non sequitur

Up in the Air - Movie Review

Spoilers Ahead:

Tonight most people will be welcomed home by jumping dogs and squealing kids. Their spouses will ask about their day and tonight they'll sleep. The stars will wheel forth from their daytime hiding places. And one of those lights, slightly brighter than the rest, will be my wing tip passing over.
-Ryan Bingham

You know what! I would like to think that Ryan will be fine. All of us have these moments of self-pity when we yearn for company and wistfully wonder about the bliss in the lives of people who are welcomed home by the jumping dogs, squealing kids and spouses. I believe that it is like those moments when these people wistfully wonder about the joys of being alone and without the weight of relationships in their backpacks. Ryan is intelligent and mature enough to come out of his heart break and enjoy the life and backpack philosophy he has created for himself.

There is a scene towards the end of the film where the to-be husband of Ryan's sister gets cold feet on the day of his wedding and Ryan talks him out of it and makes him go back to the girl. The scene shows this guy going back to the girl and then cuts to Ryan and the older sister happy about it. Ryan is a confirmed bachelor who does not believe in marriage and the older sister, at the time of the scene, is going through a separation. And the two are happy about bringing the young couple together - almost implying that all said and done, marriage is a necessary evil.

Ryan is a self-confessed shark - and towards the end of the movie we see him sharing 500 thousand miles of his with his newly-wed sister and her husband. It is not that the events preceding this made him into a more loving human being. We see that all through the movie, he is going around all the cities with the cut-out of his little sister and her husband to-be taking pictures in front of all those Patel Points. Without thinking twice, he jumps to protect fetch the cut-out from water when it falls into the water and starts drifting away. Ryan is, by nature, a nice man.

I could be saying something very far fetched, but the structure of the movie and the adventures of Ryan across the United States reminded me of adventures of Marcello in the city of Rome in La Dolce Vita. A party on the ship, a wedding, Ryan and Alex, his work taking him to various places - Natalie playing Paparazzo to Ryan's Marcello etc.

I was almost groaning during the scene where Ryan abandons the motivational speech midway and runs to Chicago to find his girl and be with her - the scene follows the grand tradition of the climaxes of rom-coms (Pretty Woman instantly came to mind) bringing the movie to an apparently dissatisfactory ending. What follows is refreshingly different.

Up in the Air is the second best movie of the year - only behind Inglourious Basterds and George Clooney has probably given the performance of his career.

4 out of 5 Stars.

Martin Scorsese - Cecil B. DeMille Award

For the first 20 years or so of our careers Marty and I made movie after movie together. For the last 10 we have been presenting each other with awards. We are like an old married couple. We built a life together, we have great memories, we just don’t sleep together anymore... and I can’t help thinking that if the times were a little different, how proud Cicil DeMille would have been to be honoured with the Martin Scorcese award.
-Robert De Niro's tribute to Martin Scorcese

It is hard to believe we've only been watching movies for the last one hundred years; while other art forms have been around for thousands. As we look back in history, there are those names that truly define their own medium. Picasso, Da Vinci, Shakespeare, Beethoven - to name a few. And a thousand years from now, as the history of film unfolds, there will surely be one name for future generations that is synonymous with master film making and the word cinema and that name is Mr. Martin Scorcese.
Leonardo DiCaprio's tribute to Martin Scorcese

Don't miss the acceptance speech of Marty Scorcese. It is a tribute to cinema and Cicil DeMille himself.

3 Idiots - Movie Review

Professor: How does an induction motor start?
Student: Dhurrrrrrrrr

Professor: Stop It
Student: rrrrrrrrrh!

Every engineering college has a super-senior (a senior who takes 8 years to finish his 4 years course) to whom this joke is attributed.

When the NASA astronauts discovered that their pens did not work in space, they spent a million dollars to create a pen that could write perfectly well in space. The Russians used a pencil. The movie has a reworking of this joke - though I must admit the real punch line doesn’t end there; it comes towards the end of the film.

How many times have you not entertained your friends by replacing the word chamatkar with balatkar to great effect?

If nothing is impossible why cant you just put the paste back into the toothpaste tube once it is out? (yawn)

'3 Idiots' is surfeit with such I-have-heard-them-all-before gags.

Every post-Lagaan Aamir Khan film, I ignore all the hype and sometimes end up watching it without any expectation except that it turns out to be a wash-out. Most movies turn out to be hits - even blockbusters. '3 Idiots' is probably the most entertaining Hindi movie of the year.

