Copied/Inspired from Western movies

[sreenath]

Hi friends,

I am not sure if u aree with this or not, there are two films(may be more because I didnot see many of english movies) of a great hollywood director similar in some aspects of some malayalam films,
Director Steven Speilberg

films
Catch me if you can - The story of a clever thief and an fbi officer

A film named Kalikkalm(released 10-15 years back)with mammooty as thief and murali as the police officer
Some reports came in some film magazines comparing the two films when this film is released.

Minority Report - The film has some strong similarities at the climax to a malayalam film,
Randambhavam(released 2 or 3 years before MR) . Both films the boss of the hero is the villain .At the climax in both of them the hero gives a gun to the villain but he shoots himself.

There are other similarities also with some other malayalam films (may be with some other language movies) of a scene which in which a video of the villain killing a lady is shown in front of a crowd. Similar scenes are there in some malayalam films like superman,rajaputhran etc.

We cannot say that they copied from us but how this happened is an interesting question.

[alwarpet_andavan]

Can we go a little further and discuss about copied/inspired acting, directing methods, editing tricks, and screenplay adaptations? .....

Akira Kurosawa is the most copied [the one who has inspired the most] director.

* Aiming the camera directly at the sun
* Using glasses, screens etc. as light reflectors
* 3D technique of composition. Characters remaining in 3 levels/dimensions with respect to their distances from the camera, all of them being in focus.
* Using color reflectors to enhance contrasts/color depth in his color film Rhapsody In August. In fact, he even went to the extent of lighting up a pond with under-water bulbs to get a rich color depth!
* Samurai/Westerns! [Seven Samurai, Yojimbo].
* The theme of a veteran cop paired up with a rookie
* The most famous one - Rashomon!
All these and more have been borrowed/copied from or sources of inspiration for cinema as an entity. That's how it works in ANY field, let alone cinema. It is an individual who would have introduced counterpoint [Bach?] in music, but today everyone uses it.

Sergei Eisenstein - Montages

Stanley Kubrick - Pioneer of zoom-ins and zoom-outs to enhance composition [somebody confirm pl]

The first instance i've seen of the now common non-linear narrative which is often associated and credited with Tarrantino was in Stanley Kubrick's "The Killing" released sometime in the 50's. [not sure if he was the pioneer though]

[kannannn]

A_A, Kurosawa's medium shots ('Seven Samurai') and sequential close-ups of members of a running group (again 'seven samurai', remember the scene when the group is first alerted to a (false) alarm?) are also firsts, which were later used extensively by others. Also, in Ikiru you find that the narration is so slow at times, that you feel the movie is stagnant (I did find the discussion on the dead man too prolonged towards the end). I'm not sure if such a narration style was used in earlier films by other directors.

[alwarpet_andavan]

A_A, Kurosawa's medium shots ('Seven Samurai') and sequential close-ups of members of a running group (again 'seven samurai', remember the scene when the group is first alerted to a (false) alarm?) are also firsts, which were later used extensively by others. Also, in Ikiru you find that the narration is so slow at times, that you feel the movie is stagnant (I did find the discussion on the dead man too prolonged towards the end). I'm not sure if such a narration style was used in earlier films by other directors.

Good point regarding the sequence in Ikiru. In fact, Kurosawa had to cut a few minutes of flash-backs because everyone felt it was too long!
Also, yes, Ikiru was made a couple of years, at least, before "The Killing".
The sequence of still-shots [o Watanabe's photograph in his funeral] was also first, to be repeated in the opening scenes of Seven Samurai. In the latter, the scene of the bandits riding against the backdrop of the sun in the horizon is a standard theme in subsequently made movies across the world

[as_Arvind]

s.j. suryah's vaali and Richard linklater's 'before sunrise'

scene in vaali:

ajith and jo in a boat. jo and ajith pretend to speak to their friends on a phone and express their love.

Same scene in b4 sunrise: Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke - they both do the same in a restaurant and express their love.

btw, excellent contribution made by two members (can't go back and see their names!) thanks to them.

keep it going.

[Kartikeya]

Here are some more Carbon Copies of the English movies in Hindi...

1. Roman Holiday: Chori Chori (Raj Kapoor)
Dil Hai ke Manata Nahi
2. Dial M for Murder: Aitbar (Dimple Kapadia)
3. A Marathi movie: Teen Chor
4. Hound of Baskarville: Bees Saal Baad
5. Seven Brides for Seven Brothers: Satte pe Satta (Big B when he was a Small B)
6. Comedy of Errors: Angoor, Do Dooni Char

Kartikeya

[great]

in the movie usual suspect, main lead act as crippled and escape from the cop this has been used in the opening shot of the tamil movie villan .......

[narayanan]

New (Tamil) from The Big

Pattiyal(Tamil) from Bangkok Dangerous

[selvakumar]

S.J. Suryah's - Vaali - is more like 'Moondru mudichu'. Suryah himself has talked about this. just substitute kamal & rajini with 'ajith & ajith'. I have not seen moondru mudichu.

Arvind,
It would be better if you could comment like this after having seen both the movies.

MM & Vaali are lot more different. Let me give you the difference.

We cannot substitue elder Ajith's character in Vaali with that of Rajini in MM.

MM deals with the love / madness of Rajini with SD.. and in the whole process he kills his friend (who is a lover) then and attempts everything before it even SD marries his own father. It is like dealing with the one which he is unable to get / lust combination etc.. IN the mean time, he rapes her servant too.. We cannot justify his nature as a love that he portrays towards SD.. But in VAALI, elder ajith will be mad about simmi only and will not be interested in others. Before that, he will be portrayed as a NICE CHAP, GOOD BUSINESSMAN etc. He portrays the inability of a person to woo a female in his first sight.

VAALI plot is totally different. IT is the feelings and emotions of a deaf & dumb person who is longing for a girl whom he met already in his life.

The plot and script itself is difference.

The only similarity that can be found in both vaali and MM is

-- The kind of cruel attempts made by both the characters in attaining their goal.

Apart from that, VAALI & MM are totally different. I am not sure how much SJS commented about the similiarity.

May be, He might have commented about the kind of films that were taken in the past & he might have correlated it with his film.

[bingleguy]

Kamal is good n remaking a concept which has inspired him ...

Mrs. Doubtfire -> Avvai Shanmugi !

He has followed Robin Willams in performing many roles ... including the appu character, mrs.doubtfire concept .....