Sounds Like Power

Apne paraye (1980) - review and gratuitous screencaps

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 03:04:00 +0000

I finally finished my review of Basu Chatterjee's 1980 movie Apne paraye - you can read the review on Filmi Geek. I was somewhat disappointed with the movie but Shabana Azmi's performance was one of its strong points. Her expression was able to add nuance to her characterization that was missing from the dialog alone.

Here at Sounds Like Power, though, we are all about the pretty. And so here are some gratuitous screen captures from the film, for your enjoyment!

One thing that seems to be true of Basu Chatterjee - he (well, his costume designers) seem to love draping Shabana ji in an endless parade of gorgeous saris. I once tried to count all the different saris in Swami - I lost count around 14, all vibrant and lovely with wonderful detail work. Apne paraye offers almost that many. Sartorially, at least, the movie does not disappoint!

"Halke halke aai chalke" - Apne paraye

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Sun, 09 Oct 2011 12:42:00 +0000

A quiet few weeks here as my real life once again drags me away from the blog. I am 2/3 of the way through Kaifi & I and have a few things to say about it when I get time.

I managed to watch Basu Chatterjee's 1980 film Apne paraye, which stars Shabana Azmi with Amol Palekar, Utpal Dutt, Girish Karnad, and a few others. I'll review it on Filmi Geek soon. In the meantime, it provides a Shabana-gaana for us, this sweet and sad lullaby "Halke halke aai chalke."

Healing with ... what?

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 14:37:00 +0000

I saw this press release the other day that reported Shabana Azmi taking enthusiastic part in a book launch for "well-known homeopath Dr. Mukesh Batra." (I have shamelessly cropped Dr. Batra and others out of the above picture; please follow the link to see it.) Shabana ji said at the event that she believes in homeopathy, and praised Dr. Batra for helping relieve her pain and speeding the healing when she suffered a leg fracture. She also credited him for her beautiful skin.

The press release gave me pause. To me, the word "homeopathy" refers to the use of hyper-dilute "solutions" in which nothing is left of any active ingredient other than some mystical molecular memory. I believe this is utter quackery, snake oil of the lowest order. It includes such arrant nonsense as the claim that these solutions become more effective as they become more dilute. In short, I think it's rubbish, and that purveyors of it should be prosecuted, not praised.

But I did some research before sitting down to write this post, because I know that the term "homeopathy" has a broader usage as well, that refers to a wider variety of what we in the West sometimes call "alternative" medicine, natural medicine, or holistic medicine. That is far too broad of a scope for me (even as a fairly narrow-minded rationalist) to dismiss out of hand. Reading the press release, it sounds to me like Shabana ji, Dr. Batra, and his book are using the word in this broader sense. I did a sanity check with an Indian friend of mine, who also understood the word that way (and spoke very highly of her own experience with practitioners).

If Shabana ji believes that she has been helped by such natural and holistic remedies, I have no quibble with that, and no concern for either her good sense or her well-being. I would worry about someone who would reject scientifically-developed treatments for serious ailments - I wouldn't mess around with cancer, for example - but for pain remedies, or mild stimulation, or treating cold symptoms and the like, I can readily believe that natural remedies are often as effective (if not more so in some cases) than pharmaceuticals. So, it was just the term "homeopathy" - its two very different meanings - that threw me in this case.

This video puff piece has some more about Shabana ji's relationship with Dr. Batra, and some clips of both Shabana ji and Javed Akhtar looking wonderful.

That is some guest list ...

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 02:43:00 +0000

The Times of India yesterday had this report with more information about how Shabana Azmi spent her birthday at her new Khandala home, named Sukoon ("peace, tranquility"). Lots of fascinating people stopped by to pay their respects. In the picture above you can see Nandita Das with her little child, and Konkona Sen Sharma. To our right of Shabana ji is, I believe, Sandhya Mridul. And that fellow over on the end ... the text says it's Anil Kapoor, and it does look like him - 30 years ago though. Perhaps it's the youthful clothes ... at any rate, a very flattering picture.

Also present, according to the report: Urmila Matondkar, Ashutosh Gowarikar, Poonam Dhillon, and a bunch of others. (Perhaps one of these years I'll get myself invited.) One thing I'll say, I love the way that many of the younger women Shabana ji has worked with - Urmila, Nandita, Konkona, Sandhya among them - remain close to her years after those projects. It's lovely, and it speaks to what a marvelous mentor and friend she must be.

