Kabir Khan's "New York"

Well, I am no filmmaker but being an avid cinema-goer I can obviously tell that none of the characthers of the movie were appropriately established throughout. A lot of work went into making the audience feel what the torture would have been like and these scenes were well-filmed - but then that needed to be kept and flowed through the movie which was not. It was intense and that that intensity seemed to have given-in to the commercial element too much - making it a total waste!

Re: # 8 Thanks anmool. If the film provokes a discussion about why it didn't work and which of our assumptions we need to re-examine to understand the problem better, it would have served some purpose. I thought the bit about Zilgai's first testimony about what happened to him the prison (which Maya films) was very well done and perhaps the only genuinely moving part of the film. But what they did with Zilgai after that was very disappointing.

Thanks for writing this piece Anannya, as since watching this movie I have felt the urge to comment on the way this subject has been handled.

It touches the subject of a state committed atrocity rendering close to 1,200 people incapable of meaningful lives which in itself is a tragedy comparable to 9/11 and proposes a very ill-conceived solution that no accountability should be done of the matter.

When such a delicate subject is revealed, the purpose must be to alleviate some of the pain suffered by the victims by projecting to the masses the injustice/brutality so some of the feelings can be understood widely, however, Kabir Khan seems to have raised the topic and then smashed it on the ground by the inconclusive & apologetic ending.

Such a shame and waste of an invaluable subject...

Re: # 3 Thanks for reading PabloGanja. I am not "demonizing" the majority, merely pointing out how the majority maintains its power. In the film the character Roshan gives in to how the majority would like to solve the minority related issue of terrorism. He justifies state torture and avoids its consequence by envisioning a convenient world of homogeneity.

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It's a stupid movie. Not worth writing about it.

"Its problem is it wants to uphold the state that it critiques because it wants so badly to be a part of the dominant majority"

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Yeah, yeah, yeah. If it actually did that I wouldn't have a problem with it. Enough demonising 'the dominant majority'.

I disagree with some of what you found most offensive about the movie though, I thought its tacit apologia for terrorism was the most pernicious thing about it.

You know, apart from a few directors, Bollywood is so devoid of true artistry, that it is like a collective canker on the art of cinema. When the buffoons who comprise it try to take on serious issues, it is cringe-inducing. New York is one such movie.

"And the film taps into whatit imagines they want. What they want, apparently, is to be white in a white America"

++++++++

My friend, Bollywood is on the whole, with a handful of notable exceptions, a culture of stupidity. It is created by morons, without any sense of style, any sense of coherence or any sense of truth.

Its depictions of NRI life are cretinous to the point of hilarity, and invariably represent the moronic perception of life outside India by Indian filmmakers who are infantile to the point of psychosis, than the actual lived experiences of the Indian diaspora.

It is very, very difficult to take Bollywood seriously at all, when its products are a culture of the cretinous and it manifests forms of infantilism that border on the disturbing.

And yes, the movie is of a piece with all of that.