Creature of Mad Enthusiasms

It's a Bollywood musical number, which means lots of dancing, repetitive lyrics, bright colors, and a length of almost 7 minutes.

It's also a condom ad. No, I'm not kidding. filkertom had the link. Yes, you did see what you think you saw at the 2:28 mark. And in case you missed it, they're really, REALLY explicit at 5:44.

This is pretty much the definition of not worksafe. And yet, I share the... love.

This is actually a message to jennetj pursuant to a conversation in Stratford, but I'm assuming that all y'all are just fascinated by my every wierdness and opinion. :>

Bollywood Movies What I Recommend:

Lagaan - the granddaddy of 'em all; the one that got me and many another person into Bollywood. (And if you were a Dresden Files fan, the same guy who played Harry plays the villain in this. And in Bollywood, the villains are amazing stinkers.) Back in the days of the British Raj, the young man of the Indian village has had enough of being smacked around by the snotty British leader of the local outpost. A cricket challenge is proposed. If the Indians win, they get off from paying their taxes (lagaan) for the year. If they lose, they owe triple.

For Bollywood, this is low on random melodrama and pasted-on songs. The plot keeps ticking along, throwing in wrinkle after wrinkle. It's an Indian movie made in India about Indians - is it really a surprise how the game turns out? - but the movie still had me on the edge of my seat for every wicket.

Lage Raho Munna Bhai - another gateway movie that I recommend. Much lighter than Lagaan, this is about a low-level hoodlum who has a crush on a DJ. When she announces that the winner of a contest about the life of Ghandi will get to meet her in the studio, Munna Bhai rigs the result. He manages to impress her so much that she invites him to start giving discussions on Ghandi. To make sure that he isn't outed, he starts studying... to the point that he suddenly finds Ghandi himself appearing to give him advice.

This is a flat-out comedy, and thus the plot isn't as tight at Lagaan's. But it's really hilarious, so if your interests are lighter, go for it as your gateway.

Mujshe Dosti Karoge - Cyrano de Bergerac, with a gender flip and as a comedy. Three kids were growing up together; the boy moves to England, asking the pretty girl to keep in contact with him. It's her "plainer" friend who actually does all the writing for the next 10 years, but does he realize that when he comes back to India? Does she declare herself? Not with 2 more hours of movie to go!

Chori Chori - a ripoff of an American movie that I've never seen, he's an architect who's building his dreamhouse. She's a con artist who needs a new place to stay in a hurry, so she heads out to the remote village where his house stands and announces that she's his wife while he's away...

Kuch Kuch Hota Hai Very famous. Very corny. Very fun. Boy has a tomboy best friend in college who loves him, but *he* loves the pretty girl. So when he proposes to her, the tomboy takes herself out of his life. But the pretty girl dies in childbirth, leaving behind eight letters for her daughter, to be read on her birthday. Letter number eight tells the story of their college days, and orders the child to find the tomboy and make sure they marry...

The fromage factor is huge, but how can you not love a movie that has a scene of a woman playing basketball in full sari?

Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge - reputedly the longest running movie in the world. If you liked the couple from the previous movie, here they are back again in a different movie. (Not as the same people.) She promises her ultra-traditional father that she will go to India for the marriage he arranged if he'll only give her one last thing - a trip to Europe with her college friends. While on the trip she meets a loud, rude, annoying (besotted) boy who will follow her to India, promising to marry her, but only when he can convince her father to agree to the wedding. The fromage factor is HUGE, the the dance numbers colorful, and the plot is both thin and rather incomprehensible... but you'll be having too much fun to quibble.

Some of these movies I've also reviewed under the Bollywood tag. All of them are available on Netflix.

Lage Raho Munna Bhai is out on DVD! This is the movie I saw and adored in early September and which has rocketed ahead of Lagaan as my suggestion for a gateway movie. If nothing else, LRMB is about an hour shorter, has fewer random musical numbers, and has a really accessible storyline applicable to all cultures.

While channel-skipping on cable, I came in on the middle/end of a Bollywood movie about a middle-aged couple that had been separated due to some odd oath. Each was staying with a different ungrateful child and their family. The woman sucked it in and saved her granddaughter from being roughed up by a boyfriend; the man hung out a local "music cafe" that played no music and was coaxed into writing his memoirs, which became a runaway bestseller. At a big press dinner he praised his (adopted?) son and his faithful wife, and dissed the rotten grown up kids.

...what the heck did I just watch? The name of it?

I've got a question so dumb that I'm embarassed to put it on Bollywhat. I just bought a copy of the CD "King Kahn" and it's got a picture of Shahrukh Khan with Hrithik Roshan and a couple of women I don't recognize. Any ideas what movie that's from? (Because, quite frankly, unless it's a total downer of a plot, anything with the two of them is going to be just too scenic to miss. Hand me the mayo and call me a sandwich.)

On the other hand, I notice that the pages of the little booklet that comes with the CD has sticky pages. Sexgod of Bollywood + sticky pages = equal parts *giggle* and *ew!*

Next in a series of Bollywood notes - my thoughts on The Ghost and Mrs. Martin Guerre ( Paheli. )

A random "I'm not dead" post:

Eggs and Evangelism
( Wherein Nea hopes that the breakfast bar has finally changed the radio station. )

Smushed Fingers
The finger that was not-quite broken is starting to itch something fierce. I'm hoping this means that it's on its way to completely healing.

HELL!
Hell doesn't have nine circles, it has two parts:
1) No projects at work
2) No internet access all day.

Lagaan
( Nea discovers Bollywood )

Overheard on the Radio
One of the radio stations I listen to has an Armenian DJ, who soaks up a fair amount of twitting from her cohorts, who act as though she's never heard of indoor plumbing and lives in a mud hut. Today she got the last word.

ARMENIAN GAL: So anyway, before we married, my husband met the family and they checked him out...
RADIO PERSONALITY: Brought 'em a couple of goats and a chicken? With this livestock, I do ask permission to go on a date?
ARMENIAN GAL: There was a cow involved too. I'm very valuable.

For the Jewish Folks
Local Rabbi makes it his life's mission to find and restore Torahs hidden during the Holocaust. (note: this link will only stay active for 2 weeks)