Express-oholic

Mon Avis: Movie review - Peepli Live: Bumpkinly humor but a cliche!

2010-08-14T20:50:00.006+05:30

Peepli Live is a satire alright! Even with a dash of rustic humor and with a smell of grim pity thrown in for good measure. But does it manage to entertain you in its whole? No is the answer. This movie starts out well as a closer look into the plight of a farmer bogged down by impending confiscation of his land. Mixed quite well with countrified demeanour, Omkar Das (playing now famous Natha) remains constantly mystified while being coaxed by his elder brother Raghubir Yadav (playing Budhia) into suicide attempt. Pathos of this film aside, many other events in the movie make you roll with laughter but ultimately fade away after first forty five minutes or so. Humbugging of the media at its sensationalizing of the trivial, opportunistic politicians and fleecable villagers are cliche depicted and exhausted in many other satires. However, this one may be a tad better in its initial execution.

Ups:

- Strong cast - does most of this movie's lifting. Raghubir, Omkar and other bunch of theatre veterans have come out with commendable performance. Apart from the main lead duo, watch out for tongue in cheek slapsticks of Dhaniya (played by Shalini Vatsa) and expletives-ridden bitchings of Amma (played by senior actress Farukh).

- Satire - Most of its satire holds, though written around a very cliched script and banal characters. A dig on media , especially senselessness of Hindi media is praiseworthy. Alongside, it breaks ground in bring down English media from its pedestal and critiquing its lust for TRPs too.

Downs:

- Script - Though tightly edited, this script failed to engage in most of its second half. Full of cliched characters, it became dull beyond the humor. Its climax became very predictable and it lived upto its predictability. Second half is unable to hold you engaged and you rest on the entertainment of the first.

- Hype - Its disrespectful towards other better productions in early 2010 to tout this as the best movie of 2010. It may be produced (and even implicitly promoted) by Aamir Khan but if you think of it, he dint have to spend more than half of proceeds from any of his TV commercials :). This was virtually no risk for him. :)
Watch it once but with tamed expectation and if you think you have no alternative in the theaters.

Mon Avis: Movie review : Shutter Island - a fascinating thriller!

2010-06-04T07:49:00.002+05:30

Ill be honest ;I am a huge fan of Scorcese and Leo. In fact, since the time they started pairing up, their fan quotient have just risen. Gangs of New York, The Aviator and The Departed. Scorcese's talent of turning a seemingly passive storyline into a spool full of gripping imagery, tight narrative and almost skittish plot makes me his die-hard recent fan. He is a master of his craft and his latest film Shutter Island is his testimony in action. Shutter Island excels in creating an aura of detail that Scorcese is so famous for. It intrigues, challenges and then demystifies, all in about of a thrilling drama and, hence, a superb cinema. This is a thrilling feat and an all out watch.

Ups:

Scorcese, scorcese and scorcese - His execution is ingenius and so his respect for Leo. He handles Leo like no other and he makes the cinema so endearing that despite its dependence on climax, the unfolding of this mystery itself is highly gripping. Kudos to this genius. Heres to many more.

Leo - Bias or no bias, his talent is undeniable and he just does it again and again and again. His boyish charms do no harm to his serious renditions and in this movie, he discovers himself all over again

Script : It isn't meant to confuse but it isn't meant to simplify itself either. It holds you by your brain and keeps you guessing. It meanders but somehow leads you to its climax. Even the last dialogue in the film, leaves you to believe whether you have really understood the character (of Leo). Such and more makes this movie a must see.

Watch it for Leo, watch it for Scorcese. And if you know neither, watch it for it is a fascinating cinema.

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Prince of Persia: The Sands of time - a popcorn affair!!

2010-05-29T21:13:00.006+05:30

This movie definitely has a retro appeal. A charm that is so characteristic of the game our age group has played during our adolescence. Flurry of leaps on parapets, wood lines , rooftops, wall edges and swordfights - these heady sequences borrow directly from the scenic game. Alas, you see the games have an advantage - the thrill depends directly on the player's aptitude. Here, it is all Bruckheimer's vision (nothing similar to POC series) backdropping heavily on CGI effects.

Prince of Persia game barely had a script. It had a theme. Bruckheimer has done a decent touch up to the theme and constructed a script that just about satisfies the audience. Mix of characters are added to weave a mystic drama, enough to carry forward this 120+ minutes long affair.

Without diving into any part of ths story, I would merely put its ups and downs:

Ups:

Script somehow is able to engage the audience coupled with in-the-face special effects. Those who liked Mummy series will relish this movie.
Jake - is cute and fits the character nicely. His action sequences are made to look sturdy and his parkor free-runs add a believable touch.

Downs:

Arterton - is almost made to look like a silly doll - plastered with overdone makeup and short legacy from Bond movie "Quantum of solace"
Other characters (Ben Kingsley and Alfred) have sketchy parts , nothing much endearing

Watch it with a tub of popcorn - This is definitely an acceptable dose of special effects worth the ticket's price.

Mon Avis: Movie review - KITES - a hollow gushy flaunt

2010-05-21T01:33:00.005+05:30

Read this also on Reviewgang

Movie has been over-hyped. Period. It is an unabashed attempt at making a cross-over and almost launching Hrithik into the realms of Hollywood. Releasing in over 2000 screens worldwide, you will be more than convinced that this movie is shot like a showcase portfolio for Hrithik's cross-over casting attempts. But does it work? Hell No. Not much. It does succeed in parts.

J is a young soul making his living in the sin city of Las Vegas by doing random errands, teaching dance moves and marrying illegal immigrant girls to provide them Green Card for thousand bucks each. One of the girls is Barbara Mori whom he meets again during his hookup with Kangana, a lass born into money while her crooked brother is all set to marry Barbara. What happens next? I could tell you, but I won't . In the name of whatever-is-there script, your imagination must not be aided.

Downs:

Lack of script. Or must I say, total lack of respect for need of any script. This movie seems to be an attempt to redefine the genre of romance with Hrithik and Barbara becoming the latest mushy avatars. But despite their covert glances at each other, Hrithik's hearty grimaces and Barbara's coquettish moves, script runs into a sluggish first half. It almost makes you question your intention to be in that hall in the first-place. You beg for more and better in the second half and your prayers are half answered.
Hrithik - As we had such a drought of this hunk,this flick is a welcome satiation. He looks good but I can put it conclusively that his hamming really put me off. His dialogues in English undo a lot of good work done in emoting towards the climax. He really needs to be told that he must drop the put-on accent.
Kangana,Kabir and dialogues - Some of the lines and some of the actors have been really corny. You must see it to understand what I mean. Anyway.

Ups:

Barbara - Well , this dishy 30-something can act. We will give it to her. She can emote and she can mesmerize. Her chemistry with Hrithik may not have worked but it is no way due to her. She may not have literally 'arrived' but she definitely ain't a bimbo.
Second half - Alas! a savior portion of this 125 mins taradiddle. Smart action, racy scenes and a somewhat acceptable climax just about saves this movie from being an utter crap.
Music - Rajesh Roshan's work as always is hummable. Anurag Basu's fetish with rain sequences et al can easily be felt in Kites too. He does a fair job with picturesqueness of it all.

Watch this flick for its gushy visuals, its background score peppered with latin overtones, its sparse and slick action sequences and for Barbara Mori. Do not expect an overwhelming story.

Mon Avis : Review - Iron Man 2 - The lesser mettle!

2010-05-06T18:35:00.013+05:30

Iron seems to have lost its sheen. While I was enamoured watching a fresh super-hero so suavely brought onto the screen in Iron Man 2, I am mostly put off by the same trap most sequels fall into - brooding, self-introspecting, haughty hero who needs a bout of self-discovery with a sense of purpose - a similar overkill as in spiderman 2 (and 3) and others.

Here was a character who truly enjoyed being a super-hero with a flair and less nonsensical turmoils. Plus, he was not an undercover superhero. I definitely dint ask for IM 2 sitting in his condo mooning over his fuss with dad. Cummon - there was more to this flamboyant debonair. Anyway, what we do get is the zillionaire playboy Stark revelling in his i-created-world-peace talk, summoned by the senate and grudged at by his competition - Hammer (Sam Rockwell). Further to all this, there is rise of another abstract physicist son of his dad's partner (Micky Rourke- sidelined in this non-muttering role) hijacking arc-reactor technology and ganging with Hammer to bring IM down. Then you have the quintessential-to-Stark;s-life Pepper pots (Paltrow) mothering him . And oh! Lest I forget you have another set of characters thrown in for good measure - Don Cheadle, Samuel L Jackson and ever so dishy , Scarlett Johnson. What about them? Let me not spoil your fun.

Ups

Robert Downing Jr. - He looks as stylish as ever and his quips do remain - Victim to the mushy script, he is downed a little
Sequences - Most clanking of metals in this movie is fun - So are the 'bots fights - The only grudge : these are too less and sometimes clunky. The F1 circuit scene is a gem and so is the fight in the club.

Downs:

Script doesn't entirely smell as fresh as the first one - We see a lot of unnecessary deviations meant to create a sense of higher world order et al. The audience frankly doesnt want it. Give us some high-fired blazing techno action! That's Iron Man
Scralett/ Samuel/ Don Cheadle - Frankly, I understood most of this cast was to create fire-power and glamorise the sequel. But frankly, all of them remain underused. Ever Rourke is underplayed though his fight sequences cover up for it.

You can watch it with tamed expectations. Ofcourse, there is not much on the BO this summer.

Mon Avis:Movie Review - Teen Patti - a disgraceful blinder!

2010-03-01T10:58:00.012+05:30

To be honest, the producers, including the stars in the movie were playing a blind while betting on this script. Result : A shockingly disgraceful hand (read : abominable cinema). My wife and I, both having seen Spacey's 21 and thus intrigued by this upcoming movie, still dint have high hopes . But it would be this shoddy, was not imaginable.

Bacchan plays a so called genius mathematician whose life is a failure as his research papers are repeatedly turned down for the lack of any practical application. One fine day, he discovers an online 3 patti game and starts scribbling few calculations in the paper and Voila! He can predict the winner. He tests this experiment with another young professor (R Madhavan) and a group of nondescript students who are in it for thrills at first but soon get greedy to the core. Things spiral out of their control and Bacchan is forced to play in response to a blackmail by a mysterious man threatening to kill one of these students who are in the play. Well, lets cut to the chase:

Downs :

Stupid screenplay: Yes, the screenplay and the sequence of events are horribly stupid and insulting to the viewers, whether or not he/she has seen its ripoff source. Characters keep popping up from nowhere (would you believe that - Tinu Anand, Mahesh Majerakar, Shakti Kapoor, and our own Ajay Devegan) with over-the-top and mindless dialogues. These, along with other characters, have absolutely no contribution to the script. Well, they dont even get eyeballs! Worst of all, there is no description of teen patti the game or even any mathematics remotely attached to it. They even had to rip of the goat problem from 21!

Bacchan/Kingsley/Madhavan and other unmentionable four - It is heartfelt disappointment to see a legend like Amitabh fall for such an illogical movie. He does his best but even at many instances in the movie, even he is seen blurting some incomprehensible dialogues that do not at all seem character-driven. Kingsley's entire role is is a joke- He is playing some supershot who mouths few of the most senseless dialogues you could ever see in a movie. You need to see this to believe this! Its surprising to see Madhavan seemingly unable to act. Rest of the kids - including Shakti Kapoors daughter Shraddha - are hopelessly shoddy actors.

Script - There is no logic to the sequences of scenes. One thing just doesn't seem to be connected with the one before. In short, as film makers would love to call it, everything is randomized. :) for example, Kingsley after seen speaking in fluent English in three-fourth of the movie is suddenly dubbed over in Hindi using Boman Irani's voice (Special credit given to him in the movie ! take that!). There are so many loopholes that the list is outside the scope of length of this blog.

Music - There is none except a back baring bimbo model who tries to get your eyeballs in 'Teri neeyat khaarab hai'

Watching a movie, I have never cringed this much in my seat. I would give it one on ten just because a movie HAS BEEN made - they somehow took the chance.

Mon Avis: Movie Review: Karthik calling Karthik - Crisp thriller!

2010-02-26T23:00:00.010+05:30

One doesn't actually buy into it until much later in the movie. The mystery of the phone call seems overdone at first and one realises that it must be Karthik's own hallucination? Is it or is it not? The movie then leads you to believe that the person behind the call may be real? Is he or is he not? But what actually you find out at last, let me assure you, leaves you utterly satisfied with a sense of compliments towards ingenuity of the director or/and script writer. This movie is about a loser Karthik (Farhan) whose life turns 180 when he gets a call from Karthik (once again Farhan ! ). The caller claims to be the same man Karthik speaking in the same voice as our protagonist. So he knows all the intimate secrets of our man and knows him as his own self.

One thing leads to other and you see our man getting smarter, richer, upmarket and acquiring his arm candy (played by Deepika) who did not even notice him before his new Avatar. Then, one day after being exposed to have played a role in our loser's life , the phone Karthik turns against our protagonist and then hell breaks loose. Within a day, his life is crippled and all that he worked out of his smartness (including Deepika), is reversed leaving him miserable.

Ups :

Farhan Akhtar - This man has showed us how to direct, produce and now act successfully over different films based on different themes. His refreshing demeanor in all his roles so far have been very endearing to the audiences, knowing that none of those were stereotypical roles even if in cliched scripts. He has done it again and single-handedly carries this movie and its otherwise sluggish screenplay. He is timid in his pre-avatar and utterly suave in his post avatar. There is a thing about this man's simplistic dialogue delivery and a tongue-in-cheek humor that almost culminates in this very actor-critical movie. His execution delivers tidy credibility that audience can attach itself to and move along to this thrilling pot boiler
Script/Direction/Dialogue: All these departments (done by Vijay Lalwani) have done an excellent job to bring this tale in a very crisp form. Nothing much really seems overdone , especially in the first half, when the metamorphosis of our protagonist is shown with utmost believability and an underlying style. The winner, as I said earlier, is the way this script satisfies its audience in its climax. You will not be left to doubt its elements and call it fantasy.

Downs:

Screenplay : Is apt in the first half, but becomes slightly sluggish in the second half until you are told are about whos, hows and whys of things! This film could easily be shorter by good 15-20 minutes despite its crisp and tight editing.

Watch if if you are looking for some thrilling cinema and if you are a recent convert to Farhan's fan base. There isn't much from Deepika to invoke her fan base :) A decent suspense thriller (sans any murder mystery) to have appeared after a long time.

Also find this review at : ReviewGang

Mon Avis: Movie review - Love Aaj Kal - a 'mango' film (if mango meant - super ordinary, huh! )

2009-08-02T10:15:00.011+05:30

Love Aaj Kal is no coincidence - The way Bollywood is ripening , it is no longer shy in providing a sharp-dialogued, tongue-in-cheek portrayal of modern live-in couples who make out, make up and break up - all for a casual fling. But does that mean it is true? Not too far , not too close. I guess film too had to bank on the age old formula (however true or false) - Amongst all the flings, flimsiness and futility of a casual hook up, there is a heart somewhere that beats for love.

All that said, the question is whether Imtiaz could pull this one off with Deepika, Saif and Rishi as main leads. The answer (arguably) is 'Not quite'. The film has its moments but then it has its bores too.

Imtiaz and others of his generation have found a strange refuge in gaudy cinematography at few of the most exotic locales - looking as if someone has meticulously touched up each and every frame. Costumes are funky - Saif is dudish , Deepika is styled in minis and micros and even our own Rishi wears a test cricket (oh so English) sweater. But then Imtiaz realised this and put a contrast - He put together a good-enough 60s ensemble set and gave it a little life with a parallel story (as he says - Eastman color).

Saif and Deepika are an ambitious dating couple who slowly get bored of each other and 'amicably' (you should see this redefinition of word amicable . lol) Saif meets Rishi who gives him a wisdom nugget or two and recaps his flash back of his 'sturdy - surdy' days. So starts a parallel tale of Love Kal vis a vis Love Aaj. How does it all end? As if we cared as long as it is quintessential feel good :)

Ups:

Saif - Manages superb expressions in his Sardar role and less so in his cocky modern avatar - Watch for those wonderful scenes of him and a new lass (one dimensional , as a dear friend puts it) in the balcony - all love struck and moony eyed :) His modern role is just so much a repetition of DCH, KHNH and other such metrosexual-ish sketches
Deepika - Charms a bit in her straight dialogue delivery but falls short on some real acting. There are many occasion and scenes which demanded far more gravity but none was to be found. But then, she is hardly 2-3 films old. This film , however, presents her well.
Rishi - Was good, was suave and was as genteel as his young days. I have always maintained he must do more of films.

Downs:

Imtiaz - Was a let down - Not even comparable scripts to Socha na tha and JWM . His direction in the first half, coupled with some random edits gave the movie a befuddled look. He tried his hand at parallelism and I will give that to him. Else, this film would have been a disaster. Alas, he failed to touch any chords with me or my partner.
Cinematography - Too gaudy , too colorful and strikingly unwarranted - In an attempt to make it colorful , this film ends up being an unrealistic canvas.
Music - Two hummable songs Dooriyan and one in end credits - Twist is OK too but after third listen you lose the connection
Script - Horrifying loopholes, - Deepika's sudden marriage takes a lot of time to sink - ridiculous scenes justifying Saif's recovery of passion was shocking and many such moments that leave you with awkwardness that gets covered up by some decent acting and humor. Even in the humor department, this film takes itself too lightly and gives out few bunch of lines that really dont make anyone laugh. But then, alls well that ends well

A decent watch for the lack of anything else. With a tub of popcorn and an interesting company - all should be well . This is the only choice Aaj Kal.

Mon Avis : Movie Review - X Men : Wolverine - Weakest link!

2009-06-26T21:41:00.010+05:30

With nothing memorable to offer like the movies before it, this is reduced to a whirl of movements photographed up close. Jackman leaping onto an airborne helicopter and shearing the tyres of a jeep with his sharp cutlery admantium. This and a wee bit more is added to an otherwise ordinary drama that leaps from frame to frame seemingly dwelling on the making of the clawed man - Wolverine. Then there is Sabertooth played by Schrieber , will only be remembered for his trademark crooked smile. Rest are a bunch of under-powered mutants who fade away when the credits roll unlike Storm, Cyclops, Mystique and Magneto and others from first two ventures. Sadly, no characters stick here.

James discovers his bone claws quite early as a child (in 1845) and is seen being part of his family falling apart. His brother Victor (Sabertooth) carries him to adult age where they join Elite Forces to battle for US knowing their superpowers almost make them unbreakable. A nasty day lands them in a rotten cell from where they are rescued by (now well known from X1,2,3) General WIlliam Stryker(Danny Huston) to form a special force . Affected by all the bloody mayhem, he quits and becomes a lumberjack inside dark woods living peacefully with a sultry Kayla (Lynn Collins). Then happens a chain of events which lands him to Stryker's lab where he volunteers to inject admantium into his bones. This and more, is a superficial attempt to recapitulate the life of Wolverine.

Ups:

Take it or not - trying to further unravel the mysterious life of Wolverine makes for a decent screenplay full of intrigue, no matter how you find it to be executed in the end.

Downs:

Eventual lack-lustre execution which ends up leaving you with little thrills
Mutant concept is highly played down and there is no battle between humans and mutants for supremacy - All this made for a brilliant premise in first three of the franchise.
The characterisation of main protagonists it self isnt as juicy as your expect - Failing to make any impression - I wonder if this is the end of the franchisee?
CGI s that were so raved about when the bootlegged version came out , are reduced to a bunch of scenes - Period. You could easily count them in your finger if you have seen the bootlegged version with unfinished CGI. This lands up a major disappointment

Well, its the season of franchises and with T4 and Transformers 2 slated to come out soon, the box office is sure to heat up but so far it hasnt been much encouragement.

Watch this if you are a die hard comic fans and have followed the first 3 religiously.

With an approval rating of less than 30 % on Rotten Tomatoes , this is surely a rejected sequel (prequel , whatever!)

Mon Avis: Movie Review - Star Trek (XI) - Mega FX spectacle, fun for 'series' lovers !

2009-06-10T12:57:00.008+05:30

We have all known the franchise Star Trek as a long running series spanning across atleast two generations (43 long years) and we have all known JJ Abrams (director) through smash hit addictions like ALIAS and LOST. So here he comes again re imagining and bringing to life a mega special effects extravaganza with all the capabilities of present day animation. So whats the result? Well, some exotic display of space frontiers, star ships, morphed creatures and state-of-the-art video game like yield.

But along with all this jamboree, poor non-Star Trek lovers like me was sucked into the confounding world of Vulcans and Earthlings and took as many as first 30 mins just to figure out the backgrounds attached to the characters. Coming to the plot - This is claimed to be not so vintage Star Trek - To begin, we go back to the day of James T. Kirk's birth in deep space while escaping in a capsule out of a wasted ship, when his father makes a noble sacrifice to save the lives of others, including that of his to be born son . The next time we see young Jim — in an energetic Spielberg-influenced sequence (one of the best moments of the film(— he's a bratty Iowa boy of about 11, stealing a car called a vintage car on fossil fuel (we are talking about 2050s i guess). Flash forward another decade and Kirk (Chris Pine) is a townie. He's still a brat, but also brawny and possessing a William Shatner-esque swagger (My favorite swagger by the way - Boston Legal - also Ex- Star Trek Kirk). Then there is rest of the classy cast of Spock (Zachary Quinto)and other members with whom the series lovers will identify. Rest of the story - When you go and see the movie.

Mind you , this is not the first attempt of Star Trek on Big Screen but 11th. Last one was about seven years ago. Not that people dont tell me it has a fresh look and feel ought to be present in an ambitious summer blockbuster.

Ups:

Grand FX and pure Star Trek space adrenaline - The graphics are nothing short of a spectacle as they must be for a movie reaching across universe and galaxies - Even in characterisation - Kirk and Spock are played wonderfully and cast with precision :)

Though it takes a while for a newbie to get hang of the storyline, but once you do there is enough there to keep you hooked - eg. chemistry between Kirk and Spock is well developed

Downs:

Believe it or not - JJ falls into his own trap of doing too many series and at the point of climax it looks more like a silly tele series than a grandeur movie ending. A bit kiddish to say the least but can be ignored

Though I appreciate the effort in adaptation but for non-star trek watchers like us - the storyline could be a little simplified rather than waiting for first 30 mins to aid our comprehensions.

All in all, a refreshing sight to see a blockbuster come through this summer after miserable Wolverine (yet to hit India) and Angels & Demons et al.

Watchable PG 13 family movie with or without encyclopedic knowledge of all things Trekkian may sputter ! :)

Mon Avis: Movie Review: Angels and Demons - kitschy gibberish, a modest thriller!

2009-05-30T16:13:00.010+05:30

Book was a prequel - The derivative film is a a sequel - all set to tap into the euphoria surrounding Dan Brown's pulp fictions that read like a hooey and get watched panning a range from kitsch to profundity. The story line is filled with esoteric references that even a Catholic would find very hard to relate to and we the audience had to just make do with the elements of thrill and pretension that 'Oh! There is a puzzle'.

