The Affair(2011) by Lee Child, Genre: Action/ Mystery, Pages:526, 4/5

It started with Batman Begins, this journey of the person discovering the superhero in him. It continued with Casino Royale, X men origins: Wolverine and the ilk. Taking inspiration from the trend, Lee Child takes us sixteen years back to 1997 and to the case whose culmination made Reacher resign from the army and become the maverick loner Jack Reacher. 

A woman is found murdered with her throat cut behind a bar in rural Mississippi. There is a military base near the place. The army wants to control the blow back from the incident and hence sends the trusted major Reacher to keep tabs on the local law enforcement. 

The sheriff is a supremely beautiful woman Elizabeth Deveraux. Her investigation has led her nowhere so far. 

After the initial distrust, Reacher and the sheriff predictably start working together to catch the killer.

Narrated in the first person by Reacher, this is one of the best books which Lee Child has written. 

The altercations between Reacher and some of the locals are preceded by dialogues which drench with sarcasm. Reacher humiliates his opponents with words which are extremely funny. They are so well written that the reader would end up wishing that the fight never transpires and the verbal exchanges keep on continuing.

The violence, when it happens, is absolutely brutal and described vividly. Those with a fertile imagination would be able to see Reacher land punches with remarkable clarity due to the language used by Mr. Child.

The whodunit part is also well done. It is not as good as “Gone for Good” or “One Shot”. But still, the reader won’t feel disappointed with the denouement.

The sex scenes are well written and you may find yourself reaching for your zipper to do the needful after reading some of them. 

Reading this again brought back to me the casting disaster which was Tom Cruise as Reacher. 

Reacher has been a hard ass from his childhood and that is well brought out by the short story Second Son which is provided after the end of the book. The review for the same can be read at http://readthenwatch.blogspot.in/2013/07/second-son2011-by-lee-child-genre.html.

Reacher has become an integral part of my life due to the excellent books written by Child. He is slowly acquiring mythical status due to his cool quotient and this book does no harm to his reputation.

Thank you, Jeeves(1934) by P. G. Wodehouse, Genre: Humor, Pages: 263, 4/5

Bertie has offended Jeeves in a number of ways. His mustache, his gaudy shirts and his choice of girls have always left Jeeves’ sensibilities rattled. Here, the quintessential gentleman’s gentleman is left cold by Wooster’s far from perfect handling of the banjo. So, in the very first chapter of the book, Jeeves gives notice to Wooster and the employee employer bond is severed.

Bertie, meanwhile, is invited by his old friend Chuffy to spend time in the countryside. He gladly accepts thinking that he would be able to play the instrument unimpeded. Jeeves ends up being hired by Chuffy.

Chuffy is a shy giant and is unable to profess his love to the lady of his dream who happens to visit him along with her father for purchasinging Chuffy’s palatial house.

The Woosters, as Bertie keeps on repeating, can go to any length for their friends. Upholding this age old tradition, Bertie thinks of a hot plan to make Chuffy confess to the girl he loves, Ms. Pauline. He decides to kiss her so as to make Chuffy realize the foolishness of procrastination. However, she happens to have been previously engaged to Bertie and all hell soon breaks loose creating a truly knotty situation which only Jeeves can resolve.

I have exhausted my vocabulary praising Wodehouse. I don’t think his genius can be analyzed threadbare. Suffice it to say that this is another winner in a truly distinguished writing career.

Wodehouse makes me feel giddy and glad. I become giddy savoring the way he uses English. His choice of words and the style in which they are arranged to describe even the most mundane incident in a novel and hilarious way has seldom disappointed. I am glad because I know the language. His work is one which, in my humble opinion, cannot be translated, either into a different language or for the big screen. The series Bertie and Wooster is not a patch on the books.

If you want to be transported into a different, better and funnier world, pick up a Wodehouse book today. This is unalloyed joy and has to be read to be believed.

The Zombie Survival Guide(2004) by Max Brooks, Genre:Humor/Horror/Self Help, Pages:249, 4/5

How does a person turn into a zombie? Which is the best weapon for killing a zombie? How can you get physically ready to battle the undead? How can you make your house ghoul proof? How will you be able to survive in a world which has been overrun by them in the millions? Did you know that Srinagar witnessed a Zombie attack in 1996 but it was covered up under the guise of an infiltration bid?

Max Brooks, the author of the absolutely mind blowing World War Z, answers all these questions with a seriousness and intensity which would leave the reader rattled. 

Divided into chapters which begin from the very origin of the Zombie myth, the narrative races through chapters detailing the expected and the ideal human response during the fight and the flight modes.

The last bit, which covers almost seventy pages, is all about the recorded Zombie attacks. Starting from 60,000 B.C., Brooks recounts incidents up till 2002. 

It actually took me a while to really involve myself in the book. However, the chapter about the flight mode made me sit up and after that it was a stunning read till the end.

