And yet again Aseem Merchant!
Mood:  lazy
Topic: Crushes
So, I've updated the nos. on the hits for today ... but if I wanted to be scientifically correct, I should have done it at the same time every day ... but never mind that! This is a qualitative research (maybe!) and that shouldn't be too much of a trouble - plus his numbers are not going up drastically.

Well, only found one review so far, and the review wasn't too good about the movie ... gave it only one *. So, I am wondering if it will make any effect at all, considering it is opening together with Shabd (although that didn't get as good reviews either - but stronger cast) and Black (a better review - good cast and it is Sanjay Bhansali!). The reviewer says that he does:

"Aseem Merchant does an able job. He looks the character he's portraying. However, he needs to go easy on his expressions at times. His villainous laugh at the interval point mainly is quite irritating."

I think the reviewer may be right on the villainous laugh- I've seen the promos, the laugh is stereotypical of a bollywood villain (although in the b4u interview - they sort of claim he wasn't but he sort of looks it - except this time the villain is youngish, slim and trim!). I think the reviewer was probably more impressed with Iqbal Khan, since he claims that Iqbal did "quite well".

So, probably fame is elusive right now ... but he may get a female following, which may carry up his ratings. Supposingly, at a distribution of Bullet cassettes, the females were screaming their heads off, because of him. Well, this should send his ego up a bit, because he had taken part in a model show, in which the models had to show their chest (sounds a bit cheesy!), and the females there were more crazy about Dino Morea (I think it was him).

Well found some more facts about him, it is putting him into more context now, and setting a scene a bit ... well, he is part of the revive bombay campaign (at least in 2003)and took part as a model in a fund raising activity for Children in Pain (CHIP)-(but that could just be contractual obligations rather than be a humanitarian). As more data (notice my use of data! ... textual data I should add too) become available I will add.

I also have an interview from his ex-wife, Mamta, in 1998 (well at that time she was his wife) - I wonder if taking different views from people - can be considered a triangulation of data? In that case, interviews from his wife, and document reviews etc. are triangulation! Well, this is the story how she met Aseem, and I'll quote her from the interview,

"I was at the disco with my boyfriend when Aseem met me. He immediately developed a crush on me......The first time we met he said, `I love you. Will you marry me?' I said, `Hang on. You do not even know my surname'."

Seems, terribly romantic doesn't it ... like straight out of a romance novel ... but remember a couple of years down the road ... they did get divorce!! And if you want to get more romance novelish even, they did attempt a reconciliation ... but nothing romantic happen either! What I do note however, is at the time she had a boyfriend ... but yet still he made a pass at her ... now to me (my reflexivity coming in again) ... with my terrible good sense of feeling what is right and wrong (will come back to this later)... will have thought it in terrible taste (an ungentlemanly!) to break up a relationship ... but then she didn't seem to mind too much now, did she?

There seems to be some contradiction (or misinterpretation on my part) - as to something that Mamta said or the info provided in the article. She claims that "he used to come with me to the fashion shows and he was discovered." In the article, with this interview, the author claims "after a few months of wooing her, the Romeo got his Juliet when she was just 21". Yet still, in another article just a couple of days ago, another author claimed that Aseem started modelling when he was 19 ... if that is the case at 19 ... he was dating a 21 yr old ... and mighty sure of himself too ... but I've done the math ... and it does seem to work out ... if indeed he is 31 now, and she was 27 in 1998. So no contradiction, just misinterpretation on my part.

Oh yeah, let me come back to what my sense of right and wrong is ... yep ... had some misgivings with myself for actually doing this ... ethics have come into play! But given it is public information I am using ... in that sense I'm not intruding into people's privacy (and how much people will actually read this!) ... but ethically, if he is indeed the person I'm observing ... I should at least hide his identity (still struggling with that). His ex-wife is also a public figure ... so don't feel too bad including her comments ... but she looks to have fallen out of the limelight ... and so I kind of want to safeguard her privacy ... his I don't mind ... since he is looking for fame (why else go into acting!). I want to include his name here only for one reason (or probably got more and not telling :D)- it is to get feedback and comments (if anyone really have time to read this) ... to triangulate my data ... I am struggling how not to include his daughter ... I don't want to (think about the ethical issues arising there! Besides children should be left out of this ... since this is marginally sleaze/research ... to some extent in my mind) ... but there may be articles or interviews about him talking about his daughter ... so might have to include that ... but I'll minimize the content, so it will be from his interaction, and nothing about her ... I'll have to work on that (note my use of methodological notes!).