The final one – any positives?

The journey of analyzing torture genre movies comes to an end with this post, at least for the time being. There is one thing I have missed in this string of posts and that is to look at the profitability of the movies in depth. Hope I will write one for that later on sometime. But, that one will be more mathematical oriented analysis rather than a cerebral string of reasoning.

Now, before coming to the actual point of this post, I want to narrate a story. This is a story of an episode from my current favorite series “Boston Legal”. So, as it happens, there is this divorced guy who has issues with his ex and who has fantasies of killing her. As a person, he is a very docile guy and people don’t expect any such fantasies from him. Now, as is the fashion (or perhaps a necessity) in US, he has his psychologist who gets paid for hearing to this guy’s traumas and gives consultation. And this doctor gets into dilemma after hearing to the guy’s very violent fantasy and decides to tell the ex-wife. The lady obviously gets scared and wants to call the police but the doctor asks her to wait and just be alert. The guy comes to know of this and wants to sort the things and make it clear to his ex that he won’t ever do anything like that. He goes to the lady’s place who gets frightened on seeking him. And in the next scene, we see the police arriving at the place and the guy dead.

The above incident, though it’s a story from a teleseries, can very well be a real incident. Human brain is a very convoluted and dark place. There are lots of things which are social taboo and still a regular phenomenon in brains of people. And there’s a necessity for an outlet for these thoughts. Leave alone taboo (let me clarify that the taboo need not be sexual) thoughts, even the usual feeling of being left alone or being disparaged or laughed at, if not vented through some mechanism, may lead to very disastrous results. So, how bad is it if people who get violent dreams or who may have such feelings occasionally mustering in them get an outlet in form of the torture genre cinema? Isn’t it good if such feelings can get calmed down or satisfied watching a false torture scene than to actually performing such heinous act after getting frustrated?

I guess it’s not an easy question to answer. It’s very subjective and then, there is a total diagonal viewpoint to it too. I will touch upon it, but just a tad bit later. For now, let me relate the usability of such a torture genre movie to another profession – prostitution. I don’t carry a very strong view about the acceptability of the profession but from whatever little I understand I think that if somehow the atrocities and bad conditions can be removed from the profession, then, perhaps legitimizing the profession isn’t that bad. Sure, the class of prostitutes might be looked upon with but then how many of us are actually there who don’t look down a person we think aren’t as capable as we are? Anyways, apart from the social cause of legitimizing the profession and giving a chance to those women to not get subjected to horrifying life, I have a certain other rationale for legitimizing the profession. Once not long back, I read the news that two guys raped a fourth standard girl who would be barely nine years old. Nine year old girl getting raped? What the hell? Are these guys even worth being called men? Not that I support the rape of girl of any age, but how can one get stimulated by raping a nine year old? Well, perhaps that’s the problem. That the human brain just works in mysterious way. The frustration that builds up gets an outlet in very ugly ways sometimes. And somehow I am pretty sure that it’s not the age of the girl that played a part, but the opportunity of going after a meek organism. Not that I am unaware that there are pedophiles also walking the surface of this earth but it’s just my feeling that the rogue was sexually frustrated and he saw the outlet in a female who could not do much about his heinous act. Now, if that’s the case and had prostitution been an easily accessible and not so costly affair, perhaps, such an incident might not have happened.

I guess it’s perhaps pretty clear what I intend to say from the above – the same thing about providing people with an outlet for their emotions; the emotions which are hard to accept, not very common and which when realized lead to disaster. Now, going back to my story of the guy fantasizing of violently killing his ex, there’s another small thing to ponder over there. The guy gets killed because the wife gets afraid knowing about his fantasy even though in reality the guy is pretty non-violent which even the wife knows. But then, that is how we operate, isn’t it? If we get a dream, we link it to some sub-conscious feeling we may have and extrapolate it to predict our behavior. In a very similar way, if we get to know that a person enjoys sadistic behavior and enjoys watching a cinema of torture genre, we tend to have a very negative view about him or her. I have experienced this with myself too when I got disgusted that how can one enjoy such gruesome killing scenes and such plots where torturing people and killing them is seen as something enjoyable. In a similar vein, suppose you get to know that one of your same sex friend is gay, won’t you get wary of him or her? But is it that since you are a hetro, you are interested in each and every person of opposite sex? So, why this extrapolation? Well, I guess it is so because a person simply isn’t defined by what he himself is, but also by the mirror of society in which his image develops. And well, then, there is another concept of risk and return playing here too. How risky is it to maintain a relationship with a gay friend in lieu of the returns (emotional or otherwise) you will get? Well, I guess if it’s a close friend the risk of you being subjected to some gay love is pretty underplayed but if it’s the risk of losing your life and that too after being subjected to a sadistic unearthly torture, then, the risks just multiply manifolds. And perhaps that’s one of the reasons why we (people who keep away from torture movies) form opinion about people who love torture cinema. And though, we can’t 100% say that the person is sadistic and will kill someone but the probability certainly is higher than a person who doesn’t like it.

Now, the diagonal viewpoint about what’s bad in these kind of movies. Well, I guess they are more than obvious and need no explanation. With the violent video games taking over the world and killings reported by children, it’s no news how these kind of movies can very well effect the people enjoying it. So, I will refrain myself from delving into it. As it is, the entry has already gone pretty long :) . And with this, I will conclude my string of write-ups about the torture genre movies with a hope that these sort of movies actually do some good which goes on unreported in media but helps the society to exist in peace.

Context

What’s life without purpose? What’s journey without motive? And what’s a movie without story? The answer is “a boring waste of time”. So, let’s have a look at what kind of scripts do the torture genre movies apply. I should have written about this quiet earlier but perhaps it kept on slipping my mind somehow.

It’s said about bollywood cinema that they follow a set pattern which is known as formula. Another phenomenon about Bollywood cinema is that once a movie becomes a hit, then there are strings of movies that release on similar formula. A similar concept can be applied for the various genres of movies too. Every movie in romantic, action, horror, thriller or drama genre can be categorized in fixed set of underlying ideas. So, let’s see what these sets of ideas for the torture genre are:

· Revenge saga: The oft repeated and the widely used formula. Something very very horrible thing (like rape, rape of girlfriend/family member) occurs with the protagonist and then he or she takes the revenge in the worst possible way.

· I’ve a physical defect; let me take it out on you: A place is deserted because of some nuclear testing in the area or some toxic chemical plant in that area. There are inhabitants left behind with pretty less to eat. And now, they have grown into cannibals eating humans who have unknowingly come in that area. Though, you see, the killing of humans has to be in style. They can’t be killed with poison or bullet or a knife. No no, they have to be killed in some gross way so that the killed humans have almost become inside out.

