Kamal Haasan's new movie Virumaandi arguing against capital punishment is being released for Pongal. Kamal also gave an interview to The Hindu on this work, that was published yesterday.
Kamal could play the role of RMS in a future Pongal release titled someting like Puthu Puail - GNU Storm or any title that is more appropriate. I have a short script for the movie here. The opening shot zooms and shows my computer screen, showing this this messgage getting typed and sent to fsf-friends, and the rest of what follows could be the script for the movie, in true free software traditions. The story of the free software movement is full of life, struggle, emotion, dance, fun, frolick, disappointments, agony, pain, success, glory and every other nuance a movie can capture and portray on screen. Taking free software to the masses will require such an effort. Someone recently requested me as follows:-
<quote> "I found 2 Movie Names On ilugc homepage (On Agenda for the Nov 15th 2003 Meet) . If you have The Copies of Any movies on the freesoftware theme plz send to me. I am belongs to a film club Named Drishti campus film club,Thrissur. We are showing Shortfilms, Documentaries, and Feture films on Social interest in campuses, and youth clubs. We got the charge of "Another World is possible film festival" of kerala social forum (kerala event of WSF http://gnu.org.in/fsfiwsf.html) happening 20th to 24th at thrissur. For this purpose i searched for documentaries on freedom of softwares. but i dont find anything. if you can bring movies on free software theme plz send it to the following address. i will send you the price or send it by VPP" </quote>
Kamal hardly needs an introduction, but for those who need it, he is a versatile and talented actor who sets very high standards for himself, and is someone who can strike 70 different poses in 4 minutes, if that can convey a sense of measurement of talent. Besides he is a producer, script writer etc. etc. There is no speedier way to take the story of RMS and the free software movement to the masses.
Kamal experiments a lot and may not mind researching and trying this.
I don't have Kamal Haasan's email, and his site at http://www.kamalhaasan.net requires flash macromedia that I have not yet installed. So if possible, someone who has access to the site may forward this message to reach Kamal Haasan for a future Pongal release.
Regards, Ramanraj.