Atlas Reborn

Sunday, June 1, 2025

Putting Your Body, Heart and Intellect into Parenthood

Movie Title: Species

Director: Roger Donaldson

Year of Release: 1995

Copyright Holder: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc.

To give sex education the seriousness it deserves, we must first understand that our parents aren’t sterile creatures. We have been asked to live up to their expectations, but there’s a deep-rooted desire within them that we don’t see. Sure, we’ve seen films on parental instincts such as Jurassic Park (1993), The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), and Godzilla (1998), but did we miss the point? Did we not see the intrinsic needs of the dinosaurs and kaiju creatures all these years – that they had other drives before hatching children?

Often lost among monster movies is Species (1995), which fell into a crack between creature features and psychological / erotic thrillers. Its lead character could have been a household name like Alex Forrest, Catherine Tramell, Ivy, Adrian Forrester and Meredith Johnson, who built their reputations as cinematic home-wreckers. But it wasn’t.

These women have aroused our fears in Fatal Attraction (1987), Basic Instinct (1992), Poison Ivy (1992), The Crush (1993), and Disclosure (1994). If you have seen at least three of them, you know that these movies send a chill down your private parts rather than awaken your parental instincts.

Unlike the other crime films on femme fatales, Species was garnished by a pinch of science-fiction / horror. It starts out like 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), with humans and extraterrestrial beings making first contact, and mutates into a never-ending nightmare a la Alien (1979).

The story begins with a glimpse into the lead character – a young, pre-pubescent Sil (played by Michelle Williams). She lives in a caged facility, the way Taylor (Charlton Heston) did in Planet of the Apes (1968). While the apes gratify him by providing a woman – that Taylor names Nova – the humans in Species plan to kill Sil with lethal gas.

Young Sil is seen through the eyes of her male captors, with her long, blonde hair in focus. The leader of this pack of captors, Xavier Fitch (Ben Kingsley), and his men watch from an office above, looking down on young Sil.

While the men seem to be in a position of power like the three bears in the Goldilocks story, only her reflection leaves an impression on them.

The nature of her true self is hidden within her, and it is first manifested through her survival instinct which helps her escape from the transparent cage.

The men’s attempts to make young Sil docile fail because her survival is at stake. She displays great potential to fight for her freedom with the ferocity that men are believed to possess. From the surroundings, it is clear that Sil is not conditioned by the outside world. She is far from believing that she needs to be submissive to the male-dominated facility.

The military starts a manhunt, on foot and via vehicles and helicopters. No ‘chariot,’ ‘ship’ or ‘train’ will help them conquer Sil, let alone what she represents.

But a train, which can be considered symbolic of colonialism, will save her for now.

A transient, who has also sought refuge in the train, gets aroused at the very sight of Sil. She is neither mature nor curious, and even if she was, the transient is not a suitable partner. So, he dies at her hands.

He becomes useful after dying – Sil’s survival instinct compels her to raid his belongings, starting with his clothes. Since she has no money – with no means for an income – she helps herself to a cash register on a train. Sil cannot remain a raider, though. The first major act she does is observe how items can be bought using currency notes and, in a more advanced way, a credit / debit card.

Now that her immediate survival needs are taken care of, her interest has moved on to seeing dynamics in male-female relationships through the media.

While all this is happening, in another part of the country, the most assertive male character in Species, Preston Lennox (Michael Madsen) is introduced. Before going on an unspecified mission, he leaves his pet cat, Lorca, with a neighbor.

The name Lorca could either allude to a place in Spain or a man from the dark corners of art history. If you dig deep, you’ll learn that Salvador Dali, a surrealist artist, had rejected the sexual advances of his close friend, Federico Garcia Lorca. Fans of avant-garde films will also recognize the name Dali because he had made Un Chien Andalou (1929). Species is loaded with avant-garde imagery based on the design work of H.R. Giger (who was also known for designing the creature in the 1979 Alien film). So, you need to read up more on what used to fascinate Salvador Dali if you’re wondering why sexual subtext is prevalent in Species.

Donaldson juxtaposes young Sil’s transition into sexual maturity with a bizarre train that can only be Giger’s handiwork. Changes happen to her skin, and she gets cocooned in a chrysalis. This transition is made evident by the train compartment becoming illuminated and dark and vice-versa in quick succession. By the end, we see a fully-grown Sil played by Natasha Henstridge. Once Sil matures, a repeated action is the way she observes children. This is the first clue as to what her heart truly desires.

At this point, Lennox meets his team, and they listen to their leader, Fitch, explain Sil’s conception process.

The idea was that, by creating a female, they would have a docile and controllable sample to study.

One of Lennox’s team-mates is a telepathic man named Dan Smithson (Forest Whitaker), who calls himself an empath. Despite Smithson’s valuable observation that Sil is a predator, Fitch’s behavior implies he is not inclined to listen. That Fitch is somehow tolerating his presence, almost as if he is treating Smithson as an alien, too. Or Fitch doesn’t want Smithson to read his mind, and the best way to do that is to build mental blocks.

