What a Waar!

They say "You have to see it to believe it". This does not apply on the movie "Waar". People had already created a lot of hype about the movie. The trailer had grasped audience attention and it was very much awaited by all.
I watched it today. After at least three weeks of it's release and reading spoilers (thanks to Twitter ofcourse) about the movie I finally watched it. and what a experience it has been. I am still spell-bound by the acting, cinematography, the sound effects and the music. Everything left its permanent charm on me. I couldn't really imagine it was Bilal Lashari's debut film. I'd like to first highlight the positives (and believe me it has many) of the movie.

Positives:
Shaan: Our Hero. I could easily say "agaya tey chah  gaya thaa kar ke" for him. Every single dialogue he uttered was so captivating, filled with emotions and so heartfelt that I felt goosebumps whenever he had a scene with the villain Shamoon Abbasi (ill come to him later). His sober acting suited his character so well that one could feel his pain almost exactly the same way. Shaan lived up to his character. I still cant find any weak points in his role.

Hamza Ali Abbasi: my newest crush ever ofcourse. Lol. I always knew he was a good actor. Having watched him in his drama "Mere Dard ko Jo Zubaan Milay" playing an extremely convincing negative role, I knew this guy had potential. Bilal Lashari saw that too. Hamza Ali Abbasi is everything you want in a movie or in a (side) hero. He has got looks (hayee), he has got talent and he has got what it takes to become a great actor. His speech that he gives to his soldiers "Tau tyaar ho dikhanay kai liye apne dushmanon ko kai ham tyaar hain, iss Dharti maa kai betay qurbani kai liye tyaar hain, Naara e Takbeer ALLAH HU AKBAR" That Speech is what made me fall in love with his character. I was moved to tears and I wanted to yell "Allah Hu Akbar" with him! He played a police officer's role perfect to the core. The only thing I would have wanted was Abbasi's fighting sequence with one of the villains but nonetheless,I have no complains.

Ali Azmat: I really thought Ali Azmat had a strong character in the movie. He had. I still cant recall his acting skills the way I can of Shaan and Hamza Abbasi though. He could have really worked on his diction and accent though. He talked like one of those weird jageerdar politicians of a town we all hate and thus it was difficult for me to see him as a positive character. saying "waqt" as "Waq-qat" and "Quaid" as "Qaa-yad" was not cool.

Aisha Khan: beauty with brains would be a perfect title for this lady. She has it all. Just like Hamza Ali Abbasi, she did not fail to make her mark in the movie. Her acting skills shown through every single scene she appeared in. The only exaggerated part was where she suddenly turns into one of the members of a Bomb Disposal Squad ( if Im not wrong she just worked as an Intelligence officer and trained for shooting and DIDNT deal with explosives). Nevertheless, Her scene after Hamza Ali Abbasi's death (oh shut up, y'all must have watched it by now so this is not a spoiler :P) was so so real, I couldnt hold my tears back and me and my mum were crying in unison with her. Thank you for those tears, Aisha.

Meesha: Lakhsmi aka Meesha Shafi. I have a strong disliking for her cause I think she can not act and she was just there to fill in the X-factor of that movie (as if there was any need). I wont be giving her due credit if I said I didnt like her acting in this movie. She did well. Created a negative vibe around her and made us fall in hate with her. Thats enough, my dislike doesnt allow me to proceed further on Lakshmi Bai.

Shamoon Abbasi: You know that feeling you get where you fall in love with the hero as well as the villain? that was what Shamoon did to me. What an actor. truly inspiring. If anything, Bilal Lashari needs to be proud of casting him for a villainous role. He lived the character to its fullest, made us hate him and made his presence felt. He was everything a villain should be. The only thing I would have wanted was Shaan to beat him to a miserable and more cruel death (yeah didnt we just hate him that much?)

Negatives:

Well the only negatives I found are regarding the accents of the actors. Pushtoons speak in Urdu in a Punjabi accent (I mean seriously, what was that?). The fighting scene between Shaan and Shamoon was really really cut down to a minimal. I swear the director should have extended it to a 5 mins scene and nobody would have questioned it. The dance scene between Meesha Shafi and Shamoon Abbas was a bit over-board. I mean Shamoon could have been shown singing "Ni Swan Song tu meri meri, main tera Rawal Rawal" for Meesha and it would have looked fine.

