Bangladesh or, For Shame but she agrees

একাত্তরের পরেও আমাদের দারিদ্র্য ছিল। সেটা financial  দারিদ্র্য। আজকে এর সাথে আমাদের মানসিক দারিদ্র্য যোগ হয়েছে। আমরা আজকে মানসিকভাবে দরিদ্র। - শম্পা রেজা , Channel  ৭১, অগাস্ট, ২০১২

( After 71, We were poor too but that was financial poverty. Today Mental poverty is added to that. We are Mentally poor now.- Shompa Reza, Channel 71, August 2012)

Listen to what he said! (Ananta - the Hero, the Producer, the Star!)

For better or for worse, he's here, he's rich, he is on TV and producing movies so he can be a 'hero'.

This particular story was told by him about an incident in a KFC around Dhaka.

এক লোক বলে উঠল "ওই দেখ বাংলা ছবির হিরু" এই কথা শুনে জলিল জবাব দিল এই বলে- "ইও ফ্রম ঘানা? হুইচ কান্ট্রি ইও ফ্রম আফ্রিকা? টেল মি। হুইচ আব হোয়ের কান্ট্রি আব আব হোয়ের আর ইও ফ্রম আফ্রিকা? টেল মি। বাংলা ছবির হিরু মিনস দে আর uneducated? ইউর মা আব ইউর মাদার ফ্রম রাসিয়া? ইও লিভিং ইন বাংলাদেশ। ম্যান ইও হেভ টুঁ respect ইন বাংলাদেশ। বিকজ ইও আর ইটিং ফুড ফ্রম বাংলাদেশ। সো ডোন্ত সে বাংলা মুভি !!!"

Ananta was on channel 71 during eid where also present was his wife and 'heroin' of two of his movies, a cultural correspondent and another film producer. They said, its wrong for us to make faces at our Banlga film industry's produce. We should like and appreciate these movies just because they say so, thus relieving them of any duty to improve on their storytelling and craftsmanship. I don't know buddy. That's a tall order!

He'd Like to See a Good Story For a Change!

Saw a few people on TV last night crying over the state of our drama on tv, and similar cries have been heard about the state of our cinema*. From a historical standpoint, one can argue that since liberation (1971), the business minded, with the help of a corrupted avenue, and the blessings of a silent intellectual mass (probably very small) has taken all steps to spoil all avenues of our 'culture' - literature, cinema, drama, and music.

* Though, some cry, there are enough sponsors out there to push the status quo of cheap/expensive cinema with the same old stories wound this way and that. As you can see below, there are TV shows that are created such as 'Star Night' where they'll showcase the ONE 'hero' of our film industry!

As the analysts argue and cry, the statements that they pose usually are as such:
* We don't have a good budget
* Bollywood is stealing the show (and again, we don't have their budget)

Only recently did I hear someone put blame where it made a bit more sense:
1. Our stories are not good enough to attract viewers!
2. As far as TV is concerned, the sponsors take up a ridiculous amount of time from the actual show!
3. Again, concerning TV - there are just too many stations (more than 7) out there! how would people choose what to watch!?

It all boils down to two things - which are really two sides of one coin - Greed & Corruption. We've chased the money for so long and established so much around it that we fail to have any 'art' here, and fail to have 'class' or 'creativity' in our entertainment. From the interview of Sakib Khan (No. 1) one could see that is our unfortunate reality.

Related:
Bullets of Bollywood
End of Show for Movie Theatres?

She too asked,"Who knows who He is to me?"

They say you see what you want to see.Or , in this case, hear what you want to hear. I speak of the new Arnob album.May be I wanted to be overwhelmed. May be I wanted my heart to stop somewhere in there. May be I longed for that sigh that was held back for so long,to get out of my system.

I listened to the album few weeks prior to it being out on CD, in extremely bad quality via the cellphone service provider. I must emphasize if that was to be a clever marketing ploy, it was not clever at all. Not everyone is miserable(or curious) enough (like me) that they will go on to listen to the album after that horrible a preview. There. Its out Robi. Do what you must.

A friend got me a copy and admittedly the first listen was a bit of a downer. But then I picked up on Phagun Haway Haway... even though when it was raining outside, it was a great mood lifter. May be the bass was a bit too heavy, with the voice drowning out a little too much but the frivolity and the dreaminess did some real good work for me.

