One of the plays i had written --- Ramgarh ka bhola kunwara hi reh gaya.

The stage is empty and a voice in the background is playing.

Bhola: mujhe kya ho gaya hai. Mujhe aisa ajeeb sa kyu feel ho rha hai. Samajah main nai aa rha ki kya karu. Main kisi bhi cheez main concentrate nai kar pa rha hu. Jaise ki ye car, jo mujhe pta hai ki mere samne se aa rahi hai. Oh crap!!!!

This is followed by sound of an accident. The stage lits up and there is bhola is standing in there. He wonders around a bit, then he sees someone who looks to be a guard walking by.

Guard: how are you.. I mean who are you?

Bhola: main bhola, abhi to whaa tha? Yaha kaise aa gaya. Ye konsi jagah hai.

Guard: this is swarg, I mean ye heaven hai. But yaha to direct entry nai milti. Admit kard dikhao n andar aa jao. Warna main n mera danda aksar ye bate karte hai, tum hote to aisa hota, tum hote to wasie hota.

Guard 2: are ruko! Ye yaha ka hi hai. Galti se gate ke bahar land ho gaya. Jab se recession start hua hai, landing software bhi sub-standard ban rahe hai. Ise aane do.

Bhola: par main swarg main kasie. Main to abhi bohot hi young hu. I can not be dead?

At this moment a Archimedes enters the stage.

Archimedes: eureka!!

Bhola: aap kon ho.

Archimedes: Bête us jamane main acche blade nai they.isliye shave nai karte they bt ab to hai. Jab se shave kiya hai log pehchante hi nai.

Gurad2: are ye Archimedes hai.

Bhola: par inhone to kapde pehne hua hai.

Archimedes: had ho gyi yar. Ek time galti se mistake kya hui tum logo ne issue bana diya yar.

Bhola: sorry but aap apne aapko issue bana rahe ho. You are stealing my thunder. Here am the topic. Main mar nai sakta. Meri umar hi kya hai. Yar shadi bhi nai hui. Abhi to mili thi.

Archimedes, guard, guard1: Kon?

bhola points a finger and says

bhola: wo.

Everyone freezes and titli comes in the stage (“La Vie En Rose” starts playing) bhola joins for a bit

As she goes away, everyone unfreezes.

Archimedes: oh! She’s good. Gf hai?

Bhola: nai abhi nai. Maine try kiya tha bt nai mani. Ab kya karu. Ab to phir se try karna bhi impossible hai.

Archimedes: OK its decided. Hence proved!!!

Guard: kya hua?

Archimedes: maine decied kar liya hai main iski help karunga. Main ise is ladki se zarur milwaunga. Maine apni life main kabhi aisa nai kiya, But main ye iske sath nai hone dunga.

Guard1: par aap ye karoge kaise?

Archimedes: main help mangunga, I’ll call Newton, Einstein, Galileo.

Bhola: kya sach main ye sab meri madad karenge?

Guard: aap majak kar rahe ho? Wo log nai aayenge. Wo kabhi bhi nai aate.

Archimedes: yahi to experience kaam aata hai. Mujhe pta hai in sab ka pressure point kya hai. Tum bas dekho. Bas mujhe ek apple, ek carpenter aur ek telescope la do.

Bhola: aap in sab ka kya karenge?

Archimedes: bas dekhte raho.

Then Archimedes took a apple and threw it upwards, then suddenly Newton jumped up in the stage and caught it.

Newton: kisne ye apple feka. Kon namakool hai jo itna uncool kaam kar rha hai.

Archimedes: it’s me and I would like to thank my parents, my friends and academy….

Newton: do you think its funny?

Archimedes: yar dekho tum log apne aap main itna kho jate ho ki tumhe kuch or nai dikhta. Yaha am trying to help a guy.

Bhola: ha ye sab meri help karne ko ekagrit hue hai.

Newton: its not my prob.

Archimedes: dekh lo. Ya to sharafat se baat maan lo warna main apple fekta rahunga. yaha to free ke milte hai.

Newton: aggggagga(agitated) ok ok. Batao kya situation hai?

Archimedes: dwar rakshak inhe batao kya hua hai.

Newton goes to the side with guard1, focus is still on Archimedes.

Archimedes now tell the carpenter something in ears after which carpenter starts shouting.

Carpenter: carpenter wla carpenter, accha wala carpenter, darwazo theek karne wala carpenter.

Ye sunte hi Einstein stage pea a jata hai n jake bhola ke peeche chup ata hai.

