Well, it is Harris. So in few more days, we can expect to see people uploading videos in youtube, showing with proof that he "adopted" the songs from some english or spanish song. But lets give it up. The songs are really good. A good mix of fast and melodious numbers. I liked 5 songs out of the 7. "Adiye Kolluthey", "Yethi Yethi", "Nejukkul peithidum" are the three most played songs according to my winamp playlist.
Really looking forward to the release of the movie. They say it is like Forrest Gump, which is one of my fav movies of all time. So should definitely see the movie.
This is a famous term in the Wall Street. Every traders nightmare is this. And that is about to happen. The monday that initiated the "Great Depression" in 1930 is called the Black Monday. Can today, the history repeat itself? What will happen if this monday indeed becomes the beginning of the biggest depression that we have ever seen? Or will the take over of Merrill Lynch by Bank of America, smoothen the crisis? What is in store for the Asian Markets?
There are so many unanswered questions and we shall get the troublesome answers in few more hours, when the NYSE and DowJones start the trading.
Lehman Brothers, one of the worlds most successful Investment Bank is about to file for bankruptcy. Lehman was one of the highly paying, cool investment banks. But today, it is filing for bankruptcy. No one has a clue as to what will happen to all the 25000 employees in Lehman. All their stock options evaporated in days. The stock price of Lehman was once worth 85USD, but on friday it was 3USD. Almost a 95% drop in stock price within a matter of few months. The CEO's stock options were worth almost a billion one year ago. but now, his stock options are worth 36 million. The worse is yet to come. If lehman indeed file for bankruptcy, the stock price will fall way below than this. There are so many companies that have invested in Lehman Brothers stock and bonds and Lehman will drag them all to mud.
Next is Merrill Lynch (ML). One of the oldest and most famous Investment Bank in Wall street. The company was worth almost 150 billion a year ago. But now, they have been acquired by Bank of America for 50Billion. But i would say, this is a good move by ML, as they can prevent themselves from becoming another Lehman.
If you had followed the events that happened in the last weekend, it was like a thriller novel. All the emergency meetings and the billion dollar funds and rescue attempts...Lehman and ML were two of the four pillars of Wall Street and American Banking system in general. They have collapsed and brought to their knees by this Subprime mortgage crisis. “My goodness. I’ve been in the business 35 years, and these are the most extraordinary events I’ve ever seen,” said Peter G.Peterson, co-founder of the private equity firm the Blackstone Group who was head of Lehman in the 1970s and a secretary of commerce in the Nixon administration. (During the Interview with the New york Times)
This leaves Singapore in a very bad state, as Singapore is one of the Financial hubs, where ML and Lehman are pretty strong. What will happen to the employees here? what will happen to students like me, who are just now starting to look for a job? Singapore is pretty much a manufacturing hub. If it is not Finance industry, Singapore will face serious problems.
This problem can continue to European Markets. I recently read an article in nytimes, that said the house prices in UK are suddenly falling in a rapid rate. If you can remember, this is exactly how the US credit crisis started. If the problem continues, it will result in the downfall of the European banks that have been pretty sterile to the credit crisis so far. Lets hope that doesnt happen.
Indian software companies could face various problems. They might loose a lotta money in this crisis. When the foreign companies fear about their future, the first spending they will cut is IT.
What is the fate of US Economy? What is most likely to happen? These are two important questions. Well, the answer lies in todays stock market. If the stock market reacts very very badly to the problems in ML and Lehman, then that is the beginning of the disaster. Because you see, failure in investor confidence will seriously affect the stock prices. If all the investors think their holding is risky, they might try to sell it off. If every single investor is plannin to do that, then we are doomed. The virus will then spread to all the other sectors, with falling stock prices and job cuts. And further increase in inflation and spiralling loss in consumer product manufacturing companies.
All the financial ministers have already started pleading the markets not to panic. There can be no panic in Japan, because the exchange is closed for a public holiday. But no one is sure how the other stock markets will react to this. This might as well change the way we see Banks and Investment banks for the next few years. There is so much at stake here.
The entire world is talking about him. Let me just say this. If i had a vote in the US, i am gonna vote for this guy. I have no relation whatsoever, i dont live in the same country as he is and pretty much dont like the country and its policies, but i can swear it, if i had a vote, i will most certainly vote for him.
I pretty much spent the last 5 hours watching various debates that i missed to see and also the speeches in the Democratic National Convention by various Democratic Party Speakers, including Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama, Joe Biden, and of course Barack Obama. And also watched all the TV ads by John McCain.
