Thursday, November 09, 2017

The Official Story (Spanish: La historia oficial) 1985


Can we start by rejecting all conventional and established social institutions consisting of family, community, culture, education, marriage, religion, government, legal, judicial, healthcare, mass media, political and social welfare?

How can we discard this system considering we were born into this organism? What is the alternative? Do we have a choice?

Are we aware that all is not well in our world, all is not quite alright? – but we choose to ignore the fact – and prefer not to do anything about it. We have a preference not to ask questions and believe blindly whatever we read in our history (story) books.


Outside of Argentina very few of us are even aware of the repressive days of the late 1970s to early 1980s by the military junta and the days leading to the Falkland War. Totalitarianism is always the same throughout the world.



La Historia Oficial (The Official Story) directed by Luis Puenzo is an eye opening film. The story takes place shortly after the coup d’etat by the Military Junta ( 1976-1983).


What looks implausible is that how could possibly a history teacher be so blind to the environment around her while even reporting one of her students who remarks that "History is written by assassins”. What the student probably meant was that history was and is written from the point of view of those who are in charge and those who win the conflict.


One is led to feel that the protagonist even though being a history teacher represents the general mass of any country that practices a life time of complacent ignorance and apathy and is unaware of the horrors unleashed by a (paradoxically) democratically elected authoritarian government.

This awakening and realization of the horrors that occurred in Argentina without the protagonist’s consciousness could very well parallel several situations occurring in the world even today.





Human endurance on one side and brutality on the other goes hand in hand since time immemorial. We are perennially in a state of denial - We allow what happens around us.


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Sunday, November 05, 2017

Abeerdeen (2000)




Watched Stellan Skarsgård’s (who convincingly plays the character of an alcoholic) Abeerdeen (2000) and came out with a relief that the director Hans Petter Moland does not give us any moral lesson and does not tell us what to think. You are left on your own to make up your own mind!



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Friday, November 03, 2017

The 47 Ronin (1941) - Kenji Mizoguchi



The 47 Ronin was released in 1941 during WWII. Kenji Mizoguchi’s cerebral 3 hour and 40 minutes film will really take into task the most ardent film buffs.




This samurai movie is in Japanese language, shows a different culture and a different time period (18th century historical event), most of the characters are clothed alike with unusual and unfamiliar names.



It peeps into the world of hara-kiri – a ceremonial suicide by slicing the stomach until the bowels spill out, then decapitated by a accomplished swordsman.



No blood is spilled, neither is there an exhibition of swordsmanship skills. It's strictly a historic drama


No sarcasm intended but this two-part film is not for everyone. It is tormentingly slow paced, colossally lengthy and necessitates a lot of endurance.


A must see in one’s lifetime.

Visit : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forty-seven_r%C5%8Dnin


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Thursday, November 02, 2017

You will be what you are!


If Human beings are left totally free, they would all become like Idi Amin/Kim Jong II/Saddam Hussein/Josef Stalin/Adolf Hitler/Mao Zedong/Benito Mussolini/Francisco Franco/Muammar Gaddafi/... . But how did they become like them? Were they totally left free to become what they became? Or was it that they created themselves because of their ability alone and not by the submissive and psychotic masses who wanted someone like these totalitarians to have authority over them?




Are you thriving to crave for a life under authoritarians?

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Wednesday, November 01, 2017

The Cranes are Flying (Letyat Zhuravli)



If you are a misanthropist, you will become more cynical after watching a film which is unknown to the general mass. The portrayal of war and the effects it has on the common people is cataclysmic. Mikhail Kalatozov’s The Cranes Are Flying (1957) is a masterpiece of film making.

Cinematographic effects, shots, acting, direction, camera angles, mise-en-scène, themes, creativeness……astounding!





