1984 by George Orwell
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The best thing according to me about 1984 is that it is never superficial in its dealings. The totalitarian regime is elucidated perfectly. The characters portrayed are very clear and the sense of fear is pervasive throughout the book.
Like an Issac Asimov book, entirely a new world is created and described and as true of every classic you cannot help but hang on to every word in the book.

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Liar's Poker

Liar's Poker by Michael Lewis

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The book starts off hilariously, then starts delving into the Wall Street business. The parts where Michael Lewis shares the anecdotes from his life as the bond salesman are the best in the book.
Few paras I had to read like 2-3 times to catch the whole meaning. Like the part where author explains about how the junk bonds were created by taking over some established firms, or the parts where mortgage bonds are explained .
Overall a great book to read if you can't get enough of Wall Street phenomenon from the movies like Wall Street and Margin Call.



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India Unbound

India Unbound: The Social and Economic Revolution from Independence to the Global Information Age by Gurcharan Das

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The book covers economic history of India and the major social and political impacts that the economic policies had on the Indians. The book starts with the state of affairs of Indian society just before Independence and highlights the importance of British rule. The author, Mr. Das stresses how Britishers helped Indians set up a comptent railway network and an effective bureaucracy.
Mr. Das notes early on that India had two economic paths to take after independence - on of Gandhian self sufficient economy and other of Nehruvian model of setting up big technological industries.
India after independence went with the Nehruvian vision of mixed economy, wherein public enterprises were set up to promote important industries with help of foreign capital and technology.
Throughout the book, Mr. Das rues about the woes of this model and discusses how this model was inefficient and ineffective. He also comes down heavily on the way Indian politicians and bureaucracy stifled private industries.
He then discusses the Indian economic setup after the 1991 economic reforms and how it has changed the way an common Indian thinks. Throughout the book, Mr Das has also shares some interesting anecdotes from his professional life along with the stories of famous industrialists like GD Birla, Tatas, Dhiru Bhai Ambani, Subhash Chandra, Sam Pitroda and others.




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Crime and Punishment

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Its after a long time I got to read some terrific characters and such novel and scintillating philosophy in a book. Last time I such an effect from the novel was from The White Tiger.
For the most part, I found the book quite scintillating. The epilogue though, takes some sheen off from the book at the end.
Incidentally, I saw Crimes and Misdemeanors while I was reading this book, and both dwell on somewhat similar undercurrents in the story.



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Animal Farm

Animal Farm by George Orwell

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is an amazing read. After a looong time I have read a book completely without losing my focus. I didn't find it a scathing critic on Socialism or anything like that. The last chapter is really a treat especially the concluding statement.



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AGNEEPATH(2012)

Right now just after watching this movie, there is only one word I can think of to describe this. Its "Explosive". The extremely loud bg score, the awesome performances, the large scale settings for many scenes, the many close up shots are all a treat.
Like the earlier Agneepath, this one starts with the village(Mandava) setting where a "Master" is trying hard to elevate the economic and knowledge level of the people. But, all that is ruthlessly crushed by Kancha who gets the Master set up for a serious crime and eventually kills him with support of villagers. What follows then is the revenge story.
While the structure and some of the critical scenes resemble the original Agneepath, this movie is in true way inspired. After Sarkar this is the hindi movie that can truly be said to be inspired( or remake). The many scenes which although resemble the previous Agneepath, have been taken a step further with some important additions, like the one where Vijay's sister is kidnapped(this particular sequence also happens to be the highlight of the movie for me) or the one where Vijay goes for the dinner to her mother's house.
Regarding performances, Hrithik delivers one of those performances which we refer to as "breathed fire to his role". It is completely on the different lines than what Amitabh had portrayed. Like at places when Amitabh believed in just using his eyes to tell a lot, Hrithik uses his whole face to express the same emotions. In any case at the end you do have to appreciate Hrithik for giving something meaningfully different to the role of Vijay Chauhan, instead of making a mockery of his predecessor(yeah I am referring to SRK here).
Sanjay Dutt as Kancha is again entirely a different person than Danny was. Though the right amount of "edge" is there in his role but I still felt there could have been something more to be able to call his character as Pure Evil. Priyanka just has an extended guest appearance, and at most places is just there for song and dance routines. The best character to me was of Rishi Kapoor as Rauf Lala. The old man is simply scintillating who first plays a father figure then a bitter rival to Vijay.

The movie has a long running time, and some parts are quite loose in terms of screenplay especially in the first half, but the end product is worth a watch one time if not two.

That Girl In Yellow Boots

First up, I don't know if it is wise from Anurag Kashyap that he has released this movie along with the biggie Bodyguard and that too without any promotion. Though he says that he won't be competing with Bodyguard but then too the amount of screens the movie is running in is abysmally low, due to Bodyguard hogging up almost all the screens in multiplexes.
Anyways, abt the movie, in my opinion with TGIYB, AK has given us his boldest movie till date. Also it is not like his previous movies in terms of style. I mean most of the movie is low key and cinematography is quite hazy to give us the bleak look, this differs considerably from the bright colors and fanciful characters that AK usually throws at us. For most parts of the movie, I felt like that I was watching one of those old Scorcese movie wherein he picked up a character in the big city and studies him through his camera. We get to know the character's day job in detail along with some hidden purpose/goal he is having in the wholescheme of things.
The only colorful characters here are the Gulshan Devaiah as clumsy Kannada gangster and the parlor owner who incessantly talks on phone, who also happen to be the best of the side cast.
Naseeruddin Shah delivers another elegant performance but I was confused about purpose of his character in the movie which makes his character to somewhat lose out as compared to others.
Regarding Kalki, as expected she carries the whole movie quite successfully on her shoulders and I could hardly pick out any scene where I was not convinced with her character portrayal.
I was also amazed by the number of distinguished actors(Piyush Mishra, Ronit Roy, Rajat Kapur, Makrand Deshpande) featuring in so small roles, with couple of them not even having more than a dialogue in the movie.
That said, I can't still shake off the feeling that at someplaces either its the script or AK's direction that stops this movie from becoming a great success. These were small things but however they disturbed me,like the fiery argument that breaks out between Kalki and her bf(Prashant) in second half wherein Prashant keeps referring to her as "tum", now why would he do that when they were shown so close in the beginning. That thing almost killed the whole scene for me.
But I am ready to cast them aside for the around 100 mins of gem which shocks us at each step.
Final Rating: Green (catch it as soon as u can)