Nonetheless, the movie dint allow you to look at your wrist watches till the end of the second hour. But lo! The suspense dint end yet and there was more to come - Like those Abbas Mustan movies thrusting at your face in the (n-1)th minute - Are you sure who the real killer is? Lol

Langdon has irked the Church for telling it that Jesus was a family man , yet he is summoned for solving appearance of a mysterious sign belonging to a mythical secret society called the illuminati. One of its agents has kidnapped the Four Cardinals after the Pope is dead (later suspected of murder). Langdon is joined by Vittoria Vetra (immensely beautiful Ayelet Zurer) introduced through a sub-plot of having created the deadliest explosive in the world (in CERN) called the Anti Matter a.k.a The God Particle, that gets stolen. Thus begins a fast paced chase taking the audience through sealed crypts , dangerous catacombs, deserted cathedrals and even inside the most secret vault in the Vatican. Langdon begins to unravel the location of the Church of Illuminati where the kidnapper has also kept the stolen God Particle for blowing up the Vatican.

Ups:

Thrills - The screenplay and script is strictly OK and will keep you glued till much later.
Cinematography - Pity that most of the flick was not shot in actual Vatican but on lookalike sets but understandably so. Vatican could not allow too much of access after Da Vinci Code. However, the landscape is portrayed beautifully and the churches effuse a rustic charm

Downs :

Clocking 138 mins eventually gets to you and that is a serious minus for an otherwise bearable film
Tom Hanks doesnt add much grace to his role as he plays haggard Harvard Professor who makes an exaggerated effort to create an air of importance and mystery with senseless renditions of Catholic history

Overall, it isnt a bad flick - If you are Tom Hanks 's fan, you may be on your guard. For the fan of the book - I think this one does not live up to the standards of cinematic adaptations

Mon Avis: Movie Review : Confessions of a Shopaholic - Not intended for de-addiction!

2009-04-15T23:30:00.016+05:30

By Aparna Verma

You have a bad day at work and if the only thing that can cheer you up is a movie, then girls this is the one. Every single woman would identify with Rebecca's character ( Isla Fisher ), trust me. We’re all shopaholics in some way or the other or atleast become one during the sale season. Its a temptation which is so hard to resist.

The movie literally takes you on a shopping spree. The girl is mad about clothes, bags and shoes and accessories that all women die for. She believes mannequins talk to her and entice her into buying all these things. Her friend even makes her join a shopaholic de-addiction programme, but to no avail.

She accidentally lands up a job with a finance magazine and becomes their star writer with much help from her boss Luke ( Hugh Dancy )… helping commoners understand the nitty-gritty’s of finance. He makes her understand the difference between "cost" and "worth". Its all good until her credit bills have rocketed sky high, and she cannot evade her debt collector any longer.

Then it’s the usual story of how the girl clears her debts and learns to say no to the mannequins.

Ups:

This is 100 minutes of total fun with some really good comedy scenes.

Downs:

Some may find it Rebecca's character similar to that of Reese Witherspoons’s in Legally blonde, but I guess as far as a movie makes you laugh, how much does it matter.

Watch it for the feel-good factor. :)

Mon Avis: Movie Review : He’s just not that into you - Funny guide to love

2009-04-12T09:43:00.009+05:30

By Aparna Verma

This is what one can call a typical girly flick, with a bit of everything in there.
Its about single women desperately trying to find the “right guy” through all possible sources and methods and formulae ( Drew Barrymore & Ginnifer Goodwin ). A married woman (Jennifer Connelly) unable to keep her marriage going, while she doubles up as a love counselor to one of her colleagues. Then there’s the other category of committed live –in relationship ( Jennifer Aniston & Ben Affleck) not going the marriage way, and an extra marital affair( Scarlett Johansson & Bradley Cooper ).
I cannot really say how many of us would actually identify with any of those characters, because unlike the West we do not have an obsession with the whole dating circus.. where you have to be dating someone to be socially active.. where being single is “uncool”.. or that’s what its made out to be.

Its not a guide to love as many may think, since its based on a book of the same name. All that it tells you is that no relationship is similar to the other… that normal people can be the fairy tale exceptions to the “rule”, or probably there are no rules at all.
Watch Drew Barrymore and Ginnifer Goodwin go through the drill of finding a "soulmate", being ditched by various men by various means(my space etc) in the process. Jennifer Connelly who is more disturbed about her husband's (Bradley Cooper) smoking habit rather than him sleeping with another woman( Scarlett), who on the other hand seeks comfort in her boyfriend ( Kevin Connelly) only as a feel good factor. Finally you have Aniston & A ffleck uniting after their dilemma over marriage v/s live-in.

Ups:

Actors for sure. When you have Jennifer Aniston and Connelly and Scarlett and Ben Affleck and Drew Barrymore in one movie, why miss it.
Story: all repetitive but still who doesn’t like watching romantic comedies.
Direction/Editing is good.. managing so many interconnected stories is some job.

Downs:

Nothing really. Not that it’s a great cinema, but one cannot be overanalytical about such light hearted movies.

This is a cute movie which you can enjoy with an all girls gang. Men would probably find the whole thing a lot irrelevant, but if your girlfriend/wife insists do take her for this one. Do not say no. :) You will enjoy it in parts, if not completely.

In the end, each one of them have their own “happy endings”, with singles finding their “love”. The unhappily married getting separated and finding happiness in living alone. But what I liked best was Jennifer Aniston and Ben Affleck’s story.

Mon Avis: Movie Review - Fast and Furious - Thrills but drawls, and a ridiculous fun!

2009-04-05T19:35:00.007+05:30

It is Auto(mobile)-eroticism at its best! A car-porn - all stunts, no story! The tag line turned out to be 'New model , stale (old) parts!'. No, the package isn't all that bad but trust me when I say, none of it is due to its old cast! In fact, Rodriguez's is almost reduced to a cameo and Brewster sulks, stares, and looks dreary.

But, if a revved up engine turns you on, if you are flushed with adrenaline at the sight and sound of revved up roaring oil-guzzlers, and if you adore the cocktail of flashy double nitro cars clocking endless mph with skimpily clad chicks swaying at the start line - you may not be too disappointed. Boys and their toys, eh! But don't go looking for a story in this otherwise high-pitch four-parts videogame. Yes, it has FOUR sequences that take you to the world of video games where the cars and NOT in your control.

There isn't much to be spoken about the non-existent chemistry and the bloated carcass of a script. To keep it simple, the street-race mania is taken into Mexico deserts with a haphazardly woven shots of Latin rugs and an anonymous gang lord with little suspense to inject into the story. Rodriguez dies, Diesel gets vindictive, Walker joins hands , Brewster pretends to be worried and exhibits a wrinkle or two and rest, as they say (or tried), is a movie.

Ups:

High-fi car sequences that leave you with a gasp and may be the only real deal for your two hundred bucks a head. Mindless thrilling speed with stomach clenching flying cars turning into debris by a nudge at that zooming speed. Not bad for a car porn! - Watch for the cross-border tunnel sequence and a street race - these wont let you blink!

Downs:

Old cast stinks - Guys, removing 'The' does not make it anybetter unless it was an astrological compulsion. Diesel is reduced to a sulking hero with a lot of useless drama to convey romanticism that is more of a ridiculous stray. Brewster was, frankly, unnecessary even for a short lip-lock with Walker! Walker himself is hardly a character in these chain of loosely linked car-sequences, in fact anyone else could have done as bad a job; we dint need Walker for it - Rest is hot cars and hotter chicks! And please , can some one tell me what was the lesbo-licks all about?
Story - It wasn't meant to have one - they created a superfluous one to let it be called a MOVIE - This is half as impressive as the first of the four franchisee deal.
109 minutes though comparatively short turns out to be long by theory of relativity. This is what happens when there is no story to hold the stunts together. Anyway, take an interesting company along for comfort.

Watch it if you are looking for an escape from this realistic world of recession and gloom. Timepass.

Mon Avis: Movie Review: WATCHMEN - Thematically realistic, occasionally brilliant!

2009-03-29T18:49:00.004+05:30

Not being a fan of graphic novels sometimes helps! It did here! I certainly dint know what to expect from this one and hence it came out just fine! It was able to tell a story and did it reasonably well. This movie is thematic and holds together a bigger picture in itself, just like its director Snyder's last epic 300! Though I wouldn't genuflect as a die-hard aficionado, I would certainly not give it a thumbs down. Save for its length, it is a nice watch - despite limited release in India!

Set in alternate-1985 US where the world around is on the brink of Cold war and Nixon's fifth term (fiction) has a grievous standoff with Russia risking a nuclear wipe-out. The country has been watched over by a group of masked super-hero vigilantes. But by 1985 most of these vigilantes have either retired or have been cracked down by the government. The story then takes us to a savage murder of a superhero called The Comedian (played byJefferry Dean of Grey's Anatomy fame). A quirky superhero Rorshach, who still continues his watch over act without government sanction, decides to gang together a group of retired vigilantes to go deep into the mystery of this killing. Then there is a CGI-ed portrayal of a physicist Dr. Manhattan (Billy Kruddup) who turns into a blue radiating figure after a freak accident and now works for government and is a so-called nuclear deterrent due to his supernatural powers of bending matter. Adding to the cast are Malin Akerman as a dishy Silk Spectre and Patrick Wilson as Nite Owl who play a part in the gang act.

Ups:

Storyline/storyboard - The movie ain't a typical superhero flick - it has much the same darker side setting as did TDN and adding to that is its realistic grounding! It is one super-hero flick based in realistic times (though as old as 1980s cold war). I have been told by the comic book addicts that the story boards stick to the 12-part series graphic novel.
Scripting , cinematography and music - all the three support each other brilliantly - Though you may find scenes to be little disjointed yet, they are backed by handsome editing and direction. Complimenting the flow is a nice retro score most of it borrowed from folk rock. You get to listen to Dylan (opening credits), Jimi Hendrix, Cohen amongst others. Mainly, the concept at the end is the significant 'it' of the movie - a play at the psychological phenomenon of common fear uniting the worst of enemies is especially likable. Though, again, you may accuse the movie of taking itself too seriously but that what I think its makers intended.

Downs:

Long 163 minutes sometime become a little too dreary, though once you get engrossed , there is much to leave you glued!
Aberrations - Though most of the CGI is well done most of Dr. M's frontal exposure is too distracting and also that ridiculous love-making scene on the space ship Archie which is totally misplaced with Cohen playing Hallelujiah in the background. Certainly lends no sensual benefits.

For the lack of any non-pulpy cinemas in the theatre, it is certainly not a bad watch - if you are prepared to sit for two and a half hours.

Mon Avis : Movie Review :Gulaal - Kashyap's surreal rusticity!

2009-03-15T01:57:00.006+05:30

Hopes were high, and the delivery meets the expectations! Overdose of Mumbai for time immemorial and recent splurge of Delhi in OLLO and ill-fated Delhi 6, we have Gulaal for a change.This one comes directly from the heartland of Rajasthan - though much of the imagery is due to its intense cinematography of sets rather than Rajasthan's scenery.

Kashyap sets a bar and then raises it with another stunner - His Dev D may not have been a classic but certainly it was a style of its own. Gulaal comes fairly close to it. If Dev D was a modern reincarnation of a classic character from literature, Gulaal has a rustic backdrop of a tell-tale of lust, greed, power, betrayal, love and revenge! And boy - Aint this gritty?

Kashyap's stature takes a new height with this superb movie filled with innumerable metaphors from red vermilion powder symbolising the masks to alcoholic beverages named after Democracy and Constitution etc. From taking a dig at US's illegitimate supremacy through false sense of democracy to a taste of writhing student politics. This flick has it all and has it in a fantastically maneuvered screenplay.

Keeping the story elements at bay, let me just delineate the cast - Raj Singh Chaudhry plays a meek law student who comes to Rajasthan to study law but is with serious of coincidences gets mired into student politics, love, jealousy, puppeteering and revenge. Abhimanyu Singh has a rather short but powerful stint as Ranvijay Singh - an early influence of Raj's character who is strong but rash and has a rather ill-fated destiny. Model Jesse Randhawa pulls off role of a gritty young teacher who is sexually abused early in the movie and strikes up a chord with Raj's character. Kay Kay Menon plays a central character of a rebel who wants to take control of Rajasthan from the govt. and is building a financial framework for the same. One of my recent favorites, Mahe Gill plays his moll , not doing much than wearing a low -cut blouse and singing to some brash lyrics of Piyush Mishra. Piyush himself plays an eccentric character who stands a symbolic reference to one too many things in what is a very important character to the narration of this story. Then there are two characters - Aditya Srivastava and Ayesha Mohan who has carry the darker side of the game on their shoulders and play a pivotal role in the unfolding of the story.

Ups :

Ensemble Cast : All have done remarkable well. Kay Kay shines like a gem and infuses the fearsome appearance as no one else can. I have always been his fan and this gives me another reason to stay in the club. He is one of the most prolific actors of our times. His entire role is sketched with grim tenor and you never see him smile but once, for that rarity that dissolves moments after it appears. Raj is a find and plays his character with remarkable compatibility - his scenes have been well written and his transformation from a meek geek to a revenge-spewing lover on a killing spree, is phenomenally sketched. Watch the ease and warmth in his dialogue delivery and you will become a fan. Ayesha - negative in character connotation and almost arbitrary character development graph - her presence lends an incredible weight to the storyline - Her character plays the cause to many a effects in the movie - Her innocent looks carrying vile intentions with an underlying lust for power and scheming mindset are the cynosure of this entire storyline . Abhimanyu Singh has a short but influential role that charts the course of Raj's character. Aditya Srivastava plays a conniving , shrewd brother of the two illegitimate children (him and his sister - Ayesha's character). Look for the grit in his execution - due entirely to the well sketched role. Piyush Mishra - is funny and highly lyrical with his intrinsic words sung through a mad character who references to many aspects of this movie - You will fall in love with his lyrical imagery as well as the songs that he has written for the movie .
Music and lyrics - Its beauty lies in the ears of the listener - Soulful, majestic, sarcastic, rogue and metaphorical - In short , one of its kind and genre - Well used by Kashyap to lend dramatic quotient to his story telling. Injected at right moments in the right dose , tells you how Kashyap has mastered the art and also reinstate your faith into Bollywood style of blending music with story. No more are songs all about debauch dancing and running around trees. Listen to Ranaji and Aarambh amongst others.
Screenplay - Kashyap belongs to that school of art which neither ignores nor insults viewers' intelligence and sensitivity - rather he prods viewers to think and think hard on all the imagery and well-meaning metaphors strewn across the movie. Tight screenplay that keeps you to the edge of your seat and doesn't allow you too much of leash. Too good for a story which is not a mystery genre
Dialogues - Though raunchy and sometimes downright scurrilous , they are a strong element of this drama and hence invite an A certificate from the censor board. I personally was not offended with the kind of dialogues used, because I know ragging scene in and out and Kashyap has done a restrained job to convey the sense. Trust me .
Cinematography - Though this movie does not take us on tourism spree of Rajasthan, yet the kind of symbolism needed to justify the references have been created magically by Rajeev Ravi - Vermilion powder and red lit sets are wonderfully captured to their rightful effects by Ravi. It gives the movie a life that is so essential to discriminate between theatre and motion picture. The red tinge stays with you long after the curtain falls and you cannot help by carry this image home.

Downs:

Mahe Gill and Jesse Randhawa - Post end-credits the two people who turn out to be the weak link. Quite frankly, I did not understand the sketch of these two characters. Gill had terribly short role restricted to hapless pouting and mimicking her similitude to Tabu . While Randhawa's part in the second half was almost a blind presence with no real purpose. If she ever represented anything symbolic to the main tale, it was never clear enough. Similarly, a weird presence of ardhanareshwar is again not understood.
Second half loses the sheen on many characters including that of Ayesha - She is dealt with casually and her significance to the entire plot is reduced to a bunch of haphazardly delivered dialogues. Plus the pace too slows down and the length of the movie that drags to 2:20 minutes begins to have a toll on itself.

Overall, a must watch.

Indian cinema is changing, and you do not want to miss witnessing this transformation. One cannot but wait desperately for PAANCH

PS - A background on the casting of Raj and also of Kashyap's distress with Censor board. Read here


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Mon Avis : Movie Reviews - MILK, The Reader, Revolutionary Road - Academy's side picks for 2009 beyond Slumdog euphoria

2009-03-12T16:00:00.002+05:30

Waiting for these movies to find distributors in India only after hype generation through Oscars, goes a long way to tell you about how an Oscar hit may not be of much commercial significance for Indian distributors. With less than 50 prints released nationwide for each of MILK,The Reader and Revolutionary... , there isnt much ROI one can expect. So I am not sure, how the mathematics worked.

But I am glad that Indian audience at least got the taste of these big three, no matter late! For some , like myself, torrents are always a blessing.

Looking at these movies it is not difficult to fathom why Slumdog walked away with glory and TCCBB was the closest match. Milk, The Reader and Rev Road aren't exactly breathtaking cinema and they rest their capabilities only on script, story and execution. Nonetheless, it is also not too difficult to know why these are academy's favorite. After all, a gay drama, a nazi camp love story and a touching post-marital discord story are always likely short-list with the academy.

MILK - Penn's incredible improvisation!

Based on true story of a gay activist Harvey Milk who became the first openly gay person to be elected into a major public office in United States, hence triggering a coalition of people championing gay rights across the political spectrum.

Milk charts the last eight years of Harvey Milk’s life. While living in New York City, he turns 40. Looking for more purpose, Milk and his lover Scott Smith (James Franco) relocate to San Francisco, founding a small business Castro Camera. His business place soon becomes a breeding ground for gay rights meeting and idea seeding. Thus begins a journey marred by noted opposition, sexual bias undercut by political preferences and a heart touching portrayal by Sean Penn.

Ups:

Sean Penn - A well deserved Oscar - Get a chance to see some historical footage of real Harvey Milk and difference from Penn is hard to tell. Amazing improvisation , that awed the audience and jury alike
Screenplay - Another deserving academy award, the screenplay is smooth and gels well to the overall theme of the movie, backed by solid execution from Penn.

Cinematography and editing - Wonderfully crafted and full of old and real footage about US in late 1970s. Lends sheer originality. Editing too is crisp.

The Reader - Kate's magnum opus!

The Reader is a post world war II drama starring Kate Winslet (as Hanna) and Ralph Fienees (as M

hael). The movie begins with a torrid sexual encounter of the young boy (David Kross playing young Michael) with a mid-30s woman (Kate). First half of the movie delves in this illicit affair and views almost like soft porn. Adapted by David Hare from the novel by Bernhard Schlink, it is directed by Stephen Daldry, who has made Eight and The Hours.

But films being what they are, the early sex scenes are a powerful distraction from reflection on deeper things. Michael (played as a youngster by David Kross) is 15 when he meets Hanna. Apart from the carnal rampage, Hanna exhibits a fetish to be read to by Michael (hence the name The Reader) - passages of classic literature. Chekhov, Dickens, Ernest Hemingway, Mark Twain, Homer's Odyssey are among her favourites. This we understand later was partly due to her illiteracy that gets plugged to a more secretive plot as the movie progresses. Years later Michael is a law student who is taken to a war-trial by his professor, only to find a much older and ravaged Hanna being tried for some of the most hideous crimes in Germany's history.

Ups :

Direction - Definitely Daldry's finest, he stay away from sensationalistic storyline , being majestically sombre and very gripping!

Kate - She was my pick even for the Titanic , but later I came to know Academy dint give a damn. Almost a decade alter, I maintain my stance but clearly this is Kate's Magnum Opus and it was indeed high time Academy recognised her gritty acting. And they did! She breathtakingly potrays a socially misfit woman who is psychologically scarred, resentful and embittered all the way, carrying a dark secret. Guess what she could have missed out as her part was initially offered to another maestro - Nicole Kidman who was ruled out due to her pregnancy.

Screenplay (Adapted) - Amazingly mirrors fear, wonderment, calculation and despair in the responses of its two central characters.

Downs :

Keeping the lust factor aside, the porn scenes could have been avoided. They are far from aesthetically done and in a way overdone to the point of being morally questionable. We are a generation spoilt for choice in porn and do not need a film's explicit depictions.

A must watch flick carrying a strong sense of question on morality and judgement, despair and affirmative action, war-crimes and a purpose of duty.

Revolutionary Road - Titanic's favorite pair of Leo and Kate ! :)

Alls well, but i will carry a grudge - How long will Leo have to wait to finally get a golden lady - I was pained when he did not get one after being nominated for Blood Diamond and Aviator - and when he wasnt even nominated for The Departed. What further escaped me was the art direction nomination, being a period film , its art direction is just about what was needed.

Anyway, it took a good script and more than a decade to see the lead pair of Titanic back again. Had it been Bollywood, one hit pair would have been instantly repeated and then over repeated to the point of making them cliched.

Directed by Sam Mendes who gave us Tom Hank's solid Road to Perdition and also has an academy award to his name for scintillating drama American Beauty , Revolutionary Road covers the ever-so-used bollywood formula of post-marital discord. As a difference, , they put in a strong dose of 'American Dream' and add some dash of infidelity.

The young couple, hoping to live the “American Dream” come to understand how restricting and forced the entire concept is and work very hard to keep their marriage intact despite the differences keeping them apart. Frank Wheeler (DiCaprio) longed to move to France and live high and free. His wife April (Winslet) wanted the same for him and their family, but as time went on, they moved farther away from this goal. The film centers around one last desperate attempt to achieve that dream.

Ups:

Winslet and Decaprio - I was a fan of their chemistry with their solo pair up in Titanic and 1997 and I am a fan of them working together now. Decaprio's boyish charms and Winslet's enrapturing face are perfect for each other's cinematic grace.

Downs:

At times, week screenplay with many questions unanswered , as the film focuses too much on the duo and less on script.

A good watch for Kate/Leo fans, Sam Mendes has not disappointed keeping up with his priors.

Mon Avis : Movie Review - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - Brad's 'forrest gump'ish magnum opus!

2009-02-26T20:17:00.005+05:30

Nationlistic feelings aside, secretly I wanted TCCB to win over Slumdog. I would have judged it the best flick of the six nominated for Best Movie, without blink.
This is clearly Pitt's magnum opus! Evoking the same kind of esthesis as did Forrest Gump, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a queer epic tale that surrounds a man who is born old and then ages backwards to an infant. A concept as mind-boggling as this has been executedwith an ease that only a director like David Fincher can do, having directed weird subjects in Fight Club, and edge-of-the-seat dramas like Zodiac and Panic Room.

No need for spoilers as we all know the basic plot of this prodigious masterpiece, one which almost fetched an Academy Award for Brad as well as for the film and its director, had Slumdog not been favorite all around.

Spanning over 86 years of life of Benjamin, this film captures each of its element in a neat and emotional screenplay.Benjamin is born on the last day of WWI. Seeing an 86 year old body of a child, his father abandons him in front of a nursing home. He is raised by the people of nursing home , fostered by a black woman Quinee (nominated this year for best supporting actress). The film is a beautiful flashback through narration of his daughter Caroline (Julia Ormond), being insisted by her mother Daisy (Cate Blanchett) who is on her death bed.

