The Common Man Speaks

Awareness needed ASAP, say Fibromyalgia patients

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By: Keyur Seta

Twelve years ago Sagarika Chakraborty, then in her teens, started suffering from a terrible headache which refused to subside even after undergoing medical treatment. Due to this, it was concluded she has Migraine. She started medication for that as well but to no avail. Later on, she developed a whole lot of other health issues that just wouldn’t get cured. She underwent tests after tests without any conclusion. “In fact, there is not a single test I haven’t undergone,” she said at The World Arthritis Day meet in Mumbai recently. The event was an initiative by rheumatologist Dr Shashank Akerkar.

Since she was appearing absolutely normal with the tests showing no signs of any illness or disease, people started believing she is faking an illness just to stay away from studies. Worse, questions were even raised about her psychological wellbeing. Sagarika lived with such physical and emotional baggage for 12 years until she came to know from a doctor in Hyderabad that she is suffering from a rare condition called Fibromyalgia. And it was only a year back when she was able to start proper treatment for the disease from Dr Akerkar.

“For 12 years I suffered mis-diagnosis and took over 36 medical opinions. God forbid this should not even strike my worst enemy. I suffered but pledged that others around me shouldn’t. So I am here to talk,” she said.

There are only a handful of people in India who have heard about Fibromyalgia. In fact, people might take some time before even pronouncing or spelling it properly. Fibromyalgia is a chronic disorder characterized by widespread musculo-skeletal pain, stiffness and tenderness of muscles and joints without detectable inflammation. But that is not all. Patients suffering from Fibromyalgia also experience sleep disturbance, fatigue, irritable bowel movements, depression, anxiety, stress, hypersensitivity to light, sound, heat and cold, etc.

Anuradha Khanna Pentapalli speaking about Fibromyalgia at the World Arthritis Day

Some patients also show symptoms of Parethesia (feeling pins and needles), cognitive dysfunction and memory problems (known as Fibro Fog). Sadly, the symptoms are not reduced to these. While revealing few other symptoms, Sagarika says, “I can’t move for a few seconds after I sit for long. Sometimes, a thousand pins prick my body and my eyes. It locks my jaws and dehydrates me. I have nerve pinch in seven parts of my body. There are mornings when my fingers won’t move. My nostrils hurt and a certain nerve throbbing is almost visible through the skin.”

Needless to say, emotional trauma goes hand in hand with Fibromyalgia. It is been found that a very high percentage of Fibromyalgia victims are females. In fact, the female to male ratio for this disease is 9:1.

What is worse is that there is no sure shot cure for Fibromyalgia. There is treatment available but it can only help in reducing the symptoms or controlling the disease. And since there are a wide range of symptoms, undergoing a single treatment doesn’t work. A patient is prescribed medical drugs but at the same time, it is vital for him or her to undergo physical exercises as prescribed.

As patients suffering from Fibromyalgia appear totally normal, the disease is also known as ‘Invisible Illness’. “If an employee is suffering from Fibromyalgia, he or she has to often take leave from work. This becomes difficult because the patient looks physically normal. Hence, most of the patients quit their jobs to work part time as working full time becomes extremely difficult,” said Anuradha Khanna Pentapalli, another patient suffering from Fibromyalgia, at the meet.

It is due to total lack of awareness that Fibromyalgia has derived the nickname of ‘Invisible Illness’, especially in a country like India. This was enough to prompt Anuradha to launch an awareness campaign for the disease in the form of a website called – http://www.fibromyalgiaawareness.com/. The website provides complete information for a layman on Fibromyalgia including its meaning, symptoms, tips on how to live with it and most importantly, comments from patients. The website also has a Facebook page – http://www.facebook.com/fibromyalgiaawarenesspage.

Anuradha and Sagarika along with a group of individuals are also all set to start a non-profit organization called The Purple Pact which will aim at setting up centers with specialized facilities for chronic pain patients. But for that, one needs awareness.

“There are around 3-6 % of world population suffering from Fibromyalgia. But the percentage of patients in India is just unknown! Due to the lack of awareness, naturally people won’t understand what a patient goes through.”

Both Sagarika and Anuradha are thankful to their doctor Shashank Akerkar for creating awareness on Fibromyalgia through World Arthritis Day. “It is vital to create awareness. If people start accepting the disease and the problems associated with it, it will certainly make life better for us,” sums up Anuradha.

