Vedam

Lead actors: Allu Arjun, Manoj Manchu, Anushka Shetty, Manoj Bajpai, Lekha Washington, Deeksha Seth, Saranya

Watched the movie almost two weeks back and missed the first half hour of the movie. Yet, here goes!

Vedam tracks 5 stories to give the audience a simple a message; that the greatest ‘vedam’ is nothing but to live and let live. The 5 stories sometimes seem like a stark contrast to each other, and sometimes complement each other. The biggest disappointment though is that the message (what I wrote above) isn’t lucidly shown in the movie.

I just caught that line from a song from the movie and somehow it went deep into my head and I watched the movie from that perspective and felt that the movie wanted to convey the same. I don’t know why I gave so much importance to that line, it wasn’t exactly highlighted, and maybe the point I got wasn't what the director wanted to convey!

Well, if that is the point or IF there is any other point, then the movie does a pretty lousy job at conveying it. Those who didn’t notice that line will find the movie to be a hotch-potch of stories with nothing much in common except the very clichéd climax.

Coming to the story, Allu Arjun plays a guy who dreams of bungalows but lives in a slum. He has this uber-rich girlfriend (Deeksha Seth) who thinks he is the same (this guy manages the show that way) and plans to introduce him to her mom at a party. But…the ticket to the party costs about 30K for 2! So what does our hero do? He decides to steal to make the money!

Manoj Manchu and his rock band have to head to Bangalore for a concert – their biggest break ever. They miss their flight and hence decide to go by car. After a crazy attempt to overtake a lorry who’s driver mocks him, they end-up with a flat tyre. This guy is left with a girl from the band (Lekha Washington) while the others set off to get the tyre repaired. A bunch of people soon show up and force them to marry or tie a rakhi. This guy gets into a fight with them and is almost killed…

Manoj Bajpai is a Muslim (that needs to be explicitly mentioned for the story) who loses his to-be-born child when he gets into a brawl with a Hindu procession. He then decides to fly away to another country to run away from the place which caused tragedy in his life, but the police land at his door a day before his departure and arrest him and his nephews on the grounds that they are terrorists. Well, he isn’t! So he protests, but to no avail…

A poor farmer sells off his kidney to pay some dues. Now this guy suggests the same thing to his niece (Saranya) to release her son from bondage labor and get him educated. There two naïve people are told to lie that they are related to the kidney recipient, but they screw it up and are kicked out….but these people NEED the money.

Anushka Shetty plays the role of a prostitute who escapes from the place along with a transvestite. But they both keep landing in trouble and when escaping from a place the transvestite is stabbed!

Well, after a lot of twists and turns in the plot, the 5 tracks end up at a hospital! And the hospital is attacked by terrorists!

I liked the 5 stories and each was given its own importance. Many are of the opinion that the Anushka Shetty role was completely unnecessary, but I think it was included to convey that transvestites are humans too. I appreciate the fact that Allu Arjun, Manchu Manoj, Anushka Shetty agreed to play those roles and shared the stage with the others.

The 5 stories start off brilliantly. The Allu Arjun and the kidney-transplant plots were the best. I felt that the other 3 tracks lost their steam somewhere in all those twists and turns. The climax is, as I said, clichéd, fails to impress and hardly has an impact.

Well, atleast they tried something different and innovative, I would love to see more such (and better) movies in Telugu.

Verdict: A good one, better than most of the movies these days. Should be watched for its uniqueness

Rating: 3/5

The Matrix Trilogy

The Matrix

Mr. Anderson (Keanu Reeves) lives a pretty ordinary life except that he is a hacker (by the name of ‘Neo’) and is curious to know what ‘The Matrix’ is. Enter Trinity and Morpheus, and THE TRUTH is revealed to him.

Here’s the truth…

******Warning: Spoilers ahead******

The world Mr. Anderson grew up and lives in is FAKE. The people and places and even the year he thinks it is – all are fake, it was all an illusion created by ‘The Matrix’.

After the creation of AI by mankind, machines grew powerful and soon there was a war between man and machine. The machines ran on solar power, so humans created impenetrable black clouds to cut off the power-supply for the machines.

And what did the machines do? They overpowered humans, plugged them into towers and used the body heat generated as power!!! Humans are now not born, but ‘grown’ in farms!

And….‘The Matrix’ is a set of programs that create the illusion of a real world to all those plugged in – to keep them in control!

So, Mr. Anderson aka Neo wakes up from the illusion and finds himself in some gooey liquid and plugged into the tower and is astonished to find hundreds of rows of such plugged in humans in hundreds of towers!!!