Archimedes: are Einstein kya hua?

Einstein: ise kisne bulaya yaha. Maine strict orders diye they. I didn’t wanted any carpenter soul near me.

Archimedes: are to kya hua.

Einstein: bol to ase rah hai jasie nai pta kuch bhi.

Archimedes: are nai pta. Batao na.

Einstein: google it. N ise le ke jao.

Archimedes: ye to tabhi jayega jab you’ll agree to help us out.

Einstein: ha ha agree agree. Ab le ke jao.

Archimedes: dwar rakshak inhe batao ki kya situation hai.

Again as the guard takes Einstein to the corner to explain the focus is still on Archimedes

Archimedes now goes near Galileo

Archimedes: Galileo ji main aapke liye ek tohfa le ke aaya hu.

Galilio: mujhe nai chahiye. N chale jao yaha se.

Archimedes: are aap ek baar dekhiye to sahi.

He is shown the telescope, on seeing it he runs away from it,.

Archimedes: are kya hua?

Galileo: dur le joa ise. Mujhe nai chahiye ye. Le jao ise. Iski wajah se meri bhot watt lagi hai. Le jao ise.pls

Archimedes: as you wish. Le jaunga, but then help us out.

Galileo: tum jo kahoge wo karunga. Bt ise le jao.

Dwar rakshak inhe bata do ki ituation kya hai.

Einstein: mujhe smajah main aa gaya, ise ladki ko impress karna hai. Bt ye to tough hai. Actually I was writing a theory on it.

Archimedes: yar help karni hai bacche ki. Physics nai padana.

Galileo: dekho beta wo karo jo maine kiya tha. Kisi bhi higher post ke bande se pange le lo. Ladki tumhe bahadur samajhengi n ho gaya kaam.

Archimedes: ha sath main jail ka kahan muft muft muft!!!

Newton: are easy hai yar. Poem likh de impress ho jayegi. Jaise

“Apples, apples, what a treat,
Sweet and tart and good to eat.
Apples green and apples red,
Hang from branches overhead,
And when they ripen,
Down they drop,
So we can taste our apple crop!”

Archimedes apne sar pe hath rakh leta hai.

Archimedes: its my mistake. Maine hi galti ki. These people are so high on IQ that they have a EQ of a 9 yaer old. Tu ek kaam kar. Main jaisa bolunga waisa karna.ok

Bhola: Ok.

Archimedes:kuch universal rules hote hai jo har jagah follow hote hai. Duniya main aisi koi ladki nai hai jo impress na ho. Persinstance is the key to the success. Jis din tum use ye mehsus karwa doge ki use jyada imp tumhari life main koi nai hai .tumhara kaam ho gaya.

Bhoal: hmm

Archimedes: 2^nd stage main jab wo tumahe taraf inclined hone lage tab uski friend main interest dikhao. She’ll be so very jealeous.

Bhola: hmm..

Archimedes: third stage main jab wo gussa ho jaye tab use jakar sach bata do ki tumne aisa kyu kiya. Girls like those people who are true to them. Ye teen stage hote hi, tum dono jeevan bhar ke sathi.

Bhola: accha. Sach main. Main kya hum dono sath rahenge. Aisa kya sach main ho payega.

Archimedes: ha kyu nai.

BHola: par main ye sab try kaise karu main yaha. Wo wha. Main to mar gaya hu na. aapne mujhe kyu itne khwab dikhaye. Main to bhul gaya tha ki main swarg main hu or wow ha. Ab in sab cheezo ka kya faayda.

Einstein: ha tum bade chalak bante ho Archimedes par ye to sabse badi baaat hai jo sochne kit thi, is liye to hamesha step wise kaam karna chahiye. Or tum hame pagal kehe ho.

Archimedes: accha itna hi wiswas hai to take it as a challenge. make sure ye prithvilok main laut chahye. Hai dum ye challenge lene ka?

Einstein, Newton, Galileo: hame manzoor hai.

Everyone goes to yamlok.

Yamarj: aao mahanobhawo. Aao. Aaj yaha yamlok main kasie aana hua.

Einstein: are kcuh nai bas aise hi socha aap se mil lo. Main ek theory likh rha tha soch aap se kuch salah le lu.

Newton: yamraj tum iski baat mat sunna. Ye pagla gaya hai. Tumko to pta hi hai ki ye kaisa hai. Isne thory of relativity ko jab prove kiya tha tab total 8 logo ko samajh main aai thi. Bohoto ko to aaj bhi nai pta ki funda tha kya.