Dr Shashank Akerkar (Click to enlarge)

Aiyyaa Box Office Prediction

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Director: Sachin Kundalkar

Producers: Viacom 18 Motion Pictures and AKFPL Production

Writer: Sachin Kundalkar

Cast: Rani Mukerji, Prithviraj Sukumaran, Sobodh Bhave

Music: Amit Trivedi

Genre: Drama

Release Date: October 12, 2012

Analysis:

Star Value: Rani Mukerji’s star status and fan following is enough to create excitement for Aiyyaa, although she won’t pull huge crowds to the theaters initially. Due to her presence alone, the star value for the movie is quite high.

Hype: The promos of the movie have impressed the audience and managed to create a lot of buzz. Apart from the humour, Rani’s crazy antics have made the audience curious for the movie.

Music: The song ‘Dreamum Wakepum’ has become instantly famous. Other songs like ‘Aga Bai’ and ‘Sava Dollar’ are slowly becoming popular. The music has had a big hand in popularizing the movie.

Prediction:

Aiyyaa will get a good opening at the box office but only in the multiplexes of the metros. After OMG! Oh My God and English Vinglish, this is the third film in three weeks that shouldn’t be judged by its collections of the first weekend. It should earn around Rs 20 crore or more in the first weekend if it manages to impress initially. If that happens, Aiyyaa will continue to do well after the first three days. It will face competition from Sridevi’s highly impressive English Vinglish which is expected do well in its second week as well.

Kismet Love Paisa Dilli (KLPD) Box Office Prediction

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Director: Sanjay Khanduri

Producers: Invincible Entertainment Pvt Ltd

Writers: Sanjay Khanduri

Cast: Vivek Oberoi, Mallika Sherawat, Ashutosh Rana, Anshuman Jha

Music: Amjad Nadeem and Santokh Singh

Genre: Thriller, Comedy

Release Date: October 5, 2012

Analysis:

Star Value: Both Vivek Oberoi and Mallika Sherawat are famous actors but they are no longer crowd pullers. Hence, the star value for Kismet Love Paisa Dilli (KLPD) is just average.

Hype: The promos of the film have failed to create any major buzz or excitement. The makers have promoted the film well but that has not helped much. Hence, there is hardly any hype for KLPD.

Music: The song ‘Dhishkyaon’ is a good peppy number which has become somewhat known. The rest of the songs have hardly succeeded in making a mark.

Prediction:

Kismet Love Paisa Dilli (KLPD) won’t get a good opening at the box office. If it manages to super impress, it will get an average response, mostly in the single screens. Overall, it looks difficult for the film to succeed at the ticket window.

English Vinglish Box Office Prediction

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Director: Gauri Shinde

Producers: Eros International and Hope Productions

Writers: Gauri Shinde

Cast: Sridevi, Mehdi Nebbou, Priya Anand, Sulbha Deshpande, Amitabh Bachchan

Music: Amit Trivedi

Genre: Drama

Release Date: October 5, 2012

Analysis:

Star Value: Sridevi, one of the most loved actresses of Bollywood, is making a comeback after 15 long years. This has created some excitement for the movie although she won’t be a crowd puller by any means.

Hype: The unusual first teaser of the film (where Sridevi reads a censor certificate) made heads turn. The main promos have received a decent response. The overall hype is good although not as high as one would expect from Sridevi’s comeback movie.

Music: Only the title track has become somewhat popular. ‘Navrai Majhi’ is also slowly becoming known.

Prediction:

English Vinglish will get an average to decent opening at the box office. The film will score more at urban multiplexes while it will struggle at single screens and small centers. But like last week’s OMG! Oh My God, this film too relies more on word-of-mouth and it shouldn’t be judged by its’ first weekend collection, especially the first day. It should earn around 15-20 crore in the first weekend. If it impresses initially and gets a strong word-of-mouth, it might surprise us and earn more.

OMG! Oh My God Review

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Director: Umesh Shukla

Producers: Akshay Kumar, Paresh Rawal and Ashvini Yardi

Writer: Umesh Shukla (Story, Screenplay and Dialogues)

Cast: Paresh Rawal, Akshay Kumar, Mithun Chakraborty, Mahesh Manjrekar, Govind Namdeo, Poonam Jhaver, Nidhi Subbaiah

Music: Himesh Reshammiya, Anjjan-Meet Bros, Sachin-Jigar

Rating: * * * *

Plot: A complete non-believer, Kanji Mehta (Paresh Rawal) earns great profit by taking advantage of people’s blind religious faith. He sells random idol of Gods and attaches false mythological history with them which obliges people to buy them at a giveaway price. One day, Kanji goes a bit too far by halting a Dahi Handi festival by spreading a rumour.

Just then, his shop is destroyed in an earthquake. Worse, he is unable to recover losses as the insurance company regards earthquake as an ‘act of God’. Hence, Kanji sues God in the court of law. His argument is simple – If there is God, He will appear in court!

