Oh this is just too hard! Out of all the movies from 2016, which one is my absolute favorite? Hmmm. Oh! I just remembered a loophole! Oh good, I’m all set then. I get to talk about my favorite films that weren’t mainstream Hindi and didn’t necessarily get a big release, and why I loved them anyway. And why you should love them (and see them) too.
This was my rule for finding the best character. Who felt like a real person, a full 3-dimensional person, like someone you almost expected to see on the bus on the way home? And I promise, my massive prejudices played no part in this decision!!!
2 weeks into my new series, and I am getting decent views and comments. Yay! I will tentatively continue. In case you are new to this, the idea is that if you didn’t grow up surrounded by Hindi film, it can be hard to learn all the things that small children in India just know by osmosis. And so I am giving you a little “101” course on the things you need to learn. Kind of a follow up on the basic grounding I gave in my book. (part 1 here, part 2 here, part 3 here) Starting with the Kapoors, because where else?
I was debating who to give this to, Anushka or Alia or Shahrukh, and then I realized, just because I was thinking of them, that meant they were ineligible. Because in every part I was very aware of who was playing the role. No, the real best actor of 2016 is one who was in 4 of the biggest hits of the year, and you didn’t even realize it was the same person.
The tagline was “Love Him. Hate Him. Judge Him”. And I do all those things! Except the first one. I judge Azhar to be a truly terrible move in every single possible way, and also I hate it.
Thank goodness I am not alone in this, on my Readers Choice post, I have already gotten a few comments voting for this as the least favorite film of the year. (Don’t forget to VOTE HERE if you haven’t already!) This is one of those “personal feeling” categories, not objective quality, so everyone has a different reason for hating it. Read on if you want to know my reasons!
I went back and forth on this one. I really really wanted to do Nargis Farkri, because she drives me crazy, but that didn’t seem fair. Because she was kind of set up to fail in her movie roles, with a bunch of characters that never made sense and no real direction, so she was left to sort of pouting her way through the part as best she could. No, I want to give it to someone who had a good script backed role and failed to manage it. (did that header trick you into thinking it might be Kat? No! She actually did a pretty good job in her movies this year)
It’s a race to the middle! And be warned, there is math involved in this calculation (blech, math!) This is just the “editor’s choice” option, remember. Go here to put in your vote for the readers’ choice for all 9 categories. I’ll be tallying votes at the end of the week and putting up another series of posts for each category.
If you remember, yesterday I announced Datablue as the winner of the last Christmas Giveaway. But also announced that I was out of original cards, so Datablue would get to pick her favorite out of all the remaining ones. And the winner is……
2016 is over! Yaaaaaay! Now, let’s try to remember what was good about it. Here is every new Hindi releases that I saw in theaters and wrote a review of, in chronological order. And you get to vote on them! I’ll be putting up my own “Editor’s Choice” type Awards over the next week, and then at the end of the week I will post the results from this.
SO EXCITING! Don’t feel too bad if you didn’t win (although I think most of the regular commentators did), I’ll be coming up with some other kind of give-away for Valentine’s cards in a few weeks. (week 1 here, week 2 here, week 3 here, week 4 here, week 5 here, week 6 here, week 7 here, and week 8 here)
When I was putting together the post for last Friday, I ran across a photo of Salman with a puppy. Which lead me down a bit of a movie-stars-and-puppies rabbit hole. And what a lovely way to enter the New Years weekend, with a bunch of movie star and puppy photos!
I already put up a post that I wrote earlier about past presents. But now Christmas morning is over, and I officially have all my gifts for this year, and there are a couple of phenomenal ones! Which I get to brag about to you, because they are blog-adjacent! (plus, the Christmas salt and pepper shakers that I used for the header image because they are festive!)
Well, if we are on our usual schedule, my family is now in hour 4 of Christmas morning present opening. We take presents VERY SERIOUSLY in our family. Each person opens one at a time while we all watch, and each person gets about 25. So it takes quite a while. To clarify, not all 25 are good presents. They can range from a blu-ray player (my “big gift” about 7 years ago) to a joke pencil (one of my 4 gifts for my brother-in-law this year, DON’T TELL HIM!!!!). But no matter the value/quality of the gift, they are always wrapped, with a note including a clue that must be read out loud and debated and appreciated before the gift is unwrapped. So the time adds up.
Merry Christmas!!!!! As we all know, that means it’s time for a sexy bondage dance, followed by Santa to counting down to midnight, and then we all kiss while fireworks go off.
There was a request for me to set up an area for all the Monday Morning Questions posts, which made me think I should also set up an area for all the TGIF posts. Which meant the menu became too long to easily fit, and it all kind of snowballed (how seasonal!), and now there is a new site design! I am tentatively enthusiastic about it, but if I change my mind, you may see a whole series of new designs show up as I try stuff out.
I put up my NO SPOILERS review last night after I got home, and then I slept for 5 hours, and now I am at work and all ready to write my SPOILERS review. And then right after work is family dinner tonight, and then I come home and do laundry and wrap 37 presents and empty my sink of dirty dishes and maybe think about finishing decorating my trees. Christmas week releases are not the easiest. So forgive me if this review sounds a little punchy.
I first knew Sarfarosh for the love songs, one of which (“Hoshwalon Ko Khabar”) is one of my all time favorite songs, both the video for it and just the way it sounds on its own. And then a watch the movie, and come to find out that it is barely a romance at all! Which is what, I suspect, it will have in common with Dangal. The Aamir romance is there, sure, but it’s not really a big deal compared to everything else going on.
Aaaaa! Only one week left to Christmas! I have now finished with 4 Christmas parties, 3 one on one get togethers for gift exchange, and today I mailed everything that needs to go to the out of state relatives. Which means my decks are cleared for the hardcore holiday stuff, the family events that happen during the week around Christmas. And it also means this is the second to last give away post! If you missed the earlier posts, the rules are, whoever makes the most comments in a week gets a card. Unless they already won a card, in which case I move on to the next most comments person. (week 1 here, week 2 here, week 3 here, week 4 here, week 5 here, week 6 here)
He deserves a birthday post, right? Maybe not as long as the ones I did for Dilip Sahib and Raj Kapoor, but still something. Let’s say, a dozen reasons to love him, that seems fair.
My first TGIF post was equally male and female, but since then I’ve just been taking the easy way out and doing men only. No more! Women! At least for one week.
If I were Aamir Khan, I don’t know if I would have released a trailer for another movie today. On the one hand, it gave a little extra buzz around the name “Aamir Khan”, so that’s good for the Dangal release. But on the other hand, the buzz isn’t about Dangal, it is about something else. A risk! Oh, and also a trailer for Gurinder Chadha’s Viceroy House. That’s the one that’s looking to the past, Aamir’s trailer is super cool and modern.
Happy 10 Days to Christmas! As I mentioned in my book, Christmas music is the only kind of music I really enjoy, besides film music. Because it feels like it is creating a mood, like it is part of a bigger story, not just isolated art. But this also means I spend all of December listening to Christmas songs and I can get pretty sick of the same old-same old. Just in case you are in the same boat, here are some of the best not-standard songs I have run across. (for my favorite standards, check out my earlier Christmas post)
dontcallitbollywood 