Must Watch! – List 05

Hi friends here are my new recommendations for the movies you must watch. For all recommendations under ‘Must Watch!’ segment click here.

Casablanca (1942) They had a date with fate in Casablanca! This movie is directed by Michael Curtiz, starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman and Paul Henreid and featuring Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre. Set during World War II, it focuses on a man torn between, in the words of one character, love and virtue. He must choose between his love for a woman and helping her and her resistance leader husband escape from the Vichy-controlled Moroccan city of Casablanca to continue his fight against the Nazis. This movie often gets credited as the best romantic movie ever made. This is one of those ever green classics that appear so fresh when you watch it even today, in spite of being made more than six decades ago. The story is timeless and meaningful, full of heart and should endure for another six decades with no problems. You can’t afford to miss this beautiful classic. Kedu’s Rating: 8.5/10 IMDB Rating: 8.8/10

Goodfellas (1990) “As far back as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to be a gangster.” — Henry Hill, Brooklyn, N.Y. 1955. This movie is directed by Martin Scorsese. It is based on the non-fiction book Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi, who also co-wrote the screenplay for the film with Scorsese. The film follows the rise and fall of three gangsters, spanning three decades. The film stars Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci and Ray Liotta in the lead roles as James ‘Jimmy’ Conway, Tommy DeVito and Henry Hill respectively. Many refer to this movie as director Martin Scorsese’s best, but I personally like his movie ‘The Departed’ more. Anyways this is one of the best Mafia movies I’ve ever seen. This movie is based on true events and expresses a lot of the gangster ways and how they really did things. It tells the viewers what mafia life is lower down the mafia food chain. This movie is power packed and full of energy with no dull scenes. All I will say is this is must watch if you enjoy gangster movie. Kedu’s Rating: 8.0/10 IMDB Rating: 8.8/10

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) A Disgrace to Criminals Everywhere. This movie is directed and written by Guy Ritchie. The film introduced actors Vinnie Jones, a former Welsh international football player and Jason Statham. The story is a heist film involving a self-confident young card sharp who loses £500,000 to a powerful crime lord in a rigged game of three card brag. In order to pay off his debts, he and his friends decide to rob a small-time gang who happen to be operating out of the flat next door. In a way the confusion really starts when a pair of antique double-barrelled shotguns goes missing in a completely different scam. This film oozes with style, class, dark humor, plot twists and turns, and doesn’t drag one bit. The movie is beautifully balanced between being serious and hilarious at the same time. You are definitely going to enjoy this movie. Kedu’s Rating: 8.0/10 IMDB Rating: 8.1/10

The Matrix (1999) Remember there is no spoon. This movie is written and directed by Larry and Andy Wachowski and starring Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Joe Pantoliano, and Hugo Weaving. It has been one of my all time favorite movies. Why is it appearing so late in my ‘Must Watch’ recommendations? It is because I think most people have already seen it. Anyways for the benefit of the people who haven’t I have decided to mention it in this list. This is an amazing sci-fi movie which will make your brain turn crazy. This movie can be referred as mother of all special effect movies. And it is not just about amazing special effects and action; it has a great plot as well. The film describes a future in which reality perceived by humans is actually the Matrix: a simulated reality created by sentient machines in order to pacify and subdue the human population while their bodies’ heat and electrical activity are used as an energy source. The movie shows the struggle between the few humans who have managed to break out from the Matrix, to overthrow the Matrix and free other humans. It is very difficult to describe the movie; you have to see it yourself. Maybe watch it multiple times to get it correctly and the funny thing is every time you watch it you take back something new. A masterpiece! Kedu’s Rating: 9.0/10 IMDB Rating: 8.7/10

Fight Club (1999) How much can you know about yourself if you’ve never been in a fight? This movie is adapted from the 1996 novel of the same name by Chuck Palahniuk. The film was directed by David Fincher and stars Edward Norton, Brad Pitt, and Helena Bonham Carter. Norton plays the protagonist, an “everyman” who is discontented with his white-collar job in American society. He forms a “fight club” with soap salesman Tyler Durden, played by Pitt, and becomes embroiled in a relationship with him and a destitute woman, Marla Singer, played by Bonham Carter. With this fight club they find their release from the prison of reality, here men can be what the world now denies them. Their concept catches on, with underground fight clubs forming in every town. Their boxing matches and harmless pranks soon lead to an out-of-control spiral towards oblivion. The real shocker is the climax of the movie. This movie is a must watch! Kedu’s Rating: 8.0/10 IMDB Rating: 8.8/10

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Calvin & Hobbes – 03

More of my favorite C&H strips. For all posts on Calvin and Hobbes click here.

