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adityamurti79
Reviews
Forks Over Knives (2011)
All that you have read and may be your parents have told you about the goodness of milk, eggs, and meat ..well it was a myth as this documentary would tell you
A couple of years ago it was Food Inc made famous with its slogan "You are what you eat". And now we have "Forks over Knives" reviving the nutrition debate backed by a whole set of scientific data and logical analysis.
I am not too overwhelmed by it, but somethings gotta give. I see some truth (and experiencing it too) in their premise although giving up it all might not work for most of us. But we can do it in moderation for starters. So what does the documentary talk about? In a nutshell it borders on years of scientific experiments, years of data collection, and the conclusion that an American physician Caldwell Esselstyn and professor of nutritional biochemistry T. Colin. Campbell have arrived on through years of painstaking research.
Face it. Animal protein is not good for your health. The rising incidence of cancer can be directly associated to the growing intake of animal protein, should you choose to believe the documentary. Similarly the intake of egg is detrimental to your immune system and not good for your health. And if you are still surprised here's the killer. Milk, that we consider to be a source of calcium actually leads to bone erosion in your body. Stunned. The documentary points out that the intake of milk actually leads to rise in acidity in your body, and to counter that and maintain the pH balance, your body actually absorbs the calcium of your bones that would form the alkali to stabilize the acidity. This in turn makes your body more deficient of calcium and your bones weak. Aaah! so much for the calcium in that milk.
Caldwell and Colin go on to prove that whole food plant based diet is the best source of the nutrients required by your body without any detrimental effect. In fact proteins and nutrients from a plant based diet have the capability to reconstruct your body cells, valves, arteries and make you a new person altogether. Try a rocket salad or a spinach salad for that calcium and feel the difference. If you don't believe that witness the cases of a Type II diabetes patient who was cured without any medicines and that whole food plant based nutritional diet alone.
I am no scientist. But after watching the documentary and implementing the diet and cutting down my intake of milk and meat products, I do feel more energetic, responsive and healthy. The lethargy is gone. I can't say about the cholesterol, and blood sugar because they never troubled me before. However I intend to stay like that forever with this new found knowledge and diet plan.
Indiekaleidoscope
Silver Linings Playbook (2012)
Everything in the movie is about mental breakdown, and slowly and steadily, and quite comically you make sense out of it. You relate to the method in the madness.
Its a stressed out world indeed. And we are all stuffed inside this pressure cooker, dreading from the fact that we might grab too much of that mid flab, frantically transferring the balance on that god damned credit card to flash that Steve damned i Phone.
We have husbands and wives cheating on each other while they had acknowledged their unconditional love just the night before. We are super informed and more aware, except for two things. A substantial lot of us could be "undiagnosed bipolar" or a "superstitious OCD".
I know you might have never realized that, but that's what this movie does to you apart from making you marvel at the creative genius of the script writer, the director, and the acting cast.
There are Hollywood movies with a pent up storyline, and compelling and dramatic performances jazzed up with an out of world graphical realism. They most certainly come with the wow effect.
And then once in a while you have a farm fresh movie with a simple story but crazy characters. An Indian psychiatrist (Anupam Kher) preaching his patient about the importance of Excelsior and medication. The protagonist patient (Bradley Cooper) working on his strategy for his previously undiagnosed bipolar disorder. Jennifer Lawrence as a self proclaimed and widely acknowledged slut with her own bipolar and medication to take care of. Robert De Niro in what he does best but with an added superstitious OCD as he is out of job and has been betting his balls off in American football.
Behind these characters is Bradleys mentally challenged desire to get back in shape and win his wife back who has been remorseless about getting hotter under the couples hot shower with another man. Jennifer is the one worth her salt by being the only one in the movie to confront this mental craziness with her overpowering bipolar.
When you have a once in a while farm fresh movie where everything is about mental breakdown, and you are watching it and slowly and steadily making a sense out of it. This, not through a nerve wrecking and nail biting storyline, not with a slapstick overtone, but through madly interwoven edgy characters. When you love it because you understand and relate to the method in the madness even if its remote. It is then you realize the creative genius of Silver Linings Playbook.
The movie is by far one of the best movies I have seen in a long time. Its right there in the league of The Tao of Steve, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Darjeeling Limited, Jeff Who Lives at Home, and Our Idiot Brother.
It's only a lot crazier and a lot more better. It's my five finger and whole palm blessed movie.
Indiekaleidoscope
Wild Bill (2011)
Wonderful with that Indie flavor - must watch
What do you do when you come back home after serving time, and find your children abandoned by their mother, fending for themselves in their apartment. What do you do, when to add to your miseries the social service gives you one final warning to either mend your ways, or lose your family forever.
I can't say much about us, but Wild Bill Hayward (Charlie Creed-Miles) works as a human signpost. He can't risk it and wants to set the broken pieces right. His elder son Dean (Will Poulter) is a no nonsense guy. A tough life in the absence of his parents has made him being worked up all the time.
But the crown goes to Jimmy (Sammy Williams) who is the sweetest kid in the block, and is successfully, and willingly lured by the drug peddlers, and the local drug dealer. He is the one who seems to have inherited his father's genes perhaps. But Bill knows that he has to fight back. He has to keep Jimmy out of harms way, and in his mission, he is arrested again for breaking the terms of the parole.
The story of the film is good, but the way it has been scripted and has been shot makes that difference, and makes it a winner.
Two classy scenes that's a must watch. The scene where Bill makes a paper airplane and propels it to take a wonderful flight from his balcony much to the delight of Jimmy.
The second one is the last scene, when he tells the cop as he is about to be driven away on the police car. "They are my boys. I am their dad", and then he cries almost inconsolably. I still feel that powerful emotion while I am writing this review.
It's a must watch movie that would remind you of the style in Tyrannosaur and most of the attitude in Attack the Block. Go for it.
Indiekaleidoscope