This film, though skeletally resembles a Munnabhai Movie, is not one - it is an imposter. The credo of a Munnabhai Movie is to take the viewer genuinely to the brink of tears and then leave him in splits inspite of himself and vice versa. The makers forget the truism in Frank Capra's homily that tragedy is not when the actors cry but when the audience cries. You see almost all the main characters in the film crying copiously at least once - almost breaking the fourth wall and begging you to cry along with them. The movie tries too hard to make you cry and goes overboard in trying to make you laugh (with the likes of the aforementioned stale jokes) eventually failing in doing either. Even I, being a sucker for emotional stuff was left largely unmoved.

The movie has a lot of predictable scenes. For instance, the twist during the intermission albeit interesting, turns out to be quite figureoutable. It is at least 15 minutes longer expressly because of the delivery-on-the-TT-table scene - which I understand has a purpose which could have been achieved in probably far lesser time. The purpose of the entire movie is to question the education system in India and encourage the teachers, parents and students to teach and learn the right way - which is a long term goal. Of course, the short term goal of the movie is to make good money, which it definitely will succeed in achieving.

Here are a few things that I really liked about the movie:

Newcomer Omi Vaidya's performance as Chatur Ramalingam is best thing about the movie. He comes up with the most convincing performance in the entire film. I expressly recommend you to watch this movie for him. He features in the centerpiece scene of the movie and brings the house down with his histrionics as he addresses the entire college - the Indian cinematic equivalent of the iconic chapter in English literature where Gussie Fink-Nottle distributes the prizes at Market Snodsbury Grammar School. I wish he gets the Filmfare best supporting actor award for this performance.

The scene where Madhavan convinces his father that he wants to become a wildlife photographer (this scene is strongly reminiscent of the scene is one of the Munnabhai movies where Jimmy Shergill confesses to his father about blowing-up his (father's) money. The deja vu is even more intense because in both the cases the father is Parikshat Sahni) crosscut with Sharman Joshi's job interview is one of the highlights of the movie.

The scene towards the end where Boaman Irani hands it (both literally and figuratively) to Aamir Khan works very well.

Also, there is a scene involving Javed Jafrey, Sharman Joshi and Madhavan that is a hat-tip to Andaz Apna Apna. It is very close to the 'Amar! Goli' scene.

As for the mid-forties Aamir Khar playing a college going lad - trust me, I have seen classmates in engineering college who could pass off as fathers and uncles. If someone is telling you that the 40+ Aamir playing college going guy doesn't make the cut, they are lying. Aamir Khan has found a way to fight his age and that smile with both eyebrows raised is going to keep him in good stead for a few years to come.

After watching the movie, I have added Ladhak in one of my must-see places.

All in all, I highly recommend this movie. Something about it could remind you of your own college days. I give the movie 3 out of 5 stars.

1stDay2ndShow

12-Feb-2010
Movie:    My Name is Khan
Place:    Big Cinemas, Anantapur
Time:     unnamed

29-Jan-2010
Movie:    Ishqiya
Place:    Fame Value Mall, Bangalore
Time:     unnamed

08-Jan-2010
Movie:    Sherlock Holmes
Place:     Fame Value Mall, Bangalore
Time:     9.30pm

18-Dec-2009
Movie:    Avatar
Place:     Fame Lido, Bangalore
Time:     9pm

02-Oct-2009
Landed in Bangalore today. Off to watch Inglourious Basterds.

05th Jun, 2009
Movie:    Star Trek
Place:     INOX Movies, Chennai
Time:     10.20pm

22nd May, 2009
Movie:    Watchmen
Place:     Satyam Cinemas, Chennai
Time:     10.30pm

As a preparation to this movie, a few weeks back I finished reading the 12 issues of the eponymous graphic novel/comic book on which the movie is based.

50 Memorable Movie Moments

"I want everything I've ever seen in the movies!"
-The Producers

I hope you are not imagining that I sat and typed out these personal favorite movie moments at one stretch, say, in a couple of hours or something to that effect - in the lines of some 19th century Russian novelists who typed out entire books in a span of few weeks. This is a list that took a lot of years of patient movie watching, notes taking, revisiting the list from time to time adding something new, removing something - if the scene is a passing fancy. There are scenes that are unique looking - like the end credits of West Side Story, scenes that made me cry sometimes out of joy, sometimes with emotion - sobbing, sitting alone in front of my TV screen and sometimes swallowing a lump in my throat in some corner of a cinema hall, scenes that made laugh out loud, scenes that gave me gooseflesh - knotted and combined locks to part and each particular hair to stand on end, like quills upon the fretful porpentine; some movie watching memories are a mood that is evoked by the whole film. If I can think of one common thread that ties all these scenes - they made me feel alive.

