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The Generation Gap!

Discussion in 'Cheeniya's Senile Ramblings' started by Cheeniya, Mar 6, 2007.

  1. Cheeniya

    Cheeniya Super Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    My dear Kamalji
    Please don't do that! You have no idea how happy I am seeing a revival of interest in my old posts. To have writers of eminence like oj and Balaji visit them and offer their FBs is a big shot in the arm for me!
    Sri
     
  2. manasa_gs

    manasa_gs Senior IL'ite

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    Dear Cheeniya Sir,
    It was a good post, i was reading very seriously and suddenly started laughing , ur last line was really funny....my god :)
     
  3. Padmini

    Padmini IL Hall of Fame

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    dear cheeniya sir,
    happened to read this lovely post now only. you have described the generation gap through an idiot box.
    eventhough there were movies in which Appa duraisamy coughed and died, there were really good movies which show the love and affection, the value of forgiving and forgetting the vice. i became too emotional even now if i see that films. but the same films were not greater attraction to my children. they simply describe it as " over acting". but i cannot digest it. but bear with it with saying one word " generation gap"
    with love
    pad.
     
  4. Cheeniya

    Cheeniya Super Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Manasa
    Thank you for your word of appreciation. The films of yore nearly ran for 3 to 4 hours. 75% of it would be spent in crying and coughing. Crying by the heroine and coughing by her father. We too had a laid back approach to life and we didn't mind having to spend our spare time watching these hapless creatures on screen. They never made our BP to rise like the modern villains and strip-teasing heroines!
    But today action is the word from start to finish. Heroines do not cry in front of their fathers' pictures. If they are not treated well by the society, they become terrorists and make the villains cry!
    Sri
     
  5. Cheeniya

    Cheeniya Super Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Padmini
    The life style in those days was least complicated. We were able to grow in our professional areas because there was no severe competition and there was a lot of 'give and take' We had a lot of time and inclination to emote as the situation demanded. People generally got along well with each other and jealousy was within manageable levels.

    But in today's rat race, we have to keep moving at break neck speed even to stay in a place. There is no time for niceties and finer feelings. If a fellow is butchered in broad day light, we move over to the other platform and continue our journey. Unlike in the past, the generation gap has been imposed by circumstances beyond our control.
    Sri
     
  6. arshi1611

    arshi1611 New IL'ite

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    Dear cheeniya sir,
    once again enjoyed this post immensely... what u made us see was much more dramatic than what must have really been i think...:) Inspite of all this i agree that yes the present generation is much more practical i feel even more than us.My children are 5 and 3 and they don't like half the things that i'm sure i'd be thrilled bout when i was their age.
    Although I'm not a great fan of weepy movies i've still seen a lot of black n white movies of dilip kumar n wept whenever he's died...courtesy my uncle who said that i shouldn't miss out on it!My younger sister found it way over the top!!! licking a diomond ring and dying is just too much she says haha.


    What amazes me is that the scenes that used to move us to the very core in our younger days do not have any impact on the youth of today. Take, for example, the hapless father of the heroine who preferred coughing horribly to uttering dialogues. How we clutched our chest when he coughed! He just used to walk away with the acting honours merely for the wide variety of his coughing. Just before the intermission, his passing away would be signified by an oil lamp suddenly going off. On resumption after the intermission, there would be a garlanded portrait of the old man under which the heroine would be sitting, sobbing uncontrollably. There was an actor called Appa Duraisamy who revelled in coughing and passing away before interval. He did that in film after film but moved us to tears every time. He used to be responsible for many a lump in my throat.

    Another great directorial touch used to be a daily calendar with fluttering sheets that signified efflux of time. The changing seasons also signified the same thing but people always preferred the calendar. A cat licking the milk spilt on the floor would indicate that the villain had beaten it to the heroine before the hero.

    Whenever such poignant scenes from vintage films are shown in TV these days, people laugh heartily and make some jovial remarks while I continue to feel that lump in my throat. I become painfully aware that times have changed drastically. The simple things that moved us or made us happy in our days are not even noticed by the modern youth. They don’t want to see a helpless, coughing father of a heroine just waiting for the interval to get into a garlanded portrait. They prefer someone very rich who could match the hero muscle for muscle. They prefer someone who could beat the hero to pulp before condescending to accept him as a son-in-law. We squirm uncomfortably when witnessing such scenes. After all, we belong to the old school who would not even sit before the son-in-law until we were permitted to do so. This generation gap can never be filled.