Review: In order to please and worship God, a number of religious rituals are followed in India like pouring hundreds of liters of milk on a Shivling, offering many chaadars in a dargah or offering lakhs of candles in churches. However, Umesh Shukla’s OMG! Oh My God rubbishes off all these rituals while stating that all one needs to do is be a good human and help the needy in order to impress Him. It also gives a moral slap to those who carry out business in the name of God. The powerful message presented in an entertaining manner makes sure the film is worth watching more than once.

Like all well made films, OMG! Oh My God has a very meaty and a fast moving script. Umesh Shukla succeeds in narrating the tale at a steady pace, defining characters clearly and at the same time providing some quality humour. The first twist in the story, which comes very early, gives rise to a number of powerful and entertaining scenes. A human lodging a court case against God is never seen before in a Hindi film. Of course, Akshay Kumar’s arrival provides the icing on the cake.

Picture courtesy – OMG Facebook page

Thankfully, unlike a number of Hindi films, OMG maintains momentum in the second half too in terms of story development and the script. It is during this period where there a number of clap-worthy scenes which are enlightening and a real treat! Some further interesting twists ensure a heartwarming as well as an eye-opening climax.

The whole team of OMG deserves applause for daring to give such a bold message in a country where people are obsessed with blindfaith which certainly doesn’t do any good to them or the society.

If one tries to find flipsides, one can include some scenes showing miracles and also the fact that Kanji’s original mission goes off-track in between. But since these points also help in bringing the final outcome, you don’t really mind. However, there are chances of some over-sensitive God worshippers might get offended by some scenes and dialogues.

Talking about the technical departments, the cinematography, background score and editing are fine. Two songs ‘Go Go Go Govinda’ and ‘Mere Nishaan’ suit the situations while ‘Ji Ji Ji’ is superb due to the lyrics.

Paresh Rawal’s performance deserves a standing ovation. He gets into the skin of the character and displays every emotion with ease. This will surely be one of the talked about performances of his career. It is risky to play a character like God but Akshay Kumar manages that easily and gives a lovable act. However, Mithun Chakraborty’s act as a gay swami wasn’t amusing. There was no need to include such feminine mannerisms in the character.

Govind Namdeo is effective as a short tempered priest. Nikhil Ratnaparkhi does very well as Rawal’s loyal friend. Murli Sharma, Lubna Salim, Poonam Jhaver and others are not bad.

Overall, OMG Oh My God shouldn’t be missed for it gives a great message while providing quality entertainment. The film needs word-out-mouth to succeed at the box-office.

Kamaal Dhamaal Malamaal Box Office Prediction

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Director: Priyadarshan

Producers: Percept Pictures

Writers: Neeraj Vora (Story, Screenplay and Dialogues)

Cast: Nana Patekar, Paresh Rawal, Om Puri, Shreyas Talpade, Madhurima Banerjee, Asrani, Rajpal Yadav

Music: Sajid-Wajid

Genre: Comedy

Release Date: September 28, 2012

Analysis:

Star Value: Due to the presence of some quality veteran actors like Nana Patekar, Paresh Rawal and Om Puri, the star value is quite high, although not as high as is needed to attract large number of audiences.

Hype: Although the promos have received a decent response, the hype is missing. The makers have failed in promoting their film. But this is not the first time that Percept has done such a thing. It is not known why the banner fails regularly to market its films.

Music: None of the songs of the movie have become known.

Prediction:

Kamaal Dhamaal Malamaal will at the most only get an average opening at the box office. This is surely disappointing considering it’s another crazy entertainer by Priyadarshan. The reason for this is its low key marketing. It’s only hope is to impress supremely at the onset. Else, it will be very difficult for it to make a mark at the ticket window.

OMG Oh My God Box Office Prediction

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Director: Umesh Shukla

Producers: Akshay Kumar, Paresh Rawal and Ashvini Yardi

Writer: Umesh Shukla

Cast: Paresh Rawal, Akshay Kumar, Mithun Chakraborty, Mahesh Manjrekar, Govind Namdeo, Nidhi Subbaiah

Music: Himesh Reshammiya, Anjjan-Meet Bros, Sachin-Jigar

Genre: Drama

Release Date: September 28, 2012

Analysis:

Star Value: Although Paresh Rawal is a character actor, he has succeeded in gaining mass appeal through some fantastic performances over the years. And Akshay Kumar’s presence, despite a second lead, adds more star value for OMG Oh My God!.

