Bollywood: The Films! The Songs! The Stars!

Bollywood: The Films! The Songs! The Stars! 

A visual tour of the glamour and color of Indian cinema in the only comprehensive illustrated guide to the world of Bollywood movies.

Mumbai's charming movies, with glittering costumes and epic song-and-dance productions, have captured hearts all over the world since the early 1900s. Bollywood features film stills, plot timelines, star and producer profiles, plus historical insights, lesser-known facts, and behind-the-scenes gossip on such iconic movies as Mother India, Mughal-e-Azam, Sholay, Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, and Bajirao Mastani.

Yes, we knew this would happen at some point, right? I found a book on Bollywood! The cover alone tells us that they understand a big part of the appeal — those colors are glittery, shiny, and sparkly. I don't know how I came across it but was thrilled to see the library had a copy, which I instantly ordered.

This is fun for dipping into, especially considering our family's current obsession with Indian films. It was a wonderful surprise to discover how many of the most recent "great movies" we'd seen and how many of the stars we knew. Rose has been pulling a lot of our viewing choices from a Time Out Best 100 Bollywood and Hindi Movies list, supplemented with top grossing, well reviewed films from after that list's date. She has done a great job, evidently.

We're enjoying all the background materials and finding new movies to put on our list from this book.  In fact, it has been in high demand, with one person putting it down only to have another snatch it up for their own reading. So, naturally, I bought one for our own home library! A necessary household resource, you know.

The Dark Meat of the Angel

Not that she is not enjoying the holiday [Spring Break] — as it is sometimes called. She really likes to see three helpings of mashed potato, thick slices of steak, and mountains of toasted angel cake with chocolate sauce systematically stoked into young furnaces. There was chocolate angel cake once: an innovation, a departure from tradition. Mrs. Appleyard had a read a rule in the paper. Even she is not proof against all human frailty.

It was Sally who summed it up politely.

"Thank you," she said. "I don't think I care for any more of the dark meat of the angel."

Louise Andrews Kent, Mrs. Appleyard's Year

This is such a charming and gently humorous book. I recently reread it as my pre-lights-out book. It was perfect for powering down before sleep.

Excellent Hunter

Excellent Hunter, Remo Savisaar

Listen Up — Daily Poem

The Daily Poem offers one essential poem each weekday morning. From Shakespeare and John Donne to Robert Frost and E..E Cummings, The Daily Poem curates a broad and generous audio anthology of the best poetry ever written, read aloud by David Kern. Some light commentary is included and the poems are read twice.

I really enjoy this podcast which says something since I often struggle with liking poetry. David Kern's commentary has gotten more in-depth as the show has gone on, but without making the episodes longer which I appreciate. Each episode is between 4 and 10 minutes.

Listen to episodes here or subscribe.

Fan - a solid thriller

Gaurav develops an obsession with a movie star who looks just like him. He goes to Mumbai to meet his idol, but he refuses to grant him five minutes of his time. Gaurav is enraged and plots to destroy his hero.

They had me at Shah Rukh Khan playing his own stalker. Normally I wouldn't care about this sort of movie but was curious to see how Khan carried off the dual roles. I'm happy to say this is a solid thriller and a real star vehicle for King Khan who proves he can really act. I also enjoyed the fact that this had some very tense moments but without indulging in the extremes that Hollywood would have included.

Rating — Bollywood Medium (mostly straight forward but with some concepts it is helpful to have come across before. Such as, in this one, knowing that Bollywood fandom is taken to ridiculous levels such as huge crowds waiting outside a star's house just to wave to him on his birthday ... or people having small shrines to their favorite stars.)

ALSO
Hannah and Rose discuss it at An American's Guide to Bollywood.
Scott and I discuss it at A Good Story is Hard to Find.

Staying Catholic at Christmas. A Gospel reading for the scandal in the church.

I'm a little behind on my blog reading but this piece works for any time of year, I think. I really liked this linking of the "begats" to the current scandal.

Anyway, I myself like it when we dig into the boring parts and pull out the plum of deeper meaning that speaks to us here and now. I need to be reminded of Christ's lineage and what it means ... and what the gospel writers were saying.

