Me and Motion Pictures...

I love movies, I just love them! I don’t know how long I would type, but its all about my love for them. I loved movies right from my childhood days. Dad used to take us for a lot of movies; I remember a lot of the movie outings so afresh, right from when I was 4. And when I grew up, like when I was around 8 I owe it to my uncles who took me for movies, I could say I was the only one in my class who would have seen ‘The Ten Commandments’ ‘Omarmukhtar’ ‘Two Missionaries’ ‘The Five Men Army’ 'The Guns Of Navorone’ and these kinda classics at the 3rd grade in school. I would hardly understand the dialogues still managed to understand the movie or at least the gist of it.

I would throw a tantrum at home if my brother goes for a movie leaving me behind; still I missed a few of them. I don’t know how many kids today enjoy watching classics. These movies were not just entertainment to me, of course I enjoyed them, but the most I enjoyed was the story telling sessions at school about the movies, and the pride I used to carry, on the attention I get for the same reason.

My kinds of movies are the ones that are either emotional or practical. When I was in my teens I enjoyed a lot of old regional movies like, Azhiyatha kolangal, Johnny, Varumayin niram sivappu, moodu pani and so on. I never enjoyed those romantic and the action packed masala movies which were block busters, I enjoyed only these emotional ones. Azhiyatha Kolangal tops my chart in my all time favorite regional movies. This movie had almost everything in it, Love, comedy, emotions and everything…Pratap pothen and Shoba were my favorite artist then. Again, I don’t know how many teens at the year 95 would have favored them.

There was an interesting point of time when I started watching a lot of English movies. My bro went out of station for his studies, and every time he comes home, we make it a point we go for a movie, most often the late night ones. Satyam complex was the destination most of the time. We loved movies and the ride back home in the middle of the night, and we would have talked almost everything under the sun during those rides. The sad part was that he would leave the same morning, and I wait for him to come back for the movies and those rides. We watched a lot of movies, a few real good ones like ‘Seven’ ‘Fallen’ ‘Romeo and Juliet’ ‘The Count of Monte Cresto’ ‘the brave heart’ and so on. We continued it even after he came back to Chennai…till he got married!

There is another best buddy called Farish, with whom I have watched a lot of movies. When we finished school, we decided that we meet up every Sunday in a movie hall and watch a movie; we thought it was so cool then! And I just cant forget the way we rode after watching ‘Jingle all the way’ Assuming that I was the turbo man character in that movie. Gosh! It was so funny.

Satyam complex is one place that I would have visited more than any other places in Chennai. I still do at least once every fortnight. I love the crowd and the ambience and not to forget the butter popcorns and the larger size Pepsi’s. And that’s a place where I bump into many of my friends whom I would love to see and a few from whom I try to hide!

Sometimes I have watched some amazing ones accidentally in the television. That’s were I first saw my all time favorite – ‘The Shawshank Redemption' and a few other good ones like ‘Now and Then’ ‘That Thing You Do’ ‘The Devil’s Own’ and ‘American Beauty’. These are a few movies which I saw unplanned, and I just watched them accidentally, and I fell in love with them, and are all in my all time favorites lists. And I’ve also seen a few good French movies (subtitled English) late nights in TV5


Off late for the last 2 years it’s all in DVD’s. Thanks to all the cheap pirated versions we get here. They help me watch everything I missed, For instance I watched ‘The Day of the Jackal’ and ‘psycho’ just last week. Like I said in my previous blog, I’m not much of a book lover but I get to see them in movies like ‘Wuthering Heights’ ‘Sense and Sensibility’ ‘The Day of the Jackal’ and so on.

When I think about it, I see that my love for the movies has never dropped all this while. I still hang out in Satyam and still buy DVD’s and still watch at least one movie in a week. A lot of people would say it’s a waste of time to watch a movie for 150 minutes, well it could be, However if you ask me, I would say movies are not just entertainment for me, it’s something more. I get inspired by William Wallace in Brave Heart; I learnt Patience and determination from Andy’s character in the Shaw Shank Redemption, Lester in American beauty showed the harsh realities of life. Forrest Gump, Detective Miles in Seven, Oscar in the Schindlers list, Antwone Fisher and Kamal Haasan in Mahanadhi, All of them are characters, so real, from whom I learnt things, with whom I’ve laughed and cried…

Movies are so close and very personal to me or let me finish saying I’m so close to movies… I love movies, I just love them!