Surabhi Verma

From 'Saving Private Ryan' To 'Suburbicon', Here Is How Matt Damon Became One Of The Most Bankable Stars Of The Generation

Jul 312017

Good actors are unpredictable and so is Matt Damon.

With each new performance, Matt keeps growing not only as a performer or an artist but also as a viewer. He knows which roles would suit him the best and so he takes a chance on them. Surprisingly, the performance turns out to be as always a better and polished one. ‘Smart choices’ could be the two words for his splendid and enormous career of around 29 years (since 1988). It could be his brilliance as an artist as he outperformed many others of his age and bagged his first Academy Award, not for acting but for Best Original Screenplay in ‘Good Will Hunting’ (1997), when he was just 27-year-old.

A Look At Actor Matt Damon Brilliant Career Over 25 Years © YouTube

Who would believe by then that the young Matt would certainly become one of the most bankable stars in Hollywood? He is not only an actor by now a producer also. His last production ‘Manchester by the Sea’ (2016) received six Oscar nominations including the one for the Best Picture.

When it comes to acting, Matt has tried his hands onto multifarious roles. For him, it is just not justified to be normally beckoning. He has to be the superior one, a brilliant mathematician, an uptown businessman, or an astronaut cum botanist, as his career demands. That is the hard reality of Damon’s life. Behind those clean blue eyes and the chocolate boy image, there is something more which makes him the ‘Jason Bourne’.

It all started way back in 1997 when Damon teamed up with his childhood friend Ben Affleck and wrote the screenplay for ‘Good Will Hunting’. The two actors with Robin Williams created magic on screen.

Thanks to the fact that this young lad knew by then, what a gripping screenplay is all about. The following year was more glorious for Damon, as he bagged a major role with Tom Hanks, a titular character in ‘Saving Private Ryan’ (1998). However, it is a lesser known fact that Robin Williams, who had earlier worked with Steven Spielberg, introduced Matt to him. Steven signed him later for the role.

After Private Ryan, there was no stopping for him. His character in ‘The Talented Mr. Ripley’ (1999) was critically acclaimed. The very next year he did ‘Dogma’, an intense and highly intellectual subject matter, which earned all praise for him. He also tried his hands onto some romantic dramas, films which proved to be commercially unsuccessful. Damon got a wider recognition when he signed up two major film franchises – Ocean’s Eleven and Jason Bourne, the latter established him a star of global recognition.

A Look At Actor Matt Damon Brilliant Career Over 25 Years © YouTube

One cannot forget his stellar performance in Martin Scorsese’s ‘The Departed’. With less noise, the star quietly transformed into a great ‘everyman’ actor (As described in Entertainment Weekly). While his roles in ‘The Informant!’, ‘Invictus’ remained critically acclaimed, his magnetic performance in ‘The Martian’ (2015), when he earned a nomination for Best Actor against Leonardo DiCaprio, got a positive reception from both critics and audience. This year, Matt is coming up with two films of different genres – ‘Downsizing’ and ‘Suburbicon’. ‘Suburbicon’s’ trailer has already hit the screens; Matt seems to have worked really hard to put on some plush for this role.

We hope to see more of Damon year after year, as it is said, the best is yet to come. Though Leonardo got his Oscar in the acting category after 25 years since he started, it will be interesting to see if Matt will be able to bag one, yet again, however, this time for the Best Actor!

A Look At Actor Matt Damon Brilliant Career Over 25 Years © YouTube

Roots Of Nepotism In Bollywood Are Strong Enough To Spoil The Status Of Indian Films Forever

Celebrities

Jul 212017

Bollywood, an industry that has taken India to an entirely new level and has given us moments to be proud of, seems to have come to a standstill with lack of novelty, almost 100 years later since its origin. Gone are the days when actors were known to be artists, their aura served as a light to many and their art was not only a source of entertainment but an inspiration to many. It was many decades ago when no ‘Kapoors’, ‘Khans’ or ‘Bhatts’ used to rule Bollywood, the fact that performance and stardom used to walk hand-in-hand is no more completely valid these days. While ‘Kapoors’ are known to be the flag bearers of nepotism, almost every second actor in the Indian film industry is the flag bearer of families which have produced some of the greatest actors, ironical is the fact that these flag bearers are not born actors.

The Impact Of Nepotism On Bollywood Is Larger Than What We See © Twitter

We saw the seeds of nepotism easily sprouting in Bollywood. Actors with pure talent are sidelined due to first priorities given to recommendations. And the worst part is, if an outsider tries to raise his voice, he is slammed, cursed and denoted a wannabe seeking attention.

Let us talk about a recent example which sparked the nepotism debate on a bigger level. When actress Kangana Ranaut with her ‘Rangoon’ co-stars Saif Ali Khan and Shahid Kapoor appeared in an episode of ‘Koffee with Karan’, she didn’t shy away in tagging Karan Johar as the flag bearer of Nepotism. In no time this divided Bollywood in two groups, the feminists and the ones supporting Johar. Much has been said and done till date and this issue has become a wider phenomenon.

However, Kangana is one of the few people to have given an opinion. The idea of nepotism is wider than we believe it. So why did, in the first place, Karan Johar choose to launch Alia Bhatt and Varun Dhawan through ‘Student of the Year’ despite of the fact that their (Alia and Varun) fathers have remained well known directors-producers in their times? Was there a dearth of good struggling actors, who could have deserved the stardom? And now there are speculations about who would bag the lead role in ‘Student of the Year’ sequel, let us tell you that Jahnavi Kapoor (Sridevi’s daughter) and Sara Ali Khan (Saif Ali Khan’s daughter) are already in discussions for the role.

