father continues to walk away. After a night of indulgence, filled with dance and champagne, the sudden visit of death leaves him disconcerted. He is emotionally unavailable to his son, because he continues to ponder whether his life has had some meaning, and prefers to leave.

Fellini’s paparazzo, who ever so relentlessly pursue the need for sensationalist news, are the true predecessors to Louis Bloom from Nightcrawler. They are devoid of empathy, focused only on the debacle, and are worlds apart from those who fall prey to their cameras. They are neither concerned with what happens before the incident, and what happens after the incident. Acting as agents of media, they merely exist only to give glimpses of events. The seething criticism that news agencies have transcended the state of being informative to become a spectacle platform that lets us disengage from our own lives, or to avoid facing the ever persistent question of meaningfulness, is ubiquitous, just like the paparazzo.

However, as I watched La Dolce Vita, I felt two scenes that were vital in revealing our protagonist, as something more than an individual wandering through life. Someone more than a hedonistic man, a catalyst of sensationalism. The first of them being the dilemma he faces between pursuing journalism and engaging in the process of writing a book which has long been on his to-do list. Caught between the lustre the entails journalism and his yearning to do something less recognized but closer to his heart, he confides in Steiner, who only offers him a way out through a publisher, but does not dish out any advice. Marcello decides to type his book, but his thoughts and reflections are not visible to us as we directly cut to the sea shack that he has taken refuge in to gather his thoughts.

Perched on the shore, the scene is set in such an artless way. Perez Prado’s Patricia, the ever lively song which would ultimately find its way back into the film, is played on the stereo by the young waitress. Amidst this, our ever relentless Marcello argues over the phone with Emma, showing contempt over her obsessiveness, before he retires to typing again. The exchange between him and the young waitress is a beautiful little exchange. It highlights Marcello as someone who can take a breath, and be more light-hearted, paradoxical to his apparitions throughout the film. It’s almost as if Fellini tries to state that amidst this chase for glory and gratification, we share these warm little exchanges, but we neglect them as insignificant in the bigger picture. We fail to recognize that these little moments make up life, and our projected bigger picture is merely a façade.

The second instance that sheds light on Marcello and his outlook on relationships is when he is seated in his car with Emma, as they bought argue in a ludicrous fashion in the still night. Through a series of medium shots focusing on both characters when they speak, Fellini captures the essence of both his characters. Emma consistently feels jealous, largely due to Marcello’s frivolous engagements with other women. After a heated argument, Emma pleads Marcello to tell her what he is afraid of. For which he states –

“A man who agrees to live like this is a finished man, he’s nothing but a worm! I don’t believe in your aggressive, sticky, maternal love! I don’t want it, I have no use for it! This isn’t love, its brutalization!”

Both Emma and Marcello have widely varying views on love. Marcello seems to view it as a relationship that is laid back, allowing both individuals to explore themselves and the world around them while being distinctively individual. However, Emma views it as a lock-in with no bailouts. That two individuals must be consumed by the emotion. But it seems baseless as she merely wants to be maternal and aggressive, believing that the man she loves must bind to her words and she would bind to his and the buck stops there.

After an argument that gets physical, Marcello drops her in the middle of the road, cursing her and vowing to never take her back. And yet he drives back the next dawn to pick her up, and they both end up entangled in bed. It’s ironical, but bitterly true. Even though they do not feel completely satisfied in each other’s presence, even though they stem from two perceived verities, their need to belong somewhere or with someone supersedes their innate feelings about life and love. However, in an earlier sequence, the vivacious Maddalena questions Marcello if he would marry her, both of them seated in separate rooms. But before they could see each other, Maddalena is enticed by another man and Marcello is left to wander. It gives us certain ideas about Marcello’s willingness to commit but also makes us dubious about his ability to actually do the same.

The most pivotal moment in both the film and Marcello’s life is the sequence of Steiner’s suicide that involved the murder of his own two children. Marcello is left shattered. He couldn’t fathom that Steiner would resort to murder to avoid the overbearing fear of uncertainty. The man whose life he looked up-to was merely a bag of lies, a life in which he feared to step outside this construed security, for the fear of slipping into a void. And as the prospect of the horrendous event parlayed in his mind, it pushed him to take extreme measures. Silenced into stupor, albeit not shown, it is presumed that Marcello ponders about life, love, and everything that we do. But before can experience his grief, Fellini cuts to the final sequence of the film, and as always, we are also made to experience the emotional detachment that our characters waiver through.