As Bill Clinton said, "the heat in this election is so high, that i think it even contributed for the Global Warming". I am really looking forward to all the presidential debates. Past few weeks, John McCain have been hitting hard on Barack Obama on his various policies and his lack of experience. But this DNC looks like a twist. It shows that Barack Obama is ready to take on McCain and his complaints about Obama. That is a great start.
See this fairly lengthy article in International Herald Tribune about the speech of Barack Obama and what the future holds for the Democratic Party. The Speech by Barack Obama was just brilliant. "An Economy that honors dignity" is a dream. Which is currently a dream in all the countries around the world. The first part of a 5 part video is here. Watch the first and you will certainly watch all the 5. But i recommend the last part and so i have embedded the video here. '
And also the speech by Bill Clinton, was amazing. "We have to show the power of our example, rather than the example of our power". At one point in time, Bill Clinton said something good about Obama and the crowd started chanting, "Yes, we can. Yes, we can"(Obama's party slogan). He immediately stopped them and said, "Yes, you can. But first, you gotta elect him". Great timing. I have pretty much watched all the videos of his speeches in youtube. He is most certainly one of the greatest American presidents( just for one min here, forget Monica Lewinsky). The first part of the three part video of his speech is here.
If you wanna check out various policies of Barack Obama, visit his Scribd page. If you dont know what Scribd is, it is the youtube of documents. Anyways, i also saw few ads by John McCain team and all the recent ones show Hillary Clinton saying something bad about Obama. Are you confused why people in the same party say bad things about each other? If yes, then welcome to American Politics. Hillary started lots of issues to beat Obama to win the Democratic nomination, and sadly the Republicans are using that against Obama now. See the video below and you can see why Obama didn't select Clinton as his Vice President. This should hurt anyone's feelings. Hillary said it once and McCain is now using it against Obama. It is definitely a little bit funny. '
Biggest minus for Obama is his lack of experience and lets hope Joe Biden helps him with that. Biggest minus for McCain is his association with Bush and his policies.
Bush and McCain. (This picture makes me laugh every single time. Sorry cant help it)
Before the debates, there is one other thing that i am really really looking forward to. I am waiting to see Bush and McCain in the same stage, in the forthcoming Republican national convention. Gotta wait and see what President Bush is gonna say about McCain. And what McCain is gonna say about Bush.
"If there is no law, and the government does not listen to people's complaints, then it is better to go back to the Taliban era. At least then we had justice." - Sister of a 11 year old child who have been raped in Afghanistan.
I am not a huge fan of American policies. During the past 7 years after 9/11 attacks, America literally stopped investing in herself and started attacking all the other countries. They have spent a trillion dollar in both the wars. And what have they achieved? Nothing. They have ruined the development within their country and also ruined the lives of various other countries, including Afghanistan or Iraq. I am not saying, the Afghans and Iraqis had a prosperous living before America entered their life. But at least they had a secure life. When America created a political vacuum in both the countries by removing Taliban and Saddam, the vacuum was filled by bad people. And that is the reason for this political failure. Read this article in "Time" Magazine, about child rape in Afghanistan and i am sure everyone will share my opinion.
American might be a world superpower, they might have the world's best army, navy, etc, etc, buts lets face it, they dont have the resources, to restore order in a country. They can march in and remove the Talibans and Saddam in a week, but they just cant restore order in a country. That is a tremendous task and America has failed in both these countries. They have to realize the entire world economy is swirling around theirs and should become more responsible. The lack of this realization is the reason why people are even talking about the emergence of another Super power.
The Civil Engineers society of America have calculated that the American government has to spend one trillion more dollars in the next 5 years to update the infrsturcture in America. Because there are nearly 10000 bridges in the US, that needs some kind of patch work to be done or all the bridges will become unusable in 10 years. Now, can you see the where the trillion dollars went? The tallest and attractive buildings are not in the US anymore. Can you see why the government was not able to upgrade the technology and infrastucteure in the country? They were concentrating completely in wars and the affected people are not just Americans. I hope atleast the next president will realize this.
Today the Beijing Olympics officially comes to an end. This was a good Olympics. With 40 billion dollar budget, this is the most costliest Olympics. I read somewhere that the Chinese government has already did break even on the spending for the Olympics games. That is just brilliant.
I went to Beijing during the last year december, as a part of an "Exchange" program between Peking University and NUS. It was a good experience. I was the only non-chinese guy. I din understand a single word of Chinese. And the Chinese din understand a single word of English. It was a good experience.
" I WAS THERE "
(Can you see the "Birds nest" and the "The National Aquatics Center" in the background ?)
