Movies to look out for this week

Tees Maar Khan [IMDB]

A conman sets up a fake cinema shoot as a smokescreen for a daring train robbery

Cast: Akshay Kumar, Katrina Kaif, Akshaye Khanna

Direction: Farah Khan



Megamind [IMDB]

The supervillain Megamind finally conquers his nemesis, the hero Metro Man... but finds his life pointless without a hero to fight.

Cast: Will Ferell (voice), Tina Fey (voice), Brad Pitt (voice), Jonah Hill (voice)

Direction: Tom McGrath



The Tourist [IMDB]

Revolves around Frank, an American tourist visiting Italy to mend a broken heart. Elise is an extraordinary woman who deliberately crosses his path

Cast: Johnny Depp, Angelina Jolie, Paul Bettany

Direction: Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck



Toonpur Ka Superhero [IMDB]

The good cartoons of Toonpur enlist an unsuspecting action-hero Aditya into their war against the bad toons

Cast: Ajay Devgan, Kajol, Sanjay Mishra (voice)

Direction: Kireet Khurana

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Phas Gaye Re Obama

The setting is 2008, when the entire world is reeling under the financial tsunami of the Wall street collapse. And the tremors of those events are being felt as far as rural India, where a group of bumbling “khandaani” kidnappers are ruing the “recession” that has made their plight pitiful – victims are offering ridiculously low ransom payments, no one is paying protection money and things are so bad that they cant afford even outgoing calls on mobiles.

Amidst this gloominess, the semi-literate member of the group Anee announces the arrival of NRI Mr Shastri to their town and the kidnappers immediately see a pot of gold with him. Unfortunately for them, other “senior” kidnappers in the area are also seeing stacks of dollars in front of them. In the midst of all this, imagine if Mr NRI is himself bankrupt and is in India only to sell off his ancestral property.

Phas Gaye Re Obama’s story flows well, and a few sequences are especially memorable. Especially the organised kidnapping business, with its bank-like ransom handling facilities and a “kidnapping receipt” - which is to be shown in case of any other kidnapping attempt and is valid for 12 months :) !! There is no sag anywhere in its runtime and the laughs are generated by its quirky characters and their rustic nature (it carries the tradition from the previous gangster capers Sankat City and 99 - both of which I adore).

The “khandaani” kidnapper, Bhaisaab, played by Sanjay Mishra, is a delight to watch. And giving him company is Oye Lucky Lucky Oye’s Manu Rishi – the America-worshipping, small-towner Anee – who gets his dreamer yet gullible act pitch perfect. Rajat Kapoor plays the hassled NRI effortlessly – he seems made for these kind of roles only. Neha Dhupia was the only misfit – her character too unrealistic and her performance nothing to write home about. Amol Gupte carries from where he left off in Kaminey, a natural gang leader.

The movie holds your attention well for its entire runtime and the ending is not quite what you expected – so full marks to the director for that as well. There are no songs etc to distract. A solid effort by debutante director Subhash Kapoor, but left an aftertaste very similar to Sankat City etc. If it was not preceded by the above mentioned movies, I would have rated it a little higher. And others, who haven’t watched those movies will definitely have a lot of fun watching Phas Gaye Re Obama



PS - Even after watching the movie, I did not quite understand the title, although there are definitely a lot of Obama references in the movie
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Khelein Hum Jee Jaan Sey

For me, Kheley Hum Jee Jaan Se will probably be the last time I am going to invest time and money in a Ashutosh Gowariker movie. It marks a very sad decline for someone regarded as one of India’s finest directors not too many years back. While length had always been his weakness, his story telling has now become a joke. What started off in the laborious Jodhaa Akbar has reached the nadir in this movie – the story and screenplay lack any drama, any sense of cinema or emotional highs and lows.