The final sequence is a lavish party or orgy. By this time, Marcello has denounced both journalism and literature, and has become a publicity agent. He has become nearly monstrous in behaviour, and in every sense, desensitized. Not aware of place nor time, he floats through the party, aided by liquor. And as dawn breaks, he and the others move as a parade through the beach. As the others are fascinated by the morning catch, a sea monster, which too has its own implications, Marcello wanders away. On the other side of a small inlet, is the benign young waitress that Marcello conversed to in the sea shack in one of the previous sequences. She constructs a series of hand gestures that Marcello doesn’t seem to understand. The divide almost implies that they are not only distant physically, but also in their outlook towards life. The young waitress Paola, with her optimistic outlook and artless nature, which is parallel to Marcello, who has succumbed to a dwindling lifestyle.

La Dolce Vita embodies many things that Fellini tries to convey. From religious symbols to lascivious indulgence, it is a sardonic take on man’s relentless pursuit to add meaning to his life. Some resort to religion, some resort to fame, and some resort to indulgence, to avoid the ever persistent shadow of meaninglessness. But no amount of words can be used to surmount the beauty of moving pictures, and La Dolce Vita is a film to be watched and re-watched at various points in life, as we can always collect new shells on a shore that we may have traversed on for years together. As Roger Ebert says, it is as though Mastroianni and Fellini were struck with a moment of realization that they decided to capture this dwindling lifestyle through their film. Cinema doesn’t change, but its viewers are ever shifting, and we take something different from every encounter.

Star Wars and George Lucas – The Catechism of World- Building

“A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away….”

For far too long I remained abstemious with my choices. I always wanted to watch Star Wars but I found myself conjuring a reason to wriggle out of the obligation that I had created for myself. But ever since I fixed my gaze on these words that popped up on my screen, I felt that my penchant to wriggle out from the grasp of my obligations was nothing short of asceticism.

A simple choice of words to open your film. It suffices the need to establish a dramatic premise. However, inexperienced filmmakers seldom stay true to their prologue, and their urge to branch out often implies abated storytelling. My pessimistic view is one to be taken in jest, but the reason why I stress this is because how you set up a film, ultimately shapes the course of the drama that follows suit.

George Lucas envisioned not a nation, nor a world. He envisioned a galaxy. His magnanimous vision made him play nothing short of a second fiddle to god in front of the nerve wracking white paper and pen. The ability to toy around with the laws of physics and the inhabitants of these worlds may seem never-ending. However, on the other hand, you also run the risk of over stretching your story, where repetitive elements could jeopardize your narration.

In any situation, building a world requires the writer to be assiduous. However, if a story fails to be relevant, it becomes less enterprising. My journey throughout Lucas’s galaxy made me fall in love with its intricacies, and through this post, I would like to share what made this space saga distinctively rich and archaic, yet propelled into the future.

Tatooine: The Desert Planet.

Act I in the first instalment of Star Wars opens on Tatooine, the home of Luke Skywalker. Bearing in mind that this would be the first of many worlds to come, it becomes extremely important to set-up this world with finely woven intricacies.

World- building is strenuous task for it encompasses multiple facets that a writer must consider before jotting it down on the initial draft. The settlements, the culture, the geography, its resources and the cobweb of relationships between its inhabitants. This endless list can often prove to be menacing and shaping a world that is convincing becomes rather arduous.

Earlier, I mentioned the importance of relevance. Any civilization usually dwells on the planet’s resources to sustain life. This is staple and any writer can fabricate the nature of these resources to provide a much more vivid and unseen world. However, sculpting the culture of a planet and the way of life forms an integral part of storytelling. These worlds are merely tools in storytelling, a base on which the characters traverse. A badly written base would be the visual equivalent of your character walking on quicksand. Not a pretty sight in all fairness.

Tatooine is portrayed as a land of nomads. A picturesque day on Tatooine would see a skirmish waiting to happen on the streets of Mos Eisley spaceport as onlookers slurp a glass of Jawa Beer to quench their thirst in the sweltering conditions. A word of caution for anyone looking to tour the spaceport would be to take cover at any given point in time to avoid being hit by a shrapnel whose trajectory is almost impossible to predict. Due to the absence of any distinguished authority, the order of affairs is commanded by how deep one’s pockets are with fear and money driving those on a planet whose resources are finite. The entire set-up of Tatooine resembles Middle-Eastern settlements where one’s status was defined by the resources at his disposal.

Home to both Anakin and Luke Skywalker, the way of life defines their dramatic need. Albeit the difference in timelines, they are both living on a planet far away for the centre of the universe, with very little to offer in terms of resources and power for their kind. This drives both of them to leave, on a quest to achieve something that would have never been possible if they remained amongst the outlying system of Tatooine. This could not have been possible if the planet was not established properly, and the dramatic need of the protagonist would have been impaired. Lucas’s ability to extract a segment of human society and project it to create a world helped in creating a stronger character.

Naboo: The Terrestrial Planet.

