Midnight in Paris Quotes

Gil: Because this is unbelievable..there is no city like this in the world.

Inez: You are in love with a fantasy.

Gil: I’m in love with you.

Adriana: Tell me more about your book.

Gil: My book is kind of a .. you know what, i couldn’t care less about my book tonight. I just want to walk around Paris with you.

Gil: You know, sometimes i think, how is anyone ever gonna come up with a book, or a painting, or a symphony, or a sculpture that can compete with a great city. You can’t.

John: Certainly they have been no friends of the United States

Gil: Well i mean you can’t exactly blame them for not following us down that rabbit holes in Iraq with the whole bush you know.

Gil: By the way it is fine for me and your father to disagree. That’s what a democracy is. Your father defends the right wing of the Republican Party and i happen to think that you almost have to be a demented lunatic to be so. It doesn’t mean that we don’t respect each other’s views, am i right?  

Adriana: I keep forgetting that you are a tourist.

Gil: That is putting it mildly.

Paul : Sex and alcohol..fuels the desire, kills the performance, according to the Bard.

Gil: That’s what present is. It’s a little unsatisfying because life is unsatisfying.

Ernest Hemingway: No subject is terrible if the story is true, if the prose is clean and honest and it affirms courage and grace under pressure.

Gil: I am jealous and I’m trusting. It’s cognitive dissonance. F.Scott Fitzgerald talked about it.

Ernest Hemingway: Picasso only thinks that women are to sleep with, or to paint.

Ernest Hemingway: you’ll never be a great writer if you fear dying, do you?

Gil: Yeah, i do. I would say it’s my greatest fear.

Adriana: I’m from the ‘20s and i am telling you the golden age is la Belle Epoque.

Gil: I would like you to read my novel and get your opinion.

Ernest Hemingway: I hate it.

Gil: You haven’t even read it yet.

Ernest Hemingway: If it’s bad, i’ll hate it. If it’s good, then i’ll be envious and hate it even more. You don’t want the opinion of another writer.

Gil: 500 Francs for a Matisse? That seems fair! So, can i get 6 or 7 ?

Gil: You two have the same names as ..

Scott F.Fitzgerald: As what ?

Gil: Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald

Scott F. Fitzgerald: Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, the Fitzgeralds. Isn’t she beautiful?

Gil: Yes, yes..its a coincidence ..like its a ...

Zelda Fitzgerald: You have a glazed look in your eyes, stunned, stupefied, anaesthetised, lobotomised.

Gil : I am having trouble (completing my book) because i’m a Hollywood hack who never gave real literature a shot..until now.

Gil: you know, i think better in the shower, get all those positive ions flowing.

Ernest Hemingway: All men fear death. It’s a natural fear that consumes all. We fear death because we feel that we haven’t loved well enough or loved at all, which ultimately are one and the same.  However, when you make love with a truly great woman, one that deserves the utmost respect in this world and one that makes you feel truly powerful, that fear of death completely disappears. Because when you are sharing your body and heart with a great woman the world fades away. You two are the only ones in the entire universe. You conquer what lesser men have never conquered before, you have conquered a great woman’s heart, the most vulnerable thing she can offer to another .Death no longer lingers in the mind. Fear no longer clouds your heart. Only passion for living, and for loving, become your sole reality. This is no easy task for it takes insurmountable courage. But remember this, for that moment when you are making love with a woman of true greatness, you will fell immortal.

Ernest Hemingway: It was a good book because it was an honest book, and that’s what war does to men. And there’s nothing fine and noble about dying in the mud unless you die gracefully. And then it’s not only noble but brave.

Ernest Hemingway: If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a movable feast.

Gertrude Stein:Everybody knows if you are too careful you are so occupied in being careful that you are sure to stumble over something.

F.Scott Fitzgerald: Genius is the ability to put into effect what is on your mind. 

Zelda Fitzgerald: Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much the heart can hold. 

Gil: You look around and every street, every boulevard, is its own special art form and when you think that in the cold, violent, meaningless universe that Paris exits, these lights, I mean come on, there’s nothing happening on Jupiter or Neptune, but from way out in space you can see these lights, the cafe, people drinking and singing. For all you know, Paris is the hottest spot in the universe.

Ernest Hemingway:If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a movable feast.