Meanwhile, Sil kills a female conductor in a coach, wears her ill-fitting uniform and leaves a train station. Later, Dr. Laura Baker (Marg Helgenberger), one of Lennox’s team members, observes the crime scene. She notes that young Sil has been consuming a lot of food to store calories for something unknown.

The team dynamics gradually change when Lennox offers to assist Dr. Baker in a lab.

She says that she likes “a man of action.”

At Sil’s end, she is taking actions of her own, in the town, with enough money to survive. A shop’s screen window displays two mannequins – one male and one female. Both mannequins are in wedding attire. Logically, Sil’s interest in a wedding gown reflects her instinct to mate. During the purchase, Sil notices that the store clerk is pregnant, which hints at why she seeks partnership. So, she gets a wedding dress, with no mate around, and the only clue is her watching an anthropomorphic carnivore in the window display of another store. This carnivore is wielding a blade, and there is also a gun on display nearby. Does this mean Sil is hunting for a mate like a caveman?

After checking into the honeymoon suite of a motel, Sil puts on the television set. While channel surfing, she sees a car crash, a passionate love-making scene, and an ad on hair dye. All these observations will aid her as time passes.

Once Sil gets ready, she asks the motel manager where she can get a man. He mentions a club named Id which, coincidentally, is a term used in psychology to denote innate desires. In the case of Species, sexual drive is the one in focus. The way Sil requires it, though, has more to do with function than with pleasure.

Right before Sil’s first attempt at mating, Lennox is alerted to her location, just when he was watching ice hockey, a hardcore masculine sport. The main contrast here is, he is working with a team, while she’s playing her cards all alone.

At the Id club, Sil finds a rival, and eliminates the competition by killing her. Yet she doesn’t return to the man who was considering her rival. She leaves with another man, Robbie (Anthony Guidera), using a line that her rival had used when she was still alive.

Sil watches Robbie starting his BMW, a luxurious car. Later, at his place, she detects something unusual and wants to leave. Robbie asserts dominance, so she kills him, proving that she is the one in charge. Sil escapes in his car, which shows her disregard for his ability to afford a BMW and healthcare. Robbie’s dependence on medication surfaces during the analysis of the crime scene by Lennox’s team. Dr. Stephen Arden (Alfred Molina) adds that Sil has no social inhibitions that are associated with the human race.

This lack of inhibition leads to Sil meeting with a traffic accident. John F. Carey (Whip Hubley), who sees this, takes pity on her and rushes her to Parkbay Hospital. There, Sil witnesses a male doctor using a dominating tone to send the nurse away on a task. Rather than letting him treat her, Sil heals her own body and leaves with Carey.

At Carey’s home, he prepares a meal for Sil. This shows that he is capable of more than a superficial relationship with a woman, unlike how it was with Robbie. As a parallel, Lennox offers candy to Dr. Baker. They’re getting drawn to each other. But out of the four adults, only one person has feelings of attraction for a much greater purpose.

A living thing’s nature is a marriage of mating, parental and self-preservation instincts, and Sil knows when to use them, especially when Lennox’s team enters Carey’s home. Since Carey rejects Sil’s wish to have a baby, she chooses self-preservation and her own true identity when she kills him. She stops looking like her human self and displays her alien form.

While Lennox investigates Carey’s property, Sil watches Lennox from afar, like a predator, but for some odd reason, she does not kill him even though she could. When Lennox believes Dr. Baker is in danger, he rushes to save her, but it was not Sil. Even though it was a false alarm, Sil notes Lennox’s protective instincts for a potential mate. He exhibited these desirable qualities out in the open, without the luxury of a car or a house.

Before Sil can continue her mating and parenthood mission, she needs to work on self-preservation. She spies on Fitch from far away, from within the protective environment of a car. Sil learns the hunting team’s plans by reading his lips, much like a supercomputer, HAL, did in 2001: A Space Odyssey. She drives off in the car, kidnapping a woman in the process.

It is clear that Dr. Baker is also in charge of her life choices, driving her own car and going places. Lennox is a passenger who hears her admit that she pines for a man like him, but she presents it like a sad joke.

At a hotel (painted like the hotel in The Shining), where Lennox’s team is staying, Dr. Arden attempts to get closer to Dr. Baker – because they’re scientists. The attempt fails, because Dr. Baker is considering Lennox as her mate. Sil, meanwhile, fantasizes about Lennox, too.

The only person that Sil tries to sort out her feelings of confusion with is the abducted woman, not a man.

Later, at the Id club, Smithson tells Dr. Arden that Dr. Baker and Lennox like each other but do not like to express themselves. Sil attracts everyone’s attention by walking up to Smithson and exploiting his extraordinary telepathic abilities.