· The psycho kills all: Well, this one doesn’t even need a reason. The guy is simply a psycho and loves to indulge in some harmless simple fun like capturing a guy or a girl and then experimenting over it to know what all ways are there to kill a person in the most gruesome way.

· We need to do an experiment: Haven’t found many movies on this. Have read about one, named Salo. It is one gross movie even to read through. And deals with some sort of storyline with Nazis conducting experiment on children related to sex and violence. It has some pretty graphic scenes and some very unthinkable sort of stuff.

· The realistic ones: No storyline. No screenplay is the motive here. And the one that falls in this category is Cannibal holocaust and its remake coming in 2009. The protagonists are a group of people who venture into woods to make documentary and come upon a tribe of cannibals who get afraid on seeing them. These so-called urban people rape their women making the viewers wonder who is more uncivilized. And well, the documentary goes on with the climax of the protagonists getting killed by the tribe and various other scenes depicting very gory actions.

· The intellectual ones: The new breed of Hollywood cinema has seen a very unique trend of movies going deeply intellectual. The most effected cinema of this wave are the ones which perhaps didn’t have an intellectual leg to it namely the superhero movies and even the latest Bond movie. This intellectual cinema crept in torture genre too with the making of the movie Saw. It was further followed by three sequels. What’s the intellect of this movie? Well, seems that a dying person (who can’t possible save his life) intends to make people understand the meaning of survival and of the term “survival of the fittest”; he wants people to appreciate their lives. And, how does he make them understand about that? Well, read it at http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0387564/plotsummary . Now, who said that not everything can be justified? :)

Well, that’s that about the various storylines that the torture genre uses. Whatever may be the storyline, the movies of this genre mostly focus on the torture and gore part. That’s what gets the audience coming, not the storyline. Anyways, this is the penultimate entry in this thread of blogs. In the next one, I will conclude with my few paisa thoughts over whether this kind of cinema helps the society in any way or not. If you have any thoughts over it, do drop it in the comments.

Fata poster, nikla terror

The title simply means that the terror will come out of the poster by tearing it out. Yeah, you guessed it right. This entry is on the other promotional tool used by movies – posters. For this post, I thought of giving you people a taste of the few screenshots that are used for the torture genre. And as an experiment I thought of comparing it with the posters of some movies of horror genre which I don’t categorize as the torture genre. That is, the plain vanilla horror where the ghosts, demons and zombies come and terrorize people instead of people themselves torturing other people or animals. Well, did I find some real revelation? See for yourself.

Posters of the movie Hostel:

A poster from the sequel of the above movie:


I dare not put other posters of this movie. Too horrifying to put it here. And I guess I have shocked my readers enough to do it at that extent anymore.

A poster from the vintage torture movie, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre:


And now, Cannibal Holocaust. The first one is the original poster whereas the next one is the poster used for re-release in USA.


The above looks pretty simple, isn’t it? Wait for the next one:


Is there a similarity you find in the pattern of these posters? Yes, there are similarities, glaring similarities. All are dark and depict a pretty horrific picture. Another similarity is the use of props like tools which can be used for doing some serious damage. The intention of these posters are very clear – to inform the viewers that the movie has gone some real gory scenes and to make them think if the poster is so horrifying, how much more would be in the movie itself. Oh, and by the way, I haven’t put some of the worst posters here. I simply couldn’t put up the courage to post it in public.

Now, let’s contrast the above posters against some of the ghostly horror movies. I have chosen few of the very famous and widely recognized horror movies for this.

Poster of The Omen and The Amityville Horror:


Poster of Shining and Shutter:


Well, do I even need to contrast the two separate style of horror movies? In one of my earlier blogs, I had asked if devil would be wondering that humans have surpassed the devil itself when it comes to torture. And I guess with the above posters we have a clear answer. The moviemakers certainly tend to portray the torture part much more evidently when it is done by the humans rather than when demons inflict the trauma on us.

And after having researched for this particular blog, today I am pretty sure that the target segment of the torture genre of movies cannot be same as that of normal horror movies. It simply can’t be. Atleast, not in the eyes of movie makers. The positioning of the movies is too contrasting to believe that the target segment is same. It certainly is possible that the target segment of normal horror genre is a subset of torture genre target segment but it can’t be the other way round.

Disclaimer: All the posters taken have been copied from sites allowing for the copy and I have assumed that there are no copyright issues.

Can a movie go too far?

In coming couple of weeks, the great RGV’s Phoonk is going to release. It’s a horror movie and there is a challenge supposedly in which any person who watches it alone in a theatre completely will be awarded a sum of 5 lakh rupees. On knowing this plan, the first question that came to my mind was who was going to pay for the rest of the seats in the empty theatre because obviously every next guy will perhaps want to make some quick bucks and the theatre owner can’t possibly allow so many empty shows on his own cost. Anyways, on a similar line, there was one yester-year movies by the name of “Jaani Dushman” also which had thrown such sort of challenge to the viewers. I wonder if such sort of promotional gimmick is also played in Hollywood or other woods.

This and the following few posts will be dedicated towards the various promotional tools and strategies used by the torture genre movies. This particular post will look into the taglines used by these kind of movies. The tagline is normally a catchy phrase which intends to make the reader curious about the movie. And at the same time it has the task of delivering to the reader what he or she can expect from the movie. Going forward, I am going to enlist some of the tag lines used by various movies.

Let me start with my favorite one which I am not sure I should categorize as horrifying or funny. This tagline is from the remake version of a movie named House of Wax and stars Paris Hilton. Paris Hilton perhaps needs no introduction and if there is a rating for few of the most hated celebrities, she perhaps will definitely come in the top three. And the movie promoters perhaps wanted to utilize this particular wave to promote their movie. Check one of the tagline:

a. On May 6th...See Paris Die!

Below enlisted are the various selected taglines along with their movie names. I have selected few of the taglines which perhaps are not as usual and which might dare the readers to try on the movie:

House of Wax (the original one, made in 1953):

b. UNLIKE ANYTHING YOU'VE SEEN BEFORE! (original print ad - all caps)

c. Nothing that has gone before can compare with this!

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003)

d. What you know about fear... doesn't even come close.

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

e. Banned for over 7 years! Now finally released INTACT! UNCUT!

f. Who will survive and what will be left of them?

The hills have eyes (2006)

g. The lucky ones die first.

Hostel (2005)

h. Shen mer tsui huai neng fa sheng (What's the worst that could happen)

Paidia tou Diavolou, Ta (1975)

i. The lucky ones simply got their brains blown out.

j. The movie that the censors don't want you to see

Cannibal Ferox (1981)

k. They must pay for their crimes with blood and pain. For what they have done, Make Them Die Slowly

l. The most violent film ever made!

m. Banned in 31 countries!

