My thoughts on the silver screen...

Celluloid...Cinema...Picture...Feature Film...Movies............

Interesting synonyms to a very interesting entertainment medium we have today! I sometimes wonder what our lives would have been without movies around us!

Some might find this amusing or even funny..But having been brought up in India - a lot of us are influenced by the Hindi film industry - popularly known as Bollywood! And when I say influence - I really mean it!

I was in High School when HAHK (Hum Aapke Hain Kaun) hit the screens and every other teenager/person in love was coughing his/her heart out !!!!

Anybody who has seen the movie knows exactly what I am talking about :-) However for those who haven't..here's a quicky. "The lead characters Prem & Nisha are having this chemistry amongst themselves ever since they meet up. The coughing starts as the mimic of an older accountant around. And it carries on toward the end of the movie as a sign or symbol of teasing between these characters. They use the mimic coughing instead of saying 'hello' over telephone and every other place they are having a secretive romantic act going on.."

My point is - whether it is a mimic cough or a dialogue used repeatedly by lovers or a hair style that has made a fashion statement..It was and is very hard for most of us to ignore the long lasting influence of the silver screen! We laugh till our tummies are ready to burst.... and cry till our eyes are sore..but still just cannot stop watching! There are even times when we hate the melodrama and we want an intelligent director to come out with something much more realistic - and needless to say - it happens!! For many of us its a place where we can take our lessons from and for all the dreamers - we want those stills in movies come to real life with either the character or our loved ones!!

For people like us who are living thousands of miles away from our home country - the craze for movies has increased even more. We hunt for theaters who show these movies as soon as we relocate to another place. And if the Indian grocers don't have the recent collection of movies - we would probably think of switching stores! :-)

It doesn't mean that all we watch is Hindi movies.. The regional movie industry including the now famous Tollywood is reaching new heights every day..And we love those too. And if you are a movie buff like my dear husband - you just can't miss the ever famous Hollywood movies!! That's like a never ending collection of mystery...drama..romance...action! Of course not as many songs as our famous Indian movies :-) But that doesn't make us love these ones any less!

Most of us have our favorite movies/characters/roles/dialoges just scribbled somewhere in our memories and won't mind watching them again n again.. But at the same time we like to watch what's happening next ..and which director is coming out with what .... So here's a small piece of the internet dedicated to the all time famous Celluloid from practically all over the world.. In no ways I mean to officially criticize anybody's work here. Its just a nook where I would like to note down my thoughts over the movies I have and am watching....And I would love to know how much you agree or disagree with my thoughts...

So read on...my fellow Celluloid Lovers! And Happy Movie time!

Cheers!!

-Shailja