What a considerable waste of talent!!
Chitrangada Singh who enthralled us in Hazaron Khwaishein Aisi delivers such a dud that i was left wondering if it was really the same actress. Sure she looks stunning...infact extremely gorgeous..but thats it. The nuances that needed to be brought out by Aaliyah as the tormented bride to be is simply missing...and its disheartening. Same goes for Sanjay Suri. He looks like he is bored throughout the movie. Where is the Sanjay of My Brother Nikhil and Jhankar Beats and Pinjar and numerous other similar stellar performances.
The premise of the movie is as the name suggests - Brother falls in love with the elder brother's wife to be and the story begins. The movie is actually very funny and will kepp you in splits at most times. The music is ho hum while the direction is taut.
What lifts the film is its story - lighthearted but meaningful, and just the very very good performance of Sharman Joshi. He makes his Siddharth's character look older, mature and likeable while at the same time retains his youthful boyishness. Add to that the spice provided by Shabana and Boman - brilliant as a loving and very natural husband & wife pair - and you have a movie which is eminently watchable but which could have been so much more if only the leading protagonists had put in just a bit more effort...
Watch it for Sharman....
Friday, January 23, 2009
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Chandni Chowk to China - Kung Fu Hustle meets Bollywood
This movie is hilarious...exactly at those points where it is not intended to be!!
Now here is the sad part, since this is a Akshay Kumar movie - and i am inclined to say that i like his style of comedy and therefore i like to watch his clean masala flicks - i did not read the reviews and went to watch the film with very high expectations. They all came crashing down!!
Infact the movie starts very well. The first fight sequence and then the way the narration moves from China to India and then to the heroes abode is very gripping and just then Akshay gets a kick on the backside and so do we....the pain of those kicks linger throughout the film...
In fact i have one simple question for the director....why...why do you need to add those 15 odd minutes of akshay flying across delhi after getting kicked, or why do you need need the song sequence in the middle of a flight journey.They are not even FUNNY!!
The entire movie suffers from not knowing where its placed. Is it an action film showcasing Akshays kung fu skills. Is it a rip off of Kung Fu Hustle - must say without the meaning of that superb film - and a mix of bollywood or Is it a comedy where the director makes it such a bad movie that it actually becomes a masterpiece??
Sadly, None....though Kung Fu hustle is primarily the take for this movie even though it gets hidden under layers of bad acting and bad direction.
In a gist, the movie revolves around Sidhu (Akshay Kumar), Sakhi (Deepika Padukone), and Chopstick (Ranvir Shorey) travelling to China believing that Sidhu is a reincarnation of some great chinese warrior and who will deliver the residents of a particular village from evil in the form of Hosho. (Nusiance - atleast the names should have been of some sense. Hosho, & Chuchi being prime examples). In this adventure there is an interwoven plot of an indian daughter trying to find her chinese twin sister and a father who has amnesia, god only knows where the mother is....i have a gut feeling Nikhil would have remembered about her when he saw the film himself ;-).
There are some really amazing scenes though throughout the film. The first narration as i have mentioned earlier is very good. Another good scene is the flight scene about akshay loading the luggage...hilarious. The action sets are impressive most of the times. Unfortunately, just good scenes do not make a good film.
Couple that with bad acting..Oh lord!!...Akshay though is the only saving grace somewhat though even he goes very much over the top on many occasions. Deepika is extremely bad. Infact she does not even look that great throughout the film with her awful dressing style and stymied dialogue delivery. Same goes for Ranvir Shorey. In fact at one point of time i felt that the wig will come off for him.
I certainly did not have too many expectation of the director as i have not really appreciated Nikhil Advanis last couple of films Salaam e Ishq and Kal ho na Ho. These films atleast had good acting to speak of which carried them somewhat on the box office.
Musically also this film is weak. 5 music directors are just too many and do not give you a feel of the direction in which the music flows. Kailash Kher is good without being superlative. Everyone else is average.
