Whilst I Muse!!

  THE ARCHIES Zoya Akthar and her team took me back to a world I'd forgotten. One I and much of my generation had lived in and grown up on. It was regular fare that we lapped up hungrily on lazy afternoons, at our coffee tables, couches, the front porch, perched on our favorite tree and sometimes, cheekily, even behind our school books. The colorful Archie Comics, have endured since 1941, the characters crafted and sketched creatively by the publisher (John. L. Goldwater), writer (Vic Bloom) and illustrator (Bob Montana), were something to wait for, like how we anticipate the next episode of our current favorite OTT show. Archie with his carrot top hair and carefree grin, Jughead in his sloppy clothes and love for Pop Tates, Big Moose, the bully, all brawn, sans brain, Betty, blonde, so sweet and pretty, Veronica with her black-violet hair and snobbish ways, Reggie all cheek and conceit, Big Ethel, was she really big, Mr. Weatherbee round, bespectacled and long-suffering. We w...

The last few days have given me an appreciation of what it like to be alive! The coughing refuses to subside, and now I know what it means to be knee deep in phlegm, that seems like an ever flowing spring from under the ground, only to tire out the hole it incessantly arises from. What started off as a regular cold and respiratory congestion, and was expected to be chased away, with absolutely no challenges, via a dose of antibiotics, after the said dosage, showed no signs of abating, very soon turning into a nightmarish chest infection. I glared, in my mind, and wondered suspiciously at the unnecessary necessity of X-rays and CT scans that my trusted pulmonologist was uncharacteristically recommending. I even went so far as to mentally question his good sense, cursing hospitals for laying the bait, so as to reel in their daily moolah from unsuspecting prey, only to have the results come back positive with signs of an infection in the lungs, an organ, by the way, I've suddenly gain...

  MALAYALAM MOVIE REVIEW JANAKI JAANE(JJ)   Fear, we all know can numb us, debilitate us and render us incapable. Fear, has been explored as a theme in many movies before in various ways. However, Janaki Jaane offers a fresh take on fear and how it can affect a person. Extreme fear leads to anxiety and panic attacks, which is what Janaki, the female protagonist experiences too, affecting her daily functioning and capability to deal with life. And yet, she is a normal, healthy, happy, confident person in many ways. She realizes her issues may create problems if she marries, and she chooses not to, citing various reasons, until a man comes into her life, wanting to be with her, despite her issues. An incident, resulting from her fear, unwittingly puts her bang in the middle of a political controversy, amidst imminent elections, making her and her family scapegoats, in a political rivalry that soon takes the form of a scary media circus, resulting in loss of privacy, freedo...