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Browsing through NetFlix’s online streaming collection is not unlike those late Friday nights spent browsing through the movie maze in your local video store. The search for that perfect movie is often tricky. Sometimes you have to deal with a fuming partner and/or a melting tub of ice-cream in the car. The pressure is compounded by a listless, unhelpful store clerk in some cases. This column aims to be that clerk for NetFlix Instant Watch – maybe just a little less listless and little more helpful. This is what I waded through recently – at NetFlix.

Went Looking For…

Believe it or not, I sometimes do have a predetermined playlist while browsing for movie titles. Generally, there is a week between my adding them to the playlist and actually watching them. The movies under “Went Looking For…” are typically the movies that I had slotted as “Ended up with…” the previous week.

Avatar: The Last Airbender (The Anime Series)

The world is in the throngs of annihilation. Entire races are in the process of getting wiped out. Peace is a thing of the past. The one person who can restore balance has been trapped in ice… a hundred years and counting. All gloom and doom? Nah… this is just the right stage for some uninhibited fun courtesy of Avatar: The Last Airbender. One can draw many parallels with Harry Potter in this anime series. It has a bunch of teenagers, including the "chosen" one, who are gearing up for a showdown with an evil Lord while dealing with their hormones at the same time. The show is set in the world of martial arts and is a lot more colorful and cheerful than the wizard world. This makes me wonder if Manoj Shyamalan would have been a better fit for the dark world of Harry rather than Ang’s jolly surroundings.





Coming back to the anime series, I was spellbound by the artwork, which pays rich tribute to the four elements driving the plot. The art department is aided by some really humorous writing. The character of Sokka, devoid of any special "bending" talent, is the underrated gem in the storyline. Most characters clearly establish their preferences between good and evil. Prince Zuko is the only outlet for the writers to generate some internal conflict and they do a good job of it. Despite the gentle hues used in animation, the story is one that involves at least one major showdown per episode making it unsuitable for the really young ones. For the rest of us, it is a major thrill ride. It took a while but I completed all three "books" available on NetFlix streaming.

Born Into Brothels

Oscar Winner for Documentary, Born into Brothels, from photographer Zana Briski, provides a rare look at the dark world that is Sonaganj – the infamous red light district of Calcutta. As a filmmaker, she plays to her strengths to get the elusive look into a community where no outsiders are allowed. She trains or rather provides the means for a bunch of kids to document their immediate surroundings with cameras. This is interwoven with her own take on the bleak world that these kids live in. Sonaganj is a taboo topic for most Indians. It is a stark reminder that the progress that Indians witness in their day to day life does not extend to all corners of the country and that exploitation of women and children still goes on like nobody’s business.

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