Naboo is essentially the planet which is akin to our own home, Earth. The surface dwellers are humans who live and govern themselves through the presence of a Queen whereas the Gungans live under water in the swamps of the planet in a self-imposed exile.

Naboo could have been any kingdom that had existed in the course of our history. It houses several institutions which aim to develop education and the arts. They lead a peaceful way of life with an emphasis on intrinsic wellbeing. Home to Queen Padme Amidala and the seemingly immaculate Jar Jar Binks, Naboo depicts the middle ages in human history where power was placed in the hands of an individual.

The quest for power has been pervasive throughout the history of the planet. Initially it was between the inhabitants of the planet and then later on the quest for power stemmed from within its own civilization. Senator Palpatine who was born on Naboo, would later rule over the galaxy as its emperor. In many facets, Naboo is similar to the Roman Republic. The fall of the Roman Republic paved way for the Roman Empire, and a similar shift of power stems from Naboo. The ascension of Palpatine through the ranks of the senate to become the supreme chancellor and then the Emperor began through the trade federation blockade on Naboo in the years building up to the Clone Wars is a similar to the power driven needs that plagued the Republic causing its fall, giving birth to the Empire.

Naboo has been used as a tool in the narrative to uphold the political aspect of Lucas’s storytelling. Unlike Tatooine, it does not delve into the lives of its inhabitants and tends to be shown from a macroscopic perspective. In the context of the story, each world serves a different purpose. Due to this, the story is able to hold multiple layers with relative ease. However, the world still holds potential to be explored further in future films.

Coruscant: The Capital of the Old Republic.

“Coruscant, capital of the Republic, an entire planet evolved into one city.“

Coruscant is a beautiful mesh of advancement and technology and is the most apt choice to act as the capital of the Republic. An entire planet that functions and throbs as one city. Suspended in the middle of the galaxy, this giant city is home to a trillion inhabitants, emitting an unparalleled jazz due to its diversity. Besides being resplendent eye-candy, Coruscant is not merely a culmination of the galaxy’s inhabitants. It serves a much greater purpose and is the center of political power.

The planet serves as the base of all political institutions in the republic. The Senate District situated on the equatorial line houses representatives from the inner, middle and outer rim territories and also the infamous Jedi Temple and the Jedi Council. The planet serves as the house of power, with the governing forces of a galaxy vested in its sprawling settlements. However, this does not imply that Coruscant does not have anything to offer on the cultural front. Each vicinity in Coruscant is brimming with modern culture. Nightclubs see thousands of people flock towards them and shoddy alleys act as channels of crime.

Lucas envisioned Coruscant as a culmination of our world’s biggest cities. Basking in broad daylight, the planet and its settlements resemble the dizzying heights of a futuristic New York and as darkness edges closer, the fluorescent nightlife of Tokyo springs up in the lower levels of the city. The disability to bridge the gap between geographical locations vanishes and the writer leverages the advantage of the fictional realm to bring the best of both experiences under one roof.

Even though Coruscant serves primarily as the center of political affairs and events in the course of the films, the diligent work of George Lucas has setup possibilities for his successors to exploit the untapped underbelly of Coruscant to make future spin-offs that can be rich and engaging due to a well-established base.

Kamino: The Ocean Planet

Although Kamino makes only a small appearance in the second episode of the Star Wars saga, I found it to be more than what it appears and that is why I chose to feature Kamino over Utapau or Geonosis. Long forgotten and situated on the outer rim of galaxy, Kamino and its inhabitants are constantly ravaged my incessant rain that belts their establishments. But what makes Kamino interesting is more than just obscure climatic conditions.

Kamino is shown to be preparing an army for the Old Republic, if required in a battle against the separatists. As Obi- Wan lands on the planet, he is greeted by a Kaminoan who expected his arrival much to his confusion. He learns that the Kaminoans have resorted to genetic cloning to prepare an army based on a genetic template provided by a bounty hunter, Jango Fett.

Kamino is a planet which acts as a catalyst to the clone wars. A dormant outlier, the creation of a clone army shifts the tide of the war in Palpatine’s favour. However, in Obi-Wan Kenobi’s visit, he is informed by the inhabitants that their clones can think creatively, while remaining docile in comparison to their original host.

The entire segment is Lucas’s vision on artificial intelligence and the possibility of genetic cloning in mankind’s own future. The idea of creating a docile offspring through one’s genetic composition is indeed fascinating but debatably immoral. Teasing the concept of cloning, Lucas projects a futuristic view and this could also make room for a separate episode with genetic cloning as the underlying subject. Laying down a potential foundation that can be worked upon, opportunities are abound for prospective writers looking to branch out from the initial storyline during a later point in time. But caution must be exercised, and the writer must be wary of overspending time on a segment that holds future prospects, compromising the current narrative by doing so. The world must aid the story and its characters, the story must not manifest into a description of the world.

