alsacecypr
Joined Jul 2004
Welcome to the new profile
Our updates are still in development. While the previous version of the profile is no longer accessible, we're actively working on improvements, and some of the missing features will be returning soon! Stay tuned for their return. In the meantime, the Ratings Analysis is still available on our iOS and Android apps, found on the profile page. To view your Rating Distribution(s) by Year and Genre, please refer to our new Help guide.
Badges2
To learn how to earn badges, go to the badges help page.
Reviews1
alsacecypr's rating
I've been newly introduced to Indian film, so I'm no expert. But clearly it is more than just Bollywood. Viewing "Satya," after previously seeing another film by Ram Gopal Varma, "Company," I would have to say that Varma is one of the greatest filmmakers now working. With these two movies that are deft, unsentimental, and at the same time not hard-boiled, he seems to add something unique to the gangster genre: the emotionally rounded portrait of the gangster, the gangster inside-out.
Unlike American gangster movies of the 30s, which "Satya" and "Company" remind me of somewhat, Varma's movies are more philosophically ambitious and do something more difficult: they manage to be moral without moralizing. And differently than Coppola's "Godfather" trilogy, where people seem born into a life of crime, Varma shows them becoming criminals and the results of the choices they've made.
I should also say, from the point of view of entertainment, Varma's films are riveting and earn every second of their "Bollywood" length. They do not have unnecessary "filler." Even the de riguer musical numbers "work" and have arrangements and choreography you could imagine on a hip New York stage.
If it hasn't already happened, Varma is ready to be discovered by the festival circuit. I myself am ordering everything I can find by him on DVD and can't wait to check out his other work. Films like "Satya" and "Company" are surely not a fluke.
Unlike American gangster movies of the 30s, which "Satya" and "Company" remind me of somewhat, Varma's movies are more philosophically ambitious and do something more difficult: they manage to be moral without moralizing. And differently than Coppola's "Godfather" trilogy, where people seem born into a life of crime, Varma shows them becoming criminals and the results of the choices they've made.
I should also say, from the point of view of entertainment, Varma's films are riveting and earn every second of their "Bollywood" length. They do not have unnecessary "filler." Even the de riguer musical numbers "work" and have arrangements and choreography you could imagine on a hip New York stage.
If it hasn't already happened, Varma is ready to be discovered by the festival circuit. I myself am ordering everything I can find by him on DVD and can't wait to check out his other work. Films like "Satya" and "Company" are surely not a fluke.