Sooo nice to hear Chitra sing again

Just heard the title song of Kalavaramaye Madilo and it was sooo good to hear Chitra again who is not singing much in telugu these days. The song is also composed very well and I strongly recommend everyone to lisen to it.

Google Chrome OS explained - but is it ahead of its time?

Check out this link http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/introducing-google-chrome-os.html . Google has taken pain to explain us what their new opereating system is all about. Sounds interesting, as I read I understood that the OS is going to work on internet and we should be connected all the time incase they don't give the offline option. Even if they do we need internet to upload the files and save it online. I just have a feeling that it might be a bit ahead of its time as apart from USA rest of the world is still struggling for good internet connection. Expecially, in poorer countries using a computer is going to be much more expensive as they need to buy an internet connection if they have to use chrome OS. Microsoft might score over chrome in this aspect.

The verdict of the tussle between Microsoft and Google will only come out next year when google is planning to release its OS in full scale compaticle with laptops and desktops also. Microsoft has time to analysze what chrome is all about in the mean time when it is released on netbooks. Let us see how it goes

Deepika Padokone in an item song in Telugu?

What is going on? It is a bit surprising that Deepika Padukone is doing an item song inspite of being a super star in Bollywood. Usually, lead actresses (Heroin) resort to south Indian movies when they don't get enough chances in Bollywood in order to be in the lime light. Their ultimate goal might still be to be very successful in Bollywood. For example Shriya, Genelia, Namitha, Bhumika, Simran, Jyotika, Nagma etc are all north Indian models who couldn't create chances in Bollywood and so created a career of their own down south. Ofcourse, Genelia and Shriya at the moment are enjoying decent success in Bollywood too.

For Deepika (hailing from Karnataka), though she started off with Kannada movie Ishwarya (Nuvvu naku Nacchav remake) she is highly successful in bollywood ad there is absolutely no need to act in telugu/tamil movies. But she is doing an Item song, not even a lead actree in Jayant's forthcoming movie Love 4 Ever!!! Is it hunger to be successful which is driving her down south or is it money? In any case, I am pleasently surprised to see her dancing in a telugu movie.

Audio of Magadheera is below average

It is a big disappointment that such a high budget film has such an average music. There are a lot of expectations on this movie as it is coming after almost 2.5 years after the release of Charan's first movie Chiruta and it is learnt that a telugu movie of such magnitude has never come on the screen. Above all it is the combination of Rajamouli, who has delivered hits after hits and Charan that has created considerable curiosity among movie lovers and fans.

Except for two songs (Panchadara and Dheera Dheera) every other sing is a let down. In fact it would have been a bad album with out those two songs. Even the Bagaru Kodipetta remix is done very badly. Ofcourse, it has been a while since Rajamouli and Keeravani has delivered a true musical hit. Yamadonga, Chatrapati, sye and now Magadheera, all have average or below average musics. If I remembere correctly Simhadri was the last musical hit for this pair. Hope the movie does well. Rajamouli though hasn't delivered a flop is losing his grip on story narration. If not for the NTR-Rajamouli factor and a story line which isnt repeated often in telugu, Yamadonga would have been a disaster.

Balakrishna Vs Bellamkonda Suresh

Both Balakrishna and Bellamkonda Suresh should be absolutely ashamed of themselves. Whatever happened to their rivalry, they are happily posing for pictures now. I am sure you all remember the shooting episode at Balakrishna's house where he shot Bellamkonda Suresh for the reaons known only to them!!! I still can't figure out how Balakrishna can celebrate his birthday with Bellamkonda. Crazy world

The transformation of Mandira Bedi

The picture says it all. At the bottom is the Mandira Bedi we know from the TV serial Shanti and the top is the Mandira Bedi today. The transformation is pretty amazing and praiseworthy. She is as successful today as she was in the era of conservative India. That makes her all the more special. Not many have achieved it. She has successfully managed the aging affect and all. Women doesn't have to look beyond Mandira for a role model in today's world. Hats off to her. 

Ofcourse, she has to be ever thankful of Sony Max for selecting her to comentate the 2003 world cup. 

Runway 9!!!

I have been to Runway 9 very recently and was pleasantly surprised by the magnitude of entertainment it can provide. It has the most popular go-karting track in Hyderabad and that is the only thing I thought it had! Only after reaching the place I came to now that there are host of other entertainment options alos. It had archery, shooting, bungy jumping for children, an indoor entertainment parlour which has a snooker table, table tennis, fusball table etc and a laser fighting game which is played outdoors. Ofcourse the quality of the snooker tables/cues and table tennis bats are not of good stabdards but who cares, they are good enough for a fun evening. A nice place to hangout on a weekend evening in Hyderabad. 