    I have heard some people saying that the generation gap is more marked between successive generations but far less between a grandfather and grandchildren. I wanted to check this out. I, therefore, asked my grandson to watch an old Tamil movie with me in which Appa Duraisamy scaled new heights in coughing. He sat through for few minutes and walked out shouting. “ Why can’t this old man go and see a Doctor or take some good cough syrup?”[/quote]
     
  7. Cheeniya

    Cheeniya Super Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Arshi
    You are right about the 'hard to please' nature of the present generation. I remember a quote of Herbert Prochnow who was a Banker in US and a regular contributor to The Saturday Evening Post and Readers Digest. He once said of the present generation that 'It now costs more to amuse a child than it once did to educate his father'! Apart from being funny, he was quite profound in that statement. The pressures of modern life are making our children a lot more materialistic and hard to please than their grand parents ever were. Simple joys of life elude them. Nor have they the time or inclination to stop for a while and savour them.

    What you say about Dilip Kumar makes me think. Those days dying scenes were more symbolic and yet grieved us no end. Today, the poor actor is made to lie down stiffly with cotton wads stuffed into his nostrils and flies buzzing over his face. Wailing women keep falling on his body with great regularity. He is carried to the crematorium where they stack cow dung cakes all over him sans his face. After everyone has had his share of crying, the last piece of cow dung cake is kept on his face and the hero sets fire to it with a grim face. Every one leaves but not before the hero takes a solemn oath with the torch still in his hand to avenge his father's death. While all these happen on the screen, the audience sits through the ordeal with passive faces. That's the difference between the diamond licking and getting covered by cow dung cakes!
    Sri
     
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  8. Prettina

    Prettina Gold IL'ite

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    Generation is a cylic process Man lived like animals in the early stage He developed lived his life like a human being now he is returning back as animal again.
    And I mean it.:bowdown
    Fashion,trends,styles and what not?????????
    has terribly changed the lifestyle,culture and tradition of today.
    The corruption and crimes that are going around the city
    My GOD Open the newspaper it really frustrates me.
    Someone is murdered,someone ran with some others wife.someone is raped et al
    Ohh Holy God.Save Us.These are my words when I read the newspaper.
    haan the IDIOT BOX is really a idiot that makes others idiot as well,if they are addicted to.
    this IDIOT BOX brings lots of commotion inside the house like fighting for remote,saddy soaps etc.
    Yuck better avoid it.
    We say that science has developed so much so kids are smart these days but
    I really wonder on the intelligence of our forefathers. :thumbsup
    They are the one who created a value,life,way for human beings.
    Anything or any pattern I stich may it be blouse or chudi i show my granny her answer will be "This all pattern we have already worn".
    I would be like Oof again uh.:spin
    I beleive that the old idea's with just little enhancements is coming as a new model.
    But the basic thing is the discovery of the old product which is done by our forefathers.
    Hats off to them.
    Coming to cinema really i wondered much when I saw "Yaar Nee" Wooow Such a thrilling and chilling movie in black and white.
    Really great that would swallow horror movies of these days.
    What a poweful thinking.
    Thanks Cheeniya you have written in a humourous way which was so nice to read.
     
  9. Cheeniya

    Cheeniya Super Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Prettina
    That was a refreshingly different perspective from a youngster about 'old values' It is nice to see someone like you having such respect for the innovative bygone generations. Having said this, I must tell you that it is hard to put a value scaling for each generation. Every generation acts as best as possible under the prevailing conditions of life and demands of the society. We can't say the earlier was better or worse.
    Sri
     
  10. mikku

    mikku Gold IL'ite

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    Dear Cheeniya sir,

    I have been reading your blogs since past couple of days....I am in no capacity to laud the writing style of THE stalwart of IL, so I choose to give a feedback to this particular thread only, since this one is a bit easier to assimilate for someone cognitively challenged as myself....
    I was laughing out through the post, as it reminded me of Gollapudi, a notable actor of the vintage telugu movies,who was destined to similar fate in almost all his movies, just like the actor you mentioned. The poor chap had to play father to ANR and NTR who were of his age. Needless to say, the writing style brought out the laughter, than anything else, since I adore some of the old classics, though Gollapudi did over do it at times. The last line cracked me up:)
     

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