Business Standard on Saturday Oct 2 2010:
"Rajini fells all records with sci-fi entertainer Endhiran...The year’s biggest box-office event, Endhiran’s first day, first show, kept its date. On Friday, the big-budget, multi-lingual Rajinikanth starrer, with an ‘official’ budget of Rs 162 crore and ‘unofficial’ budget based on market rumour of Rs 250-300 crore, opened to packed houses, with tickets sold out days in advance...
# Biggest budget for any movie in Indian film industry
# To be shown on 2,250 screens worldwide, including in China
# First Tamil film album in iTunes World Album Top 10
# First Indian sci-fi movie with 1,500 graphical shots"गोविंदराव टेंबे: "नवीन काहीतरी करावं हे धारिष्ट्यच आपल्या सिनेमावाल्या लोकांत नाही , त्यामुळे आणि त्यामुळेच त्यांची अशी दुर्दशा झाली आहे."['सांस्कृतिक महाराष्ट्राचे शिल्पकार : गोविंदराव टेंबे', 2006 लेखक: डॉ. सौ. चारुशीला दिवेकर]
(Govindrao Tembe: "Thers is no courage among our cinema people to do something bold and because of that and that alone they are in terrible shape."
from "Sanskritik Maharashtrache Shilpkar : Govindrao Tembe", 2006 by Dr. Mrs. Charusheela Divekar)'Enthiran The Robot' was shown on
Sony TV on the evening of
March 13 2011. I couldn't see it because I wanted to watch the live coverage of the last day of
Yonex All England Badminton Championships.
Rajinikanth's (Shivaji Rao Gaekwad, शिवाजीराव गायकवाड) first language is Marathi and he still speaks the language with some relish and certainly much 'better'- for my ears at any rate- than many Marathi 'celebrities'.
Earlier I wrote a post on Marathi films on Dec 18 2007. Read it here
Ugh! Marathi Films.
Since then I have seen parts of both '
Mee Shivaji raje Bhosale boltoy' (मी शिवाजी राजे भोसले बोलतोय) and
Natrang (नटरंग).
I did not like the former at all and found the latter OK.
But frankly 'Natrang' is not close to many Marathi films of the past, especially a few of those starring
Nilu Phule (नीळू फुले),
Arun Sarnaik (अरुण सरनाईक),
Ganpat Patil (गणपत पाटील),
Ramesh Deo (रमेश देव),
Jayshree Gadkar (जयश्री गडकर),
Usha Chavan (उषा चव्हाण),
Leela Gandhi(लीला गांधी)- (has a Marathi speaking woman ever danced better than her?)...
[The other day I watched
'Mumbaicha Jawai' (मुंबईचा जावई) . What a wonderful film with some brilliant acting by
Sharad Talwalkar (शरद तळवलकर) and others!]
I have already quoted following earlier.
Suhas Palshikar: "...preferential treatment to locals is always an easy and attractive policy proposal. What is wrong with it? It is wrong simply because it creates an untenable category of “local”. In administrative parlance it becomes “domicile” – meaning resident for 15 years. This strategy practically abandons diversity. Apart from raising issues of definition of the local, such a policy encourages inbreeding and denies its beneficiaries he advantage of greater exposure and competition. It produces ghettoisation at schools, colleges and at workplaces – resulting in non-diverse social universes –hostels, localities and cities...."
More than anything else, I feel, this ghettoisation affects Marathi culture deeply.
Almost no Marathi cultural program shown on TV is complete without talking about "outsiders". For them, not just
Hindi, but any other language or its native speaker is a fair game.
Even the devastating floods of 2009 in
North Karnataka- where lacs of Marathi speakers live- were NOT covered in any depth by most Marathi media. (btw- They are covering
March 2011 Japanese quakes in great depth!)
Like
Vilas Sarang (विलास सारंग) says about Marathi literary world, this Marathi media world too is afflicted with "inbreeding".
As I have said earlier,
Namdev is arguably the greatest bilingual Indian writer because apart from his enormous talent, his vision was worldly and heart large. (Where was he domiciled?
Maharashtra or
Punjab?)
If Marathi has to assert itself on India and the world stage, her 'lovers' need to do some serious re-thinking on how to get there.
Returning to Endhiran, look at the picture below.
Artist:
Alan Dunn, The New Yorker, July 17 1937"I dread the day when I'll have to tell him about sex."
Maybe. But what about telling him what happens after the sex?
In Enthiran, like '3 Idiots' in 2009, robot Chitti manages a complex child delivery successfully.
p.s. We as a nation are obsessed with producing babies!
