Reviews

Benazir Bhutto-The Iron Lady of Pakistan was a daunting personality all by herself. She was the first Muslim lady to become the prime minister of a Muslim nation not just once but twice. She was assassinated while she was running the campaign for the third term in Dec 2007 when she returned home after being held in exile for seven years. Bhutto-A documentary on Bhutto dynasty starts with the India-Pakistan partition in 1947 and leads to Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's ascendancy to the presidency in 1971. The focus of the documentary swiftly shifts to his elder daughter, Benazir Bhutto, a magnetic yet beautiful person who was studying in Oxford carrying no passion to pursue politics ever in her life. But fate had decided the other way. Her father's reign was overthrown by a military coup Zia Ul Haq in 1977 and he was put into jail and later was executed on the charges of murder. This was the time when Benazir Bhutto came into politics and ran a campaign to save her father from the conspiracy charges but she failed to save him. Before Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's death, he passed the mantle of his political party (Pakistan People's Party) to her daughter who later became the heartthrob of her people and got elected as prime minister of Pakistan in 1988, following the legacy of her father. She was also ousted by another military coup just to be re-elected in 1996. She was forced into exile after two years when she faced corruption allegations against herself and her husband Asif Ali Zardari who was arrested and put into jail for eight years. She later returned to Pakistan to run PPP for the third term which ended in her assassination on Dec 27, 2007. Benazir Bhutto anticipated her murder even before her return to Pakistan and she blamed it on the hands of General Pervaiz Musharraf. She was a true demonstration of courage with the mixture of unyielding that people in third world countries find hard to comprehend.

"The Funny Fat Guy" tells the story of a fat guy who is funny and an aspiring standup comedian. The funny fat guy named Charlie McStean, (the role played by Sandy Danto) was once a funny comedian but now his career is on the verge of downfall. He is a struggling standup comedian who finds solace only in drugs and fast food instead of making people laugh which he used to crave once a lot. While the movie funny fat guy revolves around the world of a standup comedian in L.A, the writer Nick Snowden hasn't offered much to laugh about in his script. He provides an extremely honest and realistic story which is painful to watch at times. He explores the darkest side of a comedian who used to make people laugh with his jokes and funny gestures but now his only comrade is alcoholic and drugs. It was great to see an actor of Sandy Danto's caliber, a graduate from Indiana University, whose performance is so achingly beautiful and realistic that you both laugh on him and empathize with him. He is a kind of a person that you keep on cheering for him for no obvious reason. His acting definitely needs applause. The funny fat guy is a low budget film of only $15k and was shot only for 20 days. Despite this fact, the film still managed to pay SAG-ULB rates. The movie has only 17 members and to my amazement, all of them are standup comedians and they still managed to give energy and sense of urgency to the movie. Besides Danto's super performance, there are other supporting characters as well such as Trevor Lee as Taylor, who is Charlie's best friend and is climbing the ladder of success in his career, thus leaving Charlie behind. This is the main theme of the movie as Charlie realized his friend's success and his downfall; he is consumed more and more by alcohol and drugs to cope with his dwindling career. While they are many moments of laughter in a funny fat guy, the truth is it is a dramatic movie with few intense scenes which lingers in your mind even after you have finished the movie for many days. The climax isn't something unexpected but it is penetrating and bold than most of the nonsense driven out of Hollywood these days. Rest of the supporting cast including, Shelley Dennis whose powerful performance gives the movie an emotional reverberation, and Timothy A.Bennett whose performance as Lou, truly deserves kudos. There is much to love and cheer about the funny fat guy, though the movie has a very low budget, still, those who are familiar with standup comedy can well understand the how honest and spot on this movie is. Funny fat guy captured a top prize at Cupertino's diamond in the Rough film festival. Do watch it if you get a chance and if you wish to know the world, the ups, and downs in the life of a standup comedian.