Adriana: That Paris exists and anyone could chose to live anywhere else in the will always be a mystery to me. 

Gertrude Stein: The artist’s greatest job is not to succumb to despair but to find an antidote for the emptiness of existence. You have a clear and lovely voice. Don’t be such a defeatist.

Ai Weiwei

Ai Weiwei - without fear or favour

Fans & following: EPL

The English Premier League has started its fresh season. With new season come new fans. Because they have decided to follow the game, they have to choose a club to support. Fans mostly are armchair experts fooling themselves to believe that their vociferous ‘support’ from Hill Road, Brigade Road, Salt Lake or GK-II in anyway makes a shard of a difference to the proceedings in England. It doesn’t. Yet they choose. For all the fellow collegians are choosing and all the office employees are too. Besides, girls respect a football follower more. Every boy and his uncle knows that.

The game run by BCCI Mafioso is too mainstream and to show that you are in a different league, club football especially EPL is the way to go. In doing that, people end up making the wrong choices. Then again, the reason to choose maybe varied– say your crush on a star player or that your arch enemy supports club A so you end up with Z or that you follow that your group does. Doesn’t matter, you can do a switch to the opposite camp and no one will call you fucking Van Persie. Maybe this list will help in going through the options.

Arsenal is an underachiever, at the same time the club is an over-achiever. The sort of team that just guarantees to give you heartburns with their unpredictability, as they oscillate between prodigious brilliance and school boy faux pas. The Invincibles of 2003-04 have long gone. Each year they built something and see their players lured by deep pocket clubs. It is as easy as luring kids with candy. You can’t win the league with a bunch of kids, except if the kids are Manchester United’s Class of 92’.And Sir Wenger, O Professor, you don't win anything for financial fairplay and non abuse of capital. In Arsène you trust, in Arsène you will rust. So will the trophy cabinet.

Chelsea, masters of parking the bus. Or in John Terry’s case barking racial slurs. Yes, finally they are Champions of Europe.. but wait till they crash out of Champions League or play against Barça, whichever comes earlier. Like a rich playboy who doesn’t settle for one glam girlfriend, Chelsea doesn’t settle for the best of coaches. How else would you let José Mourinho, Gus Hiddink and Carlo Ancelotti go? Their game is not visually attractive, and they are not even the best club in London, leave alone England or Europe. And one more thing, they aren’t the richer club in the deviously, sinisterly labeled El Cashico game vs Manchester City. A legacy of financial profligacy – Roman Abramovich and Stamford Bridge. Some one make him watch Moneyball.

 White Hart Lane is a breeder park for bigger clubs. A bed and breakfast inn until you find a cozy apartment. Quite similar to their North London neighbours Arsenal, they play with visual flair only to end up as unlucky losers. I digress. The important question is – how long are Gareth Bale and Scott Parker staying? Shall we ask manager André Villas-Boas? What i learned from Titanic is that rats jump a sinking ship and try to find a Parisian bakery. Seriously, Tottenham and Arsenal have much in common. It’s just that they have been perennially warring siblings…alright cousins…alright neighbours who can’t see the other succeed.

June 08’was a time when the crude oil prices hit $140 dollars/barrel. It was also a time when you could fill the entire of Manchester City supporters in a single Etihad flight. Then came Sheikh Mansour to build the most expensive collection of horrendous looking players you can find- Lescott, Tevez, Balotelli, Zabaleta and the works. City fans in India should not complain about an oil price hike, if they have some moral fiber, because that is what finances their ‘great’ club that has won a grand total of 2 EPL titles in 44 years. Naturally, there has been a sudden sprouting in City fan base and they can give United fans a run for their money in terms of being obnoxious weeds. City have stolen the Poznań and have ruined a song like Hey Jude. It’s true, what they say - petrodollars can’t buy you class.

Liverpool. You can’t say I support them because they win. And they are not even underdogs, you can root for. Liverpool are just have beens who only occasionally really show up for their big games. They play to cancel other team’s advantage and not to maximize their own. When they can’t, they wail and moan. Even Sir Matt Busby would be tired of this bunch who still live in the 80s when a pint was much cheaper and they were still at the fecking perch that Fergie knocked them off. Honestly if you want to pick a team from Merseyside Liverpool, pick Everton. David Moyes is one good guy. 