Endor: The Forest Moon

Ewoks are the first thing that strike your mind as soon as Endor is mentioned. The quirky little creatures are the ones I saved for the last. Miniscule their presence might be, but their role in the film is one that shoulders a greater responsibility than mere comic relief. The forest moon of Endor is a pivotal place in the final battle between the rebel forces and the empire. The iconic troupe comprising Solo, Luke, Leia and Chewbacca along with the bustling R2-D2 portrayed by Kenny Baker and C-3PO with his impeccable wit and humour are hosted by the natives of the forest planet.

Endor as a planet in the narrative has significance both in terms of the overall narrative as well as an underlying theme. The Battle of Endor takes place between the Ewoks and the Empires forces. On the surface, this battle may seem one that provokes great enthusiasm to the viewer. But yet again, this is layered battle depicting a faceoff between nature and mankind. The empire with their blasters on one side and Ewoks with their brazen guts and pitchforks on the other. As the events unravel, it turns out to be a magnificent spectacle to watch.

However, upon closer introspection, the genius of multi-layered story telling proves to be immensely satisfactory. As you peel of the nature vs mankind layer, you also stumble upon the fact that the battle is between the early stages of evolution against a much more advanced stage of evolution. The clones are a result of genetic modification whereas the Ewoks are a result of evolution. In the end, it accumulates and boils down to natural warfare versus modern warfare.

Although the inclusion of Ewoks and Endor was highly questioned and criticised, I felt that the inclusion of Ewoks instead of the rebel alliance felt much more satisfactory and served the scene better and their presence was fuelled by a purpose and was not merely to provide relief through their antics. However, if the inclusion of a different species does not add anything to the story, it can cause the writer to lose additional screen-time trying to establish these species when the requirement of their presence is arguable or unnecessary.

When a writer confronts such a huge task of creating multiple worlds, doubts may start to creep in, and the writers mind only too willing to create roadblocks debarring him from writing the next segment of his narrative. But the reason as to why Star Wars has burgeoned in fame across the world is due to its capability to contain multiple characters with ample openings for fans to expect individual stories to branch out from the core set-up.

George Lucas’s vision to extract shards from human history to weave a world that is coherent and complementary is one that deserves plaudits. As a writer, you are given the ingredients and the go ahead to create a fictional world. This equips you with unlimited creative freedom but you also find restrictions cropping up as you explore, and maintaining a plausible storyline becomes all the more imperative. George Lucas was able to keep his story in place and succeed in transcending the constraints of time.

Each world in some form is a representation of human history spread over the course of millenniums and centuries, either propelled into the future or firmly rooted in the past. The ability to view different worlds that resemble our own across various points in time is a rewarding experience in itself. Many writers have successfully created their own fictional realms on screen post the Star Wars franchise, but the first man to charter on unknown waters and still leave discoverable areas for his successors could not have done it without immense forethought on how he would build his worlds.

Pathological Liars – Creating them & believing them.

Lying is something we subconsciously engage in. We use our lies to weasel out of uncomfortable situations, to place ourselves in more favourable positions and even fabricate events to mask our desires or intentions. But, why do we lie rather than present the blatant truth? Our reasons could be laughably remote, or yet another step in gratifying our intentions.

Lies are often labelled as common mistakes or conscious decisions. This is true, but seldom do we track our need to lie. It could spiral out of control, becoming compulsive or habitual. It is known that no social interaction could be devoid of lies, but we ride on a fine line. A line that separates lying from being natural to becoming habitual, transcending our normal consciousness, fortifying the absolute need to lie, when the underlying reasons could range from being non- existent or malicious.

The life of a common man, who lies to his wife, superior or colleague, begins and ends on the safer side of that line. His needs are trivial and remain the same till his death. But, not always does one dwell on one side. Over the course of life, lying does become compulsive, with an unmitigated need to lie in every situation, placing individual desires over and above societal welfare. This gives birth to compulsive liars whose relationship with lying is akin to fish and water.

There could be a plethora of reasons behind how one could become a compulsive liar. It could either arise from past experiences or from an insatiable need for admiration and glory. But, my purpose here is to not engage in the endless social or scientific causes that may exist. I’m going to spend my time in explaining how writers create pathological liars in their scripts, and how their lies are made believable by actors, and how directors present them to the audience. The plausibility of my explanation, as always, resides in your final judgement.

