ePlus magazine: Chronicles of UAE's best toilet rag

[X.]

ePlus or, wait for it, e+ is a weekly entertainment magazine published every Wednesday by Gulf News, UAE’s alleged leading English newspaper. It has a cover price of 5aed but comes complimentary with the newspaper. Trivia: The only time I remember spending the 5dirhams to buy ePlus was when the country ran out of toilet paper.

Among the hot sweltering pile of dog shit that includes semi-naked pictures of inane celebrities such as Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie and Jessica Simpson and, OK, you get the picture…ePlus also attempts to review films and provide news on all major entertainment happenings aboard and local. It is printed on glossy paper and edited by, what I presume are, monkeys.

This topic here aims to the collect all the little tasty pieces of shit sticking out UAE’s best toilet rag.

Issue: 2 August 2006

Check out Pg 41 for Dr. Mandar V Bichu's "review" on Antonioni’s “The Passenger.”

Yes, this laborius but visually striking film is typically representative of those arty mvoies, which just seems to moving in circles without having any definitive narrative.

….

With a wafer-thin plot, a snail's spped and no clear cut point to convey, this film seems to be made only for the high-chair critics who have the ability to see beyond the normal audience's vision and understanding. If you are one not one of those, give it a miss.

I mock Bichu’s “reviews” every chance I get, but I have to hand it to the good doctor for at least understanding his readership. This is a clear example of a film reviewer who panders to the lowest common denominator and someone who does not understand cinema and its history. But you see he doesn’t care because his readership doesn’t. That’s why he’s getting *paid* to write this dog shit…he may be a "dr." but I still pity the fool!

[X.]

this film seems to be made only for the high-chair critics

Btw, I didn't know critics sat on "high-chairs."

Can somebody write Ikea and check on their availability because, hey, I want one!

[X.]

Oh, for posterity and in all fairness to Dr. Bichu, here's a counter to his arguments against "The Passenger."

Pasting from another thread...

I had the same problem with 2046. The purpose of a film is to tell a story

I just want to comment on this now. I can understand and appreciate the point Capt makes.

Narratives are essentially *stories* and the popular opinion of a director is that s/he must be a *storyteller.* This is the formalist view of filmmaking and championed by the Americans. Europeans, on the other hand, guys like Antonioni and Godard have always challenged (and mocked) conventional storytelling. They are the radicals. There are contemporary American directors who are self-styled Europeans, directors such as Soderbergh who with “Full Frontal” did the same thing. The film flopped it was berated by moderate critics but loved by radicals including yours truly.

The tricky bit is this: Subversion of the convention of a narrative is not for every fan of cinema. And that’s OK. 
 

[fizz]

Adnan....while you are at it...how about picking on that polar bear at 7 days....

Even 7 days realises how bad he is...he doesn't even have a section on the official site.

[X.]

I haven't read 7days for a year now!

Intermittently I have caught glimpses of the man's work. I told my ophthalmologist and he slapped me for carelessness!

Go ahead, start a thread about him by all means. Will need an excerpt from one of the great man's reviews,  so if you get that other rag at the office why not keep us all update/entertained?

[madali]

I'll always fantasized about getting a bunch of guys to make a really unique and maybe, pretentious, snobby, and cynical, Dubai magazine about movies, music, and books.

[sammy]

I'll always fantasized about getting a bunch of guys ...

That was pretty scarey till there that point
P.s: which polar bear are we talking about ? i must have missed something cold

P.P.S : shariq should have something to add here

[shariqq]

P.P.S : shariq should have something to add here

Ok fine. I'll say it.

I had, in my optimism of fair treatment and anticipation of them recognizing talent, emailed my review of Omkara to e+ last friday. They've published a slaughtered version of it in today's mag. (page-59). To give you an idea, it is Just the first paragraph, and 2 more sentences from near the close, with some paraphrasing and editing.

[madali]

Link?

[shariqq]

It's not online. But to give you an idea, the highlighted parts are the only ones printed. The stuff in brackets is their own creation.

*ing:

Ajay Devgan	- Omi Shukla
Saif Ali Khan	- Langda Tyagi
Vivek Oberoi	- Kesu Firangi
Kareena Kapoor	- Dolly Mishra
Konkona Sen Sharma	- Indu
Naseeruddin Shah	- Bhaisaab
Bipasha Basu	- Billo Chaman Bahaar

I took only the masterline from Othello and sketched it from there on my own. I almost felt as if I had written it …only 400 years ago.- Vishal Bharadwaj

Haughty comment of a wannabe or simplistic fascination of an artist? A fairly new and art-house director with a star-cast to challenge any Yash Chopra production and an eight-figure production budget is not just a rarity in Indian cinema, but unheard of. What Vishal ends up delivering is highly-intelligent cinema with all the accessibilty of any major commercial release (akin to a Batman Begins as a summer movie). I can't resist quoting from my review of Maqbool:

Give Vishal Bharadwaj a solid pat on the back, and sit back waiting for his next movie. This man (He) seethes brilliance in his film-making. His dialogues, his script, his music, and his direction - all are top-notch. This movie proves that Makdi were no fluke.