In all the meetings with the professors from Peking university and from the meetings with few beijing based companies, (Lenovo, Sohu, Aigo, etc) one thing was clear to me. The ambitions of the country was high. They had huge hopes for Olympics and they were looking to expliot all the opportunities to take their companies global. If you can remember, Olympics in Japan paved way for all the Japanese companies to go global and that is why their economy became strong. The chinese were also looking to do that. That was the first thing in Agenda.
The dominance of Chinese in this olympics is discussed a lot. Check this article, in the Washinton Post. The article titled "The Real China threat" addresses their dominance and what it means to the rest of the world and how their policies contradict that of the United States. Talkin about the dominance, read this article in Newsweek magazine, about "The post-American World". Pretty interesting.
One take-home point is, this olympics is seen as the beginning of the end of America and beginning of another era of Chinese Dominance in the world history. Lets see.
This olympics was good olympics for India too. We won 3 medals. Read this article in Newyork times, that made my blood boil. They call india as the "mysteriously nonathletic nation". That is kinda demeaning. But i hate to agree, that is the truth. Cricket is not a athletic game. You need more stamina to play soccer or Tennis compared to Cricket. (One thing that makes me laugh is, Beach volleyball is in Olympics, but not Cricket. Sorry Cricket fans)
The opening ceremony was just brilliant. If you missed it, see these photo galleries in "Time" website. Pretty good collection of pictures.
But few really bad things happened in this Olympics. First the lip-sync. say whatever you want, nationalism, Olympic spirit, but that issue doesn't look good in the eyes of the world. Similarly the fake fireworks issue. It just shows their desperation to make the opening ceremony into a big hit. Above all is the Gymnastics issue. I don't know if anyone can prove it, or if it is true, but that really gave a bad impression to China. It raises a question as to whether china won all the gold in the same way. Obviously that is not the case, but i cant help asking that question.
Anyhow, today is the olympics closing ceremony. Am eagarly waiting to see that live in Channel 5.
People in India are always complaining. Always whining about something. But look at Zimbabwe, inflation is only 2.2 million percent and people dont call for a Trust vote. Communists should see and learn from this fantastically stable south African nation.
I saw this really good ad by "Discovery Channel" in GV Max the other day, when i went to watch "The Dark Knight". Check this out. Really awesome. The song got stuck in my head and i was singing it all day. Well, if i were given the job of editing this ad, i would have added one more line after "The World is just Awesome" and it would say, "Mend your ways, or it is no more". Pay attention to "Boom-De-Yada" said by Stephen Hawkings computer.
I am a huge fan of batman. All the other super heroes are not as good as batman. Lets face it, Spiderman is just some mutant combination. Superman is some extra terrestrial living being. Batman is the real hero. (Believe it or not, i have 8 GB worth of Batman episodes in my PC. Ya, it does sound childish, but i don't care.)
I have always loved the batman series. If you consider all the villains faced by comic superheroes, the villains that Batman face are far more creepy and dangerous (If you watch Spiderman series, you can recall that all the villains that spidey face are from other planets or some mutant lizards or some lousy sand man) On the other hand, see the villains that batman face. Joker for example. There is no better villain than this character. Purely psychotic with a criminal master mind. Best villain ever.
I went to the movie, "The Dark Knight" today. Imagine the following scenario. The movie is over. People are just sitting in the theater silently watching the credits roll. Spellbound. Totally stunned by the movie. That is how powerful this one is. Of all the movies, that Nolan has directed, I would say, this is five times as good as "Batman begins". Three times as good as Prestige" and two times as good as "Memento"
Fantastic screenplay. Honestly, a superhero movie cannot get better than this. Nolan has lived up to the title name. The movie is completely dark. The mere darkness adds a thrill to the movie. The special effects are fantastic. That too, to watch in GV Max is a great experience. If Bourne Ultimatum can get two Oscar for sound effects, then this movie should definitely get one for the Back Ground score alone.
Above all, the performance by Heath Ledger as Joker is just marvelous. He should get an Oscar for this. I wish he was alive to act as Joker in forth coming movies. His death is a real loss. (And only now i feel it. Damn !) The way they ended the movie gives me a clue that there is surely going to be a third part to this and Joker will be atleast one of the villains in the third part, even though he might not be the only villain. If that happens, the guy who is going to act as Joker got big shoes to fill in. The expectations will obviously be higher in the next part.
This is just not the same superhero movie that you watch in every summer. This one is a lot more than that. They have really put in so much thought into the screenplay and characterization.
Really imagine a world where a masked guy just comes in the night and kills bad guys. This will trigger a bit of heroism and will lead to series of "Copy Cat" issues and this has been clearly portrayed in this movie. Also the inner thought process of Batman has been made clear in this one. The Batman character is getting an uplift by directors like Christopher Nolan. Now Batman is getting a lot more gadgets like Bond, something different when compared to normal comics. These kind of evolutionary changes are attempted in this movie.