 Manchester United has a philosophy of intimidating referees unless he goes by the name of Howard Webb. United is not a bad club, they try and try and try until they have the injury time goal- by hook or crook or sinker. You want to irk them, just say Paul Scholes is not the greatest midfielder of his generation. They have a youth program, they use home grown talent, have financial strength and a decorated recent past. But the fans are snooty and give the club a bad name. You will seldom find a United fan who will not be a jerk. Most have never kicked a football farther than 50 yards but would still buy overpriced official jersey that looks like a table cloth. The original Glory hunters whose tweets end with #GGMU.

And remember,anybody can beat anybody in EPL. It is just that sort of a league, just look at last season’s circle of results.

Citius Altius Fortius

Liu Xiang fell; clutching his heels and then gave us an Olympic moment to cherish.

With the cleanest, smoothest hurdling action, Liu Xiang was back in form. He had won recent Diamond League races and was back to his personal best. He was back to get the gold medal he won at the 2004 Olympics in 110m hurdles. 

This was the event that he had worked towards since the injury plagued him down. This meant a lot to him.  These were the heats to qualify for the finals. He was the crowd favourite.

Then the race started.Liu’s Achilles, the same injury that had robbed him of the 2008 games, had been aggravated again.He fell at the first hurdle.

His frustration was palpable.

 He even struggled to get up.

He finally got up, and hopped towards the exit tunnel, ignoring the offered wheel chair.It would have been crushingly disappointing for him, for he still is a great hurdler.  

London looked like it would end with a bitter taste. But then, he stopped.

And he turned around and he re-entered the track to a stadium-shaking ovation, and finished the 110 meters.

Stopping to kiss the final hurdle.

As soon as he crossed the finish line, his fellow athletes embraced him and helped him. And just like that Liu Xiang’s tragic day became what is surely one of the most enduring moments of the 2012 London Games.Tagged with his breakthrough gold medal run at Athens, Xiang now has two true inspirational Olympian moments – one of sweet success and another of spirit triumphing over tragedy.

Johnny Gaddar Film Noir

Johnny Gaddar (2007)

SPOILER ALERT: If you haven’t seen the film, stop reading right about now.

Johnny Gaddar pays reverential homage to the film noir genre of film making. Film noir ‘dark film’ is a term first applied by French critics to describe a type of American film, usually in the detective or thriller genres. Johnny Gaddar tributes both the original Hollywood film noir films and the Indian film noir that was inspired by it in late 1960s and early 1970s.The pre-credit sequence introduces the noir-aesthetics  that characterises the film as the grey tones combined with the rain and darkness create the stifling suspense that is interrupted only by the red colour of the blood spilled. 

Immediately after the action cuts to the title sequence montage that cements the film’s genre and sensibilities. Established noir traits of low-key lighting and somber mood that emphasise on cynicism, greed and sexual motivations are explored further into the film’s running time.The film’s opening credits montage establishes its key intertextual sources of inspiration as well as tribute- Jyoti Swaroop’s Parwana (1971) starring Amitabh Bachchan , Vijay Anand’s Johny Mera Naam (1970) and James Hadley Chase’s novel The Whiff of Money .

The montage is made of selectively included snippets of scenes that come later on as the film progresses. The credits have been done in the style (colour, font and music) of a 1970s crime thriller from India. Director Sriram Raghavan has admitted to toying with the idea of shooting the entire film in black-and-white, keeping in with the noir atmospherics of the film. The black-and-white treatment was let go in favour of colour; however red palette is pre-dominant in the frames. The red standing for danger, suspense and thrill.

Vikram (alias Johnny) gets ideas of how to implement his double-cross from Johny Mera Naam and Parwana. Parwana supplies him with an alibi and Johny Mera Naam gave him the alias. The allusions and inspirations in Johnny Gaddar are accompanied by irony as both the films are rather innocent and relatively naïve vintage crime thrillers that Vikram watches on TV. Johny Mera Naam is playing in the hotel lobby when he is checking in while making his detour to Pune enroute to Goa. Inspired by the film, he checks-in under the name Johnny G. The irony is that the character whose name (alias) he adopts is infact, a law abiding police officer in the original film. Furthermore, both are love stories with redemption and explanation to amoral acts in the end. Whereas in Johnny Gaddar, the moral delineation is not smoothened by the redemptive feature. Crime here is a personal choice not a social one forced by circumstances. This is apparent in the coin toss scene .He flips the coin at the juncture from where there is no return. Vikram wants to convince himself that it is his fate to get the whole booty. When the coin toss doesn’t fall in his favour, he opts for a best-of-three and when the second toss also is unfavourable, he opts for a best-of-five.

