User Centered Marketing
Recently saw a newspaper advt that had a picture of an innocent looking girl of about 6 years with a caption: “My daddy works for the 4th largest security company in the world”. Or something in those lines.
I was thinking, why not the ‘daddy’ himself proudly proclaim that he works for that company? Why drag a six year old into the middle of it? It got me thinking. I recall another advt that showed a proud blue collar employee standing near an aircraft saying, “I check on the guy who check on the guy who check on the guy who check on the guy who checks the landing gear of our aircrafts.” And the byline said that we take qulity very seriously, so that you dont have to worry about it.
Both the advertisements register in your memory with somewhat different tactics, but they follow one key rule of marketing: To be effective, marketing must personalise the problem. You want to sell something to user, view it from the user’s angle. Sounds UI Design to me!
50/50
50/50 tells the story of a life altering finding by a young and casual lead played by Joseph Gordon-Levit. The way the funny and serious parts are mixed — thanks to the focus on friendship between the male leads — makes the movie a very interesting watch. Young and dying could have easily slipped into dramatic and shattering than how it is shown. I hear that it is a true story based on the writer’s experience with cancer.
Other than the side kick role in Inception, Gordon-Levit has been a revelation in the past couple of years with the choice of his movies, starting with The Lookout. If the awesome Ryan Gosling is the future Clooney, Gordon-Levit looks to be the future Spacey!
Blog or Backup?
Is your blog now a backup device? If everything you post on twitter or facebook needs a common place to reside, a blog would be ideal. Just keeping track of your exposed life, online still, but not pushed into everyone’s desktop. Is there a tool that collects stuff from twitter and facebook accounts and post on your blog?
Dirty Picture – Lovably Gross?
Some folks from the team went for this movie. The next day they were discussing the movie at lunch table, and one comment was: “It’s so gross that I loved it”.
ZNMD
Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara is very long, and happens in 3 chapters. It is OK as a movie, well crafted, and great on style quotient, but also has too many flaws (DCH had just one). What could have made it better?
Casting. Terrible selection of actors. Almost all of them ham their way through the movie. Hritik in later stages was bearable but horrible in the beginning. Farhaan is a natural, but this is not his role. And this is the first Abhay movie where he has acted badly. His costumes were awful — costumes were another let down. Kalki was wasted. Katrina, was actually the best among the actors!
Second big problem is the loose script. How some characters just drop by and take screen time shows carelessness in scripting. Some logics and dialogue to establish characters (guy gifts 12k euro bag to friend’s would be, but braggs about making 2k pounds!!). None of the pivots in storyline get adequate explanation – stealing of the girl friend, going after money, missing father, love life before proposal etc. Many scenes are shown as after thoughts, or need-to-know-now basis. Not tight, not flowing, not interwoven.
Good things: The best part was the poem interludes that stayed in a single scene, which I think is a first. But it is one thing that it didnt relate with the rest of the movie!! Camera work – some of the underwater and sky shots are brilliant. Lighting in the switch between 2nd & 3rd chapter was dull though. May be it was deliberate to depict the “looming death from bullhorns”. The scene of conversation in Hindi and Spanish – no boundaries – could have been really great, but shows lack of ideas as director.
In general, this movie is a poor remake of DCH. The characters are the same, story line is the same, locale is similar (but Goa had a realistic hold). But DCH was not just a road trip movie. That’s where ZNMD failed to catchup – it being a pure road trip movie, either there should have been an awesome concept, or a big star to influence involvement, and must have an awesome soundtrack/ theme.
PS: Actually, in the second viewing I liked the movie better. Perhaps I disregarded the flaws, or we are too accommodating to feel good stuff?
Chalo Dilli
I have been hearing this buzz about I Am, Shor in the City and Chalo Dilli as must watches! Did Chalo Dilli. Short of it – dont trust the reviews in Times, or film advts!
Chalo Dilli is not that bad. Only, it is a story that has been told 400 times in the last 50 years. (So what? Godfather is just a gangster story, right?) Jab we Met actually had story in it, while this one doesnt. Just a road trip movie, with all cliche situations plonked in to extend the time. Some are more forced than the rest. Thankfully there arent any songs, during the make believe subplots/ situations.
It is fairly enjoyable, especially if you go with low expectations. Even lower for Lara Dutta who is utter waste as an actress – she cannot act and her dialogue delivery was at best pathetic.
Oscars Anyone?
We canceled our cable subscription a while ago. TV is full of junk anyway. One does get tempted to bring it back on, like during a big event like the Oscars. But we resisted the temptation. Ever since Best Picture had 10 nominations, it was obvious that Oscars is going the diluted path. But I was glad that non-typical films (Hurt Locker!) were winning. But I also knew that this will not last long — the Academy will soon go back to their traditional face. When I watched Social Network and The Fighter, I felt I was wrong but then King’s Speech won. And Inception didnt get what it deserved, just like TDK?
But I find it difficult to ignore the Oscars. That is my only window of ‘what did I miss last year’ check!
More Outdoors
i-escape.com describes itself as hip hideaways, and how!
Summer | Autumn | Winter | Spring
Outdoor is where I love to be, no matter what the climate is. And here are some pictures that Apartment Therapy readers shared about their outdoors. Sigh!
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Dont get any ideas with tattoo and girl, or the dragon 
The original title of the Swedish book/movie – Män som hatar kvinnor – is a spoiler, so it’s good they changed the name for the worldwide release.
The main story is about a middle aged investigative journalist hired to probe a disappearance that happened 40 years ago. The parallel track is about the punk girl who helps in the search. And how they make unlikely partners during the detective journey. But the real story is about the darkness surrounding each character. The mystery is exceptionally well handled till the can-figure-out point. Then it slips a bit into the clichéd genres, but thankfully doesn’t follow the beaten path to the end.
Enhancement to some of the sub-plots may look unnecessary on hindsight. But I am told that the novel is written that way. Some of the scenes are not for the weak hearted, but the movie is a must watch (8/10)