Musings about the Telugu cinema industry:
Just a few hours back I watched this movie "Chaitanya"
starring Nagarjuna and Gautami.
Well what can I say, I felt disgusted. The Telugu cinema industry does
not deserve to stay
afloat. Very few movies are actually 'original' in most aspects. The
songs are lifted from
English and the worst part is that they are given the proper credit.
Why? If you say that
you have lifted (aka Inspired (TM) Anu Malik) this song from so and so
source you would
have to pay them the royalty. Ok so coming back to this movie
"Chaitanya", the last few
scenes are wrt the hero penetrating the enemy base and rescuing the
heroine. What's the
problem with that tried and tested (and abused) formula? The whole
sequence is lifted
from "Commando" (*ing Schwazzenegger). However neither does Nagarjuna
have the
body of Arnold, nor can he act like a commando. Some extracts: While
Arnold dresses
up in proper commando gear, our dear frnd with the help of CBI or CID
officers enters
this hideout in something short of an Armani suit (exaggerated). Arnold
rows his boat,
while Nagarjuna drives a motorised boat. Arnold does a good job @
depicting the
covert penetration exercises, Nagarjuna sux @ it. Arnold carries a four
barrel missile rocket
launcher, nagarjuna also carries one just that it looks more like that
it has been made of
card board than titanium. Arnold carries a huge array of weapons,
Nagarjuna is clever here,
he grabs the weapons from the bad guys. Actually he throws his first
weapon
(while capturing the boat) into the water, for whatever reasons. Well
as usual, in most
cases the hero Nagarjuna dodges the bullets. I say the Telugu cinema
(along with Hindi cinema guyz) must sue the Wachowski brothers for
copyright
infringement. Sadly the story does not end here. There are so many
Telugu movies that
are directly "inspired" by Hollywood movies. Now tell me, if I know
that most of these
are plain Telugu remakes, then if I do not understand English, I would
start watching
those Telugu translated/dubbed english movies. If I do understand
english, I would stop
watching telugu movies (like I did). If art is not about creativity,
then what is it about?
Copying does not yield richer art, it just makes copies of the
original. Once the original
artist is noticed by everyone around (with internet?) what is the need
for a duplicate?
Now I come to my favourite guy - Jr. NTR. I really like the way he
dances, a wide body
does not hinder him from dancing like a pro. Lets look @ his songs -
every movie has
@least one song that he has lifted from one pop song or the other. I am
wrong is saying
this maybe because it is not he who is writing the songs (oops
copying), but someone else.
This seems to be a slim chance. Tarkan Simrik - lifted. I plan to make
a list of
these movies/sequences/songs soon. Whenever I see these I would make a
list and
put it up here or on my blog. And there is our dear Tushaar Kapoor, who
keeps
remaking the telugu movies (I dont know if these telugu movies are
inturn lifted or not).
Talking about Bollywood: Well I heard about this website http://www.bollycat.com
Take a look @ it. It may not be completely accurate, but you will
probably see the
rot in this culture. When will this rot end... I am not waiting for it,
I have stopped watching
this stuff.
http://students.iiit.net/~cyrax