Using the abducted woman as a decoy to take her place, Sil fakes her death, dyes and cuts her hair, and becomes a brunette in everyone’s eyes.

Now that Dr. Baker and Lennox believe that Sil is dead, they are ready to dance with each other and take their mating to the next level. Since Lennox is not convinced that Sil is dead, Dr. Baker gets upset and goes to the washroom.

When Sil returns to the hotel, she looks like the rival she had killed at the Id club. In the hotel washroom, She and Dr. Baker share the same perfume. Dr. Baker later announces – in front of Lennox, Smithson and Dr. Arden – that she is going to bed. Smithson gently reminds Lennox that Dr. Baker wants him. As Lennox proceeds to meet her, Sil stalks him. Lennox gets a whiff of the perfume on Sil, and stops for a moment, wondering whether he has smelled it before.

Later, in Dr. Baker’s room, while Lennox towers over her, she gets on her knees, and they start making love, with Sil eavesdropping from the next room. The room is actually Dr. Arden’s, and this resembles a scene in The Shining movie, where Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) meets an otherworldly woman in a washroom. Sil seduces Dr. Arden and asserts her dominance by pushing Dr. Arden into bed and being on top.

In Smithson’s room, he sees the ads Sil had seen earlier, sees past them, and senses her presence. Meanwhile, Sil and Dr. Arden finish up, and she announces her pregnancy. When he realizes who she is, she kills him. Her work is complete – Robbie wanted things to move fast; Carey was slow with his commitment; and Dr. Arden was just right for her. Now that she doesn’t need to remain in human form, she flees.

It is only now that Fitch talks to Smithson. But Smithson is unable to give him satisfactory answers.

The hunters go through an underground tunnel much like the seeds’ journey into the womb. Sil kills Fitch, the man who had put her in this position, and watches the herd of humans like predators do. The survivors enter a womb-like cavern.

In a corner, Sil gives birth to a boy. This boy disguises himself as a human soon after, but Smithson manages to kill him. With the rage of a parent who lost a child to hunters, Sil resurfaces, in her alien form, and attacks everyone. Then it’s survival of the fittest. When Sil burns, she tries to take Smithson down with her, too. Lennox kills Sil, and the humans leave the cavern.

Later, unknown to all of humanity, a rodent eats a part of Sil’s son’s remains, and transforms into a half-alien creature – the cycle of parenthood doesn’t end.

Do parental instincts help gratify your desires? Do they fulfill your expectations? Is there a good answer even if you hunt for it?

Thursday, May 18, 2023

This Scorpion Keeps Staying on Top

Movie Title: Black Scorpion

Director: Jonathan Winfrey

Year of Release: 1995

Copyright Holder: The Pacific Trust

Roger Corman is the name that launched a “thousand” masters into the world of filmmaking. He has worked with the most imaginative budding writers, directors, actors, art directors and composers. His productions may have been made on low budgets, but with rich symbolism woven into all the scenes. Black Scorpion is no less, because it stings you into paying close attention with its very first spoken line: “Once upon a time, there was a scorpion...”

Stan Walker, a cop with Dirty Harry vibes, is the one telling his little daughter, Darcy, this fable of the scorpion and the frog. She would much rather hear the fairytale of Cinderella, but he proceeds to tell the other story, for they live in Angel City, where crime is rampant.

Though it is unclear in the original fable whether the scorpion is male or female, Lt. Walker goes ahead with using the “she” pronoun.

After telling the story, Walker has to rush out to stop a couple of suspects. But before that, he thinks of letting a married woman babysit her. Darcy opposes the idea, declaring that she can take care of herself. This is the first sign of Darcy Walker wanting to be independent – a girl who is approaching womanhood is seeking independence.

Meanwhile, Walker’s police tactics put the suspects in hospital, and a medical practitioner, named Dr. Noah Goddard, rushes to their aid. The doctor wishes to conduct a scientific experiment on the suspect who is in a more critical condition. But the less severely injured suspect triggers a shootout during which Walker shoots Dr. Goddard.

The story takes an eighteen-year-leap here. Darcy, now working as a police officer, goes undercover as a prostitute. Her target is a pimp named E-Z Street, and she needs the help of Tender Lovin, another prostitute, to get him.

Darcy’s colleague, Michael Russo, monitors her movements from a distance, and does not approve of her revealing outfit. Even Darcy feels uncomfortable in it. Tender Lovin tells Darcy there must be another part of her that she is not consciously aware of.

E-Z Street finally shows up, and takes Darcy to a private place. This development puts Michael in a position of discomfort. He dismounts his noble steed, in this case a van, and nabs E-Z Street, prematurely. This disappoints Darcy, and she gets even more upset when E-Z Street is released immediately. At this point, Darcy is aware of her outfit, and covers up with a coat – the negative feedback reminds her to resort to modesty.

