Indian movies at the Oscars, and why Mother India was banned in Turkey | #31
Also, our final panel quiz of the year š
The Malayalam cinematic masterpiece āJallikattuā has been chosen as India's official entry to the Oscars. It is so good that two non-Malayalis from IWTK went to a theater, (after being ditched by the only Malayali in the group), watched the movie without subtitles and were still blown away by its sheer awesomeness.Ā
So our newsletter this week is an ode to Indian cinema at the Oscars.
Three things that we learnt this week:
āMother Indiaā was the first Indian film to be nominated at the Oscars but lost out to Federico Fellini's Nights of Cabiria by a single vote. One of the things that Director-Producer Mehboob Khan had to do before screenings in the USA was to remove the production company logo as it had a hammer and a sickle. The film was also banned in Turkey as it was thought of as a communist film
In 1998, India for some reason decided to send the Shankar film āJeansā as its official entry. (Jeans is a pun on āgenesā as there is some twin funda in the movie). There was a lot of hype about a song that saw the crew go to all 7 wonders of the world. Interestingly the portion in Paris in front of the Eiffel Tower was delayed because of the death of Princess Diana just a few blocks away. Similarly, a stunt sequence was also shot near the Pyramids in Egypt, when a bomb blast occurred in a bus nearby. Misfortune seemed to have followed the crew. Never forget that the tagline of the move was: ā0% Cotton, 100% LOVEā
In 1965, Indiaās official entry was āGuideā, a film based on the novel by RK Narayan. But they also shot an English version titled āThe Guideā which had screenplay by Nobel Laureate Pearl S Buck. Dev Anand was impeccable with his dialogue delivery, but Waheeda Rehman had some difficulty with the language. In the end she was helped by Pearl S Buck. You can watch the film here.
Here is our ode to Jallikattu
Quiz Announcement
Lockdown might have ended but we still spend our Prime time on Netflix and on ALT things. Some of the showās we watched had a lot of hotstars.Ā
Hereās your chance to show off how much you Netflixed and chilled, by participating in our quiz on all things OTT. And we are excited by our all woman panel - hosted by Rohini Ramnathan along with Aditi Mittal and Shreemi Verma. Book your tickets by clicking on the link below! Prizes on every question, as always.
We also want to encourage all of you to spend your holiday season with loved ones after having spent many, many Sundays with us! So this will be our last panel quiz for this year!
Ā Ā Things weāre reading / watching / listening to:
Akbar - The great Mughal - A superbly written book by Ira Mukhoty on the life of Abkar. At more than 600 pages, it is well researched and thorough. Read it for an in-depth insight into one of the most pivotal time periods in Indian history.
What is love? How many roads must a man walk down before he becomes a man? How much is that doggy in the window? These are some of the most famous questions ever asked in pop music. We are reading 'Should I Stay or Should I Go?', a hilarious trip through some of the most fascinating questions asked in pop music history. Allow award-winning journalist James Ball to give you the definitive and fascinating answers to these questons.
Mr. Holland's Opus is a 1995 film that follows the life of Glenn Holland, a high-school music teacher who uses everything from Beethoven to John Lennon to teach students to love music. His one dream in life is to conduct a symphony, but it's not easy with family issues and personal issues in his school. Beautifully made with an absolutely amazing soundtrack by the genius Michael Kamen, this movie never fails to elicit goosebumps.
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Stay Safe and have a binge-y weekend
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