The Incredible Torture Show (1976) – Yes, you read it right. That’s the name of the movie

n. Join The Fun!... Human Dart Boards... "Home Style Brain Surgery"... Dental Hijinks!

And finally coming to the last movie: Cannibal Holocaust (1980)

o. Ripout! Barbeque! Devour! How long can you take it?

p. They eat and they are eaten!

q. The most controversial movie of all-time

r. The most savage and brutal film in modern history

s. Can a movie go too far?

t. Better to rest in peace in the warm body of a friend than in the cold ground

u. The men you will see eaten alive, are the same who filmed these incredible sequences

v. You won't believe that what you're seeing could have happened!

Cannibal Holocaust perhaps alone is sufficient to engulf all the types of taglines that are used for such movies. And the above are only few of the taglines used for the movie. What’s common in the different taglines is their nature to dare the reader, to make question the reader if he can really take it. And to make him curious about the movie, e.g. all the tag lines telling about the controversy or ban makes the reader think what exactly could it have been that it created such controversy or was banned. Well, atleast that was what sucked me into going from one link to other researching on these movies and trying to find out what was picturised in the movie. Tell me, won’t you get sucked in?

Child is the father of man

“Child is the father of man” – so someone great had said. That makes a child more mature than a grown-up (taking the statement literally, don’t bash me up :) ). Well, if we really try to understand the human psychology, we will perhaps find that there is a child in all of us and perhaps for many of us the child may even overpower the grown-up inside. We may pass ourselves as mature person and term “jealousy”, “competitiveness” and such behavior characteristics as kiddish but in reality we all are a part of the above sentiments. Whether we show it in front of others or not is a different issue. For that matter, whether we show it to even ourselves or not is also a very intriguing question to ponder on.

Now, why this question of being a kid? Well, that’s because I am trying to find out the reasons behind the consumption of the torture genre movies. Na na, don’t get me wrong. I certainly don’t think that watching such movies, by any long shot, is a kid’s job. It’s definitely not. It will take a lot and lot and perhaps a bit more lot of guts to watch such horrific scenes being enacted. And when it comes to a movie where you are not even sure whether what’s going on screen is an enactment or a reality being picturised, then, it’s no mean feat to consume it. So, where does being a kid feature in all this? It features if we try to look at the segment of “curious on-lookers” and “daring challengers”.

Curiosity is a feature which perhaps won’t be termed kiddish per se. But what if the curiosity gets the better of you? What if the curiosity is related to an unproductive thing which might not be of much help? Yeah, now you got it right. We grown-ups do everything thinking of a goal in mind. And there are times when we forcingly generate our curiosity in things that we aren’t even curious about because that will accomplish something for us. On the contrary, kids are curious about each and everything around them. (I was an exception though :) ). And this is the streak that I feel overpowers us when we are curious to know what a certain movie of this category shows. It’s not something usual. It’s not something that happens all around us. And it’s not something that can be experienced easily. Then, what is it? How has it been picturised? What has been picturised? Can I really see so much of horrendosity? All these questions and many more comes to mind and are discussed and then curiosity takes the better of us :).

PS: I know that “horrendosity” isn’t actually a true-blue English dictionary word but I guess the meaning that I want to convey is best put forward using that word instead of the words in my small vocabulary collection.
So, continuing the article now and coming to the daring streak that we have in ourselves – we all seek thrills in our lives. And more often than not, we seek these thrills passively by watching somebody do something. And that’s where the medium of television and cinema seeps in. Though, watching a cinema depicting torture is perhaps not that passive a thrill as watching some mean vamp fluttering her eyes and plotting an idiotic scheme to put fire in a nauseatingly sweet family in the saas-bahu serials. On the other hand, it’s perhaps as passive as it gets when we analyze the actual rendition of such torturous acts (And am not talking of saas bahu serials this time, but of the torture genre movies :) ).

Watching these kinds of scenes and being capable of taking in the scenes without puking out often will be an act of bravado which can also flourished in public chat rooms. I have gone through some of the threads discussing if a particular scene was that bad to take and though there is seldom a response unashamedly trying to prove the bravado, but one can certainly feel a sense of achievement in the responses. And in some others, one can feel the sense of being a more pro than others when they analyze the scenes and compare with others proving how these scenes were perhaps not as torturous as others think it to be. And then the game goes on in loops.

I guess with this, I will put a stop on the discussion of what motivates people to watch these kinda movies. Though, I have left out the “horror fans” category for the obvious reason that they are fans and look forward to watching these movies. And the last two segments of “one-off cases” and “by mistake people” are just some outliers who are not a regular for these movies. Here, I will also like to again say that not all horror fans perhaps approve of such kind of torture genre movie and there are separate levels within the genre of horror too. And I am pretty sure that curiosity and daredevilry play a certain very important role even in the horror fans who look forward to these movies.

The next couple of posts will perhaps be related to the promotion factor of these kind of movies and will be more informative rather than analysis based. But perhaps they will be more entertaining than these. So, watch out for them. Before signing off, let me take leave on a very different note today. It’s Independence Day for us today and though I am never enthusiastic about days which celebrate love, friendship and all such emotions, there’s a part of me which celebrates the Independence Day. Primarily because love and friendship don’t need one particular day to happen but it was only today when we got independence. So, here’s wishing everyone Happy Independence Day. And though Independence Day now, as opposed to my childhood days, also reminds me of the carnage that followed it and how I wish and hope that never does it happen again, I still want to salute the great heroes who fought for us. And going in future, I hope that there will be day when we have a boundary-less and united world, at least when it comes to emotions and patriotism, but till that happens and even after that, here’s wishing everyone again: HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY.

Consumers of Torture Genre

Movies are a life line for most of us. A chance to get away from reality and get into the dreamy world that most of us can never have. This is an analogy that has often been used for Hindi masala flicks which are too nonsensical and unrealistic to believe. But they are entertaining and lets the viewers who are tired with their non-stop life to sit back for a while and just enjoy. Now that I am writing these words I am thinking about the words “nonsensical” and “unrealistic” that I have used to describe the Bollywood masala movies, I am wondering whether the same two words can be used to describe the movies that I have been writing about.

What prevents us from saying that these gory and torturous movies are unrealistic in nature. Perhaps not 100% but certainly to a great extent. Most of these movies also have just a nonsensical and beaten to death plot. And as long as a viewer can know that whatever he is seeing on the screen is just an animation and not a reality, then, what’s preventing him to savor some unrealistic entertainment he knows he will never have in life. Perhaps, I am under-playing the kind of cinema that I am talking about but I just want to look at it from a different angle. Not from the same angle that I have always been thinking that it’s so gory and that it perhaps will take a psycho to enjoy such horrible acts of torture.

