Bluto To The Rescue

The sun was at its radiant best, heat waves scorching everything around. I didn’t mind it though; 12 years in Manipal had given me enough courage and skill to withstand the mid-afternoon sun or even thunderous showers, for that matter. Furthermore, tall trees towered around me, all welcoming me to their side and shade was plentiful. The tiles were burning, but my corner was on the cement platform above the kitchen. My books, ranging from "A text book of Social Science", to Tintin comics were all sprayed around me. I formed the centre of the mess, my head on one branch of the tree that came into the platform, my ears plugged into a Walkman, a schoolbook in hand. It was my "Room on the roof", a corner that belonged exclusively to me.

It was just then that I heard this noise. If Kumbarkarna's tummy had ever growled, then that is how it might have sounded. It was a sound that I knew well but wasn’t actually expecting; it was the sound of footsteps on the tiles. Shit! My worst fears were confirmed. The roof, in fact, didn’t belong exclusively to me; it was also inhabited by some insects, a couple of worms, mongooses in the night (I have never spotted one), and MONKEYS.

It just sat there, a few metres away, staring solemnly at me, scratching its head. Black-faced and furry, with a tail that reminds one of a burnt Lanka, it waited. My immediate impulse was to run, to jump of the roof and make it to the house. But, my legs didn’t move and I didn’t want to leave my books, least of all my Walkman behind. I tried pretending that it didn’t exist and returned back to my books.

Pretending to be oblivious of something only makes you more aware of it and that is exactly what happened. The first thing I noticed, for instance, as I stared at my Social textbook was that the picture on the cover had 3 monkeys, all with long and bushy tails. The first name I saw was a certain Mr.Hanumanth Baliga, one of the members of the writing committee of the text book. And really, it is near impossible to read when someone stares so unabashedly at you from a distance of 5 metres.

With all the slyness that I could conjure, I turned my gaze, ever so carefully, in the direction of the monkey. I looked and immediately turned away, my eyes tightly shut, and stifled a scream. Indeed, for a second, a picture of a 5-foot monkey-magnet in my place flashed before my eyes, for there was no longer one, but three monkeys! They all sat in the same position and one of them even had a baby clinging to its stomach. I didn’t dare look again.

I carefully picked up my books, again superbly conscious of every move I was making, like a thief trying to steal from a super-mall with cameras all around him. I planned my get away quite simply. There was a guava tree that I could hop on and then with some deft footwork I would make my way onto the compound wall and jump beyond the bushes and run like crazy. It seemed liked the Indian batting line-up on paper, extremely promising but terribly unpredictable.

And while I was completely immersed in this line of thought, I felt a gentle tug at the wire that made its way into my ears. This time I knew what it was before even looking. The baby monkey, as mischievous as ever, seemed to be fascinated by my Walkman and had calmly strolled across to have a look at it.
"HANUMAN" I fittingly screamed, and I heard noises beyond the tiles from the asbestos. More monkeys.
"ARREY BOLSHANKARS, HELP ME. AYYO, HELP"

And somehow, since Hanuman himself couldn’t come in his usual form (that would have made me faint), he sent a substitute. 15 feet below, running at the speed of knots in a whirlwind of dust encircling it, ran Bluto; his head raised in my direction, tail wagging frantically and barking in a frenzy. My prayers had been answered; my Hanuman had arrived. He climbed the roof in the very manner that I had planned to get off and landed right in front of me.

What happened next on the roof, I still don’t know. I gathered all my books, hopped, jumped and ran. In less than a quarter of a minute, I was home, panting hard, but terribly relieved. And all I had to show for my adventure was a shirt that had torn somewhere during my frantic run.

That evening, as I made my way past my neighbour's house, I saw Bluto. It had a brand new shining collar.
"Bluto has lost his collar again" said my neighbour, an amicable old man, well into his 70s.
"Actually, Uncle, I think I know where it is, but I don’t think I will be going there in a very very long time" I said, and with a wink at Bluto, I ran past the house singing praises of the Lord Hanuman.

Riots

The night wasn’t silent; the streets weren’t dark. The lights weren’t put off, the owls weren’t hooting. The moon hid behind dark grey clouds as if unable to witness what was happening below. Dogs howled; women and children cried. The earth shook, unable to bear the weight of the stampede above. The wind whooshed past at a frightening speed carrying with it the dust, the flames, and everything else that dared to cross its way. Pandemonium prevailed.

It all started with the sound of footsteps. A group of people, all hooded and armed, galloped across the street. Then came an ear-piercing scream and the sound of wreckage. A house was blasted open and set on fire. Within minutes, chants were heard and someone sobbed loudly. More people, all armed, arrived.

And in the midst of this chaos, beside a heavily paan-stained wall by the street, he lay down. He could hardly move, and yet he tried.
"Help me" he screamed.
But there was too much going on, too much noise. And each man had his own life to take care of.
'Help me" he cried again, his voice now going down a few decibels. He could feel the darkness engulfing him, his life slowly ebbing away.