Go read the whole thing, but here's some of what I liked.

If you only know the Bible vaguely, this litany of names probably sounds a bit pompous, an attempt to elevate the infant Jesus by linking him to great patriarchs and noble kings. But the truth is roughly the opposite: The more you know about Genesis or Chronicles or Kings, the more remarkable it is that Matthew announced the birth of the son of God by linking him to a pack of egregious sinners.

[...]

Take a line like “Judah begat Perez and Zerah of Tamar.” Just a typical nuclear family, right? Here’s McCabe with the real story: “Judah slept … by mistake, with his daughter-in-law Tamar: She had cheated him by disguising herself and dressing up as a prostitute … [When] Judah heard that his daughter-in-law had prostituted herself and become pregnant, he ordered her to be burnt alive. He was disconcerted when he discovered that he himself had been the client and that the child, Perez, was his.”

[...]

Crucially, in claiming the divine is entering the world through this line of “murderers, cheats, cowards, adulterers and liars,” Matthew isn’t offering some particularly Christian innovation within the larger biblical story. He’s simply picking up what his own people, the Jewish people, already said about themselves: We’re the chosen people of the one true God, and to prove it to you here’s a long story about how awful and promiscuous and murderous and fallible we are, how terrible our leaders often turned out to be, and how we deserved every exile and punishment we received.

If you don’t find that message credible, well, I understand. But if you find it strangely compelling, then you’re close to the case for remaining Catholic at a time when the corruption of the church is driving a number of very public defections from the faith.

Ross Douthat, Staying Catholic at Christmas

Kahaani - a mother of a story

Vidya Bagchi arrives in Kolkata from London to find her missing husband Arnab. Seven months pregnant and alone in a festive city, she begins a relentless search. With nothing to rely on except her memories and a photo, all clues seem to reach a dead end and she slowly realises that nothing is what it seems.

We put off watching this for weeks because the description sounded depressing. Wow, were we wrong! This thriller blew our minds. Hollywood would be proud to have made this movie.

You might not want to take that recommendation seriously because it is foreign but just as in the French movie Tell No One, it is hard to convince people how good this is. Just watch it.

Rating — Introduction to Bollywood (come on in, the water's fine!)

Hannah and Rose discuss it in episode 48 of An American's Guide to Bollywood podcast.

Copyrighted Works are Entering Public Domain for the First Time in Over 20 Years

Woohoo! The drought is over!

For the first time in over 20 years, on January 1, 2019, published works will enter the US public domain.1 Works from 1923 will be free for all to use and build upon, without permission or fee. They include dramatic films such as The Ten Commandments, and comedies featuring Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Harold Lloyd. There are literary works by Robert Frost, Aldous Huxley, and Edith Wharton, the “Charleston” song, and more. And remember, this has not happened for over 20 years. Why? Works from 1923 were set to go into the public domain in 1999, after a 75-year copyright term. But in 1998 Congress hit a two-decade pause button and extended their copyright term for 20 years, giving works published between 1923 and 1977 an expanded term of 95 years.

Duke Law School Center for the Study of the Public Domain,
Public Domain Day 2019

This probably doesn't seem like a big deal in general. But to people who love LibriVox where you can get free audio books, Project Gutenberg where you can read or download free books, and the many podcasts which read books aloud this is big news. Those places, and many more, all depend on public domain books and that source has been shut off for a long, long time.

At my podcast, Forgotten Classics, there were many times when a book was just shy of that cut off date and it was terribly frustrating knowing that no one cared about it but me. And that I still couldn't share it with others.

I admit it gives me a certain gleeful feeling to know that Steamboat Willy's Mickey Mouse is now in the public domain.

We can blame Mickey Mouse for the long wait. In 1998, Disney was one of the loudest in a choir of corporate voices advocating for longer copyright protections. At the time, all works published before January 1, 1978, were entitled to copyright protection for 75 years; all author’s works published on or after that date were under copyright for the lifetime of the creator, plus 50 years. Steamboat Willie, featuring Mickey Mouse’s first appearance on screen, in 1928, was set to enter the public domain in 2004. At the urging of Disney and others, Congress passed the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, named for the late singer, songwriter and California representative, adding 20 years to the copyright term. Mickey would be protected until 2024—and no copyrighted work would enter the public domain again until 2019, creating a bizarre 20-year hiatus between the release of works from 1922 and those from 1923.