Anyways, to come to the main theme of this particular entry, who exactly are the consumers of this genre of movies? At the first glance, we can directly segment them on the basis of age. And anyone above the age of 18 years is qualified by law to watch such movies. But that still doesn’t point to the target segment. It’s just that the law thinks that people above 18 years are suitable to handle such movies as they have become adults. But with the advent of technology, there are perhaps a few underage people also who watch these movies. Now, out of the legally qualified people, we can perhaps further divide the segment into following people who will be willing to watch such movies:

· Horror fans
· Curious on-lookers
· Daring challengers
· One-off cases
· By-mistake people

Yeah yeah, I know. The classification is real classy. Though, going by this classification, the pool doesn’t seem to be big enough to actually make the genre worthy of making profits. We have to remember that not all horror fans will be willing to watch a movie of this genre. Horror will have its own degree of consumption and there will be various levels. This level that we are talking of is perhaps around the highest level of horror that anyone can digest. And we are well aware that as we go high, there are fewer people to find there. The second segment of curious on-lookers may certainly be bigger than the bottom two combined but still not huge enough. This segment as well as the third one of “Daring challengers” perhaps overlap each other a lot.

Now, if I have to give a percentage of world population who will fall under each category, then, what exactly it will be? I guess it’s perhaps very tough to predict it so subjectively. But, let me give it a try. If I take my base as IMDB which is perhaps the best site for movie fans and enthusiasts, then, the most popular of the movies in the site have been rated by almost 300,000 odd people. For the genre of movies that I am discussing, Hostel has been rated by around 50,000 odd people and the rest have yet to cross being rated by 25,000 people. There are some exceptions like Sin City which has gone for more than 150,000 votes but then that’s a Tarintino movie with a supposedly very artistic flavor and a huge fan following with it. Now, if we consider that only one-tenth of the people who watch the movie actually rate it, then also we will arrive at an optimistic figure of 500,000 audience. I have chosen just a fraction of one-tenth because these kind of movies perhaps have a very limited audience and aren’t released on such a wide scale all around the world. Is this much audience enough to make money for the producers? I guess not. Perhaps my calculation is too understated.

In a later post, I will perhaps give this count a more thought. Perhaps a back calculation might help to arrive at the figure. And for the next one, let’s see why do audience watch such gory flicks.

So, what do you do when you feel like killing?

As expected, I didn’t receive any inputs about the kind of movie one will like to watch when he or she feels violent and murderous. Though, I did receive couple of comments from guys about the skirts and their lengths. Well, what to do, guys will always be guys :).

Anyways, coming back to the topic. Let’s see how it feels when one tends to be violent. The emotions in the people are more of an unvented anger and irritation; perhaps something related to humiliation and revenge. Then, there are some other times when you are just bored of things and want some thrill but let’s leave it for some other time because thrills perhaps can be got in many ways and somebody resorting to torture for thrill must be one helluva messed-up-brain-character. By the way, just a thought. How many of you have tried to catch a mosquito and burn in on mortein just for the thrill of it? :).

Anger combined with humiliation and irritation is a very powerful emotion and it needs to be vented one way or the other. We all have a way to tackle with it. Few of us don’t like to think over the face whether we are right or wrong and simply bash the other person verbally. Few others take their time and perhaps punish their loved ones, with heightened pitch of voice, rather than the person they are actually angry on. Then, few others hit the wall or some object and scream in the loneliness of their rooms. (Though, there can be happy screams too. So, people who have heard me screaming, don’t just think that I am venting my frustration :P). One way or the other, the emotion has to come out. And there certainly is a tendency in people to fight when angry. If they can’t actually fight, then, they can proxy fight by seeing someone else fight and hurt the other. I have tended to try and find action and a bit gory movies when I am angry or down. But there still hasn’t been a time when I have wanted to torture a human being as depicted in the gory movies like Hostel.

For me, killing by a gun and killing by torturing a person are two very different and diverse things. Getting tortured like it’s shown in movies like Hostel scares the shit out of me. And on the other hand, I hardly fear getting killed by a gun shot (or so I think). So, as much as I like to go for an action movie with a bit of ass-kicking when I want to soothe myself down, I still don’t prefer to go for ultra-gory and torturous movies. But my own behavior and chain of thoughts do give me a clue that there is a possibility that other people might want to watch such movies if that can vent out their anger. And if can actually do that, then I must say that these movies are actually helpful. How are they helpful and how they can affect the society will be discussed in a later entry.

Before ending this piece, let me put a clarification that the angry mood is by no way the only time when a person may prefer to see such movies. A genuine interest and curiosity and other factors can very well be the biggest factors in going for these movies. But, with this entry I wanted to explore the idea of emotional state being the factor to watch a movie depicting torture. Also, I want to share a news. After reading my previous post, I got a mail from Mr. Ben Hall appreciating the interest in socionomics. He also provided me with the link www.socionomics.net . All you people who wanna explore this concept, go through the site. It has quiet a few interesting things to ponder over. As far as I am concerned, I guess this one as well as the previous one does look a bit into that kind of logic. Though, I never knew that there is already a line of thought which explores the way I think. Of course, what I think is just a drop in the ocean and I will love to explore more about it and hence all you people will be tortured with a post when I am done with it :) .

Ever felt murderous?

Yesterday was an opportune lecture I attended. The lecture (the word doesn’t communicate remotely the fun it is) grazed over a bit about the funda of socionomics. Now, I won’t delve into the details of socionomics, not that I am even remotely qualified to. Though, one of the correlations that socionomics tried to find out was if there was a relation between the kind of movies that are made in a era and the socio-economic mood prevalent at that time. Amazingly enough, the study also found some correlation between kind of movies produced and the length of skirt. (I am really waiting for some good times to arrive ;) ).

Now, why am I telling about this theory of socionomics? Well, primarily because that is a bit related to the theme of this entry. We have arrived at the part of “WHEN”. Is there a specific time frame when people like to watch movies of a typical kind? More specifically, is there a particular kind of prevalent mental state when one wants to watch a movie depicting extreme torturous scene?

This is one of the part of this series entry about which I am not as sure as the others. Primarily because whatever idea I have is just mine and based on what I think and feel. For other parts of the series about which I have written and will write, I have the inputs from few people I have discussed the things with. But, for this one, there is no clear input. Anyways, I hope to find a direction in the vagueness that I am about to enter.