Some scenes get into the list because their reputation precedes them - which makes one look at the scene in awe the first time when it comes up in the context of the movie. Most of them are, as the title simply suggests, memorable. For instance, one can never look at a picture of the Trevi Fountain - or the Trevi Fountain itself, if one happens to be in Rome - without remembering Anita Ekberg wading in the waters and Marcello Mastroianni following her. Ah, women! What allure you possess.

I am one of those soppy sentimentalists who sometimes choke up while watching an advertisement on television. 'Analyze This' changed it all. Every time I now come across a rather touching ad, Paul Vitti, the-gangster-losing-his-nerve, sobbing bitterly, sitting on his bed while watching an insurance ad invariably springs to my mind and I burst out laughing.

And then there is the baseball treatment given to the copier machine in 'Office Space' in a Joe Pesci-isque fashion. Have you watched the movie? If yes, don’t you, with desperate frustration want to take the baseball bat to the printer or copier and shatter it to pieces? Why can’t it be simple enough to be operated? I am sure you know what I mean. That is what I call an iconic scene.

There are movie quotes that just can be universally used in everyday contexts. These are but a few examples. Voltaire said 'The secret of being a bore... is to tell everything.' So I shall allow you to sit back and enjoy these great movie moments if you can recollect them. I have attached helpful links wherever I could.

Reservoir Dogs: Why am I Mr. Pink? watch the hilarious scene here.

Schindler's list: last scene when Schindler speaks to his Jews.

Saving Private Ryan - Tom Hanks in his dying moments saying "James... Earn this. Earn it." Moving.

Apocalypse Now - You can never listen to Richard Wagner's 'Ride of the Valkyries' without thinking of the squadron of helicopters, the water and the coconut tress. watch it here.

The 'When She Loved Me' song in 'Toy Story 2' - this was the first of the only two times I cried in an animation film. Read along to find the second one.

Paths of Glory: The last scene where a captive German girl sings a song to the French army in a bar. This also is on number 1 spot on the list of greatest final scenes of all time. watch the touching scene here.

Amelie: the scene where Amelie helps a blind man cross the road and then describes the entire whole world around him and showing it to him in words. That sudden burst of energy the moment lends to the movie is enchanting. We are as much shocked and happy as is the blind man. watch it here.

Analyze This: Robert De Niro sobbing uncontrollably while watching an insurance ad.

Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi: the scene when one of the teddy bear people dies in the blast and another teddy bear stops to take care of it.

The Apartment: look at Jack Lemon's expression when the doctor slap's the girl he loves on her face.

Nosferatu: the haunting background music as Hutter  leaves his wife.

Children of Men: the silence of the gunfire and the joy and awe in the faces of the people as they discover the cries of baby coming down the staircase.

Ikiru - The Happy Birthday song sung by the girls to someone walking up the stairs when the dying protagonist (nicknamed, The Mummy) walks down after he finds a purpose to his life.

It's a Wonderful Life: Clarence showing George Bailey what the world would have been like if he were not born.

The African Queen: the best scene of the movie is the one in which Humphrey Bogart makes faces at the hippos and monkeys while moving on the river in the boat with Katharine Hepburn laughing out heartily watching the funny antics. It sums-up the universal phenomenon of a guy going to the extent of making a fool of himself to put a smile on the face of his girl. To watch these two superstars at middle-age perform this great romantic scene is just mind-blasting. Do I mean mind-blowing? No, I don't mean mind-blowing. Anything can blow your mind. This is just mind-blasting. Ok Ok. I know that you recognize this bit as a Russell Peters routine.

Finding Neverland:
George: It's Grandm    other, isn't it? She's run you off, hasn't she? Oh, she's absolutely tried with great effort. And perhaps with good reason. It isn't you, Uncle Jim. She just... She just doesn't want to see Mother hurt anymore.
James: Look at that. How magnificent. The boy's gone. Somewhere during the last 30 seconds, you've become a grown-up.