Ups:

Screenplay - Terrific substance, showing several stages of Benjamin button - his visiting a brothel to lose his virginity, working on a ship, participating in War - beautiful montages of relationship he shares with people at old and many more. That is where a parallel with Forest Gump will at first flash in your mind. Look for the last scene when Quinee is described as "Some are mothers" sequence. A beautiful narrative coming to a tearful end. You bet you would need some napkins for your eyes!
Direction - As stated, this queer subject has been treated with warmth making it a queer but still credible saga of a person's life , his love and his unique condition where he sees other people grow old and himself grow young. Incredible concept treated to near perfection.
Make up- Deservedly collecting an Oscar for Best Make up this year, it is only seen to be believed. Though mostly aided by Visual Affects (in this category an Oscar again and for Art direction too), the magic of this movie truly lies in seeing Brad age back ; created to meticulous make-up details.
Brad and the rest of the cast - Brad does a role of his life time taking him to league of Tom Hanks. Truly a humble appearance, he emotes wonderfully and invites empathy like never before. His chemistry with Cate also shines in this tale and his execution of his role is marked by a finesse that is again seen to be believed. Cate too fits her role beautifully - watch out for her old avatar as she carries Benjamin in her lap - his final journey as an infant to his grave. What a magical scene! Taraji playing is mother is one of the finest and fresh act in a long time.

A cinema that will move you with its tear-jerker narrative, a must watch especially if you have been thwarted offlate by some vainglorious cinema. Do not miss it for anything. I could see no 'downs' - may be you can and let me know.

Mon Avis: Movie Review : Valkyrie - an engaging thriller!

2009-02-22T19:08:00.008+05:30

So what if you know Hitler was never assassinated? That may not be enough to debunk the movie , when it has got all other elements to engage you! It holds your attention for most of the part and you are on the edge of your seat waiting to know what happens next. Then it gives you another sneek peek to compliment your superficial knowledge of Hitler's chain of command and contingency measures. For most of us , the only draw in this movie will be Tom Cruise and its director Bryan Singer (X men, Super man Returns and my all time favorite The Usual Suspects).

The movie is a mystery drama that distinctly stays away from developing character personality of Hitler's role or that of Col. Stauffenberg (Cruise). Instead, it hangs itself on racy script, suspense and edgy screenplay. The movie is simply about Col. Stauffenberg deciding to kill Hitler by conspiring with a group of allied traitors who are close to Hitler and fed up enough of him to see him dead. Stauffen knows that killing Hitler may not be enough to end the ongoing WWII and he may have to crush SS and other such arms of government which may reinstate Hitler's maniac regime. So besides plotting to assassinate Hitler, Stuaffen chalks out meticulous plan to initiate Operation Valkyrie, an alternative military action designed to take control over the government in event of Hitler's untimely death. However, Stauffen insists that even if Hitler does not die, the rumours of his death should be enough to trigger Valkyrie. What happens next? Well, that is what you have to watch to find out if you are done with enough spoilers for now ;)

Ups:

Production/Screenplay - Not grandiose war scenes, still commendable tight screenplay with painstaking details. Bryan's eye for details in screenplay have been evident in his past projects

Direction - Bryan manages to keep the story in a fluid flow with no noticeable dull moments (if you can just overlook that you KNOW Hitler was not killed etc etc)

Tom Cruise - Does a controlled act. The movie was not meant to show his emotional breakdown of faith towards Hitler but only his making a leading attempt towards Hitler's life , last of 15 failed attempts on the Fuhrer

Downs:

Scope - The very limited scope of this movie that keeps it close to planning out one single attempt at Hitler's life and showing no other aspects of Hitler' life or regime, makes it a very narrow portrayal. This neither serves as a documentary for History students , nor helps war movie buffs

All in all, a decent pop corn thriller,and a nice hollywood product that may not be great cinema but technically is a good story teller. Watch it.

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Delhi 6 - All hope and hype be damned!

2009-02-21T22:25:00.005+05:30

I went, I saw and and I was tested... tested for patience like never before. Dont blame me. Mehra upped the bar but I still tamed my expectations. But come on, one too many guilty pleasures to expect when all you saw in promos, was a bunch of scenes with AR Rahman's music over it. We decided the movie has to be good, after all scenes look amazing and the score was magical. The plot was never hinted to and we relished the ignorance of what lied in those 140 odd minutes. Phew! So we were conned and how!

I am not an elite who likes esoteric cinema. My baseline is simple, the movie at which ever level, must be entertaining. Period. That is mainstream cinema vis a vis its art counterpart. Delhi 6 is mildly entertaining, that too only if you get desperate. At all levels, it is a mere time pass and no great cinema , not even with the superficial message it pretends to carry.

D6 is a case of too many metaphors gone consistently wrong. And this set of metaphorical blunders starts with the name - delhi '6' a reference to the area of chandini chowk, with its facets hardly explored enough while the plot meanders through its half-baked character.

By now we all know , Roshan (Abhi) comes to India to escort her grandmother back to the country. He stays here, gets awed by the aspects , which borders onto fascination and much too happily he keeps clicking all the locales and people on his Motorola cell phone. Oh dear the burden of being a brand ambassador of Motorola in real life on the reel life! So he is here, he meets all the characters around in chandini chowk with some of their own facets and an ever growing menace of 'kala bandar' - which Mehra has quite liberally used as a metaphor for inner conflict and evil. I have absolutely no problem with this and its allied metaphors, only if it was used more maturely and convincingly .

They put all of it up as a travesty which is riddled with situational humor and a couple of comic scenes to draw laughters, just when you are getting too bored to ignore the hype. So let me delineate more specifically what dint work for me:

Down :

Too many metaphors and all of them half baked - I dont have a clue how to classify this movie - was it about turmoil within characters? Was it about Hindu-Muslim repose? Was it a larger satire on human instincts? Was it simply AR Rahman? Was it Chandini Chowk ? May be it was all of it in moderation and nothing of any in conviction! Kala bandar was overplayed and escaped me completely. How can Mehra fall for such a ridiculous imagery , overblow it and then go on to relate it in a half-baked way to all possible evils mankind may be reeling under. Mehra first attempted to rib the actual event that rocked Delhi and then use it unconvincingly to rake up a reference to evil. Or whatever. Then you have Ramlila fillin in every 10 minutes which doesnt even have any figurative sense , then you have a fakir holding a mirror as a metaphor to a passage inwards - all these failing to impress one bit. Add to that the grand metaphor of Masakkali. I was almost beginning to like pigeons.

Music - No dont kill me yet. Ill have to skin myself before I say that AR Rahman's music in D6 is mediocre. I am in love with it and will be in love with it atleast for the rest of 2009 until his next better score undoes this love.Smile. Bias of the utmost form . Why I mentioned this in downs though is the shock which i underwent when this music was underutilised to degree of almost an insult to the maestro. Five songs are played in the first half itself and all barring, Masakkali, are played for barely 2 minutes (a fraction) with almost no affection for the lyrics or whatsoever attempt to choreograph. I was amazed and disappointed. Dont tell me Mr. Mehra that you edited most of it to fit your package under 150. I d rather say you had reduced your monkey gag a bit.

Character sketch - is all sketchy, underdeveloped and one too many. It is failed projection of an ensemble cast where each character is supposed to have a story of his/her own. But none of them are well - explained and all of them end up being a reduced caricature of their botched portrayals. Even the romantic chemistry between Abhi and Sonam is built out of the blue and looks weak throughout.

Background score - Should we even be talking about it? When all else is almost mediocre, this should be at the bottom of your wish-list. But hey, you dont forget the awesome background score that so helped emoting in RDB and Slumdog . Couldn't we have used some cinematic aid of that form? Unbelievable.

Ups:

Abhishek/Sonam/Atul/Rishi Kapoor and others - Though a victim of the loose screenplay, most of them still shine in whatever little they are blessed with. Abhishek's pseudo-american accent be ignored, he does good in parts. Though this movie again does not give Sonam enough scope in terms of variety of serious scenes, yet she does a fantastic job in playing a innocent, middle class girl with smouldering aspirations and acute disregard to matrimonial-obsessed society. Atul Kulkarni is solid and sails through playing a meek character. Rishi kapoor is briliiant and so is Waheeda Rahman. Supriya Pathak, Divya Dutta , Prem Chopra and Cyrus Sahukar are very corny and Aditi Rao - though an attractive woman is hardly a find (as some observers have stated) because of too little scope that her character offered. Couple of moments do work though - Watch for that hilarious scene when Cyrus and a woman are trying to make out and their feet rub on the remote control flicking the channels from birds mating to monkey menace and even a fleeting suggestive scene of rocket launch . Hah! ;) Another few scenes between Rishi and Abhishek (mention of Rishi's forlorn past) and Abhishek and Waheeda (Waheeda's growing mistrust in her own mitti ) are worth an applause.

Cinematography - Whatever Binod Pradhan has done to D6 is its only saving grace. The camera panning across Jama Masjid, Lal Quila, India Gate and even the maze by lanes or for that matter colorful scenes of ram lila are phenomenal. But alas, I get to hear most of Chandini Chowk was built in sets in Jaipur! Was it because Akshyay staged a coupe for real chandini chowk for even more disastrous CC2C around the same time..lol? You never know

AR Rahman/Prasoon Joshi - Well , their music and lyrics (which can only be truly found on music cds of this movie) is phenomenol. Listen to Delhi 6 title song, Masakkali and Rehna tu and you will swoon. Masakkali lyrics have been the most soulful of recent times and Rehna tu sinks you into a magical space from which you do not want to ever recover. Title song, on the other hand, is all meant to work on your feet :) I wish they could just be picturised as well. It hurts.

With Oscar weekend just around the corner, I was looking for a good start leading up to a fine climax at the academy awards for Indian Cinema. Delhi 6 is not exactly that. It is not so enchanting as it is hyped, and it falls prey to that. Leave me, the audience 's reaction in the theatre after the credits rolled, was a tell - tale.

You can watch it, but kill all your expectations first - especially those arising out of the fallacious trailers.

Mon Avis: Review - Billu (Barber) - Not so bhayankar!

2009-02-15T20:42:00.005+05:30

Billu (Barber) Review by Aparna:

I find it difficult to understand why can’t our film makers make movies which are wholesome entertainers and not half baked stuff. On the lines of Rab ne, Billu(sans Barber) is another such movie from the Shahrukh Khan camp.

The only relieving factor is Irrfan Khan, he’s just too good in the movie, portraying the character of a harried common man who has an endless list of troubles on his plate, more than what he can handle.

Nothing that great about the story or screenplay here. You have a villager who happens to know a filmstar as a childhood friend who’s in his village for shooting. Everyone tries to befriend him and shower favours on Billu just to get a glimpse of the star, even his kids and wife don’t spare him..

There’s good amount of moral lessons in the movie from Shahrukh Khan, which gets too much by the end. Sorry to all Shahrukh fans, but I found him overacting in a lot of scenes.

The movie clearly belongs to Irrfan Khan.. that man has an altogether different charisma about him. He gives perfect expressions and has got perfect dialogue delivery. No wonder he’s going places.

Lara Dutta on the other hand has got miles to go but she’s looking gorgeous even as a mother of 2 kids.

Ups:

Irrfan Khan- he’s a talent powerhouse, still underrated in Bollywood.
I’ll be a bit biased here.. hailing from Hindiland UP, I loved the use of “shuddh” hindi words for a change.
Music from Pritam and lyrics by Gulzar and Sayeed Quadri are refreshing and hummable.
The attempt at creating a UP village in a south Indian location is appreciable.. they got most of it right.

Downs:

Direction to top it all isn’t that great. Priyadarshan has started doling out repetitive stuff in terms of formatting plus the use of same set of side actors.
The story/screenplay is weak and the execution even weaker. Though the duration is bearable at 2.5 hours, some amount of editing could have helped.

It’s a time-pass movie, not meant to meet anyone’s expectations. But a must watch for all Shahrukh fans, you get to watch all his movie clippings.. talk of vanity.. :)

Mon Avis: Movie Review: Seven Pounds - Predictable, hardly emotional and over dependent on Smith!

2009-02-12T22:21:00.005+05:30

I distinctly remember watching The Pursuit of Happyness with a friend about two years ago and going numb when the end credits rolled. When we came out of the theatre, I asked her for an opinion and she was blank, which I only found later was more due to the shock of the impact than due to anything else. The movie was hard-hitting and thought provoking, establishing Will Smith in a different league. Will Smith (and his real-life-reel son) was endearing, emotive and extremely believable in the role, something of a pleasant surprise after his Hitch kind of acts. So as biased as my mind could be, and also owing to the fact that SP is directed by same Gabriel Mucconi who directed TPOF, I was expecting more but what I got was not 1/10th as much. Smith is in a rough patch after I am legend and Hancock

Even in its absolute context, the movie does little to help a viewer go through the emotions that the lead character may be trying to endorse. The film is boring, script is forced and the characterisation is cliched. It is quite possible that the director thought Will Smith would be enough to rework TPOF happiness. But it ain't no good.

Without giving away any spoilers, Will Smith sets out on a mission to save 7 strangers in distress as an act of redemption, after authenticating each ones case and even falling in love with one of them. Why and How? well , that is what the movie is about and exactly that disappoints. Writing anything more would be giving away whatever little the movie has - well , what it has is driving while using Blackberry, rose bushes fertilization with banana peel, soulful sex by the candle lights, swearing, car accident, and a dangerous metaphorical jelly fish.

Downs:

Script : Bland one which starts on a high note , giving audience an illusion of similarity to TPOF and a mystery which is obvious and predictable within first 30 minutes, rest is mere humdrum of a spill of a bunch of disconnected characters which fail at evoking any empathy as the plot unfolds.
Direction/Editing - Both cause the movie to drag and hence escape what could have been the only saving grace, some smart editing. The movie lumbers on and audience is not much surprised as the tragic end progresses. But when the end does come, audience instead of showing empathy, is hardly convinced about the plot and finds itself bewildered.
Title - full two months after the release of the movie in US , the mystery behind the name is still no clear and there are just about lose words travelling across mouths that relate it to .... errr... hold your breadth... well, The Merchant of Venice and reference to debt as a pound of flesh

Ups:

Will Smith: Despite his hard emoting, he still manages to infuse whatever little life possible into this otherwise dull drama. He acts with grace and sadness that is so becoming of him and reminiscent of TPOF. He has done it well but alas, could not do enough to undo the lack of a good screenplay

Watch it if you have nothing else to do, but prepare to be disappointed. And please, keep 'The Pursuit of Happyness' out of this. This is more like pursuing tragedy that too an half baked one. :)

Mon Decouverte: Two more deleted scenes from DevD

2009-02-12T20:01:00.004+05:30

You may not like it :)

Two more deleted scenes from DevD that never saw light of the projectors -

Scene 3 Dev bedding Rasika

Scene 4 Whore - beyond the lyrics

For Scene 1 and 2, refer to the post below!

Mon Avis: Movie Review : Dev D - Darker, modern yet disengaged avatar !

2009-02-08T01:57:00.008+05:30

D for Destruction of the self, D for Drugs, D for drinks, D for a demanding sexuality, D for dazzling cinematography, D for dandy direction, yet D for Disengaged!.. All this and more in D for Dev D.

Anurag Kasyap's latest offering provides the darker retake in the world of literature's iconic DevDas freeing it from all the cliched notions, yet managing to provide an aura of self-destruction that is so core to the jilted lover.

Reams have been written on a run upto release of AK's DevD, from psychoanalytical analyses that are so due to a classic , to plain simple cinematic evaluation. And Dev D as a work of art deserves most of the critical acclaim thrown at it.

Set up in modern times, our new avatar uses ATMs, credit cards, mobile phones, email chats, dope (not just drinks), exudes open sexual desperation, making his own dark side darker by an insanely driven self-destructive mood. Most of the locales belong to Punjab and Delhi, most of the script leaning closely to the age-old literature classic , yet it takes few screenplay liberties of its own - just like Omkaara did in reincarnating Othello. But that was far more engaging than this saga of mindless intoxicated self-mutilation. Anyway, here are my thoughts on what may work and what may not for this however laudable inspired cinema -

Ups:

Cinematography - Rajeev Ravi shows the bylanes of Punjab and Delhi in a meticulous , jazzy way complimenting AK's modern day vision for DevD. Taking us through farmlands of Punjab, murky sides of Pahadgunj, and underground invisible nightclubs - Rajeev does a splendid job bettering his works in No Smoking and Chandni Bar. I bet, you will simply love most of the camerawork in the movie, something that alone keeps you hooked on for this more than 150 min saga

Direction & Scripting- AK infuses the same directorial talent into DevD as he did to Paanch, Black Friday and No Smoking - covering up for their otherwise outrageous screenplay. He does it with flair and makes sure that the modern day's Dev is as much in sync with 2009 as possible.

Music - Amit Trivedi's score in this movie is what you keep after leaving the theatre. I fell in love with Emosional Attyachar (rock and unrock-ed) and Pardesi...especially jazzed up by their Rock touch picturisation.

Characterisation and Acting - Junior Deol fits beautifully into the character utterly confused and craving for drugs, alcohol, sex with a panache that he has developed over his previous successes (Read: OLLO etc) - He indulges in a sexual fling as a rebound, sniffs cocaine in the underbelly of delhi and drinks neat from the vodka bottle only to sport self-destructive tendencies sporting a devdasic beards :) . All this with a sense of humor - for instance watch for the scene when Deol gobbles up the bus ticket in retaliation of an old hag pestering him with moral lectures about drinking etc and another when Chunni tries to protect himself of Dev's ire by a pillow, Mahe Gill may not have a charisma of Aishwarya Rai's Paro but nonetheless reinvents herself as a sexually liberated middle class girl who is devoted to DevD to the extent of filming herself nude for him and engaging in failed sexual act with him at first given opportunity, but deserts him when her self-respect is castigated ; Kalki despite general critique does fairly well as a mild adaptation of courtesan Chanda - playing a prostitute of canadian-indian descent holding a murky past mired by MMS scandal (Ah, creative liberty borrowing the DPS sex scandal close to all its publicly known detail :) ?) - Though her dialogue delivery almost comes out forced .

Downs:

For once its screenplay drags in the second half climaxing to an abrupt ending which is neither happy nor tragic. Lol. (See it for yourself to judge the abruptness). I was so turned off by the length of the movie by then that I did not mind movie ending even with an abrupt and silly climax. Anyway, editing could trim it further by good 20-30 minutes - It loses most of its sheen due to its long dwindling screenplay , when you cannot help but glance at your watch now and then to indicate your restlessness. All this disengages the audience half way in the movie.

Dark theme - I am all for cinematic liberty in terms of creativity but here it turns over a dangerous leaf - It brings out a negative character seeping in drugs, alcohol and sex. It takes itself a little too casually and almost presents an in-your-face depiction of a confused soul taken to damnation. My only grudge here - The character drifts from realism especially when his confounding sense of love is pushed to the background and music keeps banging while our fallen hero slides deeper into dope. Moreover, the otherwise so adorable character of Chunni lal is reduced to a sketchily written part of a pimp. This was one major let down.

No wonder, it has received mixed reactions even from most respected critics nationwide. Receiving perfect score to just about average ratings - but yes, if you are half of a decent movie fan you, will go and relish this cinematic creativity even if you have to come out of the theatre grumbling. Not often do you see a remake of this calibre, despite all its shortcoming :)

Caution: Movie contains a lot of crude sexual innuendos including few from the leading lady :) Quite a few of them are shocking to the sensibilities.

Upcoming AK release - Gulaal (almost mired with same crude dialogue mouthpieces :)

P.S - Two deleted scenes from Dev D which for some reason dint make it to the theatres. I wonder why.

WMD Scene between Chunni and Dev

Paying Chanda scene - Time to pay for the services ..err.. through Credit Card. :)

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Luck By Chance - Splendid by execution

2009-01-31T23:20:00.004+05:30

I guess he has discovered his own terrific screen presence and he is playing hard at it. Farhan brings togethor almost the entire cast from his film industry into this flick - his take through a struggler's lens. The movie has handful shots cum cameos of (hold your breadth) - Aamir Khan, SRK, Abhishek, Akshay Khanna, Vivek Oberoi, Ranbir Kapoor, Diya Mirza, Kareena Kapoor, Rani Mukherjee, Karan Johar, Anurag Kashyap, Javed Akhtar, Shabana Azmi, Raju Hirani, McMohan.. .Phew!

With so many celebrity lined up there is another group who perform the actual act - Rishi Kapoor, Juhi Chawla, Dimple Kapadia, Sanjay Kapoor, Hrithik Roshan, Saurabh Shukla besides the lead - Farhan and Konkana. The cast is wonderful and their act - sincere! This movie neither totally lampoons nor mourns realism of Hindi Film Industry. Rather, it entertains and hence, excels in more departments than one.

Ups :

Farhan and Konkana - The writer, the director , the producer , the broadcaster and now a fully grown actor. After Rock On, he does another perfect act. Balancing the role, he looks a believable next door guy with eyes brimming with sincerity. He is an example that overrides fiascos of the likes of Himesh Reshamiyas... Some people are versatile, others are not ! Konkana is marvellous repeating her 'level headed woman' act that she has perfected over so many movies.
Rest of the cast - Each one fits their shoes and do their job well enough. Hrithik emotes well, Sanjay/Rishi/Juhi/Dimple are adorable while Isha Sharvani is hot as hell :)
Script : Well written and stays from being preachy and realism. Has funny takes which take it close to parody still being genuine. A very tough art I might say!
Score : Decently done by Shankar Ehsaan Loy . Couple of hummable songs and nice background score
Direction : Zoya proves to be another gem of the lineage. Her debut under the shadow of her brother is a definite thumbs up!

Downs:

Length - Gets draggy in between and could well be trimmed by over 15-20 mins
Songs - A couple of hummable songs but rest were mediocre and totally unnecessary in the plot.

Watch it for Farhan and the assortment of cameos. Such a treat was last visible in the title track video of Om Shanti Om!

Mon Avis : Review 2 - Slumdog Millionaire - Things that worked!

2009-01-31T21:08:00.010+05:30

To start with, for all those who saw it on their laptops.. guys you missed it.. should have waited till the movie released in India.. I guess this goes for any movie.. but more so for SDM, I believe.. cause it makes it look all the more grand...the India that we ignore.. that we don’t believe still exists .. its an in your face look into the world that none of us have ever seen this closely..
SDM is a movie about hope, love and destiny.. and that you can make it happen if you believe in yourself...

It gets the message across and how....

You’ve got to give the credit to Danny Boyle for making a movie which is so simple yet so effective.. having got rave reviews from all over the world.. it finally released in India last week.. but only a small section of society actually went to see the movie despite all the hype.. reasons could be limited number of shows in English .. or simply the fact that people had already seen it (on their laptops, like our very own Vivek ) .... :D

We all know the story by now.. so no point discussing it.. rather lets take a look at a few distinguishing features, which make the movie so special:

1. The story/screenplay.. its the story that makes us all come alive.. makes us all believe that.. yes, it indeed is “written”.. you just gotta go along believing in yourself, despite all odds..
And that love does find a way.. :)

2. The direction and cinematography.. amazing... its remarkable the way that they have shown the inside world of slums.. not having tried to modify it in any manner.. nor trying to glorify either..

3. The set of actors ranging from stalwarts like Anil Kapoor and Irrfan Khan.. to the new ones like Dev Patel and Freida Pinto and all the actors who play their younger counterparts.. amazing set of people who make their characters look completely believable..and kudos to all the 3 actors who play Jamal.

4. Music..its Jai ho all the way..a salute to AR Rahman.. having won the golden globe, I have a strong gut feeling he’ll win the Oscars too.. but whether he wins it or not hardly matters in the big picture.. he has made a mark in the international scene.. and made us all proud.. plus lyrics by Gulzar and not so known lyricists all deserve an applause..

Yes, we all know its not an Indian film per se but its a film about India and the spirit every Indian exudes.. so lets celebrate the fact and appreciate wholeheartedly the effort that a Brit has made in showcasing an Indian story to the world..