Brooks unveils his rapier like sense of humor (inherited, perhaps, from his father, the great Mel Brooks) on nearly every page and the reader would laugh out loud, both from reading (and in some cases, rereading) these gems and because of the relief they bring to what is actually a grim read about a near impossible vision of the future. 

This is a blockbuster debut by Monsieur Max. 

Brooks is obviously passionate about Zombies. The level of research he has done and the amount of thought which has gone into the book is evident from the content list itself. It is always a pleasure to read the first book of an author who has recently become a favorite. Please read this and World War Z to explore the pleasure and the pain of the undead.

The Conjuring(2013) , Genre: Horror/Thriller, Run tie: 107 minutes, 4/5

 It has been a really long time since I saw a matinee show. It has been since forever that a horror movie has given me the creeps in the morning.

"The Conjuring" is directed by James Wan. It has garnered universal praise from critics and audience alike and has proved a surprise hit at the US box office by earning more than 100 million dollars so far on a budget of 13 million. I was, hence, all pumped up to watch this.

However, I have seen the other flicks directed by Wan and his filmography is kind of a mixed bag.

"Saw" has been one of my favorite thrillers of all time. "Death Wish" was exhilarating due to Kevin Bacon's superb performance. "Insidious" and "Dead Silence" were pretty lame. His chequered track record kind of dampened my enthusiasm. So it was a cautious Dushyant who decided to view thos on his birthday.

It begins with the demonologist/psychic Warren husband-wife duo talking to three people about a doll who has been infested by a malevolent spirit. There are scenes which show the couple giving lectures about ghosts and spirits.

There is a parallel track about a family of seven which settles into a new home. The house is extremely cold, there is rancid smell pervading the air and the youngest daughter has become friends with an invisible entity.

The family discovers a cellar by chance. Little do they know that all hell is about to break lose.

Slowly, the haunting begins to pick up momentum and every family member is terrorized.

They go and ask for Warrens' help and hence begins what the Warrens acknowledged in their files as their most terrifying encounter with the dark side.

It is not as if this movie is based on an original concept. It contains cliches galore. However, it does these cliches extremely well.

The movie has minimal gore,no nudity or profanity. However, the MPAA had good reason to give this a R rating because of its scare quotient.

The terror keeps on mounting. The scares come thick and fast. The sounds are used expertly to creep out the viewer.

The acting is pretty good. However, this belongs to the director. Wan uses the camera expertly to heighten the suspense. I could swear there were entire sequences wherein the audience was collectively holding its breath waiting for the denouement.

This is the first English movie this year which I have seen on the big screen. It rarely happens that I get to recommend any to my readers because by the time I watch a flick, it is already available on blue ray. So I would wholeheartedly recommend to please go ahead and watch this in the theaters. Trust me, this is definitely among the best horror movies of this millennium.

Behind the mask: The rise of Leslie Vernon(2006) Genre: Comedy/Horror/Thriller, run time:87 minutes, 3.5/5

Back in 1992, a fantastic French movie by the name of "Man Bites Dog" was released. At its heart was a revolutionary concept.

A serial killer hires a documentary crew to capture his murder spree. He spouts a lot of antisemitism and with his wry sense of humor, gives a surrealistic touch to the slayings.

"Behind the mask" borrows the central idea but gives it a slight twist by replacing the serial killer with an exterminator who believes he has supernatural powers.

His idols are Freddy Kruger(A Nightmare on Elm Street), Michael Myers(Halloween) and Jason Vorhees(Friday the 13).

The recording crew of three consists of a girl who is the narrator and two guys who are cameramen.

The script is the real king here. There are many scenes in which obviously a lot of thought has gone.

I have never understood why does the killer walk so slowly in the slashers while his prey is scampering like hare. Here, I get, what seems to be, a pretty probable answer.

Among the best scenes of the movie are those which capture Vernon's conversation with an ex killer who has "retired" from the game. They help us understand how these perpetrators keep on reanimating themselves and coming back from the dead.

The selection of the victim and the kill zone are explained in detail.

There is a character who is generically called "Ahab". He is this slightly old person, generally a psychologist, who has known the murderer from his childhood and thinks that he can get the better of him.

The acting is pretty decent. The only actor I knew beforehand was Robert Englund, the original Freddy.

The direction and the story maketh any film and this is clearly evident over here. There are huge servings of black comedy.

It is a very clever film, one which would entertain you, provoke you and make you think. These are qualities which one seldom associates with a typical slasher flick. It is a must watch, both for the fans of the genre and for those who like intelligent cinema.

Shootout at Wadala(2013), Genre:Crime/Thriller/Drama, run time: 137 minutes, 1.5/5

Imagine you are a contract killer and you have just bumped off a newspaper owner whom the Haskar brothers, the dreaded gangsters of Mumbai, considered their Godfather. Would you be sucking off on a lolly on a roadside stall the very next day? More importantly, why would you be surprised if they turned up behind you to tear you apart?

The second half of the movie is full of such absurd scenes. However, the start is kind of promising.

Manya Surve has been shot in an encounter and is being taken to the nearest hospital by Inspector Baagwan. Before croaking, Surve tells the inspector the story of his transition from a law abiding youngster to a dreaded gangster.

