TINTIN!

Simply. Loved. The. Movie.

Fantastic animation, brought to life on an IMAX 3D screen. (Have you also felt like you're gonna fall while in the Dome? I always do. Sigh.)

Here's what I saw:

Every teeny, tiny detail - laugh lines around Tintin's/ Haddock's eyes. (Hmm. Girly, to notice.) Tintin's tuft of hair waving gently in the breeze. The Unicorn's scale model with some glorious detail. Waves in the sea. Bubbles. Bianca Castafiore's jewels. Snowy's velvety little nose and beady eyes.

And oh, the movie, too.

TORTURE

in the form of the movies.

I'll refrain from naming said horror film, but all I can is that, for a change, I'm speechless. Speechless at how a perfectly good storyline can be ruined simply by long-winded narration that travels across continents, traverses time, space and eventually defies any and all logic.

I want my money back. Better still, my money back with compensation for mental harassment and physical torture (it was a three-hour film).

On the positive (?) side, there were two three (yes! three!) good things about the film:

• My tub of caramel popcorn
• My coffee
• The interval

TV TIME

Harry Potter on the telly again! Hurrah! Off to watch The Goblet of Fire for the nth time.

SON OF SNAPE

While watching Part II of the Deathly Hallows, that's what came to mind. Heh heh! How is that possible? Well, imagine HP in Bollywood, or on Indian telly land. There, anything is possible! And by that, I do mean anything.

Sample these:

• Husband/ son of the family declared dead. Widow/ parents of said son in mourning. Post funeral, that is. So just when the widow about to be remarried, the dead - yes, dead - husband shows up.
• The Ms Goody-Ten-Thousand-Shoes daughter-in-law (DIL) missing/ presumed dead/ similar tragedy. Evil DIL (or equivalent scheming female relative) has taken over the simpering household and reigns Queen. In a twist of fate, the original DIL (believed to be dead, remember?) returns - with a shiny new face, courtesy the friendly neighbourhood Plastics Guy. Cosmetic surgery at its best!
• Child marriage long over, the matriarch of the family does not like the single-digit aged grand-DIL, and hatches an Evil Plot to have her (also underage) grandson remarried - to another minor. Many twists and turns and years (and finally hitting maturity) later, said grandson moves to the Big City and falls in love, forsaking the sweet little wife from childhood - with Wife Part II, i.e. the minor from his nightmares! Tough keeping up, eh?

So I figure, if any of that can happen, why not the Son of Snape? Or maybe sequels involving business rivalry (now that Lord Voldemort is no more - or is he? Heh heh! *eyebrow raised*) between the Potter/ Weasley kids and the Malfoys? Or wait - maybe even a marriage between them! Gasp! Of course, this would only be a plot to take over the Potter millions. Ahhh! See - endless possibilities!

What's your version?

TELLY ON THE BLINK

So we're in the middle of watching Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince for the nth time, when suddenly Hermione peers out at us from this gloomy, mud-coloured screen. That she's also eerily outlined (for want of a better word) in orangy-yellowish squiggles really doesn't help her case. Or rather, the telly's. Panic. Mad rush to the TV to switch off the mains, count to ten, and switch the TV back on again, silently sending up prayers to the Telly God. Apparently though, he's rather miffed with us: twelve hours later, Hermione still looks the same. Sigh.

Reach out for the laptop, Google Samsung India's helpline, and listen to Tinny IVR Lady for the longest time, before getting connected to "Hello, Ma'am, this is Whatsisname, how may I help you?". Turns out that the 'help' will arrive only after 24 hours, so until then, we have other forms of entertainment to choose from for today:

• Listen to music.
• Read. (Ah. Music to my ears, I don't need the radio now, really)
• Paint. (Damn, where did that canvas get to?)
• Take a walk in the rain. Hmm, maybe towards evening.
• De-clutter my wardrobe. Uh, yeah, sure. *whistles loudly, looking skywards*
• Just spend time chatting with the significant other. Now this can be done!
• Cook. Err, rain check! Rain check!

THAT CRICKET LOOK

For the enthusiast, this might be akin to a horror movie - how can someone dislike (note: 'hate' being too strong a word) those cricket matches on television? For someone not so enthusiastic about cricket (me! me!) - I can see heads nod in full agreement (read: sympathy) already.

If you stop and take a moment out to think, you'd wonder what's with men (who can, sometimes, be sensible) - they go all starry-eyed and drown mesmerized in the television screen... It's with almost the same passion as being in the throes of first love, if not more. It's the kind of look not even given to the women in their lives. Reserved specially for the game, it shrieks 'love at every sight'. Always. The love story just doesn't end.

The word seasonality doesn't apply here. On second thoughts, it does: if you're talking about the increasing hysteria around what is popularly termed as 'Cricket Season'. (If you ask me, there isn't a time of the year that doesn't fall under that category - reruns of some godforsaken matches that took place even before you were born count.)

Right now, though, the title belongs to the World Cup. From a schedule lovingly put up in the house, and plans being made to watch the game with the boys, from where I see it, it's gonna be sheer unadultrated torture until the madness dies down.

But... does it ever?

COMMERCIAL BREAKS (AND TELEVISION SHOWS)

I've decided that these are the best parts of any television show. (Err...okay, so there may be a couple of exceptions to that. Three, at max.)

You derive more entertainment (and information) from a commercial, rather than those inane soaps, where the mother-in-law (MIL, to the uninitiated) is scheming against her DIL (no prizes for guessing that one now!), while her MIL is out plotting against her. To add to this mêlée is the neighbourhood baddie who has the hots for her daughter and is going all out to ensure that his attempt at kidnapping her is successful, while the nerd from across the road injures himself while attempting to foil that very same bid... *whew* Pause for breath. Figure if you turn on the TV set some six-odd months later, it'd all look the same. At the most, you can expect a generation leap of some twenty years. Of course, the storyboard doesn't change.

To put things into perspective: You have one auntie from a daily soap, fake eyelashes et al. Also a potted plant. IQ level's significantly higher in the case of the latter.

As for the commercials, they teach you to bargain at your local greengrocer's, invest for your future, dream of a new car (and hope that you have a rich uncle in the Bahamas), zap up some astonishingly succulent looking, ready to cook in a jiffy meal for the famished family... all in a span of a total of 120 seconds, all told.

Bring 'em on! At least they don't insult my intelligence.