They moved through the panicked crowd with unusual finesse, cutting across people like a scissors through paper. They were all armed, as if forewarned of the likelihood of something of this sort happening and they were all similarly dressed. One of them spotted him, lying beside the river of blood that now flowed by the street and alerted the rest. They waltzed across the crowd, against the flow of people, and made it to him.
"Baba" said one of them, the moment they reached his side, kneeling by him.
He opened his eyes. There were 6 of them; all wearing grim yet determined faces. He couldn’t smile, but there was the slightest shake of the head.
"Baba, what is your name?"
The question brought him back to his senses. Everything came into focus just then. He stared into those deep-brown eyes that reflected the dancing flames all around, and realised that it was now a matter of life and death. He thought he spotted a streak of greying hair below the hood on the lower parts of the jaw and the cheek and with that much of a pause said,
"Abdul. Abdul Khan"

They immediately rose, eyes showing not any hint of pity for the man through whose stomach was pierced a bloodstained sword. As swift as ever, they turned and merged with the crowd not once looking back at the blood splattered shirt or the almost-still body.
"Bastards", he bellowed after them," the name is Hari Gopal".
But they had gone-- gone too far away and he was left all alone.

Swades--a masterpiece

It was way past 11 in the night. All was silent, still except for the TV in the living room that Amma was watching. I was working on my maths. My eyes were growing groggier with every passing second and my head was sinking. And then I heard this tune-- a tune that, for me, was more than just a tune--an anthem, a prayer. My head gave a sudden jerk and popped up, my limbs felt a new flush of energy flowing through, my tired eyes shone like the Buddha's after enlightenment, and my ears went upright. I ran to the living room, looked for hardly a second at the TV screen, and then asked a question that I had already known the answer to, "Swadesaa?"

I am, by nature, a person of stunningly strong likes. As a child of 10, I read Kamala Subramaniam's humungous Mahabharatha and immediately fell in love with Radheya (Karna). He wasnt the most perfect of charachters, Hell, he wasn’t even on the good side. And yet I adored him. Notwithstanding the fact that he was a mortal, I said my prayers to him daily before I slept.I have a fanatic's liking for VVS Laxman, who again, is not the most fancied of players in the Indian team. I love Kumble, for his unorthodox style of bowling and I love this lovely little book written by Ruskin Bond called "Scenes from a writer's life" that contains writings by him when he was young and raw at 16. And I love Swades, for its simple flow which is akin to Bond's style of writing or Laxman's batting.

Swades is my favourite movie. The storyline is amazing, the cast is brilliant and the director is one of the best in the industry. And yet, what draws me towards the movie like insects to light are the scenes. The scenes revel in highlighting the simple pleasures of life. Every scene is an experience; a piece of masterly craftmanship on the part of the director.And some of the them are so special and extraordinaly simple(yet happy) that one just cannot help smiling. The indescribable feeling of superlative elation after watching some of the scenes is something that I never have been able to draw from other movies, Indian or otherwise.
Mohan Bhargav,the main protagonist(played brilliantly by SRK), is not a person blessed with extraordinary brainpower or masculine abilities, but is a very real NRI. The characters, which are portrayed flawlessly, are genuine and exactly the type of people one would come across in such situations.

The movie also brings out the best in A.R.Rahman, another wizard. The maestro is at his best when composing from his heart and this movie has so much soul in it that he really brings up tunes that will stay for a long, long time. Swades has songs that are truly Indian and extremely authentic--vintage ARR. But, really, what is so truly marvellous about the music is not the songs, but the tunes that pop up when the scenes are in progress--the background music-- reflect every single emotion felt by the characters and enhance the effectiveness of the scenes.

Swades, however, is not the most perfect of movies. It has its drawbacks. The movie is stretched on both sides and, sometimes, the story seems to stay still. It sometimes reminds me of the Suvarna river, here in Manipal, in mid-summer, extremely picturesque but unmoving. Gayathri Joshi as Sita in "Pal Pal..." could have been avoided. And yes, the movie does, every so often, seem like Ashutosh Gowariker hasn’t managed to get over the Lagaan hangover.But,really, all this bothers me as much as Andy Roddick bothers Roger Federer. Shah Rukh Khan plays his most meaningful character in a career spanning a decade-and-a half, Gayathri Joshi makes a more than impressive debut, and Ashutosh Gowariker bears bravely the weight of the movie on his shoulders.

There is a beauty in imperfection, a beauty in the flawed. And this movie, though not the most seamless of ones is unique. It has captured my heart like few others have done(and sends flutters down every part of my body) and I cant help but applaud a director who explores un-trodden pathways in Indian cinema. A movie that is truly Indian. Simple, soothing and soulful.