Michael insists that he had intervened to protect Darcy, and she says she is tired of him trying to protect her. Just then, another cop passes a borderline lewd comment on Darcy’s figure. The chivalrous man within Michael intervenes again, annoying Darcy.

Darcy meets with her father, Walker – it is evident that his actions from eighteen years ago had led to his dismissal from his job as a cop.

He brings up the scorpion and the frog fable again, comparing it to the nature of his life.

When Walker and Darcy discuss marriage, it is clear that a wedding doesn’t guarantee a happily ever after. The situation is reinforced when an authority figure, who is under the influence of a ‘mysterious spell’, steps forward and shoots Walker to death.

It is at this stage that Darcy needs everything to make sense. And yet, the turning point is yet to come.

Darcy faces accusations on the lines of police brutality, and gets suspended from service, for assaulting the authority figure who had murdered her father. She makes a statement that men cross the line every day with the full support of the higher-ups.

Her position lost, Darcy declines to save Tender Lovin from E-Z Street. Later, Darcy sees Tender Lovin’s face all bruised from an encounter with E-Z Street, and is held responsible for the attack. Soon after, Darcy sees her father’s gift – a ring with a scorpion designed on it, and starts understanding her true nature, her true self.

Darcy goes, disguised as the vigilante Black Scorpion, and confronts E-Z Street. He claims he is the romantic type, but she states that she is not – making it clear that Black Scorpion can overpower a dragon-like pimp by herself. She kills him, and empowers herself.

During another night patrol, Black Scorpion saves Tender Lovin from a robbery. And finally, Tender Lovin gets a voice, when she gets interviewed by reporter Leslie Vance.

Darcy also feels emboldened to upgrade her crime-fighting technology.

Two women wrestlers become Black Scorpion’s next Herculean challenge. The so-called arena is a jewellery store – a place which sells precious items for women.

Over here, Black Scorpion encounters Michael. During their fight, they roll on the ground, till she gets on top of him. This time, it is the woman who gets to force a kiss on the man.

Michael and Darcy finally try to give their romance a fighting chance. He insists on picking her up from her doorstep. She says she saved him all the extra effort by coming over to his car. He takes her home, and surprises her with a nice home-cooked meal. In a fit of passion, Darcy pins him against the kitchen shelf and kisses him.

While their lips are locked with one another’s, the TV is on. Reporter Leslie Vance announces the Women’s Assertive Movement (WAM) candidate for Woman of the Year – the Black Scorpion. The WAM respects her independent spirit, but has reservations about her costume.

Michael is unable to go through with kissing Darcy. Michael admits that the Black Scorpion can handle herself – he is unsure whether Darcy can. This revelation confuses Darcy, especially because she had kissed him in her Black Scorpion attire.

When Darcy returns home, she sees a new-improved version of her car, courtesy of an acquaintance named Argyle. The vehicle can now change its make and colours, symbolic of Darcy needing to balance her dual identity.

During Michael’s investigation into a shady corporation, he gets into trouble, and the Black Scorpion saves his life. Later that night, she visits his house, and compels him to have sex with her. In the morning, she leaves before he wakes up. Before going, she brands him with a scorpion-shaped image.

It remains unexplained why Darcy dumps her Black Scorpion costume and identity soon after this.

She visits Michael and tells him about her father. Walker had sacrificed everything – especially his marriage – in favour of his career in law enforcement. One day, Darcy’s mother left home. Darcy does not desire the lonely life that her father once did. She is about to tell Michael something important, when an emergency requires Black Scorpion’s attention. She rushes to reclaim her costume.

The movie’s antagonist, called the Breathtaker, is steadily poisoning people with a gas that makes them do the exact opposite of what they are expected to do. The Black Scorpion and her ally, Argyle, find out that Dr. Goddard is the Breathtaker.

While Dr. Goddard traps Black Scorpion, Michael is headed to that location. Yet it is she, using her handy electrified scorpion ring, who frees herself, not Michael. It is when she liberates herself that she is truly revealed to Michael – he sees her for who she truly is. Even though she offers an explanation, he arrests her.

Darcy requests Michael for one hour so that she can find Dr. Goddard – and then she will surrender herself to Michael.

By hitching a ride with the Black Scorpion, Michael enters her world, and sees things from her perspective. It is now that Michael is ready to accept back-up (read support). They work together in the end. Michael combats the armed henchmen, while the Black Scorpion tackles Dr. Goddard.

Once the battle is won, Michael sees Black Scorpion’s vehicle change its make and colour. When the authority figures arrive, Michael is ready to let Darcy take the credit for saving the day.

After the entire ordeal, Michael requests a transfer, and he asks Darcy why she had taken the law into her hands. Her answer is that it is in her nature – an allusion to the scorpion and frog fable that her father had once told her.

Michael insists that he will forever remember what she did, but she finds a way to make him forget his troubles. She commits an act similar to the sting mentioned in the scorpion and frog fable – but is it fair to limit Darcy Walker’s worthiness to Cinderella’s shoe?