Verbal Kint :

“The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist”

The crown to Christopher McQuarrie’s career was when he bagged an academy award back in 96 for The Usual Suspects. Most of the plaudits that came his way quoted the skill and wit that McQuarrie put into creating Verbal Kint. Verbal, a two-bit con artist caught in a hugely interconnected heist that goes awry, finds himself within the confines of Agent Kujan’s office in New York. Portrayed by Kevin Spacey, the narrative is woven through a series of flashbacks and engaging conversations between Kujan and Verbal.

A pathological liar, Verbal creates or stages an entire series of events that never happened. But, the real question however here is how McQuarrie created a character that was completely believable by both Kujan and the audience alike? Let’s take down instances and break them down, so that we can piece together every lie said by Verbal that was born from thin air.

Cut into Kujan’s office. We’ve got Verbal flustering to light a cigarette, chomping on one end, with Kujan helping him out. Before this scene, it is clearly stated that Verbal’s story checks out, he has the pin of total immunity, and is free to walk out of the precinct given his cooperation. But Kujan suspects that Verbal may be concealing something, details that could piece together the jigsaw that the heist has left behind. Kujan is like all of us. He watches Verbal, a cripple so naive, yet cloistered. He is absolutely sure that there is something that would fit the puzzle, and everything would fall into place.

Verbal, in fact, is the piece to completing the jigsaw. But not the jigsaw that has been created by the heist. He is the piece that aims to consummate our jigsaw to feel complete. To stop and ponder, all the lies we fabricate and use in our social interactions, is to gratify the needs of the other person, and to some extent, our own needs as well. Our lies, consciously or subconsciously, sift through our mind before they are chosen to be words. We choose the lie that suits our standing in a social conversation. The lie that serves our needs and wants.

Back to the scene, Verbal crafts a story that sketches the events of that night, and fabricates the existence of a lawyer, Kobayashi that hitherto hasn’t been mentioned in Verbal’s testament to the D.A. This is the first major lie that Verbal uses in his escape, or rather his first step to become Keyzer Soze again, before vanishing forever. Piqued by the new evidence that he has heard, Kujan is now starting to believe Verbal’s lies, because that is what he wants to hear. The existence of the smallest possibility that could prove his theory, that something exists beyond what is on his platter, slowly blinds his eyes.

Let’s pause for a moment. Just like Kujan, we too expect the same in our everyday conversations. We tend to prefer our version, and when we sniff the smallest possibility of its existence, we are quick to jump to conclusions. While watching the film, we too believe the existence of further drama, and our need for contradictions and conflicts to keep us engaged, lead us to believe that Kujan’s theory could be right, until the final reveal. That is why lying has become habitual, and necessary for our survival. It is the way to cloak our own intentions, or satisfy the needs of others, helping us continue our social relationships from which we stand to gain something. Verbal realizes that Kujan, unlike other officers, believes the existence of something beyond his story, and fabricates further details that would fit Kujan’s theory. McQuarrie creates Kujan as a foil, one whose naïve nature exists in varying degrees within us, where we always try to gain from our social interactions, leaping to conclusions given the slightest possibility of their existence.

In the final and third act of the film, Kujan places his theory about Keaton being Keyzer Soze. Verbal begins a string of contradictions, refusing to believe Kujan. This is where McQuarrie utilizes the potential of his character. Kujan is absolutely determined to prove that Keaton is Soze. But then why would Verbal deny that and reaffirm his stance? It’s simple. Giving in easily, or altering the story according to Kujan, would raise suspicions. Kujan states that Verbal is a cripple, and he is weak, and therefore Keaton chose to cheat him. Verbal, until this point, has appealed to Kujan’s pity, refusing to accept Kujan’s theory of him being used as a windup toy in Keaton’s plan. Spacey puts up nothing short of a brilliant performance to make it all the more believable for the audience, by acquiescing and rejecting Kujan’s theory at the same time, therefore fortifying the idea of Keaton being Soze in Kujan’s mind. He has successfully made Kujan omit the possibility of Verbal being Keyzer and therefore has used his lies to serve as a contradiction, solidifying Kujan’s explanation before walking out of the precinct.

Drawing this segment to a close, a character’s lies envelop not only his words, but his actions as well. That is why it is increasingly important to create a complex character such as Verbal, with an actor in mind. The performer should be able to convince himself before convincing anyone else, something which Spacey achieved with much effort. He needs to buy his own lies, chomp on them, and digest them, before serving them to anyone else. A mesh of brilliant acting and writing, Verbal is undoubtedly a character who has gained an iconic status.

The Clown Prince of Gotham

“When the chips are down these civilized people will eat each other out”

Arguably one of my most favourite cinematic portrayals, The Joker, played by Heath Ledger, burst onto the fore with the release of The Dark Knight in 2008 and has been living on in the memory of all those who witnessed him. The Joker was no stranger before the release of the film, and has been a the most dominant villain in DC’s comic books, acting as Batman’s arch nemesis. The Joker has been altered by many writers during his stint in the comics, from the golden age to the silver age.