08-Apr-1986

16-Apr-1986

17-Apr-1986

18-Apr-1986

24-Apr-1986

23-May-1986

01-Jun-1986

02-Jun-1986

07-Jun-1986

14-Jun-1986

<< C&H – 02 |

Image Source http://www.marcellosendos.ch

Happy Independence Day!

Updating this post to celebrate our 63rd Independence day! Vande Mataram! Jai Hind!

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Hi friends wish you a very happy independence day! It has been 62 years since we got freedom and we have come a long way since. India has made a significant mark of its own on the globe and there is no stopping us from progressing. We still do have lot more to be done in various areas most important being reducing poverty, controlling population and bringing an end to corruption but this entire looks very much doable day by day. Young India is talking big steps in right direction and we are devoted in making this a better country. Hopefully we will soon be able to make it an India our leaders had dreamt of at time of independence.

Happy Independence Day!

I am quoting the speech made by our first Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru on the eve of Independence, at midnight on August 14, 1947 below. It’s a great speech and I still get goose bumps every time I hear the first few line of the speech.

Tryst With Destiny.

Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance. It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to the service of India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity.

At the dawn of history India started on her unending quest, and trackless centuries are filled with her striving and the grandeur of her success and her failures. Through good and ill fortune alike she has never lost sight of that quest or forgotten the ideals which gave her strength. We end today a period of ill fortune and India discovers herself again. The achievement we celebrate today is but a step, an opening of opportunity, to the greater triumphs and achievements that await us. Are we brave enough and wise enough to grasp this opportunity and accept the challenge of the future?

Freedom and power bring responsibility. The responsibility rests upon this Assembly, a sovereign body representing the sovereign people of India. Before the birth of freedom we have endured all the pains of labour and our hearts are heavy with the memory of this sorrow. Some of those pains continue even now. Nevertheless, the past is over and it is the future that beckons to us now.

That future is not one of ease or resting but of incessant striving so that we may fulfil the pledges we have so often taken and the one we shall take today. The service of India means the service of the millions who suffer. It means the ending of poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity. The ambition of the greatest man of our generation has been to wipe every tear from every eye. That may be beyond us, but as long as there are tears and suffering, so long our work will not be over.

And so we have to labour and to work, and work hard, to give reality to our dreams. Those dreams are for India, but they are also for the world, for all the nations and peoples are too closely knit together today for any one of them to imagine that it can live apart Peace has been said to be indivisible; so is freedom, so is prosperity now, and so also is disaster in this One World that can no longer be split into isolated fragments.

To the people of India, whose representatives we are, we make an appeal to join us with faith and confidence in this great adventure. This is no time for petty and destructive criticism, no time for ill-will or blaming others. We have to build the noble mansion of free India where all her children may dwell.

The appointed day has come-the day appointed by destiny-and India stands forth again, after long slumber and struggle, awake, vital, free and independent. The past clings on to us still in some measure and we have to do much before we redeem the pledges we have so often taken. Yet the turning-point is past, and history begins anew for us, the history which we shall live and act and others will write about.

It is a fateful moment for us in India, for all Asia and for the world. A new star rises, the star of freedom in the East, a new hope comes into being, a vision long cherished materializes. May the star never set and that hope never be betrayed!

We rejoice in that freedom, even though clouds surround us, and many of our people are sorrowstricken and difficult problems encompass us. But freedom brings responsibilities and burdens and we have to face them in the spirit of a free and disciplined people.

