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Baharen Phir Bhi Aayengi
Tanuja in Baharen Phir Bhi AayengiBaharen Phir Bhi Aayengi (Spring always comes again, 1966) feels a bit like the swan song it is. The movie was the final production of Guru Dutt Films, and Dutt...
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Haydn's operas
The operas of Joseph Haydn are far less well known today than those of his older contemporary Gluck and his younger contemporary Mozart. No Haydn opera has ever been performed on the main stages of New...
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Bimal Roy's Parineeta
Bimal Roy's Parineeta (The Married Woman, 1953) is based on a 1914 novel by Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay (or Chatterji, as the film's titles have it), who also wrote Devdas. And there are some striking...
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Orhan Pamuk
Still from Orhan Pamuk: My Istanbul (Günther Schilhan, dir.; 2008)A man seeks a beautiful and mysterious woman through the streets, squares, cafes and apartments of a city that is simultaneously...
View ArticleGangnam Style in alternate worlds: Duncan Watts' Everything is Obvious
Stanford University Gangnam Style flash mobI first heard about PSY's "Gangnam Style" video in mid-summer, although I didn't get around to actually watching it until a couple of weeks ago. Throughout...
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Six favorite songs from Yash Chopra films
Yash Chopra, 1932-2012 (Carl Court/AFP/Getty Images)I was greatly saddened to hear of the death of Yash Chopra on October 21. Although I'm not an uncritical fan of every Yash Chopra film—see my posts...
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Nick Hornby's "Stuff I've Been Reading"
Every time I pick up a Nick Hornby book I'm reminded how pleasurable it is to read him. His style is straightforward and unpretentious, he's disarming in his willingness to say what he thinks, even if...
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Cross-cultural comedy: Outsourced and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
Late to the party, as ever, my partner and I watched Outsourced (2006) last night, and thought it was pretty delightful. Todd (Josh Hamilton), a Seattle call-center manager, discovers that the jobs of...
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Jeffrey Eugenides: The Marriage Plot
In Who Cares if Tanu Weds Manu?: The New Bollywood Romantic Comedy I asked, "in a modern world where everyone can choose (and change) their romantic and sexual partners at will, where class and caste...
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Favorites of 2012: Bollywood and Bengal
Meena Kumari as Lalita in Bimal Roy's Parineeta (The Married Woman, 1953)This wasn't a great year for our Bollywood viewing. Films first seen this year included:Anamika (The Nameless Girl, 1973): a...
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Favorites of 2012: Movies
Here are my favorite (non-Indian) movies first seen in the past twelve months; for Indian films, see Favorites of 2012: Bollywood and Bengal.Mysteries of Lisbon (Mistérios de Lisboa, 2010): Chilean...
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Favorites of 2012: Television
Francesca Annis in LillieMost of our favorite television series of 2011—among them Daniel Deronda, The Barchester Chronicles, Cranford, and Desperate Romantics—were set in the high Victorian Era of the...
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Favorites of 2012: Music
For me 2012 was The Year of Haydn. In Haydn Chamber Music I wrote, "For many years I resisted the appeal of Joseph Haydn's music. It seemed too clever to be profound, too pleasant to be emotionally...
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Favorites of 2012: Books
NonfictionDaniel Kahneman: Thinking, Fast and Slow (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2011). There are two modes of thought that we each employ: we use the fast "System 1" for things like emotional...
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Kahaani
The performances in Kahaani (Tale, 2012)—especially those of Vidya Balan as Vidya Bagchi, a very pregnant woman seeking her missing husband, and Parambrata Chatterjee as Inspector Rana, a Kolkata cop...
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Les Troyens
Who can describe the havoc of that night?Who can tell its deeds of death? Who can with tearsEqual in sorrow its calamities?Our ancient and imperial city falls. All around, on streets, in homes, at...
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Barfi!
I had no intention of seeing Barfi!. The "whimsical" trailers were insufferable, I'm generally allergic to movies with an exclamation point in the title, and the film's premise—deaf boy (Ranbir...
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How do you solve a problem like Maria Stuarda?
Mary Stuart, ca. 1578The background: Mary Stuart was indeed a problem. The Queen of Scots never stopped plotting to become Queen of England. The younger cousin of Queen Elizabeth I, Mary throughout her...
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English Vinglish
English Vinglish (2012) is a very welcome return to the screen for Sridevi. She plays Shashi, a traditional mother and wife who finds herself becoming gradually estranged from her family. Her husband...
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Today's Special
Blockbuster films belong to everyone, which is another way of saying that they belong to no one. This isn't to say that it's impossible to ascribe personal meaning to films that are designed to be...
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