Galileo: are ye sab bacche hai yamraj. Tum meri planetary research paper pad ke dekho.

Yam1 wishpers into yamaraj’s ears

Yam1: yamarj ye budau pagal log hai. Inhone sabka funda hila diya tha prithvi lok pe. Aap samabhal ke rahna. Inhone aise hi maje maje main narad muni ko apne funde bata diye they. 19 ghante nai chora unhe. Wo to apna “narayan narayan” hi bhul gaye they. Aajakl suna hai “hare Krishna Krishna hare” karte hai

Yamraj (scraed): are ruko ruko. Main sab ki baat maan gaya. Aap sab kahi na kahi sahi ho. Mujhe maaf karo.

Einstein, Newton, Galileo: are nahi nahi. Sunie to

Yamraj: are nai yar

Einstein, Newton, Galileo: nahi pls sunae na. thoda sa hi sahi.

Scene goes of the stage

Einstein, Newton, Galileo comes laughing

Einstein: dude we really nailed him.

Newton: yo man I am felling so young again, never did anything of that sort.

Bhola: kya hau? Aap log gayethey na yumlok. Kya hua. Bataeaana.

Galileo: dude no fear when Galileo is here. Tumko permission mil gayi. Tum agle 2 ghante main ja rahe ho apni would be gf ke pas.

Bhola: kya sach main. Aap majak to nai kar rahe? Aapne yamraj ko kasie manaya?

Newton:(with a misceveous smie) hmmmm… lets say we convinced him.

Bhola: thankuuuuuuuu so much. Main tahe dil se aapka sukhriya karta hu. Really thanks.

Archimedes: are nai bhola sukhriya to mujhe tumahara ada karna chahiye tumne hame nai raah dikhayi hai. Hum yaha se dekhenge tumhe. Hamari blessings tumhare sath hai. Hume bhulna nai. N prithvi lok main bhi hamara naam bhumne nai dena.

Bhola: zarur sir, you have made my life. I’ll remember you each day.

Duniya main aa rha hu. Yipeeeeeeeeeee!!!!

goes off stage.

Again bhola appears with titli danching with her (la vie en rose playing)

Titli: bhola tum apne accident ke baad se itna badal kasie gaye. Ab to aisa feel hota hai ki tumse dur rahi to mar hi jaungi. Batao na itna drastic change. Kasie?

Bhola: (with a mischievous smile) lets say… I had to die first to be alive again.

Takes a pause n takes to her while goes of the stage

Bhola: but main keh rha tha ki hum apne bacche ko physics n astronomy acche se padayenge. You see everyone has a guarding angle. Since we have 4……

The end………

Movies are something without which i can not imagine my life. I know i am not alone. There are plenty out there who will agree with me when i say that watching movies is like meditation. It soothes the soul and refreshes, rejuvenates it. There is nothing i like more than watching a flick which challenges my acumen. If i started naming the movies i love then it would be a unfair call to my memory, cause i can't remember the name of all the movies that i loved so amazingly. Still to give an insight as of the varieties of the movie that i like then some of them are:

Memento

Notting Hill

Fight Club

Dial M For Murder

Smokin' Aces

The Girl Next Door

Up

Once

The Holiday

etc.

No surprise there? I know. How can there be? Its obvious that there are millions of other people who like them, that's obvious! They are good. Sorry, Damn GOOD!

Now coming to the main reason why i am in here is because now that i have given it a good amount of thought and researched it i can safely say why i like some movies better then other. The answer is music.

Few moments just can not get out of my head.

The climax of FIGHT CLUB when buildings fall.

The climax of SMOKIN" ACES when Ryan Reynolds pulls the plug.

First 10 minutes intro of UP.

The haunting voice of Celine Dion in TITANIC.

There are innumerable more such moments but i am tired so won't mention more, but these are the true magic moments, These are the moments when it feels that God himself came to work, everything fell into its right place.

The puzzle was solved. YIPPEE!!!!

some of the creatives that i have done.

CASE STUDY----INDIAN FILM FRATERNITY AND GLOBAL FILM AWARDS

An average Indian when asked whether he/she has heard about “Raja Harishchandra” being the first movie produced in India and “Alam Ara” being the first talkie, would reply a ‘yes’ more than 50% of the time. But very few would know that the first documented presence of movies in India was on 7th July 1897, when a silent movie which was all of 6 scenes long and a runtime of 10 minutes was shown in Mumbai (Previously Bombay).