When Nolan was tasked with helming The Dark Knight trilogy, most of his efforts were targeted at making Joker the perfect antagonist for The Batman. From the first act of the film, the Joker is set-up as a highly unreliable persona, a man without a past, who can never be held for his word. Writing such a character, requires much skill, but also provides the writer with ample amounts of creative freedom. A man without a past is an embodiment of a lie. He is whatever he says, and can never be relied on, making him a complete enigma. The Joker is the perfect foil in the The Dark Knight and I shall try to bring out how he spins his lies to perfection.

From the opening sequence, Joker double-crosses his hit team and walks, or rather drives away with the money, and this sets up his character. A man who dwells in the realms of insanity, and can never be relied on. Since the Joker has no backstory, it makes him all the more unpredictable, because whatever he says and refrains from saying, is open to interpretation. When you try to deduce a man’s actions, you tend to look upon what he has done in the past. But when you have no past, you are dealing with a man who can be seen only for his words and actions in the moment. The truth to the Joker, is what he fabricates within the confines of his mind. The nature of that truth is fragile, and can be broken at any point in time. But his ability to convey this fabricated version of truth, so that it becomes believable to others is what makes him a perfect villain. Written by Goyer, and the Nolan brothers, the Joker is setup to exploit Batman at every turn, through his artifice. Let’s take an instance to look at how the Joker exploits the Batman in what turns out to be a pivotal scene in the film.

We are now in the interrogation room in the precinct. Batman and Joker sit facing each other on steel chairs. The air is perforated with cold, the Joker in handcuffs and the Batman with all the leverage. It’s clearly setup that Batman has all the means to extract what he wants from the Joker, and the Joker, as always, is given the liberty to his words. It’s blunt force against the sinister tongue. The Batman begins to question the Joker about Dent and his location, exerting his strength immediately. Now, we are trying to place ourselves within the Joker’s shoes, trying to figure out how to exploit the Batman, and create a leverage out of thin air. So what’s the first thing that strikes his mind?

The Batman, or the caped crusader, regardless of his adopted persona, is a man before anything. A human with a pool of emotions that can be tapped into to create an advantage. He has been able to conceal his identity extremely well, but along the way, we tend to make mistakes. When going up against the Joker, even the slightest stumble can transfer your leverage to him. Earlier in the film, the Joker drops Rachel, Bruce’s love interest, from the building. He plunges down to save her at any cost. Now, The Joker doesn’t need the information of who the Batman is, but he has deduced what matters to him, and he utilizes this to his advantage in this scene.

He tells Batman that he knows about his feelings for Rachel. In this moment, the Joker is addressing the man under the mask. Not the hero of Gotham, but Bruce Wayne. He has nothing to threaten Batman with, and threatens Bruce Wayne instead. We can immediately see that Bruce is caught in a cacophony within his mind, ricocheting between the fear of losing Rachel and his inability to threaten the Joker. He resorts to increasing violence, but realizes he is failing with each passing moment. The Joker realizes he has broken down the suit and reached the man inside, and now reveals the location of both Rachel and Harvey. Now, he has placed a situation in which Batman can only save one person in time, and therefore making a conscious choice of killing the other. Batman reacts by exiting the room, rushing to save Rachel, eminent that he still harbours feelings for her. The Joker is fully aware that Bruce Wayne would save Rachel over Harvey, and lies to Batman. Therefore, The Joker realizes the need for Bruce to save Rachel and exploits it, and therefore making the Batman believe that he has consciously let the other person die, which is equal to the act of murder. A pathological liar would place his lie in such a manner that leads to the omission of one need to choose another. However, this is also another reason why compulsive liars don’t have solid relationships because of their incessant need to lie. It’s a genius scene in which the Joker is crafted as the perfect foil, or rather the crippling blow to Batman from which he must recover. Goyer and the Nolan brothers deserve the plaudits for sketching a character so complex, and Heath Ledger for bringing him to life.

Drawing this post to a close, I had rummaged over many ideas before I settled in on this one. Lying is an intriguing yet increasingly common act that is often overlooked. We watch movies where we have characters that lie, and yet we find it comforting to believe them rather than question them. I felt that understanding how they lie would be an interesting choice to ramble about why other characters sometimes tend to overlook a lie, and why they grasp on it as the last straw. It’s an important area for writers to look into when they draft their character sketches before beginning to write a screenplay, and although I don’t have the access to their notes, I have tried to deduce from the words and actions of these characters. I’d begin to write my next when I stumble upon another intriguing idea that challenges me as I write, and I shall take a break until then. Hope you have a good read, and I’m always open to incorporating any feedback received.

