scratching an itch

“Chloe” was a good movie except for the fact that the ending was slightly weird. I get the fact that Chloe invented the elaborate story of David (Liam Neeson) cheating on her just so she could get close to his wife Catherine (Julianne Moore). And when Catherine threw her away after their one night stand, she just couldn’t accept it and so had sex with Catherine’s son coz he reminded Chloe of Catherine. But what was the bit after that? When Catherine has a confrontation with her, and Chloe pricks herself with that hair and then tries to prick Catherine, and then the kiss and Catherine pushes Chloe towards the window, and the window shatters and Chloe allows herself to fall … I didn’t really get that. 

I had an inkling of an idea that Chloe was probably making up the stories so she could get close to Catherine. But I didn’t know what to expect when Chloe turned up at Catherine’s home (towards the end) to have sex with Michael (Catherine’s son). At that moment I wondered whether this movie was going to turn into something like “Obsessed” (maybe Chloe kills Catherine with the hairpin and then commits suicide?! This thought was strengthened when Chloe tries to prick Catherine with the hairpin), but it didn’t, and instead had this ending which I didn’t understand. 

Overall, “Chloe” is a good slow movie. Worth a watch, but probably not now that you’ve read this post and know the twist in the end. ;-) The score sounds good, must check it out. The girl who plays Chloe - Amanda Seyfried - is good. She’s got this cute nad vulnerable look, and at the same time can easily switch to a “don’t mess with me” look. I think its her eyes that do the trick. 

Caught a glimpse of “The Expendables” trailer yesterday. Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, together, in one movie? Wow! The kid in me skipped a heart beat …

This one’s a must watch. I grew up watching the action movies of Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger. 8-) 

Heh, this is funny: Google’s joint policy proposal for an Open Internet.

I am not aware of the background (coz I don’t follow the net neutrality news much) but what I understand from this proposal is that Google and Verizon are saying the *wired* Internet must be open and nondiscriminatory (which is a Good Thing), but that these rules do not apply to the *wireless* space (which is NOT a Good Thing).

Its sort of obvious why the latter is a good thing for Google though. Their primary are of interest is the wireless Internet (via the Android OS on mobile phones and tablets, the Chrome OS that will soon be there on net-books, etc) and by leaving it open for discrimination, they can do whatever they please there. Wired Internet is dying anyways; even in a country like Oman (where I live), our new ISP offers wireless Internet coz its so much so easier to get up and running (no need to lay cables all the way to end users etc). 

Yesterday I setup email on my iPod Touch but not Exchange sync and so far battery life has been excellent. So it looks like Exchange sync on the iOS 4 on a 3G device is what causes battery drain… Unless I am missing out on some setting with sync that can reduce the drain.

This is definitely not going to help my Google rankings. I changed the domain name of this blog once again. The blog began at rakhesh.com, then a month or two ago I moved it to ra.khe.sh, and now it’s back at rakhesh.com. And I’ve put a landing page at ra.khe.sh pointing to this blog and another.

Before I forget, must mention that I happened to watch “Once Upon a Time in Mumbai” this weekend. I had heard it’s a good movie. My brother said so, and so did multiple reviews all over the Internet. I guess all these people saw something different to what I did. 

“Once Upon a Time” is good, no doubts about that. But I wonder what the point to the whole movie is? Is it to chronicle the rise of a real life Don? I don’t think so, coz checking the Wikipedia page of such real life Don seems to give a different story. The movie gives the impression that its based on real life events (even though the disclaimer at the beginning does away with it). The name of the movie suggests so, and even when the movie ends, it does so with a message that this is the story of the great betrayal behind the myth (or something like that; whose myth, I wonder?!). 

So - considering this movie to be a piece of fiction - I don’t see what the movie makers were trying to convey. Ajay Devgn’s character seem to be a good bad guy. Doing all the bad stuff, but for the right reasons. He was against smuggling goods banned by his conscience, for instance. He loved his girlfriend, even married her when he came to know that she’s dying. He was a believer of friendship and peace. And oh, he saved a train from derailing at quite a bit of risk to his own life. And yet in the end he’s killed. By one of his own men - a selfish jerk whose only purpose in life was to become the #1 Don, who didn’t care much for his girlfriend or friends, who would happily smuggle drugs etc to make a quick buck. Since this movie is a piece of fiction, couldn’t the creators at least do something to ensure the good guy doesn’t get knocked off? I wouldn’t mind if the bullet just grazed Ajay Devgn’s shoulder, so he escapes, and then there’s a gang-war that erupts. At least that would have been better than him getting killed! 

Ajay Devgn did a good job. The change of name and marriage to Kajol has had the stars shining upon him. His eyes were expressive in the past too, but now many people have started noticing them. That’s good. He looked all tough and the part of a kind Don. Good good. 

Emraan Hashmi irritated me. Which is probably indicative of good acting, coz his character should irritate the viewers I guess? Or maybe I was irritated coz I didn’t find his acting that believable - I don’t know. I felt happier with the movie when he was off the screen than on it. 

I guess what irritated me about Hashmi, and the movie in general, is that it wasn’t convincing. Hashmi’s motives didn’t seem convincing enough. And the reason behind him deciding to kill Devgn - the great slap! - wasn’t strong either. (Speaking of which, I understand that the Devgn character left the Hashmi character in charge and went to Delhi. But when the Hashmi character started doing all the wrong things, couldn’t someone just call up Devgn and tell him so? Surely he wouldn’t be pissed at that. And surely phones were around in those times? If only someone had done that, this slap and the subsequent death could have been avoided!). 

The only thing I really loved about this movie was the background music. But that’s Blackstrobe’s “I’m A Man”, and if you want to see another movie where this music is used, and where the movie itself is good, check out Guy Ritchie’s “Rock’n’Rolla”.  

I changed the theme of this blog from the nice “Postage” theme to “Stirred”, and changed its background and link colors. I have no idea why I did it. I got bored of “Postage”, and I couldn’t find any better looking themes, so I switched to “Stirred”. And to make matters worse, I am feeling “dark” and so painted the theme too dark.

Apologies to any readers who suffer eye damage due to this atrocity on my part. 

UPDATE: Have now changed the theme to something more pleasant.