Doubts of St. Thomas

Rebecca Solnit, in her recent article, was observing how Trump is behaving like a vengeful ex intent on destroying the life of the 'one' who rejected him. In this case, America in 2020. Unfortunately he is somewhat successful in the venture, acting on some nihilistic impulse to take the entire house down with him.

Elsewhere, actor Megan Prescott and director Adam McKay have teamed up with OnlyFans models to explain climate crisis through their short NSFW videos. An extension of the trick used in McKay's The Big Short, where Margot Robbie explains subprime mortgages from a bubble bath. It is the realization that while the ex is busy burning the house down, the only way to get the neighbors to notice the fire, is to bait them with a thirst trap.

Jumping to Kerala, we see the movie Vaazha 2 crossing hundred crores this weekend and somewhere on Reddit, someone wonders why the third film can’t center on girls, given that the first two revolve around boys. The reply comes: "Is that even possible.. are girls ever even called vaazha"? I haven’t heard it used that way, but regardless, writer-cum-producer Vipin Das today has announced that the third installment will indeed be female-led. I suspect our majority-male audience won’t show up for it. They want their 'vaazha uselessness' to resemble themselves.

I have often believed art is for art's sake. But the current demands of the market push everything (not just art), toward a productive output. Basically, everything you do requires some 'transferability'. Personally, I’m an alien to this concept, and I choose to remain one. It is why I 'subjected myself' to the recent Wuthering Heights — I needed to see how a novel I love was portrayed, regardless of the dismal reviews. I needed to see it with my own eyes. The St. Thomas in me raises the doubt, clears the doubt, and settles it once and for all. Yes, it was as bad as they said, but how would I know for sure unless I witnessed the wreck myself?

So, there is this guy Gaz Oakley, who I occasionally watch on YouTube, mostly for the aesthetic quality of his videos. Actually the credit should go to his DOP cum Editor... but anyways.. Oakley is a strict vegan living in a Welsh village with access to incredible forest produce. He spends hours foraging wild mushrooms, only to add a hell of a lot of ingredients to make them taste like chicken. And I wonder: why can't he just have some actual chicken instead! Why must the mushroom apologize for being a mushroom? 

I often miss the friendly crossfires we had in college among rivalling ideologies: Left vs Right, or Mohanlal vs Mammootty. Oddly beautiful when close friends disagree without dissolving the relationship. It reminds me of the Tamil movie Kodi, where lovers stand on opposite political ends. Which brings me to Tamil Nadu, where Vijay is going in full swing with his election campaign. How self obsessed has he become over the years, is what I always wonder! A bunch of enablers around him and he seems convinced he is the next MGR. Man! Oh we are taking a full circle now... I started by talking about one such showman on another continent. 

But for the hopeful, the glass is finally half full in Hungary. Yesterday marked the end of Viktor Orbán’s sixteen-year far-right rule. My beloved columnist Michelle Goldberg, was in Hungary the day before the election. She says, the opposition leader (now the winner) Péter Magyar, "over and over beseeched the crowd : Do not be afraid!".. and the crowd in turn broke into a chant: ''We are not afraid". The voter turnout in fact proved they meant it. Surprisingly or not, it reminded me of Snyder's Justice League. When Steppenwolf descends to steal Mother Box and declares to the Amazons, he will bathe them in fear, Queen Hippolyta smiles and asks her warrior sisters: "Daughters of Themyscira, show him your fear!" and they in return say: "WE HAVE NO FEAR!". 

That’s it for now, even though the civil war in Sudan continues into its fourth year with no sign of a hard stop. The death toll has crossed 150,000, but who really wants the statistics of these expendables? Here is a more 'interesting' statistic for the market: the cost of delivering UN aid is now higher than the cost of the supplies themselves, thanks to the Iran war driving fuel prices through the roof.

Coming back again to Kerala, we still have people who say they are proudly apolitical, and that politics is irrelevant to how anyone lives. Good for you! Distance has been kind to you.