My reaction at this point: I was dumbfounded; kinda short of fainting with astonishment and simultaneously could not help but worship the writers of this story, WHAT AN IDEA! Oh my! The best scene ever! The best concept ever! (Hope, really hope it isn’t copied from somewhere).

Neo is rescued from the matrix by Morpheus and Trinity and he is trained for combat by loading programs into his head as well as learning how the rules of the matrix can be broken/ bent in the illusionary world, coz they have to defeat and avoid being killed by ‘the agents’ – programs to eliminate such people in the Matrix…the deadliest of whom/ which is Mr. Smith.

Morpheus believes that Neo is ‘The One’ – who supposedly will destroy The Matrix and grant freedom to mankind, as ‘The Oracle’ prophesizes so. ‘The Oracle’ is a sweet old lady who can foresee the future…or so they think…

Is Neo really ‘The One’?

The Matrix Reloaded

Neo has learnt the tricks of the Matrix and is now hard to catch/ beat.

But…

Neo is repeatedly haunted by a nightmare - which he fears will come true, and danger is close as a swarm of sentinels (machines that search for and kill any free human being they find) is fast approaching Zion, keen to destroy the entire city.

(‘Zion’, built near the Earth’s core, is the only free-human city left. This city is just mentioned but not shown in the first movie.)

The only way Neo can stop this is to reach The Source, but first he has to find ‘The Keymaker’…who is in the hands of ‘The Merovingian’ - a distasteful, arrogant, uncooperative idiot (as you will discover while watching the movie)

Will Neo get to The Source? What is at The Source? Will Neo’s nightmare come true? What is the fate of Zion and mankind? :-O

More of the truth is revealed and this time it extends far…beyond anyone’s, even Morpheus’s imagination…

(:D just a tiny attempt to rouse curiosity in those who didn't watch the movie :D :D :D )

The Matrix Revolutions

Is Neo ‘The One’? If he is, Mr. Smith is his exact opposite.

The Oracle says ‘The power of The One extends beyond The Matrix’…

Neo and co. are pondering over the consequences of the decision Neo took at the end of The Matrix Reloaded…

Mr. Smith is cloning himself like crazy…

Zion is preparing for war…

The Oracle has played all her cards…

The Sentinels attack Zion; Zion puts up a good fight and just when Zion is about to heave a sigh of relief, scores of sentinels loom over Zion eliminating any hope of winning the war. The only thing that can save them is a miracle.

Movie Analysis:

The Matrix was released in 1999…and I watched it in 2010…before I cursed myself for not watching this movie then, I realized what my age was in 1999 and forgave myself :P. Somehow this movie was never telecast on TV; at least in the recent past, and I never found the movie’s CD/ DVD :(

Guess what I see in the library on the day I take the membership…!

Good that I watched all three movies at once… wonder how those who watched the movie in 1999 contained their curiosity till 2003! (The sequels were released then.)

A LOT of thought has gone into making this trilogy and a dunderhead like me had to see it twice to get it into my head. Things are not so obvious and direct in these movies. The meaning of each scene/ dialogue is so deep, I don't think I figured them all out yet.

The Oracle, I feel, is the main character in this story, not Neo…it is she who contols the main characters, and her prophesies are just to set them into action and bring out the results that SHE wants. She tells each one what they need to know, not necessarily the future or the truth.

Agent Smith is another fascinating character. He can give you the jitters just with his sly looks and mean, sarcastic tone. I love the way he says 'Mr. Anderson' :D

Morpheus is portrayed as this demi-god who knows the truth in The Matrix, but his importance is reduced and he is overshadowed by Neo in the sequels. I felt he should've been given more importance and the character should've been better sketched in the sequels.

Trinity - I agree with her character and the amount of importance given to it. She fits just right in the trilogy.

The Matrix is the best of the trilogy. The sequels continue the story fascinatingly but somehow the awe factor drops a little.

The graphics in the movie are mind-blowing. They did not look even 1% fake/ animated and perfectly complemented the screenplay.

The stunts and action sequences are amazing. I personally hate fights and action sequences, but there were instances where I re-watched some action sequences from this trilogy. I especially liked the chasing-fight sequence with The Twins in The Matrix Reloaded and the final fight with Mr. Smith in The Matrix Revolutions.

This movie is a masterpiece. It makes James Cameron's and Steven Spielberg's movies look like Cartoon Network stuff.

Verdict: Awesome movie! Watch it right away!

Rating: 4.5/5