Lips Don't Lie- Review of Rockstar

This movie (Rockstar) has to be one of a kind. It gives immense scope to the heroine's lips. They dominate the scenes in which she figures, to the exclusion of everything else- by design or accident, one does not know. So much so, that Shakira of the 'Hips Don't Lie' fame could have serious competition. And an aside for those in the weight-reduction business- liposuction does not mean a de-fattening of the lips.

Anyway, coming to the serious stuff, Nargis Fakhri (of whose lips the para earlier speaks) looks gorgeous, though she seems weak in the acting department, a little like Ash in her first film. Her Hindi diction can improve too. Ranbir acts well, looks cool, and convincing for the most part. The songs are good, and may grow on one after multiple listening occasions. The support cast- Aditi Rao Hydari is competent, and could be one to watch out for. The funniest character in the movie is that of the music company tycoon Dhingra, and his 'being-massaged-by-a pehelwan' (a metaphor for an ego-massage, maybe?) scene was an ROFL kind (to me at least). Shammi Kapoor's role is small but endearing.

The comments about the life of a superstar being lonely and frustrating are probably true for many of the ilk, given our intrusive public and media, and a complete lack of sensitivity for the person behind the persona. Some of the anger and outbursts Ranbir's character shows are totally understandable.

The pace of the movie could have been a bit faster, but the idyllic locations in Prague make up for it a little. Thank God, we've had enough of Switzerland in the seventies.

Definitely worth a watch, is my conclusion. Though judging by the audience reactions, it could turn out to be a cult film- the lips notwithstanding.

Doing Research- The Basics

Academic research done for the purpose of publishing a paper or presenting it at a conference or for a doctoral thesis is not everyone's cup of tea, and should not be. But if it is, how should one go about it? I get asked this question often, and it's not so difficult to answer. Let me attempt to do so. Sorry if it sounds like gyan from a baba or a baby!

The most important part of any research is not the statistics, but well, ...RESEARCH. Or, in easier to understand jargon, the literature review. Of past work done in the subject area you want to work on. Many researchers start with questionnaire design, do a survey of sorts, and wonder what they did! The reason is, there's no link with theory, no justification for what you did or how (methodology, to use jargon).

A good literature review can be done at your desk with the help of an online journal database like EBSCO or ProQuest these days. It takes only a day to download your readings for a particular keyword or phrase (research topic), but many weeks to read and digest it. Once it floats around in the brain, questions arise, and some of these serve as research questions for your study. Others lead to a possible methodology, after discussions with peers or your research guide. Justification for your work is easier, and linking your findings after your research to existing findings provides a validation or otherwise of work done earlier- and yours.

Questionnaire design is critical if you want to do a survey, but that must follow the literature review. That must result in getting the results in a format you want. If you can visualise blank tables of results, can you get them from the questions you have got on the questionnaire, is a good way to think about it.

Lastly, the results must allude to the hypotheses or questions asked in the beginning, and say what happened to each one of these. All this applies to research with primary data. Conceptual papers can come out of literature review and some projections or hypotheses alone.