Smithsonian Magazine

At any rate, we will now add to the public domain year by year as each January 1 rolls around. And that makes it a Happy New Year for me!

Picture Miss Seeton — a delightful, cozy mystery

Picture Miss Seeton
by Heron Carvic

Miss Seeton is a retired, often bemuddled British art teacher with a slight psychic ability for drawing things more accurately than they appear. Picture Miss Seeton, the first in the series, is an absorbing novel in which an elderly and naive drawing mistress, finds herself suddenly involved in the baser side of life, becoming embroiled in a murder and its subsequent mayhem.

This was a delight to reread.

I'd forgotten just what an endearing character Miss Seeton is with her ever-present brolly and continual misunderstanding of what's going on around her. To balance that, though, there is the fact that she was a school mistress and you realize she must have been a good one because she brings that sense of judging people to different situations. If only she understood just what the situations were.

This would go in the "cozy mystery" category as well as the comic category, while still being a very  satisfying mystery.

Here's a bit of the beginning of the book in which Miss Seeton reflects on the opera she just saw.

"L'amour est tum tum

De something..."

So colorful. Not romantic—no, one couldn’t call it that; if anything perhaps a trifle sordid. Carmen, herself, for instance, no better than she should be. In fact, if one were frank, worse. And the other girl, the young one; it was difficult to feel sorry for her. Her fiancé, quite obsessed with his mother—obviously weak and easily influenced—would have made a most unsatisfactory husband in any case. Still, for him to stab Carmen at the end like that—so unnecessary. Almost contrived. Though, of course, one must not forget that foreigners felt differently about these matters. One read that people abroad did frequently get emotional and kill each other. Probably the heat.

Heron Carvic wrote the first five Miss Seeton mysteries. Although the series continued with other authors none of them really rang true. Those first five though are great fun.

Big in Bollywood

27-year-old American-born Omi Vaidya, a struggling actor in L.A., miraculously lands a dream role in the Bollywood film “3 Idiots.” Curious to better understand the world of Bollywood, four of Omi’s buddies armed with cameras fly to Mumbai to document his big premiere. Within a week of release, “3 Idiots” skyrockets to box office success, becoming the most successful Indian film in history and transforming Omi into an overnight megastar.

But being a national sensation in India is not all glitz and glamor. Aside from the language barrier, Omi struggles with the pressure of his newly acquired fame and continuing his career momentum while trying to maintain a healthy domestic life back in Los Angeles. Set against the backdrop of Mumbai, Big in Bollywood is a film about what it is to be successful in show business, seen through the eyes of Omi’s best friends, who witness his career transformation firsthand.

We watched this last June and it provided the impetus to watch 3 Idiots.

This was immensely helpful in our plunge into Bollywood and also just a fun documentary about an American's experience as part of a huge hit film in a foreign culture. I realized I never reviewed it and that it might be helpful for anyone else interested in trying movies from India.

2019 Resolutions — Reading and Viewing

  B O O K S  

Reread the books I own. Do I still love reading these books? Only one way to find out as I tend to buy them and keep them as treasures on the shelf, but often forget to reread them.

Also, though this goes along with rereading, I recently began rereading Charles Dickens' novels in order. Am only partway through The Old Curiosity Shop, but will be intermittently pursuing this goal during the year.

Reading "I'll get to them sometime" books I keep skipping over. I've been given gifts, made impulse purchases, and as so many of us do ... have them in a fairly small but growing stack of books that I always overlook for something else that grabs my attention. This seems to me to go hand in hand with rereading, since the ultimate goal is to enjoy the books I've got and to get rid of the ones I don't care for.

  M O V I E S  

More Bollywood! More Tollywood! More Indian movies in general ... as if that were possible. But the fascination continues.

Also, we have watched a couple of director William Wyler's early movies (1930s) and will continue with his filmography through the year ... whenever we need a bit of American culture to leaven the Indian movies.

