The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D

i admit i used to invent superheroes much like the ones in ‘shark boy lava girl’ when i was in the third standard. like max in the film i did have a special notebook where i used to draw them out- the men were all muscular hunks with that rectangular jaw line that makes them so american looking; and the women were oozing out of their skimpy outfits with hair flowing freely down to their shoulders. i used to color them with camlin crayons.

these were all symptoms of my unnatural fascination with all things comic book- especially super hero comic books. the more obscure the powers of the characters, the more i used to enjoy the comics. ‘dial h for hero’ naturally was one of my favorites where a young teenage boy and girl get special watches which they dial ‘h-e-r-o’ and automatically turn into some strange new superpeople. time man/ electric girl/ radar boy/ illusion woman.. whatever.

the stories i used to imagine were never written down- but for that one time that shyam, babu and me invented ‘shivaji bond’ starring rajnikanth. i think shyam still might have a copy that brilliant screenplay. i hope he burns it.

the movie seemed like it was conceptualized by a kid like me with a much larger budget who could afford more than a ruled line paper notebook for his daydream. once the kid had the idea out of his system hollywood studios took all of its silliness and added their particular brand of sickening family feel goodness and cheesy inspirational dialogue("when you dream hard enough your dreams can become reality") and in dreadful 3d to boot.

all in all a very predictable hollywood children’s film- with all the right strategies to sell over the counter miniature plastic replicas of characters and action packed video games.

and since i havent mentioned them this season- in reality talent show recommendations.. katherine in 'american idol' and karunya in 'indian idol'.