I could go on and on about how the fighting scenes, the locations and the background music were shot to perfection. Waar truly is what our Pakistani Cinema needed. Shoaib Mansoor opened the doors for the young talent to step forward and shine and thats what Bilal Lashari did. Kudos to him. I was sure I won't be alone in applauding the movie after the credits appeared and the audience would clap along with me and guess what? I wasn't wrong.

"Dont create a fuss if someone abuses on twitter."

 I am always told this by my Twitter friends to calm myself down when someone abuses on Twitter in their random tweets. "BC kaisa hai?" "salay b***** tu ne reply kyun nai kia". Okay I agree guys in general talk like that. not a biggie. maybe its usual for them. maybe their friendship requires a certain "you have to abuse otherwise you are not among us" rule to be followed. but what's with girls? I dont recall saying to my friends "aur B******* kaisi hai?" or randomly throwing your mom is so fat jokes at them. no. I wasn't ever taught that. I dont know. I wont say I dont use abusive language. I do. but, shouldnt there be a limit to it? I mean. Its okay to use abusive language with your besties and they need to be girls. but girls calling their guy friend "BC and Haram*****" is so uncool. big big problem there. The other day, I read a tweet like "hey mother******, how are ya?" by a girl. okay. after a few days I had this to ask to people on Twitter. "If a person calls someone "mother******", should they call their dad that too? since it sounds extremely legit.". obviously. nobody answered.
Abusive language is only fun when its done in private and not used in public to be counted among the "kewl pepol". if abusing is uber cool to you and then I wonder what would you teach your kids to call you... "oye chakkay abba, idhar ayen zara" probably.

Rape is not Funny

they would call me a butt-hurt and told me to grow up when I stopped them from cracking any rape or Cancer jokes. I always thought it must feel weird If I were a rape victim or a cancer patient (God Forbid) to sit among people who think these are some frivolous subjects to be made fun of. Once, my pet died because of fever and I had become every sentimental and frenzied whenever someone mentioned fever in my house. These were my feelings for a pet. A thing that cant think, talk back to us or respond to our moods in the same manner as ours. A cat for example, still understands when you are in a bad mood, or when you want to shower love for them. The way they purr or meow in different pitches informs us to an extent what a cat wants. If we can understand animal psychology then why not make some effort to understand human's? Human emotions should be the easiest to understand since we all interact with our family members, cousins, relatives and friends the whole time. Humans should always prove themselves to be humans. Human emotions should be taken care of. One should choose their words carefully, utter things that don't become a sensitive matter for others and be a little more tactful while cracking jokes. every topic is not funny. Rape is one of them.

Facebooking your Life

I always wonder what pleasure does it provide people in letting others know where they are dining with their beloved ones, where they are shopping for the summer and why they tag a friend in a status when he or she is sitting right beside them the whole time. Facebook does it to you ladies and gentleman. Facebook, a social network where people post about their problems, their love for their husband/wife and love for their non-facebooking parents. It is strange that all of us are deeply lost in posting about our likes and dislikes over social networks like Facebook, Twitter and other such social networking websites. What has resulted this situation? according to me, I think its the lack of communication with loved ones and our friends. Before we indulged ourselves into these websites, we used to rejoice going to a fun place with our family, with our friends and talk with our best friends about a new experience. Now, we have subjected ourselves to talking to our friends via Twitter and Facebook only. The importance of meeting up with our friends is only highlighted when we meet up at a restaurant. Even during that event, we spend our time taking pics the whole time cause it will make a cool album on Facebook or a perfect DP. I sometimes, don't even enjoy conversations with my friends cause all they have to tell me is that someone posted a pic of their chacha ki beti ki marriage pic and the groom didn't look good enough with the bride in the pictures. Amusingly, the pictures are supposed to have "privacy settings" for the friends and family but my friends somehow dig out pics to satisfy their officious desires.

