The Lunch Date

The Lunch Date

Film: The Lunch Date

Director: Adam Davidson

Duration: 10: 23 Min.

Language: English

‘The Lunch Date’ gives an introduction to the dry attitude of the white society towards the black Americans, where the perception of a middle aged woman is analyzed via the race factor existing in the society. The story is set in 1940s at the Grand Central Station, where a woman is rushing towards her train stuffed with her shopping bags. Within the gush of crowd, she collides with a passing black gentleman & misses her train in the rush of things. While she sighs at the wailing train, she realizes that her wallet is missing. She throws a scrutinizing attitude to the blacks around her and decides to walk to a nearby cafeteria. With some leftover change, she manages to buy a bowl of salad, but finds a fat black guy hogging on her salad vigorously. As the guy sits and eats off her salad, she stares furiously at him with heart full of hatred for the blacks. Her stomach constantly growls with hunger burning her till head. She hastily sits up with the black guy & takes a famishing bite, giving a sudden emotional as well as satirical kick to the audience. She ends up sharing the food with the black man, whilst each bite lightens up the weight of hatred in her. To post mark the meal, the black buys her back some coffee. The lady leaves the café in dilemma & surprise. It is revealed only a little later that she sat on the wrong booth and her salad was still lying on the same booth she left her packet.

Now whether the director has left a loophole here or he’s done it on purpose, that towards the end, when she walks out of the door, she still doesn’t react to a black beggar (Suggestions are invited in comments). The audience may find it absurd to see the harshness of the woman who actually eats off a homeless man’s lunch or even take it in a sensible manner as she actualizes the whole incident and laughs out loud at the café. This film has proved to stand as a powerful medium for the discrepancy between the black & white people that caused distress and annoyance among all. No matter what sect, race or creed one belongs to, the biggest identity of a human being is empathy as well as humanity.

You might wonder: This story was remade as ‘Rice Plate’ by an Indian Director ‘Rohit Roy’ in ‘Dus Kahaniyaan’.

Kikujiro

When we express our thought in words, the medium is not found easily. There must be a process of translation, which is often inexact, and then we fall into error. But eyes need no translating; the mind itself throws a shadow upon them.

- Extracted from ‘Dark Waters’.

Film: Kikujiro (Kikujirō no Natsu)

Director: Takeshi Kitano

Genre: Family/Drama     

Language: Japanese                                                                                     

If This Was Real: Life of a child is as magical as the sudden stroke of pink in the sky just after the rain, which fades within the blueness making it dissolve like a muddy hare lying in the sand.  Those were the gloomy afternoons, where he played in his mayo colored sneakers, splashing water, kicking musk melons, nodding warmly at the miserable beggars and making friends with the roadside pups hopping helter-skelter. This playtime hour breaks when the angel’s bell chimes through the forest. As it turns dark, the sky starts pouring right across the ocean like shallow-painted sea gulls. The mellow light of life with pretty wings and the babe blue angel gets him back in his bed, putting him back to sleep. It is hard to believe, yet beautiful to imagine, sighing if this was real.

This is real: Even a tiny crib is filled up with lots of golden fishes, but something still goes missing. The dark side of the past tickles him inside, burning down the tears : a crave to play with friends of the batch, a swift caress of an angelic mommy , the easy-to-climb shoulders of royal daddy and a small window that used to be his Sun, beaming life each morning!

One little boy Masao (Yusuke Sekiguchi) chubby cheeks, raw eyes, buttoned nose walks the heavy road back from the school, fearing the summer vacation that starts tomorrow. The passers exclaim at his intensity, the neighbors sigh to his fate. He squeaks in weak cheer for the friends who are heading off for a beach vacation with their parents, restores his calm walk to the old granny’s archaic style care and a sudden desire to catch the glimpse of mother, the lady he’s never met. 

Masao lost his father when he very young, with very few memories of him, while his mother played an invisible character in an unknown land far-far away. The obliged kid is a gentleman to the granny, ill-fatedly left alone by her mother so that she can make a living. The vigor in the child’s eyes is agonizing and his vision here kinda gets me a feel of detrainment, whether to balance or fall on the tracks of hostile luck, or to be betrayed by the loved ones, what Masao apparently defines throughout the film. The piano raiding is warm and touchy across the film, as Masao has his own silent conversation through his body and soul. The shrills of the boy are barely examined, the street boys guard everywhere to mug his capital, however a neighborhood couple killing a way long dog-cat fight, arguing the augmentation of numerous husbands applied to each of their mothers, are still good enough to realize the boy’s intentions. A dominating wife, though with positive energy, sends her crook husband (Takeshi Kitano), to help the boy find his mother. A Mister and the boy, with a pocket full of money and random fantasies, walk together to beat the vacation. The Mister has his money making races while the boy, weaves his characters, naming them each. The sad and the funny versions keep over routing the paths of mischievous phase between the two.