Best of 2018 - Movies

In 10 words or less, my top picks from the movies we watched last year. As always, the movies may be old, but my viewing was brand new in 2018.

Paddington

Charmingly old fashioned, playful mystery.
(My review here.)

The Lost Weekend

Riveting story that surprised me with great performance.
(My review here.)

Black Panther

Fresh, exciting design with fascinating ideological point of conflict.
(My review here.)

Coco

Love, family, memory, and loss anchored in Mexican culture love letter.

(My review here.)

Jumanji: Return to the Jungle

The Rock and Jack Black make this tons of fun.
(My review here.)

A Foreign Affair

A forgotten Billy Wilder treasure. Romantic comedy with deeper commentary.

Indian Films

We tried Baahubali and went straight down the rabbit hole.
(Reviews of favorites/discoveries with newest on top.)

Our favorites:

- Baahubali 1 & 2 - 

- Lagaan - 

- Om Shanti Om -

- Tashan -

- Dhoom 3 -

-Omkara -
- Lootera -

- Barfi! -

- Bajrangi Bhaijaan -
-PK-

Tom wrote a reflection of our Year of Bollywood which may be read here.

PK

A humanoid alien (Aamir Khan) lands on Earth naked on a research mission in Rajasthan but is stranded when the remote control for his spaceship is stolen.

Tom describes this best:

2014 satirical comedy-drama about an alien who gets stuck on Earth - it is not E.T. Instead it is a lighthearted view of humans through the childlike PK, played by the always intense Aamir Kahn. (PK means tipsy in Hindi.)

Amazingly charming, it uses India’s religions (which is almost all of them) as a backdrop to finding his way home.

It is really much better than my description. Look at it this way: it cost $12 million to make and had a box office of $140 million.

This was unexpectedly delightful and would be a good introduction to Bollywood since it is a bit more Western in how the story is told, with a few songs and dances to carry the story along. I especially enjoyed the religious angle, as well as the ingenuity with which PK has to figure out how to live on Earth using language instead of telepathy. And, of course, there is Aamir Khan (my favorite of the Three Khans).

Scott and I discussed this on episode 205 of A Good Story is Hard to Find podcast.

Rating — Introduction to Bollywood (come on in, the water's fine!)

Best of 2018 - Books

In 10 words or less, my top picks from the books I read last year. You may find old books here but if they're on this list, then they were new to me!

The Man Who Was Thursday

by G.K. Chesterton

We were warned. The subtitle is "A Nightmare." Loved it! 
(My review here.)

Cool & Lam series 

by A.A. Fair (Earle Stanley Gardner)

Bad-tempered Bertha Cool and clever, attractive Donald Lam. Detecting perfection.
More here.

Big Book of Rogues and Villains

edited by Otto Penzler

Mostly good-hearted rogues or villains being foiled. Delightful!
(My review here.)

The Boys in the Boat

by Daniel James Brown

Inspiring, informative, historical. Going on my "best ever" list.
(My review here.)

The Best Cook in the World

by Rick Bragg

Personalities, old customs, and hard times — more memoir than cookbook.
(My review here.)

Brideshead Revisited

by Evelyn Waugh

I respect and admire but didn't love. Will definitely reread.  

(My review.)

The Black Swan / St. Martin's Summer

by Rafael Sabatini

Totally entertaining swashbucklers/romances.
(My reviews here.)

The Fellowship

by Philip Zaleski and Carol Zaleski

Far superior to other books I've read on the Inklings.

(My full review)

Mother Angelica's Answers, Not Promises

 by Mother Angelica with Christine Allison

Solid advice, instruction, inspiration.  
(My review here.)

A Catholic Introduction to the Bible: The Old Testament

 by John Bergsma and Brant Pitre

Informed opinion, trustworthy scholarship, fascinating reading.

 (My review here.)

Discovering the Catholic Herald

I received a copy of the Catholic Herald in the mail a few days ago. Occasionally I receive samples from different publications and usually find they don't add much beyond what I'm already reading on the internet.

In this case, however, every time I picked up this weekly Catholic news magazine to take a look through before tossing it out, I kept finding I was slowing down and reading it with attention. That in itself was rare but I also liked the features such as the global map showing what was happening in the Church worldwide. (Oh, right, the U.S. is not the center of the Catholic world!) I liked the schedule of daily mass readings tucked into a corner. I liked the blend of news analysis, editorials, and pieces looking at common elements with a Catholic eye.