[/color]

Omkara (Ajay Devgan) is a gang-leader in the semi-lawless state of Bihar. Bhaisaab's (Naseer's) election win promotes Omi, leaving his "Youth Leader" seat empty. In a logical political move, Omi selects Kesu Firangi (Vivek Oberoi) as his successor ignoring his loyal right-hand-man Langda Tyagi (Saif). Green with envy, Langda slowly poisons Omkara's mind against Kesu leading him down a path too dark for anyone's good. Kareena, Konkona & Bipasha play Omi, Langda & Kesu's love interests respectively.

The movie starts in the middle of an attempted wedding of a girl and carries on until she gets married. The events that transpire inbetween, the turns that different people take to affect her life and the eventual effect is Vishal Bharadwaj's unique Omkara. The title of his second Shakespearean movie went through a few changes before finally resting on his Othello equivalent. But this movie could easily have also been called "Dolly Mishra" or "Langda Tyagi". These three characters equally occupy our minds with their unpredictable fates and yet it is the triumph of Saif Ali Khan's powerfully vile performance that his limp Tyagi towers head and shoulders above anybody around him.

Vishal writes the Screenplay & Dialogues, composes music, sings and directs in just his fourth movie¹ yet which only strengthens the (Omkara is a) silent promise his is making to his fans of greater things to come. Missing are the (No) escapist dream sequences and melodramatic dialogues (, this movie is realism personified.) that Hindi movies are generally associated with. He instead roots the movie in realism with even the song-and-dance sequences being what are existent in a real-world Indian lifestyle. Do be aware though : the setting of the story in rural north-India requires the vocabulary to be, and is therefore quite explicit in an authentic depiction of the conversational style of the said area.

Anyone who has followed Indian cinema since the 70s will note the clear influence in Vishal's work-style from his previous two movies. It does help to have this influence (Gulzar) as the lyricist of the movie and (my guess) a quiet advisor too. The most clear indication of this is in the dialogues and the style of sparesly sprinkled humour.

My only gripe with the movie was the language spoken by the characters. It is a mix of Hindi & Bhojpuri - something that is indeed spoken in Bihar. But this gripe is more to do with my short-coming in not understanding the language rather than a flaw in the movie.

If you have not seen an Indian movie in a Long time, this is the one to break your hiatus with.

1/2 out of

___________________________
1 - Vishal Bharadwaj has directed, in order, Makdee (original story), Maqbool(Shakespeare's Macbeth), Chatri Chor(Ruskin Bond's Blue Umbrella) and Omkara(Shakespeare's Othello). Chatri Chor remains unreleased although it has been shown in a few festivals around Europe.

 

[shariqq]

I'm just gonna email to Gulf News:
Dear Editor of ePlus,
 
I had emailed a review of Omkara that I penned for your consideration to be published in your weekly magazine.

To my surprise the review was selected, but in a more surprising turn, it was published after being edited and, in some parts, re-written. It was also condensed from a full-review to a two-paragraph residue of what it originally was.
 
Although I am somewhat grateful for your having selected and published a part of my written word, I am equally appalled that a review (which is always conceived in full) is so trounced and then credited to me.
 
It would have been better to have credited it as "part of a review by" or "from a review by". Also if I would have been asked to shrink it to a limit - I could have done so as author of the original piece.
 
In humilitiation, I request you to kindly not completely credit any author for text modified by you - atleast not without his/her consent. It's only fair and professional.
 
Kind Regards,
Shariq

[madali]

Hah, this is my favorite edit -

<i>Missing are the escapist dream sequences and melodramatic dialogues that Hindi movies are generally associated with. </i>

To

<i>No escapist dream sequences and melodramatic dialogues ,this movie is realism personified.</i>

agh, the second line is so bad.

[sammy]

the funny thing is there is an online version of e+ on gulf news site, but no reviews on it :|
or maybe they pulled it from the online version ?

[fizz]

Shariq, welcome to the world of publishing in Dubai, where your work is your work only as long as its not published.

[X.]

I'll always fantasized about getting a bunch of guys to make a really unique and maybe, pretentious, snobby, and cynical, Dubai magazine about movies, music, and books.

Print magazines are economically not feasible unless one of us has a LOT of spare cash lying around (Oil Baron Kaytee?)

Besides, distribution and marketing of print magazines is a pain in the ass because you have follow the same medium (print marketing is better for print magazines. Online for online).

If you're serious about this, I have some practical ideas about a bi-weekly eclectic ONLINE magazine that will cover movies, music and, some, books. It will require some discipline from you in terms of creating and submitting original content, on time. Kind of like sensesofcinema.com-diet