Godfather 2: The fresh-off-the boat Young Vito Carlione looking out of a window at the Statue of Liberty. In this scene, one can see the Statue's reflection on the glass of the window. That one-second frame on film poetically immortalizes the dreams and aspirations of immigrants coming to America.

Grapes of Wrath: there is a moment in 'Grapes of Wrath' which reminds one that movies directly connect to the emotions. You see the smile on the faces of Ma and Tom Joad when they are at the dance at the end of the movie. The smile on their faces, probably the first and only time you see them smile in the grim-all-through movie automatically cut a smile across my face. It was like a blast of fresh air for someone gasping for breath after feeling suffocated by the grim mood of the movie thus far.

Grave of Fireflies: the glimpses of a day in the life of Seita with poignant music in the background after she dies. I couldn't help the tears running down my face when I saw that scene. This is the only second time I cried in an animation movie uptil now.

Taxi Driver: Travis Bickle - "you talking to me?"

Al Pacino in 'Dog Day Afternoon': "Kiss me. When I'm being fucked, I like to get kissed a lot." As an aside, 'Dog Day Afternoon' is my favorite Al Pacino film.

Al Pacino Scarface: "I'm Tony Montana! You fuck with me, you fuckin' with the best!"

Rules of the Game: the h(a)unting scene. A very sad scene. This one reminded me of the Odessa Steps scene in 'Battleship Potemkin'.

West Side Story: End Credits.

Woody Allen and his wife naming the baby in 'Mighty Aphrodite'

The World's Fastest Indian: the bikers giving Burt Munro a guard of honour when he leaves to USA for the biking competition.

Mr. Smith goes to Washington: The scene where Mr. Smith tours Washington when he first lands in Washington.

The Italian Job - 'On Days Like These'. I'd like to drive like that.

The insane intensity in the eyes of Klaus Kinski in Werner Herzog's 'Aguirre: The Wrath of God'.

Ben-Hur: the chariot race

The progressive descent of Fred C. Dobbs in 'The Treasure of the Sierra Madre'.

Shawshank Redemption: Morgan Freeman's voice over.

Amadeus: Salieri describing Mozart's music

Before Sunset: The expression of careless joy on Ethan Hawke's face in the closing frame of the movie.

Office Space: The three guys giving the copier machine the Joe Pesci-treatment with the baseball bat.

Casablanca: The scene involving Rick Blane and the young girl Annina, Rick helping her husband to win at the roulette table and the scene following that. This film has a lot of great scenes but I pick this as my top favorite. As another aside here, 'Casablanca' is also my favorite movie of all-time.

A Fish Called Wanda: John Cleese talking in Russian and stripping himself naked and the residents of the house walking in.

2001 - A Space Odyssey: the jump-cut of the bone turning into a spaceship.

The Truman Show: Truman dodging the traffic set-up in the process of discovering that there is something funny about his life.

Sunset Blvd.: the opening scene with a dead body floating in the water.

Strangers on a Train: the scene where the villain loses the lighter in the iron-manhole and struggles hard to get it out.

Psycho: The shower scene

To Kill a Mockingbird: Scout disperses the crowd that comes to attack Atticus outside the jail.

The Searchers: John Wayne lifting grown up Debbie in his arms and saying 'Let's go home, Debbie'.

Blow Up: the first photo shoot that runs more like a sex scene than a photo shoot, ending in an orgasmic way.

The Night of the Hunter: the river journey.

La Dolce Vita: Anita Ekbert wading through the waters of the fountain of Trivi.

Matrix: There is no spoon

Enter the Dragon: last fight in the hall of mirrors.

This one's not just one movie. It is the style - the fantastic choreography of stunts in Jackie Chan movies.

That is all for the moment, folks. Thank you - I hope you enjoyed reading it. Await the vol2 to complete the list of 100 memorable movie moments. Then there is a separate list that has my favorite Indian movie moments. If you find links for any of the above scenes please do share them with me.

Here's a list of 10 Great Movie Monologues and here are some Unforgettable Bollywood Movie Characters that I compiled in the past.

Kaminey - Movie Review

Consider a Indian food dish like a Biryani or a curry which tastes great with all the ingredients, bringing to life your taste buds and as you are wolfing into it with gay abandon and great relish, you bite a cardamom - you bite a full bloody cardamom that breaks between your teeth as you chew the food and leaves the flavour lingering in your mouth. Well, I am not aware about you, but such an experience screws up the entire eating experience and you are not happy with the dish until you wipe the taste away with the next morsel sans the cardamom. The movie Kaminey reminds of that experience.