I believe that given the right circumstances, everything is possible. Quoting a dialogue from a movie (don’t remember which), “Everything has a cost”. The cost can be paid sometimes in terms of money, sometimes in terms of love and so on. And circumstances have a much bigger part to play in what we pay and are paid for. So, what is the point of it? The point is another question. And the question is “Have you ever felt like killing someone?” Has there been a time when you felt like going all out and hit someone very hard or even to kill him/her?

For me, the answer to the above question is “Yes”. Yes, I have felt like that at couple of times. And in one of these rare times, I had quoted to my friend, “It’s good that gun is not readily available to us”. I am sure that other people also would have felt like that at some point of their life. And it’s good for us that we people have some sort of control mechanism which allows us not to be just barbarians and revenge-seekers. But how do we all control ourselves? If given a choice of controlling yourself by watching a movie, what sort of movie will you choose to watch at such a time? Will it be a comedy to soothe down your anger? Will it be a romantic one to get you thinking about happy times? Or is there a possibility of watching a cruel movie which may depict how cruel you want to be?

I guess I have been very vague in this entry. And perhaps I can’t help it either. There is so much to write and yet an unclear cloud over it. So, let me just try and gather my thoughts more concretely for a bit before I complete this sub-topic with a continuation, and meanwhile you can let me know the answers to the questions I asked.

Can you take in these scenes?

In this particular series of blogs on movies depicting physical torture by humans, I have finally arrived at the point where I will be describing what kind of movie scenes I have been referring to. What is it exactly that makes it different from normal horror movies? What is it that made me wonder if even devil and hell themselves would have conceptualized acts so heinous and painful.

So, coming directly to the point, here are few of the scenes as depicted in various different movies. Of course, this isn’t the complete list of the movies and neither are the scenes totally comprehensive. But, I hope they should be sufficient to describe the movies. Also, I am not describing the scenes in my own words for two reasons. One – I haven’t watched all of these movies. Two – whatever movies I have watched of these, for them, I guess it will be easier for people to read as these scenes have been written on http://www.imdb.com/ rather than my version because I am sure that I will get more elaborate with the depiction of pain. So, the following one-line scene contents have been taken from “Parents Guide” section.

Day of the Woman aka I spit on your grave

· In three scenes a naked woman is assaulted by four men and raped. In all three scenes she is heavily beaten and in one a man briefly puts a bottle in her vagina.
· A woman cuts off a man's penis. We see blood spray in the bathtub, and he frantically screams and runs around the bathroom in pain. The woman keeps the door shut from the outside and he bleeds to death.

I guess I started with really horrible ones. Even without my words and a full description of the scenes, the above seem pretty profane and disgusting. Anyways, before going ahead, let me ask you, Can you read them?

Hostel

· A man is forced, at gunpoint to suck his own penis (quite disturbing)
· The film's focus shifts from sex to violence for the final thirty to forty minutes, and it does so in particularly bloody fashion. There are graphic depictions of torture and murder such as:
o A man gets shot in the anus
o A man gets all his limbs cut off

Lets see what the sequel of the above movie had to offer:

Hostel II

· A nude woman is hung upside down and slowly cut by another nude woman.
· A man is castrated with a pair of scissors.
· A woman using shears cuts a man's genitals off: he screams in pain, other men watching cringe, the woman grabs the severed genitals and throws them to a dog which eats them and we see the bloody crotch of the man while he writhes and screams (he's left to bleed to death).
· A man is shown eating another man alive

And I guess I can’t go ahead with this anymore. I had thought of putting scenes from around 6-7 movies over here but I just don’t feel I can go ahead with it. Though, if someone is interested they can visit http://www.imdb.com/ and go through the section of such movies. I have listed few of such movies in my earlier blog.

Before ending this literally torturous blog, let me tell about a movie that I didn’t have the courage of watching. It’s Cannibal Holocaust. I had read about this movie much earlier and from what I knew it was a banned movie and perhaps not even available at rentals, at least the uncut version. But we live in an age of technology. And after few years, I got to put my hands over this movie. I started watching this movie and skipped through the initial part of the movie (which is actually picturised as documentary and people still question whether it was a movie or a documentary) because it seemed boring to me. And later on, when I reached the point where the torture scenes were picturised, I had to just fast forward my media player hurriedly. I perhaps even missed the scenes that were described as disturbing in the site. Though, I did watch the climax part of the movie. Something that I let you people give your views about rather than me describing it. Also, I want to add something about this movie that Cannibal Holocaust was actually different in its execution and the underlying reason. It is still not clear to me if it was a movie or really a documentary; and if everything that was shown in the movie was actual picturisation or just the usual cinematic stunts that are not real.

I guess this reading would have been really torturous. Not that my other entries (whether related to this topic or the general ones) are not torture. But this one has been in a very different sense. I will like to express my apology at this point of time if I would have ruined anybody’s mood with this entry. And before ending this one, let me ask you this – Can you really take in these scenes?

The rationale behind making such movies...

The basics of whatever we study during our two year course for Diploma in Management are simple and restrictive in nature. What becomes diversified and perhaps complicated is the implementation of these basics in vast gamut of situations. It’s essential to understand the basics so that one can first identify what to apply and then tweak the basics so as to answer the issue. One of such basics that remain in market is the demand and supply gap. Let me not go into the details of this concept as I guess the concept is simple enough to be self-explanatory.

So, what’s the rationale behind producing movies that depict extreme on-screen torture scenes by humans? Is it just the demand for such movies? Or just the fact that money can be made by making such movies? Or just that there is an audience which may not over-enthusiastically demand such movies but still like to watch one? By the way, just to let the readers know, there are people who love movies of such genre (which goes beyond the normal horror genre) and look forward to them.

Let me try and answer each of the above asked questions and more. By what I understand, there hardly are movies of this genre which are made to provide the world with the great artistic experience. Not to deny that there are none, but they are very few. Most of the movies which depict sex and violence in a very cruel way thrive upon making some quick bucks. The overall production cost of such movies isn’t huge and the sales of these movies (including theatrical, DVD and TV release) easily give the parties involved enough cash to be happy about. Just to give an example on how much is earned making such movies, let me take the example of Hostel II. This movie is a sequel to Hostel. It’s user rating on http://www.imdb.com/ is 5.4 (not that great) and it released in 2007. This movie was made at an estimated cost of $10 million. The cost is much less as compared to industry average. Any ideas how much it would have grossed? It grossed in excess of $61 million. And this is the figure just from 2007. A whopping profit in excess of 500% on scale of $10 million. Now, who won’t be interested to get such a profit? More on the profitability figures of such movies in a separate blog.