The Mister and the boy, Equals to Kikujiro and Masao, are two inexplicit definitions to life where the mister speaks, boy too, mister nods, boy has neither inventions. The careless Kikujiro is a frantically funny and irritating character to begin with. As he startles the by passers with hysteric rudeness, including the boy, he loses all funds in the race. The little one’s silent breathtaking disrupts him as Kikujiro eventually, grabs the boy’s capital money and asks him to guess the numbers. Bingo, the man is already convinced. The super funny Kikujiro has a cocky idea, as he bribes the boy to guess the numbers on and on, till they loose everything again. It’s far more than what appears again. The boy was doing well at the same time missing precious moments to see his mother. Kikujiro isn’t a bad man; he’s just a liar, an illiterate diver (app. Land and water), rude bloke breaking window shields of those who refuse a ride, cackling and guffawing in his own natural manner, attempting to keep the boy out of troubles, and eventually failing.                                                            

The canvassing of characters in Masao’s life is very similar to the ones described in fairy tales. Or say, the kid has narrated them so realistically through his picture book to bring all those toys back to life. There is a scary man, shiny head light moustache. Octopus, water melon, alien, the old castles witch, tree demons, black panda and the porcelain blue angel. The tears shimmer like a silver pond, diving and hiding the grunts of lil Masao. The lives revolving around him play hide n seek, waves of emotions come gushing in block the way from others was kinda pretty. The slink traveler, the charming pair of fatso and baldy, and mushy Kikujiro plays toys to him, ‘for the kid’s sake’. The journey of Kikujiro and Masao, consciously or unconsciously keeps moving till both of them come to a moment, in common. When they say, ‘He’s just like me.’

 

The soft moments between the two were mossy enough to slip even the devil’s soul. It all ends with realization, lovingness, heavy memories, little desires, porcelain dreams, the kicking and screaming, stealing Turkish delights and holding silence to hear the chiming train whistling far in the east, when you get down on knees to make a pray of life, live a life or make a life.

DARK WATERS

(To view this film, click the above link)

Synopsis: Subhashini is a mute daughter of town's richest landlord. While, she ardently set goals for herself each day to communicate with the people around, she gradually finds herself sinking in the society’s filth & their sick mind scape. The film narrates how she struggles on day to day basis, to make the world understand about her existence.

Director's Cut

I started shooting this film on April 7, 2010 along with my team including 4 crew members & the actors. We were nothing, but a skeleton crew with very basic tools & equipment & a volcanic passion to do this project. The first scene was shot by the banks of Yamuna flowing by Noida/Mayur Vihar & the best one was when my cameraman Gowtham Shravan Kumar took a trolley shot in a trash cart, making it look much like the usual. We couldn't afford a professional camera or any lights, hence the whole movie was shot on a digital camera (Fujifilm S2000). The film was completed on April 12, 2010. I'd like to thank my whole team including Gowtham Shravan Kumar, Raman Sinha, Nirmalya Sehrawat, Divye Sharma, Neelmani Kumar, SriRaj Ray, Gaurav Gupta & my parents who gave me strength each time I stumbled.

Watch it & give your honest feedback/take/comment/reaction or even a smirk to this film.

-love & peace

Komal

Kindly note:

• The video quality has been compressed for upload.

• This film is in process of a remake.

• Those interested in getting involved in the project may drop a note.

Take me home, Country roads

Four months of exile in NCC made her neutral in the heart & pale in the face, where she turned into an intense thinker. Who would have guessed that she was merely 13. Today, she’s returning home. The train was scheduled to arrive at six forty five am at the Jodhpur Junction. Her face was getting ridiculous and threatening, as the train moved further. The train will be reaching the town in another 5 minutes. The fellow cadets were hugging each other, marking sweet goodbyes, exchanging souvenirs and making promises to meet again. But she was lost in her own world, as if someone held her soul & she’s tolerating the clutch. She got up suddenly and walked towards the door. Her expressions were dead as she footed on the train's door. People thought she is gonna jump off. While the wind kept moving leaving the tracks behind, she stared blankly at the missing poles. The train changed its path giving a slight goosepinch to the kids, as if it's gonna leave the tracks any moment. The fellow mates got tensed, though nobody dared to come close to her. The train had already entered the junction yet to slow down. The instructor makes up his mind to rush towards the door to stop her, but the girl's neutrality keeps him engaged with his thoughts. Before anyone could make an effort to pull the girl back, she jumps off the train.

The passengers run towards the doors and the window to see the girl. It felt like they all lost their five senses for a second. Everyone stared at the hanging girl. She was hanging in her father’s neck, hugging and kissing him, crying and hugging back.

It looked like a valley of heaven, as if they were meeting after many worlds had walked past them.