Weighing Instincts versus Ego in 'Jurassic Park III'

Though my ego has been stamped on countless times, my survival instincts take me forward. I have an instinctive love for movies, and it's perhaps my ego that stops me from praising some of them publicly.

It stopped being cool to praise the Jurassic Park movie franchise in 1997, when The Lost World: Jurassic Park hit theaters. Titanic had rammed into all the major players, from Walt Disney to Roland Emmerich, and sunk the competition at the box office till the release of Avatar. It was a time when John McTiernan and Richard Donner were winding down with their Die Hard and Lethal Weapon series, respectively. And no matter how hard Michael Bay tried with Armageddon and George Lucas with Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace, their ventures never did as much business as Titanic did that decade.

So, when the trailer of Jurassic Park III came on television back in 2001, I was the only one in class excited about it. My classmate and I were exchanging notes on the movie, and he referred to it as Flop III. I went ahead with my faith in Jurassic Park III and watched it, in a lifeless, near-empty theater.

The local theater used to show the biggest Malayalam movie hits of all time, and by 2001, it was reduced to presenting monster movies and adult content. That's why I could not publicize my desire to catch Jurassic Park III, but I never regretted it, and along with Superman III, it remains one of my favorite guilty-pleasure experiences till date.

Saturday, August 22, 2020

Rediscover Gender Roles in ‘The Lost World: Jurassic Park’

Have you ever tried invading a home where a dinosaur is the man (or lady) of the house? The Lost World: Jurassic Park sinks its teeth into certain issues that make our hearts race – gender roles – leaving no room for escape once you step inside.

I was transitioning into high school when its VHS tapes were available at video-rental stores – how I miss the late 1990s. And I became a secret admirer. Why? Because the very mention of the title made every guy I studied with, from high school to college, condemn the movie.

Was The Lost World: Jurassic Park all that bad? Its lead character, Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), faces his fear of dinosaurs, like his feminine counterpart in Aliens, Ellen Ripley, did. And the guys cheered more for her overcoming her fear and proving her worth in a man’s world.

Ian is haunted by a near-death experience in Jurassic Park, a theme park featuring dinosaurs as tourist attractions. Imagine how terrified he would be upon hearing that his girlfriend, Sarah Harding (Julianne Moore), readily ventured into a remote island full of dinosaurs. Ian charges to her location like a knight in shining armor, only to learn that Sarah doesn’t want to be a damsel in distress.

When Ian and Sarah argue like a married couple, they come across as equally educated. Yet it is Sarah who feels the pressure to convince Ian to believe in her. Ian’s daughter, Kelly (Vanessa Lee Chester), looks up to Sarah more than any female babysitter. The two ladies share a common sentiment – Ian neglects their personal goals. Do they have to live up to his expectations? Their run-in with hungry dinosaurs, and power-hungry men, will settle their disagreement.

A hunting party, led by Roland Tembo (Pete Postlethwaite), arrives to capture dinosaurs for Peter Ludlow (Arliss Howard) and his new-improved Jurassic Park enterprise. Their helicopters approach the island the way medieval-age European sailors did while exploring untamed lands. For the new arrivals, dinosaurs are meant to stay chained, live in cages and entertain visitors when summoned. However, the animals are stronger than human slaves, so with a little help from Ian and his team, they break free.

Later, inside a trailer, Sarah’s motherly instincts come out while nursing an injured infant dinosaur. Ian comes over, like a man returning home after a bad day at the office. The infant’s parents pay a visit, collect their little one as if it were a kindergarten school, only to return and attack the trailer.

Once Ian and Sarah survive this, they are shaken. This experience teaches them a lesson in raising children. They have learned how to take care of Kelly. But their struggle to survive is not over – they have to learn to create a symbiotic relationship with Tembo and Ludlow.

Tembo later sees Sarah smearing blood on a leaf and checks if she is okay. Then they find a location to set up camp.

Later that night, Ian and Tembo hold a meeting outside the camp for an update. In that time, the baby dinosaur's parent shows up near the cave (actually tent) in which Sarah and Kelly are sleeping. At a bad time, when the 'man of the house' is absent.

This leads to a chase sequence where Sarah and Kelly hide in a cave. The scene ends with Ian's entry.

When Ian, Sarah and Kelly venture into an even more dangerous territory, he hurts his foot, giving Sarah a chance to exhibit chivalry and help him walk. In the next sequence, all three seize the opportunity to outwit a couple of raptors. And they walk out of danger, together, and triumphant.

Now that both Ian and Sarah are on the same page, they decide to leave Kelly at home, so that the couple can resolve the dinosaur problem. They walk, as equal partners, into a death-do-them-apart situation.

