The role of dice

I recently watched Woody Allen’s ‘Match Point’ – a great thriller about how a person is moved to kill his mistress when she threatens to divulge their affair to his wife. Other than its taut storyline and intelligent screenplay, what I found most interesting about the movie is its philosophical exploration of the role luck plays in our lives. The movie begins with Chris, the main character, narrating:

“The man who said "I'd rather be lucky than good" saw deeply into life. People are afraid to face how great a part of life is dependent on luck. It's scary to think so much is out of one's control. There are moments in a match when the ball hits the top of the net, and for a split second, it can either go forward or fall back. With a little luck, it goes forward, and you win. Or maybe it doesn't, and you lose.”

I agree with Chris there. The intervention of chance in our lives is not limited to big, obvious occurrences like winning a jackpot, or being in a road accident. If we look deeply enough, a lot of our successes have to do with being at the right place at the right time. Or meeting the right person.

Less obviously, what Warren Buffet calls ‘Ovarian Lottery’ plays a much bigger role. Some of us are fortunate enough to be born with above average intelligence, among parents who were inclined to, and could afford to prioritize education. We happen to be born in a country that was politically stable. If I were born with below average IQ, or worse, with a genetic disease, I would have stood very little chance. If one is born in a village in a poor, strife-torn African nation, it is impossible to escape poverty and a life of misery.

Given how vulnerable is a happy life to chance events, I agree with another quote from the movie, which says, "To never have been born may be the greatest boon of all."

Nostalgia

Nostalgia is a curious phenomenon. It somehow elevates mundane past events into fond memories.

Chennai was my home for seven years. In the last few days of my stay in Chennai, even the routine, day-to-day stuff was filled with a twinge of sadness – the regular drive to my daughter’s school, going to Nilgiri’s to buy grocery, taking an evening walk in our apartment complex. When I was dropping off my maid to the Egmore station on the last day, I even felt sad that I’m not going to hear these Tamil announcements in the railway station in near future. Never thought I was going to miss that!

Can it be true that our childhood was not as idyllic as we make it out to be now? With many years in between, may be our memory has glorified mundane events into sweet memories, and erased unhappy ones?

Bengal: A strange place - Part I

Recently, I relocated to Calcutta. While I’m happy to be closer to my parents, my roots – culturally, I find the place to be quite alien.

Nowhere is it more apparent than when you step into a shop to buy something. There is no concept of customer service. Indeed, there is no commercial orientation altogether. That does not mean shopkeepers are altruistic and want to give you things for free. They do not want to sell things to you at all. They are irritated if you ask questions about a product. The length of their yawns are often more than duration of your patience. Their mobile conversations seem to stretch longer when they have a customer at their doorstep. And of course, afternoon siesta is of paramount importance – doing business, making profit, earning a livelihood – everything else is secondary.

And of course, the issue of change (Khuchro, chutta) dominates commercial transactions. In most places, if you cannot produce the exact change, they will refuse to sell you things. If you produce a 100 Rs note after buying something of, say 76 Rs, - they may say you should have warned them in advance that you do not have change, in that case, they would not have given you the product. Suppliers are more worried about accumulating change, than selling their products. I wonder whether there is a business model possible – where you sell ‘change’ (Khuchro) for a premium – say you give small change for 90 Rs in exchange of a 100 Rs note, and pocket 10 Rs. Such a business model would work in West Bengal.

In retrospect, the obsession with small change is not surprising. After all, big money has eluded Bengal.

My favourite directors

In movies as well as literature, there are some people whose works resonate with us more at a personal level, often more than the bigger and more celebrated names. It may be due to a number of reasons – we may find their style easy to access, or their message close to our heart. Or we can identify with the characters they create, given our personal experience. For such an author or director, you cannot just have enough of them – you savour their latest work, and eagerly wait for the next one. In movies, there are some directors whose work I particularly like, and always look forward to watching more of their films:

Spike lee: He is really my top favourite. His movies transport you briefly to a different world. You identify with the characters, you empathize with their situations, you enjoy their conversations. At the end of the movie you feel you know the characters like you know your close friends. Even though you may not have like all of them, you always understand them. I would recommend everybody to watch ‘Do the right thing’ – which is really the finest movie he directed. However, ‘25^th hour’ and ‘Malcolm X’ are not to be missed as well.

Larry clark: I loved his ‘Kids’ and ‘Bully’. His portrayal of teenagers who have somehow failed to find any meaning to life – and sunk into the abyss of drug, sex and animal gratification – is so real that it is frightening. There is always a lot of sex in his movies – but given the bleak story, you are unlikely to enjoy those scenes.

Oliver Hirschbiegel: The German director who gave us ‘Downfall’ – a grim portrayal of Hitler’s last few days at the bunker, and ‘The Experiment’ – a movie which encompasses many genres at once – thriller, documentary, philosophy.

Robert Mulligan: I have a personal reason for liking his movies. Two of his best movies – ‘To kill a mockingbird’ and ‘The man in the moon’ – are set in a small town. Small towns have their own charm, and idiosyncrasies – most people know each other, people drop by your house without prior announcement, life moves at a tranquil pace. If something happens that is out of the ordinary (an accident, or a scandal), the entire town would be abuzz with discussion, opinions and gossip. With my childhood in a similar small town – I felt quite nostalgic watching those movies.

David Cronenberg: I do not normally like thrillers with their routine shootings, fights and chases – but I sat absolutely riveted when I watched ‘Eastern Promises’, and ‘A history of Violence’ – movies that contain quite a few of those elements. These are the two most recent movies he directed in his 40 year long career. He is 66, and at his best now. I eagerly await his next release.

Sam Mendes: His ‘Revolutionary road’ was overlooked for Oscar last year, but I thought it was much better than the likes of Slumdog and Benjamin Button. Roger Ebert wrote “This film is so good it is devastating.” His ‘American beauty’ is milder in comparison, but also explores similar issues of existential crisis and loneliness.

Jill Sprecher: He directed two little known gems – ‘Thirteen conversations about one thing’, and ‘Clockwatchers’. In ‘Thirteen conversations…’, he explores some of my favourite themes – life’s unfairness and unpredictability, and how fragile our happiness is in the face of chance events.

This is just a partial list – hope to add to this post soon. Specifically, we cannot forget Indian directors like Mira Nair, Vishal Bharadwaj or Raj Kumar Hirani!