What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993)

Leonardo DiCaprio is a born artist! At the age of 19, his performance as the mentally ill Arnie Grape is truly astounding.  Rarely do supporting roles translate themselves as main roles during the course of a movie and Leonardo does it with such charisma.

What’s Eating Gilbert Grape is a laid-back family drama happening in a small town where the lull of waving fields and full view of the sunset prevail more than the buzz and flamboyance of concrete. Gilbert Grape, played by Johnny Depp in a consciously subdued fashion, dithers on the borderline between what he wants to do and what he has to do. It’s about his mildly dysfunctional family and what lies within. It’s about Gilbert's love for a free-spirited nomadic woman. It’s about the lost pride of his obese mother who wouldn’t take one step out of the house. It’s about the hyperactive Arnie who loves to climb on the branch of a tree and hear his brother call, “Where’s Arnie?” In the scene towards the end where Arnie tries to wake his mother, you will realize how behavioral acting could instantly transcend all preset virtues of film-making.

Thank you, Harris!

How do you that? Sometimes, you just hit the sweetest notes, don’t you? Your musical career is just over 10 years old and may even be shortened in future by rising criticisms on constant mishmash of your old tunes or strong derivations of Rahman’s songs or bad selection of movies. Maybe you are not the best in business; maybe you are not as prolific as your predecessors and competitors. But every time, I wait for your album even when the previous one disappoints overall. And it has been happening ever since I heard that enchanting album of yours, Minnale, for the first time during the lethal end of my 12^th standard. How do I forget sneaking out for a night show to watch the movie just to know how those stunning love melodies flashed on screen when I had the alarming Physics lab board exam scheduled next morning? I still recall how I waited at the doorstep of Connexions on the morning of release of Kaakha Kaakha songs while the attendants brought in the big unwrapped box of new albums. Why? Not because you are a genius or the most celebrated. It’s because you stormed in at an interesting phase of my life! And you were absolutely sensational then! I had just turned 18, you know? It was the age when I started making choices. It was when I started owning songs; making up my own collections and own playlists; argued for my favorites whenever others belittled them; boasted that they were the best in the world with no level headed approach, with no real music knowledge; with no second thoughts. Every choice was driven by ignorance and all passion. It happens in everybody’s life at one point though. Do you know that your songs thoroughly filled my college years? Those endearing melodies from Majnu, 12B, Lesa Lesa, Samurai, Thotti Jaya, Kaakha, Kaakha that I used to keep on playing in my head all the time, not missing even a single note. Some were sweet; some were dead sweet; but some simply were resonating through the soul and still are. How could you churn up such cute tunes, I often wonder. How crazy was I on “Gulmohar Malare” or on “Yaaridamum” or on “Unnale Unnale” or on "Un Siripinil" or on “Anbe en Anbe” or on “Mudhal Mazhai” or on “Ennamo Edho”?  And I am currently stalking the song “Azhage Azhage” from your latest venture Oru Kal Oru Kannadi. Splendid, I say! May you just keep pouring in such melodies because you never know – there’s always one like me waiting to relish the unbearable sweetness in them. 

We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011)

She senses it. That pale horror in a mother's face after she births her baby sets the tone for this depressingly brilliant film directed by Lynne Ramsay who, based on the book by Lionel Shriver, has created one of the most notorious villains in modern cinema - Kevin. Kevin is quite real as a brat child. He doesn't move around or jump or squeal like those silly brat kids you would typically see in movies. Kids are always objectified as these things. Things that are forever cute and bubbly. Things that yearn for kisses and hugs. For once, the cliché is broken. Kevin is not right from the beginning. He doesn't disintegrate mentally. He rather integrates all patches of evil so evident during childhood and shapes up into one invincible devil who could churn your stomach by a calm stare. The film subtly crosscuts (distinguishable by Eva's hairdo) between Eva's cold memories with her son Kevin and her present grief and overpowering sense of guilt. Tilda Swinton delivers a gut-wrenching performance as a mother who is pathetically clueless about the psyche of her young man and hence bears the conundrum in her mind long enough for it to have deepened its roots to the point of no reprieve.

The Trouble with Harry (1955)

 
Based on the novel by Jack Trevor Story, The Trouble with Harry is a rare test of tension that Hitchcock puts the viewers to through a weirdly smacking mix of death, mystery and humor. It rolls on with an intriguing plot of a dead body of a man called Harry mysteriously lying in the middle of woods and how that affects or in fact entertains a group of friendly residents from a nearby town who happen to stumble upon it.

After death, our body is just a plaything. Is that a difficult idea to deal with? Yes, if portrayed with out and out reverence and quick-witted humor. And only a filmmaker as crafty as Hitchcock could achieve a feel-good factor in a death mystery.

What’s the trouble with Harry? Is he is a stranger in the town? Why does his death have to bother a retired old Captain, who goes hunting for rabbits, and an ageing single woman whose threshold has never been crossed yet, and a single beautiful mother living with her kid who argues that tomorrow’s yesterday?

The movie begins with eye-popping shots of a quiet autumn countryside, introducing the characters with their routines and idiosyncrasies. You wish you were there sharing laid-back conversations over a light supper with those residents who are particularly fond of blueberry muffins and hot chocolate. There is something so admirable in the filmmakers of the previous generation who always captured portraits and landscapes in an inarguably aesthetic fashion. They understood expressions. They understood colors. They understood time. What could be more pleasing to the eye than watching an artist carrying his sketches walking from distance into the countryside singing a light song on love?

The Trouble with Harry is nothing short of a delectable flick that you will enjoy wide-eyed on a lazy Sunday afternoon. You will experience a rare Hitchcockian attempt to tickle your funny bone using a morbidly curious case. 

Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo (1977)

There is no bigger joy than watching movies where things are made the central characters. Herbie, as the name sounds, is one of cutest cars to have graced the silver screen. Sporting great charms with that tricolor overlaid with number 53 running across the hood and blinking oval headlights and swiveling tyres, Herbie never fails to enliven you at the sight of it. The franchise, though not exemplary in terms of themes or plots, has been quite successful in entertaining a set of audience, especially teens and kids. Being a keen watcher of Herbie movies from childhood, I would say Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo is an entertaining addition to the collection.  The film is primarily a race movie featuring a cross country rally where Herbie proves, through the course, that it could be stylish, romantic, humorous, fussy, roguish, and yet unbearably swift.  The race scenes, where Herbie gets freakish and crankier because of the stolen diamond dropped in its tank much to the frustration of Wheely the mechanic, turn out truly hilarious. With some nice locales and exaggerated race scenes, and mild humor touches and caricatures, Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo is too cute and funny to be avoided.