Now, what about the demand? Well, one of the requirements of marketers is their knack of understanding the hidden needs of humans. Whenever the first movie of such a kind would have released (I just know of the movies in 1970s and perhaps will have to do more research to know of movies depicting extreme gore of earlier years), I am sure they wouldn’t have done a market research to know that people will like to see such torture happening when there is an option to see happy things or even the sad things that normally happen in life. Kudos to the people who would have understood that there is a market for such stuff. That people would like to see the tortures happening rather than just thinking how it would feel to be inside one of the gas chambers in WW-II (which I personally think might be easier to be in than in some of these movie depictions) is one heck of an achievement. Do I sound adulatory? Perhaps, I am. It’s no mean task to think of something that’s not very evident. But the question still remains. Is the demand, even in this age, so huge as to prompt movie-makers to go for such movies? Perhaps, there is. Otherwise how are the profitability figures justified? People like being afraid, perhaps even to this level. But I guess that the profitability is a bigger driver factor than the altruistic motive of these movie producers to cater to the latent or active (which is extremely small in number) demands.

Of course, not every movie of such genre is made purely for money. Though, money is definitely the factor in perhaps 9999 out of the 10000 movies made. The motivation behind making an art-piece are many. While going through the page in imdb for a movie called “I spit on your grave”, I came across the motivation for the director to make this movie. The director was inspired to make this film after helping a young woman who had been brutally raped by some assaulters in New York. The girl was bloodied, naked and with her jaw in a state that she could hardly speak. Witnessing such a scene in person can surely be heart-rendering. Nobody deserves such treatment. I, for one, feel my blood boil (not literally) when I hear about such incidents or even when I witness them on celluloid. Movies are a good way to depict the goings-on in the world. And perhaps a pretty effective way to caution people too.

There was a different movie in this category too. One that I have discussed briefly earlier, by the name Irreversible. I don’t know what might have inspired the director for making that movie. And I am not going to try and find out before I complete this blog. But, after watching that movie, I was in a state of shock and at the same time I had a sense of realization that how realistic and brutal an act of rape can be; that how cruel and out-of-mind can a human get over sex and how violent a person can get over the loss of a loved one. Why even loved one, I perhaps might get violent on the perpetrators after witnessing such an incident on a stranger too. And I guess most of you also might. This movie also had a very artistic way of depiction. And for one, I perhaps won’t term this movie in the league of the money-making movies of such genre. I perhaps might not even term it in such a genre. But it certainly falls under the category of movies that I have defined for the purpose of this blog.

Anyways, though such movies are there in existence which have their heart in the right place even when showing such depictions but I, for one, am largely convinced that they are exceptions of exceptions and very rare. Most of this torture and gory genre has much much more to do with money churning rather than being artistic or informative.

I guess this will be all for the purpose of this particular entry. In the next entry, I will write on what is actually depicted in such movies – a topic I have shied away from in all my earlier entries.

Who’s who of the torture genre

This time, I have back to my theme of torture genre movies and the rationale behind these movies. So, here it follows:

“Sex sells. Violence sells” …… This seemed to be the motto of the Bollywood cinema in the late 80’s and 90’s. And perhaps this remains the underlying truth. The same remains true for Hollywood too. Though, the people there and in other regions are more experimental than sticking to one formulae.

Though, in this writing piece, we will concentrate on the people who actually focused on this formula and perhaps the concentration was a little bit too much. There have been movies which dealt with just sex or just violence and then there are movies that dealt with both. We will focus ourselves on the two later types.

Once more to redefine the type of movies that I am talking about, the movies have the flowing features:
· Movie should depict extreme violence by humans (and not spirits, ghosts, devils, zombies etc)
· Or otherwise there should be gore and quiet graphic scenes of mutilation (either human or animals)
· The depiction of violence should be on-screen and not just intended
· The movie should have more than few scenes of such violence

Ruggero Deodato, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Tinto Brass, Paolo Cavara, Dario Argento – These are the names of few of the directors who have made movies with the theme of violence ingrained in them. In the above names, few Paolo Cavara made the movie as an exception to their general trend of movies whereas some else like Ruggero Deodato and Dario Argento had most of their career revolving around these genre of movies.

Most of the above names perhaps aren’t very well known, with the exception of perhaps Tinto Brass who is famous for his movie Cannibal Holocaust. Cannibal Holocaust is a movie that takes some special guts from the viewer and is banned in many countries too. Also, all the above directors are from mid 70’s and 80’s. There are many more but these people have directed some of the movies which I came across while my search for these movies.

Why I searched for these movies? Well, it wasn’t for this blog that I am writing. I had searched for these movies a long way back before writing this blog and perhaps that’s why it was easier for me today when I was trying to refresh my memory. But, for the reason why I started looking for these movies, you will have to wait for the blog which will deal the consumer motive aspect of the movies.

For the most recent movie makers of these kind, one name that clearly comes to mind is Eli Roth – the director of the movie “Hostel”. Apart from him, some others are Rob Schmidt, Jonathan Liebesman, Alexandre Aja. All these directors are pretty new and young in the field. To add to the makers of these kind of movies, one name that perhaps didn’t have the intention of selling the movie based on sex or violence, but still his movie stands out, is Gaspar Noé – the director of the movie Irreversible.

This has been a pretty restrictive exercise with the names of only few of directors / makers of the torture genre of movie-making. But the idea of this exercise was to give a ground that such movies exist and so exist the makers of these kind of movies.

In the horizons of cinema that extends to well beyond our imagination, we can still group most of the movies under some particular genre. And this genre that we are discussing now, though not as big has its own share of takers and perhaps a lot of other philanderers who may not swear by such movies, but do occasionally watch such movies. As for the regions where such movies are made, I still don’t have a very exhaustive idea about all the movie making places. But one place that still has to see such kind of movie with extreme gore made is the Indian canvass. None of the woods including Bolly, Molly, Kolly or any other have yet made one which had such extreme scenes. Violence has been there as had been suggested in one of the comments to my blog, about the movie “Shakti” but the movie didn’t have more than couple of scenes of extreme violence. And well, even though the scenes were a bit horrifying but they still don’t fall in the category of extreme onscreen violence depiction. South Asia including Korea and Japan have had such movies made. And so has Hollywood and some European moviemakers too. That’s the extent of my knowledge as of now.

Before ending this blog, let me write something about Irreversible. It’s a French movie with the beautiful Monica Belluci as lead actress. Why it made to my list is because of it’s very graphic violence and a very real rape scene that almost makes a person cry out. Watching this movie did disturb me but it didn’t make me think as to why was it necessary to have such graphic scenes when there can be other ways to depict it. But then, that’s just me. I am sure there will be lots of people who would think that it was very unnecessary to show such scenes.