Janam din mubarak ho, Shabana ji

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 03:10:00 +0000

"... tu jiye hazaaron saal, yeh meri hai arzoo! "

Real life reared its head in an ugly way for me the last few days, so I did not have time to plan and execute a special post for Shabana ji's 61st birthday.

According to this report, she spent a lovely day in Khandala with her family. I wish her many, many more such celebrations.

And check out this slideshow from IBN chronicling some of her iconic roles. I especially liked this one from City of Joy, which I haven't yet seen.

I'm pretty sure that four of the pictures in IBN's slideshow are screen captures that I collected myself and have posted here over the years. Delighted to see others enjoying them!

I'm not sure when I'll get to it, but the next Hindi movie I plan to watch is Basu Chatterjee's Apne paraye, starring Shabana ji and Amol Palekar. I'll report back soon ...

Okay, maybe I finally get the point of Twitter.

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 03:21:00 +0000

An exchange from earlier today, offered without further comment ...

Kaifi & I

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 18:29:00 +0000

Longtime commenter and friend of SLP Sally reminded me that Shaukat Kaifi's memoir, Kaifi aur Main, has now been published in an English translation. As much as I'd love to read the book in Urdu, I allowed myself a moment of realism and bought a copy of the translation.

It arrived today, and I'll make posts about it here as I read it.

Oh, and in case you are new to SLP or to Shabana Azmi, let me be less cryptic - Shaukat Kaifi is Shabana Azmi's mother; the book is reminiscence about life with Kaifi Azmi, Shabana ji's father. The blurb from Amartya Sen on the back of the book says: "They were united not only by love and marriage, but also by an individually assessed joint commitment to social change, artistic creativity, and personal and political ethics. In this excellent translation we have a lively account of an important part of Indian history...."

Cutting a rug at Love, Breakup, Zindagi music launch

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 20:04:00 +0000

Shabana Azmi was spotted earlier this week letting loose at the music launch for her friend Dia Mirza's new movie, Love Breakups Zindagi. Here is the story at Daily Bhaksar, also carried by other sources.

How cute is that?

More pictures of the launch here at Prokerala.

Javed sahib wrote the lyrics for the songs, which I haven't listened to yet. He was at the launch too, of course.

(Picture source)

"Jaan ab ja rahi hai," - Khel khilari ka (1977)

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 17:48:00 +0000

Remember the Shabana-gaana feature? Back when I used to update Sounds Like Power obsessively, I reserved Fridays for interesting (for better or worse) song picturizations featuring Shabana Azmi.

This week the feature returns with "Jaan ab ja rahi hai," a qawwali from the 1977 movie Khel khilari ka. I'd never heard of this film before and assume that it's thoroughly forgettable - but the song itself is not half bad. I don't care much for Shabana ji's outfit - there seemed in this era to be a lot of dressing tawaifs and female qawwals in Pepto-Bismol colored suits -but she handles herself with reasonable competence, doing something much closer to real dancing than you usually see from her.

I am not sure who all the men are who join her partway through the song - the video quality is too poor for me to tell for sure. I am pretty sure I spotted Shakti Kapoor. And, with the help of Memsaab's incredible resource, the Artist Gallery, I confidently identified a fellow named Dhruv, whom to my knowledge I have never seen before.

On Muslims in India

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 02:35:00 +0000

Another video for you today as I continue to catch up. This is not a new piece - it's an IBN interview from 2008 - but I hadn't seen it before.

In the interview, Shabana Azmi talks about Muslim identity India. She notes that Indian Muslims are in a relatively good position, compared to Muslims in other parts of the world, because they are stakeholders in a democracy, and there are prominent Muslims in many walks of life (for example, movies and politics) that can serve as role models.

I don't feel qualified to judge whether I agree or disagree with Shabana ji's statements here. What do you think?

Al Jazeera Interview

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Sat, 03 Sep 2011 12:46:00 +0000

"Every time you make a statement about India, the opposite is also true."