At the time when The Lost World: Jurassic Park was getting released, I had just lost my father. He was the sole earning member. While we wondered where we stood, my maternal grandfather and paternal grandmother became our backup. My grandmother did not cook, but my grandfather did - which was in itself a reversal of gender roles in those days. She was capable of making arrangements. If we had to travel somewhere, she made arrangements.

Whenever we decide who stays inside and who steps out, we should consider, for our survival, the possibility of adapting to every environmental change. A man may lose his job, while a woman may get hired. And if we shake the boat thinking that this will bring stability, we risk arriving at no goal.

In The Lost World: Jurassic Park, Ian and Sarah were getting nowhere as long as they strayed away from one another. They kept debating with each other till the dinosaurs helped them find a middle ground.

They discover the roles that they have to play in this lost world of ours.

Ian Malcolm is no noble hero. He opens and shuts doors at the right time, like a wife managing a house. Go ahead - count the number of times he opens and shuts doors.

And Sarah Harding is no housewife. She uses the tools of her trade, be it a camera or a tranquilizer gun.

A dinosaur corners Ian and shoves him to the ground, while Sarah jumps from one roof to the next when a dinosaur pursues her.

Steven Spielberg's movie came out at a time when male-centric action-movie behemoths were at the top of their game - Mel Gibson's Lethal Weapon 3-4 and Bruce Willis' Die Hard 2 and Die Hard with a Vengeance.

Though The Lost World: Jurassic Park may not have succeeded as much as Jurassic Park, it did better business than the critically-acclaimed Terminator 2: Judgment Day did.

Now let's see how Mr. and Mrs. Kirby (William H. Macy and Téa Leoni) will manage the home-front in Jurassic Park III.

Saturday, August 15, 2020

Welcome to 'Jurassic Park', a World of Chaos

It took just one dinosaur footprint to create chaos in our hearts. A quarter century later, we still quake talking about the time Jurassic Park was released.

We were dining at an outdoor restaurant (dhaba) run by a cute couple. The man and I started talking, and … small world … we both lived in New Delhi once upon a time. We shared fond memories of a particular theater in Vasant Vihar. Ask anyone who lived in Delhi in the 1990s about the Priya cinema hall, you will see nostalgia fill their eyes.

He and I listed the movies we saw there, and we stopped at … I’m not joking … Jurassic Park.

Back when I was a kid, Jurassic Park was a subject of wonder even before the movie’s release. Doordarshan had aired a couple of interesting dinosaur scenes. One of them gave me nightmares till I saw it in context in the theater. It featured two children in a vehicle … and a dinosaur came to peek at them.

After a fantastic viewing experience in the movie theater, we went home, little realizing that the Jurassic Park phenomenon would go out of control. A couple of years later, there were rumors of a second part. Sequels in those days were associated with Batman, Lethal Weapon, Die Hard, James Bond 007 and Hot Shots! Those movies were famous for their protagonists, not dinosaurs. We wondered … how could filmmakers recreate the dinosaur phenomenon?

They did recreate the dinosaur experience, minus the phenomenon.

Steven Spielberg (Jaws, Schindler’s List) returned to direct the first sequel – The Lost World: Jurassic Park. We got a third movie, after which the series went into hibernation. It hatched over a decade later, when development began for Jurassic World.

I don’t think the original creators made the first movie and said, “Let there be chaos.”

The real story of Jurassic Park began way before Spielberg developed it. The screenplay was adapted from a science fiction novel of the same name by Michael Crichton. From the prologue till the last page, you will see one theme dominating the narrative – chaos. Crichton expands on the subject of chaos in The Lost World, a sequel to Jurassic Park.

The two books and their movie adaptations told different stories, with one DNA strand in common – chaos.

One day, my neighbor’s kids came over to watch The Lost World: Jurassic Park, and the boy said, “They should make more Jurassic Park movies.” Three were too less for him. He wanted six, because for him, it was as great as the Star Wars series. His wish came true … a third Jurassic World is on the way.

All this chaos reminds me of the unforgettable experience of the first movie … before we met that many characters in the sequels who are struggling to prevent the franchise’s extinction.

Back then, it was just Alan (Sam Neill), Ellie (Laura Dern), Lex (Ariana Richards) and Tim (Joseph Mazzello) trying to survive in a theme park featuring dinosaurs. John Hammond (Richard Attenborough), who owns the property, attempts to regain control over the park. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) uses ‘humor’ to convey his expertise on chaos theory, only to become deadly serious when chaos erupts. It was these characters that we loved, but why?

Let’s go back to the beginning of Jurassic Park. We learn early on that Hammond is supporting his daughter during her divorce case. Alan Grant is a man who is not too fond of children. Ellie Sattler is the voice of reason in their lives. Hammond’s grandchildren – Lex and Tim – arrive. Which means his daughter, their mother, is alone somewhere on the American mainland, dealing with the absence of both her husband and her children. We also learn that Ian cannot preserve marital ties with any woman.