Now let me come back to the point i made CCTC and Kung Fu hustle. The latter movie had a meaning with respect to the hero finding redemption and his pain was actually felt by the audience even though it was wierdly funny in its approach. In CCTC, the connect is just not there cause the cause identified looks so trivial. After the first shot where the villagers are shown to be under extreme stress, the entire movie shows them to be quite content. After all they dont seem to work after the first shot. Also, as far as redemption is concerned, it would have been better if akshay had been serious about the Kung Fu lessons or even the fact that he needs to overcome the physical injuries in extreme ways. Here it looks like a stroll in the park for the reigning bolly champ.
I have heard that it is semi autobiographical in nature. I am right now doubling over with laughter!!...if only...Sigh...
Finally , please carry shades in the theatre...u will need them near the climax when the screen increduously starts flashing white every couple of seconds. You will need them to protect your eyes...
Or better go watch SlumDog Millionaire - an experience you will not easily forget....
Now here is the sad part, since this is a Akshay Kumar movie - and i am inclined to say that i like his style of comedy and therefore i like to watch his clean masala flicks - i did not read the reviews and went to watch the film with very high expectations. They all came crashing down!!
Infact the movie starts very well. The first fight sequence and then the way the narration moves from China to India and then to the heroes abode is very gripping and just then Akshay gets a kick on the backside and so do we....the pain of those kicks linger throughout the film...
In fact i have one simple question for the director....why...why do you need to add those 15 odd minutes of akshay flying across delhi after getting kicked, or why do you need need the song sequence in the middle of a flight journey.They are not even FUNNY!!
The entire movie suffers from not knowing where its placed. Is it an action film showcasing Akshays kung fu skills. Is it a rip off of Kung Fu Hustle - must say without the meaning of that superb film - and a mix of bollywood or Is it a comedy where the director makes it such a bad movie that it actually becomes a masterpiece??
Sadly, None....though Kung Fu hustle is primarily the take for this movie even though it gets hidden under layers of bad acting and bad direction.
In a gist, the movie revolves around Sidhu (Akshay Kumar), Sakhi (Deepika Padukone), and Chopstick (Ranvir Shorey) travelling to China believing that Sidhu is a reincarnation of some great chinese warrior and who will deliver the residents of a particular village from evil in the form of Hosho. (Nusiance - atleast the names should have been of some sense. Hosho, & Chuchi being prime examples). In this adventure there is an interwoven plot of an indian daughter trying to find her chinese twin sister and a father who has amnesia, god only knows where the mother is....i have a gut feeling Nikhil would have remembered about her when he saw the film himself ;-).
There are some really amazing scenes though throughout the film. The first narration as i have mentioned earlier is very good. Another good scene is the flight scene about akshay loading the luggage...hilarious. The action sets are impressive most of the times. Unfortunately, just good scenes do not make a good film.
Couple that with bad acting..Oh lord!!...Akshay though is the only saving grace somewhat though even he goes very much over the top on many occasions. Deepika is extremely bad. Infact she does not even look that great throughout the film with her awful dressing style and stymied dialogue delivery. Same goes for Ranvir Shorey. In fact at one point of time i felt that the wig will come off for him.
I certainly did not have too many expectation of the director as i have not really appreciated Nikhil Advanis last couple of films Salaam e Ishq and Kal ho na Ho. These films atleast had good acting to speak of which carried them somewhat on the box office.
Musically also this film is weak. 5 music directors are just too many and do not give you a feel of the direction in which the music flows. Kailash Kher is good without being superlative. Everyone else is average.
Now let me come back to the point i made CCTC and Kung Fu hustle. The latter movie had a meaning with respect to the hero finding redemption and his pain was actually felt by the audience even though it was wierdly funny in its approach. In CCTC, the connect is just not there cause the cause identified looks so trivial. After the first shot where the villagers are shown to be under extreme stress, the entire movie shows them to be quite content. After all they dont seem to work after the first shot. Also, as far as redemption is concerned, it would have been better if akshay had been serious about the Kung Fu lessons or even the fact that he needs to overcome the physical injuries in extreme ways. Here it looks like a stroll in the park for the reigning bolly champ.
I have heard that it is semi autobiographical in nature. I am right now doubling over with laughter!!...if only...Sigh...
Finally , please carry shades in the theatre...u will need them near the climax when the screen increduously starts flashing white every couple of seconds. You will need them to protect your eyes...