Mon Avis: Movie Review - Slumdog Millionaire - genius (not great) cinema!!

2009-01-21T00:01:00.006+05:30

The movie begins with rhetorical forethought almost with a lust for sensationalizing the plot and a self-indulgence that only a potent visual medium like cinema can afford - the movie begins with this question

Jamal Malik is one question away from winning 20 Million rupees. How did he do it?
A: He cheated
B: He’s lucky
C: He’s genius
D: It is written

And then you receive the answer... through an experience called Slumdog Millionaire

I guess seldom you see the world celebrating Indian spirit in a way like this, seldom you see the Indian cinematic creativity being acknowledged on a global forum and without parody and seldom you see the world taking Indian cinema seriously and getting curious to know 'Who is that composer?' / 'Who is that actor?'.

Such a celebration was done at the Golden Globe with a handful ambassadors of Indian Cinema. It was expected from Lagaan and it was expected from Devdaas. But it took a mix of desi and firangi crew to pull this off, may be hinting that India, by herself, is not ready enough to craft such a masterpiece.

Well, any which way, the Indian Cinema finally arrived with Slumdog Millioaire... and arrived after decades....

It was a majestic sight Rahman mentioning India, SRK presenting Slumdog .. to GG and Anil Kapur , dressed in a tuxedo, springing on his feet like a kid, at the sight of Boyle holding the trophy.

Slumdog... is a cinematic experience whose ingenuity renders you speechless and you ought to be fumbling for words other than the one that comes instantly - sheer 'genius'. Danny Boyle weaves together a cinema that is Indian in theme but certainly not in execution. That may not be great but certainly is clever. Smile. So now you know it, the reason it has hit the map is the very reason it has drawn the flak.

Story of Jamal and Latika , and many associated characters , this film is indeed a take on Mumbai's slums - rather a life from amongst slums. But one should be clear - It is NOT about Slums and it goes way beyond a mere narrative to become a string of episodes that baffle the audience when an undereducated call center chai wallah manages to unflinchingly answer all the questions in a variant of KBC.

I will not dive into the plot and I strongly recommend you dont do it either till you see the movie, because it is hard to believe now that after the global endorsement, you will not! Lol

Ups:

Script and execution - The way the scripts embeds a gameshow into the life of an ordinary boy both enchants and enthralls. This, in essence, is the crux of this beautiful cinema. Had it been done any other way, it would have risked a disastrous comedy of sorts by the sheer vulnerability towards incredulity
Actors - Lets first state that the movie is not about the actors, not about their lines and certainly not character driven - it is plot driven. Yet the cast of Dev Patel et al do too well to ignore. So does, Anil Kapoor!
Cinematography and Direction - Boyle did his homework well on India and made Anthony Dod Mantle (Cinematographer) do the exact same thing - They captured a wide glossary of Indian landscape so much so that few elite now accuse West of being fed on the lust for voyeuristic poverty in India. Well, so much for a piece of cinema and so much for a legacy in the making.
Mozart from Madras - Yes, the magician has waved his wand and created a score will be remembered for generation by east and west alike. His score in this movie lends a precious life to visuals. He has sealed his legacy in time when the entire world stood up and took notice of his music. Lets face it he has carved his name in immortal stones for generations to come and his music just keeps getting better. Jai Ho...

Downs:

Agreed that the same script that we extol has few logical fallacies that may give you more than a few chances to dismiss the movie as an imperialist's impression - the language of English spoken by Beggars in the movie, knowledge about Benjamin Franklin's to a slumdog and many more such possible loopholes ... but if you ever came across a word called creative license - this is the time to use it :) These are nothing but ways to relate to much wider audiences - Benjamin Franklin could well be Mahatma Gandhi and English could well be Hindi - Conceded with grace !
120 mins slightly too long :) As Alfred Hitchcock said - "The length of the movie should not exceed the strength of my bladder" . Lols

Caution: Please go and watch it with an open and unbiased mind - It is NOT an epic saga, It is NOT based on true story, and it is NOT meant to shake your inner soul and preach you a thing or two about the life in MUMBAI - It is an undemanding cinema which also turns out to be an effective entertainer, whether or not it garners any Oscar nominations as we speak!

Do not listen to people. Reams have been written about it and reams will be written about it in the days to come. Go and watch it and feel comfortable with the idea for not coming to like it. :) Not a shame, after all, the beauty of this cinema lies in the eyes of the beholder....

Mon Avis: Movie Review - CC2C - Average Masala Maritial Arts with a dash of humor!

2009-01-17T01:28:00.006+05:30

You take chinese kung fu (Read: Huen Chiu Ku of Crouching Tiger.. and Matrix fame) , add some saucy Bollywood drama (Read: Nikhil Advani signature), add some condiments of any new PYT bollywood may offer (Read: Double whammy Deepika), add another dash of an actor whose form is touching new highs (Read: Akki) and finally wrap it all together in a perfectly dressed high-powered production house (Read: Warner Bros.) - You get an unbeatable formula for success that puts the three Big Khans to shame. Alas, only if it works :)

CC2C borrows lightly from Kungfu Hustle in trying to create an illusion of martial arts- action -goofy slapstick genre. Again, it manages to evoke few laughters - credited to Akshay Kumar alone. Rest remains, ultra-ordinary , crisply picturized and utterly convoluted bollywood soap opera. There were so many cliched twisting-turning moments all packed into this one film that I began to wonder if the director had vowed to live his past, present and future works through this one product. Lol. Amazing sometimes when the directors get too desperate and throw everything into one - not knowing what may actually work with the audience.

Without touching the banal storyline, lets directly jump into what works and what doesnt work for this 'just about enjoyable' flick -

Ups:

Akshay Kumar - If there was any award that could be given for versatility, AK would be a frontrunner. He had a year of his life in 2008 and he just about continues the run in 09. His comic standings pretty much carry this movie on their shoulders. He is funny, he is goofy and he is likeable. Though even he is guilty of falling into the exaggeration trap
Action sequences - If you can briefly forget the legendary chinese stuff you may have seen in umpteen Hollywood movies, you will have to agree that this one has some decent stuff that look 'out of bollywood'.
Comedy - Comic moments work , a couple of them even without akshay kumar (not quoting any, may act as spoilers . for whatever little this movie has )

Downs:

Music - All songs except Akshay's rap (during end credits) are a big let down. I dont understand why they left this element out! The songs are utterly ordinary to even mention
Deepika - The PYT still has a long way to go. Merely a debut with SRK needn't be a certificate. Here too, the role made her look as if she was exerting too much to be able to emote right. Ordinary again.
Overdone masala script- Gastronomical nightmare - Too many cliched bollywood elements (what could have worked), not in balanced quantity (what din't work)- Lost sisters, demented beggary father, revenge for mentor's death, too much of chinese parody et al

Not the most enjoyable movie to have been churned out, nevertheless one could not strip it off everything - Akshay and his new style of martial arts- goofy - comedy just about works before the tipping point.

Next week in the theatres, watch out for two Oscar probables , our own Slumdog Millionaire and Doubt (Starring Meryl Streep and Phillip Seymour Hoffman)

Mon Avis : Movie Review : The President is Coming - funny visit!

2009-01-11T19:47:00.006+05:30

One thing is sure - Movie undeniably has humor and that too compelling one. It will raise more than few laughters and it will raise them as early as 2 minutes in the movie. Most of it is sitcom and most of it relies on wittingly creative satire representing microcosm of elite, social workers, chapraasis, pseudo accenters, stock junkies and literati. The movie banks only on characters and humor-injected dialogues.

TPIC is a celluloid adaptation of a play by the same name and hence you feel the theater vibe well maintained by making it look like a handycam print. The movie parodies Bush's visit of 2006 to India and adds a fictitious man-hunt for One Young Indian who represents the country. Thus begins a comic sequence of events leading up to selecting one such individual amongst shortlisted six - A poet from Kolkata (Konkana Sen), a self-proclaimed Paris Hilton inspired spoilt PYT from Delhi(Ira Dubey), an accent call center trainer from Gurgaon (Vivek Gomber), an IIT homo Microsoft engineer from Hyderabad (Namit Das), a stock broker from Mumbai (Anand Tiwari) and an IIM grad social worker from Maharashtra (Satchit Puranik). Also with the story line are two American Counsalate judges for this process - a Kleptomaniac, bossy, self-obsessed Samantha (Shernaz) and a subservient, curvy, subservient assistant Ritu (Shivani ). I wouldnt go into the details for the fear of exposing spoiles, so go and watch it yourself. Smile.

Ups:

Strong screenplay despite rough photography and cinematography
Humor filled script, though sometimes relying more on crude humor of f words and a** filled dialect. Worthy satire on many american stereotypical connotations
Konkana - She puts on a brilliant role of a cunning,literature freak simpleton poet form Kolkata
Rest of the cast - Strong character presence and funny performances from this ensemble cast

Downs:

Draggy in the second hour , could be trimmed by good twenty minutes
Poor background music (none was needed, something is not always better than nothing)

Overall, a good watch for those of you getting really bored on the weekends. For the rest, a must watch atleast after the DVD release.

Mon invite avis : Movie Review - Ghajini - Aamir's stellar, rest is amnesia!

2008-12-25T12:18:00.002+05:30

Watching a premiere show for the 1st time in life is an experience I tell you.. and add to that the anticipation of watching Aamir Khan,one of our all-time best actors,makes it all the more exciting..

To begin with,you have a medical student-Jiah Khan(doesn't look like one) picking up the case of Sanjay Singhania(Aamir Khan) for a case study project,but is not allowed to do so by the Prof, since its a police case.. Aamir is shown to suffer from short term memory loss.. He has stick-on notes all over to help him carry out his daily activities.. photographs to remind him of each and every thing he has done or is supposed to do, like the way to his house,etc.. he has a camera that beeps every 15 min..(why so..?? the director might know i guess..)

Next you have a stupid policeman following Aamir for a murder he has committed,and happens to read his diary dated 2005..(you'll wonder why is the police officer all alone without any vehilcle of his own and a gun...)

The movie now goes into flashback of how Aamir, the rich famous guy, owner of a cell network company, falls in love with Kalpana(Asin), a small time model.. she does all the social service stuff.. helping a blind man cross the street,etc.. Aamir though doesn't reveal his identity to her( why again...)

Now the brave girl that Asin is,she saves 25 girls from kidney cum sex racket,while Aamir is away in London.. The don(Ghajini) now wants her dead cause 2 of those girls tell his name to the police.. The brutality with which the act is done will give you goose bumps.. and leave you wondering if it really is so scary to help people out in this country.. how many would if you're bound to meet such a fate. Aamir in his attempt to save Asin is hit with a rod on his head that gives him his characteristic scar and a memory that lasts for max 15 minutes..

But he's all out to find the man-Ghajini(the name whispered into his ears by his dying fiance) and take revenge,even though he doesn't recognise/remember his face..

He does succeed in the end.. opens an orphanage in the name of his beloved and is back to normal life ( no.. he doesn't get his memory back.. and thank God for it, unlike the usual predictable climax of our hindi movies).

Downs:

Direction,editing, fight sequences very amateurish.. the fight scene in the end is better of the lot..
Background score.. we've heard that umpteen no. of times.. Music & lyrics are a let down.. only Guzarish and Kaise mujhe tum are good.. you don't need songs in such movies.. and for god sake not at all the likes of lattoo and bachcho.. it makes the movie look mediocre..
The choice of actors(esp the villain) could have been better.. Jiah Khan's over enthusiastic act was just not needed.. in fact the character wasn't required at all..

Ups:

Its Aamir all the way.. his look in the movie, gestures, expressions.. nobody does that better than him.. he's a perfectionist no doubt...

You have to watch it for Aamir and Aamir alone.. QED.

Contributed by Aparna - Maiden guest post for the blog - Voila :D !

Mon Avis : Movie Review - The Day The Earth Stood Still - A dud remake!

2008-12-14T19:55:00.004+05:30

Never make a remake, if you cannot outdo it - more so, a science fiction.

It isn't enough justice to remake a classic hit of 1951 (with the same name) and get away with sticking too strictly to the plot and execution , even if it means dishing out an outdated concept - To the generation that has tasted Independence Day, War of the Worlds and too many of the likes, TDTEST 2008 is frankly an old wine in an even more outdated bottle - and it is over aged- Bad bad timing! :)

And it isn't that TDTEST 2008 hasn't changed a bit from the 1951 flick. The alien (Keanu Reeves) is more morose, appears to save the earth for a slightly 'different' reasons (Hold your breath! Global Warming , vis-a-vis Nuclear endangermnent in 1951).

An alien Klaatu lands on earth through a mysterious glowing sphere in the middle of Central Park , New York. He is from another world inhabiting a human body (Keanu Reeves at that ! ) and descends along with a robot Gort to warn the world leaders about earth's destruction through global warming. US government reacts in panic, issues code red and then goes on to disregard Klaatu's warnings which forces him to initiate the annihilation procedure (through a bizarre release of some darn insects which eat up all the living /dead matter - some creativity there!). In there is Jennifer Connelly who plays a micro biologist of some kind and develops a bonding with Klaatu and keeps on hamming "We can change" line throughout as if subtly campaigning for Obama!

Downs:

The inherent problem of the movie is stale execution and sketchy development of the characters. Nothing is explained enough and nothing is introduced enough to require an explanation. The script has not been tweaked and everything hence appears to be haphazard compilation of underwhelming special effects - Honestly, they are making TV series with better sci-fi characters than this! Neither there is a strong message, nor any applaudable graphics!

Wasted cast - Keanu is wasted in his morose portrayal of a half-baked character, he derives it directly from Matrix and Constantine. But to absolute no effect. Connelley frankly had no special purpose in the movie and her step-son played by Jaden Smith (Will Smith' son) could not half manage the endearment from his The Pursuit of Happyness.

Average special effects - really nothing to write home about and totally unsupported by the script

It is waste of time even if you have high tolerance for sci-fi stuff! You can only survive if you are a die hard Keanu Fan but even then there are chances of you tearing your hair by the time credits roll.

Avoid it!

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Rab Ne... SRK's Classic Cliche!

2008-12-13T13:05:00.005+05:30

Yes, he has done this over and over again and that this one just about puts him at what he does best! Pairing up with Ady Chopra after years of creating blockbusters - Mohabbatein.. and DDLJ..., AC tries to weave the same magic again .. though not with the same success. No doubt the movie works, it even offers you a fresh script, almost a musical and danci(cal).

But then he falls into his own trap of making everything grander than life.. and he blows the otherwise seemingly innocuous script into a slight exaggeration. Come to think of it, a girl does not recognize her geeky-spectacle wearing husband because he rids himself of specs, gels his hair, and wears some almost glaring clothes. But I guess that is what 70 mm is all about - Larger than life...and mostly unreasonable (though extremely entertaining)

So here you have a geeky Surendra Sahani - lighting up people's life through Punjab Power (Actually his greeting words on phone . haha). Turn of events force him to wed Taani (ANoushka) when he merely visiting her already scheduled wedding (Talk about destiny! ).. So there begins a jodi orchestrated by Rab himself! A journey where SRK tries to win his lady love (wife! ) becoming Raj (Oh so familiar - Naam toh suna hi hoga?). We see him kidding his own previous masterpieces through Raj, DDLJ mentions and various other such funny acts! Delight when an actor make fun of his own achievements and cliches! .

Ups:

SRK restricts his hamming only to his alter ego Raj and pulls off the geeky romantic with a flair, somethings that very few actors capable of! His hamming is what we have got used to and to many of us, that is what makes him so endearing to us (exclude me)! And of course his comic streak and even monologues (see one in him talking to a mannequin) are nothing less than endearing! And as one of my friends pointed out, his only restraint has been Swades!
Music - Well, it works too - Haule Haule and even Dance pe Chance manage to keep you hooked - Then comes a most outrageous portrayal of films within a film - another SRK special spanning over four generations of Bollywood with four different heroines of the curent era! Well choreographed by Miss Merchant! - How can be an Aditya Chopra film be without hummable music!
Anoushka - She comes out as an affable and chaste beauty and balances her act brilliantly - Terrific screen presence too I must say - Not bad debuting with the King Khan!
Cinematography - Carried off well, showcasing most of Punjaabi streaks - Though I would still prefer an OLLO style cinema for that!

Downs:

V P - Let me state earnestly , I dint know Vinay Pathak was in the movie.. and in the hind sight , i am thankful I dint, or else my expectation would have been more than what I got from him - After , past few wonders from him, he could have been a paired-comedy-classic with SRK - But alas, wasted - He plays SRK's buddy Bobby Khosla who is his partner in crime for the transformation into Raj and a little more than that for few just about bearable comic scenes!
Length - Almost 170 Mins was way too long for me to bear - but then it ended . :)
Exaggerations in script took this one again into the lala land.

A timepass, and not a disappointment if you are a hard core SRK fanatic!

Mon Avis : An 'aside' note on 60 Seconds Deep !!

2008-12-06T23:00:00.006+05:30

Having seen Jaimini Pathak in Hazaaron Khwahishein Aisi and a couple of soaps on erstwhile TV erea , I was intrigued by his history of experimental theatre. And with nothing interesting to watch in movie theatres this weekend, I decided to give Jaimini Pathak directod 60 seconds deep a shot. Premiered at Prithvi Theatre in Mumbai, 60SD came to Chennai on its way to IHC, Delhi (Click on the link)where it plays in the coming week.

Less than half an hour into the play, I was awed by the absurdity of acts! Not much later I realised, this one was not going to have one single threaded script - it is half a dozen acts wound together symbolizing fast paced urban life and a search... A hilarious radio gig, a comic rip off of "the moment of truth" and half a dozen musical acts of variety angles and all that united by a common theme - Search ... To be honest, not being used to theatre medium has its own mental hold-backs - I had to strain my mental faculty to make sense of this otherwise almost bizarre 100 minutes of roleplay. As I find later, Jaimini filled up for an absentee in the cast by acting in it and did quite well !

Good show, and a good change normal dose of theatre! Though, mentally challenging! Smile!

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Transporter 3 - Action stuffed!

2008-12-04T21:23:00.006+05:30

In another of the unapologetically ridiculous 100 minutes spin-off of the Transporter franchise, Frank Martin (Jason Statham)., lets his Audi do all the talking, while he is brooding in almost a Bond-like style and intensity. Ahem! Did we hear , " In my profession, a man is as good as his car?".. Aha! There we have it! The movie is all about the maneuvers, jumps, skids, floats and climbs of his Audi! Some really breathtaking stuff, I must say, as it unfolds on the bigger screen, beyond the run-of-the mill car chases.

Amongst all the slick car stunts , thrown in are few characters - a villain played by Robert Knepper, the Transporter playing expressmail for a package (a freckled Ukrainian daughter of hi profile minister), a bunch of goons fist fighting with Statham and of course, the hero (or the heroine) of this flick - The Audi A8 which is W12 engined!

Ups:

Good action sequences - Jumping onto the running training , inventive-float out from the water and couple of others give you your money's worth . Add to that, Jason ridiculously does (or say overdoes), Bourne like action - fist fights et al. Who said the two had only first name in common? lol
Hyper-caffeinated editing - lets you from being bored
Jason Statham - He carries off the third franchise with decent flair
Good OST - Yeah, few of the Numbers really work! :)

Downs:

Though good, the stunts and story become repetitive and predictable. Though not boring, yet for the third straight time - it merely relies on high powered action and some high fidelity editing. Add to that some really senseless manual hand fights where the hero comes out unscathed - arent we getting inspired from Bollywood here? lol
They seemed to have hit a bell curve here.. T1 was Good, T2 was Better and now T3 is just about Good - I hope they dont go over to T4 unless they really have a novel concept.

All in all, a decent time pass with some edge of the seat action. If you could bear QoS, this one should not do much harm

Mon Avis : Sorry Bhai - half progressive half humourous attempt!

2008-11-30T18:04:00.004+05:30

It is difficult to completely like the movie even under the garb of progressiveness due to an almost disgusting notion of sleeping around with your brothers wife days before their wedding and yet it is difficult to dismiss this as a crass cinema because it has been executed too well with appropriate dash of humor thrown in for good measure. This is another brave attempt in Bollywood which trances the mainstream audience too due to its tightrope balancing act. It is not a preachy cinema.

Onir's smartly crafted Sorry Bhai is a story of Sanjay Suri, a hot shot Mauritius broker who is about to be wedded to Chitragandha in Mauritius. Estranged for almost two years, he calls up back home to his parents Boman and Shabana who live with his researcher brother Sharman Joshi. They meet Chitragandha in Mauritius, everyone seems to like her except Shabana, who accepts her rather reluctantly. Chitragandha slowly falls for Sharman who is a researcher in physics with a passion for Jazz. They too end up getting physical in a trial room of a clothing showroom. Then a story ensues which is rather predictable but nonetheless played out sincerely.

Ups:

The movie rests completely on performances. It is not about script, not too much of snazzy cinematography but plain execution that makes this a balanced movie. The fact that it does not harp too much on the moral angle of incest may have made it more endurable
Characerisation - Sanjay has done his part gracefully, giving the movie its best moment in a fairly sensitive act - the moment justifying 'Sorry Bhai' , when Sharman professes his guilt to his brother. The scene, if done any other way, could risk being blown into the face of the movie
Sharman plays another of the balanced act with near perfection. His social buffoonery due to his research mindset acts as source of the dash of humor and he seems to have perfected the art of comedy over last few years.
Boman and Shabana (termed by one of my friends as another Jaya and Amitabh kind of pair in their late years) carry off a delightful performance reminiscent of their chemistry in Honeymoon Travels
A delectable seductress - Chitragandha makes a comeback after Hazaaron Khwahishein... in this dishy appearance without getting too moral about sleeping with the fiance's younger bro days before wedding. She oozes sexuality in a way that is too tempting to resist. A fine act which could be better, had she not looked a little too overconfident in the role

Downs:

Even leaving the moral angle unexplored, the nonchalance portrayal of otherwise quite an incestuous act is a little far stretched exercise even with the most progressive societies
A little draggy in the end - some stretches in between become heavy, unnecessary and boring.

A not-so-bad watch if you can control your disgust for the theme, no matter how it is executed.

Mon Avis: Movie review - Oye Lucky...L.O - Plainspoken endearing cinema!

2008-11-30T09:15:00.008+05:30

There is a thing about the movie and you wont know what, that captures your attention from first frame to the last. If you have been lusting for the holiday hollywood releases to feed your appetite for good cinema, dont let this one pass off because of its corny name. Dibankar Banerjee's second attempt at cinema after splendid first Khosla ka Ghosla leaves you on a trail of picturesque winter Delhi. Casting accents from Jats to Punjaabi's this flick is mouthful of typical multifarious delhi locales.

OLLO is Abhay Deol's best work, though I still bet my shirt on his upcoming Dev D - a modern take on Devdas! He plays a cool as cucumber con man - theiving delhi households by con and feeding his worldly desires for better life and his lady love - played by gorgeously-simplistic Neetu Chandra.

Affected by his father's (played by Paresh Rawal) hostile apathy towards his demand for better things since age 15, he sets out on a brash conning spree. This is almost another take on Bunty/Bubbly but sans Bubbly and sans Yashraj rhetorics! He meets a godfather delhi conman (Paresh Rawal again) and as an insubordinate he turns to meet another vile character in form of an animal doctor (Paresh yet again in his triple role) who dupes him of a chance to set things straight!

