Monday, January 01, 2007

Aish on Sun TV

Last week, we finally started subscribing to Sun TV at our new house. It's been about four months since we watched Sun TV but in the few glimpses we've had so far, not much has changed. The biggest change I guess is that Radhika's Selvi (which I never watched anyway) has ended. But there's not gonna be any break for viewers from Radhika herself since her new serial, Arasi, is scheduled to start on Wednesday. Other serials like Kolangal(with Devayani) and Lakshmi(with Meena) seem to be going strong. Arattai Arangam is now being hosted by Raja(?), a regular and very popular participant in the pattimandrams that used to be telecast on all special days. I wanted to watch Thanga Vettai to see how Kaniha fared compared to Ramya Krishnan but didn't get a chance to see it today.

The New Year special programs were the usual mix of interviews with cine personalities (Gopika, Yuvan, Karunas, Naren), year-end recaps and public surveys about the next year. The only program I watched was Aishwarya Rai's interview since that is not something you get to see often. Considering her previous performances(like on 60 Minutes) in interviews I wasn't sure how she'd do but she did very well in the very short interview.

She looked ravishing and understandably, spoke in English. There were none of those artificial, irritating giggles that put me off in those previous interviews. She said she considers the South her home(she was born in Mangalore) and so feels at home when she has to come there for films or acts in South Indian films. Asked about Tamil words she had picked up so far, she mentioned konjam konjam, kaadhal, etc. She said she would be delighted to act with Rajnikanth and that talks have taken place about her doing atleast an item number but that things haven't worked out so far due to scheduling clashes. She had high praise for Manirathnam and said that Rajeev Menon was her dear friend. She signed off saying, on the prompting of interviewer, Nandri and Vanakkam.

Overall, it was a very light, careful interview with no mention of Abishek Bachan or even her Hindi films. But it was nice(and different) to catch Aish on our local channel...

18 Comments:

At 12:33 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

amma-va record panni vekka solliruken...paaka mudiyala...

anyways, jan 14th 2007 marks the 10th anniversary of my unabASHed jolling! coz pongal '97 was when iruvar released...DS Ramanujam wrote for The Hindu that Ash was "bound to sway young hearts."

adhula sile young hearts ipo ara-kelams (i.e. 25 thaandi!) aayaachu...but still continue to be swayed!!

om jollaaya namaha...
ram

PS: i watched the dhanush program b4 i left for the airport...liked balu mahendra's quick chat...selvaraghavan- man, that guy is sooo dullllllllllllll in front of the camera...thank god, he fares much better as a director

 
At 6:36 AM, Blogger Swamy Srinivasan aka Kittu Mama said...

serials naalae serial killers baa..

i know lots of people who say wont watch serials but they are recording it and watching :) i've so far not fallen into that trap as i dont have sun tv.

btw, happy new year to you

 
At 7:21 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

So, Rajnikanth's gapsa excuse that he considered Aish mainly for Neelambari's role(because of Aish's eyes or whatever) was verified :-) Looks like Rajni has been desperately trying to cast Aish in every film of his, and this was exactly what he was trying to refute the other day in one of those functions(I think Chandramukhi's 100th day?)

 
At 7:50 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

i thought Aish was trying to be very politically correct in all her answers. she used the clash of dates as an excuse for not working with rajini but at the same time she refused rajini, she took on other projects that were equally long in production time.

and seriously, its about time rajini stopped asking her cos there is no way she's gonna come down south anymore. she heralds movies in hollywood( nevermind some being indie flicks) and bollywood. people go to the cinema for her. is she gonna compromise that to come here and act as an arrogant gal, whom rajini tames and dances with for 3 songs and with a grand total of 28 mins of shared screen time? i doubt.

i thought she was her usual fake self in the interview. if she werent that beautiful, the interview would have been a pain. she's just one of those people whom you'd love to hate but just can't.

 
At 11:42 AM, Blogger Veer said...