Time and Memory – The Dehumanizing effects of War.

The decision to go to war against a nation is usually vested in the hands of few who are seated atop the bureaucratic ladder. On the other side of that ladder, mothers, daughters, sisters and wives bid adieu to the men they love so dearly, as they are sent by their fellow countrymen into the fields of battle, like cows sent to a slaughterhouse. Once the bugle is blown, the peace treaties signed, the men return home, either in coffins or with medals. Media outlets then proliferate the selfless actions of these brave men, through print or visuals.

This is the picture that governments and news outlets strive to paint with vivid strokes through their political paintbrushes. However, cinematic representations of war have always tried to encompass the adverse effects on the functionality of the human mind. These films are usually not devoid of the brutal side of war, but interestingly use those actions to delve into the minds of those whose fingers embrace the trigger of an assault rifle, their separation granted only by the sweet release of death. By using every act of murder, witnessed or committed, filmmakers and screenwriters try to map a relationship between physical action and emotional reaction.

While watching these films, I observed that different films have shown characters reacting to the events of war in a different manner. With increasing exposure to acts of violence, their emotional reaction alters itself. To understand this better, I shall be taking the examples of three characters from three films, each of them in different stages of exposure to the events of war.

The Initial stages of exposure: Pvt. Leonard “Gomer Pyle” Lawrence

“If god wanted you up there I am sure he would have miracled your ass up there by now Private Pyle “

– Drill Instructor Hartman/ Full Metal Jacket (1983)

Private Leonard Lawrence (Vincent D’Onofrio) ,or later referred to as Gomer Pyle by Drill Instructor Hartman is enlisted in the boot camp situated in South Carolina, where men are trained to be automatons of war before they are shipped to Vietnam to carry out the orders of their superiors. This is an interesting case to understand the mental effects of war even before a soldier steps foot onto the battlefield. One amongst many of the enlisted men, Leonard is much more naïve than his counterparts. A man who has had a cocooned existence hitherto, is then subjugated to forceful methods of training, and is hurled insults at every turn. Kubrick treats Leonard’s mind as the desired point of effect because Leonard is like any other common man, with a mind that is devoid of any prior experience to the brashness of war, almost childlike in its functionality. He then creates obstacles that verbally and physically target the character, in an attempt to provoke a response, by demolishing the latter’s perceived reality.

Towards the middle of Leonard’s journey in the South Carolina boot camp, his mind starts to condition itself to the harsh reality that prevails around it. It starts to believe in the principles that are fed to it, rationalizing the act of murder by labelling it as the only key to survival. However, this process of adapting is usually a result of constant internal conflict between existing principles and new principles, with Leonard trying to unseat old principles to pave way for the new. This is the initial stage where principles of objectification slowly establish their roots in the process of desensitization or dehumanization. To emphasize this, Kubrick shows him treating his rifle with love, fondly calling it Charlene.

Towards the end of Leonard’s journey, it is revealed that he has been assigned to the infantry of the American frontline in Vietnam, a task which cannot be carried out unless Leonard resolves the conflict within his mind. Torn between conflict, Leonard ultimately shoots Hartman and then shoots himself. He opted for the release of death to resolve the conflict in his mind. However, this was only a result of two sets of strong principles rooted in innocence and violence, which is not always the case with every man that traverses the road of war. Many men have a frail or standard set of principles that are not usually steadfast in governing one’s actions. There is a fine line between guiding principles, which waver from situation to situation. To help illustrate the same in a better fashion, let us take another example.

The second stage of exposure: Captain Miller

“Sometimes I wonder if I’ve changed so much my wife is even going to recognize me, whenever it is that I get back to her. And how I’ll ever be able to tell her about days like today. Ah, Ryan. I don’t know anything about Ryan. I don’t care. The man means nothing to me. It’s just a name. But if… You know if going to Rumelle and finding him so that he can go home. If that earns me the right to get back to my wife, then that’s my mission”

– Captain Miller / Saving Private Ryan (1998)

Captain Miller (Tom Hanks) has been a servant in France for the allied forces for a longer period than his subordinates. The acts of murder and bloodshed witnessed by him have become commonplace. He has managed to sever himself from creating any meaningful relationships in order to keep moving forward as he is responsible for the lives of all those under him. But when you introspect his character closely, you can understand that he too at some point must have underwent the emotional burden of murder, but his mind has been desensitized through repetition in such a manner that it has accepted the principles of war. Those in front of him are mere obstacles and those that follow him are merely responsibilities and his mission is to carry out orders. But this does not mean that he has grown to accept the philosophy of war. He has only adjusted to it, agreeing to cope with the harsh oddities of it. His principles of hope and love are dormant, having paved way to the principles of war, believing that they can someday be re-instilled.