It’s true that there wasn’t much time gap between the beginning of world cinema and its foray into India. However, the West realized the true potential of cinema as a business much faster than India. That was probably the reason why the first Academy Awards (Popularly Oscars) were given in the year 1929 in the West, compared to first Filmfare Awards in India, which were held in the year 1954. The Image of the Academy Awards has skyrocketed ever since then. The value of Filmfare awards is considered as any other marketing play to make viewers glue to the TV sets so that huge bucks can be made out of the advertisements telecast.

Also making mockery of the situation in this context are the ever growing new awards which keep coming year by year. Almost every TV channel has a set of awards associated with it and in order to make sure that seats are occupied with celebrity presence during the event, they make all kinds of efforts (which are even unethical at times).

Consider this, Shahrukh Khan, one of the biggest movie stars in India has been nominated for or has received a Filmfare each year since 1993!

Many would argue that the main reason Indian Film Industry (or Bollywood as many say) is not as successful as Hollywood is because they could not make right choice at the right time. Indian actor Dilip Kumar was offered the role in the Hollywood film “Lawrence Of Arabia“but he turned down the offer for reasons best known to him. Later the same film made the lead actor Omar Sharif a star in Hollywood, with an Oscar nomination.

Also there were talks that the movie which made Steven Spielberg the biggest director in Hollywood and a name to recon with, “close encounter of the third kind”, was in fact a liftoff from the script that Indian director Satyajit Ray was working upon. Spielberg, however, has furiously denied the allegation and Satyajit Ray never commented on the matter in his lifetime.

One of the first people who realized about west being a market which if exploited carefully could became a market almost 100 times as big as India is the famous Indian Director Subhash Ghai. He understood the true market potential when his movie “TAAL” broke into the Top 20 list in USA, later he stated:

“I am making movies for the West market, so why would I worry about the sensibility and the Rs.7 that I am getting from a cinema hall in Bihar when it’s fetching me $ 7 in USA.”

Although strategically it did make sense but what Ghai missed was that even in west a viewer is sensible enough to spend money on a movie which is good, and not what Subhash Ghai did in “Yaadein”, a film whose fate is legendary and is considered by many as an epitome of a poorly made movie.

So who decides which movie is good and which is not and how can one can realize that which movie is worth watching and which is not? The question becomes even bigger in an era where each movie, even before its launch, comes with tags like “super hit” and “blockbuster” and after release changes the tags to “running to packet houses”.

Well the answer to the big question is Movie Awards.

Here awards do not refer to Filmfare but global awards like BAFTA, OSCARS, and GOLDEN LION. It has been observed from time to time that when ever a movie is credited with prestigious awards, it creates a buzz and thanks to the sanity of the jury that most of the time the awards are given to the movie which is actually well made, irrespective of the fact whether it has big stars in it or not. The so called buzz makes headway for it to be seen by as many people as possible and if it’s really good to the senses of the audience, it is obviously earns its share of business. But there is always a catch! Not all good movies win awards and not all movies which are well made do great business. This is where west has taken the lead and is reaping the benefits. Movies which get nominated in prestigious awards are nominated by humans and not gods, so what does it take to convince “That particular set of humans”? Although it a basic necessity that the movie should be a good one at least if not an exceptional one.

The producer also should have right channels and contacts to make sure that decision makers watch it.

When after a slew of failures Sir James Matthew Barrie wrote a stage show about a boy who never grows old “Peter Pan”, he knew instantly that in order for it to be a success the grown ups need to be shown the movie from a child’s point of view. So he played a perfect marketing ploy. He brought seats himself in the auditorium and later when the show was about to begin, he filled those seats with young audiences. It was an instant success, the grown ups laughed every time the little ones did. Each of them tried to understand why a child laughs at a particular scene, and in doing so they became a kid at heart, and that is what that led to the show’s huge success.

Human mind is strange, it has happened to all of us every now and then.

But it can anyway not be denied that good movies are produced in India too. So how is it that the largest movie producing industry in the world has not won a single Oscar on its own (but only in collaborations)?

The problem lies in the fact that Indian producers, directors, actors most of them go after quantity rather than quality and in order to have a quality product one needs to invest time, which is considered a waste. It is been proved by Aamir Khan, again one of the biggest superstar in Indian film horizon. He despises the Indian Awards but still goes after the big ones at the Global level. His execution of the strategy he built for Lagaan is a perfect one and needs to be followed by all others in the fraternity. He made the film with right people, with right spirit working spirit and finally showed it to right people. He knew that winning an Oscar is a prestigious thing, but equally important was that it is seen by as many people possible world over.