The scenes of Veronica in the midst of the tanks, wriggling through the crowds when Boris is about to leave for war, Veronica running up the stairs to her apartment after the German air bombing only to confront that there is nothing left of her home, Boris’ death scene, Veronica trying to clutch on to hope that Boris will return while the observer learns early of his fate leaves a bleak environment, Veronica in the verge of committing suicide but timely saving a young kid and the last scene of Veronica moving frantically amongst the victorious crowd are indelible from one’s mind.


After watching this work one will be left to realize that seeking a meaning to life is as futile as life itself.

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Assortment of Quotes

Build your own dreams, or someone else will hire you to build theirs.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someones elses life.

When everything seems to be going against you, remember that the airplane takes off against the wind, not with it.

It is not the years in your life that count, It is the life in your years.

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you thing about that, you'll do things differently.

A mind is like a parachute, It doesn’t work if it isn’t open.

Stop chasing the money and start chasing the passion.

Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else. .

You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough..

Shoot for the moon – Even if you miss, you ill land among the stars.

You have not failed – you have just found 101 ways that wont work.

20 years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do then but the ones you did do.

LOGIC will get you form A to B – Imagination will take you everywhere.

It always seems impossible, until it is done

You only have to do a very few things right in your life so long as you don’t do too many things wrong.

Pain is temporary – Quitting last forever.

If yor don’t know what you want – you will end up with a lot you don’t want.

Life is not about waiting for the storms to pass. Its about learning how to dance in the rain.
Most of the important things in the worked have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all

Life is a grindstone and whether it grinds you down or polished you up is for you and you alone to decide.

The Death Rate for people who play if safe and for people who live boldly is the same = 100%

By failing to prepare – you are preparing to fail.

Everyting you want is just outside your comfort zone.

Smooth seas do not make skillful sailors.

If I have do live my life again, I had make them same mistakes only sooner.

The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary,

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results,

BE who you are and SAY what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter won’t mind.

A goal is not always meant to be reached – it often serves simply as something to aim at.

TWO sure ways to fail – Think and never do or do and never think

When you feel like giving up, remember why you held on for so long in the first place,

If you can find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn’t lead anywhere.

You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step

Don’t watch the clock - do what it does – KEEP moving

Even if you are on the right track, you ll get run over if you just sit there,

Watch your thoughts, they become words – Watch your word, they become action – Watch your actions, they become habits – Watch your habits, they become character – Watch your character, it becomes your destiny

Good judgement comes from experience – Experience comes from bad judgement.

If opportunity doesn’t knock – build a door

Your ATTITUDE determines you ALTITUDE.

You don’t get to choose how you are going to die, but you get to choose how you are going to live.

You will never find time for anything – if you want time, you must make it

The harder you fall the higher you bounce.

Don’t ever wrestle with a pig. You will both get dirty, but the pig will enjoy it.

You can do anything, but not everything.

Someone was sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago

You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life

You don’t drown by falling in the water, you drown by staying there.

You can’t cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water

Try a thing you haven’t done three times.
Once, to get over the fear of doing it.
Twice to learn how to do it, and a third time to figure out whether you like it or not.

You cannot change your destination overnight, but you can change your direction overnight.

Great minds discuss ideas, Average minds discuss events, and Small minds discuss people.

You cannot control what happens to you, but you can control your attitude toward what happens to you.

If you aren’t making any mistakes, it’s a sure sign you’re playing it too safe.

Behind every successful man there is lot of unsuccessful years,

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambition. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great

The road to success is always under construction

If you don’t know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere

Think BIG! You are going to be thinking anyway, so think BIG

The only man who never makes mistakes is the man who never does anything

You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks

It takes a strong fish to swim against the current; Even a dead one can float with it

When a man blames others for his failures, it’s a good idea to credit others with his success.

Throwing away ideas too soon is like opening a package of flower seed and then throwing them away because they are not pretty

There is no one tiny step that does it; it’s a lot of little steps

Every second you spend thinking about someone else dreams you take time away for your own

The only reason we don’t have what we want in life is the reasons we create why we can’t have thme

Everything is always created twice – first in the mind and then in reality

Why compare yourself with others? No one in the entire world can do a better job of being you than you

Others can stop you temporarily – you are the only one who can do it permanently

Ask yourself this question- Will this matter a year from now?

