How India lost a Mozart?

I was in the 7^th grade by then.

Since my parents are into the Government services, they got transferred to Chennai.

Most of the literate parents in Chennai are (present tense since this fact holds good even today) too ambitious to “mould” their children into something of their unfulfilled ambitions. Of course, the children will have to undergo the “heating, melting and hammering” stages in this moulding process.

There were many moulding factories custom designed to these requirements, in the name of “dance class, swimming class, tennis coaching, music class...” and some strange programs no one had ever heard of before.

My parents were not that “ambitious” in moulding me, and they just let me choose what I do. However, “concerned” neighbours and their half-moulded children started looking at me like an alien species with strange contamination named “liberty”.

After a few concerned pieces of advice and valuable suggestions, my parents had no choice but at least ask if I was interested in any of these “child building factories”.

I am a lazy worm who always prefers to live close to the school, college or office. The music class was the closest to our apartment. Cool.

I decided that ‘I will let them’ mould me into a musician.

It was Vijayadashami, an auspicious day to put the children into the furnace.

Martyr Jagadeesh bravely volunteered to face the occasion. My father accompanied me.

The music class was a traditional type house, with a big garden in front of it. Barbed wires fenced the garden and the house.

There was a bunch of scared little kids, a majority of them younger than me, waiting for their turn to be admitted. It was not that easy. The child or even the parents cannot choose the category music they wish to be trained in. After examining the child’s voice and fingers, the “Guruji” would decide which mould suits best.

It was my turn. I was not asked to sing. I still wonder why. Maybe singers are born with a sacred thread across their torsos. Maybe it was evident from my face that I was not born with one.

My fingers were examined. I was wondering if the Guruji would admit only the children with clean nails. (Only after a few years, I understood that the length and volume of the fingers are very vital for most of the instruments).

The Guruji gazed at me and said “Violin”.

***

The nightmare started from the very first class.

No. You are wrong.

It has nothing to do with music.

It was a dog. Guruji’s dog.

It appeared that the animal had a ‘special consideration’ for me.

It barked at a distance. Snarled and took position while I approached the door.

Luckily for me, since the initial classes had a lot of eager participants, I was able to sneak through the crowd. I could do it better than Jason Bourne.

Over a fortnight, there were few dropouts and for some of us, the class times got shuffled.

The crowd-shield became thin and vulnerable.

The enemy could easily spot me.

I was able to make a successful passage through the “enemy lines” for a day or two since the mongrel was sleeping.

But my instincts warned me that the Armageddon was approaching.

The day came.

I was late for the class that day. I looked around for some allies. None.

The enemy was waiting for me at the gate. Enemy at the Gates.

It was a face-off. One to one.

The spirit of a man was challenged by a four-legged intruder.

I hastily made a few steps forward and froze once the dog snarled.

Its head was stooped and back raised at an angle.

It was ready to plunge.

In a lightning second, I made that brave decision.

“I won't come for the music class ever again.”

And started running back. (Since this historic run was not recorded, sluggish Usain Bolt manages to be on the record books)

This is how India lost its own Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Thousands of symphonies and sonatas are left unexplored.

New Raagas remain unsung

An irreparable loss for mankind.

The Scent of Betryal: Subramaniyapuram

Stories infused with the scent of betrayal make us so ambivalent that they provoke us to inhale more of that intoxicating scent, yet suffocate. The midnight wind swirling in our dark and empty streets smuggle that scent into our backyards whispering a thousand legends that could make the kiss of Judas, the bloody hands of Lady Macbeth and the coldness of Brutus sound like bedtime stories. Only a master storyteller can infuse the hollowness of the betrayed heart, into us. Producer-Director Sasi Kumar does that with ease.

Discovering skeletons in your closet gives more creeps than reading about a ‘ghost long long ago in a distant place’.  A betrayal story unearthed from one of our very own small towns guarantees a pulsating thriller. The movie opens with Kaasi, a released convict, being stabbed to death. The vendetta originates twenty years back in Subramaniyapuram, a semi-fictitious neighbourhood in Madurai.

The most surprising thing in this movie, at least for the modern day Tamil audience, is that there is no protagonist in the story. As the past unfolds, it is the Judas “Kaasi” who guides us into the streets of Subramaniyapuram. Though an obsolete technique, it quickly draws us into the heat and dust of the streets. The camera takes a long yet brisk walk into the past, into the plot, along with Kaasi who is rushing to meet his friends at their usual joint. From there, the movie slowly introduces the audience to the characters, and their interplay and conflicts.
Subramaniyapuram beautifully captures the 80’s timeline and projects it on the screen. The voice of Saroj Narayanswami on Radio raising and fading away as Kaasi passes a tea shop, fanatic children dancing around a Dhandora Man’s procession as he unveils the poster of a new movie coming soon to town [touring talkies], the advent of television, costumes, hair styling... all crafted to perfection. The efforts go a step further, in paying extensive attention to details like accent and body language of the characters. One can hardly explain in words how different would be the walking style of a present-day young man wearing low waist pencil-fit denim trousers, from that of the way someone in the yesteryears would have walked wearing a bell-bottom trouser. You need to see it. That’s how movies can justify their existence as an independent art form but not an extended adaptation of prose.

Tamil cinema needs to mature in exposing the true colour of blood. The colour of blood on screen has constantly been maturing in Hollywood since the time of Alfred Hitchcock. It started with tomato ketchup and into the more realistic 'dark red' colour used in No Country for Old Men. The gore here is a bloody treat that it reminds us of the slitting of a goat’s throat in an altar during village festivals. The camera is so brilliant as if we are a co-passenger witnessing the brutality.

[Spoilers!!!] The sequence where Paraman gets butchered, Kaasi walks out of the scene while the chopping, stabbing and groaning sounds fade away as he walks. Kaasi guides us into the timeline and leads us out of it. A method originating from the Citizen Kane where the camera crosses the ‘No Entry fence’ into the story, and exits at the same point. In a way, Subramaniyapuram is a complex labyrinth of snakes and ladders. Ironically, it is the snake Kaasi who leads us in and out.
All the technicians, especially the Cinematographer (S.S.Kadhir), the Editor (Raja Mohammad) and the Music Director (James Vasanthan) unleash their best, once the story becomes bloody.

Fresh flowers, incense sticks and sandalwood are used extensively in Tamil funerals. These pleasant fragrances penetrate into the gloomy atmosphere of the funeral and create a “discord effect”. The background score makes exactly the same impact. An old trick from Hollywood, where a classic symphony can create a discord effect in gore scenes. I do not appreciate the standalone quality of the soundtrack of Subramaniyapuram but its amplifying effect to the visuals. 

However ripe the harvest is, there will undoubtedly be some weeds in the paddy field. Cliched song sequences, playing too many 80’s Ilayaraja songs in the background to remind us of the timeline (yes! yes! we know this is the '80s).

Despite the flaws, Subramaniyapuram is a modern day classic in Tamil Cinema.

In the Greek mythology of ‘Pandora’s Box of Troubles’, at the beginning of mankind, there were no evils in the world. God gave a box to Pandora and asked her not to open it as it would unleash the evils (like lust, greed...) into the world. Out of curiosity, she opened the box from which all the evils dawned on mankind. As a provision for survival, as a tool to overcome these evils, God kept a remedy at the bottom of the box of evils. That gift keeps the mankind surviving... it keeps the system running... it is called ‘hope’.

After being plagued by a series of evils (the last one being Dasavatharam), new attempts like Subramaniyapuram, are trying to break these conventions and are installing ‘hope’ in the hearts of Tamil cinema audiences.