Though, I have mentioned what kind of movies I am writing about, but I have refrained from describing any of such scenes till now. I will do that in some later post. But for here, let me describe a particular scene from a movie that I had read about while my search on these kinda movies few years back. That movie had a protagonist who has a job of doing autopsy on corpses. The movies shows this guy doing sexual act on a dead girl and then scenes of mutilating the corpse during autopsy and feeding his dog with one of the girl’s body parts. After having read about this movie, I did think whether there would be people in this world who could actually have sex with a dead body unknown to them. I was not sure then, but today, I guess I won’t be that surprised to know if such a person exists. Anyways, why I described this scene here was because today while trying to look for these kind of movies, I tried to find out this movie and I was unable to. It’s very remote chance that any of you would know about this movie or the maker of this movie. But if you do, please let me know.

Questions, Life and Me

I have work to do and a schedule to keep. I am talking about my blog series that I had started. And yet here I am with my second poam (after an afterthought, won't dare to call my writings poem) in less than four days. I guess sedate mood does make me write. And for all of you unfortunate people who might come across this writing and also are unfortunate enough to give tiny rat's ass about me, let me clarify here that I am not in a bad or sad mood but just a sedate mood.

This piece is something about my life and some questions which others have asked to me and sometimes I have also asked myself. I have the answers to the question or perhaps I seem to think that I have. And as we were taught in the class today (something I and perhaps a lot others already knew) that people have tendency to protect their egos against what hurts them, there is a possibility that I also use my logic to protect my ego. What's the fine line between protecting ego and actually knowing? And is an absolute knowledge still open to improvisations? From what I think, it does. Anyways, leaving this "sadiyal" philosophical thought here before it chokes me to death, one thing I want to tell about myself is that there are rare times when I haven't enjoyed. Just to press on the point, I enjoy most of the times, even when I am sad, or when I am sedate which I have been for last few days. And I like this about myself. And even though I don't have any goals and perhaps zilch passions, it's my enjoyment of life that keeps me going unperturbed.

I am wondering right now why I am sharing all this crap here at public forum. Perhaps coz everyone is different and so am I. And this vast difference in everyone, at certain point, leads to a commonality of sorts. And am sure that that I would have things in common with few ppl just as I am "different" from them. Atleast in the part of not having any goal or passions what-so-ever. So, this piece is perhaps dedicated to all of you who are just as vella and aimless as I am and yet shameless enough to not care about it :P

Ask me who I am,
ask me what I do.
Ask me what passions me,
ask me where I go.

The questions have depth,
the answers won't.
My life has a meaning,
just that it matter won't.

A laziness inherent,
a path uncared.
A fire unknown,
a destination unbothered.

Times when calm, voilent at some other.
Sedate sometimes, flowing unperturbed.
So many facets, and yet many more.
All similar to life, right to the core.
Sitting on the banks,I adore but question not.
I close my eyes and enjoy the cool.
Lying on the sands, I ask not to ask.

What's needed is to know,
the meaning of all will be in the flow.
And you have to enjoy even when going slow....

Facet of an incomplete emotion

Taking a break from my on-going blogging topic, here's a poem I wrote while I was sitting in my class today. I was way away from the place I was sitting at and yet I was nowhere. The poem perhaps is also incomplete just like the mood under which I wrote it. Just didn't feel like writing after that. Talk about being moody :) . Anyways, here it goes:

Around is the world;
The voices, the questions,
unknown answers, further discussions.

The world is moving,
and still is there a lull.

The silence within,
the desperation inside.
A braindead face,
an emotionless heart.

A drop of tear,
a needless smile.
A purposeless chit-chat,
a streak of fear.

A drooping eye tears through the skin,
am reminded, need some air within.
Staring at nothing, not even trying to make sense,
a restlesness is there, so is a silence dense...


Perhaps, there is a sense in a random ramble too. Or maybe not.........

WHY, WHO, WHEN, WHAT, WHO, WHY

So, as promised in my last piece, I start this one again with “The Dark Knight”. Though, this time it will be brief, very brief. The movie is a superhero movie with one of the most popular supervillains – Joker. Just like the hero, the villain doesn’t has a superpower either. Though, what he has is an ingenious and totally demented mind. He is ruthless, fearless and without emotions. Perhaps the exact words that may describe Batman too. But the difference is abysmal.

So, the movie begins. Goes on for some time and then you see the joker again. Making an entry at a congregation of mafia. You expect the expected. But the joker has a tad bid different idea of meeting expectations. And soon enough, you flinch, or rather I should say I flinched. The scene didn’t depict in-the-face violence. But what it depicts is an effect without showing the actual face of violence. A lot is said without showing.

And then there are couple of another scenes where Heath Ledger (Joker) explains, to his victims putting razor inside their mouth, how he got his scarred smile. This time, a fear is within your heart. This is a slow depiction and this time you are sure what is coming. Only that when it actually comes, you still flinch, even though the camera doesn’t capture the act.

The above were just an example of violence. Though, it’s a total understated violence. For the start, let’s keep it simple. And what we have is an act of violence in an otherwise normal conditions. A violence which is a bit gory but which still lies within the domain that perhaps a lot of us have fun watching.

Whether we accept it or not, violence is a part of our life. The channel may be us or just a stranger on roadside; an actual scenario we witness or just a mental image we imagine; a bout of few unwarranted harsh words or an actual physical blow to disrupt the physics and chemistry of the other. In one way or the other we all witness violence everyday. And to a large extent we enjoy it too. We often imagine taking revenge or sympathize with people who have been wronged and taking revenge. But what is the point when violence becomes totally unwarranted? When is it that we say that “enough is enough”?

The above two questions are largely subjective in its true form because we all have very different appetite for taking violence. Whereas a person may puke out on seeing a spurt of fake blood on screen, the other may actually have his eyes glued on the screen when a slow act of cutting through a human body is being depicted(and I am not talking about surgical operation here). We all consume violence and we also dare ourselves to see how much we can consume. More on this dare that we try, in later posts. For now, let me just note down the essentials in the supply and demand of this consumption:

WHY: Why are the producers and directors keen on making movies depicting ultra-violence, perhaps even unrealistic and too gory to consume in-the-face violence?

WHO: Is there a specific group of directors/producers who give us these kind of movies? What is the trend in these movies and what exactly is the nature of this violence that differentiates it from that shown in otherwise acceptable movies?

WHEN: Do people consume the gore all the time or is some specific state of mind that makes this violence more acceptable to them?

WHAT: What exactly is our appetite for this kind of torturous violence? What has been depicted until now on celluloid? Does the unreal scene increase our acceptance level of this kind of violence?

WHO: Who are the consumers of these movies? Does it has a universal acceptance or does it has a selective yet profitable consumer base?

WHY: Why do we consume the extreme torture sequence? What kind of thrill or pleasure do we get? Or is it just that we actually do want to be afraid?