On this day our first thoughts go to the architect of this freedom, the Father of our Nation [Mahatma Gandhi], who, embodying the old spirit of India, held aloft the torch of freedom and lighted up the darkness that surrounded us. We have often been unworthy followers of his and have strayed from his message, but not only we but succeeding generations will remember this message and bear the imprint in their hearts of this great son of India, magnificent in his faith and strength and courage and humility. We shall never allow that torch of freedom to be blown out, however high the wind or stormy the tempest.

Our next thoughts must be of the unknown volunteers and soldiers of freedom who, without praise or reward, have served India even unto death.

We think also of our brothers and sisters who have been cut off from us by political boundaries and who unhappily cannot share at present in the freedom that has come. They are of us and will remain of us whatever may happen, and we shall be sharers in their good and ill fortune alike.

The future beckons to us. Whither do we go and what shall be our endeavour? To bring freedom and opportunity to the common man, to the peasants and workers of India; to fight and end poverty and ignorance and disease; to build up a prosperous, democratic and progressive nation, and to create social, economic and political institutions which will ensure justice and fullness of life to every man and woman.

We have hard work ahead. There is no resting for any one of us till we redeem our pledge in full, till we make all the people of India what destiny intended them to be. We are citizens of a great country on the verge of bold advance, and we have to live up to that high standard. All of us, to whatever religion we may belong, are equally the children of India with equal rights, privileges and obligations. We cannot encourage communalism or narrow-mindedness, for no nation can be great whose people are narrow in thought or in action.

To the nations and peoples of the world we send greetings and pledge ourselves to cooperate with them in furthering peace, freedom and democracy.

And to India, our much-loved motherland, the ancient, the eternal and the ever-new, we pay our reverent homage and we bind ourselves afresh to her service.

Short Lived Excitement – Schumacher Cancels F1 Comeback.

Seven time world champion has cancelled his Formula 1 comeback due to lack of fitness. Comeback news of 40 year old Michael Schumacher as replacement for injured Felipe Massa had created lot of excitement. But to disappointment of Schumacher and Ferrari fans the champion has decided not to participate on the 23rd August European GP.

Article on official Michael Schumacher website www.michaelschumacher.de read ‘Consequences of bike-injuries make return impossible’. He wrote to his fans through this official website informing about this news. He said “Yesterday evening, I had to inform Ferrari President Luca di Montezemolo and Team Principal Stefano Domenicali that unfortunately I’m not able to step in for Felipe. I really tried everything to make that temporary comeback possible, however, much to my regret it didn’t work out. Unfortunately we did not manage to get a grip on the pain in the neck which occurred after the private F1-day in Mugello, even if medically or therapeutically we tried everything possible.”

We will be missing what could have been an awesome second half of this year’s Formula one season. It would have been great fun to watch Schumi compete with young drivers like Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton. Even though this is bad news, we wish Michael Schumacher good health. Ferrari has now named test driver Luca Badoer as their replacement for Schumacher.

Must Watch! – List 04

Hi friends continuing with my recommendations for movies you can’t afford to miss. For all recommendations under ‘Must Watch!’ segment click here.

A Beautiful Mind (2001) The Only Thing Greater Than the Power of the Mind is the Courage of the Heart. This movie is based on the life of John Forbes Nash, a Nobel Laureate in Economics. The film was directed by Ron Howard and written by Akiva Goldsman. It was inspired by a bestselling, Pulitzer Prize-nominated 1998 book of the same name by Sylvia Nasar. The film stars Russell Crowe, along with Jennifer Connelly, Ed Harris, Christopher Plummer and Paul Bettany. The story begins in the early years of Nash’s life at Princeton University as he develops his “original idea” that will revolutionize the world of mathematics. Early in the movie, Nash begins developing paranoid schizophrenia and endures delusional episodes while painfully watching the loss and burden his condition brings on his wife and friends. It is a beautiful, sensitive and a very touching movie with an important message. You will also get to see some awesome acting from powerful actors. I really liked the emotional strength displayed by Jennifer Connelly’s character. Kedu’s Rating: 8.5/10 IMDB Rating: 7.9/10

