Sparsh

Sparsh refers to the sensation and feeling of touch upon which blind people rely in the absence of sight. Sparsh is partially a love story depicting the blindness in the society with psychological analysis of characters:The sweetness of movie covers its minor flaws and make it enjoyable for viewers.

It is a sensitive movie, with intense performance by Naseeruddin Shah in the role of a self-respecting visually-impaired principal of a blind school, who hates and become enraged on the society for pitying handicapped people. He works towards making his students self-reliant and full with honour. Shabana Azmi plays a social worker who has a troubled personal life supporting him as a volunteer. The movie depicts the relationship between the two. The pride of the man and the sympathies of the woman are the cause of turbulence in their relationship.

Kavita (Shabana Azmi) is a depressed widow living alone. When she accidentally meets Anirudh (Naseeruddin Shah), a rough but charismatic a visually impaired man who runs a nearby school for blind children.He works towards making his students self-reliant and hates the society for pitying people like him. He offers her to teach in his school, also her close friend Manju (Sudha Chopra) urges her to re-join society . Reluctant at first, Kavita eventually joins the school and begins reading to the boys. Kavita is enjoying the company of the blind children and begins to welcome warmth and happiness back into her life.

As Kavita spends more time at the school, she begins forming a friendship with Anirudh. A affectionate relation flourishes between them with time and they get engaged; But their personalities and feelings are different. Anirudh is of strong character: he firmly believes that the blind need help not charity.
Kavita, recently sorrowful, looks to the school (and Anirudh) as an ideal way of sacrificial service and hospitality. However, after some time the romance sours when Anirudh gets hint of this, and assumes Kavita is simply seeking to fill the void in her life with this form of assistance. Due to some incidents, Anirudh begins to fear that Kavita accepted the proposal not out of love, but for care of a hapless handicapped man. Now Anirudh starts having doubts whether this marriage is going to succeed. He feels he is being humiliated by the aid of Kavita, and hence breaks their engagement. He even tells Kavita not to come to school anymore. Will Anirudh realize her passion and take her for what she is or left her alone sidelined from his life? A well-wisher has to step in ultimately to bridge the gap.

The Touch is representation of feeling of blind people in the world.They learn the surroundings and persons mainly by touch.The movie focuses on characters as individuals rather than representative of blind and sighted. Two main characters are handicapped with blindness and heartbreak. This disability first help them in coming together ,then bonding them and then tears them apart. They are hard in their characters but fragile also. Anirudh is proud, and that pride makes it hard for him to let Kavita care for him. Kavita, for her part, is eager for a way out of her loneliness but not quite ready to move beyond her husband's death. They are fortunate in discovering each other, both are devastated by society and need a lot of time & work to overcome. They are both navigating strong emotions, but they are also both uncertain in their thoughts to other. The reserve nature of both characters makes it difficult for them to mingle with each other. It makes the characters warm, sympathetic, likable to us.

Anirudh forms a life-affirming relationship with Kavita, left a lasting impression. They yield a very muted tone love, with few outbursts of emotion. There are some engaging scenes between characters and also with the kids. The sequence where Anirudh describes his sensitivity of Kavita's beauty in her fragrance, the sound of her voice, the softness of her touch. This scene deserves special laurel for its poetic situation.

Sai Paranjape's films always deal with situations and characters, which one can easily identify with and unify with it. Sai Paranjape made a sincere attempt to tell both sides of the story with a rare unsentimental equilibrium. Story line deals with the complexes and rigid thoughts rooted in the minds of both the characters. The psychological view of two protagonist with help of blind children makes it a beautiful movie.

The film upholds an important principle that the disabled want to live independently, to be accorded the dignity and respect other sectors of society are granted. They don't want sympathy; rather they want and need normal behaviour towards them.

Both Naseer and Shabana excel in their performance and a must watch film. This film is better and gives mature treatment to subject like blindness than a drama like "Black".