You are the AVERAGE of the five people you spend most time with

If you are going through HELL – Keep going

Behold the turtle; he makes progress only when he sticks his neck out

Associate yourself with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation, It is better being alone that in bad company


Monday, October 30, 2017

Fear Corrupts

John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton, KCVO DL (10 January 1834 – 19 June 1902)—known as Sir John Dalberg-Acton, 8th Baronet, from 1837 to 1869 and usually referred to simply as Lord Acton — once said :- "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men."

*(Even fear corrupts and absolute fear corrupts absolutely. The Fear of losing Power tends to make people corrupted.)

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Friday, October 27, 2017

Mass Production


Human beings are lonely animals – maybe that’s why they all end up trying to huddle together to form a mass. Maybe this is why the mass never creates and invents anything. You cannot collaborate in Arts, Mathematics, Poetry, Painting, Music or Philosophy. It is the lonely, individual mind that creates. Once the creation or invention is done, the mass takes over and builds it up (we call it mass production). The lonely, individual human mind is free and this is the most valuable thing in the world. It is free and undirected and takes any direction that it pleases. This is where the religion, the government and the system of the world come in, trying to control, limit and destroy the individual.

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Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Two Of a Kind



There are two kinds of men – One Greedy, Egotist, Narcissist, Smart and clever. We loathe these people, but they are associated with Success in our worldly structure. We think highly of their success!

The other kind is Gentle, Kind, bighearted, Honest, Sensitive, Sympathetic, Sincere, Candid, Considerate, and Caring. We have a high regard for such people, but there are identified as failure in our system.

Seriously! What are we THINKING?

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Monday, October 23, 2017

Life Moves On


Like the prolific poems of Stephan Crane, Walt Whitman, Archibald MacLeash and Carl Sandburg

Like the Blues & Jazz sound of Lonnie Johnson and the folk songs of Dave Van Ronk

Life moves on, along uncharted, unplanned, unscheduled, unknown meandering paths

Sunday, February 12, 2017

Bob Dylan - Chronicles: Volume One


During the early 1970s whilst I was in my teens, I discovered Bob Dylan. Later I started calling him Bob Da (Da means big brother in Bengali). Like many a teenager and having been born and brought up in the then erstwhile Calcutta, I was also into Cliff Richard, Elvis Presley, Elton John, Eric Clapton, Simon & Garfunkel, John Denver, ABBA, George McCrae, The Temptations, Roberta Flack, Smokey Robinson, Linda Ronstadt, Bee Gees, The Beatles, Eagles, KC and The Sunshine Band, The Carpenters, Ann Murray, Cat Stevens, Matt Munroe, Jim Reeves, Engelbert Humperdinck, amongst other. But Bob Da stayed.


Later I discovered Frank Sinatra. Frank Da too stayed. Much later I discovered Woody Guthrie. Initially I could not connect Woody with Bob Da. But as I delved deep into Woody, I understood how much Influenced Bob Da was by Woody. Not only Bob Da, but Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Bruce Springsteen, Johnny Cash and Pete Seeger amongst others too were heavily influenced by Woody.


Then while existing, Bob Da’s Chronicles, Volume One fell into my hand in 2016. Thanks to Bob Da, I discovered – Walt Whitman, Archibald MacLeish, Carl Sandburg, Stephen Crane, Lonnie Johnson, Andy Warhol, Wynonie Harris, Ivory Joe Hunter, Little Walter, Chuck Willis, Stanley Clark, Bobby Hutcherson, Charles Earland, Patti Austin, David Benoit, Marianne Faithfull, Joan Armatrading, Irma Thomas, Jim Dickinson, , Odetta, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Blind Blake, Charlie Patton Tommy Johnson, John Jacob Niles, Joe Hickerson, Meade Lux Lewis, Big Joe Turner, Pete Johnson, Josh White.

