Top 5 Most Influential Directors

This is a post about the most influential directors (for me). I think I can safely say most people may not agree with this list. The list will be updated every day with each director and a set of recommended works that I have seen.

Top Directors: No 1 – David Lynch

The controversial No.1 spot on my list has to go to David Lynch. Lynch is known for his surrealist, noir  and neo-noir films. He has developed his own cinematic style, which is often dubbed as “Lynchian”. Most of his films exhibit a non-linear narrative, which is not easy to comprehend for a first time watcher but is similar to what you can find in films of Nolan, Tarantino and the likes. Other distinctive traits of “Lynchian” films are the dream imagery, apt sound design, extreme use of symbolism and mysterious nature.

“Mulholland Drive” was the first Lynch film that I have seen. The brilliantness of this film is that although it seemed like any normal film, the last part of the film really work me up and I had to see it a couple of times to fully understand and notice all the intricacies portrayed in it.

So it’s safe to say that from Lynch’s films only, that I started to clearly notice everything in a film, even a minor object or dialog could help in understanding the film. Lynch doesn’t tell a story through a film, rather give some suggestions and let the viewer to interpret the story in their ways. As such most Lynch films can have multipleinterpretations and it doesn’t help when Lynch never comments on the meaning or symbolism of his films. DVD releases of Lynch film’s do not have chapters as Lynch believes, one should watch his films from end to end.

A 25 year old Lynch began studying film making at the AFI Conservatory in 1971 (he was studying for a career as painter before this). After five years of work, his first film (aided by grant from AFI and money raised from friends and family) “Eraserhead” was released in 1977. It is a surrealist horror film depicted in black and white.

Next up was mainstream success through the film “The Elephant Man”, based on true story. This film starred Antony Hopkins and achieved huge critical and commercial success. The film was also nominated in eight categories for Academy Awards.

The most different film by Lynch is “The Straight Story” -An old man makes a long journey by tractor to mend his relationship with an ill brother based on a true story. Lynch comments that this is his most experimental movie. It is strikingly a linear film, even shot in chronological order based on the actual route taken by ‘Alwin Straight’.

After that came “Mulholland Drive” in 2001 which earned Lynch the Best Director prize at the Cannes film festival.

His next film, “Inland Empire” from 2006 went one level higher from the previous film. A three hour long film, much like “Mulholland Drive” and “Lost Highway” did not follow a traditional movie structure. Titled ‘A woman in trouble’, takes the unsuspecting viewer on for a journey of their lives.A highly nonlinear film with multiple stories / dreams / realities intertwining. It was shot with actors getting freshly written dialogue each day!

Recommended Films: Mulholland Drive, Blue Velvet, The Elephant Man, Inland Empire and The Straight Story.

He also co-created a TV Series called “Twin Peaks” and a follow up film “Twin Peaks: Fire walk with me”.

Top Directors: No 2 – Stanley Kubrick

Perfectionist.

That’s how you describe arguably the greatest director of all time. His films are noted for their unique cinematography (Kubrick started out as a Photographer), attention to detail and usage of innovative techniques and technologies. In his almost 50 year career as a director, it is an astonishing fact that he has directed only 13 feature films. It is mostly due to the fact that he does most of the research, screenplays, editing and other aspects of a film. He has the complete artistic control over films that he makes. And in those films he has covered a wide variety of genres which includes war, satire, romance, horror, epics etc.

The most famous of Kubrick’s films should be the epic science fiction film “2001: A Space Odyssey”. Released in 1968, it was a very innovative film with ground breaking special effects, portrayal of future, philosophical content, human evolution, artificial and extra-terrestrial intelligence.This film is truly a modern masterpiece and epic.

At this rate, I would have to write about each and every one of his films and the specialty and finesse on them. So I will cut short on that.A most fact to add is for the film “The Shining”, Kubrick was satisfied after around 150 takes for a certain scene. So much is Kubrick’s demand for perfection and attention to detail.

He has only one Oscar award to his name – Best Special Effects for “2001: A Space Odyssey”. Sadly, at the age of 70, four days after the screening of a final cut of his last film “Eyes Wide Shut”, Kubrick passed away from a heart attack on March 7, 1999.