Therefore, it is the human species struggling to survive, not newborn dinosaurs.

Things get interesting when Alan gets stuck with the kids while running away from dinosaurs. Lex and Tim ignite the fatherly instincts within him. Meanwhile, Hammond and Ellie sit at a dining table, talking about how having complete control is an illusion. This was the kind of conversation Hammond could have had with his own daughter on marriage and divorce. Ian is a priestly figure, whose prophecy on natural selection stares him in the eye. Despite his pessimistic nature, he understands the necessity for the human race to live … survive.

Jurassic Park was released during a turning point in my family life, too. My father took us to a dinosaur exhibition in Delhi that year. We then went to a zoo. Saw a tiger and a deer. And like Lex and Tim, I was about to lose my father … not to divorce, but to death. We were not aware of his declining health.

A couple of years after his death, when I saw The Lost World: Jurassic Park, I did not feel disappointment – the reviews I heard were quite shocking. Ian Malcolm was too serious for audiences? Seriously? After what he experienced in Jurassic Park, why would he be as humorous as he used to be? I treat the second movie as a great adventure.

My grandmother (father’s side) was bedridden when Jurassic Park III was released theatrically. I cannot believe that pterodactyl-like fans still peck on some of the questionable scenes in the movie. The overall viewing experience was fine. In the third movie, a family gets a chance to patch things up. Nothing wrong with that.

Now, looming over us, earning billions of dollars at the box office is the mutated Jurassic World trilogy. It contains merely a single DNA strand from the original series. It has moments, like dead herbivore dinosaurs and a dying brachiosaurus (heartbreaking).

“Life finds a way,” was Ian’s most famous quote in Jurassic Park.

The movies have also found a way … to get Alan, Ellie and Ian back for one last walk in the park.

Tuesday, May 8, 2018

How I Won Shaktimaan’s Heart

Can’t believe the 20th anniversary of the Mein Bhi Banoonga Shaktimaan Contest is around the corner. Raise your hands if you remember Ankur Zade’s Maut Ke Moonh Se Vapsi winning the first prize among 10,000 short story entries. No search engine result will direct you to him because the contest was held during the prehistoric pre-Internet takeover. But it was exceptionally memorable for me, since the second-prize winner was none other than yours truly.

It is an honor to have been chosen by Mukesh Khanna, the legend who had portrayed Shaktimaan in India’s first ever superhero television series. And now, I would like to share with you the story behind how my name wound up being listed on Doordarshan as a contest winner.

A weakened Shaktimaan wakes up in captivity and is about to witness something horribly unholy...

Let us rewind my life to the 1980s.

The ‘Big Bang’ that spawned my imagination originated in Kuwait. Just like every Non-resident Indian child who sought comfort in television, I tuned in to Magnum, P.I. (1980-88), Knight Rider (1982-86), The A-Team (1983-87) Airwolf (1984-87) and Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-94). Please forgive me if I had never perceived any symbolic undertones back then – I was too young to understand the evolving social or political trends! Rather than deliberately forming opinions, I was unconsciously letting these TV shows ignite my creativity.

In the very same decade, epic movie trilogies including Star Wars and Superman came full circle. Once again, I was a single-digit kid, completely unaware of the polarized reviews, so try telling a child in my position to look the other way during a decisive lightsaber duel between a father and his son or when an indestructible man with the gift of flight walks through fire without getting burned. Nor will I deny how much I enjoyed Shahenshah, in which Amitabh Bachchan, a stalwart of Hindi feature films, was cast as a vengeful vigilante traumatized by the suicide of his father who was falsely accused of accepting a bribe.

Let us now fast-forward to the early 1990s.

The first Gulf War meant a dramatic change in my lifestyle. My ancestral home in Kerala provided shelter, but I was cut off from all the movies and shows that had transported me to wonderful worlds without potholes. Of course, Street Hawk and Space City Sigma sped by the small screen of Doordarshan. Then my tastes started evolving, when the local flavors started rubbing off on me, and the Siddique-Lal director duo made me fall in love with Malayalam cinema.

Moving to New Delhi a year later was just as difficult as transitioning from Kuwait to India. The culture was completely alien to me. But it also meant getting to indulge in newer guilty pleasures. Who needed otherworldly concepts when Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir Khan and Salman Khan wooed my family with their onscreen charisma?

That was when Batman ambushed me. After being nearly scared to death by the 1989 movie on VHS, I braved through the dark aisles of a cinema hall for my first English motion picture experience: Batman Returns (disclaimer: my elders had accompanied me that day). And I absolutely loved it! I never understood why a lot of my school seniors and some of my classmates could not digest the film. But I’d rather talk about Batman: The Animated Series. I was fine with it being dubbed in Hindi because the DD Metro television channel had subjected Superboy to the same treatment.

My admiration for the adaptations of DC Comics material made me raid Attractions, a bookstore in South Delhi which sold weekly and monthly issues of various superheroes.

