Monthly Review: December 2024
Towards the beginning of the month, I was roaming around places without a proper plan. I was in Pondicherry, had to visit Chennai for a day, and returned to Hyderabad. But cyclone Fenegal had a different plan.
I was in Pondicherry with my colleagues for a company offsite. Just before the cyclone Fenegal hit Pondicherry, we reached Club Mahindra in Pondicherry. After the offsite, our team (Product team at Fyle) planned to stay back in Pondicherry for a few days and work from there. My flight to Hyderabad was booked from Chennai, but owing to the cyclone, we went back to Bengaluru, and from there, I returned to Hyderabad.
The initial few days of the month weren’t going as planned, and I returned to Hyderabad disappointed, owing to the canceled trip and exhaustion due to continuous travel.
The weather was unpredictable, too! It was sunny for a few days, it rained for a few days, and it was shivering cold after the rains in Hyderabad. The weather reflected my mood throughout the month and was symbolic of the colorful emotions I was going through this month. While the weather was acting weird at times, I managed to do a few things this month.
There are two emotional moments for me, in a positive way — happy moments if I put it that way — my birthday and my best friend’s wedding.
I invited around 30 folks for my birthday and managed to host around 29 folks at our home in Hyderabad! It was a fun event — friends from school, cousins, and friends from common interests — I managed to assemble everyone under one roof and celebrate my birthday! I was happy that most of them turned up, and we had a memorable night (I slept at 4 am).
Now, coming to another important occasion — my best friend Nakul’s wedding! My friend from the last decade with whom I studied both Intermediate and Under Graduation courses and who has no filters while talking got married to his soulmate. It was a lovely event where we had a lot of fun. I had friends from both colleges coming over, and those impromptu dance moves, trolling each other and witnessing the wedding while being on stage were all lovely. I’m lowkey proud of both of them for taking this step and being able to pull off things on their own. God bless this couple ♥️
Fitness-wise, I wasn’t active this month owing to travel and other issues. I did Yoga at home and wasn’t able to visit Cult centers. I had one goal to finish before the end of this month — run 5k, and I did it! I happened to set a personal record for 5k. With this, I ran 5k thrice in 2024 and wish to do more in the next year 😀
Arijit Singh concert
My sister is a big fan of Arijit Singh, and we both went to his Hyderabad concert. He started it right on time, at 6:30 pm, and went on to sing until 10 pm. He was there on the stage throughout.
Started with Ilahi, and it was energizing. Most of the songs he sang in movies, too, were for Ranbir Kapoor and Shahrukh Khan. He sang one Telugu song too — Anuvanuvuu from Om Bheem Bush, although I had never listened to this song before. I’m listening to that song on a loop right now. Just a mere mention of this song here is making me open Spotify and play that breezy melody.
He covered all of my favorites — Agar Tum Saath Ho, Tere Hawale, Kesariya, Chaleya, Janam Janam, and the song I listened to the most on Spotify this year, Vida Karo, among other songs ♥️
He passed the mic along to the audience and made them sing with him. It was lovely to see a singer of his stature doing this during a live concert. I’m impressed with his humility. And there was a crowd asking him for autographs. He apologized to us, the audience distant from the stage, for not being able to give an autograph! Sweet!
I have a complaint about the crowd, though — people were throwing whatever they had in their hands — phone backcases, hoodies, T-shirts, and other things towards him for autographs. I wish we would behave civilized in crowds. The mob mentality is worse. He was playing guitar too, and people were throwing things on the guitar too — worst behavior from the crowd.
Overall — the concert was fantastic and memorable. Love this man ♥️
Hyderabad Book Fair
For a few years now, I have made it a point to visit the annual Hyderabad Book Fair at NTR Stadium. With a lot of untouched books on my shelf, I decided not to purchase any books at the book fair but ended up buying 4–5 books previously. This year, though, I stood firm on my oath! I didn’t purchase any books this year, and it was really difficult. I visited stalls where there were books by my favorite author, Yandamoori, but I exercised self-restraint and was successful. I went to the book fair with my friend, and he was surprised too (we had been going there together)!
Now, coming to the regular stuff — movies, books, etc.
Movies
Pushpa 2: The Rule
I watched the film with many expectations, and yeah, the movie lived up to them. I didn’t like the first part of Pushpa owing to my expectations, but this time, I knew what to expect and was totally enjoying the film. I was laughing out loud at the interval scene, was teary-eyed during the much-talked-about Jathara sequence, and was vibing to the songs. Allu Arjun 🙌
After watching the film, I started listening to the songs on a loop, and these songs made me think about the scenes, making me appreciate the organic flow of songs in the film. I was eating a pizza slice, and the moment the Jathara sequence started, I paused to eat so as not to miss even a second of the sequence. Guess what? I held the pizza slice for more than 20 minutes without eating it. Such was the experience. Everything peaked in that sequence, and I just loved the experience I had there.
