Che and I enjoy watching movies, of course we don’t have the same tastes but there is enough of an overlap to provide for combined entertainment. Over the years we have watched a lot of movies together, most are his selection as he does a good job of choosing movies to watch. I could count on my fingers the movies I didn’t like out of his selection.

That said, this year I’ve set myself a bit of a tall order. I want to watch a 100 movies this year. It isn’t much if you compute the year to have 52 weeks. That’s two movies a week and that should be easy. Well, here’s to hoping it is that easy. 😀

This year I’d like to watch not only the movies Che selects but also quite a few others of my choice. There’s the Sudeep Project I talked about earlier that I’d like to complete this year. I’d also like to re-watch a lot of movies I’ve seen and loved over the years. Apart from this I also want to try and watch some classics, some B&W’s, some milestone movies and a couple from the must watch before you die list. 😀

As you can see that’s a lot of movies. I’m going to have to sit down and make a list one of these days. But it’s already 20 days into the year and I’ve made some progress on the movie list. Here’s the movies I’ve already watched.

1. Doom 3

We started the new year with this one. Don’t look at me all funny before of our choice. We wanted an all out masala no-brainer to enjoy on Jan 1st and this one fit the bill. 😀 My thought: It is a masala no-brainer!

2. Michael Madana Kama Rajan

According to Che this is a Kamal Haasan classic and I ain’t arguing. For me some of the movie was lost in translation but I still did enjoy the plot and story. Kamal plays 4 roles and manages to make each one of them distinctly different from each other. It’s a well done performance.

3. The Imitation Game

Based on the life of Alan Turing, the father of computer science and artificial intelligence, this movie at the end had me sputtering with anger at a society that kills genius because it’s gay!

4. Maze Runner

A young-adult post-apocalyptic science fiction, this movie is good masala. Another one on the lines of The Hunger Games. The first part of a trilogy, I enjoyed watching Maze Runner and look forward to the next two.

5. Ankhon Dekhi

This movie I highly recommend. No big names and yet a big story. The movie has a simple thought – you should believe only that which you can see, feel, hear and experience for yourself. It is this thought that sets the stage for the entire movie and yet the end is profound and left me dwelling on it for hours. A must watch!

6. Big Hero 6

I like animations and the ones made by Pixar always strike a chord. Set in San Fransokyo this is the story of a boy and his special bond with an inflatable robot. It’s an exceptionally cute movie with lots of emotion and morals. Want to know more? Watch it! 🙂

Well, that’s it until now. But not to bad a start eh!? 6 movies in 20 days, I’m quite on track. Let’s see if I can over shoot that 100 number. 😀

Disney has been surprising me lately with their movies, they are still doing the happily ever after and true love’s kiss but finally with a twist and closer to reality.

I first sat up and noticed this in the two sisters tale, Frozen, where they took pot shots at true love’s kiss and turned the concept on its head. If you haven’t seen Frozen, you should. Not only is it an interesting storyline but also it has some great music. Here’s one of my favourite songs from Frozen –

Anyway coming back to Maleficent. Remember Sleeping Beauty, the girl who is cursed as a little babe by the evil fairy to prick her finger when she turned 16 on a spindle and fall into a deep sleep from which she would never be awoken? Well, the evil fairy was Maleficent. As the old story goes, when Princess Aurora was born, King Stefan had a grand celebration and to this party he invited the three fairies, Flora, Fauna and Merryweather.

As the party in in full swing Maleficent turns up in a burst of green flames, just after Flora and Fauna have bestowed the baby with blessings. Maleficent is offended and angry that she hasn’t been invited and curses the child to punish the parents. Merryweather who still hadn’t voiced her blessing, weakens the curse by saying Aurora could be awoken by a kiss from her true love, but she does not have the power to undo Maleficent’s curse.

To save the child from the curse the three good fairies hide her and bring her up but Maleficent finds her when she turns of age and lures her to a spindle, after with Aurora promptly pricks her finger and falls into a deep sleep. It’s that this point that Prince Philip enters the story in full splendor, defeats Maleficent, kisses Sleeping Beauty and lives happily ever after with Aurora. The End.