And that is really the great essence of  the album. Most of the songs have captured the actual mood of the songs ( not like I know what they all should have been but hey). Not just that, they stir up this whole range of emotions, upto the limits of Tagore's words and music and at times beyond that too.

This write up cannot finish without the mention of Amar Din Phuralo. The haunting melody is captured beautifully within that enchanting voice that is Warda (hope I got the name right). The piano, of course does no less with the incredible solo about one and half minute into the song. The subtlety of the song makes it all the more prominent in teh album. It also makes you wish Arnob would make use of other voices in the album more.

Which then brings me to my next criticism which is the fact that Arnob's voice , a fan as I may be, does not often do justice to the songs. There are technical errors that are so obvious and so wrong that even the biggest fan has to shake her head in disapproval.Examples of such numbers could be Prochondo Gorjone( I shall also take this opportunity to promote another great rendition of this song  by Banya in her album Laguk hawa) or Rakho Rakho Re.

But then there are songs that will remind you this man was trained in Rabindra sangeet. There is a beautiful rendition of Ami Kan Pete Roi that has none of the usual sense of woe that is so often associated this number. Au contraire, it is hopeful and makes one sit up with perhaps the same anticipation that Rabibabu wrote "কে সে মোর ... কেই  বা জানে .. কিছু তার দেখি আভা ... কিছু পাই অনুমানে ..."( Who knows who he is to me?... I see some glimpses of Him... some I imagine)

Listen. Buy. Listen. Admire.

PS: A great demo of Amar din Phuralo by Arnob : http://soundcloud.com/shayanchowdhury/amar-din-phuralo

He Fought Tears

He said, "Don't ever stop reading."

I cannot say I have read any Humayun Ahmed novellas published in the past 8-10 years seriously. I took them with me to the bathroom - yes; but could not particularly remember what I read there after I came out. Of course in the age of social media and paranoid entertainment I was also not ignorant of his personal life and all the little gossips that were surrounding everything he did in recent years. I must also confess of the negative impressions about him that I carried around in some remote part of me. But when around midnight my brother called and gave me the news I could not but be sad. I continued to watch some Batman series but my heart was heavy.

One of the fondest memories that I have and will always cherish of my childhood ( circa 1993/4) is that of going to Nilkhet with my mother on a weekday. She took all of three of us, hired an autorickshaw and we went to New market area which was about 30 minutes by autorickshaw from our place back then . I can't clearly remember the events such as meeting my Aunt( mom's sister) , roaming around in new market, Mother and Aunt buying sarees and other household utensils although logic suggests that is possibly what happened. What I do remember of the event though is standing in front of Nilkhet and her buying stacks of books. All old. All Bengali.  And a big huge pile of Humayun Ahmed.I think she tried to catch up because we had just come back from overseas after a substantially long period of time. I can remember the sky was cloudy and I can remember she was happy. (By the way we were not allowed to read them cause the books were all for adults or Boroder Boi as we'd be told.)

One of my earliest memories of watching a movie in a cinema is also with mother, also around New market and has also to do with Humayun Ahmed. It was based on his novel Shankhanil Karagar and it was in Bolaka Cinema opposite new market. I can smell her nostalgia even today because of the way she told us how she used to always come to Bolaka while a student in Dhaka University. Anyway it was the three of us again with mother waiting in the queue. And it was a long queue. At some point she said it would e impossible to get a ticket if we waited in the queue. So the strategy was that she was with my elder brother in one queue and younger brother and I queued up in the next counter. I cannot remember how the movie was entirely.

I dont wait for Himus and I dont wait for his new novels for a long time now.In fact I cant remember waiting for them ever as there were so many already in our house that I could not finish reading before already growing out of him . He did not make me want to be a writer. I cannot say I have affinity for the films he directed. There is one thing he did and that is he made me want to read more and more.

It makes me infinitely sad.

She Loves Woody Allen, He likes him too

Okay, this is He speaking, and we've been on a roll with Woody Allen's movies for some time. It started a long time after we had a roll with the Coen Brothers' films. We find it hard to believe what Woody Allen is doing, in this age of special effects and high drama! "You gotta love him!" is the way we feel about him.

