Ancient Celebration

Today is the first full day of the ancient celebration of Passover.


It began at sundown Monday for members of the Jewish faith and continues for eight days, ending at sundown April 26.


The observance has been occurring regularly for the past 3,000 years. For about the past 2,000 years, it has 


occurred around this time of the year. Yet every year, while Jews remember their ancestors’ exodus out of


 slavery in Egypt, there are modern applications to the celebration. This year is no different.




The Jewish Community Relations Council, with offices in Bloomfield Hills, is focusing on the modern problem 


of human trafficking.




The Council, in conjunction with several metro area groups, including Jewish Coalition Against Domestic 


Abuse, National Council of Jewish Women, Jewish Women’s Foundation and Chaldean Federation of 


America, conducted a forum on the topic last Thursday.




Bridgette Carr, a law professor at the University of Michigan and director of the nation’s only law school 


clinic dedicated to combating human trafficking, was the keynote speaker. The forum focused on advocacy 


for women and children who are victims of human trafficking and are forced to work as slaves or provide sex 


against their will.






Despite the modern times, the problem of human trafficking still exists.




As Robert Cohen, executive director of the Council, noted: “The Jewish dimension of the human trafficking 


issue is especially evident as we approach Passover, when we are reminded that we were slaves in Egypt. 


Jews are especially sensitive not only to the inhumanity of trafficking, but also of our responsibility to take 


action against it ...”




An ongoing effort in combating human trafficking is the Polaris Project. Named after the North Star that 


guided slaves towards freedom along the Underground Railroad, Polaris Project has been providing a 


comprehensive approach to combating human trafficking and modern-day slavery since 2002. Polaris Project 


is a leading organization in the United States combating all forms of human trafficking and serving both U.S. 


citizens and foreign national victims, including men, women and children.




Passover also is a tribute to religious freedom and a wish for all of humanity to live and worship in free 


societies. Amid the prayers and the thankfulness of Jews to be able to worship freely is a special appreciation 


for living in the United States.  There’s also a reference in the Passover services to “Next year in Jerusalem.” 


Centuries ago, it was the desire of Jews to move back to their homeland, where they had been exiled by 


foreign powers. Today, however, most Jews in the United States don’t literally long to return to Israel but 


symbolically they understand and appreciate the need for a Jewish homeland. That’s why Israel has had such 


strong support from Jews in America and also has had the backing of most Americans and the United States 


government.








The key to Passover is its ritual meal or Seder, which retells the story of how Moses led the Jews out of 


Egypt. Many Jews attend congregational seders but still, in essence, the focus is on family. Family, 


tradition and religious freedom are the basic tenets of Passover, yet few people of any religion can 


argue that they are not also fundamentals of American society.

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I'M GOIN' BOLLYWOOD

I'M GOIN' BOLLYWOOD!


This one goes out to Klaatu.

I love Bollywood movies. I love the pagent of them. I love the romance,
and the acting and the singing and the dancing. No, I don't generally
understand them without subtitles, since I'm monolingual; and I don't
fool myself into thinking they are being subtitled with such deft skill
that I'm actually catching all the nuances of the dialogue and the
lyrics. So what is there for me to love?

Well, before I start into this, there are likely a lot of people who've
never actually seen a Bollywood, or Bollywood-style movie. For such
listeners, a tar.gz description might be in order: in a nutshell,
Bollywood refers to that particular segment of the Indian film industry,
centered in and around the city of Mumbai, that specializes in mostly
Hindi-language films; films which often feature lavish musical numbers,
formulaic plots, beautiful actors and actresses, and a general focus on
escapism and pop fantasy. Now, that is a hideous over-simplification. So
much so, that those who ARE familiar with Indian motion pictures are
strongly encouraged to ignore what I've just said, in favor of what they
already know. I'm not going to analyze, critique, or explore the very
rich history of Indian cinema, here today. I'm not going explain how
this industry as a whole, and certain bright gems released by it over
the years, have been incresingly embraced by filmgoers the world over,
and film MAKERS right here in the good ol' U.S. of A. No, MY goal is
much more modest: I'm going to tell you why I like them -- and why I
think you should too.

First though, bare with me. Bollywood movies are big, big money. And
individual performers from within that sphere are some of the most
popular and well-known people in the history of the human race. That is
not hyperbole. Shahrukh Khan, likely the biggest Bollywood star of all
time, has, according to Wikipedia, but I've heard it from other sources
as well, a fanbase that numbers in the billions. Think about that for
just a second: this one man -- still living, still acting, NOT a leader
of nations, NOT a religious figure -- is adored and could be recognized
on sight by one sixth to possibly one third of the population of the
planet right at this moment. If Arnold Schwarzenegger could win the
govenorship of California after throwing his hat into the ring only two
months before the election, imagine what THIS guy could do in India and
other countries, if he so chose; imagine what his fanbase would support.
There are politicians and tyrants all over the world who would give
absolutely anything to have that kind of influence. So I heartily reject
any offhand dismissal about the presumed unimportance of the Bollywood
industry to the world as a whole, and even to mainstream America:
because if something matters to a enough people, then it inevitably
matters to EVERYONE on some level or other.