Seshadri, Vikram, Shiva, Shardul and Prakash are the five partners in the gambling club. The partners also deal with other underhand operations, one of which forms the storyline in the film. Shardul in his frustration calls his wife Mini a Rajshri film wife, thereby calling her as sexually frigid and insipid. Vikram’s motive is to flee with Mini after a carefully orchestrated, well thought-out plan by which he can steal the money and no one ends up dying .The eventual turn of events is unexpected as the body count keeps on rising. When he does end up with the money in his water tank safely rolled up in plastic bags, he lies to Mini feigning ignorance of the money or the murders. Despite that, one kind of sides with Vikram, if only slightly to see if he can really pull this sleight off. For he is one amongst us- young, urban and suave. There is the theme of urban discontent and the power of money to change motives and morality which The Whiff of Money alludes to .He has in the words of Seshadri, chosen a dark path.

continued....

Johnny Gaddar Film Noir II

By committing the murder on a train just after Lonavla station was crossed, he is able to alight at a designated station (Pune) and return to his place of business (Goa) without arousing suspicion - a sequence which echoes the chain of events in Parwana.The murder on train to claim money is a reminder of Hollywood noir classic Double Indemnity (1944) in which insurance money will be doubled while here Vikram would pocket five times his return (5 million to 25 million rupees) .The film has a rich presence of intertextuality in its music, dialogues and it is self-reflexive in portraying that. There are certain other popular culture references, for instance, in a bus sequence Mini (Rimi Sen) is reading R.K.Narayan 's Guide which was adapted to a famous film in the 1960s and Vikram is reading The Whiff of Money in the train (before killing for money).There’s a fleeting glimpse of the book ‘The life and crimes of Charles Shobhraj’s when Inspector Kalyan is questioning the Vikram, Shardul and Prakash about the murders of Shiva and Sheshadri.

Notable attempt at making a nostalgic resonance of 1970s is done via the casting of yesteryear actor Dharmendra as Seshadri (Vikram’s mentor) as the lead partner of the club and the revelation of his own trade of smuggling watches as he reminisces his dead wife. Added to that, Seshadri listens to an old Hindi song ‘Mora Gora Ang’ cover sung by his wife (from Bimal Roy’s Bandini, 1963 originally sung by Lata Mangeshkar) from an audio cassette in a boom-box. There are a couple of lines from old Hindi songs from Jugnu (1973), Yakeen (1969), Aadmi aur Insaan (1969). The songs from Jugnu and Yakeen are ‘Rama Rama Ghazab’and ‘Bachke Kahan Jaoge’ respectively. Dharmendra acted in Bandini, Jugnu ,Yakeen and Aadmi aur Insaan .Besides, these song snippets bring in the self referential angle to the film, a feature that is identified as a film noir aesthetic . Again as a feature of indies, these songs are not lip-synced, but are being played in the background in a discotheque. There is a soundtrack mix referring to the nursery rhyme ‘Johnny Johnny Yes Papa’, nailing the liar and cheat part of the rhyme.

There are three instances where Hollywood films’ presence is observed. In the same afore-mentioned cassette, Seshadri’s wife asks him to take her to see Dr. No (1962) in Regal theatre in Bombay. While counting the 25 million rupees, Seshadri mentions that a similar scene was there in the film Scarface (1983) which is a remake and tribute to Howard Hawks’original crime-thriller Scarface (1932). Shiva (another club partner) is watching Stanley Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut (1999) when he gets a call from Shardul (Mini’s husband). While talking of tributes, it would be an ideal time to mention the Hitchcockian device of MacGuffin used in the film. 