-- Shabana Azmi

Catching up on Shabana Azmi news I missed during my hiatus, I have come across quite a few newer videos that I'll pass along here, on the off chance anyone is reading. Back in April, Shabana ji gave an English-language interview to Al Jazeera, which you can watch here on YouTube.

The interview doesn't cover any new ground, if you are a long-time Shabanaficionado like myself. The interviewer asks easy questions that allow her to trot out her well-rehearsed lines - about art being an instrument for social change, about India living in several centuries simultaneously, about only seeing Javed sahib in airports, and other familiar topics.

Still, it's enjoyable to watch, especially to me as a sort of re-introduction after not hearing Shabana ji's voice on a regular basis for so long. Toward the end, she does make some interesting comments about religion and tolerance. And the video opens with some charming pictures of Shabana as a young girl, including this one that I'd never seen before:

Everyone: awwwwwwwww!

"Massive Food Coma"

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 01:46:00 +0000

"Am suffering from massive food coma from Eid at our home and Ganesh Chaturthi at my sis in law Tanvi's place"

-- Shabana Azmi

Did you know that both Shabana Azmi and Javed Akhtar are on Twitter? I am not a huge Twitter user myself - I have tried to get into it but (probably for the best) haven't ever managed to get too engaged. But, I do participate from time to time (@carla_filmigeek) - and of course I follow @AzmiShabana and @Javedakhtarjadu. It's fun to see what they have to say, and to test my Urdu on the shayari (Javed sahib's, Kaifi sahib's, and others) that they occasionally offer.

Today on Twitter, Shabanaji complains of "food coma," an affliction with which I am all too familiar, and a phrase for describing it that I often use myself. It's fun to see her using the expression as well. I'll continue to pass along her thoughts and Javed sahib's here when they tickle my fancy.

Update to movie review links

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 17:08:00 +0000

Since I neglected this site for so long, the link list "Filmi Geek Reviews Shabana" over at the right side of the page had fallen somewhat out of date. I've updated it now with a few of my reviews of Shabana Azmi's movies. None of these reviews can really be described as "recent" but at least the list now includes all the reviews!

Here are quick links to the additions:

Eid Mubarak!

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 13:06:00 +0000

"I love Eid. The tradition with Eid is that it's an open house. Friends drop in, we don't invite anyone. The dahiwada and sheer qorma must never run out, that's the challenge for the hostess who has no idea how many guests to prepare the food for."

-- Shabana Azmi (source)

Wow, has it really been more than two years? I have a few too many projects and got spread too thin. Something had to go - more than one thing, actually, but this blog has suffered the worst of all my projects.

I miss it. I still admire Shabana Azmi as much as ever, but I am out of touch with her doings. I haven't been keeping up with the news of her activism or her acting. I can't make any promises - it's unlikely I'll ever be able to devote the level of attention to SLP that I did in its heyday. But I'd like to find a way to have at least a little presence here. Let's see what happens.

And in the meantime, enjoy your Eid celebration, Shabana ji!

News about It's a Wonderful Afterlife

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 13:44:00 +0000

Hello folks! Some of you might have noticed I've posted a few reviews at Filmi Geek in the last couple of weeks. I am still getting into the flow of my new job and still trying to balance the various interests tugging on my time, so I don't want to promise too much and then fail to deliver. That's why I haven't tried to return to a regular posting schedule here.

However: this was too interesting not to share, and maybe it's the kick-start I need to get back to glancing at the news about Shabana Azmi every day and sharing the best of it with you.

Some of you probably know that Shabana ji is working on a film with director Gurinder Chadha (who made Bend It Like Beckham, among others). The new film is called It's a Wonderful Afterlife. I've been alerted to a Live Journal page carrying an IBN piece on the film, which includes short clips of interviews with Ms. Chadha and Shabana ji, among others. The movie looks very funny; I'm looking forward to finding out more, and looking forward also to Shabana ji being in a film that is sure to find wide art-house distribution and buzz in the U.S.

Click here to load the page and watch the video. And thanks to Gauri at BollyWHAT for the heads-up.

Incidentally that Live Journal page seems to for fans of Sendhil Ramamurthy, the good-looking fellow who plays the irredeemably stupid Mohinder Suresh in the television series Heroes. It will be interesting to see how he'll do sharing the screen with Shabana ji.