I am a big fan of Vijay TV and I wished you had subscribed ti Vijay in your new house instead of SUN. While I will blog about the shows after I watch all of them (recorded everything ), I will mention the ones briefly which I saw:

From Kenny to Chiyaan
This was a 1 hour show which was truly inspiration. It was how Kenny became Vikram and then Chiyaan.

Kalakka Povadhu Champion 2
This show airs every week and is a stand up. While it wasn't as great as the 2 hour Diwali Special, this is probably the best show I have seen on tamil TV.

Jodi Number 1
This show was funny full of outtakes from the famous dance show where the results of the finals would be announced next week.

There is also a show where the Super Singers sing the 2006 songs. Yet to watch it.

Koffee with Anu
ofcourse, with Yuvan Shankar Raja and Vishaal. Though I enjoyed the show of YG Mahendran and Mouli a week before better, this show rocks, Anu can entertain no matter who the guests are.

Leoni Pattimandram was great in Diwali ( who is a greater poet with 4 speakers talking for Pattukottai, Kannadasn, Vaali and Vairamuthu ) but this one wasn't bad either. The topic was whether tamil cinema is nijam or nizal.

Guess I have rubbed it in enough. Will update my blog in a day or two.

 
At 11:45 AM, Blogger மு.கார்த்திகேயன் said...

Wishing you and your family a happy new year Balaji.

 
At 12:57 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Happened to catch most of the Aishwarya Rai interview. Was strictly okay, but she has learnt to become a real diplomat over the years. Pozhaikka therinja ponnu, to say the least. She has also started aging fast in my opinion. You can see the age lines creeping up especially when you compare the real her vs. film clips of Jeans, Kandukonden Kandukonden so liberally shown during the program.

The biggest joke of all programs on Sun TV was their Top 10 Songs of 2006 show yesterday. Can you tell me how songs like "Ammaadi Aththaadi" from Vallavan and "Karuvaappaiyaa" from "Thoothukkudi" figured in the Top 10? Was it really such a bad year that "Poi solla poren" from Thiruttu Payale had to figure in the Top 10?

The fact that Vallavan had 2 songs in the Top 10 tells me the heavy handed politics that goes on in Sun TV in deciding who belongs in these Top 10s...

Really.. truly.. desperately...

L A U G H A B L E! :-)

 
At 1:11 PM, Blogger Unknown said...

i agree with sandya, i couldnt believe that vallavan made the top 10 movies, what happened to nice '06 movies such as pattiyal, veyil and parijaatham?

 
At 1:54 PM, Blogger Veer said...

Its weird that my blog is not being linked on my earlier comment. Anyway, here is the link http://tamilentertainment.blogspot.com/

If you like Vikram and missed the show "From Kenny to Chiyaan", I have posted a few excerpts.

 
At 1:56 PM, Blogger Balaji said...

srivatsan, 'kolangal' is the only tamil serial i've watched for atleast some time. followed it for quite some time but it really tested my patience and finally couldn't take it any more :)

ram, missed the dhanush chat since it was too early i think. wanted to c it since it was about something(specific) rather than the usual stuff...

spk, yeah i too heard that selvi's ending was rushed. wonder why...

kittu, happy new year to u too :)

vijay, yeah rajni's been trying to cast her but i thot he was pretty open about it. said she was beautiful and that they had asked her for the role...

anon, yeah she was defly being politically correct. but being a thalaivar fan, i just gave him the benefit of doubt :)

veeran, heard the same from my parents. they too said that vijay had the best programs though they didn't mention any specific programs. they did say that they couldn't understand what vishal and yuvan said in the 'koffee with anu' program :)

karthik, thanx! and wish u a very happy new year too :)

sandya, didnt write about the 'top 10' songs since i didnt catch it fully. but yeah, the selections were ridiculous. no 'pudhuppettai' or 'pattiyal' and instead they had those songs u mentioned!

 
At 2:11 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yeah SUN TV majorly sucks. They havea pretty stereotypical lineup with no effort put in whatsoever to make any programme innovative. I think after STAR acquiring Vijay things have improved there. If it was just a matter of calling dishnetwork on the phone and asking them to change to Vijay TV, I would have done it long time back. But unfortunately changing this requires much more work than that.