Whether its a big budget blockbuster strategically released for the summer holidays or a small budget indie project, they are all eventually meant to be telling stories. In that story lies the ingenuity of Woody Allen. A glimpse through IMDB tell us that he wrote 70 titles whereas he directed only 48! Its definitely the writing that scores him the points with us. Woody has always picked a classical and forward way to tell stories, and they are usually simple stories with wonderful deviations and twists. We have found some works we didn't warm up to, especially from the recent stuff (like You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger), but for the most part, its a treat. His opening titles are always the same way, almost like the familiarity of opening a book, and at the end of the movie, you might even get the feeling of finishing a good book. He keeps a steady camera, often in a wide angle on the characters as they speak, or just follows them around as they walk around the house talking to each other. Dialogue, is a major feature of the Woody genre, and nothing too orchestrated or theatrical - just candid conversations between the characters. Every movie however has the staple 'Woody Allen' character in them. The one who converses ALL THE TIME, and rants on even when there are no listeners with funny anecdotes and metaphors. If he is not acting in it himself, an actor will usually do that for the film - like Owen Wilson in Midnight in Paris or Kenneth Branagh in Celebrity. No matter what your feeling is about this unique director, I for one can really escape while watching some of his work, and they appease me to the point that they makes other films appear boring.

Movies I liked best so far are Broadway Danny Rose, Small Time Crooks and Midnight in Paris.

Tvamevaham* (You are none other than me)

This morning over tea and coffee and blissful drizzle and wind the colleagues and I discussed অন্তরমহল . Inevitably as I came back to my desk  the old mind wanted to go back to the mother of the goddess.

The story Antarmahal or অন্তরমহল by Tarashankar Banerjee is a vividly strong depiction of the plight of women of Bengal in the early 1900s. The impotent zamindar re-marries a young girl to produce an heir. The biggest religious festival of Durga Puja is right around the corner and to build the clay idol of the Goddess Durga, often reffered to as mother or Maa Durga ( as she is the mother of the universe) a young sculptor from Bihar is called in. There are many instances of  religious incarceration as the older wife of the zamindar is asked by her husband to fulfill the lust of religious leaders and priests as an action that will finally bring forth the heir that he has been waiting for. The young sculptor has a glimpse of the "antarmahal" of the zamindar one fateful day and ends up putting the face of the younger wife on the idol. It is a moving story, one that opens the eye of the reader to the feudal reality of Bengal. Tarashankar is a brilliant writer and  his portrayal of the brutal use of Religion is at once heart-breaking and enraging.

The movie adaptation has been done by one of the more controversial directors of India, Rituporno Ghosh. One would assume him being more sympathetic towards the story as he is not only a Bengali;himself but also for the fact that gender relations has always been (seemingly) his topic of interest. Much as I liked the lighting and art direction I could not say the same for the movie as a whole. There are moments when his empathy for the women comes through but sadly it is overshadowed by the overuse of sex and related activities. There are many I presume who would not be able to decipher the many symbolic incidents as attention is drawn (wrongly) elsewhere. Ghosh takes liberty with the plot but leaves the last or most important scene unaltered, the face of the clay idol of Durga being revealed as that of the young wife ( played by Soha Ali Khan). The directors obsession with mirrors , much as it may be symbolic, has left many of the characters underplayed.

Another story that links a Goddess with a mortal woman is the oh-so eerie দেবী set aorund the same time as the above mentioned story by Prabhat Kumar Mukherjee.  In his story a religiously fanatic(more like lunatic) wealthy father in law thinks his younger son's wife is a reincarnation of the Goddess Kali, the goddess of empowerment. He starts treating her as the goddess and the mindlessness quickly takes over the naive daughter in law Doyamoyee as she starts believing it herself. The story has a sad ending with Doyamoyee turning totally mad after the death of her 5 year old nephew ( who was not taken to a hospital , as the goddess herself was treating him) dies. The story again is a mirror of the society with constant struggle between formal or western education and ancient knowledge, between modernity and primitiveness;and asks the moral question of what one chooses to believe as religion.

This story was adapted for screen by none other than the maestro Satyajit Ray himself. Needless to say yet again it is another brilliant adaptation in black and white. What stands out though in comparison with Antarmahal is the brilliance of the actors. Every performance is stunning, starting from the Father in law played by ( Chhobi Biswas) right down to the younger son( Soumitra) who has rather a minor role in comparison. The hero of the film is Doyamoyee though, played ever so articulately by Sharmila Tagore ( who happens to be the mother of Soha Ali Khan). From the naive and young daughter in law , in fear of her father in law, through her transformation into the ever powerful goddess descending into lunacy- every stage is a marvel one simply could watch over and over again. 