"Halke halke," Apne paraye (1980)

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 16:40:00 +0000

Our first post-hiatus Shabana-gaana is a pretty song from Basu Chatterjee's 1980 film Apne paraye. I have had this film in my collection for ages but still have not got round to watching it.

The song is sung competently by Lata Mangeshkar but I don't find her a great match for Shabana Azmi, who by the way looks completely lovely in the song.

The video is not embeddable so click here to watch it on YouTube.

Metapost - Geek of a new trade

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 21:54:00 +0000

I am so sorry for the extended posting hiatus here and at my other two blogs, Filmi Geek and Geek of all Trades. The past half-year or so has been trying for me, with lots of soul-searching and thinking and introspection. I had to let something go, to have the energy for all that, and it was the blogs that suffered. For you, SLP readers, that meant I wasn't able to keep up with the latest news about Shabana Azmi, collect screencaps, or post random musings about our favorite excellent woman.

The good news is that I have decided to say goodbye to my career as a patent attorney, and in a little over a month I will be starting a new career and a new job as a technical writer.

I don't know exactly what the future holds, but I miss Shabana Azmi and I miss blogging and I will definitely be back. So please stay tuned for postings soon, as I turn the page on my professional life and, with any luck, get back some of the energy I used to spend here thinking and writing and communicating with all you folks out there.

Thanks for reading, and I'm looking forward to getting back in touch with all of you.

Birthday wishes

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 15:07:00 +0000

I have not forgotten Shabana Azmi's birthday.

Warmest birthday wishes to the great lady, who turns 58 today.

I have not forgotten you, either, the readers of SLP. I've just been very, very tired and have had to cut back on the extracurriculars for a while as I work through some things. I would like to keep up with the news of Shabana ji and keep you all posted as well. But for the last couple of months the energy to do that simply hasn't been there. I will try to get back to a more regular posting schedule soon. In the meantime, please bear with me, accept my apologies, and read my comments on Loins of Punjab Presents, which I finally got to see last weekend.

Loins of Punjab Presents finally on U.S. screens

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 20:07:00 +0000

It's been a long, long wait - nearly a year - but Manish Vij over at Ultrabrown reports that Manish Acharya's Loins of Punjab Presents ... is finally seeing a (limited) U.S. theatrical release.

Manish says the film, a screwball and very original comedy about a small-time desi talent contest in New Jersey starring Shabana Azmi, Ajay Naidu, and a bunch of other talented folks, will open September 12th on two screens in New York, and will later show in the San Francisco bay area, Chicago, and a few other cities.

I hope that if it does well it can be picked up for an even wider distribution. There are at least two art houses in metro Boston where it would fit right in to the usual program. But I am not going to wait to find out; I think I'll be heading to New York for that opening weekend. It's absurd that I have still not seen this movie.

Starstruck

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:00:00 +0000

The first real star I met as a journalist was Shabana Azmi. Long before meeting her I idolised her. As a rookie I still remember how fast my heart pounded as I sat wide-eyed in the portico of her beautiful house in Janki Kutir, waiting for her to emerge from inside. When she eventually did in a chic salwar-kameez, her hair falling to her shoulder and her eyes penetrating into a horizon far beyond human vision, time just froze.

-- Subhash K. Jha.

Source: An edition of Jha's Times of India column from a few weeks ago. I'm not a big fan of Jha - he's an inveterate name-dropper, and this particular article seems to have no other purpose - but these comments struck me; I think all of us who idolize Shabana ji can sympathize. I'm sure that once time started moving again for Mr. Jha, he was able to do the business he went to her house to do, and to leave with a good interview for his editor. When I met Shabana Azmi, though - it's still only been the one time - I lost my tongue, and was unable to make any impression on her whatsoever. I hope I'll be able to keep my head a bit better, next time.

Priorities in order

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 13:50:00 +0000

TV shows extremes – either the women will be as good as gold or wicked as the Devil. When somebody tells me that women are being portrayed in the bad light or as subservient, I consider it far more objectionable than women dressing up skimpily and celebrating their sexuality.