The story of the Chittagong uprising of 1930, a forgotten chapter of our freedom struggle – when revolutionaries under Surya Sen tried to make an example out of Chittagong. They decided to rid Chittagong of all Britishers by taking out five key targets in one audacious night – the telegraph office, the police lines armory, the railway tracks, the European Club and the British Army Cantonment. And if you watch the movie, you will realize how agonizingly close they came to rewriting history of British India.

And I do have to concede - even with his failings as a moviemaker, Ashutosh Gowarker has to be applauded for bringing this forgotten story to light. Because of it, I have a new sense of respect for all those who gave up so much for the fight to free this country. But ironically, I got it not from the movie but only from the end credits - where the photos of all the people who were involved in the Chittagong uprising makes the events of the movie spine-chillingly real. The biggest emotional surge for me came towards the end of the credits when I read the name of some Bengali gentleman who is still living in Bangladesh ! Alive, 80 years after the event !

Kheley Hum Jee Jaan Sey is in two distinct parts. The first part shows all the planning that went into the raids and how the group of rebels got together. The second half shows the actual raid and the aftermath of the raids as the British ruthlessly hunted down every one of the conspirators. The planners of the raid were Surya Sen and couple of his friends. Together they trained and inducted into his plans some 50 odd teenagers, mostly students, for the attack.

Did Surya Sen misuse his position as a teacher to whitewash impressionable minds into the rebellion? The movie doesn’t even consider the question relevant – everything is clearly black and white and Masterda Surya Sen never did anything wrong.

In the first half, we are introduced to innumerable number of characters, without any depth or detail on any of them. Even Abhishek Bachhan as Surya Sen seems unreal. He is always straight-faced and speaks only in a measured tone. He has always the right things to say, his shirt is always crisp white and he composure remains unruffled in most situations. Though his actions seem to suggest there is a fire in his belly, one sees no other visible signs of it anywhere. Deepika, with her size-zero, looks completely out of place in the movie – and quite frankly I didn’t think this movie needed a leading lady or any romatic angle.

The bad characterization is compounded by the absolute lack of any drama in the screenplay. I have seen documentaries with more emotional highs and lows than this movie. Emotional scenes are wretchedly handled, everything happens with an unreal sense of detachment – as if each actor was gnawing away with doubt about the lines he/she was spouting on the screen. Some actions of a lot of characters are completely unexplained – and things fall into place for the revolutionaries in remarkably convenient ways till the night of the actual assault.

Such a white-washed version of history is a little hard to digest for any intelligent audience – ironically the very same audience this movie is trying to entice. The characters fail to make any connection with the audience because they do not show much more depth than cardboard cutouts. The movie also drags on for the mandatory 3 hours of an Ashutosh Gowariker production. And frankly, the entire second half dedicated to the pursuit and capture of the revolutionaries was quite depressing – it could have been given much less screentime. All it did was to serve as a vehicle to showcase melodramatic deaths of some of the characters. Instead of focusing on their lives


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Movies to look out for this week

Khelein Hum Jee Jaan Sey [IMDB]

Ashutosh Gowariker's retelling of the Chittagong uprising in 1930 - a largely forgotten event in our independence movement that we should learn something about

Cast: Abhishek Bachhan, Deepika Padukone, Sikandar Kher

Direction: Ashutosh Gowariker



Phas Gaye Re Obama [IMDB]

A comedy set against the backdrop of global recession/meltdown that originated in USA. A suddenly-poor NRI returns to India to sell his property and his kidnapped by a recession-hit underworld gang

Cast: Devender Chaudhary, Neha Dhupia, Amol Gupte

Direction: Subhash Kapoor



Rakht Charitra 2

The second part of Ram Gopal Verma's biopic on Paritala Ravi. This part is expected to be based on the conspiracy theories surrounding his death

Cast: Vivek Oberoi, Surya, Shatrughan Sinha

Direction: Ram Gopal Varma



The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader [IMDB]

Lucy and Edmund Pevensie return to Narnia with their cousin Eustace where they meet up with Prince Caspian for a trip across the sea aboard the royal ship The Dawn Treader.