Recommended Films: 2001: A Space Odyssey, the Shining, A Clockwork Orange, Barry Lyndon, Dr. Strangelove and Full Metal Jacket

Top Directors: No 3 – Ingmar Bergman

The great Swedish director-writer is next on my list. Of almost his 40 films, I have but seen only 3 up until now. But they are excellent examples of the quality of this great film artist. His values film as an art rather than a commercial point of view.

The first film that I’ve seen was “The Seventh Seal” which tells the story of a medieval knight and a game of chess he plays with the personification of Death. The film explores themes of God, faith, and how everyone becomes equal before death. There is a great artistic touch to the film in each scene. Thisfilm helped Bergman establish himself as a world-class director.

The second film that I saw was “Wild Strawberries” which is about an old man recalling his past. The film investigates questions about life and thought provoking themes like self-discovery and human existence. There are instances of the past and present co-existing as if reliving a memory which are quite extra ordinary.

And the film that made the greatest impression on me, yet,  is titled “Persona” – one could conclude that this is a simple film owing to being just 83 minutes running time, and only 4 characters of which only 2 appear for more than a minute of which one does all the speaking. It would seem to be boring, but is considered to be Bergman’s most important work. 

“A nurse is put in charge of an actress who can't talk and finds that the actress's persona is melding with hers.”-is what imdb says as a description for the film. The film follows a three act structure.The main characters can be seen as representing extremes. Both deliver stunning performances and there is brilliant cinematography by Sven Nykvist, a long term collaborator of Bergman’s.

There is extreme contrast in the imagery of most scenes. There is strong use of duality and symbolism throughout.

Recommended films: The Seventh Seal, Persona, Cries and Whispers

Top Directors: No 4 – Christopher Nolan

Christopher Nolan has to be an under rated director in the modern times (as in under rated by the Oscar Committee). The first film which I’ve seen directed by Nolan is “Memento”. It was my introduction to the unusual narrative in films, most notable non-linear. I had to see it multiple times, stop and think about the story lines that progressed in parallel and in reverse to make out the story. He went one better with “The Prestige” which is my favorite Nolan film.

What I like so much about Nolan is the way the stories and characters are developed and introduced to the viewer. Intricate plot elements are introduced to the viewer in subtle ways such as in “Inception”.

The dialogues play an important part in his films and the actors casted always play their roles to perfection. He frequently casts some actors in most of his films, like Sir Michael Caine. His brother, Jonathan Nolan is involved with the story for most of his films. 

Nolan leaves some part of the film for the user’s imagination and interpretations (e.g.: Ending of Inception, Dark Knight Rises). Nolan is simply one of the most talented and exceptional film makers in working today.

Recommended films: Memento, Inception, The Prestige, Batman Trilogy

Top Directors: No 5 – Sir Alfred Hitchcock

I will start my list with the master of suspense. In his career spanning almost six decades, Alfred developed a very distinctive directorial style. Apart from his earlier works including silent films and early films depicting drama and romance, he is well known for his films featuring suspense, mystery, twist endings and his cameo appearances in most of his films. His films sometimes contained plot devices termed as called “MacGuffin” or decoys to serve as thematic elements.

His most famous work has to be the psychological thriller “Psycho”. Although I felt a few of his films had similar plot like “Strangers on a Train” and “Dial M for Murder”.

He made around fifty films and is regarded as the greatest British filmmaker.

Recommended Films: Psycho, Vertigo, Rear Window, and Rope.

Ra·One : A Review

All right, so I went to watch Ra·One yesterday, I had been looking forward to watching this film for a long time now.


Introduction

In case you have no clue what Ra·One is, let me give you a heads up. It is a science fiction superhero film starring Shahrukh Khan (SRK), released in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and German.


In the first scene, a new technological innovation is described which serves as the base of the film. Then you are introduced to Shekhar Subramaniam (SRK). He is a brilliant Game Developer who acts more like Mr. Bean. The character being a South Indian, his references to the Madrasi Cliché, won't seem to get well received in the South. Shekhar lives in London, with his wife and son, who is embarrassed of sorts because of his dad trying to be cool, but messes things up.