In the opening stages of the film, the men battle on the Omaha beach against opposition forces. Captain Miller can be seen leading his men into battle. However, the interchange of dialogues between Sergeant Horvath and Captain Miller at places seems to be strung in such a casual fashion, wherein Horvath tells Miller that his mother would be very disappointed in him if she had seen what he had done. Miller responds by saying he thought that Horvath was his mother. The dialogue is constructed to be trivial, rather contrastingly to the nature of events around them. Both the men have been desensitized to the extent of turning a blind eye to the bloodshed around them, be it that of their allies or their enemies, their objectives the only thing on their mind.

Progressing further, the troop have lost one of their men to a German ambush. Horvath and Miller can be seen discussing later that night, surrounded by the undying sounds of aerial bombardment. Miller states that he would have not sacrificed a known man for this unknown man who is their current mission. This interchange conveys that Miller, regardless of his position at times, values life differently for those known and unknown. But he prefers to continue believing the principles of war and be an adherent to the orders given to him, because he needn’t be completely responsible for his actions on the battlefield. It seems much easier to comply with orders and value lives lost in the same manner, instead of assigning an emotional weight to each death, although it is against his own will and former principles.

The longer you are engaged in warfare, the more you wander away from your former principles. The orders given to you seem easier to digest after a while, and your hopes of reuniting with loved ones makes you turn a blind eye. You become selfish and your dreams help you walk on the tightrope between the crossfire. Through his own words before the final battle in which Miller loses his life, he states that he was formerly a school teacher and Ryan’s life means nothing to him as long as this mission is just another in his indefinite goal to reunite with his wife, albeit he fears that his wife may not recognize him due to extent of his desensitization and diminished value for human life. The fine line between Miller’s past and present principles disintegrates, as he feels that what he does now is only to attain what his heart desires, and that alone helps him keep his sanity through the madness. He has constructed a warm fireplace surrounded by memories, and turns to it to avoid descending into madness. However, certain men are desensitized to the extent that their former life becomes insignificant and war consumes their soul. To help illustrate this example better, let me take the final character to elaborate on the same.

The final stage of exposure: Colonel Walter. E. Kurtz

Horror… Horror has a face… and you must make a friend of horror. Horror and moral terror are your friends. If they are not, then they are enemies to be feared. They are truly enemies.

–Colonel Walter. E. Kurtz / Apocalypse Now (1979)

Appearing only for the final stages of the film, Marlon Brando is the living embodiment of the void that exists in the absence of the soul, teetering on the line between sanity and insanity. The entire film is constructed in such a manner where Captain Willard unravels each chapter behind Kurtz’s exploits, leaving him with a deeper desire to meet the man behind all these accomplishments. Upon reaching the tribal outpost on the banks of the Cambodian river, he sees that Kurtz has completely derailed from his former life, becoming a ghost with neither a home nor nation.

A man loses his humane senses and morality when he no longer places emphasis on human life. He sees no value in flesh and blood, they have merely become tools to achieve objectives. The events he witnesses disconcerts him, and his former life becomes a distant memory, languishing in the farthest corner of the mind. Kurtz was stationed in Vietnam to carry out orders with due diligence. But once he saw the ways in which the Viet Cong operated, he no longer believed in the trite methods of his nation. His time on the field desensitized and dehumanized him to complete effect, and from that point onwards he saw no use in primordial relationships and sought meaning only in objectives. In an instance which he narrates to Willard, he describes the ruthless nature of the Viet Cong who hacked off children’s arms that had received medical attention for polio. He also states that this incident occurred when he was with the Special Forces, which seemed almost a thousand centuries ago. This implies that Kurtz did not have a mere lapse in memory, but an absolute derailment from the continuum of time.

Kurtz’s inability to comprehend time and memory is largely due to him succumbing to the forces of horror and mortal terror. In his own words, Kurtz says that Horror has a face, implying that through his experience, he has envisioned a face for horror. And this face as he states must be made a friend, along with moral terror, unless you wish to challenge them and lose yourself. Through his experiences and ruminations, he has been mentally deconstructed by these forces, and in order to avoid being completely deprived of his senses, he befriends them. He obeys their commands, so that the fragments of his past can at least remain scattered in his mind. When Willard hacks him down at the end of the film, his last words state horror, meaning that until that point he was merely a prisoner in his own mind.

Drawing this post to a close, I feel that every film on war deals with the adverse effects on the characters involved, which can be either physical damage or mental distortion. Filmmakers and screenwriters find it much more challenging to inculcate both the elements, and align them as obstacles for the characters to face. As I have mentioned on many instances before, no two humans are the same, and their actions and reactions are different, which always makes it intriguing to watch, and in certain cases also give us a closer look into the harrowing events that have affected them.