I’m back! Because you promised to comment and make it worth writing these. And I’m gonna hold you to that! Very depressing spending 5 hours on this and then getting no comments. (full index of DDLJ coverage here)
Happy Monday! I have a DOG!!!! A real dog, that weighs more than 20 pounds and grunts in her sleep and wags her whole body when she gets excited. So much better than the temporary dog that didn’t do any of that. So yeah, the week is off to a good start for me! And tonight I have the internet people over for a THIRD TIME and try to convince them that I am not hallucinating massive slow downs.
Happy 2 days after Jaya’s birthday! I want to do something in her honor, but it’s been a bit of A Week, so I have to fall back on one of her more recent films that I have seen enough times to be able to write about it with no re-watching needed. And I also honestly think this is a fascinating character and performance to consider from Jaya.
Happy Easter! Not a very long new fanfic this week, I put up my epic Amar Akbar Anthony Easter post from last year to make up.
This is from last year, but they are still good ideas! So along with the sequels for Rani from earlier today, here are some brand new movie ideas.
I’m excited! Lots of fun options here! Not just epilogues and alternative endings, but straight up separate movie plots following up on the same characters.
I already did a post on the “fake” problem of Shahrukh and women, and the “real” problem. Now, let’s look at the “fake” problem of Shahrukh and his movies and the “real” problem.
There are two reasons I want to write this post. First, I’m concerned that my fandom for Shahrukh may be seen as blinding me to his flaws and thereby lowering the power of my analytical voice in general. Second, I’m concerned that there is a growing chorus of criticism of things that are NOT his flaws which are obscuring the real problems in two areas: his issues as a representative of women in India, and his issues in selling the audience on his recent films. This also, by the way, doesn’t mean that I think he is a bad actor or a bad person, it is just pointing out that I am not blind and aware he does have faults.
This is another assortment of short story ideas, courtesy of you, my commentators! But slightly expanded by me, the blogger. Based on the comments on this post here.
Bollywood Newbie brought up a really interesting topic in my post on Aamir’s birthday yesterday. What identity does belonging to certain fandoms give you? This is kind of a high level fan study/media meaning making topic, so I want to hear what you all think, but I also want to give you some framework for the discussion first.
I considered songs about pie, but there really aren’t that many. So instead, to represent the concept of “Pi”, songs that involve circles.
Happy Sunday! This week, a collection of movies about strong survivor type women. Going with just outlines again, because I love it when you help me fill in the outlines! Oh, and if you are looking for SRK, he is at the last story.
Nothing interesting in the news today (so desperate that outlets are falling back on the good old reliable Don 3 rumors), no birthdays, I already put up a review, so time to fall back on the oooooold reliable fill in, a theme song post! But a fun theme this time (I hope), songs with people jumping around!
I put this together for last year’s women’s day, and it was so good I had to repost and expand it. My first thought for International Women’s Day was a “look at these pretty women!” post, but I already did that. So, I’m going to go a little deeper. International Women’s Day is supposed to be about men respecting women. Doesn’t always work, of course, but that’s the idea. And so I want to put up some pictures of men being happily dominated by women
Hmm. We gained Pardes and some more regional options, but lost Andaz Apna Apna. So, a mixed bag. (Accessbollywood.net does the real work of keeping this list updated, you should definitely absolutely subscribe to them for your day to day updates.)
I’ve got a couple of story ideas, but I’ve got vacation brain so I can’t fully work them out. You get to help me with that! It’ll be fun!
Happy Holi! I almost forgot this holiday thanks to the national mourning happening (sounds like at least a few of the Holi parties for the film industry will be canceled altogether), but I remembered in time. This is a mix of songs I have posted in previous years and new ones. Enjoy! And let me know if I missed something (yes yes, “Rang Barse” and all the other must dos are there)
I put up a post yesterday related to Sridevi’s death about how there is a recent association in Indian popular culture between “skinny” and “healthy” and also “beautiful”. And then the comments section just went wild with people talking. Mostly people from the west, where the weight issue has been the dominant issue in appearance for years. But I started to feel odd talking about this on an Indian film blog without acknowledging the fact that in India it is in fact skin tone that is the dominant issue.
This was fun, I didn’t have to write anything this week! We wrote it all together on Monday in bits and pieces, I just had to pull it together and make sense of it for this.
Well, that was frustrating! Is this what TV interviews are like? Blech!!!!! No wonder I never watch them. Not even getting into specifics of this interview, just this strange sort of “gotcha” style of question and then not letting the interviewee actually answer, drove me crazy!!!!! Why ask him a question if you aren’t going to let him talk and then respond?
My boss’ wife is sick today, so he had to bring his two year old into the office. She is the sweetest little thing and they are soooooooooooooooo cute together. And thus the inspiration for this post!
Oh look, Shahrukh is saying something important just as my blog views are beginning to drag again. He loves me! It’s totally not a one-sided thing.
This is a very very very specific post. Our nice commentator/friend Angie got Maddy to read and retweet my Breathe reviews, so in return I shall give her a nice theme TGIT post. That theme being “here are all the men you like in a variety of outfits and poses”. And then on tomorrow I will do a “normal” TGIF post that more than one reader will enjoy.
On Friday I did a “TGIF” of happy couples, and then I realized that I was kind of skipping to the end, posting the couples without defining “happy” before. And I also find it legitimately fascinating how tricky the public versus private requirements of Hindi film industry marriages are.
First, if you are in a grumpy “I hate romance and love and couples!” mood, that is your right, and you should go watch Anjaam and look at yesterday’s “men in wet shirts” post. But if your mood is more “falala, happiness and flowers and my boyfriend/husband is so awesome!”, then this will just serve to increase that feeling. Or, alternatively, if you are in a sort of miserable “there are no happy couples or true love in the world” vibe, this will convince you that is false. Also, I have a clear and declared winner for the Best Couple Award, you will have to convince me out of it.
