What Defines a good cinema show?

 Which cinema did you visit last weekend? Which shows have you attended among the recent releases? How good was the movie?

These are among the myriad of questions we are asked everyday by the innumerable acquaintances we come across. One of these, namely, the latter grabbed my attention recently. What, indeed, is a good movie?

What defines a cinema experience? What are the most defining moments in a cinema? In a world of duality, where every patron has a corresponding detractor, where every yin has its yang, how does one call a work of art good or bad?

Many scholars skillfully present the relative views of the human mind as the cause for all judgement, movies included.

The Assassination Attempt

But i beg to differ, we are all humans, granted. But being so, all of us have our own soft spots - affection for a loved one, loyalty towards friends, condescending love towards a dear pet, so on and so forth. It is these soft spots that when touched (or not) give us the true taste (or lack of the same) of the cinema show. Like a skilled carpenter that instantly finds the soft spots of the log he carves, a skilled director instantly recognises the soft spots of his audiences and connects with them. Now, from the other side of the road, when it comes to judging films as an audience, it is the way in which the movie touches our soft spots that defines our experience. It is these that create a lasting impression in our mind. 

Prince Albert jumps before the Queen

Recently, I was watching 'The Young Victoria', which - self-declared movie connoisseur of considerable class that I am - is not the best of movies one would come across. But, I will remember that movie for a long time, if not forever. Well towards the end of the film, the monarch is shown touring her kingdom when a wayward detractor attempts to assassinate her. At that very instant, far away in Buckingham Palace, the hairs on the Queen-mother's arm stand up. Duchess Victoria of Kent, mother of the monarch, is suddenly tense.

The Duchess of Kent

Time stood stil for that infinitesimal fragment of a second. Somewhere deep down, from the innermost corners of the mind, I heard a silent 'Ah!'. I had seen a magnificent example of cinematography. All this within a second's time. In another such instance, in the movie 'Kung-Fu Panda 2' director Jennifer Yuh has fabulously visualised the moment when Po the Panda attains 'Inner Peace'. He does an elegant Kung-Fu movement while moving a droplet of water around his arms while a flood of troubling memories from his childhood rush past. In the end, he let's go these memories even as the droplet gently tips onto the leaf of a sapling near the Panda. In that single moment, time once again seems to stand still while we feel a deep sense of inner peace. It is then that we are truly satisfied.

Few are such experiences that I have seen in recent times. Let us recognise such moments and give due credit to the makers of such incredible experiences, because it is not the moments in our life, but the life in our moments that we grow to cherish.