Characters


So Shekhar develops a game with the ultimate super villain - Ra-One. It stands for 'Random Access - Version 1.0'. Now can some one tell me how that makes any sense? RaOne is the ultimate super villain that Shekar comes up to please his son who thinks villains are cool and heroes are boring. The hero in the game is G-One which means life and he is modeled after SRK, albeit a cooler looking version. Reminds you of 'Rab ne bana di Jodi'. 

Not intending to give out any spoilers in case you haven't seen the film, I will say what I thought of the game film.


I have already given my verdict on the characters played by SRK. They are the usual play of duality that you see as in Fight Club or The Mask. G-One acts more like a human, which I like compared to other films with robots where you can hear metallic sounds when the walk and move in a constrained way.


Kareena as Sonia, wife of Shekhar does exactly what she has been asked to do, although you do wonder if she is limited by her character in the script. Armaan Verma as Pratheek, Shekhar's son also does well, his role being similar to the young John Connor from Terminator 2.


But Arjun Rampal as Ra-One beats everyone else by a mile. He comes in, does his job, no nonsense, no compromise. A great villainous performance.


Special Effects


Firstly it has the best Visual Effects and CGI I have seen in an Indian film, Yes Enthiran was good, but in my opinion, Ra-One has done a little better in this department. The detail in which the effects have come out is pretty good. The fight scenes have come out really well and the action scenes are on par with International movies. 


That said the 3D didn't add anything special, it's just another thing of producers jumping on the 3D bandwagon, plus the film was shot in 2D and converted to 3D. Apart from the title scenes and a few others it seemed as the 3D was non existent.



Final Word


The first half didn't seem like a lag, but the second half I wondered was too long. I am not sure how well received Shekhar's character will be, may be its a trick to make you like G-One more. And the plot of the movie is such that I don't think it will cater to the wide audience, but to younger viewers. My grand parents and all question me for spending time on my computer playing games.


But anyways, see the film for the Visual Effects, editing and the Sound effects. So I would suggest that you watch it for the Special Effects and not for the story. You can try it once. It's kind of fun to go with your friends, young nephews, nieces or children.


A 3.5 out of 5. 

Revamp in order

Over the past one and a half years, my life, perspectives, likes, dislikes and even thoughts have come leaps and bounds. So i believe a quick revamp is in need for my blog also. Feel free to comment me on the changes that you see.

This will be my 49th post. Incidentally it is a number mostly associated with my favorite football club that is arsenal. Arsenal had gone 49 consecutive Premiere League games unbeaten from 2003 to 2005 - a national record. Speaking of arsenal, i have become infected with Arsenalitis it seems. It has become a part of my blood, thoughts and life. So this 49th post is dedicated to the team that plays the best football in all the land :)

I was able to buy a sony cyber shot camera last year and have been experimenting with my photography interests for some time now. Most of my better efforts have been uploaded in mu Orkut and Facebook albums.

Opera has come out with version 10 and i had been following all the great developments from them all throughout. I use Opera mini 5 from my mobile device and it is an absolutely wonderful product. Fantastic UI design, navigation and exceptional usability makes me think that Opera have done it this time. What more can they do to improve. Will have to wait and see.

Will post more soon, chow

New Resolutions

   Ok, this may sound real stupid. But hey this is my blog, ill write anything that i wish and theres nothing anyone can do about it.

   Its just that i'd been thinking of a couple of things that i need to change about me. The worst of them is that i tend to get angry for no particular reason especially when im frustrated or pissed off. I understand that its a very bad nature. Im usually a calm and quite sort of person, but occassionally the scene gets a change!

   Its got to go then. Although i have some amount of patience, its kind of dynamic meaning that it varies. Also i do believe that im not doing better than a good no of years ago  when the case 
not like this.  

   Ive read that number of sucessful people managed their anger and disappointments.

So Just believe that every Down has an Up and every Up has a Down....

Project Time

    Yes, its time for the final year project and would kick of next week. So will be gone for about a month. So enjoying some vacation time now. But there is the 
last exam of Semester 7 that was postponed to be conducted on jan 30th.

    The project will be in Java and the topic is "Audio Steganography". Got nothing, well dont worry will be posting all the details after completing the project. So adios for now ...........