-- Shabana Azmi

Source: This article about Shabana ji's role in Ekta Kapoor's "Kaun jeetega Bollywood ka ticket," which I mentioned here not long ago. Shabana ji astutely touches upon a very important point. To object to the portrayal of women as human beings with autonomous sexuality is to perpetuate the dichotomy that is described in Western culture as the Madonna-whore problem. It shows in Shabana ji's body of work (among other things) that she recognizes the importance of a woman's freedom to express her own sexuality as she chooses, and that a dramatic portrayal of a woman doing so is not automatically cheap, improper, or objectionable.

Gratuitous screencaps: Main Azaad hoon (1989)

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 01:45:00 +0000

Marbs and Sally aced the trivia question I posted the other day: the two movies that Javed Akhtar wrote and Shabana Azmi starred in were Jhoothi shaan and the subject of today's gratuitous screencaps, Main Azaad hoon.

Main Azaad hoon is, to my knowledge, the only movie in which Shabana Azmi starred opposite Amitabh Bachchan. It was a pretty good movie - I have a half-written review which will be posted at Filmi Geek some time in the next couple of days. Until then, here are the screencaps.

(I doctored that one - the print I watched had dreadful color in some scenes)

Trivia: Written just for her

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 22:26:00 +0000

It seemed like a nice time for another installment of SLP's semi-regular trivia feature.

Should Shabana Azmi ever retire from the movies, I have a fantasy about her final film. My fantasy is that Javed Akhtar will write a script just for Shabana ji and she will win her sixth National Film Award for the role.

As it happens, Javed Akhtar considers himself rather a man's scriptwriter, and probably has no tour-de-force role for his wife lurking, as yet unwritten, in his pen. He has, however, written two films (that I know of) in which Shabana ji has starred. Can you name them?

Here is a hint:

This is a screencap from one of them, which I watched last week; the review will be going up at Filmi Geek in a couple of days, followed by more screencaps here.

Video interview "Cover Story"

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 03:16:00 +0000

Great thanks to reader Mihiri who left me this fabulous link in a comment a couple of weeks ago; it slipped off my radar screen somehow (Blogger handles comments somewhat inelegantly) and I missed it until quite recently.

What it is: a lovely video interview of Shabana Azmi from about four years ago, by Vir Sanghvi for (what I presume is) a television show called Cover Story. In the twenty-minute interview Shabana ji sings a Carnatic swaram, and discusses the difference between commercial acting and art-cinema acting, the Stanislavski method, why she became a film actor, being afraid to smile, why she decided to join a hunger strike for the rights of displaced slum-dwellers, and why she has refused to join any political party, among other things.

My favorite part of the interview is a story that is both about Shabana ji and about her parents. In 1986, Shabana Azmi joined her famous first hunger strike for Nivara Haq, an organization devoted to fighting for slum-dwellers whose homes are destroyed by government and private development, because she felt it was useless for her to lend her voice to the organization if she was not also prepared to go the distance demonstrating with them. It was a decision she made from the heart, quite risky for her career and her public perception, but she believed it was the right thing to do. Government officials tried to convince her mother, Shaukat Kaifi, to stop her, but Shaukat would not. Still, Shaukat was concerned for her daughter's well-being, and when Shabana ji's hunger strike was five days old, she sent a telegram to Shabana's father, Kaifi Azmi, who was then away in Patna. She's getting sick, Shaukat said, what can I do? Please talk some sense into her. Kaifi's response: "Best of luck, comrade."

You can watch the video here. (A note: I was only able to play the video in Internet Explorer; the player interacted poorly with my ad-blocker in Firefox.) And thanks again to Mihiri!

Gouri Dange on Tanvi Azmi

noreply@blogger.com (Filmi Geek) — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 16:18:00 +0000

I just came across a lovely piece by Gouri Dange, whom I mentioned here a few days ago. Ms. Dange is a very close friend of Shabana Azmi's sister-in-law Tanvi Azmi, and has republished on her blog an article she wrote about Tanvi a few years ago.

Tanvi and I have spent the last 15 years talking non-stop, laughing recklessly, eating too much, observing mercilessly, arguing gently, crossword solving furiously, weeping occasionally, ranting full-throadely, and exchanging the deepest of secrets - to the exclusion of anyone else - husbands, etc too. A tarot reader recently declared us soul-sisters. We didn't need her to tell us that.

Read the rest of the piece on Ms. Dange's blog.