Ajay- Raviteja-II in the making

Ajay who has been doing sidekick roles all the while is going to come before us as a solo hero very soon. The film is title Aa Okkadu and has gorgeous Madhurima as lead actress. As we know he is a terrific actor and has been in the industry for a while without any major break ala Raviteja. He has done a superb job as a friend to Maheshbabu in Okkadu and did an outstanding job as the villian in Vikramarkudu. No doubt that he is a fine actor and hopefully AA Okkadu will help him prove his mettle as a hero. Actually he has signed Sarai Veeranna too (before Aa Okkadu), but not sure when is it going to release.  Go Ajay

Inflation dips to 8.98%

Wow, what a good news it is to see inflation back into single digits. We can now hope RBI to cut interest rates further and ease the cash flow by cutting down CRR. Hopefully this should ease the liquidity concerns India is facing at the moment. IMO any measure taken now will require atleast one or two months to show any effect. So it is better our government acts swiftly and decides on PLR and CRR numbers before businesses across the country have to deal with irreparable damage. Anyways in this connection I have added a poll on when you people think our economy will be back on track. You have one week time to vote. I am interested in seeing the results as this will reflect the sentiments of Indians. 

Are we "Indians" the real communists?

I have been to China(Shanghai) recently and was eagerly waiting to see how different the world ruled by communists would be? To my surprise, the communists in China appeared much more capitalists than any country except for may be USA. Seriously, may be India is the only country which still follows communism in the disguise of democracy. It was surprising to know how easy it is in China to set up a business or get your work done with government officials inspite of it being a communist ruled country. Even they have changed, modified communism according to modern needs and may be that is the secret of their huge success. But alas!! we Indians still fail to come out of Nehruism (Communism in the guise of Democracy :) ) which never helped us in become world power!! One has to be in China to see its development. Aha, what roads, buildings, airports in word the infrastructure over there is mind blowing. May be its time India needs to change its ways if we have to have any chance to be a super power along with China and USA 20 years from now. 

Sports updates - of Mumbai Indians, French open, test series in England and west Indies and the memorial tournament in golf

Quite a few sports to follow last week and this week. We had a very close finish to Mumbai Indians Vs Rajasthan Royals match and poor Mumbai can't help but sympathize with me. They have come tantalizingly close to clinching the semifinals spot in the last three matches against Punjab, Delhi and Rajasthan. Well, that is what makes cricket such a great spectacle. Anyways, now the fortunes of Sachin's sena depends on the outcome of Chennai Vs Deccan chargers matches. Hopefully Deccan chargers will come out strong today and give Mumbai one more richly deserved chance. Mumbai has to take care of Bangalore though. Go Deccan chargers, Go Sachin!!

In the test between West Indies and Australia, WI surrendered meekly!! Very disappointing as they had a real good chance to go 1 up in the series. Stuart Clarke continue to take wickets and Australia juggernaut never seems to stop except for a brief period whenever they play India :) . Chasing 292, barring some courageous resistance from Ramdin and Sammy WI never seemed to be in the match. Giving Australia the lead is as good as losing the test series.

There is another test match going in England between NZ and the home country. Leaving the result aside the two left arm spinners seemed to have gained the most. They shared 13 wickets (Vettori and Panesar) among themselves out of 34 that fell. Panesar is the man of the match for his brilliant 6/37 which has helped England go 1 up in the 3 match series.

In golf, the memorial tournament is going to start this Thursday. Tiger Woods is not playing it and we have to see who will win it. K.J.Choi is the defending champion.

French open has also started and hasn't gained much momentum as it is only into the second round. I am sure you are all going to see a lot more posts and updates on this as the week progresses.

Jannath and Chronicles of Narnia (prince Caspian) are strongly recommended

Watched both these movies this weekend and throughly enjoyed them. Especially Jannath, one of the very few Hindi movies I liked (released in the last 3 to 4 years). It is a typical Mahesh Bhatt movie but with match fixing background. It is a beautiful love story and would have been a hit with any background. It is about how a man in search of giving all the happiness in this world to his girl friend employs illegal means of making money and finally is caught in a web which he never intended to and can't coming out of it. The climax also is well shot which is the most difficult part of any movie.

Chronicles of Narnia delivers big time inspite of its pre release hype. It is about how prince Caspian regains his thrown from his evil uncle with the help of Narnians and gifts it back to them. He continues to be the king though. The war episodes are executed impeccably though it seems pale and childish in comparison to the Lord of the rings trilogy. I enjoyed the movie thoroughly with not even a single boring moment. Strongly recommended for all the english movie buffs. And, it is not necessary to watch the first part to understand the second. Go and watch it

Go Deccan Chargers!!

