Weekly Movie Recommendations : 3rd Janurary 2009 - 9th Janurary 2009

Red River(1948)

Genre - Western/Action/Adventure

Cast - John Wayne, Montgomery Clift

Directed By - Howard Hawks, Arthur Rosson

Whats It About - Dunson(Wayne) is driving his cattle to Red River when his adopted son, Matthew, turns against him.

Why To Watch It - RED RIVER, Howard Hawks's masterpiece, is one of the greatest Westerns ever filmed, a saga of obsession and rivalry between a man and his adoptive son amid an epic struggle for survival in the Old West.

Tom Dunson (John Wayne) journeys west to Texas to build a cattle empire and adopts Matthew Garth, a young boy orphaned by an Indian raid. Years later, Matthew (Montgomery Clift) returns from the Civil War and joins Dunson on a massive cattle drive north undertaken to avoid financial ruin. Stampedes and Indian attacks build tension, but it is Dunson's ironfisted leadership that causes the most problems, finally bringing the action to a boiling point that pits father against son.

This bold canvas of the American frontier features stirring performances, including Clift in his first film and Wayne in one of his finest and most complex roles, stunning photography shot on location in Arizona, and a perfect balance of action, drama, romance, and comedy from one of Hollywood's greatest directors.

P.S. - Trailer not available, nevertheless its a great Western movie not to be missed !

Gift For A New Year 2009

A new year has come. Along with it, it has brought new hopes, new aspirations, new dreams, new goals, new commitments, new obstacles, new happiness, new sadness, new relationships, new experiences, new learning....in short a new life !! It doesn't matter how you were yesterday - 31st December 2008. Whether you were sick, healthy, financially strong, financially struggling, in despair, in hope or whatever ! Doesn't matter at all ! What matters is how you will be this coming year.

You cannot change the past, almost each one of us look back often and wish what if i had done this differently i would have been have been more happier or more rich or more independent and so on. Get this thing straight - you cannot have a better past. But you can definitely change your present and your future. The best thing you can do RIGHT NOW is to just forget the past, forget the bad times but remember the good times. Learn from your experiences and commit to yourself not to repeat those mistakes beginning today.

One of my dear well wisher sent me this wonderful link and i thought sharing this with you will be the best gift i can give you this new year.

Every time i see this i feel so good and inspired. I am that much more raring to go from that moment itself. Each one of us at sometime face professional and personal challenges. As human beings the least we can do is to encourage others in their time of adversity.

So if you like this clip, please send it your near and dear ones, a friend, co-workers, anyone you care about or who you think can benefit from this.

Wishing you a wonderful new year 2009 !

Life CAN be phenomenal, it SHOULD be and WILL be !

Catch Up Time !

Hello everyone...the 2nd last day of this year, seems a perfect time to have a post about what i have been upto lately and what you can expect in times to come. Since i will have a detail blog on each event, i will just keep it short over here.

Well the last 3 weeks was one of the most amazing (understated word) time of my life ! I was in Singapore for Siggraph Asia, met the coolest and awesome gang of people in disguise of Student Volunteers, made some great friends and also got an award for doing a good job as an SV ! So yeah...it was a fantastic time ! I also got a bit of a time and explore the beautiful island country Singapore. I really am speechless to describe how alluring Singapore is. But i shall try in the upcoming posts.

Also i was crazy busy and hence couldnt post from there and also my regular posting took a backseat. All those stuff will be back from this week onwards. And being the first week of the year thats the least i can do, say something of a new year resolution ! :D

So heres what you can expect in times to come on my blog -

• My progress of my Class 5 - Short Film Pre Production (its finally starting, time flies here at Animation Mentor)
  
• How the year 2008 was for me and in general.
• In-depth Singapore travelog with tons of pictures
• Siggraph Asia coverage
• Weekly Movie Recommendations(starting back from this week)
  
• Some more new sections(which will be revealed as and when required)
  

So make sure you bookmark, subscribe to RSS, subscribe to mail, follow me on Twitter for blog updates, as there is lots happening right here !

Wishing you all a very Happy and Fruitful New Year 2009 !

See ya next year !

Award at Siggraph Asia !

(Only if I knew before, I would have delivered a better acceptance speech ! )

Woo-hoo...

Got an award for being one of the Top Ten Student Volunteers(SV) at Siggraph Asia, Singapore who performed brilliantly during the Conference-Exhibhition and did an extra-ordinary job as a SV. 

For me its a huge honor to be recognized by the Siggraph Asia SV Chair/Committee Members/Team Leads and that too at such a prestigious event as Siggraph Asia. There were around 140 SV's(from different countries) in total and they chose the best ten !!! So you can imagine my excitement !!!! 

Off to Siggraph Asia, Catch Up Time

Hello,

I have been extremely tied up since some weeks, Class 4 of Animation Mentor was super super excited and at the same time loads of work. I learnt so much in Class 4 thanks to my wonderful mentor Sean Ermey and my classmates. Both were extremely helpful and supportive and made sure whenever i needed feedback it was just a mail away.

Also what kept me busy for my preparation for Siggraph Asia as a Student Volunteer. And considering its the first time it is happening outside United States in Singapore, i am all the more excited. Talking to my team members and other Student Volunteers, getting to know them before we meet, organizing some meet-ups, etc and you can imagine i was at the peak of multi-tasking. Its so very important to have a friendly relationship in any task and specially the event of a scale of Siggraph. Many of us are from diverse countries and getting to know them before is so very important. Its these small things which can have a huge difference.

I have tons of events, meeting so many new people(at Siggraph) not only from Singapore but from far away places like US, UK, Iran, Philippines(all sharing the same passion for Siggraph), product(softwares, hardwares to make sure we are always keeping abreast with technology advancements in the field of Animation and CG in general) launches, parties lined up for the coming week and i will be covering it all on my blog as often as possible may be even several times a day. After Siggraph i will be staying in Singapore and savoring it in all its glory. So tons of my experience, travel-log and photos coming up too. Whatever be your interest i am sure you will want to hear all of it and trust me you wont be disappointed. And if you even remotely interested in Computer Graphics/Animation this is something which you don't want to miss.

I have to go now, gotta get ready and leave for airport in an hour !

Next blog update right from Singapore !!! Woo-hoo !!!

Ciao !