Overall, fantastic performance. Wonderfully made. One advice though. Please watch in theaters. Dont just watch it in your laptop and say "Ya. Ok. The movie was good. But i really cant understand what the fuss is all about" (Most of my friends said this after watching 300 in a 14" laptop screen)
Kuselan – Superstar’s next movie. It is a remake of “Katha parayum pol”. It is a block buster movie in Kerala with Mr. Mammotty as lead actor. I really like Mammotty a lot. He is a very good actor. A sensible actor. But anyways, this post is about Superstar Rajnikanth.
Rajnikanth is one of the most recognized people in Tamil Nadu. One of the very few people respected by even the notorious Indian newspapers. Sincere and hard working person, as widely said in the film industry. People always say that he is too old to sing duet with some young heroine. But I don’t think so. Cinema is a business. Trying to make it into an art is a tough job that only people like KamalHaasan try to do. But at the end of the day, Cinema is all about business. And that is not a bad thing. If you think it that way, then no matter how old the product is, as long as it has a selling point, then there is no reason why the business world should not use it.
Rajni has some kinda magic. I dont know what he does. But people go crazy when they see him on screen. I saw the movie Sivaji (first day) in chennai Albert theatre. Oh my God. You have no idea. I would compare Rajni's karizma to Barack Obama.
If you take into account all the prosperous years for the Tamil Movie industry, Rajnikanth would have made a movie in that year. I am not implying that Rajni makes Tamil Filmdom into a success. I am just implying that there is a positive correlation. When Rajni is starring in a movie, he really does give a lotta confidence to the Tamil industry.
Kuselan Songs are out. I heard the songs. Songs are good. No complaints. GV Prakash has done a good job. I think I have heard few tunes before, but let’s give it up. Good work by this young music director. That guy is younger than me. But he is the music director for Rajnikanth movie. It is really an achievement.
But one thing I hate about the songs is the Lyrics. It is pure praise of Rajni. Every song somehow implies that he is THE star. You know, Rajni movies always have these kinds of lyrics. But this movie seems to be an over-dosage. If you think about it, director Shankar also used similar strategies in Sivaji. But he used in a very subtle way. But Kuselan is a bit too much. In this movie, Rajni acts as himself. Maybe that can explain why they were bold enough to use lyrics like this. Hear the “Cinema cinema” song sung by Shankar Mahadevan…Really really too much. Also the "Om zaarare" song. I presume, while writing this song the song writers forgot all the tamil words. So used all Rajni's previous movies to help them complete the song. I really pity the writers. I really hate the lyrics, but if u see my winamp playlist and iTunes playlist, these two songs top the list in "Most played items". Following lyrics from "Cinema" song.
அண்ணன் தொட்டா விரல் தான் பட்டா
தவிடு கூட தங்கம் ஆகும்
அண்ணன் நடிச்ச படத்த போட்ட
வருஷம் பூர வசூல் ஆகும்
superstarum சூரியனும் தான்
உலகம் சுற்றி ஒளிர்வது உண்டு
இந்த பெருமை அண்ணனை தவிர
இங்கே எந்த மனிதருகுண்டு தமிழா !
This verse reminds me of Election season. I dont know about Chennai. But in places like pudukkottai, before elections lotta funny things happen. The politicians will hire some lady who will sing in a man's voice. Then they will take a hit song, and change the verse of the song, prasing the political party head. And they will sing in open jeep. It was like the most fun i have had hearing a song. Kuselan is kinda same. (Sorry Rajni fans)
they obviously got carried away by the success in Sivaji. If this movie fails miserably in Tamilnadu, then Rajni is in for a big time embarassment. (For people who say, "Are you crazy? how will rajni movie become a flop?", i would like to remind BABA)
To me, Rajni doesnt look like a guy, who will force the directors to add these kind of lyrics into the movie. (One other Tamil Actor, forces all his directors to add these kind of lyrics, etc in the movies. You know who that actor is) I think Rajni is surrounded by opportunistic people. By all this means, these people are seeking his blessing to succeed in the film industry. Really sad.
In general, lyrics could have been better. But no complaints about music. I am a bit worried about the movie. I read the story of the original Kerala movie. It was really moving. (I am searching for the original movie. Gotta see that one before seeing Kuselan) But I am worried that Rajni’s fan following will force him to change the story, which will just replace the true story with lousy Heroism. Frankly the songs have not proved me wrong. July 25th is the release it seems. Lets wait and see.