Now I can exist a little bit more.

Saturday, February 11, 2017

Quotes - Leó Szilárd

Leó Szilárd (11 February 1898 – 30 May 1964) was a Hungarian-American physicist, and probably the first scientist to take seriously the idea of actually developing atomic bombs; he drafted the famous letter sent by Albert Einstein to U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt that was largely responsible for initiating the Manhattan Project to develop nuclear weapons during World War II. *(Wikipedia)



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# Suppose Germany had developed two bombs before we had any bombs. And suppose Germany had dropped one bomb, say, on Rochester and the other on Buffalo, and then having run out of bombs she would have lost the war. Can anyone doubt that we would then have defined the dropping of atomic bombs on cities as a war crime, and that we would have sentenced the Germans who were guilty of this crime to death at Nuremberg and hanged them?

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# A great power imposes the obligation of exercising restraint, and we did not live up to this obligation. I think this affected many of the scientists in a subtle sense, and it diminished their desire to continue to work on the bomb.

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# All we had to do was lean back, turn a switch and watch a screen of a television tube. If flashes of light appeared on the screen it would mean that liberation of atomic energy would take place in our lifetime. We turned the switch, saw the flashes — we watched for about five minutes — then switched everything off and went home. That night I knew the world was headed for trouble.



Thursday, February 09, 2017

Quotes - John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton.

John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, 1st Baron Acton, KCVO DL (10 January 1834 – 19 June 1902)—known as Sir John Dalberg-Acton, 8th Baronet, from 1837 to 1869 and usually referred to simply as Lord Acton—was an English Catholic historian, politician, and writer.





He is perhaps best known for the remark:

- "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely".

- "Great men are almost always bad men.
"

This idea has been tested in laboratory settings. *(Wikipedia)

The above quotes have been found to be re-quoted time and again by everyone, without giving credit to this great statesman:

It is surprising how relevant his third quote is even today :

- "The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority, or rather of that party, not always the majority, that succeeds, by force or fraud, in carrying elections."

Sunday, February 05, 2017

You Decide

The Hungry asks for food,
The people ask for clean water
Friends fall out
War ships carry guns and planes
Bombs fall from the sky
Houses and cities are burned
Ships don’t carry food and medicine
Hands lie idle
No jobs and no pay
You sit on my head
You make the laws
You decide how much money I should earn
You decide how much money I should spend
You decide how much money I should save
You decide how much money I should keep in my house
You decide.....
You decide everything
You keep me in jail for not listening to you
Your hospitals are dirty and corrupted
Your jails and prisons are filled with innocents
Whilst criminals rules outside
I can’t find work and I can’t buy things
And I am afraid to ask questions
Lest I be seen as anti-national and unpatriotic
I keep quite
I pretend to be dumb

Sunday, January 22, 2017

Quotes - Seneca the Younger



Source : Wikipedia

Lucius Annaeus Seneca (often known as Seneca the Younger or simply Seneca /ˈsɛnɪkə/; c. 4 BC – AD 65) was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman,dramatist, and in one work humorist, of the Silver Age of Latin literature.

He was a tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero. While he was forced to commit suicide for alleged complicity in the Pisonian conspiracy to assassinate Nero, some sources state that he may have been innocent. His father was Seneca the Elder, his elder brother was Lucius Junius Gallio Annaeanus, and his nephew was the poet Lucan.




_It is better, of course, to know useless things than to know nothing.

_Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful.

_As long as you live, keep learning how to live.

_No man was ever wise by chance.

_It is quality rather than quantity that matters.

_When I think over what I have said, I envy dumb people.

_Everywhere is nowhere. When a person spends all his time in foreign travel, he ends by having many acquaintances, but no friends.

_Life, if well lived, is long enough.

_No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness.

_For many men, the acquisition of wealth does not end their troubles, it only changes them.

_The mind that is anxious about the future is miserable.

_To keep oneself safe does not mean to bury oneself.

_Not how long, but how well you have lived is the main thing.