Here is some rambling about and a picture of the goddess and the daughter.

Resonance

The movie

*Tvamevaham  - A well known phrase to students of Sankskrit meaning you are none other than me. This is from an interesting (and perhaps a mythic anecdote about the great poet Kalidasa which goes something along these lines : There arose a question on who was the best poet, Kalidasa or Dandi? After realising no Sanskrit scholar of their time was capable of evaluating their competence, they go to the goddess of knowledge: Saraswati. Upon being asked who was a great poet, goddess answers it was Dandi who was the best. Disappointed Kalidasa asks the mother goddess, "Am I nothing mother?". She replies "tvamEvAham" (You are none other than me). 

Bangladesh

 ‘কেউ সরি বলেননি। মনে হয়, আমাদের সংস্কৃতিতে এখনো জিনিসটি ওভাবে আসেনি।’- অধ্যাপক আবদুল্লাহ আবু সায়ীদ, ০৬-০৬-২০১২
জাতি হিসেবে আমাদের শালীনতাবোধ নিয়ে গভীরভাবে আত্মসমালোচনা করার সময় এসেছে।- আসিফ নজরুল , ১১-০৬-২০১২

She is 'nothing without you'

This is something I wrote somewhere else , sometime last year:

There has been much criticism , criticism of criticism and a general consensus has been reached that we are failing as a nation. I have and I am sure most of everyone else has heard the discussion where the decadence of the society has been assessed over to the conclusion that we as humans have failed ourselves. We have nothing and no one to blame but ourselves.

Rilke wrote almost a century ago - for one human being to love another: is perhaps the most important of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation. Scarier than  frustration take over other sensory impulses, is the realization of the loss of empathy.

I can just stop writing there. But my mind writhes to write more on this topic( the mind does other exercises to make me write on other materials too but that is irrelevant here). My writing was directed towards a particular route by someone very knowledgeable and my gratitude remains with him.

It is notice worthy that our value system is based very much on religion. There is also no denying the existence of religion is to put constraints on human behavior. That incest is wrong or that being tolerant to difference is humane - are all religious values. Let us not get into the debate of where, how or who started it but agree that religion has moulded society for ages.

Despite being followers of the fastest growing religion ( following-wise) how did our society then become so inhuman that we can just sip tea and say ,”Well then what were those six boys doing in that area anyway? May be they deserved what happened to them anyway.” Be them robbers, drug addicts or something worse , no one has the right to kill another human being at any cost and even less right to be indifferent to such an occurrence.

Over the last 34 years the enrollment in Madrasas has increased 13 times as opposed to primary schools which has merely tripled. Number of primary schools have doubled over the same period but Madrasas has increased by 8 times (Barkat 2003) . If we look at numbers we will see we have in fact increased ways and means of religious education by many-folds over the years in all income groups.

So then can we conclude that  Islam has failed us after all?


The protestants (those who protested) in the 16th century objected the ritualistic observation of Christianity by the Catholic Church. They believed in grace through faith and Bible as their holy Scripture but also highlighted that rituals would not adhere people to values emanated through religion in the face of all the socio-economic change thet time was bringing in.

Religion is where you will feel your Creator , said one of my professors. Religion is feeling the presence of a supreme being who is only slightly explained through Einstein’s E= mc^2 or Beethoven’s Piano Sonata no.8. Religion is what one will make of one’s abilities.

May be it is high time there was a re-reading of Islam.

She spent a day at the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority

On a bright sunny day while having Fuchka with yogurt I realized I had lost my purse. I could not of course detail how and why it got lost but it did. And along with it went my Bank cards, National ID card and Driver's License. Quite a colossal loss if I think about it because the purse had emotional value and I do drive quite a bit.

So in Bangladesh if you lose a document issued by the Government you are meant to go to your nearest police station and make an official note(called GD) of it. To retrieve copies of lost or damaged documents you then have to provide a copy of the GD you made.