The MacGuffin used in Johnny Gaddar is ‘French Furniture’ which may or may not be drugs. MacGuffin is a term for a motivating element in astory that is used to drive the plot. It serves no further purpose. It won’t pop up again later, it won’t explain the ending, it won’t actually do anything except possibly distract us while we try to figure out its significance. In some cases, like in Johnny Gaddar, it won’t even be shown. It is a mysterious package or artefact that everyone in the story is interested in. Seshadri is immediately willing to grab hold of the French Furniture MacGuffin that his old friend Inspector Kalyan offers him from Bangalore.

The suspense in the film is not who has committed the murder. Like the best of crimes, it missed the perfection it sought to achieve. The audience knows who the culprit is.The suspense is what is the next scene going to be, and this makes it decidedly different from commercial Hindi films. The use of vernacular languages in Marathi, Tamil and Telugu brings the polyglot nature and layer of multi-culturalism. Johnny Gaddar is an original script with knowing nods to masters of the genre with a global touch and Indian texture to it.

Anthology films

Grand Hotel (1932)

A group of very different individuals staying at a luxurious Berlin hotel and their respective dramas. It is possibly the first portmanteau film and is noted to be culturally, historically and aesthetically significant. It won the Oscar for Best Film. They don’t make like these anymore.

Six in Paris (1965)

French anthological film made by six of the leading directors of the French new Wave collaborating to direct six segments.

The Illustrated Man (1969)

Based on the book by Ray Bradbury by the same name, it comprises of three science fiction stories as the protagonist recounts how he got some of the tattoos on his body.

Four Rooms (1995)

An omnibus film, originally intended to be Five Rooms, tells four stories set in Hotel Mon Signor in Los Angeles on New Year’s Eve. Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino being two among the four directors of the segments.

Coffee and Cigarettes (2003)

A series of 11 vignettes that all have coffee and cigarettes in common.

Three ..Extremes (2004)

An East Asian horror film, with three segments coming from Hong Kong, South Korea and Japan, it can be unsettling to many. The three segments are Dumplings, Cut and Box in that order.

Paris Je’Taime (2006)

Features 18 shorts stories, each set in a different part of Paris .It was originally meant to have 20 stories, one for each of Paris’ arrondissements. Two shorts were dropped. However, it spawned New York, I Love you in the series of ‘The cities of Love’ with films for Rio, Shanghai and Jerusalem being planned.

New York, I Love You (2009)

Comprised of 10 shorts, it is a tribute to the city of New York and a sister film to Paris Je T’Aime. Works both as a romance film as also a seductive travelogue.

V/H/S (2012)

A group of misfits hired by an unknown third party to burglarise a desolate house and acquire a rare VHS tape. They find more found footage than they bargained for.

From India

Darna Mana Hai (2003)

Six stories narrated by friends among themselves over bonfire as they are stuck in forest as they find shelter in an abandoned house. All stories have a supernatural or eccentric element to them.

Gobbledygook

Gobbledygook basically is pretentious unintelligible jargon.One can also call it double dutch.A bunch of baloney wrapped around in drivel topped up with more of macaronics and rigmarole. This blah-blah, hocus-pocus, chitter-chatter, jibber-jabber, mumbo-jumbo is hard to understand. See what i mean?

This uncharacteristic use of jargon is ideal to obfuscate data thereby making things deliberately unclear and might possibly give you a headache, if you read it over more than once. Comprehending it is another matter. Hence, its most easily found in corporate policy matters and even more or in government reports. It is the art of saying the simplest of things in the most twisted way possible, literally tying knots in a sentence.

Some samples of such government gobbledygooks are sampled below.Followed by their meaning in just one sentence. Can you decipher a gobbledygook?

Here is the first one.

It is clear that the Cabinet Committee agrees that the new policy is an excellent plan, in principle. But in view of the doubts being expressed, it was decided to record that ,after careful consideration, the considered view of the committee was that while they considered the proposal met with broad approval in principle, it was felt that some of the principles were sufficiently fundamental in principle, and some of the considerations so complex and finely balanced in practice that in principle it was proposed that the sensible and prudent practice would be to subject the proposal to more detailed consideration with and across the relevant departments with a view to preparing and proposing a more thorough and wide ranging proposal laying stress on the less controversial elements and giving consideration to the essential continuity of the new proposal with existing principles, to be presented for parliamentary considerations and public discussions on some more propitious juncture when the climate of opinion is deemed to be more amenable for consideration of the approach and the principle of the principle arguments which the proposal proposes and propounds for approval.

