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Fri, 09 Mar 2007 05:07:51 GMT

Ok...making fun of the Mumbai Mirror is pretty low...even by my standards. Its like pointing out plot loopholes in a comic strip, but when a news article like this doesn't even make it to the Lokmat Times (later on why I'm reading that paper these days) you're glad that the Mumbai Mirror comes free with the Times of India. Maybe we should sympathize with the next telemarketeer (I'm not sure thats the right word) who calls us considering that this guy obviously needs help. Pathetic stuff...considering that the underlying story here is not the petition that he filed, but the circumstances that led him to it!

My Lord, tell people I’m God

HC judges reject Kurla resident Mishra’s petition saying divinity is beyond their jurisdiction

Friday, March 09, 2007 The Bombay High Court on Thursday heard an unusual petition from a resident of Kurla. Dharmendra Mishra wanted the court to declare him as God.“I’m Ram, Vishnu, Buddha, and Christ. I know everything that goes around. I should be given the same powers enjoyed by President A P J Abdul Kalam.Whatever I say should be considered a rule and followed by the whole world,” the 30-year-old call centre employee told a bench comprising acting chief justice J N Patel and justice S C Dharmadhikar.Arguing his case in person, Mishra pleaded that he be given the reins of the country and the universe. His petition mentions that his wife is ‘Laxmi’ and she recollects instances from her previous births.He claims that his son is an incarnation of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi while Congress president Sonia Gandhi was his mother in his previous birth.He insists that he would not die even if he consumes a poisonous substance such as potassium cyanide. Apparently, he has apprised the President, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, Sonia Gandhi and Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan about his divine powers.
After Mishra spok e for nearly 20 minutes, the court said it could not entertain his petition. “It is not in our jurisdiction to declare you God,” it said.On hearing this, Mishra left the court telling the people present in the premises that he could prove his divine powers.

I should be given the same powers enjoyed by the President and whatever I say should be considered as a rule —Dharmendra Mishra

Of course, just when you're about to write off this newspaper...it redeems itself with this article (in spite of the cheesy headline). This didn't appear in the Lokmat Times either. Sure, we're familiar with movies without immediate endings ( Star Wars V, Back to the Future II, POC- Dead Man's chest, The Italian Job) and movies that don't appear to have endings (Arzoo, Hum Aapke Hain Kaun, Only Yesterday, Contact) but this one's well...different.

An end-less film

Friday, March 09, 2007 Raman Kumar's cross-border drama Sarhad Paar which releases today is, according to the director, only 90 per cent complete. Director Raman Kumar is, understandably, upset. "The producers are going ahead with the release although we haven't shot some vital scenes. I can't say they haven't taken my consent, but I have given it very grudgingly. What can I do, if they simply go ahead and release the film? The story is incomplete, and some of the highlights are yet to be shot. It's a very sensitive Indo-Pak film about prisoners of war. It tells the story of a soldier who loses his memory during the Indo-Pak war and how his wife helps bring him back to normalcy. After his memory returns, he wants to return to war. This was a story idea that I lived with for 10 years. I wanted to make it in Punjabi with Amrish Puri. It finally went to Sanjay Dutt. And it took four years to complete — or rather four years to remain incomplete."
This isn't the first time this is happening to director Raman Kumar. Earlier he had watched helplessly as the producers of his comedy Wah Wah Ramji had gone ahead and released the film in an incomplete state.

Now, Raman has vowed never to work with any other producer. He says, "I'd rather do television, though it isn't fulfilling. But I can't make feature films under these terrible conditions. See, the beautiful moments in the film aren't carried forward logically. There are too many inexplicable gaps. The war scenes were never shot…."

Raman attributes the 4-year delay and incomplete status of the film to several factors. "During one schedule in Chandigarh, Tabu had to suddenly leave for a Bengali film. Tabu and Sanjay Dutt had a common secretary. But the delays just kept increasing," he says.

Sanjay, apparently, wasn't comfortable doing Sarhad Paar. "I think he lost interest in the film. I'm neither his type of person nor filmmaker. I can't sit and drink with him. But Tabu is my kind of actress. She and I used to joke that we should make a film on the making of Sarhad Paar. It would be even more interesting than the film," he says.

Then again...there's always the possibility of a sequel..."Abhi Bhi Sarhad Par..." Or maybe its part of a trilogy of unfinished films that are unleashed on the paying public.

Somedays you just can't be funny. Sigh! The things I do to move up on Technorati.

This is practice: Bad newspaper

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