But, I digress. This is supposed to be about me. Why do I like them?
Being an American, growing up immersed in American culture as I have
been, growing up as a fan of the movies, and therefore, as a fan of
Hollywood, fantasy has been my meat and drink. Oh, I was a reader, too,
certainly. Much of this applies to novels and comics and even radio
shows -- all things I love dearly in their own ways. But it's the magic
of the movies that I'm talking about here: the idea that you could
escape the mundanity of the world, simply by buying a ticket, or turning
on a machine in your living room; that you could follow particular
characters across entire franchises of filmed stories; that you could
chart a beautiful starlet's rise and fall through the expression of her
art; or be catipulted into a night of eager talk and inspiration with
friends who watched the same movie with you, waxing 'til dawn on the
mysteries of the world...it is this essense, this modern answer to the
sorcery of old, to the eternal questions of, "Who am I?", "Who would I
like to be?" This is cinema to me.

But, of course, it ain't ALWAYS this way. In fact, if you've been fed on
the bland diet of mainstream American media, it ain't been this way for
a really long time. If you turn on that machine in your livingroom, and
all there is to inspire you on that screen are has-beens and wanna-be's
dancing, and please-won'tcha-make-me-a-stars singing their very little
hearts out, or even idiots closed inside a box with a camera turned on
them...if these things are how your hours -- your irreplaceable hours --
are spent...then your dreams are enemic, and you are dying inside
without even noticing.

I ask you this: what is wrong with a better way, a better life?
Obviously nothing, right? It's laudible. So, then, isn't the dream of a
better life, perhaps a different life -- maybe one a little foreign to
us -- isn't that better than the dream of an empty one perfected? Better
than being a "star" in a place devoid of culture or true importance?
Better than wanting, needing to be the biggest fly on the pile of rancid
crap that is modern American media? We are stale. We are day-old. We are
hard and brittle and crumbling. We look at endless remakes on the big
screen starring generic blonds with fake boobs and botox cheeks, or
fools on the small screen, chasing monsters and phantoms, and we call
that entertainment. But that's the ironic part right there -- because
those fools already caught them. They HAVE the ghosts ensnared, week
after week after week.

So, I say, hooray for Bollywood. Why? Because it ain't THAT shit.

Sure, it's fake. Everyone is beautiful. Everyone can sing and dance like
an angel. The pathos is heavy, the comedy is forced, the romance is
thick enough to cut. And I say hooray. The production values are
sometimes low, but the energy is high, and we can wink and nod our way
past the continuity problems until the credits roll. Hooray. It's
fantasy, like it used to be. Like Hollywood used to be. It's a better
world, where it all works out in the end...or, maybe not, but don't we
look GOOD, looking sad? Style, class. They used to mean a lot. A man in
a well-cut suit used to be something to LOOK at. Something to admire.
Something YOU really wanted to be -- at least until the lights came up.
All that's gone now if all you watch is modern American media. If you
study film history, you can feel it again, but that kind of fantasy is
locked in time, forever out of reach of the present life. But Bollywood
is alive and well and growing. And the men are sharp. The women, oh the
women are classy and fine. And they sing and they dance and they fall in
love -- and for a time...'til the lights come up...so do we.

It's old fashioned, and brand new. It's familiar, and strange, and
exciting, and tragic, and silly -- and one HELL of a way to spend a
couple hours, when the alternative is game shows labelled as reality;
and talking heads puking up partisan poison; and big budget CGI
extraveganzas lacking heart and soul and plot. It's a better world.
They're better movies. By and large. In general. There's lots of trash
too. No perfection on Earth, and all that. But when they fly, Bollywood
movies soar. They scrape the stars, and they take their fans along for
the ride. They sweep you away. You don't sit and wish they were
something else, that the makers had done something else, something more
entrancing, more interesting. But good lord, I think like THAT nearly
every time I see a new Hollywood movie.

You need to watch indie cinema in this country now, to feel that old
magic. You need to look at low-budget film making, because it is
constraint -- mostly of the purse strings -- that tends to free the mind
of the cinematic artist. And one could say, therefore, that the
constraints of Indian life, the clash of the old with the new, of the
foreign with the hereditary, of the best and the worst of a nation just
stepping up as a world power; you could point to these things and see
lots of fodder for fertile imaginations.

But maybe I have one myself. Maybe I'm deluded, and damaged by my love
for movies, by the very fantasies I cherish. But if I am, I'm not alone.
Oh, man, not even close! 

urrent-bollywoods-news.blogspot.com

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Aishwarya bags another Rituparno Ghosh’s project

Actress Aishwarya Rai-Bachchan is apparently doing her bit of research on the reclusive Bengali cinema diva Suchitra Sen as she is touted to step into her shoes soon. Ash, who has already worked with National Award-winning director Rituparno Ghosh twice (Chokher Bali and Raincoat), will be seen playing a bandit queen in the adapted film version of Devi Chaudhurani.