Or better go watch SlumDog Millionaire - an experience you will not easily forget....
Monday, January 12, 2009
Kannathil Muthamittal - A Kiss on the Cheek
Just finished watching a movie which should be rated as one of the best i have seen till date. Kannathil Muthamittal - A kiss on the cheek
What an apt name for the movie. Probably one of the finest Mani Ratnam movies ever made. This guy needs to be saluted for his sheer genius. A tamil movie made about the Srilankan strife where no sides have been taken is a great sign of courage by the director.
The premise is relatively simple. An adopted girl in search of her biological mother and idealistic parents who help her in every step to grant her this wish. But what keeps this movie head and shoulders above anything else you have ever seen is that this is not about that girl - thats there just to keep the story moving - this is about a world where human life is reduced to nothing. Its about a world where the success is measured by the number of graves i was able to provide my brother who is now my enemy - hopefully that number is greater than mine. Where people fight for an ideology which ruins not just their lives but the lives of everyone who did not even wish to be part of it but are sucked into it. Where sometimes even ideology has died because it was given to a 10 year old who shot at its heart with his kalashnikov.
The story of the girl and her travels to the emerald island to find her mother is a moving one which has been handled brilliantly without any melodrama. The movie is a slightly long one at around 3 hrs but it probably needed this time. The best part about this movie is how natural it looks. The family life shown is like any other indian family and the romance so subtle. Something that will bring a smile to your lips is a great love song shot at scenic beaches and ragged ships on great salt farms but not between the lead pair but between the mother and the adopted daughter. Brilliant!!
The cinematography is excellent. Sri Lanka's beauty is captured in its raw essence. Its actually eerie to see beautiful parks and forests and amongst them just the shell of buildings. School Girls on cycles laughing like they do not have a care in the world and the next minute a gunfight at exactly the same place that looks so real that mentally you pary for their safety even though you know that its not real (or maybe it is!!!). Even the indian scenes are well captured. There is a scene where the young girl is running around in circles with her father in the centre and suddenly the father tells her that she is not their biological daughter. On hearing this she still keeps running around her father but now her happy carefree expression changes slowly as realization dawns on her. You go to movies to watch this...
Which brings us to the acting. Needless to say, Ratnam extracts superb performances from the various actors. Madhavan as the dad and Keerthana as the child are brilliant in the movie. Nandita Das in her small role potrays a great amount of character as the biological mother. She really looks the part as the Sri Lankan Tamil girl who goes through great turmoil in life. But the greatest of my applause is reserved for the fantastic Simran. The role essayed by her is really tough as that of a mother caught between wishing for her daughters happiness but at the sametime apprehensive of the steps that they have taken. Caught between the love for her adopted daughter while longing for her own sons too. This is one superlative performance.
And before i forget....the music...It seems that AR Rahman and Mani Ratnam are brothers. The music just knows how to follow the story and vice versa. The background score 'Vellai Pookal Ulagam' is haunting while the rest of the songs just simply fall into place.
A great movie which hopefully should make you wonder why do we fight when all we need to sort everything is to just kiss on the cheek...after all he is just your brother.
What an apt name for the movie. Probably one of the finest Mani Ratnam movies ever made. This guy needs to be saluted for his sheer genius. A tamil movie made about the Srilankan strife where no sides have been taken is a great sign of courage by the director.
The premise is relatively simple. An adopted girl in search of her biological mother and idealistic parents who help her in every step to grant her this wish. But what keeps this movie head and shoulders above anything else you have ever seen is that this is not about that girl - thats there just to keep the story moving - this is about a world where human life is reduced to nothing. Its about a world where the success is measured by the number of graves i was able to provide my brother who is now my enemy - hopefully that number is greater than mine. Where people fight for an ideology which ruins not just their lives but the lives of everyone who did not even wish to be part of it but are sucked into it. Where sometimes even ideology has died because it was given to a 10 year old who shot at its heart with his kalashnikov.
The story of the girl and her travels to the emerald island to find her mother is a moving one which has been handled brilliantly without any melodrama. The movie is a slightly long one at around 3 hrs but it probably needed this time. The best part about this movie is how natural it looks. The family life shown is like any other indian family and the romance so subtle. Something that will bring a smile to your lips is a great love song shot at scenic beaches and ragged ships on great salt farms but not between the lead pair but between the mother and the adopted daughter. Brilliant!!