Abre Los Ojos

A Spanish Matrix:Abre Los Ojos (Open your eyes)
From there Amenábar launches into a romantic thriller developing into illusion mixed of thriller-mystery and finally verging on science fiction drama, in which real life becomes inter-meshed with programmed dream-life.
Ingenious, imaginative film keeps you guessing until the end. Although the plot is confusing at times, a second viewing helps to untangle and resolve the complicated story about dreams and reality. Most of the time, I was not sure if what I was watching is really happening or whether it is a intensely disturbing nightmare. The ending is tense, mysterious and it keeps you guessing to the last what really the truth is.

César (Eduardo Noriega) has been left rich by his restaurant owning parents. When he meets the beautiful Sofia at a party he uses her as a way to escape his jealous ex girlfriend Nuria. After a night of talking with Sofia, César is picked up by Nuria who crashes her car deliberately killing her and horribly disfiguring him. With surgery limited as to what it can achieve César despairs at his loss (his looks, not Nuria) and tries to pick up with Sofia. However, when surgery returns his looks he thinks everything is solved – but his dreams become more vivid blurring his sense of reality. In flash forwards we also see César talking with a psychiatrist in a guarded mental hospital where he waits trail for murder . César is wearing a mask because he thinks his face is still messed up. The psychiatrist tells him that his face looks normal, he asks him if he remembered anything. He tells his fragmented story to a psychiatrist. His life in shambles, Sofia beyond reach, and virtually a freak of nature, he decides to take one last step in regaining his lost life... and here is when the film becomes something totally unpredictable.

The last act, in which everything gets explained (or does it?), is truly inspired. As Cesar finally understands the implications (this bad dream is one he himself has invented) the film becomes truly impulsive. It's a deranged but entirely gripping climax to a movie which takes one unpredictable turn after another. At the level of writing, you have two friends, one the protagonist, the other his conscience. The protagonist deals with two girlfriends, one affirms his self-image, one destroys it; Towards the end of the film, we are presented with two alternating theories of what is going on.

One is that the hero is living in a virtual world that he can only be revived from when he "dies" in it, and the other is that people who want access to his money want to con him into making that happen, only for real. The final act of the film is a constant struggle between these two theories that the viewer is only made aware of when they both teeter on the edge of victory.

Only when mystery gets "explained" to him does he realise how ridiculous it all is. Thin line between dream and reality disappear. He tries to achieve realistic (or illusionist) death in the end and then the nightmare starts again. It would appear that in the world of "Abre los ojos", anything is possible.

This review is impossible without mentioning Vanilla Sky .I mean not only is it a remake of ALO(Abre Los Ojos) but it's almost scene for scene the exact same movie .In fact Penelope Cruz in the exact same role as the original! The ending of Vanilla Sky pretty much explains everything. Abre Los Ojos leaves most of it up to interpretation and the viewers' imagination.

The acting is very rich, believable and many times raw with emotion and character. The visual imagery is absolutely stunning at certain points. A scene that takes place in a park when Penelope Cruz and Eduardo Noriega meet for the first time after his accident is incredibly beautiful and emotionally devastating. There is quality photography in the film: The rain in the park and before that the reflections of foliage flashing in the car windows with glimpses of tense faces. This surrealist fantasy from Spain is a unbelievable piece of cinema. Despite pain of watching it with subtitles, Open Your Eyes is a tale of beauty.

1st Lecture

Going through lanes of memory, I find ITBHU so heartwarming that it always cheers me to love this college. 1st lecture was the best of all the lectures attended by me in ITBHU till today.

Our college had started after all the formalities and this was the first day. Most daring guy was Kapil aka Sandoo. He was 6 foot tall and heavily built, so he roamed and surfed Internet on HG without any fear of rag on previous evening. Now we had planned to move to the class together at 7:30 only to attend the class of 8:00 am. It was the first decision (and i think last also) that the whole batch supported in one chores. In our batch movement, 3 guys were in front of the line: Guptaji, Bhadwa and Sandoo.

