English Vinglish

-
So I managed to watch three beautiful movies that was long due. The first movie is English Vinglish. I don't know why I did not watch it til now. The simplicity and seriousness of the movie touched my heart. Days like now when your speaking in English partly defines as to the kind of person you are or you are not in a country like India and traditional upbringing is appreciated as well as looked down upon; you see the society is such that they accept traditionalism in women in order to curb them with a manly power, if you know what I mean. The little son of Sashi ( Sridevi),six years old maybe, does not hesitate from telling his mother as to why she should scold her daughter because the daughter is wearing a short skirt. A bold reply comes from his mother telling her son that why would she scold her daughter when the daughter is atleast wearing a skirt. So the character Sashi might not know how to speak in English but has a wide mental horizon. She has the ability to correct herself on her mispronounced words and simply smiles when she too needs the feel to correct the 'dhobi' for his mispronunciation. One might think what more to expect from a woman engrossed in household works and busy in making 'laddoos'(sweets) but the director of the film changes this concept by introducing us to a language training school in America where people from different nations and countries come, like Sashi, to learn to speak in English. So you smile at the simple FACT that many, many foreigners including many French men too, don't really know how to speak in English and there is nothing wrong about it because it is just a language and Sashi is a woman who is blessed with a strong memory and is also someone who gives in all her best to improve on herself. She is an excellent Laddu maker and does not probably know that even she has the right to look down on people who can't cook or bake like her. Even if she is aware of such a right she is humble, strong and intelligent enough to know that all art is a practice. Nothing is impossible if one has love and dedication for and towards it. There is something about the film 'Queen' which we might find in this movie too. Well, since I have got some other things to catch up with, I will discuss about the other two films that I had watched in my next post. P.S- There was this part in the movie when the English instructor teach the class about articles and the chara Sashi comes up with the question that why we call U.S as The United States of America and not India , The India. The instructor fails to answer such a well constructed question but sadly, a long way to go before we call India, THE INDIA, isn't it?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Kadambari Devi's Suicide note

-
A few days back i finished reading 'Kadambari Devi's Suicide note',by Ranjan Banerjee and though it struck odd notes in many places(my opinion),it definitely falls into the category of the must read books,especially if you want to explore Tagore's world.Most intellectuals or want to be intellectuals, appreciate Tagore for his modern outlook,but appreciating the modern aspects of a character or mind is vastly different from experiencing it first hand,and the process can be painful,like a morbid pleasure,it can be so addictive,that one does not want to come out of it, rather can't come out of it.This is exactly what happened with Kadambari Devi.A dilemma she was in because she was sapiosexual and was in love with her husband's brother,ROBI(Rabindranath Tagore).She was an exceptional talent but failed to realize it not just because of the environment that surrounded her but also because she loved Tagore with all her dreams and not just her life.An exceptionally unc...
Read more

Who says English is easy?

-
Who says English is easy?I honestly did not know how to pronounce Freud-it was confusing,until one day one of my schoolmates corrected me,indirectly and since then I know that I need to pronounce it as FROYED and not FREEEEEUD.Lets take an easy example-COW;a person not knowing the English alphabets may pronounce it as CO,because the W in itself is a two syllabic word(if we consider it's spelling),so people can be mistaken and they can pronounce it as Co and then W but it's real pronunciation is CAUU.Another simple example can be the word MORE.Judged from the spelling,it should sound as MOR-E,with a clear emphasis on E,but in English we don't do that because the E becomes silent.The same goes for the word LATE because we don't pronounce it as LATE-E.Confusion persists in the pronounciation of A as well.It becomes difficult for us to contemplate if we should pronounce A as we normally do,when we follow the English alphabetical chart or should we pronounce it as Aaaaa.So w...
Read more

Ranting is allowed

-
Image
Ten years since 2013. The year when I stepped into my college. A new world, a new culture and a completely new environment with new faces. College felt numb and so did my P. G. Always thought of holidays, felt happier when got them. Three months at a stretch sometimes. Holidays always meant an escape to my hometown, to my family. Now it's my mother and me and the idea of hometown does not excite me anymore. It's just a place where I survive and try to thrive. There is no escape even when there are plenty of options. Think I already know what hell might feel like.  With a deeper understanding of life, universe and humans, my mind has almost given up on the human civilization ( not to forget I don't like the street dogs crying and howling at night and continuing with it for one hour to say the least. Cockroaches and flying cockroaches appearing from almost nowhere). Elders bless us with a long life but they always fail to mention a blessed, carefree long life. Who wants to li...
Read more