The cinematography is excellent. Sri Lanka's beauty is captured in its raw essence. Its actually eerie to see beautiful parks and forests and amongst them just the shell of buildings. School Girls on cycles laughing like they do not have a care in the world and the next minute a gunfight at exactly the same place that looks so real that mentally you pary for their safety even though you know that its not real (or maybe it is!!!). Even the indian scenes are well captured. There is a scene where the young girl is running around in circles with her father in the centre and suddenly the father tells her that she is not their biological daughter. On hearing this she still keeps running around her father but now her happy carefree expression changes slowly as realization dawns on her. You go to movies to watch this...
Which brings us to the acting. Needless to say, Ratnam extracts superb performances from the various actors. Madhavan as the dad and Keerthana as the child are brilliant in the movie. Nandita Das in her small role potrays a great amount of character as the biological mother. She really looks the part as the Sri Lankan Tamil girl who goes through great turmoil in life. But the greatest of my applause is reserved for the fantastic Simran. The role essayed by her is really tough as that of a mother caught between wishing for her daughters happiness but at the sametime apprehensive of the steps that they have taken. Caught between the love for her adopted daughter while longing for her own sons too. This is one superlative performance.
And before i forget....the music...It seems that AR Rahman and Mani Ratnam are brothers. The music just knows how to follow the story and vice versa. The background score 'Vellai Pookal Ulagam' is haunting while the rest of the songs just simply fall into place.
A great movie which hopefully should make you wonder why do we fight when all we need to sort everything is to just kiss on the cheek...after all he is just your brother.
The Best Movie Quote/ Dialogue of 2008
"Do I really look like a man with a plan, Harvey? I don't have a plan. The mob has plans, the cops have plans. You know what I am, Harvey? I'm a dog chasing cars. I wouldn't know what to do if I caught one. I just *do* things. I'm a wrench in the gears. I *hate* plans. Yours, theirs, everyone's. Maroni has plans. Gordon has plans. Schemers trying to control their worlds. I am not a schemer. I show schemers how pathetic their attempts to control things really are. So when I say that what happened to you and your girlfriend wasn't personal, you know I'm telling the truth. It's a schemer who put you where you are. You were a schemer. You had plans. Look where it got you. I just did what I do best-I took your plan and turned it on itself. Look what I have done to this city with a few drums of gas and a couple bullets. Nobody panics when the expected people get killed. Nobody panics when things go according to plan, even if the plans are horrifying. If I tell the press that tomorrow a gangbanger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will get blown up, nobody panics. But when I say one little old mayor will die, everyone loses their minds! Introduce a little anarchy, you upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. I am an agent of chaos. And you know the thing about chaos, Harvey? It's fair.
” The Joker in "The Dark Knight"
” The Joker in "The Dark Knight"
Slumdog Millionaire...It Rocks
It has to be about a Love Story....It just has to be!!
In one of the finest films made this year...shucks...till date...at least on Indian Soil, the love remains the undercurrent for everything. And why not?...if you take out the romance between the lead protagonists Jamal Malik and Latika, you lose the soul.
In an utterly impalusible movie, it still makes you wonder just a little bit...can this really happen, and this is the biggest tribute to the director since everything else is absolutely real. Both sides of India with its pukish slums, brothels, pimps, beggars one one hand and the glitzy call centres, Reality shows, Hiranandani and Mercedes Cars on the other are very 'in your face' real!!
The story is just an elongation of the Movie Name: Slumdog Millioniare in Hindi Slang - Basti/ Jhopad/ 'gandagi' ka Kutta who becomes a crorepati. A dog from the slums who is one the verge of becoming a millioniare and then just before the last question is asked all hell breaks loose. Since the guy is a slumdog, he should not know the answer to questions which even rich people do not know but he does....the situations that he has been in his life till date which makes him know the answer is what forms the crux of the story.
The Q&A moves between the good and the bad but keeping in kind that it has been made for international, particularly British audiences, it makes sense. What makes the Q&A session brillaint is Anil Kapoor, who in a short but career defining role is as slimy and stinking as the pot of shit in which the protagonist falls.