You can read a lot of this online at their site. In fact, they say the reason they began a U.S. edition (this is originally a U.K. publication) is that half their website visitors were American. However, there was really something gripping for me in having a magazine to pick up and peruse for a few days.

My copy was from Dec. 7, not the gorgeous double issue whose cover I show above. And it isn't cheap. But that is the price of a decent magazine these days, I have a feeling. Anyway, take a look. You might like it as much as I do.

UPDATED — Thank You! The Bayeux Tapestry by Lucien Musset

There was no card or other acknowledgment in the package containing this treasure. I was going over my list — yes, checking it twice against the many treasures I have stacked in my closet. And then I opened it and ... found something filling me with great delight!

Early in our marriage Tom and I went to France and one of the places he was determined to go was Bayeux. You know, so we could see the tapestry.

"The what?" I said, which is how Tom found out my utter lack of English/French historical knowledge.

We toured it just ahead of a pack of English schoolchildren on a field trip. As I read the captions and followed the story this wonderful piece of art told, I became a fan just like Tom. I've never forgotten that experience.

Naturally I was dying to read this book which "presents a full-colour reproduction of the entire Tapestry, with a detailed commentary alongside each episode, equipping the reader to follow the story blow by blow and this marvellous work of art step by step."

And now, thanks to some kind person, I can! It looks simply fantastic now that I've had a chance to briefly glance through it and I can't wait for tonight when I can settle in and begin. Thank you so much!

UPDATE
I read it quite leisurely and it was everything I hoped for and more. Highly recommended.

Caught My Eye: Secular Advent, Muslim Youth Guarding Churches, Taiwan's Silent Majority

The Secular Christmas Season is Actually Secular Advent
From National Catholic Register comes a point of view to help counter frustration with the "Christmas too early" feeling.

Then one year it dawned on me: For most people the Christmas tree, Christmas lights, the music, the parties, the cookies, etc., are actually Advent activities. They call them Christmas decorations, but when they come down right after Christmas Day, they actually are Advent decorations. If they were really for Christmas, then they would stay up for the whole of the Christmas season. And realizing this changed my whole outlook.

Muslim Youth to Help Guard Indonesian Churches at Christmas
I love this story which you can read at the Catholic Herald.

More than 90,000 police and soldiers and a moderate Muslim youth group will help guard nearly 50,000 churches across Indonesia, including some previously attacked by terrorists, during the Christmas period.

How Taiwan’s ‘Silent Majority’ Blocked Same-Sex ‘Marriage’ Momentum
A fascinating story since I didn't know Taiwan's take on these issues.

Until local elections that were held Nov. 24, Taiwan was considered the San Francisco of Asia — the most “gay-friendly” country in the region, set to redefine marriage to include same-sex couples, as ordered by the country’s highest court.

What happened instead surprised even Catholic clergy deeply involved in defending pro-family laws.

In a set of five referendum questions, Taiwan overwhelmingly affirmed traditional marriage and voted to remove content reflecting gender ideology from elementary- and junior-high-school curricula; 66.1% of approximately 19 million eligible voters participated.

Read the whole thing at National Catholic Register.

I finished my Christmas shopping.

That calls for a warrior's celebration. Luckily, I've got it all lined up. There aren't any captions, but you can get the vibe of the thing.

(I love the YouTube comment on this: My cat and goldfish listened to this song, now the cat is a tiger and the goldfish is a shark.)

Watch it full screen.

Sweet Dreams

Marianne Stokes, Sweet Dreams

This Just In — Villains of the Church: And How They Made Us Better Christians by Mike Aquilina

This book just in. Here's why to read it:

The villains of the ancient world proved the mettle of heroes like Peter and Paul, Irenaeus and Athanasius. Treachery and adversity inspired the Fathers' clearest teaching, most entertaining invective, and more than a few memorable jokes.

I'm looking forward to learning some good lessons from this one. A full report after I've read it, but it's Mike Aquilina so I know it's going to be good.