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Browsing All Posts filed under »Television / Online«
The one-for-all channel
Doordarshan Chennai turned 40 recently, which is as good an excuse as any to talk about what Doordarshan meant and what it means today. This Independence Day, I was thinking about Doordarshan. In the late 1970s and early 80s – that’s when many of us got a television set, something that resembled a crate with […]
Common men, uncommon stories
August 15, 2015
On the eve of the release of ‘Manjhi – The Mountain Man’, Baradwaj Rangan traces the journey of our biopics, which are no longer just about larger-than-life achievers. It all began in 1959, when a landless Bihari from the Musahar community, a scheduled caste that traditionally made a living as rat catchers, decided to make […]
Apples, oranges, and a lot of stale cheese
February 23, 2015
If you want to know what was wrong with this year’s Oscar telecast, just Google up “2013 Tony Awards: Neil Patrick Harris Opening Number HD.” Now that is a show. There’s singing. There’s dancing. There’s acrobatics. He leaps through a hoop. And there’s magic – literal magic. Harris steps into a box on stage and […]
Switching channels
July 10, 2014
Baradwaj Rangan gets used to the idea of life without TV. I am amazed at myself. The last time I was so amazed at myself was when I discovered that I could touch my toes without bending my knees. Okay, so I bent my knees a little. But that doesn’t count as cheating. We are […]
Lights, Camera, Conversation… “Taking a knife to a classic”
May 10, 2013
Thoughts on Hitchcock’s ‘Psycho,” Gus Van Sant’s remake of ‘Psycho,” and the ruthlessly butchered ‘Psycho’ that’s shown on television. Psycho is widely seen as the progenitor of the modern-day slasher film, yet watching it today, I wonder if that credit shouldn’t actually go to the movie Hitchcock made immediately after – The Birds, where the […]
Kogitating over Koffee
November 13, 2010
Is it possible, through television, to unearth the truth (the whole truth, nothing but the truth) about a public figure?
Between Reviews: Creating a Critic
October 10, 2009
CREATING A CRITIC In which our film critic says “thank you” to Doordarshan for shaping his cinematic sensibilities. OCT 11, 2009 – WITH SO MANY RHEUMY REMEMBRANCES being directed towards Doordarshan on its completion of 50 years, I felt compelled to contribute my two-and-a-half bits of nostalgia. But this isn’t about oh-those-were-the-days – Oru Manidhanin […]
TV Review: Gateway
March 27, 2008
DIRECTORS’ PIX The new reality show for filmmakers is the same as every other reality show around: a guilty pleasure, but little else. MAR 28, 2008 – IN A MORE INNOCENT AGE, the most commonly experienced – or at least, commonly discussed – anxiety dream used to be that of finding yourself naked in public. […]
August 22, 2015
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