The situations are very real and what makes them more so are the young actors and their interaction. Watch the scene in which the blind child tells Jamal that bearded baldy on a $100 note is Benjamin Franklin. The subtlety of being blind is brought forward so well that its spellbinding. Or take the scene of a vey young Jamal dancing infront of his beloved Latika. The children keep the movie really alive. Infact they are so good that they overshadow the main cast members Dev Patel, Frieda Pinto and also Irrfan who are also quite impressive in their meaty roles.
This movie at some levels reminded me of 'City of God'. There are actually a lot of similarities in their subtext if you observe carefully though they are quite different in their overall positioning.
Finally the 3 things that make the movie so great are, The music of AR Rahman - this guy is a genious and mark my words, one day they are going to call him the greatest musician ever. Some of the tracks are exceptional and without words they convey so much meaning. Then there is the Direction of Danny Boyle - Hats off sir for making a movie in India which is better than what our bollywood has been dishing out for the last 50 years. Some of the scenes are extremely gritty without ever being distasteful. They are just 'Real'. And finally what makes this film truly memorable is INDIA - yes, it presents a myriad of colours and sequences and events our country that have become part of our life. It is what defines India today....sometimes to the extent that we have started ignoring some of these grusome facts about ourselves. If in some way - and i think it will - this movie awakens us to the darker underbelly of India and lets some reality seep into our consiousness, it will deserve the Oscar that is awaiting it right now!!!
In one of the finest films made this year...shucks...till date...at least on Indian Soil, the love remains the undercurrent for everything. And why not?...if you take out the romance between the lead protagonists Jamal Malik and Latika, you lose the soul.
In an utterly impalusible movie, it still makes you wonder just a little bit...can this really happen, and this is the biggest tribute to the director since everything else is absolutely real. Both sides of India with its pukish slums, brothels, pimps, beggars one one hand and the glitzy call centres, Reality shows, Hiranandani and Mercedes Cars on the other are very 'in your face' real!!
The story is just an elongation of the Movie Name: Slumdog Millioniare in Hindi Slang - Basti/ Jhopad/ 'gandagi' ka Kutta who becomes a crorepati. A dog from the slums who is one the verge of becoming a millioniare and then just before the last question is asked all hell breaks loose. Since the guy is a slumdog, he should not know the answer to questions which even rich people do not know but he does....the situations that he has been in his life till date which makes him know the answer is what forms the crux of the story.
The Q&A moves between the good and the bad but keeping in kind that it has been made for international, particularly British audiences, it makes sense. What makes the Q&A session brillaint is Anil Kapoor, who in a short but career defining role is as slimy and stinking as the pot of shit in which the protagonist falls.
The situations are very real and what makes them more so are the young actors and their interaction. Watch the scene in which the blind child tells Jamal that bearded baldy on a $100 note is Benjamin Franklin. The subtlety of being blind is brought forward so well that its spellbinding. Or take the scene of a vey young Jamal dancing infront of his beloved Latika. The children keep the movie really alive. Infact they are so good that they overshadow the main cast members Dev Patel, Frieda Pinto and also Irrfan who are also quite impressive in their meaty roles.
This movie at some levels reminded me of 'City of God'. There are actually a lot of similarities in their subtext if you observe carefully though they are quite different in their overall positioning.
Finally the 3 things that make the movie so great are, The music of AR Rahman - this guy is a genious and mark my words, one day they are going to call him the greatest musician ever. Some of the tracks are exceptional and without words they convey so much meaning. Then there is the Direction of Danny Boyle - Hats off sir for making a movie in India which is better than what our bollywood has been dishing out for the last 50 years. Some of the scenes are extremely gritty without ever being distasteful. They are just 'Real'. And finally what makes this film truly memorable is INDIA - yes, it presents a myriad of colours and sequences and events our country that have become part of our life. It is what defines India today....sometimes to the extent that we have started ignoring some of these grusome facts about ourselves. If in some way - and i think it will - this movie awakens us to the darker underbelly of India and lets some reality seep into our consiousness, it will deserve the Oscar that is awaiting it right now!!!
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