Meanwhile, I did not have enough of Batman, ergo my fondness for the 1960s series starring Adam West at a time when Star Plus was still airing English programs. In the process, I developed an appetite for Small Wonder and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The Star Trek show starring William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and DeForest Kelley was also pretty engaging, but my father cut that out, asserting that I was excessive with my viewing. But I was still able to squeeze in the occasional Thor, The Incredible Hulk along with Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends.

Everything came to a grinding halt when I shifted back to Kerala. No more DD Metro. Star Plus switched to Hindi soap operas. It took years before Star World restored nearly everything I had grown to love, right down to Star Trek: The Next Generation. And one had to travel several miles by public transportation to buy comic books.

But what was I going to do for entertainment until then? For quite some time, I had resorted to drawing my own comic books. This went on till mid-1997, when Shaktimaan’s teaser trailer was released on Doordarshan. I gave the TV series a chance because it featured a familiar face from The Great Maratha and Chandrakanta shows: Mukesh Khanna. I also recalled enjoying his performance in the lead role of a Hindi movie which was from before his stint in Mahabharat. Don’t ask me the title – I was too young to remember.

So, with enough curiosity sparked by his presence in Shaktimaan, I took the plunge with its pilot episode. It was love at first telecast. The effects at the time do not hold up against the likes of some of Rakesh Roshan’s science fiction movies, but they were way more convincing than Ra.One. What ultimately mattered was that Shaktimaan created television history. Its impact was so tremendous that even Pogo TV had aired reruns dubbed in English.

Though Diamond and Raj Comics had enough characters to fill a lineup a la the Avengers, X-Men or Justice League, Shaktimaan was the first genuine attempt toward creating a superhero platoon for Indian viewers. Years of foundation-laying within Khanna’s fictitious universe led to team-ups in later episodes.

Khanna plays the titular character, a yogi with two personalities. One minute he stands tall as the champion for truth in the avatar of Shaktimaan, and the next he exudes childlike innocence while walking the streets as the buck-toothed Pandit Gangadhar Vidyadhar Mayadhar Omkarnath Shastri. It is just as well that he takes up photojournalism because his work would capture the ways of city life, something alien to him because he had spent all his childhood in the desolate Himalayas.

The plot is set during Kali Yuga, an era when the human race descends to base levels thanks to the rising influence of the malicious Tamraj Kilvish (Surendra Pal), bearing the torch of righteousness is the Suryanshi sect. Residing in the Himalayas for the past few millennia, they train young Gangadhar in Kundalini Yoga to control the six passions of the mind, activate the seven chakras of the body, and master the five elements of life. Once he possesses the strength to make the last stand against the forces infecting the world around them, he works hard to keep his body, mind and soul free of corruption while bringing spiritual balance to the cosmos.

Is this Shaktimaan's twin brother? Only time will tell...

Following Gangadhar’s first public appearance in his yogic form, it is Geeta Vishwas, a reporter working alongside his down-to-earth self at ‘Aaj Ki Aawaz’ (a daily newspaper), who knights him with the title of Shaktimaan.

People look up to him, but is this really Shaktimaan who is threatening to spread chaos in the world?

Quick question: Do you know Dolly the sheep? Ian Wilmut had appeared on the cover of The Week magazine in the mid-1990s in connection with the cloning of a sheep and that the ‘newborn’ was named Dolly. I mentally filed away the news story till the Mein Bhi Banoonga Shaktimaan Contest was announced. How could I resist the chance to pen a tale revolving around the theme of cloning? Isn’t it worthwhile to tell the story of how science helps duplicate a righteous man like Shaktimaan but not his virtues?

A newsreader breaks the news that Shaktimaan is causing worldwide destruction, but can this be true?

The final cut of the story arc based on my entry featured Geeta Vishwas’ reputation as an honest journalist being destroyed when a clone of Shaktimaan’s, engineered by one of Tamraj Kilvish’s minions in the scientific community, undoes the yogi’s good work with acts of violence in broad daylight.

Shaktimaan finally confronts the impostor, a clone who had broken the faith of millions of people.

Even though Geeta (Vaishnavi) knows the real Shaktimaan was in captivity the whole time and that he finally defeated his duplicate in hand-to-hand combat, the world loses its belief in him.

Will Shaktimaan defeat his clone in this epic standoff?

It has been nearly 20 years since I won the second prize for Shaktimaan Vs Shaktimaan, and I have been telling quite a few stories since then. The English-speaking world has also slowly started recognizing the potential of India as a source of endless inspiration.

When I see Stan Lee’s Chakra in bookstores, I can’t help but think of a similarly powered Shaktimaan, the true pioneer who had strived to inculcate civic sense in those who grew up in the late 1990s. He taught us to never surrender to our darker passions. And Mukesh Khanna still inspires me to never quit writing.