Ups:

Wonderful cinematography and refreshing picturisation - The way the characters have been made to plainspeak hits you pleasantly. As if, this was intended to portray exactitude of real life.
Protagonist character charms his way through to the audience - best work so far from Abhay Deol - Fairly believable cons without outlandish digs !
Rest of the cast chips in with class acts giving typical delhi vibes - Manjot Singh (young Lucky) and Paresh Rawal included
Script - though seemingly banal, has been given fantastic treatment by the director - the editing included

Downs:

Music - was a disappointment - not that one was really needed
Paresh Rawal's tripling! though dint do much harm but wasnt a comprehensible move - Maybe the production house ran out of money and Rawal ran out of work! Smile
120 minutes too long - The entire thing had a drag too it that you could feel by the time end credits role! Though not exactly a pot boiler, yet few moments had uneasy boredom taking over you temporarily. Could have done with shorter version
The Name - Do not know why they settled on this one! Could turn off a lot of people

All in all, another coming-of-age cineme that is as entertaining as it can get! Watch it for a true taste of delhi and Abhay Deol's act!

Mon Avis: Movie review - Yuvvraaj - Overkill of Showmanship!

2008-11-23T22:27:00.008+05:30

I think Ghai needs to know that showmanship only works with the basic ingredients in place - I thought he had learnt his lessons with Yaadein and Kisna. But when I somehow finished watching Yuvvraaj, I think once again he took his make believe world too seriously! There are few things which are clear

Ghai is over obsessed with his showmanship and gets myopic with his so called 'vision'
I am not sure who worked in this movie for whom - Salmaan took it up because Ghai starred Katrina in it - Or Katrina took it up because Salmaan promised it would be the 'in' thing to work with Mukta Arts! Clearly, both cant be that desperate
Anil Kapoor, I am damn sure, never read the script. He probably was conned into his act somehow by a promise of stake - He can do better than this
I will not even talk about Zayedd - he is just lucky to be cast anywhere - may be he can do more but he needs be more fortunate with landing good roles
A R Rahman will never work with Ghai again - He will also regret his decision of offering Ghai a musical
The only understandable cast is Mithun - only he could take this project up because this is his only way of getting into the mainstream cinema again and play his age! Phew - atleast one blunder explained

Ghai's so called magnum opus falls short on every count - To simplify it - it is the story of three brothers - Salman, Zayeed and Anil are three brothers who are sons of a London billionaire (dont bother with the names, forgettable) - Salman plays a reel life spoilt brat (caricature of his real life i guess) in love with Kat but unable to please her dad Boman Irani after having been thrown out of his father's house 5 years ago. The eldest son Anil is autistic while Zayed plays another Casanova prodigal son. The three are shown together when the old man dies leaving his billions to the autistic Anil -

Downs

Poor script or may be the lack of it - extremely hotch potch characterization - the movie begins with a half-baked display of salman-katrina angle and dwells on it for first entire half hour - it started gettin to me - man, i thought, what happened to the other actors that they showed in the trailors - have i been conned? Lol
The entire bunch of characters - Salman hams, Katrina hams even worse in her accented english (she got to me as well with her "hard core anti social family man" dialogue - i cringed in my seat), Zayeed is paid to yell throughout, Anil struggles to bring decency to his role, Mithun just about does his part, Boman is caricatured badly as a buffoon in one of his worsts, and Katrina should think hard about her career henceforth especially with that accented hindi. The only scene that comes close to being sensual is her playing violin (or cello as pointed out by a reader! Whatever - you figure it out) amidst a full-blown orchestra. Period. Pick up any combination from the above bunch, there was no chemistry by any extrapolation
A R Rahman probably dint know what Ghai would do to his music - Certainly only two hummable songs with even more pathetic lyrics - Rahman will think 100 times before pairing up with Ghai

The only saving grace both in terms of signature-Rahman and lyrics was "Tu meri dost hai..." I fell in love with the song when I first heard it - and it featured in the first ten minutes itself - but much to my horror the picturization was as amateurish as a pictorial KG fairytale book (See it for yourself http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=9BGH1ZVNGeU ) . We are better off just with the audio i guess.

Go watch it and blame yourself for ignoring all the warnings. I did. Somehow survived till the end-credits.

So much for 50th post in three years! What a journey!

Mon Avis : Dasvidaniya - 10 things to do before/after you see this movie!

2008-11-19T23:30:00.003+05:30

All ups no downs - This is NOT a review - I tried , I couldnt.

Do not compare it with Bucket list before you see it - See it and you will know why it cannot be compared - it turned out to be different and better than the Bucket list
Do not miss applauding Vinay Pathak and the pathos he conveys through his superb execution - He is one the finest yet underrated actor in our country
Do not look for music - It did not need one yet it has a very supportive score by Kailash Kher
Do not attempt to write a review for it - You will most like never come close to describing its true sense
Do not attempt to star the movie or rate it on a scale of one to 10 or five - the attempt will be disgusting
Do not try to appreciate this movie any further than the first impression it had on you - if it dint move you, perfectly fine - your day will come!
Do not dismiss the movie as a regular cinema - it is clearly not made to make profits
Do not prevent yourself from trying to build a bucket list of your own - when you are idle and you muse over your life - try thinking about 10 things you would like to do before you die - pen it down - i did - you will find it gut-wrenching
Do not miss watching it - atleast once before you die :) It is indeed the best good bye ever.
Do not hold back ..... if you CANNOT

Mon Avis: Movie Review - Dostana - Candyfloss flick!

2008-11-17T22:43:00.005+05:30

So let me not tell you that this is PG 16 for India (.. ok.. PG 2 by American Standards :) ).. let me not tell you that this movie champions the cause of Gay Rights! Because it doesn't, far from it actually and let me not tell you that this is anything else but a crass attempt to parody gays, show some skins of both genders and of course, in the process of all this - make some neat cash. I try not question the intent of film making if it is utterly clear - This is a crass cinema. But one that works with the audience in urban India or abroad.

Movie is all about Abhishek and John pairing up , pretending to be a gay couple to rent a posh Miami penthouse owned by an orphan - but - too hot Priyanka Chopra! Throw in a dash of gay lampooning , sit com and couple of regular Dharma studios - a punjabi hyper mom played by Dharma fave Kiron Kher , a stereotypical gay vibes fashion designer played by Boman Irani and the likes.

Ups :

Movie works partially due to some hilarious gigs in the first half, all - however - aimed at tickling the funny bone using absurdity of gay relations rather than reality of it. Audience, of course doesnt care, why else do you go to Dharma for this. Nair, Kukoonoor or even Bhandarkar could be it.
Typical flashy venues, though I would prefer Miami Vice, Burn Notice or even CSI - Miami, shooting a first bollywood movie at Miami certainly eases the cinematography
To keep it simple, Abhishek's buffunory works - John doesnt spoil the broth - and Priyanka is super hot eye candy with whatever little she has on her body throughout

Downs:

Shoddy script - draggy second half with unnecessary and unnatural and forced melodrama - i think people got desperate to just wind up the shooting some how and go!
Music is certainly not the studios best. They have had better days.
They lost the plot somewhere with Bobby Deol! I do not know why have three woody faces act in a movie - all three pathetic dancers . Bobby has a forced expression all the way. Or may be its my bias. Anyway, it certainly did not lend any surprise tick to the movie.

Time pass entertainer which works because of its regular fluff! Watchable on an otherwise worthless day!

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Eagle Eye - Popcorn thriller!

2008-11-14T16:44:00.012+05:30

It is at best a popcorn thriller ranging from a die-hard kind obsessed action throwarounds to a more nuanced idea of paranoia and dangers of technology gone wild. What this movie is going to make you do is to freak out and disconnect yourself from the electronic world - it will make you take out the batteries from your mobile phones.

Shia Labeouf plays Jerry Shaw and Michelle Monaghan plays Rachel Holloman. Shaw andHolloman were complete strangers pushed together by a mysterious phone call from a female voice. A serious of freak incidents bring them closer to work on an undisclosed cause guided all the way by the mysterious voice on the phone.

The movie has a Steven Spileberg impact all over it - plus it looks like the mix of War of Worlds, I Robot and The Fugitive. It brings forward the paranoia when the mysterious voice guides the characters towards a mission and controls the entire electronic environment around them - from bill boards to electric poles, from trains to demo television screens in the showrooms. This is why the first 1 hour makes for a nail biter
Ups:

Nail biting first hour where the audience (as much as the characters within the movie) are left clueless and thrilled by the sudden unfolding of paranoia at each step of the characters and with each piece of electronic equipment imaginable around them.
Racy script which allows you no time to think and keeps you on your seat's edge

Downs:

Where they lose it all is the banal script and even more banal climax. You bear all the thrills just to find out that the voice is some cliched supercomputer project launched to keep a tab on the electronics around the US and the world - The computer (lady voice over the phone) goes wild and attempts to control the world at a trigger for a coup and thus tries to offset the US Senate (or whatever). They almost killed me here..... So much for such an excellent first half
The movie drags in the second half through all the half baked plot sequences and not-so-convincing climax. Any regular Hollywood watcher will reject it without thought. They made it a hotchpotch.
Mediocre acting partly owing to horrendous character development and forced sequence

An average watch with a bucket of popcorn. Nothing impressive really.
Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Rosario Dawson, Michael Chiklis, Anthony Mackie
Directed by: D.J. Caruso

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Quantum of solace - Underwhelming!

2008-11-09T14:08:00.004+05:30

It is just not the name is Bond ... James Bond.. but there is more to the brand. It is a franchise. A global one at that. If you walk into the world's greatest franchise - PH, Domino, McD, StarBucks et al, you expect the basic ingredients and then some experiments. The franchise cannot reinvent itself unnecessarily. Let's face it, experiment does not work and here it dint work at all.

Releasing in India one week after UK and one week before US release, the latest Bond flick QoS is a Bond Movie minus so many stylo-typical things you have come to expect of Bond.

To begin with QoS has NO line "..name is Bond.. James Bond...", it has NO bond music kept with franchise for years, NO martini (neither shaken nor stirred - rather Bond drinks some vague drink here) and NO cars - one Aston Martin regular with no gadgets - attached or otherwise.

So what does it HAVE - has a Jason-Bourne-reinvented-himself-as-Bond character who fist fights, rope fights, boat fights, plane fights and then shoots indiscreetly at any object coming inbetween his over whelming desire for vengeance for Vesper (His love interest from the prequel). In comes a Villain who is trying to gain control over the world's most precious resource - Did we say Oil? Well, no it is errrr... .'Water' ladies and gentleman. All this done by the mastermind under a random organisation called Quantum (Alas! people may think hence the name, but Alas ! (one more ) Quantum is mentioned only once at the end - How moronic!)

Downs:

As said, no typical bond elements - somethings should never be tampered with.
Shoddy script - nothing explained, no character development, no plot development
A bunch of characters thrown here and there with a half-masochistic and half- Devdasic Daniel Craig
I am sure there was a climax- but I am also sure it wasnt one I really understood - and then I became sure it was one that no one in the theatre could understand.
Bond girls were average at best with little or no skin show (again typical of a bond movie.. alas! - one more

Ups:

Few good action sequences. Period.

I saw this in Chennai where supposedly Bond movies are a rage. And even this Rajni-crazy city was writhing in agony after the end credits rolled. Shame!

Avoidable. Barely a time pass.

Mon Avis : Movie Review - Body of Lies - Pale thriller!

2008-10-19T18:17:00.005+05:30

The two Scott brothers have a knack of doing racy movies.. While Tony has doled out Top Gun, Crimson Tide, Deja Vu and Spy Game - his elder sibling has given us A Good Year, Kingdom of Heaven, American Gangster and the latest : BODY OF LIES.

But if you ask me his brother Tony did a far better feat with CIA-based spin off script in Spy Game than this B.O.L. If Spy Game was about CIA flair starring Robert Redford as the mentor and Brad Pitt as his protege, BOL stars Ridley's tried-before Crowe as the handler and De Caprio as the protege. Simply put BOL = Spy Game + Terrorism and that is where it loses it charm.

Crowe is a self obsessed, antagonistic, devious but patriotic CIA handler who is shown clumsily blabbering at his hands-free chatting up with the actual field operative De caprio. De Caprio does his Blood Diamond/Departed repeat of running around while bullets fly past him and things go up in fumes. He does the dirty work, double crosses others, gets double crossed by others (including Crowe a few times) only to land up on an unending trail of some stereotypical Al Q leader. In between they also liaise with Jordan intelligence head played by Mark Strong when hot on trail of this terrorist master mind. [ Sorry folks, whats in the name? eh!]

Downs:

Terrible scripting - Shoddily crafted characters with no clear roles and the audience is lost without a trace of story - jetting between different cities of the middle east. Add to that, mindless spraying of bullets and structures blowing up in the face of the audiences a little too often. I waited patiently for the edge of the seat moments but sadly had none. It was espionage alright, but not as well packed as you expected
CROWE/DECAPRIO - Honestly folks! I went in for this duo and their work with Ridley. To be least harsh on them, they FAILED. While Crowe is cast as a chubby and clumsy handler (almost as schizophrenic as that of his previous John Nash in Beautiful Mind ;) ), De caprio does not stand up either. Even without being objective, you could simply feel that the chemistry between the two was absent.
Length - It was 140 mins of a drag! Could have been shorter any day!

Ups:

Theme - May be this is the only saviour in today's times when everything right from Burgers to Foreign Policy is being sold to US public in the name of Terrorism. This movie too brushes the theme! though very weak execution.
Mark Strong - Mark Strong pulls up the same panache as in Syriana and comes out as the only (and surprising) delight of the movie. He steals the show with his suave arabic blended english.

Disappointing , but you can watch it for such combo of Decap/Crowe is a rare happening. Espionage genre lovers must tone down their expectations.

Mon Avis : Review: Babylon A..D. - Senseless brawn!

2008-10-11T23:09:00.003+05:30

Ordinarily I am not a sadist, but here I would genuinely request you to go and see this no-brainer and ridiculous action cinema.

This movie has an asinine script which is full of flimsy characteristics right from stupid-sounding names (Torrop and God-knows-what...) to one of the silliest story lines I have seen in long time. Couldnt believe Mathieu Kassovitz who directed Gothika last, could execute such a disaster.

Vin Diesel plays Torrop, a fighting-bull like mercenary who is some fuzzy killer for hire and carries out some random jobs around the world. Here he plays transporter to a so-called unspoilt virgin girl who has a strange aura around of her and is un exposed to cruel world outside. He has to transport her to New York, along with her protector played by Michelle Yeoh. Thus, the movie unfolds a series of senseless shots combined to appear like a big screen cinema. Pathetic, for the lack of a better denouncement.

Downs:

Shoddy script - self-contradicting, senseless, arbitrary, disconnected, expecting high level of tolerance from audience but offering no intelligent substance. Sad storyline. Neither, the girl's character is outlined to a bare-minimum level needed for an action movie , nor the side characters mouth a wee bit of expression with the dialogues. Hotch potch.
Actors - As if they fell along with the entire senseless offering. Vin Diesel, Michelle Yeoh wasted to the core.
Action - Nothing to rave about. Very ordinary stunts not worth mentioning. This could be the only salvaging point, but missed by miles

I tried once. I tried again. I became desperate. Then, I gave up. Could not find a single reason as why this movie was made.

Please go and watch it. And let me know if you could find one - will vindicate my effort of 90 mins in watching this disaster.

Mon Avis: Review: The Man From Earth - Un-aging Tale!

2008-09-29T01:14:00.004+05:30

There could be nothing more circumstantial at a day when you aged one more year, turned 25 ... to be watching a film which hypothesises all the possibilities if a man lived 14000 years to present.. without aging :)

Sitting on a couch 1100 miles away from the best buddies, friends and family... living in a privileged time of technology to be affording a cell phone which is constantly buzzing with calls of birthday wishes through the midnight (one huge surprise too!:)), I watched this riveting drama that simply was about rewarding inquisitiveness.. and the theory of "what-ifs"... and I must tell you... my entire concept of cinema changed forever...

Well, is it possible to create a science fiction cinema without a single computerised shot or special effect? Is it possible to create a science fiction cinema with a motley bunch of nondescript characters in a single hearth lit room? and above all is it possible to create a science fiction cinema with the in-film time spanning just about 90 minutes? Well, the answer is The Man From Earth.

The movie is all about conversation, it is about inquisitiveness as a human instinct, it is about a innate human readiness for giving way to possibilities...

For about a decade John Oldman (played by David Lee Smith) has been a popular history professor . He is mysteriously giving up tenure and leaving for unexplained reasons to go to an undisclosed destination. His bewildered friends are throwing a good-bye party for the charismatic teacher.

John's friends clearly want to pry the secrets from their enigmatic colleague. The secret is that he has had access to knowledge of history that they did not--far more knowledge than they could ever have. Their conversation centers on why he has this information,

but also on how history is not what people might have thought it was--and what the implications are of his special knowledge.

Then comes a shocking revelation... The man in question says he has been in existence for about a 14000 years and moves on every 10 years to some other location when his friends start to feel that he is not aging...

Then becomes a sojourn of exchanges of disbelief, consternation, mocking-queries, probing-queries, serious-queries... about what was it like... to be living such a long time.. meeting so many people... etc etc etc

Ups:

Simple, No frills drama, banking solely on characters and dialogues...
David Lee Smith - The man who pulls it off as John Oldman. His character has been sketched and implemented by him to such well-balanced way that it gives a queer credibility to the film.. and the script
The other character: What else could hold this film except the characters.. and they did just that.... fantastic performances with few unknown faces (telly dramas most of them came from)
Script : This is the only thing that this film is about.. there is no room for trick cinematography, editing, stunts, clever shots etc. This movie is a classic example of stupendous script writing.

Downs :

A mix of predictable and unpredictable climax (not giving it away. You should watch it to know it!)
Poor marketing - I dont know why but not many people knew this was released in 2007.. until it found its way through good old torrents :)

Must watch this one whenever you get time. This is a classic movie that will not bore you even for a second.

How would you feel if you had lived 14000 years to the present without aging and narrating your story to your pals?

How would you feel to BE one of those pals ? :)

Try this kind of social experiment... get into a room with your friends and bluff , say, that you have had the power to be invisible all throughout... and see how your friends react, question, discredit , willingly believe and then psychologically drain themselves. Excellent but can't pull off? Then watch The Man From Earth

Mon Avis : Review : ROCK ON : Music, Camaraderie and Passion!!!

2008-08-31T21:29:00.007+05:30

'Rock On' has a soul that extends beyond its name... a movie with 'rock' as just the symbol for passion... they dont harp on it much and they are not looking to convert either. That is the reason why a rock aficionado and a non-believer will love this alike.. for Rock music in this flick stands for passion and a language that unites four youths with a dream to make music ...and make it big.

Rock On attempts a Dil Chahta Hai and does it quite wonderfully. The difference though is that DCH was about camaraderie and friendship while this one is about music and friendship... but lets stop the comparison right here :)

Rock On begins with the present life of four college buddies united by their passion to create rock music. Aditya Shroff (Farhan Akhtar), Rob Nancy (Luke Kenny), Joe Mascarenhas (Arjun Rampal ) and Kedar Zaveri aka KD for Killer Drummer (Purab Kohli) are shown living a disconnected, soul less and mechanical 10-years-post-breakup- life. AS is an I-Banker living a bland life away from music, KD is seen working inattentively at his father's jwellery shop, Rob is working at jingles and keeping faithful to music while Joe, the most talented of the lot, is struggling to make ends meet at his house and no break with music. The story intermittently flashes back to show the audience their peaking camaraderie and then an unforeseen friction that breaks up the band and separates the four into their own corners...until .. they reunite.....

Ups:

Ensemble Cast!- The blend is near perfect but the revelation is Farhan Akhtar. He shows why cinema is in his blood . He comes out as another aamir-khan-styled perfectionist who loves his work so well. I wonder how would he decide whether to act or to direct. He comes off as stunningly believable actor and gels so well into the role that you refuse to believe his track record behind the camera.. he is too good infront of it too...and what more.. you see him behind the mic too.. he lends his voice to quite a few verses and you only wish you could stand up and applaud this fine act...he shows this uncanny charisma that establishes him as a lead actor for the sake of this movie.....kudos to Farhan...Arjun Rampal as well gets under the skin of the role and does too well in his grave role...Luke and Purab complete the cast (and the band) with their half sober-half witty act which is never overdone. Purab, especially, has shown more than often that he is too versatile.
Music!! - Music (by their band - Magik) done actually by Shankar-Ehsaan- Loy is the backbone. Showcasing rock music (hindi, at that) for the first time in a mainstream cinema is a tough job when you are faced with the challenge of appealing to mass media. This movie does it wonderfully and never seems to over do it at any point. Lyrics of the songs may be (as rock music is guilty of) absurd and un rhyming but nonethelss music covers up for it.... Titles song, competition son, two slow numbers and the final song fit into the script too well.
Script and the rest - Slick cinematography, clever editing and camerawork - all this works for the movie and in the end the director (Abhishek Kapoor - by the way. lest we forget :) ) is able to complete his tight rope walk , with an astounding finesse.

Downs:

Some loopholes (not gaping though) in the script. The band breakup for instance is not very convincingly depicted.. few other sensitive moments like FA meeting up with his ex at a party is also shown to be emotionless. Anyway, director may have feared exaggerating it.
Reunion may have been over simplified and their excelling at rock music ( competitions with no sign of struggling) may also be overly romanticised.. but then they never had that length to support so many details....

Go and watch this regardless of your taste for Rock Music. You will enjoy the artificially created nostalgia and may be identify with it without leaping 10 years :) ...

Cheers,VS

Movie Review - '21' - Esoteric Con !

2008-06-07T22:33:00.004+05:30

Lets face it! You would end up liking this one only if you have working knowledge of BlackJack (also known as 21). For the rest, it is a mistake going for this one. And then lets face this as well that they have not made the movie any simpler for those who know how blackjack works. There is 'card counting', sign languages et al that is not explained enough unless you have a prior tryst with the game and casino lingo.

Story is about a MIT whiz Ben Campbel (Jim S) with 4 CGPA and near perfect profile applying for Harvard Med. Alas! HM will not take him on a full schol for 300 grand course unless he writes a dazzling scholarship essay. Tale begins, the boy returns to MIT to find himself being spotted by an astute professor (Kevin Spacey) in an intersting class session solving 'three door variable change problem'. The boy is offered an admit into an underground BlackJack team that travels to Vegas on weekends to con casinos by card counting. Initially for the 300 grand and a girl-interest who is already part of the gang, he joins the team and finds himself a pro at it. String of events make him huge money, turns him out of favor from his friends, then one of his gang members and finally the prof himself. What was a sophisticated cheating technique through 'simple math' then turns into pure gambling on luck. Losing the money, then losing the girl and then losing even the MIT course, the boy lands himself into the hands of a card counting detective (ex-card counter himself played by Lawrence Fishbourne). The movie then shows him redeeming himself and still walking out with some cash and of course, lest we forget, a theme for an essay that surely 'dazzles' the ad com chief :D)

Ups :

Stays faithful to the novel 'Bringing down the house' based on true events
Charms the uninitiated and a BlackJack pro alike. Reasonably pacy.
Spacey, Jim and the rest of cast pull it off quite well without major hiccups

Downs:

Neither the game nor the card counting is explained well (Assuming a minimum level of intelligence with the viewer :) )
The script could be made more convincing. Viewer is not easily led into belief that all this is possible. Classic example - Oceans 11 - Conning a casino, without being from MIT, was never more chic and sexier

A decent watch if you like esoteric cinema or simply if you are a fan of blackjack or the science behind it... :)

Movie Review - 'Tashan' - Stylish Outrageous Gimmick !