So my journey began. I knew from various advertisements by the Dhaka Metropolitan Police that GDs could now be made from home through their website at one's convenience. It made me ecstatic. When did go to the website (which unfortunately has been shut down for unforeseen circumstances) and filled out the appropriate form , it instructed that I take a printout of the confirmation page, visit the nearest police station and get it stamped to make it into an official document. I was not sure how this made things more convenient if I did have to visit the police station after all.

So finally I made a GD entry , filled out the appropriate form to be submitted and sent it out along with a copy of the GD, for submission. I got a temporary paper license about 2 weeks later and was told Id have to go down to BRTA to be photographed "digitally" and give biometric specifications.

Any procedure at the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority takes days and months and a few extra bucks. I knew it and had paid off (as demanded) 3500 taka to a clerk who said he would get my papers move along the right channel and get everything ready for the photography session. The BRTA is no place for a decent person to be in for a long period of time and certainly no place for a woman to be in. So I made myself acquainted with the Engineer-in charge over there and got myself seated in his room while my papers were getting processed. Mind you , I already had a temporary license, had paid the fees and had an official receipt.. The way I see it I could have gone for the "digital" session straightaway but apparently a few more signatures were to be taken.

After waiting for almost an hour this clerk who was taking care of my papers , came up to me and told me I have to submit another 350 taka . I should go to the BRAC Bank counter and make the submission and come back with the receipt. I asked for what purpose should I tell them I am making the deposit and he told me "various( bibidho)" and disappeared. After waiting at the Bank queue for 15-20 minutes when my turn came up , the teller told me "I am keeping 345 under various  and if they ask you to give another 5 taka please come back and make that deposit." Astonished as I was I told him he can keep the full 350 right now and I did not plan to wait again on the queue. The next teller also told him to keep 350. Now he said "I am keeping 346 taka" and gave me receipt for 350 taka .

With this receipt I was pushed into a room with TigerIT employees who are actually handling the "digital" part of the documentation. I shall not whine about how I saw them sitting around and gossiping right in front of clients but the person in charge of plugging in the information told me my papers did not have the copy of the GD attached to it. I told him I have a temporary license and I could only get it by submitting the GD and this should be proof enough. Of course this was to no avail. He needed the copy of the GD. I was a bit mad by this time and told him he should find it since I have already submitted it. Now he told me he can do it if I go back to the Engineer and get his permission! I walked out of the room and told the clerk handling my paperwork that the GD copy was needed. I saw him run around a bit and then go in the same room that I came out of and finally handing me a token for the photo to be taken. He had not found the copy that was sought but managed in some other way.

Now I waited around another half hour and finally got called in for my photo to be taken. This was also being handled by TigerIT. Unfortunately the girl who was being photographed right before me had both her hands disfigured by Polio or some related disease or accident  and there I was witness to some cruel insensitivity that she must have faced all her life. Finally my photograph was taken and I was told I will be sms-ed within 2 weeks to collect my "digital" license.

It has been three weeks and counting.

She had An Epipheny

 On the 12th of March this year I like so many hundreds of my fellow country men and women retired to my room bitter , angry and sad at the proceedings of the day. One could clearly see the two major political parties had failed at being potential alternatives to each other , as they had each proved themselves to be made of the same rotten substance as the other. It is of course pathetic after 40 year of independence , where more than half of the time democracy was prevailing. After a series of episodes from the contagiously hilarious Modern Family I fell into that abyss that Morpheus calls his realm.

Next morning I woke up with a sort of an epiphany. The alternative had shown itself to me (hah). I have to confess this country is NOT all I think about all day and all night and I regularly dream of Sheldon Cooper, Rabindranath Tagore and the like. Anyway,simply put , it is obvious as the sun that as a whole the governments were/are failing due to party allegiance and such inspiring factors that will not let an individual work on his own accord. What I propose to be done is individuals run for different ministries/sections of the government . But they run as individuals to work as the minister of Finance for example. But as a precondition for running they must submit three major work plans that they intend to finish in a year’s time. Each person elected will be legally bound to finish these propositions otherwise face legal charges and consequences. There will be no head of country per se. They may have political beliefs , ideologies, religious inclinations, business partners and those will no doubt influence their propositions but they must themselves bear the responsibility on their shoulders for any failure. Parties need to be abolished and each individual may have their own understanding of socialist democracy, liberal conservatism and what-nots but that has to be for himself only. They will of course appoint the rest of the staff in their ministry or do everything by themselves.. Blaming other ministries for their misdoings may not be allowed. This is more like a general simplified framework of what I believe may work for Bangladesh. Of course the more complex specifics may be discussed over a cup of coco and I am always up for that whenever you are.