BUT… But this is not the story Disney is saying in it’s new version Maleficent, that released this year. Directed by Robert Stromberg, Maleficent is a retelling of Walt Disney’s 1959 animated film Sleeping Beauty, but from the evil fairy’s point of view. This is the story of Maleficent, her childhood, her life, her love, what hardens her heart and turns her to doing evil and how she heals her heart. This is the unheard of story, the one that is usually not told and Aurora isn’t the central character this time, it’s the evil fairy, Maleficent, who steals your heart.

Maleficent in 2014 vs 1959

Maleficent is played by Angelina Jolie, the Tomb Raider girl, who even after 13 years amazes me with her fitness, physique and figure. Jolie has done justice to the role and is an endearing character. The surprise for me was Diaval, the raven shape-shifter played by Sam Riley, who was just so cute and bewitching. 😀

Photo Credit: Celeste of afterword

In this movie Disney has not only stepped away from the archaic meaning of true love’s kiss but has also tried to explain that magic is a way that doesn’t involve lights, flashes and flames. Maleficent does have powers and they are magical but she also has strengths and personality. She has wings that take her places rather than teleportation, she has the support of a forest full of friends in a fight rather than spells and concoctions.

This is a Maleficent who has heart, she is someone you can feel for, sympathise with and above all else fall in love with. I enjoyed watching this movie and I highly recommend you watch it too!

The Trailer:

Trivia I found out:

Walt Disney’s 1959 version of Sleeping Beauty was inspired by the original French fairy tale ‘La Belle au bois dormant‘ (The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood) by Charles Perrault and Tchaikovsky’s famous ballet ‘The Sleeping Beauty‘. The Brothers Grimm wrote this story as ‘Little Briar Rose’ after hearing the orally transmitted version of Perrault’s story which was itself based on the ‘Sun, Moon, and Talia‘ by an Italian writer Giambattista Basile. It was fun reading all the versions and I’ve linked them here if you want to read them.

Young Aurora is played by Vivienne Jolie-Pitt, Angelina and Brad’s 6 year old daughter. Apparently all the children who saw Angelina on set as Maleficent started to cry and hence could not play the role, however Vivienne saw through the make-up, saw her mother and did not cry, leading to her playing the role.

The title song of Maleficent “Once Upon a Dream”, is from the 1959 film Sleeping Beauty. It was re-recorded by artist Lana Del Rey, who was handpicked by Angelina Jolie to perform the song. The 1959 song was based on Tchaikovsky’s “Grande valse villageoise (a.k.a. The Garland Waltz)” from his ballet, The Sleeping Beauty. And here’s the song with clips from both the Disney movies – the 1959 Sleeping Beauty and the 2014 Maleficent.

I first noticed Sudeep a few years back but I never did really pay attention to him then. There were multiple reasons I think – my Kannada isn’t very proficient, I’m not a huge fan of Kannada Cinema, most Kannada movies I hear of are just masala with no substance, and so on go my reasons.

Over the years though I have been seeing Sudeep’s face off and on plastered on walls around the city, then a couple of months back I watched a part of some movie of his and he caught my eye. The movie left me interested even though I couldn’t understand all of what transpired and was said (I don’t even know the name).

The partial movie got me thinking and it took a few months for the thought to crystallise, but now that that’s done, here’s what I plan to do. I intend to watch some or maybe even all Sudeep’s movies in a bid to understand him better, Kannada Cinema better and who knows maybe even make my spoken Kannada better. 😀

When I looked up Sudeep on Wikipedia I found a long list of movies and I didn’t know how to go about choosing movies to watch. I figured it’d be best to ask friends on Facebook to solve this dilemma. Here’s are the movie they recommended…

1. Mussanje Mathu
2. Kiccha
3. Just Math Mathalli
4. Veera Madakari
5. Naan E / Eega
6. Huccha
7. Varada Nayaka
8. Maanikya

That’s not a lot of movies, yet 8 movies will take me 24 hours to finish watching and seems like countless hours to find and download. That’s my biggest challenge it seems – how do I find these movies easily?

I keep you posted on how Project Sudeep is coming along as the weeks progress. In the mean time, if you know of easy methods of getting a copy of these movies please let me know. And feel free to add to my Must Watch Sudeep Movie List in comments. 🙂