What does it mean ?

In precise,

The Cabinet is not in favour of the policy.

Page 127, Ji Mantriji, Vol 1

Now try this one.

Notwithstanding the fact that the proposal could conceivably encompass certain concomitant benefits of a marginal and peripheral relevance, there is a consideration of infinitely superior magnitude involving your personal complicity and corroborative malfeasance, with the consequence that the taint and stigma of your former association and diversions could irredeemably and irretrievably invalidate your position and culminate in public revelations and recriminations of a profoundly embarrassing and ultimately indefensible character.

In one short sentence,

If you let this proposal pass, prepare for a character assassination.

Page 155, Ji Mantriji, Vol 1

And one more.

Certain informal discussions have taken place, involving a full and frank exchange of views, out of which there arose a series of proposals which on examination prove to indicate certain promising lines of enquiry which when pursued led to the realisation that the alternative courses of action might infact, in certain circumstances, be susceptible of discreet modifications in one way or another, leading to a reappraisal of the original areas of difference and pointing a way to encouraging possibilities of significant compromise and co-operation which if bilaterally implemented with appropriate give and take on both sides could, if the climate were right have a reasonable possibility at the end of the day of leading ,rightly or wrongly to a  mutually satisfactory conclusion.

This simply means

We can make a compromise deal with them.

Page 103, Ji Mantriji, Vol 3

Ji Mantriji was an Indian adaptation of the British satirical sitcom Yes Minister aired on BBC. Ji Mantriji aired on Star Plus and featured Farooque Sheikh as Surya Prakash Singh, the minister of Administrative Affairs and Jayant Kriplani as the department’s secretary whose job was to bamboozle the minister with his trademark goobledygooks.

The examples have been taken from the book adaptation of the series ,Ji Mantriji: The diaries of Shri Surya Prakash Singh published by Penguin in 3 volumes.

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Star Plus cancelled Ji Mantriji because of low TRP's, despite it having a niche dedicated audience.

Who is Don Draper?

Donald Francis ‘Don’ Draper is just a fictional character on AMC’s Mad Men. However, that doesn’t stop Don Draper from being voted the most influential man in the world by Askmen.com. Mad Men, set in 1960s New York advertising world immediately has the lure of the swinging sixties; and in that Don Draper is a shining star. Don Draper has an ego that people pay to see.

His is a rags-to-riches story but saying that the story is chequered would be an understatement. His life is an illusion. An illusion of a happy marriage with Betty Draper and three young kids lasted more than it was supposed to considering his long list of extra-marital affairs. But its also an illusion in the sense that he is actually living on an identity he stole while he got a chance to while stationed in the Korean War. For a long time we didn’t know that he is actually Richard ‘Dick’ Whitman, born to a prostitute who died while giving birth to him and sired by a dad who never stopped reminding him that he is a whore-child.

In a way, he is responsible for his half-brother hanging himself, for Don never wanted to go back to anything from his last iteration. He has lived two lives- one as Dick Whitman and now as Don Draper. The Don Draper iteration is scared of his Dick Whitman past. Only by the time he either confides or people find out on their own about his identity theft does he slowly begin to stop worrying about it .Nonetheless the truth has the potential to make him immensely worried. And it does, infrequently in the form of IRS or US Government security checks.

Don has lied, cheated on his wife multiple times and been downright disrespectful, he is a chain smoker and drinks copiously. He is not exactly a role model of a father either. However that description is painting him in broad negative strokes; for the man has some positive qualities on display. He is cynical and arrogant, yes, but he has his own code of ethics that he goes by. He insists on honesty, forthrightness and chivalry in people working for him. He is protective of people who he sees potential in and he is quite likely to admonish rude and crude behaviour towards women in workplace. This although hasn’t stopped him from seducing his secretary and letting another one seduce him. For him, there is not even a contradiction there.There is so much coolth about his ways that we often forget what all he gets by with. It seems there is a different yardstick for him.

What makes him an asset to Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce is his sheer talent and his ability to spot it. Another thing that he has is insight. He knows who or what has potential. Just see what Peggy Olson has become under his wings. Peggy shares the most meaningful relationship with Don based on mutual admiration and respect. Women in workplace had it tough in 60s, but Don has always treated her as an equal. That apart, the only woman Don has been really happy with is Megan Calvet.

