Movies, Books and me..

Life was going on.. steady and at ease when lo i went off to meet a dear sweet aunt of mine and her hubby whom i was meeting for the first time.. Some people, i believe are met just to attain a cause. N this time I'm sure that was one of the purposes of my visit to their home.. Abundance of knowledge, encyclopedia of books, movies and again knowledge... what do i say.. but i was simply mesmerised by the depth of knowledge he possessed(my uncle). Geography, History, of India, Us or the entire world..Even the dates were known by heart to him.. And he is a doc by profession..So count in biology too..Also equally knowledgeable is my aunt..About books, economics what now.. in their midst i felt glad to admit that i am a kid and was pleased to be treated like one.. And from there i now have a whole new list to to be read books and to be watched movies..

N a few impressive ones i already saw from their collection are -

A Passage to India - A beautiful movie by David Lean adapted from E M Foster's famous book A passage to India.. It gives us a view of British India. How the British lived in India and later a clash between the Britishers and the mob.But unlike a movie on freedom struggle, this movie has a good story line and its mysterious till the very last reel.Truly awesome was the performance of Alec Guiness as professor Godbole.Also impressive were the dialogues which were apt and crisp.A good movie involving and Indian doctor, a young British lady tourist, her old adorable companion called Mrs Moore and how their nice little picnic turns into a nightmare..

Mississippi Masala - A lighthearted movie about an Indian family residing in Mississippi.. Its a story abt forbidden love between the Indian girl played by Sarita Choudhuri and an African American played by denzel Washington.. Must say i have become a fan of the director mira nair, especially since her other movie Monsoon wedding too had been exemplary. The best thing about the movie was that it didn't have any special or great story line or anything much different form other romance movies, but still it was cute in its own simple way and i liked the girl a lot.

She played the character remarkably well.. :)

After movies it time to mention a book, the author of which I'm reading for the first time And I'm just speechless by his total grasp on his entire plot and layout.. He seems to have a mental picture of each day of his characters and with tremendous ease he flip flops between the past and present making drowsy readers jerk and flip back pages.. not that readers can doze reading his book..The person I'm talking about is Mr. Amitav Ghosh and the book is The Shadow Lines which won the Sahitya Akademi Award, India's most prestigious literary award.. Rest of his books are in my to-be-read list and his non-fiction books like In an Antique Land are also much appreciated..

Death Speaks

Jeffrey Archer has been my favourite writer from the time i turned 15. Thats when i first read his short stories, thanks to a very dear aunt who has always been a role model to me. She always had the habit of buying us books and i truly loved her for that.. i believe books are the best gift and i too practise gifting them now :) Also im really happy that we are visiting her in a few days time. :)

She gifted me his ""Collected short stories" which contained all 36 short stories of his till that date.. The book had to be a favourite firstly because she had gifted it to me.. secondly it was remarkable, the twist and turns he brought in his short stories.. i was so spellbound. From there began the saga of reading Jeffery Archer and i still like reading him over and over again..
Here is one of his shortest stories for you i came across from my current read "To cut along story short" titled "Death Speaks"

"There was a merchant in Bagdad who sent his servant to market to buy provisions and in a little while the servant came back, white and trembling, and said, Master, just now when I was in the market-place I was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I turned I saw it was death that jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening gesture; now, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate. I will go to Samarra and there death will not find me. The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it, and he dug his spurs in its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he went. Then the merchant went down to the market-place and he saw me standing in the crowd and he came to me and said, Why did you make a threatening gesture to my servant when you saw him this morning? That was not a threatening gesture, I said, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Bagdad for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra. "

The witch of portobello

lotus reads so many books n her book reviews are splendid.. She inspired me greatly to read new books.. I always used to pick up the books from libraries and have hardly chosen a random book from the store to read.. It was fine till now.. But recently when the parameters of time n resources are being abundantly favoured on me, i thought it was time to move a step further...

i have started frequenting Barnes and nobles bookstore near our place n have found the ambiance there really refreshing.. Few teenagers r lying down on the floor reading while some others are sitting squat legged taking down notes.. The kids have their own space n so do adults..The plush sofas are cosy and welcoming n i found there were people spending their whole day there.. It was 4 weeks back, here, that i had started reading "THE WITCH OF PORTOBELLO" However that time i cudn't finish it and luckily i got it from the library on request..

Being a Paulo Coelho fan, i had badly wanted to read that book.. The Alchemist has completely swept me over n somehow i started to believe in the lessons for soul and in spirituality.. What he says seems to make sense to me..

The same holds true about The witch of portobello too..(However The alchemist still tops as my favourite :) ) Based on the current day lives in London/Dubai n Romania, the story binds the contemporary and spiritual lives of a young woman..She is Sherine Khalil who loves to call herself as Athena, a normal young girl who has great determination to live a useful worthy life.. The beauty of the book is that it is a first person narration of the many people who closely knew the protagonist, who now is dead.. The author speaks about the female form of god and this time around love plays a central role in his plot..So does the part of a guru/teacher.

I feel he is an author of great calibre and has the power to take u to a next level..It is like picturing the story from an invisible fourth dimension plane.It sure is deep and thought provoking and not all of u may like it much.. Philosophy is illustrated with simple facts but at times the goin may get a little too tough.. However a good read for anyone who likes a little spirituality/philosophy.