Why I think this will work probably lies n the fact that I do not believe in democracy as preached today to be the only way of life. It may work for USA and it may work for India but this is a country-specific case. Brilliant professors seemed to have overlooked this fact ( or were they ill-motivated?) so making this mistake of ethnocentrism may be granted.

But at the same time some form of leadership is vital to avert absolute chaos in the society ( which ironically may be the case of Bangladesh , despite the resence of leadership). I watched a brilliant little film titled The rise and rise of Michael Rimmer recently, written by the genius that was Peter Cook and I cannot talk highly enough of the movie. In one important segment he highlighted how people do not want to be given to make all the choices for themselves. When the head of the country asks the people to vote in there choices for every dainty little decision he wants to make , the people take to the streets, in protest. One of the protesters ask why they have to take all the decisions when there is an elected government. The bottom line is in today’s progressed social structure people tend to depend upon an unitary authority to dictate their lives and may be this is a way to maintain social cohesion as well. However a strict form of accountability may make it perform better and in my opinion taking individuals as responsible parties for their deeds would be more efficient than pointing finger at a large institute.

There. I have jotted it all down.

Cinema: A Lesson in Politics

With recent situations, and unsettling worries about the future of the society I happen to be living in, I have rounded up some movies that has satirically painted a picture of this phenomenon called
P-O-L-I-T-I-C-S.

The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer
Being married to someone who is a fan of all things Stephen Fry, it was a matter of time before I saw a Peter Cook film.

I was born in the 80's and an understanding of politics if any, had to develop from the mid 90s till now. This film made in 1970 however is a primer as good as any out there, of what politics has become. So, what I had partially suspected it had become, was in 1970 shown in a film across Britain! Brilliant! The writers of this film include its star Peter Cook, John Cleese and also the director Kevin Billington.

About the Film (IMDB)

Wag the Dog
As you can see, this one has the pair from the Meet the Parents series! This pairing might be less known to some of the younger folks of the day, had it not been for this comedy franchise. Wag the Dog also has a comic undertone, and portrays the increased role of the media in politics in terms of creating  or controlling opinions.

Dustin Hoffman is brilliant as the temperamental film director who is hired on behalf of Robert De Niro who is the Go-To man working on behalf of an administration that is trying to cover up a scandal that would affect the president's popularity. Ain't that a pickle!

About the Film (IMDB)





 

In the Loop
There is a full on onslaught of swears in this one from the get go. Peter Capaldi plays a major role here, and he is the source of this onslaught, who is making sure things go as planned. There is talk about a war, which seems to have been made necessary by no real reason at all. It is most interesting to see the relationships between the people who fall in different heights in the hierarchy. We are from the start on Britain's side of things, and then there is also a trip to the White House, USA, where there is again a tug-of-war for control, and last words.

About the Film (IMDB)

While watching this foul mouthed civil servant at work in the movie, I had the bouts of those "Where have I seen him before"s, and when it finally came to me, I had to wonder what happened to that nice young man! That movie was called "Local Hero", also a nice movie, but not political as the rest here. The soundtrack of that movie was incidentally done by Mark Knopfler, who also wrote music for the film Wag the Dog.

Conspiracy
Lets end the list with one with a serious (maybe an understatement) tone. Its a reenactment of a very hush hush meeting organized by the SS Gestapo under Hitler's orders to decide the fate of their enemy - Jews, not just in Germany, but as the viewers will find out - all of Europe. Besides military personnel, there are also lawyers present who had previously created laws that would stop an increase of the Jewish population. The discourse that we hear, is a particularly chilling one. You will be astonished at what human minds are capable of conjuring in the name of peace, and glory.

About the Film (IMDB)



All in all, there are quite a few others that are also really good movies and give us quite a good idea of what kind of nonsense, almost, that we have created in trying to create governments. Maybe things were not so fickle or greedy at some time, or maybe this is how things always were. There are more great films that could go on this list, V for Vendetta, and Bob Roberts (Was quite surprised that it was both written AND directed by Tim Robbins) are also really good ones and highly recommend. Maybe I'll cover them in a part two, who knows!