There are many other dimensions to the above questions and even more questions. In the coming posts I will try to discuss each of these questions and more. The sequences might start to get very gory now and I hope I am able to get a direction towards the answer by the time I conclude this series of posts. At conclusion, let me ask something. Whenever I have watched such movies or wondered about them, I have thought that if Devil and hell actually exist, would they be having an appetite for committing an act of such violence as the characters in such movies do? Have we surpassed the mythical devil and hell by our own imagination of the acts that can be carried?

The beginning - The Dark Knight

“Fcuk man!!!!!!!!!!!! That was awesome......... that was one awesome fcuking dark movie I saw and I am just not sure how much exactly I liked it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” – This is what my gtalk status message reads right now. And this was somewhat my state of mind when the movie today was in its climactic stage. I was simply not able to understand if I was loving the movie or not. The truth being I was loving it but the movie had dig a hole in my heart. My heart was sinking. I was thinking, “The movie is dark. It’s really dark.” Not that I haven’t watched a darker movie than this nor that I haven’t watched a movie that plays with your emotions and mind in a more cumbersome way. But seldom have I watched a movie which combined both and managed to blow you apart.

I guess I should stop to write about the movie now otherwise I will simply keep on going on and on. And today, I am not here to write a review. Today, I am a man with a mission. A mission that I had been postponing for a very long time. And that mission is to write the second blog entry of my life. But before I start with the actual topic, for the people who haven’t yet guessed the movie, it is THE DARK KNIGHT.

Now, to get back to the blogging topic – It has been long since I have been thinking of writing this one. But I never could make myself do it. I am just way too lazy and need a really big impetus to do something (My body structure also demands something of similar sort J ). I should thank the movie for giving me that push. And though I had decided to write this today but I am sure I wouldn’t have, if not for this movie. And in fact, I am lucky to have watched the movie. But then, that’s another small story which is perhaps boring. Though, I did have a feeling that my luck was good enough for me to ask anything today and I might just have got it. But the nice guy that I am, I didn’t wish for the not-so-nice things that keep on giving my grey cells the only work out they have ;) .

The movie stayed with me. It tortured me. The right won over the evil and still there was something so dark about it that kept on lingering even before the movie had started to finish. There was perhaps only one movie that had tortured me like this or perhaps more than this, and it was “Seven.” I remember that the afternoon I had watched the movie, the sun had simply stopped to shine when I finally came out of my room after finishing it. Thankfully, this movie hadn’t that sort of effect on me because it was already dark when I came out of theatre. But what this movie gave me was the idea to start analyzing the thing that I was intending to. And that thing is the depiction of torture by humans in movies.

I am a big movie fan. Perhaps a very big fan. But I shall also confess that I am more of a popularist movie watcher. I perhaps can’t watch most of the classics including the great Oscar nominations. Neither do I have a great idea about the out-of-the-world directors, though I have watched a few of those movies and loved them. Now, coming back to the topic, this movie that I watched today depicted some scenes in not so graphic way and still I flinched at them (Not disapprovingly though). The same goes with the movie Seven. Both these movies didn’t have scenes which depicted torture. And still the pain could very well settle within me. On the other hand, there are movies which show torture in such a graphic way that perhaps keeping eye fixed on the screen becomes a heart-stopping process. But then, that is just perhaps me. Or else, people just like getting their heart being stopped. Be not mistaken, I am not talking about small thrills like going on a dangerous fun ride of the sort that Aamir Khan dares Priety Zinta to take in DCH. I am talking about scenes with people torturing other people, mutilating them, making them bleed and what not. To get a more clear picture, you can perhaps visit http://www.imdb.com/ and check out couple of movies like “Cannibal Holocaust” and “Caligula”. These are some very “horrible” movies. And I have often wondered what prompts humans to make these movies or watch them. What makes us to think, imagine and relish something that perhaps devil (if it exists) also wouldn’t have thought of doing, to make human soul his (or her, let me not be sexist and I give the fairer sex full opportunity of being devil).

This is just the start of the journey that I will take to try and question the behavior of consumption of torture. There will be lots of questions and perhaps a lot of Freudian type (with perhaps far lesser sexual element) analysis making no sense. But all in all, there will perhaps be absolutely no answers. But let’s not mind that. Let’s try and understand this phenomenon. And I will perhaps need help from you all. So, as the starting, why not give me the names of the movie(s), which you think had depiction of torture inflicted (not by dead people or bad ghosts, but by human characters) on humans, which you felt was surreal.

That’s all for today. Tomorrow will be the next chapter in the journey with the first question. And as will be the trend for coming few days, the piece of writing will start with discussing THE DARK KNIGHT (If you haven’t understood by now, I perhaps am just in the awe of the awesomeness of the movie). Just to end this piece I will love to quote a line from the movie. And no, the quote didn’t come from Batman aka The Dark Knight nor did it come from the joker. It came from Harvey Dent aka Twoface and here is goes: “You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.”

The push...

This will be short and simple.

My life is governed by one thing - inertia. I don't like to change my stance until unless I am absolutely bored with it. That's the reason perhaps why I don't even pursue the things that interest me. Oh wait, a correction there!!!! My life is not governed by inertia, but just by inertia of rest. I am always ready to come back to rest even when I am in movement though it takes an enormous amount of mental energy (and few will love to contend that it takes physical energy too, for me) to give way to movement when I am in rest.

The rest and movement here doesn't signify just the physical aspects, but also that of choices, actions and decisions. Now, the question is why all this explanation.

Well, that's just to describe why I am writing this blog today. It has come to my mind a few times more than "very less" that I should put my gtalk status messages as part of a blog, and perhaps screw them sometimes with my non-sensical observation about the world in general. But it never got translated. Not even when, as an exception, I got bored of watching movies and sitcoms and thriller series (Who ever thought I would. But I guess absence of a friend circle can lead to disastrous circumstances like giving up on movies and orkutting etc). Though, all credits go to Wipro, where I am interning, to get me so much bored and out of work that I finally have to give up on all my strategies to hold myself back from attempting something new. Ofcourse this "new" is like a dead rock from centuries for rest of the world. Well, so that's the initial story.

Following this will be a series of my status messages which will spordiacally spring up once in a year or so. And hence, don't bother to check on the blog regularly. Whenever I manage to get my fat ass and even fatter fingers to move, I will tell that on my gtalk status message :). Till then, chao.... (I hope that's the right word though it may easily be wrong as I am too lazy and too busy to see the meaning)

PS: No offence meant either to me or Wipro :) . It's just that things have perhaps been way too busy (in the real sense) for my manager and I secretly hope that the same continues but with a bit of difference that my manager allows me to go back instead of letting me sit here doing nothing :D.

AKS