Rubber & Prejudice or No Bride for Rubber Tappers

June 01,08 | M.R. Subramaniam |Businessline

No Keralite is coming forward to tap rubber these days. Workers from Tamil Nadu are getting jobs in infrastructure projects. Therefore, planters have now turned to getting workers from the North,” says Mr N. Radhakrishnan, President of the Cochin Rubber Merchants Association.
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One reason Keralites not wanting to become tappers is due to a social stigma attached to it and them not able to get brides!

Parashu on art of cinema

You know what, actually, 'Good cinema' or 'award cinema' is not meant for a layman, because it's goal is not to operate with cliches or existing audio-visual language. it is meant for those in the filmmaking trade, much like a trade journal or a concept car to those in the engineering or auto-industry. It's role in the system is to stretch beyond cliches, the form/content. Art cinema has the role of exploring new ways of telling stories. stretching the medium to its limits... the new idioms thus created eventually gets adopted into the mainstream/ commercial cinema.

In the media i have heard certain filmmakers and critics talk about good cinema as an opposite of commercial cinema.

'Good' is subjective, we could fight over what is good or not yet not find an answer. Good cinema. what the fuck is good cinema anyways.

commercial cinema is a term used to categorize films that play to the gallery, whose objective is to entertain, and titillate primal senses and aspirations of its viewers. It is called commercial cinema, because of its primary motive to make profit. Continuing to speak in the same breath; Good cinema doesn't play to the gallery. It has an arrogant stamp of its maker. Who says 'this is the way i want to say it, see it or go to sleep'. That is the way it is meant to be.

Let us face it. It is an art to entertain people. not every toms, chandrans, and harrys can do that. It is an art to entertain and make money. every filmmaker dreams of it. maybe not for moneys sake, but as an indicator of a being heard by a larger audience. (larger the audience more the money)

But why do we need the so called good cinema which will put a layman to sleep to have commercial release, ending up being a waste of money and precious time because it is not the audience it is meant for. Good cinema has rightful place in the cinema ecosystem when it is not seen as the opposite of commercial cinema. This is the bane of Art cinema in Kerala- The art filmmakers who see 'Good' Cinema as something against Commercial cinema. It has to be made with an aim to create new audio-visual idioms rather than stick to the form of film noir or cinema verite which unfortunately is the only genres made in the name of art films in this part of the world.

Why not truth now?

Like the zen master said, truth does not always liberate masses/ society/ community. They have to be readied to first accept the truth, to understand the truth in its real context and perspective. The ground has to be prepared for the seeds to be sown.

-like the true stories about how behind closed doors detailed strategies are drawn to tighten the grip of control over a community's perspectives and further shape it by the the moral standards of the media baron's orthodox family values, using a network of marketing agents who stand guard to the empire of profit that is founded on instilled sense of guilt, shame and false pride of community.
i know real stories of people, (more than one), driven to edges of depression and despair by the network of information that is in place for the media network. it is scary. the network of control is like a state military intelligence. they use it to intimidate the powerful and drive common man to suicide.

or

real stories of how the liberators/ party of the poor, innovate and learn new techniques of extortion to build a corporation so huge that it makes the ex- oppressor look like a petty thief. how they are mastering the art of extortion of public and private fund over phone calls, leaving no messy trail of evidence. all legit fund creation, that will fund the future uprising of the masses fed and blinded on liquor and hyper-reality. They are not ready for the truth.

Many true stories are condemned to languish in small gatherings and get passed on as murmurs ear to ear within closed circles, sometimes leaking out into the mainstream as hearsay and as a report of news from a reliable source, which never really gets substantiated and ends up as mere gossips or conspiracy theories.

advertising in kerala. prt-2

Word of mouth rules in Kerala. Advertising in the way the rest of the world thinks is paralyzed in Kerala. The uncrowned kings of kerala advertising: the real people who have helped shape the identity of kerala as the best test market in india. Please welcome into our midst Saboo Coloniaa, Gayatri and Rehman and their predecessors- the film poster designer.