 
At 3:36 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

i was a little puzzled with sun tv's top ten movies list...parijatham, thalainagaram, thiruttu payale and pattiyal were all successes but none of them found a place...wonder what exactly ws their yardstick...defn cant be "artistic quality" coz vallavan was in the list!

bb, other than balu mahendra's kind words for dhanush (he seemed very genuine in his affection for the actor) there was nothing worthwhile in the program...the next time a compere asks a star/director, 'ena message solla virumbreenge' i am gonna yell 'shut uppp' at the top of my voice but then i'll probably lose my voice pretty soon if i did that! like selvaraghavan's msg was "happy new year" ada thooooo!

 
At 4:47 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Spk/Balaji, on Selvi's rushed ending..

The truth is, Saritha had already given her notice to quit Selvi a month or so back. They hurriedly finished her off, but what they surely realized by doing that is, no matter who they replace Saritha with (if her character were to live), it would only be a futile attempt at filling Saritha's shoes (pun fully intended! :-). My personal feeling is that nobody could have saved the tanking ratings if Saritha had left and Selvi had still continued.

Without saying as much, Radhika chose to say that Selvi was based on friendship and since Thamarai died, there was no story after that (which you will see in Tonight's Arasi preview at 7:30pm PST)..

They could've done a better job of tying up loose ends than resorting to scattered odds and ends in the name of a conclusion.....

 
At 5:06 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

We have had Sun TV for as long as cable was made available in Singapore but to most us, it stands for:

S - Serials...and more serials
U - unbearably long-running
N - non sensical game shows
T - torturous Tamil by female hosts
V - vile game shows


It is unparalleled entertainment for house-bound homemakers who savoured 350+ episode serials...which ran for 15 mins of narrative & 15 mins of advertisements. BTW, advertisments for water pumps & rubber hoses never sounded so catchy!!

Though SUN TV's programmes are arguably subjective to tastes, it seems to have done its marketing & sales adequately to reach a wide network of broadcast rights worldwide. That's commendable...but if only they could take a cue on the contents it is undoubted they will reach a wider audience.

As it stands now, SUN TV with Vijay TV are the only options...

 
At 7:42 PM, Blogger Bart said...

I would certainly support Veeran's comment on Vijay TV. Overall quality of programs (but yes, you do not have the typical "selvi" type serials) is far better than Sun, Jaya and Raj.
On New year programs, "Chiyaan to Vikram" was the pick for me.

 
At 10:28 PM, Blogger Ananya S P said...

First time here!

I guess Sandya is right. "Selvi" nonsense was ended abruptly as Sarita left the unit.

Ash was indeed at her diplomatic self but she looked aged! You could see aging lines...

The countdown did not showcase one of the best songs last year "Chithirayil Enna Varum" from "Sivapadhigaram". I was quite irritated to see 'Vaazhameenukku' song...

 
At 9:12 AM, Blogger Boston Bala said...

The Gopika interview was more natural and spontaneous.

Dhanush's phone call back home was as stupid as the Aish interview.

Naren had the interviewer chat for herself.

I presume the Aishwarya interview was one big advertorial for Longines. Insipid, contentless & full of giggles.

 
At 3:23 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

WHY ARE YOU ALL TREATING aiyishwarya A VERY IMPORTANT PERSON? Don't you feel so shamed to over-do certain things on her subject.

Just put in your mind she has been the most suitable person for the beauty contest AMONG those participated in the contest. There are in several thousands or in millions in the world much more beautiful than her. Go to Italy or Egypt you could see thousand times better than Aiyishwarya. Those people did not have either opportunity to participate nor they knew that there is something like this. Some don't care to expose body to the public. There are so many village innocent girls so beautiful that Aiyish cannot even near them, but they are worried o f their chastity or modesty etc to participate openly like her.

So, if this much is clear in your mind, and think beauty is skin depth, then you wont be so over-excited with Ayish and her topics. CINEMA makers and MEDIA stir up your mind to make their bread and butter.Don't be over-fooled by them and become a life time idiot.
thank you

 

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