1980s..
Pongal (a fantastic period in Tamilnadu to witness life full of fun around you, especially when you are living in small town/village. Colourful cows and loudspeaker (people who dont know to be happy claim this as noise pollution..) and full music..Fatastic part is the new releases of various Thalivar (Rajani,Kamal,…) movies and full rush to get to see the movies..through fan clubs…
Well, to top all the above mentioned daylight activities the night life would be even more fun..Full of lights and various games and competetions held for children and what a sound and activity it brings around..wow..
The ultimate experience for everyone comes in the night after 10.00 – video deck arrives (in the auto..which was a costly mode of transport, then) and everyone is excited to know what old movies and what new movies are going to be casted..Trust me, whole night non-stop movie watching..
It would traditionally start with a well-known religious movie (im sure everyone would have seen those movies atleast 10 times earlier if not more), and the mood gets set and it is such a beautiful thing to watch the movie when whole community is vibrating with full enthu…The most essential thing to note that, the crowd is heterogeneous mix of age and sex..Every one gets something from his home to eat (muruku, kamarakat, theen mutai, kadala, etc..) and share and eat these with the respective gang..(Teens who assume themselves as heros..never care for these silly things and have cigars during songs sequences). Whistles and throwing of papers (used lottery tickets) kept ready to throw up and dance..during key fighting and song scenes..
It used to be such a wonderful thing to wait for the offical first movie that is next to the saamy padam(religious movie) – to see the new movie..so the protocol is like this first the religious movie then a new movie (less than 5 yrs before released) and then a old movie (20 years before released). Afer this it would be an alternating sequence of new and old movies and manytimes when the older people go home back after early morning..it used to be only the new movies….
Ofcourse there would be discussions amongst the older people on how nasty/worst the new movies have become unlike the old ones…( i guess this is a common topic for all ages..)..and amongst the younger generations..it would be comparisions between various hero’s and heroines..
The most important thing is all the above mentioned activities, (sports, other competitions and movies) are from the amount collected from individual homes..and it used to be such a great community activity…
Back to 2000.. More homes even in small towns start experiencing the home theatre experience..and needless to say about cities..Yet the fun to go to a theatre to watch(community movie watching ) is still there..except that there are different protocols now like one should not carry anything from home(something made at home is dangerous..for their business) and no whistles and one has to be indecent to dance……yet the underlying fact is that “community movie watching is still an effective entertainment..”
Tags: English, Flashback, Incidents, India, Life, Remenisence, Sout-India, Tamil