They design poster that foil warp kerala. Over the years their posters helped shape the mallu's dismissive attitude towards advertising and publicity. Flop film posters consistently claim superhit status, numbing the senses and trust of the market. “ You cant trust these printed words “, says madhu- who sells among other things lolly-pops from his rickety pavement shop near chittor road in Cochin. He had over heard our plans for the matinee show of ‘taskaraveeran’ , the just released mammooty flick . The poster is screaming ‘SUPERHIT’ in the fifth colour. These posters are mostly final struggle of a sinking producer trying to keep nose above the waters. (These guys are overlooked by watchdogs that are on the look out for false claims in publicity materials.)

These people are not seen in the award functions or the seminars of Cochin advertising club- the official union of the advertisers. Rahman or Saboo or Gayatri have no clue about the theories of advertising. These guys follow their gut. They have their protocol, their set of rules and process. Family posters- to woo the family audience, title poster to announce, action posters mend to curdle the young’s blood, ‘glamour posters’ with the mandatory ‘A’, ‘the class posters’ done in white space… these rules have set the ground rule for advertising in Kerala. Any one at Cochin Ad Club listening!

Coming soon- IMAGES that set the rules.

advertising in kerala. prt-1

Did you know that? Kerala is considered to be best product test market in India. That is the reason why many products are launched here before the high decibel nationwide commercial launch. The legend goes that if the product clears in the litmus test in the kerala market, it will succeed any where in india. The critical ‘force’ of Keralites is not entirely useless!.

But finally when commercials are made for a nationwide launch, kerala is not considered an important market worthy of a tv commericial with its regional sensiblities. So they dub the north Indian sensiblity into Malayalam often ends up being not understood in the most literate state.

I am told if there is enough budget, then a single commercial is made of the consolidated southern states mostly taking into consideration the tamil/ telugu/ kannada cultural backdrop. They know that kerala is a totally different cultural consciousness, but it is not considered a worthy enough market to spend precious tv commercial budget on!! We should not be fighting about cultural endangerment posed by globalization when ‘Hindisation’ of Malayalam is happening through advertising and films. I shall talk about fear of the ‘inevitable’ globalization in another post.

The Mumbai advertisers fears are not entirely baseless. When greeted with a commercial the ‘who are you trying to fool’ sense is triggered in the mallu brains.
Since the ad filmmaking community is virtually non-existent in kerala the blame of nuking 2 generation of malayalees trust on advertising falls on the print campaigns. The agencies in kerala have being bombarding the mallu brains with functional advertising with false promises and claims. Image advertising/ branding is non-existent.

Kerala is a word of mouth market. The Malayalam film industry will vouch that claim.

To be continued….

Kingdom of heaven- Grey hero and white villian

The story has a stronger political and philosophical message, as opposed to the primal emotions of a wronged father in 'Gladiator'. Even though it is very timely given the political climate of the world, 'Kingdom of Heaven' will have lesser universal appeal.

Queen Sibylla "There will come a time when you wish that you had done a little evil for a greater good" Balian stood silent. Profound statement is wasted because the professed time does not come. After the surrender of Jerusalem to the army of Salaudin. Sibylla and Balian ride back to a little village in France and live happily ever after!! The film looks like it is edited out to cater to the box office demands. The duration looked like it was too small to tell the story the director really wanted to say. Especially the relationship between Balian and Sibylla looks incomplete and underdeveloped. Their on screen passion does not have proper build up. Hope we get to see the film from Ridley Scotts heart which would be possible if there is ever a director's cut.

The film does manage to break a few stereotypes. For one the people from the Middle East are portrayed as disciplined, belonging to a more advanced society than the Europeans who are mostly shown as crude and barbaric. Sallaudin is portrayed as a noble visionary general. This is the first time i have seen a villian with a halo portrayed in pure white, as opposed to the shades of grey on the hero.

Parashu liked the film. He is yet to recover from the sheer scale of production. (He has not seen 'Lord of the rings')

Digital Malayalam Cinema: An irrelevant discussion of a relevant issue

I overheard a Malayalam film producer's PA in conversation with Parashu. Now this dude knew all the inside stuff, when i say 'inside stuff', i mean 'real underbelly stuff'. The kind of stuff that won't get written in the media. The powerful media is expected to be fearless and truthful, but the editors are after all folks with families and career aspiration.