2008-04-26T17:19:00.008+05:30

The movie is undoubtedly a tashni affair that enthralls you from the very first scene. Resting only on some slick camerawork, outrageously colorful cinematography and star power , comes this Yash Chopra banner flick that may just about qualify as a TIMEPASS entertainment....A roller coaster ride taking you across locales from greece to ladakh, from kerala to mubai and from ghats of haridwar to allahabad.. this film is a banal stroy presented as a narrative of a call-center-guy cum english teacher casanova Jimmy (Saif) falling for Pooja (Bebo) who hires him to teach angrezi to her mafia boss Bhaiyyaji (AK). The seemingly benign pupose is actually a clever ploy of leaking some confidential information from Jimmy's call center for extortion of money. One thing leads to the other and then Bebo goes missing with few crores of rupees. Then comes in Bacchan Pandey (Akki) on a trail of Bebo and Saif...

Ups :

The film is all about stylish camerawork and breathtakingly colorful locales.. the movie's tashni highpoint is its cinematography which is so outrageously overwhelming that it overshadows the lack of everything else. How about that - even the dull looking ghats have been wonderfullly captured... the camerawork looks totally magical...with some slick editing.
Bebo! This movie is Kareena's answer to Aish of Dhoom 2. She lost pounds and that she makes no bones about while flaunting her figure. Playing a brash don side-kick and sizzlng in a two piece bikini (10 seconds front and back shots), she proves to be an eye candy of the film. Extremely sexy and oozing charecteristic charm, she steals the show.. see her in Challiya and Dildara...Total paisa wasool
Another solace of the movie is our own Akki who manages to tickle a funny bone or two..he shows he can fit in any role effortlessly ..he also gets some outrageous monkey like stunts

Downs:

Very ordinary script - The movie is a half-baked comedy, quarter baked action and another quarter baked thriller. Director's debut attempt focussed more on cinematography than story
Music is just about ordinary.. it sounds better with Video because of obvious reasons
Length - Just over 150 mins it is way too draggy , more so at the climax...
Action - So outrageous that you actually spend a laugh in the middle of it... too overboard
Anil and Saif - Totally wasted and in the movie only for their star power... Anil's costumes are disgustingly flashy...

All n all.. Tashan is a one time watch.. See it for Kareena and its cinematography...

Review : Krazzy 4 - A crazy senseless marketing gimmick

2008-04-13T09:09:00.009+05:30

Krazzy 4 is such a wonderful marketing gimmick that you will end up wondering whether this could be another of those cinema that can serve as a case-study in B schools - How to successfully sell a bad product - through item numbers, creating controversy around item numbers (fuelling hrithik vs shahrukh having danced on the same song), generating more media bytes by being drawn to court over copyright infringement (wonder if that was not a gag!!), and then appearing on television to promote your film as if this was an epic comedy the country had been waiting for. You are left scratching your head as to why this movie was made in the first place. Me and my fellow audience came up with these reasons :

1. The director went Krazzy

2. He actually 'outsourced' his JOB to some junior to be able to sell it in his name anyway

3. He had this strong urge to convert some black money into white

4. (I love this one - Thanks Joy!) He made a exaggerated bet over few drinks with someone that he could bluff the entire nation... ......

........ and he actually did!!!

This is another of the spate of comedy movies that bollywood has been churning out since last year but lacks the touch that fuelled the demand in the first place - Golmaal, Bheja Fry, and others were brainless ticklers but made sure that audience laughed and heres where this Krazzy product fails. Even if you see the movie on its own, it is all gas! Four mental patients (Irfan, Rajpal et al) let out by a sympathetic doctor (Juhi Chawla) to watch an India England cricket match in all her sincerity. The doctor gets kidnapped midway and the four patients are let lose in this world.... and a humorless tasteless tale unfolds

Downs :

Not a single dialogue evokes laughter, all it evokes is sympathy for each resource - from actors to spot-boys have been wasted
No script, brainless story line and hollow dialogues; They managed to ignore our intelligence.
Cliched comic stereotypes with nothing funny to do
Music or the lack of it - Horrible songs thrown in between the movie with absolutely insane lyrics - I wonder what was all the copyright fuss about - The music is far from worth it

Ups

Two item songs (title song) featuring Hrithik's insane break-moves and Shahrukhs MJ act. and one by Rakhi Sawant (Yes..indeed watchable) ....but then would you go all the way to theatres to spend 2 hours for 10 minutes?

Avoid it unless you are too fond of crass cinema!!!

Mon Avis: Review - Black and White - A soulful cinema

2008-03-18T08:24:00.006+05:30

Subhash Ghai has finally come up with a movie that has more soul and less of his now-so-characteristic showmanship. Mukta arts banner that was dead for a while has now been resurrected with this 10 crore piece shot almost entirely in Delhi's Chandini Chowk. This is neither a season of Republic fervour nor an Independence day fad so it makes you wonder whether the reason this movie has bombed at the box office is its sheer case of mistiming. Anyway.. the cinema he has constructed is praiseworthy if you are ready to overlook minor glitches. Well.. folks .. it will take SG some time to get over his bollywood impracticalities...

The film traces the life of two distinct individuals on two sides of patriotic idealism. Numer (an alias of a suicide bomber played by a newbie Anurag Singh) and Prof. Mathur (Anil Kapoor playing an Urdu professor at DU's Zakir Hussain Coll) symbolising black and white. While Numer is shown driven by fanaticism , Mathur is a peace-loving preachy lecturer who has become an epitome in chandni chowk for his secularism and harmony. The story revolves around Numer sneaking into Delhi, losing his inside-mentors, and subsequently plotting to misuse patronage given by Mathur and his wife (Played by shefali chayya). The bomber finally converts to drop his plan after an inner mind-battle.

Ups:

Anurag Sinha is undoubtedly a good find. His screen presence is enthralling and he fills the role extremely well. His grim face demeanor in the movie givs a a meaning to the plot and the way he sketches the character is awe-inspiring. No reason why he should not have a good future though he is yet to tested more.
Anil Kapoor is as usual awesome but a little preachy. he fits the role well but his character is too overdone to be belived. For instance, what kind of man would still attend indepence day show at red fort after duly cremating his wife been shot in bizaare shoot out at his place. Height of idealism. As said, somthings have to be ignored.
The movie without doubt has a soul. It is not over preachy and conveys just about the right things in a not-so-overdone manner.
Well shot.. The direction too has been nicely taken care of with no grandiosity as seen in many of Ghai's previous films
Performance.... The powerhouse performances by Anurag, Anil, Shefali and one Gaffar Bhai (Dont know his real name.. but he made a heart winning 84 year old actor with charismatic urdu touch)
Sukhwinder's music is not out of the league yet gives a good support to the story. Few hummable songs and nothing much to rave about except "Yeh hindustaan.. " and a sangeet song...

Downs:

Character development with lots of loopholes... Sketchy characters that are underdeveloped and hastily grown along the storyline
Climax is not as wholesome and almost dragged to bore. Though there is no cliched ending to the movie yet it gives you moments when you have to stare at your watch to know how longer...

The movie is worth a watch if not a repeat. It will nonetheless make enough profit considering its low investment but i am sure this movie was filmed not as a business but as a meaningful cinema. With so many stereotypical movies about patriotism churned out every patriotic-season, this one manages to hold on its own with a distinct streak....

Mon Resurrection : Five months Hiatus!!

2008-03-11T20:39:00.003+05:30

Its been a long time no see. Five fricking months since my last post. Where had i been? Well, simply put may be i was too lazy to come back to my notebook. Hence, the hiatus that will mostly be unexplained. However, most of it can be attributed to two phenomenons - Lack of internet connectivity at my home (plus some ****ing artificially over-intelligent software at work which blocks Blogger.com...anyway) and secondly, the most ill-fated season of entrance examinations that do nothing but constantly beat at the back of your mind.. Anyway.. all this did not mean that the movie trail stopped. Well, it didn't..I managed to catch most of the holly-bolly flicks. But never got down to write for any of those.

Hope to be back with some words hereon....

Mon Avis (Movie Review) : Laga Chunari Main... Old Wine Old Bottle

2007-10-13T22:22:00.000+05:30

Laga Chunari ... is a regressive film in many terms. No it is not preachy and contains no social message. It is hooked upon a bunch of stars who play their part fairly and manage to tell a short story in a very very long film. Rani Mukherjee is a simple young gal in an orthodox small city of Varanasi, her life plagued with problem with an ailing dad (Kher), overworked..hyper tensed mother (J Bachhan) constantly fretting for money, a sweet little sis (Konkana) and a bunch of vile characters set to encroach the only abode they have. Forced by circumstances, Rani lands up in Mumbai where she is turned down in Job interviews for the lack of qualifications and abused by a call center boss giving her an untrue promise of a job.

Then she turns to high class prostitution (escort) service which she remorselessly chooses as the profession.

Ups:

Only saviour is the power packed cast who are able to decently bring this cliched story to life
The movie unlike lot others of its genre (B- grade attempt Julie et al) is not preachy and does not attempt to carry a social message
Nice film packaging with decent score and good performances across characters
And yes i must say.. a good scenic package of shots of the holy city of Varanasi [:)]

Downs:

Too much has been said and done on the subject and Laga Chunari ... does nothing different. Old wine and old bottle... the worst part of course that Rani's character evokes absolutely no sympathy
The script and more so the screenplay is too flat to address anything in its entirety leaving the audience gawking with a dose of near perfect lightening and sets
The movie is simply too long crossing 150 mins

Watch it if you are getting too bored for the lack of choices..But if don't, you really dint miss anything

Mon Avis: Zodiac - Grim, Gritty, inconclusive trail

2007-08-28T12:12:00.000+05:30

This movie is all about hot trail of a serial killer remaining elusive but daring the Bureau to sniff him out, killer names himself Zodiac...

The movie is closely based on the string of murders of a serial killer who was never caught. A cat-and-mouse mental run which is often without conclusion and also comes teasingly close to busting the suspects..

Ups:

brilliantly capabale of sustaining interest and obsession, though confusing at times but very detailed and edgy
fact-based drama causing you to make an effort to relate events and follow the leads
skilful rhythm to the plot and deft editing
Jake Gyllenhaal, Robert Downey Jr., Mark Ruffalo do their bit and dont really take away anything from the larger plot

Downs:

the length of the film might give you a twitch
the inconclusive trail with no pay-offs generate as much of frustration as in the reel life to the ones on chase
a nice period piece set in 1970s and capturing the era well on the CinemaScope

It is difficult not to like this movie, the intensity of this drama through celluloid will affect you not too late into the movie..

Mon Avis: Gandhi, My Father - Sincere but Ineffective

2007-08-04T22:02:00.001+05:30

Gandhi, my father is a narrative that just falls short of being a documentary, and because of this it doesn’t spare you from yawning. No doubt that it is a sincere effort, an effort at doing something that has never been tried before – Showing Gandhi, the Father of his sons rather than Father of Nation.

As said, narrative is arduously long and to add to the misery it is also incomplete and ineffective at most of the times. The drama is intense but unable to sketch the strenuous father son relationship that MK Gandhi shared with his son Harilal (Played by Akshaye Khanna). The film canvases across his ambition to be a barrister, his shameful and guilt-ridden failures at business and matriculate exam, and his connivance with few greedy and opportunist businessmen to cash in on the popularity and benevolent image of MKG

Ups:

The movie is unique in terms of its context. It restricts Gandhi’s role in National Freedom to a backdrop and manages to devote most of its time to showcase deteriorating bond with his son
Akshay has pulled off gem of a performance. Needless to say though, he is one of the most underrated actors who have time and again shown what he is capable of. Even when you see him hamming in few of the scenes, he wins over your heart with the sincerity with which he rises above his role
Darshan Jariwala has done well in the role of Gandhi, though his impersonation of Gandhi dwindles at the end of the show
Shefali Chaaya shines in the role of Kasturba Gandhi as a woman torn between her allegiance to her husband and her love for her son

Downs:

Actors apart, director Feroz makes an honest effort to put things in perspective but fails to present a convincing portrayal.
Script, likewise, leaves a lot of loopholes to ponder over, Why MKG is against his son’s early marriage? Why he is left alone in India to study in his 'Rashtrabhasha’ while other children are in South Africa? Why suddenly he converts to Islam and who is his patron? These issues have been left hanging.
Length of the movie is another big mistake that director seems to have overlooked. The movie spans for more than 150 minutes and cannot do without a little pruning

All in all, a nice cinema if you have any interest in periodic dramas.

Mon Avis : Aap Ka Suroor - Excruciating !

2007-06-30T12:44:00.000+05:30

Please some one go and tell Himesh Reshamiya aka HR (Disgusting abbreviation!) that he was already well accepted for his singing and music talent and that he need not over-transfigure himself into a silly Music Icon who seems have an entourage of secret service guarding him!

How very stupid! But the insult to your intelligence does not stop there, HR goes on to mouth silly dialogues, participate in hamming his own concert and god knows what. If i were to list down the follies of the movie, i would rather be prepared to frustrate myself. But still i think ill do it upside down.... give you the downs first and ups (if any!) later

Downs :

Script : Show me the script if there was ever one written before picturisation of this movie. There is no story, no script and therefore no screenplay to talk of. Everything in this movie is such a hotch potch that you wonder which la la land the director attempted to take you. Even the scenes dont seem connected and hence speak volumes about the shoddy editing. Anyway, the movie wasnt made for script

Direction : Himesh's child hood friend, the director of the movie has been kind to HR to cinematize him but been very poor at his tradecraft. There are some scenes which are down right arbitrary ( For eg the Mumbai Autos (with cartoonish typical autodrivers) appearing in Germany literally out of thin air. What an injury to audience's sensibilities!!) But Alas! The movie wasnt made for director either

Music : Simply put, the score disappoints but possibly the only saviour. Going by HR's history of music blockbusters this one is at best OK if not a dud. It seems HR wrote his music first and then inserted dialogues in the middle of a bunch of songs.

Acting/Characterisation/Dialogues : As if these words never existed in their dictionary. The acting is mediocre, if i were to be kind with my words and the characters are both irrelevant and badly skectched. Dialogues are purile as if written by a 12 year old. HR's is such a frigid expression that has no grimace even in the most emotional of scenes.

Hansika Motwani - The chick is no babe and no slender and even looks too chubby in some shots. Hardly a figure to talk about! Check her out on wiki. She is 16 this summer but looks way beyond her age.

So if it is not about Acting,Dialogues, Music, Hansika or the non-existent script then what is it about. Hold your breath... you need no telling that the movie is made for showcasing Himesh in a gradiose style. This movie banks only and only on the fan base of Himesh Reshamiya. It is supposed to cash on his popularity due to his music and his appearances in so called talent hunt shows which end up being soap operas.

Himesh - Gosh! you get tired of counting how many caps he changes, i guess his stylist focussed just on his caps and nothing else. His so called elusive smile is rather a forced caricature of himself..what a fool one has to be to delve into these fancy mysteries of one's personna through the medium of cinema. He knows no dialogue delivery and even makes few fancy actions which end up looking stupid. He even tries to do Rajnikanth! What a shame!! Average at best.

Mallika Sherawat : Better forgotten than mentioned. The sexy damsel hardly even justifies her sex appeal. She is wasted to say the least and is also lost in a maze of sketchy characters with meaningless roles.

Germany : I think they can very well use this movie as Germany's tourism Advertisement. The shots from this movie can allure people to visit the country. Sadly, Germany ends up being the hero and heroine of this dull mystery potboiler.

Discount all of the above and go for it if you want to see a turning point in Indian Cinema. This one undoes what Life in a Metro and likes have done to take Indian Cinema a level higher....

Final Verdict for ticket buyers it is a Caveat Emptor

Mon Avis : The Queen - Well done!

2007-06-23T19:37:00.000+05:30

Well, it doesn't feel like a commercial cinema and hence shies away from all the jamboree. A simple drama showcasing the insides of royalty of England in a plain style. The monarchy's face in turn of post-Blair election and post-Dianna's death events forms the storyline of the movie. Set in 1997, the movie has already proved to be a masterpiece winning a well deserved Academy award.

Ups:

Helen Mirren has pulled off a role of a lifetime playing Elizabeth II and done it too well. The lady may not be an exact look alike of her Majesty, even so her demeanor posesses no less gravity and royal arrogance. She compliments the screenplay well and expresses the dilemma at the unexpected turn of events following Princess Dianna's death. Her stoic indulgence to the tragedy is well brought out as she continues to live her normal life after the car crash that killed Dianna which shows her in bad light and earns her flak from her subjects
Michael Sheen plays a look alike of Tony Blair but captures his role very well. He is another well-etched role which tells you a lot about the chemistry between a subservient UK Prime Minister and her Majesty
Screenplay is well done and the pace just about keeps you from getting bored

Downs:

Too centric on Post Dianna events
Sluggish in the first half and a little too longish

A must see even if you have no love for history... A package of good performances and a commendable screenplay...

Mon Avis : JBJ - Musical sans script!

2007-06-16T17:39:00.000+05:30

First things first, since they could not make a stage play with the script, Yash Raj banner decided to spin a movie out of it... and they ended up making a stupid product. The promos looked cryptic and also appealing.. the grapevine was mum about the script and lo! you discover why... because there was none in the first place....

It seems that Yash Raj have sworn to churn out a fixed number of movies every quarter so they make a movie no matter what. to meet their quarterly target..And their classic format: Take up big names or not so big names, choose London or New York, Shankar Ehsaan Loy, A couple of schooches and/or love making scenes and grandiose song and dance. Voila! you get a YR product that will do double business in UK than in India. Anyway.. lets tell you how JBJ fares...

Ups:

Music and music alone is the saviour.. Shankar Ehsaan Loy have done the trick once again and the versions of title song are so fantastic that you wanna shake your leg right there in the hall... Rest songs are average
Cinematography... There has been no compromise with the attention to detail. The picturisation is colorful and almost bordering on being gaudy...
Bobby Deol is refreshingly original and does a better job than the others...
A few comic moments

Downs:

No story.. no script.. period
Abhishek Bachchan hams, Lara Dutta shows neck line and legs and Preity is irritatingly over board..
Amitabh Bachchan does not nothing but make a fool out of himself with the ridiculous attire and absolutely no role in the movie but being a mascot for the title song... God bless him with some brains....Two weeks ago it was the fab Cheeni Kum and now we see this...Uff!
All the cast are ordinary dancers.. the music seems wasted...

See it only if you must.. a brainless entertainer with song and dance and just enough to keep you on your seat till the credits roll

Mon Avis : Oceans 13 - Racy, Stylish Ride

2007-06-11T22:16:00.000+05:30

The gang is back and is back in style. The style quotient of this franchisee just gets better. Clooney, Garcia, Pacino, Pitt and Damon together produce a chic flick that is so racy that at a point you just give up the race with the screenplay. This movie is more of a con rather than a steal. Danny Ocean's (Clooney) team pulls off this smooth job to avenge ego maniacal Willy Bank's (Pacino) defrauding of Reubon (gould)..The movie returns to the Sin City where the gang play out their entire fraud once again in a casino.

Ups:

The roles have been etched to perfection and the con job is mesmerising to the finish
Pacino is a fresh introduction and does the wicked job too well. Hams a lil but to get to see Pacino is such a delight
The only element that pulls together the plot is that of surprise... the next move of the gang is so well covered that you really have to wrack your brain to connect one frame to the next.. A classic Steven Sodenbergh crack...
The music compliments the plot and adds a charm to the movie

Downs:

No Julia and no Zeta Zones.. how we miss them....
The plot is good but some cons are not too convincing....
French Night Fox remains wasted after a brilliant showdown in Oceans 12

Watch it if you are a stickler for style and panache that is so George Clooney and Bradd Pitt..

Mon Avis : Cheeni Kum - Sugary Syrup

2007-06-02T21:09:00.000+05:30

You have seen his slick ads.. now see a cinema through his lens... 10 minutes into the movie and you have this queer sensation that this movie is hatke.. It is one of those 'feel-good' cinema which is presented in such a convincing style that you actually stand up and applaud.. R.Balki's debut tryst with Bollywood oozes charm and feel of the romance that every other teenage flick tries so desperately to produce...

By now the characters and the plot is very well known to most so lets not overuse those...

Ups:

Tabu...to borrow from another review " Tabu has balls" and she puts all those over rated heroines to shame..the role is played with such a finesse that for once you are shocked.. she is tremendously believable and holds your attention with her grace in each frame... There hasnt been a finer cinema off late. The ease with which she delivers otherwise so purile dialogues... for instance a scene in which she exhorts amitabh to run across a hundred meters to touch a tree and run back...only to tell him later that she wanted to know if he had the stamina to do "it"...the camera simply adored her.. and so did the audience
BigB... The man is only getting younger with age...debonairly suave...from sexy sam to almost a similar demeanour.. the guy is unstoppable... you must see the scene where he changes into a pure white suit..... he looks no lesser than his son Abhi... He is one legend that Hindi Cinema is only too blessed to have.... Specially when all his peers (Shammi et al) are in oblivion
The screenplay.. is rolled out to perfection.. so engrossing and suave that one hour into the movie you forget that the characters have not even spoken their names... every frame bears a strange simplicity that only a meticulous ad man is known to have.. when they are all used to capture an entire epic in a 30-second shot...
The girl (dont know the name) called sexy.. is a role fantastically played out and surprisingly refreshing...unlike you would have seen in a long time...

Downs:

Length of the movie is a pain... the movie drags for 150 minutes even without more than 3 songs... it gets a little sluggish in the end...
Paresh Rawal is simply wasted.. His comic streak is completely missing when he is just been made busy playing protective father to aging unmarried daughter
Some loopholes in the script....some moments in the end (one at Ashoka Pillar) is completely avoidable...

Anyway.. it is a must watch... sugary syrup that will never look like a diabetic overdose.. (smile)

PS : - PiratesIII is a waste of money...Donate your money to your worst enemy rather than buy the tickets to this movie.. you will still feel better...

Mon Avis - Life in a Metro - 'Rock'ing!

2007-05-12T20:58:00.000+05:30

Another new age cinema and a loose rip-off of Love Actually, but a different theme. Theme of finding love outside commonplace life. Half an hour into the movie and you wonder why is everyone cheating on everyone else... Too much infidelity of a character's life linked to another.

There are several highlights of the movie, most of it is due to its ensemble cast. KK,Irfan Khan, Konkana Sen, Sharman Joshi, Kangana Raut, Shiney Ahuja and Shilpa Shetty..and Nafisa Ali paired with Dharmendra .Each one of them living an unsatisfactory, incomplete yet ambitious life in a Metro (Read:Mumbai).
Ups:

Lets give credit first to the man with the vision-Anurag Basu . The director has shown that he is one of the best in his craft. Anurag comes up with this watertight script and a remarkable intertwining of all the characters' turmoil..He knows exactly what he wants from his actors and makes everyone (Read : Even the novice Kangana Raout) look endearing and believable. Kudos to him for putting together such a fab cast!