Now,we were going to our classes in the morning with getting good/cuss words from the seniors passing beside us on bicycles. They were strictly trying to make a queue of our batch.The good words were in the Hindi language bit slightly in different dialect and word power was quite good .That language,I call now as Chatra Bhasha. I saw my friend Pulkit Srivastava who was in 2nd electronics then passing by with a sardar sitting on his cycle; But i did not call him and just keep moving ahead with my batch of Mech-08. Then there was a call from a senior to give him a way on the path and my batchmate vijay got his nickname, Hathi.............
After all these obstructions, we finally managed to reach in our class before time.

That 1 hour class was disastrous and held at ground floor(G5 i think). Problem was that at ground floor classes of Civil, Mechanical and Electrical department (off coarse seniors only) take place. We entered in the class calmly and more relaxed after such a long march. What happened after was really hilarious and also memorable. Due to mistake in our timetable, both 3rd Mech. and 1st Mech. were in the same room. Hence, there was entry of 3rd Mech; Daduu log aa gaye. So starts the PDP(Personality Development Program).

They started catching us first by distinguishing us from the cities from which we have arrived. Kanpur(G####ur) was the name of my city told to me by the seniors and all cities were given new name under it. Kota (kothaa) and Jaipur(ja###r) were the other two most popular cities. I was then told that 50% Delhi wale Lund hote hain (Not my humble opinion, sorry all Delhites). I was getting the full idea of my background of Kanpur and seniors asked me to say few words in the praise of my colleague sitting next to me. Then, I used my vast knowledge (yet marginal in compared to engineering guys but enough for school going teens) and just speak flawlessly the versatile Kanpuriya slangs. I think words were coming out like bullets because of my experience in Kanpur Coaching Mandi. Then, a senior remarked "Aa gaya ek aur sala Kanpuriya". That was said in praise of me as Kanpur was ill famous for its guys who can speak fluently and innovate any new abusive phrase.

Scenario of the whole class was more entertaining than my personal encounter at that moment. We did not have to look in eyes of seniors and also to give our INTRO. It was bit difficult for some guys to whom it was unexpected. Intro was prepared by us in English but it was argued (not correct word here) by seniors that as we study in Hindu university so our intro should be in Hindi: Cultural Language. That was not easy for me also, but rather was impossible for rest of the class.

I was then ordered to ask the name and native place of some people sitting in a row: I do not remember the name of persons whom i asked about him(no her) in chatra bhasha only. Since my colleagues could not raise their head, they did not know even today (till now) that i was that guy with foul words, not any seniors. Varun Murli was there surely there because no one comes in our batch from down south Trivandrum. I was really happy till that moment. In a flash, I viewed the whole condition of the class. It was laughable. I think 3 persons(AGP was sure in them) were there on the Teachers desk throwing bombs on the enemy. They had not just to throw bombs but also to give the music effect of explosion. Dance shows (not angara dance) but sapera and nagin dance was going on superbly in the space between front row and blackboard. Performance of Muzzra was also a major attraction in the classroom. Contradictory to our dashing performances, studies were going in next classroom. Our seniors shows us, how things can be handled easily or we can a say a lesson on Management. They just mingled between us and ragged (sorry, its banned word) pdpied us without disturbing the other parallel classes.

Outside of our class, now came a senior professor just on his way to somewhere. On seeing freshers with 3rd yearites, he shouted "what the hell is going on here?" Till this time none of the teacher of both batches had arrived in class. Gopu at the last moment was throwing a brick outside our class when professor comes in. He was not leaving the brick till a senior took his brick and throw it away on arrival of two teachers.

I forget to mention that there was only 1 girl in our batch and their batch, what a wonderful resemblance!! Some of us have to go to our Daadi(Pooja Shukla) and give his intro also. A Railgadee game was also played in just front of them. Somewhere Ninety maarna process was going on till late moments. We tried to laugh by seeing our batch mates position but were silenced by the mighty seniors. If anybody laughed then; MUSKI process was implanted to him thoroughly. All of this end with the lectures when some teachers disperse us and seniors. But now a bond has been made between us, seniors and this Institute which will be with us till our last breathe.