He has changed since he popped the question to her. Megan has had the most evolving part in Mad Men from being a receptionist to now an aspiring actress, and in between that she graduated to being Don’ wife and a copywriter at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce (SCDP). The rise is quick and meteoric.

Megan is a great step-mom to Don’s kids, especially with Sally. Megan dealt with Don’s ex-wife Betty poisoning Sally’s mind with calm, poise and emotional intelligence defying a twenty something year old. She threw a surprise birthday bash for Don at their classy New York apartment and performed the sensuously classy Zou Bisou Bisou with whole of ad agency in attendance. Don was irked but blushed still. She even salvaged the Heinz Beans account even as it was gone for all money and Don was in awe of his wife.

Don is finally happy in his second marriage .He even told Pete Campbell that that kind of life is not worth throwing away. But we know that Don is not really comfortable with successful wives. Even a ravishing model as Betty did become a housewife. The friction in the Don-Megan relationship,whether Don admits it or not, is Megan’s acting aspirations. And as Megan’s mother pointed out, she has an artist’s temperament without necessarily an artist’s talent. How much of that can Don really entertain is quite a query. Megan, meanwhile is desperate enough to knife a friend for a part in a mere Butler commercial  and Don is not head-over heals with her anymore.

The affection remains, which is surely going to be stretched as she gets her wings to fly.Don was against helping her get the ad and that is why he told her ‘You want to be someone’s discovery not someone’s wife’. Megan took a creative shortcut and Don is the sort of guy who will never take shortcuts to his creative process.Don’s nonpareil creative genius remains. Pulling out words and insights that none saw. Take Kodak’s Slide Projector for instance right here.

For he also wrote that courageous ‘Why I’m quitting tobacco’ letter after losing the Lucky Strike Cigarettes account which has had such an impact that it is just called ‘The letter’. And this is the same Lucky Strike for which he came up with ‘It’s Toasted’ line in a stroke of genius.

The women in his life are a reflection of his thoughts. And he was downright unhappy by the manner in which SDCP bagged Jaguar, even though the creative pitch had great merit in itself. Don was clearly against the Jaguar dealer’s sleazy proposition with Joan. Don Draper has immense respect for Joan Harris that was evident in the sparkling conversation they had in bar after she accompanied him to the Jaguar showroom.

With his office wife and protégé Peggy Olson moving on to be Copy Chief at rivals Cutler Gleason & Chaough (CGC), Don might find himself alone at work and if he responds in kind to “are you alone?” query by the unknown blonde, it might be back to his philandering, womanising ways again.That shouldn’t surprise anyone,given his sexual prowess, but Don Draper can always spring another surprise. One that might be completely out-of-the blue. As his media buyer Harry Crane said ‘Draper? Who knows anything about that guy? No one’s ever lifted that rock. He could be Batman for all we know.’

And on that note, i am off to see The Dark Knight Rises .

Cool Proverbs

The native Indian proverb goes - We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children. Here follows a list of lesser known proverbs. Mostly because they are not English in origin, they are not as widely used. Some of them are German, French, Italian, Chinese and African. Yet a proverb is a proverb with a witty way of saying a worldly matter with local nuance. Here goes...

Too far east is west.

An old horse knows the way.

Two dogs over one bone seldom agree.

The mother of idiots is always pregnant.

Between doing and saying lies the sea.

Better to lick the knife than give up the spoon.

When you drink the water remember the spring.

Sour, sweet, bitter, pungent, all must be tasted.

Even a blind chicken finds a grain once in a while.

The rooster that crows too early gets a twisted neck.

Evil enters like a splinter and spreads like an oak tree.

It is the chef who knows the contents of the pot best.

If you don’t scale the mountain, you can’t view the plain.

The wolf would hire himself out very cheaply as the shepherd.

Rebuke is greater to the wise than a hundred blows to the fool.

Tell me who you spend time with and i will tell you who you are.

If you are looking for a fly in your food, it means that you are full.

The rain of your insults do not breach my umbrella of indifference.

When the bush is on fire, the antelope ceases to fear the hunter’s bullet.