The Impact Of Nepotism On Bollywood Is Larger Than What We See © Facebook

No doubt Ranbir Kapoor is a good actor and has proved himself after giving a few flops, no doubt Alia Bhatt has nurtured herself to become a better actress, but what about those who after years of struggle bag just the side roles and are never considered amongst the royals? We are proud of the fact that we have people like Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Ayushmann Khurrana, Priyanka Chopra, Randeep Hooda and Richa Chadda to name a few, whom we can refer to as actors with real acting capabilities.

Even after working under good banners and having spent years in Bollywood, some of them have just taken their privileges for granted. They have neither been able to speak up for themselves to the least, nor have they worked hard enough to keep up the names of their filmy ancestors. Becoming an artist who not only brings the glamour to you but also brings a change in society, is no more existential, ‘competition’ seems to be a dull word, particularly for those who have not even tasted the essential crisis which the word ‘struggle’ itself holds.

The Impact Of Nepotism On Bollywood Is Larger Than What We See © Facebook

If Bollywood is not about nepotism and favouritism, then why a major number of actors do not reach one level up, where the world starts noticing them. Why till date, we do not even have a good number of Bollywood stars with international recognition? Reason is as clear and bitter as ice – For years and years we get to see the same sparkling yet hollow faces who do not even know the number of opportunities they have snatched, just because they belong to a good old Bollywood clan. If we see the ratio, the percentage of outsiders in Bollywood, it would not even be fifty percent.

Boredom has already set in with no good scripts, less good actors and almost no experimentation. Look at Hollywood, Bollywood! And notice the gap if you can. Sooner or later, the Indian audience would wake up to let you know that they are no more interested to see the two and half hours of nonsense being presented to them in the name of big directors or actors. They would stop loving you for not being able to present your art which you were supposed to do, because now they have something called Netflix which would anytime replace a boring Karan Johar drama with an interesting original series.

Christopher Nolans War Epic Dunkirk Is Likely To Emerge With Major Oscar Nominations This Year

Celebrities

Jul 202017

‘Dunkirk’ is a kind of film which is in generally labeled as “monumental”.

Set against the backdrop of a coruscating reformation, of the 1940 evacuation, of almost 350,000 men from the beaches in Northern France, the film is a tribute to the ebb which later became a subtle insignia of pride on a national level. Hundreds of civilians arduously crossed the English Channel towards Dunkirk, on an unparalleled rescue operation. Soldiers were chauffeured back to England with fishing rafts, yachts, dinghies, while the RAF engaged the German air force overhead.

Director Christopher Nolan, who is known for creating terror through his inexhaustible imaginations taking the form of ‘Gotham City’ experiments with a new theme in the form of World War II. Nolan tried his hands on a genre that he has never worked in, and has emerged ahead of the game. He understood the fact that Dunkirk was an affair with more storylines and details than the commercial best-sellers which has made Nolan an auteur film-maker and a master of non-linear storytelling.

‘The Dark Knight’, ‘Interstellar’ and ‘Inception’ are created from a materialistic perspective and serpentine plots, yet ‘Dunkirk’ has a contrasting nature. For sure, it is a portrait of a British nation at its most woeful.

At various instances in the film, the scenes are exhilarating and perceivably red-blooded. No dialogue appears in the first fifteen minutes in the film, as the opening set is as cutthroat as the timeless sequence in ‘Saving Private Ryan’.

A troop of English soldiers roaming around a packed street in Dunkirk are set aflame, causing mass causalities, while one of them survives and succeeds in getting to the shore. At this juncture, the film widens out, to hundreds of men reaching out towards the water. The view goes as far as the human eye can see.

The soldier who survives is played by Fionn Whitehead, and meets two other soldiers including Aneurin Barnard and Harry Styles. The trio sneaks into ships and boats and make several attempts escaping from the beach. Nolan has made the actors act so well that one can easily smell the panic, courage and fear in their performances.

Kenneth Branagh plays the fictional character of an on-sight representative, the highest ranking officer at Dunkirk. While, Tom Hardy and Jack Lowden play the RAF Pilots chasing Nazi aircrafts. Mark Rylance who was also seen in ‘Bridge of Spies’, plays the middle-class Mr Dawson, who leads his yatch towards the chaos, to help the people suffering. Cillian Murphy appeared shortly after, looking soggy and mortified.

The series of events in the film have been divided into three different spans of time – The turbulence at the beach, the dog-fight drama and the sequences en route to Moonstone.

Three zones of varied lengths all converging at the same end is what makes the film labyrinthine and majestic – the most indisputable and noticeable part of Nolan’s ideologies. Foxy camera-work by Hoyte van Hoytema and editing by Lee Smith together with the splendid score by Hans Zimmer makes ‘Dunkirk’ an audio-visual regale. It would not be wrong to say that the film could emerge with major Academy Awards nominations this year.

‘Dunkirk’ can be unquestionably compared to the works of Kubrick and Spielberg, though with a dash of honest conviction, depicted in the most crucial circumstances. Christopher Nolan has yet again proved that art is not always beautiful; its essence lies in the nature of the story-telling which can be grim and heart-wrenching.

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