I wish the old times come back, when we used to visit our friends place just to rant about our siblings, our teachers and sometimes our parents too. Those old times when we enjoyed talking to each other about ourselves, not about what others were doing in their life. Times when a conversation with our best friends was the most fun and blessed thing to happen to us in comparison to the happiness we now get in receiving a hundred likes over a pic. Someone was right when they said," Old is Gold".

A Moment of Realization

No. You aren't a part of my life anymore. stay away from me. please. thats all i am asking you to do. please. I had to come and rant on my blog cause that's all I wanted to do right now. yell. scream. shout out loud. whatever could lighten me up and relax me. watching a comedy movie would be a good choice. maybe not. maybe. will decide that later. people care. they actually do. thats what makes you realize there still are people alive in this world who want to be a part of someone's happiness. not just to be officious or nosy but actually to show they love, to show they care, to show they are still there for you to cry on their shoulder, to show you are not alone, to show they can always put a smile on my face, to show no matter what happens they will cheer me up, to show they can take my bull shit and throw it away with a flippant behavior and pretend as if it didnt matter to them, to show that my rudeness as a result of my anger will never effect them, to show they are much more humane than anybody else alive in this world. These people make me feel alive, to trust in humanity once more, to live with a hope that all's not lost yet, to believe that everything is fine and will be fine again. That is ladies and gentleman, a moment of recognition.

My Voice as a Pakistani

Okay, you might find this blog is written in bit of a patriotic frenzy and some of it might not make sense to you but every year I have to come across some of the most obnoxious things ever. Every year, I have to argue (rather fight) with some early-twenties pseudo-intellectuals about how Pakistan is a land of opportunities corrupted by our very own faults and not a land inherent with malignant atrocities since its birth. The argument from their side always starts with the worse: "The partition was a mistake, Pakistan should have never landed as a separate entity at all, We would have been better off as Indians." When I first came across this idea, I was almost left speechless, thinking what sort of mind could conceive a thought like this and completely overlook all the sacrifices and bloodshed that caused us a free land.

Muslims, are different from Hindus, that is very much a established fact. If Indians are considered to be an epitome of peace, intellect and patience for every race and culture (this can be contested), it was not like that in the 1930-40's. I am definitely weak at history and giving any cogent examples to defend my argument but I know one thing: I am a Pakistani and will die as a Pakistani. If my ancestors decided to land into Pakistan for their betterment and even if something has gone wrong since then, It's my duty to stand up and take charge. It is my duty to change the whole disgusted scenario my country has to face. It's definitely my job to point out faults of my people but it's also my job to do my own part first in order to preach others about doing good. I am terribly disturbed with the psyche of youngsters planning to leave Pakistan for good cause this country is not allowing them to excel in their life. It is the people who need to be changed, not the land. If its in your hands to mold your future according to your liking then it is also your responsibility to improve the condition of your people and your own country. If something goes wrong in your family then you surely don't leave them behind and run away, do you? If that's what you do then you are most welcome to leave this country to people who care for it and still have a glimmering hope that this will become a safer, better and beautiful land for every one to live in.

I have this sudden urge to repeat what ex-PM Yousaf Raza Gillani once said to a reporter from CNN (the context was different though but anyways)," why don't they just leave then? who's stopping them?".

Andddd It's Gone.

So Eid Mubarak Everyone. Hope your Ramzaan and eid went well. The third day of Meethi Eid has finished now but I still wanna enjoy some more. The third day was quite boring to be honest. I couldnt go visit a certain relative cause some other relatives of mine had already invaded the house of that person. Never mind. I sorta miss the Ramzaan feel now when it's gone. I followed a certain routine, a patterned life style and a way of living that I should be following the whole year around. I am some how disappointed that Ramzaan doesnt have an alrernative pattern. Well, I need to reevaluate this because I dont think I would have followed the pattern perfectly if that was the case. I need to turn myself into a better person and Muslim first to follow the set path of piousness.

My mind is sleepy right now I guess. or may be too many ideas have taken place at the same time. I  shoul dgo and figure out what should be the topic to my next blogpost and meanwhile you need to turn your stove off. Salaan na Jal jayay.