The movie is not a regular entertainer but an entertainer nevertheless. It provides with a very satisfying movie watching experience. The movie has all the elements that are needed for a movie of its genre in place - the MacGuffin, multiple double crossings, seedy gangsters, and a plot that that keeps taking the serpentine twists and turns - and then settles for a placid Bollywood movie ending. As the movie reaches its closing scenes we really don’t care for the fate of any the characters - which is very good place for a movie of this genre to arrive at - and then reverts back to a traditional happy ending. This and the unnecessary flashback with an entirely pointless backstory of the twins bring the story down by a few notches and increases the viewing time by a few minutes.

The movie takes it's time to establish the characters - and that is putting it very mildly. The first half-an-hour almost frustrated me and at some points it desperately demanded subtitles in English. It takes around 20 minutes to half-an-hour to get a hang of the tone of the movie and the style and language of the characters and you suddenly see yourself involved in the proceedings.

I think the biggest flaw of the movie occurs in the end. Charlie sees his lover's (well, Charlie and Mikhail are not 'just friends'; There is a definite homosexual relationship implied in every scene between the two of them) dead body in the jeep and this acts as a trigger to empty the entire contents of the guitar into the fire building up below him. If I remember the movie correctly(I have watched it just once and the structure is a bit difficult to remember), his partner was shot in front of his eyes in an earlier scene in the mock shoot out that ends in a 'Satya'isque bang that leaves the fellow dead. Then why the 'naheee...' kind of shock and late wisdom on Charlie's part that works as a completely unconvincing trigger for the closing scenes. For all the respecting-the-intelligence-of-the-audience theme that everyone is mentioning to me, this is an unforgivable mistake. Of course, as I mentioned, I have watched the movie just once and tell me if I got this scene entirely wrong.

I seem to be giving an impression that I haven't liked the movie. On the contrary. I immensely enjoyed the movie and these are just a few areas where the film fell short of my expectations – the cardamoms in the curry, as I like to call them. Kaminey is a very good movie that falls short of being a great movie. Go watch it in the theatres.

Final Note: Everyone and his uncle are comparing the movie’s ‘Dhan Te Nan’ to the theme song of Pulp Fiction. I say, it is a huge load of horseshit. If at all it resembles anything from Pulp Fiction, it resembles the background score during the scene where Zed sodomizes Marsellus Wallace.

The Importance of Being Michael Jackson

Today morning when I woke up, I saw a missed call on my phone. I know that I do not get calls that early in the morning unless it is something urgent or important. I return the call to find out that break-dancer and singer Michael Jackson is dead. I come to office and when I login to gtalk, the first message I receive shares the news that Michael Jackson has passed into the ages.

Of course, no coffee corner conversation with a colleague or a call with a friend is complete today without the mandatory reference to this news. As you see, even the thought I am sharing with you today refers to the news of his death.

For a lot of English-educated Indians western music began and sometimes ended with Michael Jackson. Well, let me even proceed to knock off 'English' from the previous sentence. Michael Jackson is probably the most popular western music icon in India - in a Democratic, Socialist, pan-Indian way. The coincidence that the only other international star to probably enjoy such popularity is another Jack is trivial- the fast-action-entertainer, Jackie Chan. Young adolescents found Michael Jackson as a window to foreign music and it gave one a great deal of confidence to share a seat in the council of the musically literate.

If you jog through your memory of Indian movie songs of the 80s, you would find his name in the lyrics of many a bizarre dance numbers. The tunes of his songs were ruthlessly recycled by enterprising music directors in movies of all languages. Making a more personal reference, any blue-blooded fan of Chiranjeevi, as is the case with me - and probably the entire state of Andhra Pradesh, his recent electoral debacle notwithstanding - is inseparable from his knowledge of Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson practically invented the break-dance which established the megastar a dancing sensation - Chiranjeevi virtually moon-walked his way into the hearts of thousands of young Telugu people. I can take the Pepsi-Challenge on this - you would not find a kid growing up in the mid-eighties who would not have demonstrated his own skills in the rope-walk or moon-walk to his parents and relatives in the way of family-talent-shows.

Mithun Chakraborthy, Govinda, Prabhu Deva, Hrithik Roshan – these are only a few names in Indian showbiz who owe something to Michael Jackson.

These are a few thoughts that come to my mind upon the news his death. You can share your own thoughts if you have any and it would, I am sure, be very interesting to hear your memories of Michael Jackson.

