Ties that Blind

For the last 20 years or so a new breed of film makers have come to the fore, makers who are geeks and fans first and film makers 2^nd. We see their work all around us. Turn on the TV and watch Dexter, Battlestar Galactica, Lost, Alias, 24, Law and Order, Monk, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Turn on the movies and watch Mission Impossible 3, Clerks, Dogma, The Dark Knight, Up, Cloverfield, Star Trek, Iron Man 1 and 2, the new Incredible Hulk directed by Louis Letterrier, Lord of the Rings, Serenity, Kick Ass, Ring, Grudge.

I call them a new breed because they've been thinking about films, be it TV or Movie, in a different way. They've dumped conventional thinking into the toilet and set out to tell a more honest, a more realistic and as a result a far more interesting story. I've watched Iron Man 2 this summer in the US. The hall was packed, I was there with my girl friend, her sister and her husband. Immediately beside us and behind us were people whose average age was 40+. We LOVED the movie. All of us. Everyone clapped when the movie ended. It was complete entertainment. We were all fulfilled. So imagine my surprise when I found a lot of average reviews of the movie on the net from reputed reviewers. Even from people who I revere and adore, namely Orson Scott Card, genius science fiction writer. They all enjoyed the movie, but compared it unfavorably to Iron Man 1. They found a hundred and one flaws. The story was too convoluted, there wasn't enough characterization, tying the movie to the greater marvel universe was a distraction for the common audience bla bla bla etc. So I came back to Dhaka slightly dazed and confused. And I waited for the DVD to arrive. I had to watch the movie again. Was I so biased about superheroes that I had got the wrong impression? Was I such a bubble head that the big screen and the pop corn and the coke and loud explosions blinded me to the rotten core of the movie?

So just before the Eid vacations, I got my hands on a copy of the Iron Man 2 DVD. And I sat to watch it with my good friend and Bhoutist Gibran. And you know what? I was blown away AGAIN. This time I watched the movie in total analytic and geek fashion. We stopped the movie several times to discuss a plot point or a sequence, we rewound to watch a particular delicious actions sequence again, etc etc. And at the end of the movie I asked what Gibran thought of it. He said, “dost this is BETTER than Iron Man 1”. And I was like, “exactly!” So then we got to discussing how in hell was this movie getting lukewarm reviews. And this is the conclusion we reached.

Its all to do with this new style of film making. Its all about understated drama. From our childhood we have been brainwashed into watching grand moments in film delivered in a grand fashion with the appropriate music and stylish camera treatment, sometimes in slow motion, and the melodramatic dialogue so that there's no way in the world you miss out on the fact that THIS IS A DRAMATIC MOMENT. Now however, we have this new breed who think that if your story is interesting enough, the moment will stand out on its own. So we get a lot of fast cuts, lots of hand held camera, and sometimes no music. The dialogs between people feel like real conversations instead of theatrical dialogs which belong on Broadway. But since we have been brainwashed into thinking “when Superman saves the girl falling from the building there will be dramatic camera work, a climactic music and cheesy dialog”, we get disturbed when we don't see these things. In Iron Man 1, the first action sequence with the proper Iron Man armor in that village has no slow motion camera work, no music, no dialogs from Iron Man. That is one of the BEST superhero action sequences I have even seen. In Iron Man 2, we have two wonderful antagonists played by Micky Rourke and Sam Rockwell. They put in steller performances. No cheesy dialogs, no “you can't stop me iron man, I will rule the world” shit. And for some of us, it was too shocking I guess. Where were the stuff of blockbuster Hollywood that we were so familiar with?

So the next question was, then how come I didn't have a problem with this new style of Hollywood movies? I think its because I never liked the old Superhero movies. I mean yes I enjoyed Superman and the Tim Burton Batman, but that was more on a “beggars can't be choosers” basis. And this new style of movie making, I think that’s how I’ve been playing movies in my head for a long time. This is what I wanted to see on screen for a long time. So when I finally saw these films and TV series, for me it was like coming home. And fortunately for me, even though Iron Man 2 got lukewarm reviews, it made a hell of a lot of money. So these film makers are not going away.

It's good to be alive.

mixed feelings

What song to put in a mixed album -- something everyone will like? Or something the band wants to do right here right now? This dilemma of choice has been plaguing artists since the dawn of time. Roger Waters once said something interesting in an interview. He was talking about the early days of Pink Floyd and how people would come up to him and ask "why do you guys do such dark songs? can't you do some lighter, more fun stuff?" Waters then went on to say that what those people don't know is that the artist does not control the art. I'm talking about all good/great artists in their fields, from Van Gogh to Mozart to Rabindranath, Nazrul, to Hitchcock and Spielberg and JJ Abrams to Lep Zep, Deep Purple, Maiden, Metallica to Asimov to Satyajit Ray.

The Artist does not control the art. There's something inside the artist at that particular point in time which is a culmination and a reflection of his emotions, actions, surroundings etc. And anything the artist creates at that point will be the product of those things at that point in time. If the artist is lucky, his work will be well received.

Every time i sat down with my band Cryptic Fate for a mixed album song, the only thing we cared about was sounding different from the 12 other bands that will be in that album. "Different" is a loaded word in the world of creativity. Everyone wants to be "different", everyone is working on a "different" angle. And at the end of the day, it turns out (to your horror) you are "different" in exactly the same way 6 other bands are "different". Or you are "different" because you were creative with your tempo and tune sense. Be that as it may, being "different" became our magnum opus motivation for every mixed album song. And its worked out pretty well so far. Just recently two of our songs were released, one as a radio single (Tepantor) on Radio Foorti, and the other (Ondho) on a mixed double album called "rock 404\505". Why two songs at the same time? Well as i said, the artist does not control the art. We did the Cryptic Fate thing for the mixed album and hopefully delivered something "different" than the 29, yes TWENTY NINE other bands haha. And the Radio single? i had this poppish tune in my head that i had to get out and i don't like solo projects so i used all my cards to get my band to play the song and then Radio foorti graciously released it. So after 4 years of Silence, the Fate engine is roaring back to life. Stick around. It will be interesting.