Aside from the positives of the movie, there are negatives to the film, too — the primary one being the incoherence throughout. I still enjoyed the film owing to the expectations I had before the film. Would I go back to watch the movie all over again? Nope!
Tenet
Christopher Nolan’s Tenet got re-released in Hyderabad, and I watched it!! I honestly feel he’s one of the rare filmmakers who understands cinema in a different way and ensures that he presents a different experience altogether with his movies. I was surprised and was in awe of the way he stitched the screenplay and made it look smooth.
I hope we get one more screening of all of his movies so I can watch them without taking breaks in between.
On OTTs, I watched these movies: Life in a Metro, Tu Jhooti Main Makkar, Salaar: Cease Fire, and Bhagavanth Kesari. Will share my thoughts concisely here.
Life in a Metro
To be honest, I was scared at the beginning of the movie to see the relationships portrayed in the movie. The writing is top-class, and the filmmaker, Anurag Basu, had an ensemble cast to do justice to the script he wrote. I loved the film. This hyperlink story has an engaging screenplay that isn’t confusing. One thing to learn from this movie is to have an interesting screenplay and actors who can showcase their strengths effectively. I loved the way he brought the music composer and his band to sing the songs in the movie. That was lovely!
Tu Jhooti Main Makkar
This film has a good conflict, and the entire movie uses that effectively. Again, a good screenplay with actors playing their strengths and enhancing music — everything complementing each other made this a good watch. The comedy scenes worked well, too! I loved the screenplay for its payoff using comedy and conflict — a good way of adding something interesting to the usually successful rom-coms.
Salaar: Cease Fire
I watched it on Netflix on its first theatrical release anniversary. I had low expectations, but the movie worked out well, although there were a few scenes that felt unnecessary or over-the-top. I loved the world-building, elevation scenes for the hero and the reaction shots of the side characters.
For the last year, I saw multiple posts on social media hyping up the “Kateramma Fight,” and before watching the film, I wondered if the hype was real and it worked out well for me. I feel it was worth the hype, although the setup for the fight is not new for us. Overall, I look forward to the second part and appreciate the writing in this movie.
Bhagavanth Kesari
This movie has good scenes that weren’t coming out coherently. The flashback episode could have been more intense and had a bit more screen time for it to have a proper payoff. Again, the writing of a few scenes was good, but they didn’t turn out as effective, like the bus fight scene, where they used retro songs for the comedy element. There’s a scene where the hero lectures about good touch and bad touch to primary school kids. That scene alone was good on paper, but again, it wasn’t falling smoothly in the screenplay.
I ponder over this question when heroes in commercial movies pause the flow of the screenplay to give lectures to the audience — Would people listen to their heroes preaching about something in between the movie, or as an audience, do we need to care more about the film rather than the messages in between?
Runway 34
I was talking to my friends about Vettaiyan and how the movie didn’t work for me owing to not using Amitabh Bachchan properly in the movie, and someone recommended me to watch this Ajay Devgn’s directorial. I had no expectations for this movie, but it worked out well for me. Amitabh’s intensity, sarcasm in high-tense situations, and his gestures with eyes — oh god, just amazing. I watched it only for him and this movie turned out to be interesting for me. Loved it overall and will rewatch the courtroom scenes. Ajay Devgn directed it well, especially the tense situation during the landing and these intense trial scenes.
Books
13–14–15
A Telugu Novel by Yandamoori Veerendranath. I had a reading slump for a month or so due to travel and other things, and yet again, this man helped me get back to my reading habit. I finished the book in four days, and although I didn’t like it, it certainly was a page-turner. I believe once you are used to the style of an author, no matter how bad the plot is, the writing style makes you binge-read (I don’t know if there’s such a word). The novel starts off well, but after a while, it feels pointless. At the time of writing the novel (as a serial in a Telugu daily in the 90s), the author diverges to bring in social awareness on medical mafia and defrauding people in the guise of curing terminal illness. Although I liked the climax of the novel, I couldn’t appreciate the majority portion of the novel except for a few lines and, again, the writing style!
But this man kept me on the reading track again 😀
Kadambari Devi’s Suicide Note
I was browsing our bookshelf to get my hands on the shortest book so I could finish quickly and saw this. I read the back cover of the book and couldn’t keep it at bay after that. Although the book is short, it is deep. This book, as the title suggests, is the valedictory letter of Kadambari Devi, sister-in-law of Rabindranath Tagore, who committed suicide four months after Tagore’s wedding.
I won’t spill much about this book, and it can neither be reviewed nor judged because it’s not the work of an author to be published or garner reviews.
I kept postponing the blog posts yet again owing to my procrastination this time, too, and I am writing this blog post towards the end of the month.
With this, we are towards the end of the blog post. I wish everyone a Happy 2025 ✨