May his soul dance is peace.

A Wednesday - Movie Review

I'm quite keen on movies. Especially the ones about vigilantes. I find the whole mythology surrounding vigilantes fascinating. Take my favorite vigilante, the Everyman, as played by the inimitable Naseeruddin Shah in 'A Wednesday'. Not a very young hero. The movie is not particularly well-marketed. But the mythology... The mythology is not only great, it's unique. Now, a staple of the vigilante movie is, there's the vigilante and there's the back-story. Take as examples, the body of movies directed by Shankar. 'Indian' lost his daughter to corruption. 'Gentleman' lost his friend to the flawed educational system. 'Anniyyan' lost his sister to the indifference of the society or whatever. Nana Patekar in 'Prahaar' lost his officer to the goons of the society. When that character starts off, he is just an everyman oblivious to the evils of the society. He has to lose someone very close to him to open his eyes to the ills plaguing the system. After that he goes on to wreck vengeance on his villains in particular and take up the larger cause of the society in general. And it is in that characteristic the Everyman stands alone. The Everyman didn't become Everyman. Everyman was born everyman. When Everyman wakes up in the morning, and goes to the office, his wife calls up to enquire if he caught the train on time. When the Everyman is toiling his hours in the office, his wife calls to ask him if he finished his lunch. As Naseeruddin Shah so wonderfully explains, she is not asking him if he has finished his lunch; she is calling him to check if he is still alive - to see if he has not become yet another victim to yet another terrorist attack. The Everyman didn't need the mandatory back-story to wake up and do something about the problems surrounding him. The absence of the back-story made the movie much shorter and more powerful. 'A Wednesday' is how Everyman views the idea of each one of us needing a wake-up call to act. 'A Wednesday' is a critique on the whole genre of vigilante movies.

The last line of the movie qualifies to be the best last line of a movie ever.

The Commissioner of Police, again, wonderfully acted by an equally great actor, Anupam Kher, says something to the effect of, 'mein uska naam nahin boloonga. kyun ki log naam mein mazhab dhoond lete hai'. It poorly translates in English to 'I shall not reveal the name of this person, because people search for religion in a name'.

Quintessential Tarantino

Original Post: 17-April-2007

Have you observed? Quentin Tarantino has shown a special liking for rhyming nouns in his movies. Here are some instances I have come across in his films to make you appreciate this aspect of probably the most intelligent director of modern cinema.

My name's Paul,
and this is between y'all (Paul, the bartender in Pulp Fiction)

My name's Pitt,
and you ain't talkin' your ass outta this shit. (Jules in Pulp Fiction)

My name is Buck,
and I'm here to fuck. (Buck in Kill Bill)

Zed’s dead baby, Zed’s dead. (Butch in Pulp Fiction)

Kill Bill (The title of the movie rhymes)

Have I overlooked any other instances? Show them to me.

Updated on 15-May-2009

Well, I did seem to have overlooked at least one more rhyme. Just watched the movie last night for the zillionth time and here's another rhyme I caught.

If your hand ain't off that case,
I'm gonna unload right in your fuckin' face.(Pumpkin in Pulp Fiction)

A few more thoughts on QT's Pulp Fiction are here.

Zed's Dead, Baby

It was in the 80s when my cousins were little toddlers and were belting out nursery rhymes that I remember them singing the popular rhyme that teaches kids the letters in the English alphabet in a sing-sing manner thus:

ABCDEFG
HIJKMNOP
LMNOPQRST
UVWXYZ
XYZ, butter and bread
if you don’t like it better go to bed.

Today, after the turn of the millennium, I see the children of my friends singing the same nursery rhyme in the aforementioned way only till the third act and from here on, the script is given an entirely different spin.

ABCDEFG
HIJKLMNOP
QRS TUV
WX Y and Z
now I know my ABC
next time won’t you sing with me?

If you still need a more elaborate explanation, bread and bed rhyme with Zed while C and me rhyme with Zee.

Quentin Tarantino rem acu tetigisti-ed it best when his Butch in Pulp Fiction said 'Zed's dead baby, Zed's dead'.

Ironically, the dead Z has entered other areas where S was previously holding court. I being the luddite and anglophile that I am insist on spelling the words the way my English teacher taught me - Microsoft Word's spellchecker notwithstanding - viz. Organisation, Realisation, Cocacolanisation.