Great weekend this one. Finally got to unwind, watch a movie, catch a gig and even a play. Perfect weekend almost.

INNUENDO.

A film of three stories, stories set in modern day Bangalore that reflect human behavior across the world like - Adolescent curiosity, Writers blocks and Party-poopers. Here’s the trailer -

Now, it would be really difficult for me to give an unbiased review of this film, mainly because I feel I know the director pretty well. But as a first time viewer of this film, I felt it was easy to digest, dramatic and yet quite captivating. I liked the stories and I liked some of the characters. But, the similarity of the protagonists in the three stories are uncanny. I could almost imagine the same character experiencing the three scenarios at different stages of his life. I liked the simplistic story-telling technique but i really wish the stories resolved better and I had a bit of what happened next.

I also happen to know that this film was shot on a real shoe-string budget and I applaud Bharath, the DoP, on some of the camera movements and rigs they’ve put together. 

Technically, i think they would’ve been better off with a 5D Mark II or any full-frame DSLR. The Canon 60D’s sensor gave way to terrible distortion especially with wide-angle lenses used to shoot scenes indoors. Focus seems to be a problem with these shots. They quality of their light set-up was also not at par and of course I do believe that the color tone of the entire film can be made so much better.

But the real let down was the audio. I think Arvind should just drop the idea of using ANY audio recorded by the camera. Sync-sound works but not everywhere in the film. The overall audio needs to be normalized. Its not something to be over-looked upon. Speech is sometimes unnecessarily loud or quiet. I could hear clicks, pops, hiss, ambient noise, cameraman’s footsteps and at some parts even noises from the camera. The music didn’t impress me one bit. It was just there. It fit in quite all right but it didn’t involve me and it sounded a little too synthetic. Drums didn’t sound very natural and i’m quite sick of listening to chordal pianos every time someone starts to think or feel bad or dies.

As an exercise in film-making, Innuendo stands as proof that dSLR film-making is here to stay. It’s also here to say a few things about story-telling and it sure does render a unique feel to the stories. I don’t think Arvind would’ve been able to create this work of art without the tools at hand. A few years ago, this film would’ve looked very different.

Yes, Arvind is an artist in a directors avatar. This is his subject for life-study and he knows how to tell stories. Although, this might not be the best place for him to remain in, i’d still put out a warning-  Watch out world!

After the movie was the usual q&a session, which was cut-short to about 5mins because the space was unavailable. But, the audience sure reminded me I was in Bangalore because Bangaloreans are shy. They feel they must never start the conversation, its somebody else’s job.

From there i picked up a friend and headed off to CounterCulture. Its basically an old factory converted to a bar with bands playing there all the time. Caught the awesome Ska Vengers there. They were on! Its not easy to get me moving, but these guys did. I’d seen a more primitive line up at The Big Mushroom Cloud Festival, but this Ska-ish, raggae based band is one of the hottest bands from Delhi. They look good, sound great and what a performance!

The Delhi Sultanate who does male vocals for the Ska Vengers sure knows how to handle political issues, provocative lyrics and more in a still highly taboo-ed society. Speaking freely about the pusher-man, who likes to sell his weed and mdma to the rich kids Delhi, about the double standards in sexuality that prevails in the upper classes of Delhi(and around the world i’m sure), about the vampires and murderers in the police who call in “encounters” and even giving us a bit of gyan about Ska in itself. This band was surely the best part of my weekend. Here, watch video -

The Pillowman by Martin McDonagh.

Its a bloody good script. One of the best dystopian satires I’ve come across in a while. With brilliant metaphors, incredible puns and fantastic characters. Sadly, this wasn’t the best performance of this script.

The female lead would’ve been better off teaching pre-school. Please don’t put her on stage ever again, don’t even let her busk. She wasn’t a bad actor. She just doesn’t understand the character. I’m sure if i met her outside, she would be a little less violent but pretty much the same person.

The rest of the play was good. The stage plan was incredibly smart, music timed perfectly. Lights were although right, i think they could’ve used a couple more to accentuate characters. All in all, a good Sunday evening. I have no complaints other than the female lead in the play.

I think, the group ought to work with some musicians to create a better experience. I didn’t quite like the recorded violins from half a century ago in a play which had that many f-words thrown around.

Yet, worth watching. Here’s the teaser -

The Pillowman Teaser Trailer from Studio 33 on Vimeo.