Articles by Poonam J

What film societies do is show meaningful cinema - at a meaningful hour. Befittingly remembering Hal Ashby during his death centenary month, Bangalore Film Society (BFS) screened the intriguing director's "tantalizing knuckleball" comedy Being There, a few weeks ago. Shampoo, Bound for Glory, The Landlord, The Last Detail, Coming Home and Being There - with each of his films drastically different from the other, it makes a certain categorisation that erudite critics and viewers like to 'assign' to artists and their work, an exercise in futility. However, this could also be the chief reason why he never received as much…

I saw Ramayana with the attention that can only come from a seriously escapist 8-year old. This was in 1989. Then came 1992, and with so much mention again about Ayodhya, I felt Ramayana was being replayed somewhere. And why not – everyone must have been as enthralled with Hanuman carrying the mountain for Lord Ram – as I was. Only this time, it didn’t come with that happy feeling. After a few years I understood all that unfolded then was a drama of a different kind. And the Hanumans’ in it were the mindless destructive monkeys who called themselves…

Jean-Luc Godard’s 1967 movie, Weekend, was screened by LACEfilms on 26th October at Suchitra Film Society. On a nice Sunday morning which usually is reserved for films by great auteurs, a bunch of 30 or so gathered to watch this French film. What I expected to see in the film was general drama on how the bourgeois or the privileged class is enjoying his weekend – but I then immediately realigned my cognisance about Godard and what he stands for. To be able to comment on Godard or his films requires serious credentials than being a mere journalist who has…

Considered a classic by most, yet not the best of Chaplin, The Great Dictator which released in 1949, is one of the most enduring satires of its time. The film takes place, as the title card clarifies, in a ‘period between two wars’. This film was screened as a part of Meta-Culture 2008 Film Festival on Conflict and Resolution last month at the Alliance Francaise. In the film, writer-director Chaplin plays opposed dual roles – that of a Jewish amnesiac barber and the Tomanian dictator Adenoid Hynkel. The plot The Great Dictator was Chaplin's first feature-length talkie. The movie, in…