Reflections of Passions

Tis the season to be jolly... and to ponder whether you've been naughty or nice! Merry Christmas everyone. It's the time of the year when we're all looking forward to the dawn of a new day... the decorations are out and so is all the finery... with everyone making plans for a spectacular entry into the new year! Christmas for me has always been the season of giving and joy... the season of Santa Claus, Christmas carols, gifts around the Christmas trees and Christmas dances, celebrations and loads of yummy, yummy food. It's also a time when family and friends come together. The feeling at this time of the year in the two weeks that lead into Christmas and new year is indescribable... it's warm and fuzzy yet exciting.. it's rushed and action-packed yet relaxed... it's time of reflection... yet a time to look forward for new beginnings! At this time of the year, I cease to be Akshay... literally! I am Santa Claus... in my head and in my behaviour! It's now ...

It is just so refreshing to see a period film that is made with such glorious reverence and affection. Khoya Khoya Chand does its best to transport you to the golden era of Bollywood, among the archaic lights, melodramatic sets, divas and classic automobiles. The visual treatment of the story is stunning, and thanks to that a superbly chosen, we get the smell of the vintage greasepaint. Perhaps, the in-jokes, at almost every step of the film, was lost to the audience. This is an unhesitatingly insider film, Bollywood reflecting on Bollywood, not marked by raw impressions or cynicism. This is a glossy, neatly crafted romance set against an era of cinema the director himself is clearly overwhelmed by. The tale is of a pretty young starlet Nikhat (Soha Ali Khan)--who has been more couched than cast, right from an abominably early age--and her compromise to break into the limelight by giving in to the reigning star Prem Kumar (Rajat Kapoor). Enter then Zafar (Shiney Ahuja)--the nascent scr...

Mumbai's cabbies are an institution unto themselves is a well-known fact. Sometimes their reasoning seems rooted in some parallel universe whose logic defies mere human understanding. Recently, when a friend alighted from the cab, a driver asked for Rs. 98. She happened to have a tariff card in her purse and pointed out that she owed only Rs. 89. Bristled with indignation at the implication that he had tried to rip her off, the cabbie said, "Madam, if I really wanted to cheat, why would I jack up the fare by only eight rupees? I would have asked for a thousand!" Since my friend was in a hurry, she paid him Rs. 90 and desisted from pointing out two flaws in his argument. One, the argument was nine rupees, not eight and two, a cabbie would need exceptional luck to score that one-in-ten-million chance of finding a passenger foolish enough to cough up Rs. 1000 for a 10 kilometre ride. The cabbie failed to convince my friend that he had made a genuine mistake, but he did provi...