Devi Chaudhurani is a novel by Bengali writer Bankim Chandra Chatterjee in 1884 and is regarded as one of the most popular novels of its times. The film’s adaptation is also regarded as one of Sen’s most appreciated works.

“Aishwarya has asked for the DVDs of Suchitra Sen’s film which is about how a typical affluent housewife turns into the leader of a pack of dacoits. The film will be an adaptation of the novel which is set during the 1880s but nevertheless, Ash wanted to do some research on the actor,” says a source.

Incidentally, both of Ghosh’s previous films with Ash were also on-screen adaptations of well-known literary pieces.

According to sources, Ash has already seen the movie once and has even selected certain portions that she would like to watch again.

“Ash has always regarded Sen as one of the finest actors that Bengal has ever produced. She also wanted to meet her once but she knows that this wish is near impossible as word has it that the senior actor rarely steps out of her appartment. Ash is very interested in her though,” the source adds.

Ghosh and Ash apparentlysat over a series of meetings to discuss the storyline of the film and how it should be adapted in a modern context.

“The script has already been handed over to Ash and she is about to allot dates for the shooting. Rituparno had discussed this with Aishwarya when they were shooting for Chokher Bali itself but he finally got the nod from her when she was in Kolkata last year to accept an award for Raavan,” the source adds. The film will in all probability be a Hindi-Bengali bilingual.

Both Ash and Ghosh confirmed the news of the film being made.

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Men & Women NO PROBLEM

Looks like, director Annes Bazmee has a fondness for expressive words like WELCOME, NO PROBLEM and now THANK YOU. And ya! comedy and Akshay Kumar undoubtedly goes hand-in-hand.

After SINGH IS KINNG, Akshay Kumar and Anees Bazmee have once again paired up after almost 3 years, now in Thank You. A multi starer rom-com heavily inspired byBazmee’s earlier comic flick, No Entry.

Thank You is about three married men trying to have some fun outside their marriage.

Raj (Bobby Deol), Vikram (Irrfan Khan) and Yogi (Suniel Shetty) are three friends who are married to Sanjana (Sonam Kapoor), Karthika (Rimi Sen) and Radha (Celina Jaitley).

Raj (Bobby Deol) and Sanjana (Sonam Kapoor) are a happily married couple. But soon, she suspects her husband flirting behind her back, Maya (Celina Jaitly), wife of Yogi (Sunil Shetty) catches him red handed with another girl, and Vikram (Irrfan Khan), who is also unfaithful to his wife, keeps Shivani (Rimi Sen) so petrified that she never dared to question him.

In short, the trio philandering husbands tries to spice up their humdrum lives by embarking on extramarital affairs. They never think twice before cheating on their wives.

Enters Kishan (Akshay Kumar), a private detective or you can say a modern day love doctor who spies on the three promiscuous husbands and promises to teach them a lesson that they’ll remember lifelong.

As usual, there is a lot of confusion that follows. That’s not it… There is a very tacky flashback story of Akshay Kumar too.

The highlights of the flick are the scenes between Vikram and Shivani and Yogi’s frustration, which tickle your funny bones to the core. The first half of the film is disappointing, leaving you to look for the rare laughs, while the second half saved the entire script. It has you grinning at certain goof-ups. Again, the film’s climax was a BIG bore.

Akshay Kumar’s carefree acting did create a lot of laughter. He delivered a fine performance. Sunil Shetty kicked up a bit of fun, and must confess, his acting came as a pleasant surprise to me. Bobby Deol’s role hardly had any humor in it as he is seen angry with his wife in almost the entire film. But his acting was decent enough. Irrfan Khan is mind-blowing. It was a delight watching him. Every single scene that he was in, brought a riot of laughter among the audience.

Sonam Kapoor was again just a glamor doll in the flick. She could not emote genuinely in a single scene. Her performance was below average. Rimi Sen did a fabulous job. Her comic timing was simply wonderful along with Irrfan Khan. Celina Jaitly is hardly seen in the drama. She disappears from the large part of the film. Mallika Sherawat item no Razia, failed to impress the audience.

There was no freshness in the plot of the film. Anees Bazmee’s direction is praiseworthy. He did try to keep the audience involved and amused for a larger part of the flick. Pritam’s music is not inspiring at all. Unlike his previous creations, this one was disappointing. Editing by Steven H. Bernard is crisp, Yadav’s cinematography is first class.

A final word, Thank You is a one time watch. Head to the theater without any expectations. This is a flick for the mass and not the class.

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Hindi Lyrics

naa tum humei jaano, naa hum tumhe jaane
magar lagataa hain, kuchh ayesaa, meraa humadam mil gayaa

ye mausam ye raat choop hain
do hothhon kee baat choop hain
khaamoshee sunaane lagee hain daasataa
najar ban gayee hain, dil kee jubaan

mohabbat ke mod pe hum
mile sab ko chhod ke hum
dhadakate dilon kaa leke ye kaarawaan
ke jaayenge dono jaane kahaa?

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