They say “A picture is worth a thousand words”, what better way to impart and imbue a moral and social message than to watch a movie. On the evening of the 8th September ‘MATRIX’ organized a special screening of the Oscar winning movie ‘Men of Honor’ for all MATRIX members, campus students, staff and faculty. The main theme was to discuss the inspirational moral message that the movie left and to develop the aesthetic sense of the viewers.
The college students were honoured to have in the midst Lieutenant Commander in the Indian Navy Paramjeet Sood who graciously agreed to spend some quality time with our students and head the panel for the movie discussion. The faculty representative was Dr. A .V. Kulkarni and the other panel member was a 3rd year student of our campus, Rasagy Sharma.
The compere for the event Shivansh began the discussion by putting up questions to
Lieutenant Sood regarding the intoxicating levels of honour, passion, courage that develop inside a military man, assigned some perilous duty. The Lieutenant valuably spoke about the sense of pride that each military personnel carries about him. He explained that courage was a quality that is an inherent quality of every individual. It is something that comes up automatically when you develop an insane passion to achieve something and impulsively try and succeed in that. He later enlightened
the young budding engineers of our institution about the various avenues, opportunities and the vast scope for engineers in the Indian defence forces. He expatiated on the various perils and hardships and that a Navy personnel has to go through and the sacrifices that he makes in order to safeguard the country’s honour and privilege. He instilled in us the sense of pride that is associated with a no profit job where every moment you live your life in the edge of uncertainty. He proudly
told us that the armed forces are perhaps the only service where you don’t live and work for yourself, but for others. ‘The intuitive feeling of honour that comes the minute when you realize the entire nation is banking upon you is really what is worth dying for’, is really the main theme of the movie.
Dr. A. V. Kulkarni too spoke at the occasion and provided the students to think about careers and avenues in the armed forces. He urged the students to join these prestigious ranks and utilize their technical engineering skills in developing a sound military equipment and armament. He solemnly reminded us of the sacrifices of the young revolutionaries of our age who died fighting for our freedom pre-independence and motivated us to take up the initiative upon ourselves. The bottom line of his views was that we should begin to think beyond ourselves for the country and its
citizens. The movie discussion concluded with an interactive session when the audience put up a few questions to the chief guest, regarding the current naval strength of our forces and the future plans.
After that the movie was screened for all the present in the auditorium. It revolves around the life of Afro-American Negro Master Deep Sea Diver Carl Brashier who faced all sorts of hurdles and distractions to become one. Born to a black farmer, Carl wanted to become the first black Navy Deep Sea diver but colour discrimination being true in those days posed a lot of problems for him.
He was treated disdainfully by his seniors who made his life insensitively uncomfortable. Yet Carl persevered and become an honourable Deep Sea Diver against all odds, by virtue of his undying spirit, passion to succeed and undampened grit and determination. He later during service has an accident while salvaging his country’s pride owing to which he has to lose a leg thus barring him from deep sea diving in future and supposedly ending his career prematurely.
But it was not the way it was to be. Carl the master, ‘against all odds’ , scripts a heroic
comeback to active Navy duty service with an amputated leg through hard training, sheer grit and hunger to succeed, fuelled by his undying spirit and unsurpassable passion for HONOUR. The movie ends on a moral high and everyone left the hall with a moral message “Never ever quit or give up”. Honour is perhaps the only thing in the world worth dying for. Money may bring you fame and luxury but by ‘HONOUR’ history will remember you forever.
- Raghav Bansal