The cast : Irfan Khan and Konkana Sen - Let us stand up and give a well-deserved applause to these two maestros in the art of acting. Irfan and Konkana play thirty something youth who are on a look out for prospective bride and groom respectively, meeting one day through Shaadi.com You will roll in your seat with laughter by the ease and warmth with which Irfan potrays a comic role of a slightly-weird-but-good-at-heart guy who instantly takes a liking for Konakana but fails to impress her. You wont see much of Irfan in between the movie for a long time.. but each frame he enters is a treat to watch

KK, Shilpa and Shiney : KK is a veteran and Shiney no less.. They both portray opposite ends of life.. while KK is a successful and rich owner of a BPO , Shiney is a struggling actor. Shilpa plays KK's wife who is trying hard for their marriage to work but to know avail. She almost falls for Shiney.. well, almost... details in the movie :) But the most striking part of hers is the ease and precision with which she plays out the role. Probably the only memorable performance from her in recent memory

Sharman and Kangana : You must approve of Sharman for he has almost begun to show how versatile actor he is.. He has been able to play this role with equal finesse as he did in the string of comedy he has acted in

Dharmendra and Nafisa : If there is something as refreshing to see in the flick, it is the romance oozing out of Dharmendra and Nafisa. After a long time, Dharamendra shows what he was once best known for (not those macho fights!).. mushy romance. And here he plays an elderly foreign return to meet his long lost sweetheart (Nafisa) living in an Old Age home...

Dont know what to write about Music... The Indian Rock genre has finally arrived with Metro, The songs are melodiously rich and very meaningful... Sung by Pritam , James et al.. the director pops up the band trio one too many times to capture the ongoing mood of the movie.. Superb music and even better presentation of it in the movie... Immensely absorbing and creatively done!!!! :)

Downs:

A little long .. almost 140 mins ... but still bearable
Lot of ideas which could have been original are borrowed from one or the other hollywood flick ..( Love Actually ... Theres something about Mary etc)

Dont miss this wonderful piece of cinema...

Mon Avis - Spidey 3 - Action packed Melodrama!

2007-05-03T23:40:00.000+05:30

An hour into the movie and you feel like in a bollywood flick - song, dance,comedy, envy, revenge, love, power, double cross, and what not.. But all this around an iconic superhero called Spiderman. From Sam Raimi comes another sequel, tastefully directed and a complete masala film with lots of action and loads of senti stuff strewn around in the script. Peter parker is back as spider man but this time the world is shown to have accepted him as a superhero. Though he soon finds out that there can be a darker side to a super hero which makes him just a human. He finds love and loses her, finds friends and loses them and finally finds himself to save the day...

Ups :

Lives upto the last two movies if not surpassing those
Usual racy and tight script, no boring moments
Classy editing and state of the art graphics
Masala blend - Has something for every type of audience
Takes character development a level higher

Downs:

Sometimes you feel a craving to get out of those emotion laden scenes and see spider man saving the world
One too many villains with one too many superpowers... The script gets predictable at moments

One of the most highly awaited and widely advertised movies of the year...A 140 minute entertainer... Must watch for superhero fans..One of the best comic-adapted sequels!!!

Mon Avis : Bheja fry - Clean comedy, Vinay style!

2007-04-15T10:36:00.000+05:30

If you have seen enough of Kya Kool hai..., No Entry and the likes then this one is without any double-entendre .. A neat and clean comedy which cannot be described having a script :). The sitcom stars Vinay Pathak, Ranvir Shourie, Rajat Kapoor, Milind Soman, Sarika and others. Everything said, this movie will make you go insane with laughter...Some serious comedy here. Lets not go for the storyline!

Ups :

Even if i were to take you as an alien and assume that comedy is not your types, you must see Vinay Pathak as Bharat Bhushan the protagonist.. He carries the whole film and does a hell of a job at it. He comes out as a champion comedian and is incredibly natural at it, the one who makes your Bheja Fry!! A safe thing to say, without him, there could be not be this movie. His timing, his spontaneity gives a new life to otherwise very mundane script. Superb piece of performance
The rest of the cast is just about good and fall in place with the leading man

Downs:

The script, the story or the lack of it...Sadly, this directorial debut is lifted straight from a french flick
The movie looks more of a play than a motion picture. I think it would be as tickling on stage as on silver screen

Kudos to Vinay Pathak for showing us yet again that comedy can be so unique and tasteful (without inneundos too! Huh)

Mon Avis : Shooter - Crass Spy Thiller!

2007-04-15T10:26:00.000+05:30

This one is a spy cum conspiracy-to-kill-the-president cum double-cross cum action thriller starring Mark Wahlberg and others. Mark Wahlberg plays a retired sniper who is coaxed back into an unofficial, off-the-record assignment by CIA to plan the assassination of the President (who else???Huh) so that real plotters can be caught! Alas! He finds himself double-crossed and then the usual chase begins..

Ups

None too many to speak of except the thrill and action sequences
Not too many bores in the script
Mark Wahlberg is bearable

Down

Run-of-the-mill story based on a cliched spy novel (forgettable)

A spy action drama that is just about tolerable...

Mon Avis : The Namesake - Not Just One !

2007-03-25T20:54:00.000+05:30

Another adaptation, and this one not much different except for some solid screenplay and admirable performances! One more American Born Confused Desi (ABCD) flick, with almost run-of-the-mill story lifted from Jhumpa Lahiri's novel by the same name. But this is no literal Namesake, for it usurps one of the most powerful medium of expression - Cinema. The book is almost tasteless and will not appeal to most of you; nonetheless the movie does.

Ups :

Powerful portrayal of Ashok Gonguli by Irfan Khan and even more graceful show by Tabu. These two are the heart and soul of the movie. No one else could have done the roles better. Irfan (Ashok) is a doctorate student in US who comes to India and marries Tabu (Ashima) . The couple head off to US where they start a new life in cultural isolation, full of struggles in raising their two kids.
Screenplay/Direction - Mira Nair does justice to the book and the characters. Though at some moments, characters lack depth but overall they manage to sustain the script.
Kal Penn finally shows some acting skills, though even in this movie he does nothing different from what he has been doing: He plays an ABCD yet again but with a slightly different touch. He becomes a rebellious, disgruntled brat fed up of his strange name - Gogol Gonguli - The Namesake of a russian writer legend Nikoli Gogul who was his dad's (Ashok's favorite)

Downs :

Script lacks momentum at places. Other times it is too racy. But i guess that is the hazard which comes with remaining faithful to the book
The film is also a little longer than it should be with no particular purpose of character development

Watch it once! A heartwarming flick to be savored for Irfan and Tabu

Mon Avis : 300 - Sham!

2007-03-23T19:42:00.000+05:30

Dont go by the figures. The movie has raked in more than $ 130 million in two weeks, but the story is a Mahabharata with the hollywood touch. With its slow motion scene, it looks like a clumsy video game in which the players are out of your control. The movie is a dud with no script but just a cliched concept of combat honor and virile pride. A handful of 300 spartans fighting for glory...(Yawn!!)

Downs :

The problem doesnt stop with the script. Even the execution is very stupid, with absurd creatures, humongous bloodshed (graphic to the last drop) and even sillier characters
You get a feeling that dialogues are written desperately to be dramatic and powerful but fail miserably to even keep you interested. Few like "Spartan women give birth to real men" "We will fight in the shade" etc. manage to tickle your funny bone
There is no acting in the entire movie. Only screaming exhorts and pointless scenarios

Ups :

Thankfully, the movie is over in just under 100 minutes...what a relief...

If you have seen LOTRs and Harry Porters and similar stuff, you must stay away from this one. A total bore.... Some novels are better left untouched...Hollywood must learn this. Ghostrider and 300 build a good case for it....

Mon Avis: The Pursuit of Happyness - Endearing cinema!

2007-03-10T23:17:00.000+05:30

The pursuit of happyness( yeah.. with a 'y'..watch it and find out why!!) is all no romance, no thrill and no suspense. It is all about Will Smith's character who fights against odds to survive his penury, broken marriage and a growin son and in pursuit of happiness. Guts, conviction, self-belief and never-say-die in face of adversity...the character captures your apathy as the movie goes long....

Ups:

Will Smith has done a role of his life time and hence a well deserved oscar nomination to the movie and to him (equally sad loss in both categories...but Oh my personal bias for The Departed ;) )
Screenplay and direction are the heart and soul of the movie. A rather cliched story is so well laid out through Will Smith and Smith Jr.
Smith Jr. is an ace artist already.. Perfectly played out role

Downs:

Well......none... Just that it wasnt good enough to match Martin Scorcese's The Departed.. Hah!

Watch it.. No excuse to miss it... Endearing flick with a happy ending but enough to draw the tears out..

Mon Avis : Nishabd - Unconvincing

2007-03-04T22:38:00.000+05:30

So one thing is clear! Ram Gopal Verma is all about zooming cameras, slick art direction, one hot nymph, one intense person, shoddy dialogues, classy editing and tidbits of cast thown here and there in the script...

Nishabd is almost all of the above...a mere illusion of russian classic Lolita.(Yeah ! cant even call it an adaptation)

Going for Nishabd is like expecting that it is a storyless movie bent on showcasing some oomph under the garb of a much broader storyline... As Ramu calls it "There is no love without lust"... May be.. or may be not........but a good selling line to say in the talkshows...

Shot in 23 days it captures some vague but scenic tea estate landscape with Ramu's typical ease...

Ups :

If there is one reason why the scenes are taken seriously, it is Amitabh Bachchan. He has one Midas touch to make any scene so realistic. A gem of a performance from first to last frame. Ramu almost saved his film by convincing Big B to play the part or else it could have been labelled a B grade cinema(Think! Who else could play this part!)
Ramu's direction is flawless but Alas! someone go an tell him that dancing cameras is not the only method in the madness.
Revathy is reasonable in her performance as a typical housewife married for 27 years
Ravishing ...Errr...cinematography (You almost thought i used it for the hottie Jiah Khan
An honest potrayal of Amitabh's character
Background score is another saving grace
Lots of sexual overtones but no acts except a dry lip lock kiss! (unilateral ofcourse.. Amitabh with all dignity doesnt kiss back ;) )

Downs:

Jiah Khan is worth a mention but only till the time she doesnt open her mouth. She is certainly one of the sexiest things to happen to Bollywood (even a half blind will tell you that) but the leggy beauty has no credits in the acting department. Her accented english and her incorrigible hindi adds to your woes.. So Ramu does a perfect job of spannin cameras across her assets (Mostly her slender legs) to titillate whatever audience he has got in the theatres... Jiah has a long way to go... The acting mismatch between Big B and Khan is both conspicuous and irritating
Dialogues- Very shoddy, puerile , out of place, and a complete disconnect to the efforts towards character development
Loose script! and least convincing character of Jiah
Draggin script.. The film could easily have been wrapped up in less than 100 mins

To borrow loosely from the film's own tagline " Some of RGV's film are better not understood.."

Watch it if you are die hard RGV fan coz off late he seldom directs the movie on his own... This one is signature Ramu...

Mon Avis : Ghost Rider - Avoidable

2007-03-03T23:10:00.000+05:30

The movie is all about the comic book hero by the same name and the only celluloid touch it can provide through hi fi special effects. Story of Devil senior, Devil junior (Yeah Rite), Motor Cycle Stunts man, his love, his soul being possessed by the devil senior for retrieval of some arbit contract (Honestly, I never had appetite for such wizardry gobbledygook..)

Ups:

Sin City like special effects , Typical Hollywood style

Downs:

The lead role could have well been done by absolutely any other actor... Nicholas Cage is wasted
No Script...Hollywood needs to learn that every comic book cannot be adapted..Somethings are best left in those colorfully decorated pages which you can flick and roll into the world of imagination
Dragging screenplay

You would really not miss anything if you stay home to watch TV...

Mon Avis: Honeymoon Travels - a mixed bag!

2007-02-25T19:36:00.000+05:30

This one started with all the right things but suddenly the things start to go wrong. It is as if, the director listened to Farhan Akhtar in the first half but chose to go her own way in the next. And you see the effect ... the contrast is too conspicuous...

Ups :

The movie is full of hilarious moments which are original and soothing..but the rider: only in the first half
KK Menon, stands out again and Raima Sen is refreshingly captivating
Chemistry between Shabana and Boman is fantastically brought out

Downs:

It is saddening to see that the film starts with so much promise but fails miserably to meet it.
Abhay, Minnisha (Oh i love her face!) , Ameesha (Disaster) and all others have been wasted! and someone please explain me what was arjun rampal and diya mirza doin in the movie
Film drags in the second half with ridiculous fantasies (some super hero stuff and its method of showing is downright embarrassing)
Music from Vishal Shekhar! A couple of songs are good and rest are better written off
The script! Messed up in the second half with too much of soap opera

A honeymoon gone awry for Farhan Akhtar mentored Excel Entertainment!

Avoid unless you are on a date and its her choice ;)

Mon Avis : Eklavya - Royal 100 mins Splendor

2007-02-17T00:24:00.000+05:30

Eklavya is no epic saga as the length of the movie will tell you. A mere 100 mins that may leave you wanting for more. A classic Vidhu Vinod Chopra movie with its duration not the only surprise. Set in the backdrop of colonial symbolic royalty in modern india, the movie showcases a hosts of actors - Amitabh, Saif, Sanjay, Jackie, Boman, Jimmy, Vidya Balan etc... No plot spoilers here... only the shades

Ups :

Terrific script, doesnt give you time to breathe... Every scene is well thought out and carries a significance...
Picturisation - Chopra is a master in this department. All the scenes could be so cliched but this director has a full command over the cinematic medium. It makes such an impact!
Classic musical score lending a mystic charm
Elements of surprise and thrill, racy screenplay
Only ONE song and that too not bad.. I wonder why Vidhu lost out on the Music part. He usually puts together a nice bouquet of songs...May be he dint have time
Performances- Amitabh and others perfectly fit the roles and also super cede expectations

Downs :

small loopholes.. but acceptable in lieu of the grandeur

Also, few upcoming flicks from the Vidhu factory.... Munnabhai chale America and Talisman (Starring Amitabh and inspired from Chandrakanta).. Way to go...

Mon Avis : Traffic Signal - "At crossroads"

2007-02-04T20:45:00.000+05:30

Traffic Signal is signature Madhur Bandharkar theme movie. An angle at a corner of life that you and I would otherwise ignore. But this one is a litte less complicated than Corporate but as hard hitting as Page 3.

Traffic Signal flashes crossroad tales of several by-lane footpathers who make a living by selling or conning the by passers. It is a depiction of eventful and sometime wretched life of few unfortunate souls whose destinies are glued to that one world around Traffic Signal.

Ups :

Bandharkar captures the misery and the cunning very well
Bandharkar attempts to give equal screen time to stories and characters
Thankfully, only two songs
Good performances from Kunal Khemu, Konkana, Ranvir, and everyone else. These actors carry the film along

Downs :

Background score is under par
No concrete script, the theme alone becomes the backbone.
Very sluggish at times and unduly longish

Go for it if you appreciate Madhur Bandharkar cinema. It is the third of the trilogy that started with Page 3 and Coporate.

Mon Avis : Rocky Balboa - Shawdow-boxing vintage Rocky

2007-02-03T16:41:00.000+05:30

Trash Stallone as much as you want but the character is bigger than the man himself and he understands all of this. Rocky needed a farewell and he got a fitting one. Rocky comes out of a 16 year hiatus to fight an "exhibition" match against current heavyweight Dixon (Undefeated with 30 out of 33 knockouts)

Ups :

This flick is nostalgic with scenes from first one
Too sentimental but never overboard with low key treatment
Usual Rocky grit in stallone
Better than Rocky V (I guess it could never serve as a bookend until Rocky Balboa)
Credible storyline and a simple treatment to the fight result, a result that is otherwise a foregone conclusion... Stallone in his own direction doesnt make a dramatic climax
A satiating end to a captivating Rocky saga

Downs

Sometimes the movie is rushed
Not enough of Rocky fight and too repetitive of the earlier ones

Modestly Entertaining

Worth a watch

Mon Avis : Deja Vu - "Already Seen"

2007-01-26T10:16:00.000+05:30

Deja Vu is a typical old wine in a new bottle and Alas ! Just a french cliche name could not help the entire concept or could it...?

A not-so-regular time travel drama with Denzel Washington playing an ATF (Arms, Tobacco and Firearms agent) investigating a cruise bombing and a mysterious death of a pretty young woman. Soon he is taken into a room where (here, hold your breath!) they can somehow (i honestly dint follow the science) reconstruct a 3D scne of any place on earth.. the catch is ... it can run only 4 days and 6 hours ago...one way with no rewinds...i.e the past world runs parallely with present (some damn thing like that!!)

Ups :

A Tony Scott film - Need I say more.. It is racy , pot boiler , making full but different use of already exhausted time travel concept! Like other Tony Scott movies - Top Gun, Spy Game, Hostage, Enemy of the State - this movie scores on its thrills and spills , convulated theories and slick direction
Brilliant picuturisation
Speedy script

Downs :

Denzel looks haggard and lack lustre
Disappointing acting performances (Not that the script had much scope)
Time Travel is now a ripoff in Hollywood with waning charm.. Time travel is Deja Vu
Loose screenplay and a rushed climax

Watch it as a total time pass... a no brainer thriller...

Mon Avis : Blood Diamond - A Gem

2007-01-14T23:43:00.000+05:30

This is gory, This is poignant, This is bloody and painful, This is full of pity...TIA - This Is Africa .....Blood Diamond shows you an Africa that you only encountered as an adjective for abject poverty and jungle law. Directed by Edward Zwick this pot-boiler is set entirely in Africa, on a chase for a "pink" ... a large diamond.

An under privileged nation where Child Soldiers are dreadfully deadly and villagers are maimed and butchered as if in a video game. Set against a backdrop of Civil War, the diamond chase stars Leonardo De Caprio, Jennifer Connolley, and Djimon Hounsou.

Ups :

Leonardo plays a diamond smuggler to the best and comes out shining
The film captures breathtaking scenes of Africa, contrasting life with a sudden sporadic gun roars that punctuates it
The script thrills and chills the last cells of your bone
The underlying diamond conflict scores with the audience. Developed World's greed for Diamond , Diamond Cartel and Africa's consequent wretchedness
Djimon is able to arouse the sympathy and pity , a well played role

Downs :

Sketchy climax
Jennifer wasted
Loopholes ( Settings of 1990's couldnt have a 2007 car and a 2002's videogame)

Enjoy the Gem!

Mon Avis : Abhishek's Magnum Opus : GURU

2007-01-13T23:40:00.000+05:30

Oops this blog will have its anniversary soon..19th Of Jan.. What began as a new year resolution happened to be an on and off affair with events!!! But a blog can never be as eventful as life!!

Coming to Guru of all movies! What a start to 2007 for Aby Baby.. If theres anything in this movie (There is a lot :) ) that sparkles overwhelmingly, it is Abhishek Bachaan from first to last shot. He plays the role of his lifetime. A sheer pleasure to watch overshadowing every other character, even the script!

Closely based on legendary Dhirubhai Ambani's rise to Corporate pinnacle, the story of Guru steers us through his persistence, failures, grandiose vision and an unflinching greed for profit (Munafa)...and of course the story of Guru delves into the phase of DB's life mired by controversies and unethical (read: circumventing law) tactics...

The UPs

Abhishek (See him like you have never seen him before) - He dazzles in every scene and plays the role with such a fervor that only his Senior (Dady) is known to have played. He outgrows his own shadow and comes across a perfect choice for the role.
Mani Ratnam (What can I say! He can only compete with himself! The sort of life he infuses in as simple a shot as Aish dancing in the rain (It was supposed to have been filmed in more than half of existing Indian States) is mind blowing! His treatment is amazing and beyond all possible compliments. He knows exactly what he wants out of his actors.
A R Rehman - I won't so much even try to describe this Magician's work. Only he knows the art of blending Music into the film's landscape... And he has a knack of giving his Best to Mani Ratnam, over and over again!
Dialogues - Striking words! My favorite - Climax scene with Abhishek in court.. A clinching phase! There is a clever line of 30 seconds munafa!!! The audience just loved it
Aishwarya - Wondering why I mention her last! Coz she simply could not match her husband-to-be. Though it was a nice change to watch her with more clothes on (May be in D2 she looks HOTT ... I havent seen the flick), she makes a good pair with Abhishek in the same frame.
Mithun Chakraborty - Oh yeah! He seems to have found the best character role he would have done in his lifetime.. It just gave his name a new meaning... A truly adorable character with strength and true bengali panache!

Downs:

Rushed Climax
Small loopholes in the plot (Forget it )

Watch this movie for awesome threesome : Abhishek, Mani and Rehman.

Mon Avis : Babel - A biblic failure

2007-01-01T16:16:00.000+05:30

First, Let me crack the name... The Tower of Babel (According to Hebrew Bible) was an attempt to build a structure that might reach heaven. The angered God thwarted their effort by making them speak different languages and scattering them to different corners of the world

Honestly i went for it because Bradd Pitt was a guarantee..But the movie is not about him, it is an ensemble cast trying to put together a Crash 2..minus the politics and a moral of course. You could also imagine it to be Syriana without the affairs of the state.

Yes, it reminisces of Crash and moves along just like it.. An interconnected story of a couple fighting hard to survive in their marriage(Bradd Pitt and Cate Blanchett) by vacationing in Morocco, a poor Moroccon family, a sex-starved nubile deaf-mute girl in Japan, and a middle aged petite mexican woman living illegally in USA for more than a decade (hence the title Babel). The script connects the misery of these groups brilliantly as one freak rifle shot in Morocco has ripple effect across continents and influences all 4 families. Despite the connection the script also peeks deep into their individual frustrations, haplessness and dejections.

Though the movie is not badly picturised but at the end of it you are sure that it was not meant for an entertainment purpose.

You leave with the understanding that there was none to be made in the first place. The only thing which baffled me was "What is this story for?".
It depicts a day when things go horribly wrong, but again the chain of events really dont bring out the horror.
You feel pity for the characters but there are worse things to invoke horror in you.
There is no message in the movie, except one of my friend used an internet borrowed joke...the moral "Don't give guns to Arabs, Dont trust mexicans and Japanese people are wierd".He He
One of the stories though is not amply attached to the others and serve no purpose to the script( Potryal of a Japanese sex hungry young female whose father seemed to have gifted the gun to the Moroccon family and whose mother seemed to have mysteriously comitted suicide (Eh! Confused!!! So was I)

I dont know if you should watch this grim movie at all because you may not even end up getting entertained. Lots of nudity(The Japenese part of course!!) which is obviously trimmed on Indian Screens (2 hour 45v mins in US and 2 hours 15 mins in India)

No recommendations. Watch it if you really have guts to appreciate this kind of offline cinema.

Happy New Year

Mon Avis: Temptations of the West : How to be modern in India, Pakistan and Beyond...

2006-12-25T17:22:00.000+05:30

Don't be misled by the title, more so by its subtitle. The book is not a stand alone assault on the hollowness of western culture imbibed by the east, not also a blindfolded condemnation of colonialism. In fact, Pankaj Mishra's latest treatise lays threadbare a contrast between South Asia and Western Civilization.

It is obviously a heavy book, a book I picked up only because of two reasons : One, that i have followed the authors previous books and Second, the book opens with a chapter about Benaras (My wistful attempt to relive Benaras through literature.. Alas!..) Pankaj Mishra lives in both India and London, so he cannot disclaim influence of the West and hence his book offers no prescriptions on the ways of modernism.