Hype: Since OMG Oh My God! is based on superhit plays in Gujarati and Hindi, the film made news since it was announced. The makers’ idea of bringing out a teaser explaining Paresh Rawal’s character should be lauded for it made the film known much before the release. Later on, when the full-fledged promo was released, it helped the film further as it turned out to be very impressive. However, the excitement for the movie is not as high as it should have been.

Music: Prabhudeva and Sonakshi Sinha starrer song ‘Go Go Go Govinda’ became instantly popular. Although the rest of the songs aren’t famous, they will slowly gain acceptance if the film does very well at the box office.

Prediction:

OMG Oh My God! will get a decent opening at the box office. The first weekend collections should be around Rs 20-25 crore. It will be affected by the India-Pakistan T20 World Cup match on Sunday and Ganesh Visarjan in Maharashtra. However, it shouldn’t be judged by its first three days’ profits. This is a type of a film which will slowly climb the ladder at the box office provided it manages to impress initially. Due to its genre, it has a chance at both bigger and smaller centers.

Kale’s novel relevant even in today’s era: Shree Partner director

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Whenever a film is made from a popular novel, the first question that arises in everybody’s minds is whether the celluloid version is as good as the book, if not better. But should there be any comparison between both the versions? If yes, to what extent? Such questions were explored at a discussion in Mumbai named ‘Pratisanvad – Sahityache Cinematle Roopantar’. The conversation took place after Ganesh Matkari’s book ‘Chaukati Bahercha Cinema’ was launched.

The focus of the interaction was director Sameer Surve’s movie Shree Partner, which is based on the classic novel Partner by Vasant Purushottam Kale. Secretary of Prabhat Chitra Mandal Santosh Pathare, author Anant Samant, filmmaker Sameer Surve, filmmaker and writer Abhiram Bhadkamkar and film writer Ganesh Matkari were the speakers at the event.

During the discussion, Pathare raised a question on Surve’s decision to make a film on Partner since the book has been read by a large number of people over the decades. To this, Surve replied, “We have to accept that in today’s times, there is a dearth of good stories. But the base of every film is a story. Many of the classic foreign films are based on some great literature. I chose Partner since it has a great story. Although the book was written in 1977, I think it is relevant even in today’s era.”

Narrating his experience, Surve adds, “In fact, I was surprised why not a single movie was made on Partner all these years. But when I was thinking of making a movie on the book, I came to know someone else has already decided to make it. Obviously I was disappointed. But later on, that person shelved the project. Hence, I grabbed the opportunity with both hands.” He also says he found a cinema angle in the book as he was stunned and touched by it, just like one does in a movie.

When Pathare pointed out that Shree Partner will be compared with the book, Bhadkamkar opined that there shouldn’t be comparison. But on the contrary, Surve said there should be comparison. “If you have passion, you don’t worry about post mortem. I have worked hard for three years to make this film. The script was finalized after 17 drafts and I also had to re-shoot some of the scenes. When a friend of mine got to know this, he laughed at me saying this is just a Marathi film. But I said I wanted to do full justice with the book.”

To know whether Shree Partner has done justice to the book, one has to wait till October 26 when the film releases.

(The remaining part of this interesting discussion will be published soon.)

Barfi!: Shamefully plagiarized film sent for Oscars!

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Oscar or Academy Awards are considered the highest honours for any film. Each year India, like a number of countries, nominates one film in the Foreign Language Category for the Oscars. Since the nominated movie is representing India, it is logical that originality should be the biggest criteria along with other pre-requites. However, this year the Film Federation of India (FFI) has flouted all norms by sending a shamefully plagiarized film like Barfi! for the Oscars!

To see for yourself, click on this link – http://ibnlive.in.com/news/barfi-vs-hollywood-homage-inspired-or-copied/293100-8-66.html – http://www.bollywoodlife.com/news-gossip/exposed-the-sources-from-where-barfi-was-stolen/ –  and you will get to know how Anurag Basu has plainly lifted scenes from various international films. Apart from copying the scenarios and conversations from the original scenes, Basu has not even spared the camera angles! But the buck doesn’t stop here for Barfi!. Pritam’s (who is more famous as a music lifter than a music composer) background score is way too similar to the French film Amelie.

The above mentioned facts about Barfi! have spread like fire in the last week or so. Therefore, it is impossible for the FFI to wash their hands off saying they were unaware about it. This also shows that this isn’t a mistake or a blunder by the FFI. It is a simple case of grave injustice to more deserving and importantly, original films like Deool and Kahaani.

From now onwards, we shouldn’t be surprised if more and more copied products emerge from Bollywood when the FFI itself openly encourages plagiarism. Despite being an Indian, I am hoping Barfi! doesn’t get the Oscar honours!