The Pianist (2002) Music was his passion. Survival was his masterpiece. This movie is directed by Roman Polanski, starring Adrien Brody. The film is a co-production between Polish, French, German, and British film companies. In addition to winning the Palme d’Or at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival, the film won the Academy Awards for Best Director, Best Actor, and Best Adapted Screenplay. This movie shows the suffering of Polish-Jews subjected to inhuman Nazi law during World War 2 through eyes of a Pianist. It is an adaptation of autobiography of same name by Jewish-Polish musician Władysław Szpilman (Adrien Brody). At the outbreak of the Second World War, Szpilman becomes subject to the anti-Jewish laws imposed by the conquering Nazis. Szpilman watches his world go from piano concert halls to the Jewish Ghetto of Warsaw and then must suffer the tragedy of his family deported to German concentration camps, while Szpilman is conscripted into a forced German Labor Compound. At last deciding to escape, Szpilman goes into hiding as a Jewish refugee where he is witness to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. The Pianist doesn’t celebrate heroism of any kind but shows a life of a simple man who is doing his best to stay alive. Roman Palanski does a brilliant job in telling this real story. Excellent film! Kedu’s Rating: 8.5/10 IMDB Rating: 8.5/10

Crash (2004) You think you know who you are. You have no idea. This movie is co-written, produced, and directed by Paul Haggis. The film is about racial and social tensions in Los Angeles. A self-described “passion piece” for director Paul Haggis, Crash was inspired by a real life incident in which his Porsche was carjacked outside a video store on Wilshire Boulevard in 1991. It won three Oscars for Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay and Best Editing of 2005 at the 78th Academy Awards. Race is paramount in this film, and all our preconceptions of who people are get twisted and turned through the intricate plot. With each new additional character we find another assumption, another stereotype, and then watch as that preconception is obliterated as the character develops. It is a credit to the deftly written script, tight direction and exceptional acting talent that every one of these many characters is fully realized on screen without ever feeling one-dimensional. Kedu’s Rating: 8.5/10 IMDB Rating: 8.1/10

The Prestige (2006) Are You Watching Closely? This movie is directed by Christopher Nolan, with a screenplay adapted from Christopher Priest’s 1995 World Fantasy Award-winning novel of the same name. The film features Hugh Jackman as Robert Angier, Christian Bale as Alfred Borden, and David Bowie as Nikola Tesla. It also stars Michael Caine, Scarlett Johansson, Piper Perabo, Andy Serkis, and Rebecca Hall. The story follows Robert and Alfred, stage magicians in London at the beginning of the 20th century. Robert, his beloved wife Julia McCullough and Alfred are friends and assistants of a magician. When Julia accidentally dies during a performance, Robert blames Alfred for her death and they become enemies. Both become famous and rival magicians, sabotaging the performance of the other on the stage. When Alfred performs a successful trick, Robert becomes obsessed trying to disclose the secret of his competitor with tragic consequences. Movie has lot of twists and at the time when you least expect them. Christopher Nolan delivers yet another master piece. Kedu’s Rating: 8.5/10 IMDB Rating: 8.4/10

Atonement (2007) You can only imagine the truth. This movie is an adaptation of Ian McEwan’s novel of the same name, directed by Joe Wright, and based on a screenplay by Christopher Hampton. It stars Keira Knightley and James McAvoy and is produced by Working Title Films. The story starts off with 13-year-old, bratty aspiring writer (and playwright) Briony (Saoirse Ronan) who has completed her first play. Briony, after that is given a letter from the house-servant’s son, Robbie (James McAvoy) to give to Briony’s sister, Cecilia (Keira Knightley). But it’s only after he gives Briony this letter that Robbie realizes he has made a mistake by giving her the wrong letter. This letter he had given to Briony is very erotic. This letter confuses Briony. But to top it off, Cecilia and Robbie do something Briony has never seen before and not able to completely understand. When Briony’s friend and cousin, Lola Quincey (Juno Temple) is attacked, Briony commits a lie that has strong affect on the lives of Robbie, Cecilia and herself. What surprises you most is the climax of the movie. It is a wonderfully crafted, beautifully lush and immensely moving film that shows, above all, how storytelling can both destroy and heal. Kedu’s Rating: 8.5/10 IMDB Rating: 7.9/10

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