A long winding road that always leads somewhere interesting…
It’s a jungle out there…isn’t that fantastic!
Serpentine and yet completely harmless..
Star and moon gazing through a Dobsonian telescope.
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We took in the sights around Mysore a bit and then drove to Madikeri in Coorg. Less pictures from the drive this time around since TO was in a *major* snit from being denied a Choco Shot at a place we stopped to refuel ourselves and get some caffeine. Apparently if you deny a child his chocolate, the world explodes in lava and misery and there’s no kernel of joy and hope left anywhere. *rolls eyes*
Take a look at the grandeur of the Mysuru Royal Palace.
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After spending a fairly cozy night in Bangalore ( I have to remind myself to say Bengaluru; it doesn’t come easy) we started out for Mysore this morning and the road was fantastic! While Google was showing us a shorter option, Red did his due diligence and found a route that was slightly longer but the roads were FAB!
National Highway 75 Most of us, me included, usually talk about corruption in governments or wonder where our tax payer monies are going but once you start traveling by road you’ll see how beautifully the infrastructure has and is coming along across the country.
With plenty of good clean places to eat in along the way, this route is one that has fairly heavy traffic even for a Sunday but given the wide lanes, it’s no difficulty to drive here.
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Red loves to drive. The longer the distance, the better. TO luckily has his spring break starting today…and yes while it *is* a funny concept in Hyderabad where we have Hot, Wet and Cold as the primary seasons; it’s a good opportunity for us to plan getaways.
TO diving into the bag of snacks within minutes of starting from home. Our destination this time around isn’t Goa. Not yet anyhow, although with us you never know. We just might get a hankering for the pristine beaches of Varca and end up driving there impromptu. Anyhoo…Coorg is where we’re headed in a few days with pitstops at Bangalore and Mysore. Or Bengaluru and Mysuru to be more precise.
We drove leisurely enough, packed to the gills with snacks, comfy clothes and just took in the scenery of hills and undulating plains which merged into flat ones within the blink of an eye.
With stops at good, clean places for breakfast and lunch and being pleasantly surprised at the quality of service, food and overall lack of rusticness, the first leg of the trip’s been just dandy so far. Stay tuned for more from the travel diaries. Ta!
A few snaps from the car along the way…Kurnool, Gooty, Penukonda. -
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When one goes to watch a Sanjay Leela Bhansali (SLB) movie, one goes expecting theatricality but one also expects a narrative that is interesting. I have watched quite a few of SLB’s movies that I’ve had differing reactions to; boredom hadn’t featured in them till date. While the sets are of a particular type, the lights and cinematography done in a particular manner, the acting is usually engrossing. It all fell flat for me today. Even more so because the trailer gives off a vibe of an engaging narrative which the movie fails to build up let alone sustain. Gangubai Kathiawadi could have been so much more. Could have. But it wasn’t.
Let’s start with the positives- the topic. It is the only thing that gets slotted into this category. And yet, it didn’t get the treatment it deserved. It could have been a gritty movie. Made well, with angsty characters and the pain of their suffering, frustration and betrayal underlying the phoenix-like rise of a woman scorned in the infamous red light area of Mumbai.
Moving onto the less than positives: the choice of Alia Bhatt baffles me. While Alia is a good actor and emotes well (Highway etc), this particular character was not something she was cut out for. The pain and the utter fall into degradation and despair is touched upon so glancingly by her that it doesn’t even seem like Gangubai suffered the agonies and indignities that she did in real life.
The music falls flat as well and there’s hardly any chemistry between the actors- whether it’s hatred for the madam that made her into who she became, the old lover who betrayed her or even the new one with whom she’s taken up- they all seem to be going through the motions of acting in a movie without becoming the characters. And that’s the tragedy of a dramatic movie like this; when it fails to live upto its potential and when everyone in it is so obviously acting and that too, not well.
A movie of this type needs to be brutal without necessarily having gratuitous violence and profanity. It needs to be able to show angst and pain without just showing teary-eyed heroines. It needs to show the underbelly of a place which clearly keeps its own rules of justice. But it does none of these things.
I left because I got bored and maybe I should’ve sat through at least more of the footage where Vijay Raaz gets to be on the screen because he’s always quite engrossing but I just didn’t want to. While the critics may be lauding the characterisation and enactment of Gangubai Kathiawadi to the skies, this is just one movie I’ll give a hard NO to. Go watch Spiderman instead. Way better ROI anyday!