 

John Abraham surprisingly acts pretty well during the first seventy odd minutes. As a student who gets framed along with his brother, as a helpless prisoner and as a lover who sees his inamorata getting hitched to another man, he lets his eyes talk. 

The first irritant which I encountered was Tusshar(I hope I spelt the fucker’s name correctly). He is supposed to be this Morgan Freeman type prisoner who keeps on dispensing obscene lines which would leave you disgusted. One sample of the junk he spouts out of his mouth “ I am Bruce who hasn’t fucked someone in eight years- Main Aisa Bruce hoon jisne aath saal se kisi kee lee nahin hai”. 

What struck me as really funny bit was every time someone lit up a cigarette on the screen, a message would pop up telling that smoking causes cancer. However, no such warning appears when the characters trade deeply offending insults and disparage women.

Kangana plays Abraham’s love interest. She is literally manhandled by him in their supposedly love making scenes which come off more as rape attempts.

Anil Kapoor plays the cop. He looks awesome for a guy who is approaching sixty. His fitness is even more accentuated in scenes wherein he acts along with Jackie Shroff who was once his contemporary and now looks at least ten years older than Mr. Kapoor due to his booze afflicted eye lids and protruding tummy.

 

There are enough twists and turns in the plot to keep the viewer sufficiently interested till the half way mark. After that it seemed as if the director wanted to screw away to glory. There are clichés piled upon more banalities, sufficient enough to give you long lasting migraine.

For reasons unclear to me, the Kaskar siblings (Dawood and his elder bro) are named Haskar. Manoj Vajpayee is becoming expert in dying the Sonny Corleone way. After the epic scene in Gangs of Wasseypur, here he again is bumped off in the same manner. 

Sonu Sood as Dawood is fucking hilarious. He is supposed to convey dead seriousness by his quite manner. In most of the scenes he looks like an amnesia afflicted patient, one who has forgotten his lines.

However, the absolute worst part of the movie was to see Sunny Leone speak Hindi and act as the love interest of Vajpayee. It lasted for around one minute only but nearly drove me batty, ape shit crazy.

I had the pleasure of reading Dongri to Dubai some time back. It is a fantastic book, one which would make you proud of an Indian author. Six pages of it were dedicated to the Wadala encounter. Those six pages were bloated with enough nonsense to give birth to this two hours long shit fest.  

Watch only if you have a masochistic streak.

Private Games(2012) by James Patterson, Genre: Thriller/Mystery, Pages:479, 1.5/5

James Patterson is an asshole.

After this definitive statement, you must have got an inkling of the direction in which this review would now proceed.

There was a time during the formative years of reading as a habit that I used to read everything written by Patterson. The Alex Cross books were awesome. I loved the short and snappy paragraphs. A 500 page tome of his contained, on an average 120 odd chapters and most of these ended on a cliffhanger. It was like a dream come true for a thriller fan. 

Cross was a great creation. After that came the not so great Women’s Murder Club (what a bloody pretentious name), the Bennett series and what fucking not. He began collaborating with lots of authors and all the books slowly started resembling one another. 

Because of the idiot that I am, it took me nearly 40 odd books to realize that the man had transformed into a hack and was fooling his readers left, right and center. I stopped buying his books.

Flipkart was offering huge discount on thrillers this month and that is how I ended up purchasing this.

 

When I approached this, I had no idea about Private, the world’s “most exclusive” detective agency and monsieur Knight and company. After reading this, I don’t think I would be delving into their world again.

   

The story is set during the London Olympics of 2012. A psychopath who goes by the name of Cronus is targeting the games along with three ladies called the Furies. Knight, a detective working with Private, gets involved because of high personal stakes. 

By giving his killer a Greek name, Patterson gets to write about some mythological bullshit whose hollowness made me cringe. There are war crimes tied in, rather fatuously, to the plot.

The pacing of the novel has always been Patterson’s strength and that may just be the only saving grace of this book. The absurd events keep on happening at a breakneck pace.

I have never been exceptionally good at predicting the killer in a mystery book. Even the most pedestrian whodunits end up astonishing me. Imagine my surprise, then, when nearly 150 pages from the end, I had an epiphany about the true identity of the criminal and it turned out to be right.

There are chapters dedicated to bollocks like the spirit of Olympics.

The characters are ludicrous caricatures. The participants in the Olympics don’t have a single mean bone in their body. The athletes perform so many selfless acts that they begin resembling good Samaritans more than hard nosed athletes. I nearly puked after reading the various instances of human “kindness”.

The biggest unintended joke of the book is the motive behind the crimes. You won’t believe your fucking eyes because it is so fucking stupid.

I won’t be wasting any more time with a Patterson book. 

 As the saying goes: Fool me once, shame on you and fool me twice, shame on me. Mr. Patterson, you have fooled me enough number of times. I only have two words for you along with a gesture involving my middle finger. I think you are smart enough to take the hint and fuck off.