Well, the passion will not die till the team has absolutely zero chance to make it to the semifinals. I am still hoping that the chargers will fire and win all the 5 matches so that they will be in the semifinals. Ok, let us take it one by one. We are playing Delhi today and it is one of the weakest batting line ups in IPL. Hopefully our bowlers will encash on the bad form of Sehwag and poor batting line up of Delhi Daredevils to register their third win in the competetion. Go chargers, Go gilly!!!

Shame shame Aamir!!!

It is well know to everyone by now that Aamir's pet dog's name is Shahrukh. What a loser you are Aamir, if you can't take the competetion get lost. This is absolutely demeaning to name a dog Shahrukh and above all mention it in the blog. May be the dog is his caretaker's, may be it was named Shahrukh even before he bought his Panchgani house, may be it could be anything. But mentioning the same and referring Shahrukh licking feet and all is such a shame on Aamir. Get lost man, you have seriously degraded yourself in everyone's eyes. Shame Shame Aamir!!!

IPL updates

As expected it was a low scoring affair and congratulations to Kolkata who scored a much needed win to consolidate their position at No.4.

Amit Misra surprisingly looks like a very competent batsman. He was very good yesterday and he bowled well too. 3 to 4 years ago he was considered as Kumble's replacement but he lost the plot somewhere down the line. Thanks to IPL, he is back in the reckoning competing with Piyush Chawla (who has been outstanding through out the tournament) for a place in the Indian squad.

It is Mumbai Vs Chennai today and the whole world will be looking on how Sachin responds to 20-20 challenege. Go Sachin!!! It will be a treat to watch Sachin and Jayasuriya open togather. A nice article on his return

http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?newsid=1164273

ICC wants to save Tests from Twenty20 lure!!!!

It is so infuriating to read something like this!!! What is ICC thinking? Do they just want to preserve the tradition or also make the game popular? Isn't it pathetic that an extremely interesting game like cricket is not even played in 10% of the world nations? The major reason is the lack of innovation in the game over the years. T20 has done something to attract world's attention and these bunch of losers (ICC) want to spoil that. ICC needs to be clear on their agenda, whether to preserve cricket or make it popular. They can't play double games with the paying public. Come on ICC, wake up!!!! What are you upto?

Can Deccan Chargers do it?

It is almost a do or die match for Deccan Chargers today. Royal Challengers is one of the easiest teams to beat and I hope Chargers do record their second win today. I don't call it a do or die match, but a loss here means our chance to get into semifinals would seriously take a dent. Nothing can be predicted in IPL till each team play atleast 7 matches. A win here for Deccan chargers means they will be tied with Knight Riders with 4 points each and just a win or two away from the fourth spot. Go DC. Make us proud.

Parugu is no good!!

Well, I haven't watched the movie but for sure going by the reviews it looks like the movie has bombed. I have posted an article on Sheila's fate lying in the hands of this film a week ago and looks like with this result she has to head towards Kollywood forever.

There are quite a few rumours going on at the moment about this film. A section of crowd feels that Chiranjeevi has asked to direct this movie deliberately so that the crowd can empathize with him for all that he has undergone during his daughters fiasco. And then there is another section who feel that the movie was directed for doom so that Ram Charan Teja can be higlighted in the course. As of me I think they are just rumours and nothing to be seriously taken about.

Can Sheila win with Parugu

Sheila is a beautiful and talented tamil actress. In my opinion not many actresses today can match her in terms of acting. For some reason she never got a start in telugu industry justifying her talent though she acted in movies like Raju bhai, hello premincu, sitakokachiluka etc. Dil Raju who co produced hello preminchu along with Puri Jagaanath was so impressed with Sheila that he signed her as his hero in in the movie parugu. Hope the good luck of Allu Arjun will rub off to Sheila. An actress with substance is the need of the hour in telugu industry. All the best Sheila

Will the uppal stadium ever be completed?

I have been to Deccan chargers Vs Dare devils match the other day and to my surprise the Uppal stadium is still not completed!! Mr.Shivlal Yadav, nothing to be proud about the 6 flood lights you were talking about the other day in the media. First complete the stadium!! Pathetic administration. I think the stadium has run into problems over the name when Mr.Y.S.Rajasekhara Reddy has proposed Rajiv gandhi's name to it. Actually the stadium was supposed to name after its promoters, but the givernment intervened and promised to refund the money to the promoters to change the name which I guess never happened and the stadium is stalled. Whatever it might be, it just highlights the pathetic state of affairs with HCA.