Movies : February 2003

26 February 2003

Russian Ark

The theater managed to misspell the second word in the English-language title on the sign board with the show times and on the tickets. There’s something about shooting in real-time that is antithetical to story-telling. I did find this Russian film, shot as one take for its entire length (excepting the credits and one scene created in post-production), to be slightly less sleep-inducing than I found Waking Life.

100 minutes.

15 February 2003

The Guru

How did an R-rated comedy see the light of day in this age? Director Daisy von Scherler Mayer I knew from Party Girl, with Parker Posey, which I had recently revisited on the archaic technology of laserdisc. Dance instructor Ramu Gupta (Jimi Mistry), entranced with the idea of America since his first glimpse of Grease in a Delhi movie theater (subtitled in one of the local languages), finally emigrates certain that stardom is his. Dismayed at the idea of driving a taxicab, and incapable of handling the stress of being a waiter, naïve Ramu finds a classified advertisement for an audition. Completely oblivious to the fact that the audition is for a lead (male) role in a pornographic film, he gets the job. But on set, he has performance issues, and seeks help from the female lead, Sharonna (Heather Graham). Sharonna allows herself some professional empathy for the recent immigrant. Ramu ultimately uses the lessons from Sharonna to impersonate a guru. His tips on sexual performance make him the toast of the town (or at least that part of Manhattan that matters). But with so much lying on the part of all the players, there must be some crisis in the offing. It’s funny. Plus Marisa Tomei is in it. Heather Graham is on my list of pretty actresses with no charisma, but she tries hard in the role.

94 minutes.

Entries subject to editing at any time. Last edited on: 12-Sep-2004