“If a movie has won an Oscar, it must have deserved it”.

BBC predicted before Oscars, that if ‘Lagaan’ won the Oscar, the amount of money it would gross in the USA alone would be enough to compensate for the losses that whole Indian film industry faced that year. Now that’s something!

Now how can one say that awards does makes an impact on the mentality of the viewer? Now consider the following data of the movies and the money that they have earned before the movie won any significant award (Mostly Oscar’s).

· Since 1990, only five movie have failed to cross $ 100 USD mark (with most of them inexplicably failed to capitalize on the winning momentum as of the five movies four didn’t have a wide release)

· Life is beautiful (1998), best foreign language Oscar winner had earned $18,369,921 USD before its nomination, but earned another $ 39 Million USD after the nomination.

So it does prove that winning or in some cases even nomination makes an impact on the business that a movie does. Now as far as making a movie which is sensible and will make an impact is not easy but not impossible either. Look at the past movie which has been nominated for best foreign language film category. It will provide a clear picture that the most of the pictures which are nominated have fulfilled the certain criteria:

· They all represent the culture of their respective countries to the deep core showing values, tradition being followed their.

· All of them have showed their presence in the different movie circuits, no bad movies gets nominated.

A number of people around the world have seen Lagaan and have liked it (a single negative point which came out was the length of the movie, which later also being criticized as the major factor for its low gross worldwide minus India) and many have argued that it was a better movie then that year’s winner NO MAN’s LAND (although many would argue that it Amelie was the best one), but it’s a wide known fact that it was the same year when 9/11 happened and America was putting a NO-FIGHT stance, so they obviously voted for the movie which promotes “No fight”.

Still Lagaan do remained a landmark in terms of its efforts in made to get itself noticed by academy members.

After Lagaan, it became clear that if you have proper business acumen and a good movie in your hand you can have a nomination with right amount of exposure.

The nomination is being done by the Members of the Academy and there are selective theaters where they go to see the movie. So the catch is that you need to run your movie in those theaters again and again, but has to make sure that no one puts pressure on the people who nominates, as it can go against them in a bad way.

Next step is to show it to the people who matters, it can be found with the help of using the right channels and right contact and showing them your movie without pressurizing them. The more members you’ll show your movie to higher is the chance of it being getting nominated.

Now if we take an recent example then a very proud moment came for Indian film Industry in 2008 when a very Indian movie, although being produced by an American and directed by an British, was nominated for 10 academy awards “SLUMDOG MILLONAIRE”. This movie was very closely scrutinize by the movie freaks the world over since the news came that it was being directed by Danny Boyle, who is considered to a very good director. It remained in news for a long time due to its unconventional approach, whether is the cast which was all Indian, whether the script which was based on the novel written by Indian Diplomat Vikas Swaroop and was based on the show “Kaun Banega Crorepati?” it had all the ingredients in it to make the critics the world over interested about it. It was not all, it maintained it hype after the shooting was finished, when none of the production houses were ready to release it, there were talks that it might go straight to video like a lot of movies which are not good enough to be released in theaters. It created a buzz that it might not a good at all, at this point Fox searchlight took over the realm of the project and made sure that it had a theatrical release. Now before its wide release it played in the major film festivals to see how it is being liked and reviewed, unexpectedly the first major film festival it played in Toronto International Film Festival gave it the People's Choice Award. From there it picked up the word of mouth and it presence was felt on every site that promoted and talks about films like Rottentomatoes.com, Imdb.com etc, in all these sites which mostly works on word of mouth the ratings it received made it a curious case. People wanted to watch it, in the meantime it kept on playing on a few more circuits over all kept on winning awards. Later it played a nice strategy just in order to be eligible for the academy considerations it had a small release in US in 20 theaters or so. By the time it released their it was already being nominated for BAFTA and Golden Globes. It created a massive interest in the movie. Eventually it ended up winning 7 BAFTA, 4 Golden globes and 8 Oscars and just before its Golden Globe winnings it had a wide theatrical release in US. Up until now the movie has grossed $311,107,572 USD worldwide. The biggest movie for the year 2008 for India is Aamir Khan Starrer “Ghajini” which had an $ 30 Million USD gross worldwide (which in comparison around 10 Times lesser then Slumdog Millionair). Amazing feat for a movie which was considered to be a Indian flick and was expected not to release in Theaters. This movie truly shows the Power of Awards Functions Specially The OSCARS.

Sources used:

www.imdb.com

www.rottentomatoes.com

www.ibosnetwork.com

www.timesofindia.com