Unlike these editors Parashu is fearless, at the same time he is wise enough to know that most of that discussion lay outside the topical scope of this blog. There was this passing bit in the conversation that i found more interesting than deals and kinks of the famous.

I must tell you guys this...he spoke of digital cinema projection. Parashu was excited by the time 'the insider' had left. He told me how the Malayalam film industry could get its glory back. Malayalam cinema with capability of the innovative subject selection, could phase out the threats it is facing from the other film markets. If only MACTA and film exhibitor's association saw with the clarity he did...

The possibility of film projectors in the theaters and multiplexes going digital would be liberating. This technology is available now. Imagine a filmmaker being able to shoot on digital, edit the film in his home pc. burn the product on to a DVD. Marketing it. Getting censor clearance and put it on the exhibition. Sounds simple and alluring, alley!! It is the economics of the film format which is hindering the technical competitiveness of Malayalam Cinema.

Conversion of film to and from digital format is a very expensive option. while in the big markets like west and the big Indian markets where cost is not a consideration, film is worked upon digitally to make enhanced visuals. That is why foreign films and current crop of hindi, tamil and telugu films have better production value. Now-a-days an art house film in those market can afford minimum budgets ranging between 2-3 crores. But for small markets of the size of Kerala, a film that costs more than a crore and an half for a mainstream film is financial suicide.

That is where digital format comes in. The digital projectors being a new technology can be expensive. What if the Kerala film distributor's and exhibitor's associations can collectively take initiative to bulk purchase digital projectors in place of film projectors. Then the cost of production of the film would come down. That would mean democratization of the film industry, letting new people into the industry making some old hands redundant (this would come in with its fair share of flux) but in the end; one of the more mature film industry and market in India would survive. This would also mean some people would have to give up the habits of deals and kinks, which is easier said than done. Till then we movie goers and cinema at large would have to suffer for their pleasures.

(disclaimer: This piece would make filmmaking in the future sound alluring and simple, Complexities of ever changing film grammars, technicalities and other intricacies , are conveniently ignored to maintain the focus of the topic of discussion. Parashu or the writer will not be take responsibility for any such illusion of simplicity and resultant acts that the above discussion conjures)

Television is the future of malayalam cinema

" Television is the future of Malayalam cinema". Don't take these prophetic words of Parashu lightly.

The much talked about 'malayalam cinema prathisandi' (the malayalam cinema crisis) was blamed on the emergence of satellite television. This lead to bans being imposed on films stars doing shows for television channels or acting in soaps and shows. Basking in the past glory, those at the helm of the Malayalam film industry can choose to ignore television at their own risk.

The real reason for the crisis in malayalam cinema industry is the lack of quality content and form. Innovative content comes from vision while form is dictated by techniques. Innovation in content calls for addressing issues that are relevant to the times. There is a need for production of commercial and art house cinema that appeal to the masses by tickling their senses both primal and evolved. But unfortunately, the existing filmmakers fail miserably as torchbearers of their society. There is a void of genius in the industry which now is filled with flash-in-the-pan hit makers and pretentious art filmmakers. If MACTA has real intention of saving the industry they should seriously think about launching a voluntary retirement scheme for filmmakers who have outlived their context. Cinematically speaking they should be archived.

The other reason for the current sorry state of affairs is the lack of support and respect towards the emergence of new technicians especially editors. More than any others, Malayalam cinema needs editors who understand and can make use of the digital technology in post production. It is the editors and post production artist/ colorists who have graduated from television that are giving the hindi/tamil films the sheen that they have now. They bring with them new way of crafting the stories. Television is the breeding ground for these digital artist. So instead fearing the emergence of television, the film fraternity should accept the strength of the medium. They should realize that the big screen will always be the ultimate dream for the small screen fraternity. It would be silly for the lion to look at the rat and panic, instead get the rat's help to cut free from the trap it has fallen into.