The Benaras Chapter : Benaras : Learning to read

He begins his novel with the start of his journey in swampy and dusty Central Library in Benaras Hindu University where he devours the works of Edmund Wilson and Gustav Flaubert. Here Mishra uses his talent of discovering exemplary and representative characters and introduces us to Rajesh, a frustrated young chap with an ever confused sense of life around him full of corruption and favoritism. Rajesh is well educated with a taste in literature as he reads Wilson's essay on Flaubert's "Sentimental Education" given to him by the author. Rajesh tips it to be "story of my(his) world", a story of miniature but potent tragedies, thwarted hopes and disgruntled ideals.

Worth mentioning that Mishra has lived in Benaras in 1980's and seen its way of life. Though much to his astonishment he still makes a pleasant discovery that the city had as much holy significance for Muslims as it had for Hindus, and he finds a 17th century Sufi shrine placed behind a tea shack where he spent most of his evenings (Place not named though :( )

There are more chapters on Allahabad, Ayodhya, Bollywood (He actually met Mallika Sherawat before her Murder release and saw nascent brashness of her sexuality, besides meeting Mahesh and Pooja Bhatt... He denotes the grim and bright bollywood way of life as seen through the eyes of an outsider), Afghanistan, Pakistan, Tibet and Nepal. Mishra depicts a world striving for modernity where expectations are constantly evolving, colliding and vanishing into a nadir. It puts in perspective each of the above hallmarks of South Asia and their hunger for a place in the modern society.

I would rather not write much about the other chapters as they read mostly like an updated history book of modern events focusing on post 911 events and their impacts on the above.

The book is part autobiographical, part travelogue and part journalism, an assembly of his first hand accounts of visits to the catalogued landscapes. All in all it is a bold book, much separated from his usual genres and much beyond the usual cliches and rheoteric... A book that has recieved less support from his own country in general and its Hindu majority in particular. It was very lately that Pankaj Mishra was mired in controversies regarding his article about Kashmir Massacre on 20th March 2000.

More about the author here

Enjoy the book in leisure...if you wish to travel across South Asia seeing it with penetrating eyes of the author and his thought provoking accounts..

Merry Christmas!

Mon Avis: The Guardian

2006-12-10T00:02:00.000+05:30

Well this was a real hard hitter!! I guess Coast Guard is not all about the sleazy Baywatch....

"So the others may live" sums up this saga of courage, comaraderie,
team spirit, dedication, hope, despair, love, loss, destiny, victory and much more....

Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher team up in a story about a rescue swimmer Ben Randell (Kostner) who is a legend in his own right and has a history of unrelenting miraculous saves, one of which the movie begins with. Then comes the blow of fate, he loses his team in a freak accident and his wife leaves him because he has too little time to spare. The accident leaves him shaken and traumatised which lets him no choice but to take a coaching position in the school which produced him alongwith the best Coast Guard fleet.

In comes Jake Fischer(Kutcher), a mysterious swimming champion with no reasonable cause to take up the rescue swimmer as a career. The training begins where the two character come face to face with each other's expectations and question each other's motives to be at the place. Jake graduates with flair and breaks all Ben's previous records.. except one.. he is yet to be tested in real life.

There are several hallmarks about the movie

1) Kostner and Kutcher are too convincing!! Kutcher comes out a gem. Kostner at his usual best!

2) The movie is gripping from first to last frame. The tumultous emotions are well interspersed with breathtaking action sequences at roaring sea. One actually feels like on a rescue mission.

3) The music score compliments the movie well and what more.. it ends with a Bryan Adams's

4) Few of the exchanges are timed perfectly to be comic, not keeping the tone very serious. Further, the rescue events are as exhilirating as they are symbolic.. For instance, first one where a couple at the sea are fighting hard to survive and a husband is pulling down his wife to stay afloat, purely out of "survival instinct"

5) Dialogues are amazingly striking.

My favorite.... When Kutcher asks Kostner one last time "Whats the real number?" (of people he rescued in his entire career)

He answers "22"... Kutcher: "Well, 22 is not bad not 200 but not ba..." Kostner : "22 is the number of people i have lost.. and that is all i keep count of.."

There are many more like these which are so truely punch the viewer....

A fantastic movie which stands to show human courage and attitude have the power to conquer all ........... It is all about the choices you make in life............

A real mover, Go for it!

Mon Avis: Casino Royale

2006-11-24T23:34:00.000+05:30

I will be short in writing about Casino Royale. Because it has nothing much to it. Few points though

1. If you dont like Bond movies with usual run-of- the mill plots and gadgets and cars etc, you would probably end up liking this one as
a) it has no bond gadgets (except one shock machine which is hardly a treat!! :( )
b) no bond car (Aston Le Mans racer is sexy but without the snazzy gadgets that are so previous bond cars)
c) Bond is a little too mushy for his girl, so unlike 007 Brosnan who had this naughty streak on him, ready to bed and shed the next day ..he he

2. The movie attempts to remain loyal to the first Ian Fleming's novel by the same name, all about Bond 's growth and learnings in his new 007 status

3. Fight sequences are good but nothing extraoirdinary. Just about comparable with last few bond movies

4. Bond girls are dishy and downright luscious but again too sketchy characters

5. Daniel Craig is a treat to watch. With a debonairly suave attitude he is a bond minus mischieviousness

6. His last dialogue is the most awaited of all .......... " Name is Bond.... James Bond"

A must watch if you are or are not a bond fan... carries a license to thrill...

Mon Avis: The Departed

2006-11-04T18:09:00.001+05:30

What do you expect when you cast Martin Sheen, Mark Wahlberg, Matt Damon, Leonardo De Caperio and Jack Nicholson? What more when these powerhouses are directed by Martin Scorsese!!! A fantastic act of deceit, deception, double cross, Gang war and corruption!! The Departed comes out as a perfect rip off of Hong Kong thriller 'Infernal Affairs' . But this one does one better, this one is Scorsese Style...

More than one plot run in tandem, with double cross looming dangerously in each and Jack Nicholson is conspicuous in both. Both Decaperio and Damon play reassuring moles in Nicholsons Gang and Police department respectively...This is by far Caprio 's best performance (I liked Titanic one better though!!) .. This time he may just be lucky at the Oscars ;)

Caution though, each minute of the film is teeming with the f-word. The entire movie is expletive ridden, from both the bad guys as much as good guys.
Another surprise is Vera Fermiga, who plays a police psychologist and Damon's girlfried, though also taking a night out with her patient Depcaprio.

All in all, a fabulous thriller and a cerebral, gory drama........Must Watch...

Mon Avis : DON

2006-10-29T22:22:00.000+05:30

So let me play around with something that now is almost a cliched line.. "Don ko remake karna, mushkil hi nahin .. namumkin hai.." And this is exactly the feeling with which i left the hall after watching DON, first day first show. Let me confess, the movie was a mood-spoiler. I may have gone in with high expectations but that is what you ought to do when you have seen Big B's classic.
1. To begin with, there is so much more that could be done, given the locales... the director (Akhtar) and the King Khan himself. The movie just failed to cash in on the original screenplay and ended up being nothing but a slick rip off
2. The King Khan has always looked an ass in the Gunda roles and let me again state, he hasnt got what it takes to carry off the same charisma as Mr. Bachhan did.
3. Kareena and the other forgettable ladies have been reduced to a joke. I am not a huge fan of Zeenat Aman (Mallika Sherawat of the bygone era), but even then i could not see a tinge of that superb vindictive stoic...
4. Farhan Akhtar... I guess he has tried another genre this time. Quite like Lakshya.. DON too does not come anywhere close to DCH
5. Songs are nice, but they are just that.. nice.. nothing to write home about. I personally liked the remix Paan Banaras Wala ( I am sure back at banaras it is already a rage)

I could go on and on with my rap.. but why bother.. the movie is a hit anyway....

Yes, Ladies and Gentleman..The people's verdict is out.. DON is all set to become a top notch grosser at the box office. What can i say... You can never predict the Bollywood audience.. Plus the hype that preceded DON was incredible to say the least. All TV channels and rest of the media was flooded with DON sound bytes. King Khan himself jumped in to promote his movie big time ( I guess thats again Hollywood way of doing things)

However. there are still some reason to go for DON

1. You are on a date and its her choice;
2. You have no clue how else to burn 150 bucks
3. You are a die hard King Khan fan
4. DCH has worked as an appetiser, looking for more from Mr. Akhtar
5. You fell in love with the original don. Want to relive the moments.
6. There are a couple of twists. A fairly surprising crimax ( treated just as 'Primal Fear' climax)

What more can you say? As i write this, the TV infront of me screams that the DON director has been approached by an undisclosed Hollywood production house..

Any guesses who will play DON in Hollywood ?

Mon Saluer: CULT FEST, a process more than an event!!

2006-03-06T09:07:00.000+05:30

Published in KY Souvenir IT BHU

CULT FEST: A PROCESS MORE THAN AN EVENT

“All the management I needed to know, I learnt by organizing our cultural festival(Mood I)”

A self-made manager, an IT revolutionary, a thought leader and an engineer by training and an entrepreneur by heart, Nandan Nilekani, an IIT Powai alumnus and CEO, Infosys.

Huge marquee, expansive tents, roaring crowds, live bands, impulsive audience, hip-hop discos and hundreds of fluttering bodies…a chaotic scene interspersed with various competitive events in dance, music, theatre and literary- a typical scene at a college festival or in running lingo “cult fest”. But, this is a mere façade of frantic activity behind which another level of psyche operates: A level where only those participate who have nerves of steel, go-getter attitude and a lust for triumph, a level which surpasses boundlessness of mind and body and reveals true instincts in exacting conditions, a level which creates superhuman out of common people. This is the level which holds those who make such carnivals happen.

One should wonder why these mortals surrender all their faculties to the mission of putting together a three day pomp and show? What is their motivation, their driving impulse…making us marvel at that inexhaustible gusto? How these people get along with receiving both adulation as well as ruthless criticism for the way they shape the fiesta?

Any festival is as large as the other but it is mutually agreeable that a cult fest is the most diverse and eventful owing to the sheer turn outs. A cult fest becomes the bench-mark of social presence and charm among the college student circuit and hence a symbol of vanity. In fact, a college may not be popular for the courses or placements as much as it is for the cult fest it hosts.

Anyone remotely associated with the festivals , whether at our college or elsewhere, will swear that none of it is child’s play, that the stakes are too high and that when everything goes as planned , the experience is all worthwhile. A cult fest begins with a vision and a single point agenda of making it larger than the previous one and grander than it has ever been. The dream is hatched in the moony eyes of those who take the mantle upon themselves. This is the last dream that they see as they literally adopt the condition of insomnia. Thus begins their sleepless and desolate excursion into the world of anxiety and fretfulness and the days ahead are a drill teeming with angst, ecstasy, despair and at each instant a fresh resolve to scale unforeseen summits. The entire team is mobilized and the chain reaction gets triggered. One goads the other and in no time a large intertwined network of fully fanatical souls appears. Then suddenly the path in front unfolds a mire of plight waiting to swallow any pipe dream. Splitting hair over the facilitation of funds,tackling red-tape of the apathetic administration, haggling with the band agents, scurrying for logistics and in general meeting the hype and expectations of students, such is the scene building up to a cult fest.

All in all, the extravaganza becomes a litmus test for the entire team., testing all the leadership and management fundas. From teamwork to people management, from finance to salesmanship, from pressure handling to meeting deadlines, it becomes a corporate environment in microcosm. So the question one still asks… Why do it? No, it is not for the money, hardly enough to cover expenses so nothing to skim off. Not even for power, at least not in absolute term. And certainly not for fame because many a time people present do not even notice you unless you are already a popular figure. Then what keeps the ball rolling? It is nothing but the feeling of self-worth, a desire to influence results by your decisions, a gratifying sense of accomplishment seeing a dream shaping into reality and above all, a redeeming chance to etch content ment on the minds of those who go home exultant.

So when you visit a “cult fest”next, remember, there is more happening than what meets the eye! A frontage of fun and frolic hiding the grit of few unsung heroes...

VIVEK SYANIA

Metallurgical Engg. Part IV

Mon Raison: Judicial Activism

2006-02-19T10:54:00.000+05:30

Judicial Activism is just that “ Activism” and should not be equated to unleashed interference in the roles and responsibilities of the other two wing of Indian Democracy namely, Legislature and Executive.

Activism in context of judiciary was coined by Arthur Schlingser, a US author and historian but its need was bugled by an earlier by Aristotle himself. In his cynic description of Democracy he said, “democracy turns into a monarchy and then an anarchy follows”.

Yes, Judiciary, Legislature and Executive were meant to be independent. Yes, Judiciary was never expected to interfere into the roles of of the other Organs. I agree to all that, much to the delight of those who support the motion. But then suddenly a doubt strikes my mind. How many of us will sit pretty when Parliament disregards the very public which elected in the first place? How many of us think that the most secular institution in the country,genesis of the law making, is not the converging point of politics or say realpolitik to be exact? None of us. In case of Environmental Law for example, Supreme Court has become the basis of the law because the Legislature could not synchronize with time. You call it Activism. Then, the right to information and transparency has been the corner stones of democracy then why did Parliament did nothing until recently ? Courts had to rule responding to Public Interest Litigation appeal filed. I am sure you call this activism. The tussle between the various wings is undersirable but this is not the sufficient reason for the courts to shun the role of parens patrie … father of the fatherless. If it were not for certain landmark judgments delivered by Supreme Court, Minorities in India would be hapless. You call it activism, I call it a wake up alarm to the government.

Secondly, what happens when the Parliament shuns its work? Too frequent walk outs and adjournements? Million of rupees wasted due to abstinences? Who is to blame? Won’t the system collapse.? Yes, the courts act as the source of interim relief. Judicial Activism basically, is a philosophy wherein the courts try to cater to the needs of the changing times and for social betterment exhibit non-adherence to precedents or strike down actions of the executive or make a law enacted by the legislature void (judicial review) or in some cases even enter the realm of judicial legislation.

It is not enough that a law is enacted… but that law has to be fair and just. Ditto, for executive. Courts have become the only checks on the Human Right Violations whether those have occurred in Kashmir, Gujrat or Bihar Jharkhand Belt. The atrocities committed by the law enforcement is not minded by the legislature so Judiciary has to react. It is not unhealthy activism.

When a court interprets Constitution the scope of the choice is much larger. The constitution often contains open textured and conceptual terms, it is an organic law whose spirit must be upheld. Law has to be followed both in letter and in spirit. Terms like “freedom of speech” “freedom of religion” though seem close ended are not closed ended. They require situational interpretation under special circumstances. The courts do that.
Lets not fool ourselves calling such actions as activism in bad light.

And if you are not yet convinced, then let me refresh your memory. I wasn’t a witness to it but most of our respectable adults may be. Emergency: A watershed in Indian Politics . So much was the Judicial Activism a threat to Indira Gandhi’s government that when the allhabad court declared her election null and void, in the act of furore she demonstrated what a majoritarian government can wreak upon the civil liberties. She declared an “emergency” whereby all the rights of citizens were curbed, press was trampled and the opposition was thrown into jails. Post emergency was a golden era in Judicial Activism and it showed that no one was above the law. Not even the Prime Minister of the country. Imagine how thin a line is inbetween a majoritarian and a totalitarian government. In absence of a strong opposition and public reprisal the very secular fabric of the country is at risk.
So the next time you think that judiciary is anything but a counter check to democratic but hegemonic regimes, anything but a watchdog to the excesses or idleness of legislature, anything repository of common man’s trust? Think again!! For if a common man is to elect its political strata, let the same common man seek justice in the elitist institution of courts…even if it is in the garb of Judicial Activism…

Mon Avis: Rang de Basanti: A patriotic splash!!!

2006-01-27T19:58:00.000+05:30

If you want to look and feel young like 20’s while at 40’s whom do you call? No, not Baba Ramdev but Aamir Khan. He has mastered the art and science of it all! And if you thought that Rang de Basanti was all about fun and frolic, here is a realitycheck for you. The movie dabbles in the past , contrasting with the present and leaving a hope for the future (phew!! So much in one!) Well, the saga of modern youth scurrying from one masti floor to another is drawn into a parallelism with Azad,Bhagat Singh and Rajguru! And take my word for it, Mehra the director, has been extremely stylish in his execution. After all, his earlier, Aks was a pathbreaking movie too.

I wouldn’t delve into the story for then I will be tempted to reveal the ending and express my disappointment at that too! Along with some spunky tracks from AR RAHMAN and novel dance jigs, Prasoon Joshi has caught the pulse of youth with his cool lyrics (Joshi who? The adguru behind Thanda Matlab Coca cola)…

All in all it takes a step further from Dil chahta hai, leaving a soulful message but falls short of the rustic charm generated by Lagaan.

I betted heavily on it and sure, it was worth all the hype!!! A technically perfect flick: has a firangi chick( an amateurish lip lock between khan and this chick)…Waheeda Rahman, Anupam and Kiron Kher, Om Puri and the theater ace , Atul Kulkarni and my fave funny guy Cyrus Junior, the VJ from MTV.The rest of the cast must already be known to you.

Superb movie showing camaraderie, new found romantic patriotism and of course breathtaking, perfectly etched out characters played with flair by all.

PS: Go to this movie in a gang and you shall enjoy it all the more.

Warning: Aamir does not and I repeat does not hog all the show. The other muscle flaunting boys vying for the skies (Mig 21- All computer generated shots) have done gem of a work.

So “a generation awakens’ to the blockbuster of the year…

Also, I saw a teaser of Krish.. and by heavens!! If I wasn't dreaming, then it had never before seen special effects in Bollywood. ... It showed Hrithik hopping and posing like Keanu in Matrix.

Mon Faves : Hollywood 2006 presents...

2006-01-22T13:03:00.000+05:30

For a start, I love the professionalism shown by Hollywood. It makes public the date of release well in advance.

So it does for 2006. List is out , the Hollywood movies to look out for. The catalog is not complete and the dates of release are meant for US and no declaration of simultaneous release in India. Cummon, we are a piracy ridden country, we don’t mind that!!!

The sequels first, BRAND power

1. MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 3 : A movie I will kill for ! Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) returns with a new operative Keri Russel and a new enemy. It will only get better with this !!! Watch out the teasers on the web
The movie hits theatres in 5th May

2. X MEN III: Need I say anything. Watch the same cast from previous X Men join hands once again in battle between mutants and humans. Hits US theatre on 26th May

3. SUPERMAN Returns : Well, those who couldn’t see a Superman flick being made during their conscious times, here is the one for all of you. Will be exciting to see what can Superman do almost 20 years hence. What can latest FX technology can do….Up Up and Away !!!

4. CASINO ROYALE : Yes, we may not be ready to accept Daniel Craig. But it is official, He is Bond…. James Bond. Her Majesty’s service. Licensed to kill. The bond Girl, though, is still to be named. We know it is not Aishwarya or even Charlize Theron

5. SCARY MOVIE 4: The fourth installment of the scary movies hits theaters on April 14th. Anna Faris returns as Cindy in “Scary Movie 4” which spoofs plenty of movies including a Dr. Phil and Shaquille O’Neal take on “Saw”. Can be hilarious !!!

5. THE DA VINCI CODE : Going by the popularity of the book, this movie shall be a runaway hit in India. Ron Howard brings the controversial book to the big screen on May 19th. Is there a deadly secret that’s tied to the life of Jesus? Tom Hanks plays Robert Langdon who is trying to get to the bottom of the mystery. “The Da Vinci Code” also stars Audrey Tautou as Sophie and Ian McKellan as Sir Leigh Teabing.

6. THE VISITING: Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig (James Bond Elect) star in “The Visiting”. A woman (Kidman) discovers that her son may be the key to stopping a deadly alien epidemic. This sci-fi movie is scheduled for an August 11th release.

7. THE CHARLEOTTE’s WEB : Did I say there would be no Julia Roberts in 2006? Julia Roberts voices the title character of Charlotte, a spider who strikes up an unlikely friendship with Wilbur, a pig, in this beloved children’s book turned animated feature. Look for “Charlotte’s Web” in theaters on December 22nd.

8. The Good Shepherd : This is another one to look out for!!! It has more than just a life of a CIA agent laid bare… Robert De Niro, Matt Damon and Angelina Jolie.

There will be more.. But don’t these already look like promising block busters…All we can do is wait…

Mon Avis : ZINDA... A slick flick

2006-01-20T20:32:00.000+05:30

Any one looking for an exotic effort in cinema? Here is the one for you… Zinda may be a lifted script, a remake of Oldboy, A Korean Hit, nevertheless, it is a nice alternative to the dubbed version. From Dutt’s rugged look to the hunky John’s chic demeanour, from screenplay to music, from locales in Bangkok to a glass studded studio in Film City(Zinda hoon main…feat Lara Dutta)…Sanjay Gupta scores on all fronts. Yes, so what if he has disappointed us with crap like Kaante and Plan and other such forgettables, this man deserved a second chance.

Story may be a little too mature to handle but anyone with good taste in movies will swallow it with ease. For the interest of the prospective viewers, I wont give away the story. Sure, it is a thriller from first frame to the last.

Precautions : Junta with a love for maudlin and mushy run-of –the mill , running around the trees romances are strongly advised against giving an audience to the movie. They may end up baffled and longing for usual cinema.

USP: No songs. Not atleast amidst the storyline. Watch out , though, for a remarkable number by Strings ( Yeh meri Kahani..,) with John Abraham in a voiceover sher.

Overall a slick execution to the plagiarized OldBoy

2006-01-19T11:34:00.000+05:30

I think a simple “Hi” would do for I hate to be formal even to strangers.

So finally my new year resolution has taken shape. Though I have been following some really brilliant pieces of writings all across the “blogsphere”(I dint coin it!!!), I was always too lazy to have a regular one myself. Reasons for that are aplenty. Few of the initiation phobias that one generally experiences are enlisted below. The list is certainly not exhaustive.

1. The Big Question” What the hell will I write about?”. Yes, the battle between the eagerness to sound interesting(spice it up !!!) or writing the pure bland truth (Usually, a dreary drag) begins.

2. Another corollary question “Who the hell is going to read it?” Well, whats the show without an audience. In case you dint know even words do affable theatrics.

3. Then of course, “ Am I a writer enough?” Well, simple shero shayari will not make a good blog. Look beyond. Don’t mind grammatical errors. Look for creativity.

4. “Is the process really interesting?” Now……. This one I can’t answer……

5. Then the baap of all questions…”What do I name the damned blog?” Believe me when I say, this point haunted me for all these days since the start of the year. God knows, how many blogs I have kicked-off and then kicked-out coz of names.

Now this is how I answered these questions…

1. The Big Answer….” Any damn thing that I come across.” Hell I don’t need to be a J.K.Rowling to spin an interesting folk lore. I mean look around. Anywere and everywhere you find an interesting occurrence. You don’t have to look far to find fascinating people. So this question doesn’t bother me. I can write about what I comes across my five senses (may be sixth too)

2. Corollary answer…” Any one who has faltu time, wants a cursed opinion, wants to read about himself/herself mentioned, wants to know my mental state, wants to abuse me or simply want some brutal views. No, I will not write about my past and present love lives or in general about those who are very dear and near to me.

3. Answer “You never know till you begin”. I may not be an oxford graduate but I do know the basic fundamental of communication skill. If you have successfully conveyed what you wanted to, your communication has succeeded.

4. Well……… Dint I say. I can’t answer this one. No questions to be asked.

5. I really did take a long time. Then every answer must come from the question itself. Why do I want to write? Because I am a compulsive expressionist.

So here it is… an expressoholic for you….
One more thing.. I am very OPEN to all kinds of criticism…
So do write in your reckonings…