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All articles by Shubhajit Lahiri
18 July 2011
"I'm prepared to take chances at this point and I don't respond to the moral objections."
Vietnam War was a life-altering experience for America. On one hand, receiving a resounding drubbing at the hands of a small, poor, guerrilla-fighting nation like Vietnam was a humbling experience for a giant and superpower like the US – a perfect example of David felling Goliath. On the other, the war took...
12 June 2011
What do you think spies are: priests, saints and martyrs? They’re a squalid procession of vain fools, traitors, too, yes; pansies, sadists and drunkards, people who play Cowboys and Indians to brighten their rotten lives. Do you think they sit like monks in London, balancing the rights and wrongs?”
The first two books by David John Moore Cornwell, better known to the world as John Le Carre, viz....
15 June 2010
"That's some catch, that Catch-22," he observed.
"It's the best there is," Doc Daneeka agreed.
Let me start with the obvious – Catch-22 is the kind of book I have never read ever before, and in all probability, will not get to read since. It is a mad, crazy, insane, hilarious, acerbic, brilliant book brought forth through Joseph Heller’s mad, crazy, insane, hilarious, acerbic, brilliant writing...
19 April 2010
“Until one morning in mid-November of 1959, few Americans—in fact, few Kansans—had ever heard of Holcomb.”
November 15, 1959 turned out to be a bizarre day in the lives of the good people of Holcomb - a small, closely knit, god-fearing town located in the west of Kansas State. Comprising principally of blue-collar, middle-class American citizens who lived by the religion, were proud of who they...
09 March 2010
Mystic River, the brilliant and award-winning contemporary crime fiction novel by Dennis Lehane, is the tale of three Boston buddies whose lives took divergent courses after one fateful day when they were kids. Now, twenty-five years later, another deeply tragic event, have not just brought them together, but has also set them off on a collision course from which no one can hope to escape...
28 November 2009
“You don’t owe nothing to dead people”
Cormac McCarthy, one of the most revered contemporary American fiction writers, won acclaim in literary circles with books like Blood Meridian, All the Pretty Horses and especially his latest work The Road for which he was awarded with the Pulitzer Prize in 2007. However, one might safely state that outside the literary circles, he will perhaps be best...
16 October 2009
The Postman Always Rings Twice and Double Indemnity, written by James M. Cain, an exponent in the hardboiled school of writing, were two of the great masterpieces in American literature, and sources for famous film noir adaptations. Both featured gripping tales of lust, murder, double crosses and betrayal, and abounded in nihilism and wry cynicism.
“Except for the shape, she wasn’t any raving...
15 September 2009
Kaalbela is an acclaimed and an award-winning Bengali novel by Samaresh Majumdar. Set in Calcutta during the turbulent 1970’s, while on one hand it tracks the birth of the Naxalism – a far-Left urban guerrilla movement, through its protagonist Animesh Mitra, on the other it is a deeply personal tale of love and camaraderie during the times of revolution.
Very few works of art earn the right to be...
08 June 2009
While speaking about Ray’s contributions to the world of cinema, it is very easy to overlook, especially those who do not speak Bengali, his prolific literary output. In fact it can be safely said that, had he not been a filmmaker, he would still have been as famous, at least in Bengal – such was (and still is) his fame as a writer. I would venture so far as to state that you will find very few...
05 June 2009
Ray covered a host of genres in his lifetime – from psychological, urban dramas to satirical comedies and musicals, from political films to children’s fantasies, from historical epics to detective movies, from noirish tales to simple fables, from road movies to buddy films – he covered 'em all. In Jalsaghar (The Music Room) you have Chhabi Biswas as an aristocratic zamindar who is...
03 June 2009
Satyajit Ray was a Renaissance Man – a versatile genius of immense capabilities. A towering personality, he wasn’t just one of the great auteurs of world cinema, but also a prolific writer, a brilliant illustrator, and an exceptional composer among others. Born to a family of literary giants, Ray is a cultural icon like few others.‘Genius’ is such an overused word that it has perhaps ceased to...
29 March 2009
Welcome to the world of film noirs – a world infested by two-bit thugs and crooked cops, anti-heroes with a thing for cynical wisecracks, platinum blondes ready to take a good man on a bad ride, femme fatales in the garb of damsels in distress, shabby joints where men of dubious intents plot shady deals over cheap whiskey and cigarettes, seedy hotel rooms where love is just another word. This is...
18 February 2009
The Wrestler, a classic tale of an underdog’s life, is an intimate and bittersweet portrayal of the simple joys and tribulations of human existence and the desperate attempts at survival by a man of flesh and blood. The movie is a glowing elucidation of Darren Aronofsky’s storytelling skills. However it is perhaps more a Mickey Rourke vehicle than an Aronofsky one – he’s that good in his...
13 January 2009
Adapted from Vikas Swarup’s novel Q&A, and directed by Danny Boyle, Slumdog Millionaire is a movie that is easy to rave about but difficult to avoid. With a fairy tale storyline concerning the triumph of an underdog against all odds, that viewers are bound to find inspirational, the movie is never didactic in its approach, and manages to pack a strong punch. What sets the movie truly apart is...
19 December 2008
The Proposition, which could easily qualify as one of the best Australian movies ever made and a terrific deconstructionist Western, is a darkly visceral poetry on violence and a philosophical study on human and societal decadence. The movie is a brilliant study of the contrasts – the beauty as well as the brutal, and in the process has become both mesmerizing and menacing. One of the best films...
05 December 2008
California Dreamin’ (Endless), along with such movies as 4 Months 3 Weeks and 2 Days, and 12:08 East of Bucharest, forms one of the cornerstones of the ongoing Romanian New Wave movement. The director Cristian Nemescu, who tragically died when the movie was deep in post-production, didn’t just suffuse the movie with vivid realism, but also with enough pinching humour, bitter ironies and oblique...
17 November 2008
“What's your road, man? — holyboy road, madman road, rainbow road, guppy road, any road. It's an anywhere road for anybody anyhow.”
That’s not the kind of question that an everyday Joe would ask; that’s not an inquiry that would lurk in the mind of a 9-to-5 desk clerk. Hell, that’s not the kind of thought that someone scrubbing for a mere existence in a drab world, living just another static...
01 November 2008
The Big Sleep, along with books like Hammett’s Maltese Falcon, and Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice, is considered a cornerstone where hard-boiled fiction is concerned. It is famous for its labyrinthine and deliciously convoluted plot, filled with complex character study. The befuddling and cynically laden narrative, which twists and turns like a serpent on marijuana, however, is just one of...
21 October 2008
Arguably Truffaut’s most audacious and experimental work, it is a loving homage to and a fascinating pastiche of American genre movies, especially but not limited to, film noirs, gangster films and B-movies. The story of a washed out protagonist trying to escape his past, comical shady thugs, and love on the run might be straightforward; but the array memorable dialogues, brilliant comical...
03 October 2008
The Killing Joke is arguably the greatest Joker story ever told. It traces the history of Joker – how a simple-minded, innocent looking, God-fearing, struggling family man with a beautiful and loving wife turns into Batman’s greatest and most iconic foe. The theme propounded here is brilliant. The Joker believes that one really bad day can turn even the sanest person into the very reincarnation...
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