Sunday, July 24, 2016

Kabali Mania(c)

The social media is full of people with different reactions to this crescendo called Kabali. Let us look at a few types of people in the social media, in the context of release of this game-changer movie, and their instant reactions online:


  1. The " me first" types - anxious to post a selfie from the cinema, with a cone ice-cream in hand, real-time. The ultimate display of oneupmanship. That smirk in the face would say - "Hey, I climbed Mt. Kabali without oxygen! Before you. I am always great!" For them, first-day-first-show is a status symbol.
  2.  The "my review first" types - equally anxious to post the news of their "Kabalidom" . Masquerading as film critic, writing a few incoherent lines that are supposed to be a full review, but ending up with only one nett message - that same " I SAW KABALI BEFORE YOU".
  3. The " I-wish-I-were-first" types - the ones who scoff at the mad rush for the ticket to heaven- er, to Kalabi- and tweet " I ain't in a hurry. There is no need for this hype. Will do the honours later". In reality, they may well be cursing either their luck for not badge that badge of honour in time, or their plain incapacitation to do that.
  4. The "I-went-too-but-wasn't-worth" types - usually pontificate the futility of such mad rush, and try and portray as if they were rather unemotional in watching the movie this soon, but in reality, were equally anxious to be seen with the early birds.
  5. The " I-was-there-but-the-movie-was-a-total-waste" types . These are people who, in reality, easily fall prey to hypes around movies, and are suckers for first day first shows, but try to deliberately play down the quality of the movie, for sheer fear of being seen as protoganist of a low-grade movie. Their "I-am-THE-intellectual" badge will never permit any open admission of being a Rajini fan. In other words, they secretly drool at the prospect of a Rajini potboiler, but the mask on their face would read " I am really level-headed, you see?"
  6. The " I-will-never-be-there" types. The ones, whose "intellectual" tag will not ever permit admitting their craving for this same deluge, will stay away for some time, but then, at some point will quietly give in, queue up, pay up and surreptitiously watch the movie nevertheless.
  7. The " I-dont-care" types . They will never yield to temptation,  unlike Adam to the apple. Will wait patiently for 6 months at the minimum, and watch on TV or Deepavali or Pongal day. And then vociferously perform a critical review of the movie - at a time when the rest of the Janta would have had moved on to at least two more new release hypes.
  8. The "I-will-be-there-but-at-no-cost" types. Some of them will not wait , and would happily buy either a screenshot video from a theatre, at Rs.50 on the roadside, or watch the same trash copy on "tamillotus.com", and with red eyes, type away fast and furiously, their view of the movie. The other "tech savvy" will wait for a good DVD rip on torrent, and often wont betray their stealth mode of watching.
  9. And then there are those few Tamilians, who clearly feel embarrassed calling themselves Tamil, and would anxiously proclaim " chee! I seldom watch Tamil movies! Only Hollywood or Bollywood movies, you see!"

    So, which of these categories do you belong to?

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