Cast: Ben Barnes, Skandar Keynes, Georgie Henley

Direction: Michael Apted

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RED

Retired, but Extremely Dangerous – put Bruce Willis in a movie named that and you are definitely looking at wolf-whistling time. And the movie RED tries not to disappoint you, especially in the opening minutes. (If you cant make out by now, I am a ‘die-hard’ Bruce Willis fan). The movie opens with Frank Moses (Bruce Willis) leading a dull retired life in the suburbs alone. And his only excitement is the politely flirting with an employee of the pension department call center. Till some masked commando-types try to take him out one night

Frank takes out the silent attackers in a flurry of punches that you couldn’t even see properly – and then even a hailstorm of bullets from the outside doesn’t ruffle his hair (not that he has any, but you get the idea) as he finishes off all the baddies. Suspecting they might target Sarah (the pensions dept employee), Frank convinces (kidnaps) her to join him as he rounds up his ex-colleagues to find out why someone is so pissed with him

Enter a mischievous Morgan Freeman, who is spending his last days at a retirement home, the technology-hating paranoid John Malkovich, the ex-KGB Brian Cox who doesn’t mind joining his erstwhile enemies as long as it promises some action and Helen Mirren the lethal but dainty looking bed-and-breakfast owner. These guys obviously have a history together – and there is a twinkle in their eye when they recount older adventures – or while fighting off CIA assassins.

Soon they track down the source of the orders, and as is the case with all such movies, the rogue tends to be someone pretty high up. So our REDs hatch an intricate plan to reach their target. And ofcourse things go kabooom – with spectacular explosions all around. Thankfully, the explosions are not the gory type and blood shown is minimal – keeping its entertainment focus intact.

So does the movie fulfil all its promises ? Well, not all. It is a through-and-through entertainer, with no dull moments. The mood of the movie is borderline funny and the oldies keep indulging in playful banter with each other. It is the action which disappoints a little in the second half. While the first half has a couple of awesome sequences with Bruce Willis stepping out of a spinning cat to shoot down an attacker, the second half is bereft of any such wolf-whistle moments.

A couple more of those would have made this an AWESOME movie.


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Break Ke Baad

Debutant director Danish Aslam serves us disappointing fare in Break Ke Baad this weekend - a crisp first half followed by a damp and soggy second half. The teekha first half has Deepika‘s sizzling act as Aaliya - bringing some life & vitality to her usually expressionless face. Imran plays the chocolate boy lover Abhay – a role he has done admirably in the past and is the likeable meethi chutney. Together, against my expectation, they both produce a very likeable dish and have a crackling onscreen chemistry. However, that spark between them is completely doused by the insipid writing in the second half.

The opening credits are a montage of two six year olds falling in love as they grow up, with a shared passion of hindi movies. The girl grows up to be the impetuous Aaliya who is full of life, but sometimes does not care about anyone but herself. Abhay is the ultra-sweet guy who tolerates all her tantrums and still adores her. Maybe because he realizes he needs her more than she does. However, when Aaliya decides to fly off to Australia to study, the relationship cant take the strain and the ‘break’ happens.

This is where the movie goes to dogs – as it starts focussing more on other characters and side-plots more than the lead pair. Sharmila Tagore as Aaliya’s mother heads a useless track about the ills of the world of showbiz. She also seals my belief that yesteryear’s charming heroines lose their expressive faces in the process of ageing (maybe to botox). And hence are better staying alive in old movie reruns rather than acting in newer movies. Jaya Bhaduri, Hema Malini and now Sharmila Tagore – their faces struggle to convey different emotions – and end up looking almost similar in all scenes.

The movie meanders along for quite a while before becoming a coming-of-age movie for both Aaliya and Abhay. And this is the movie’s biggest failure – since the scriptwriter clearly doesn’t have the maturity to handle this topic as much as he has a handle on romance. The climax is stupid even by the low standards of rom-coms – and which is where you write the movie off as a failure


PS - Something struck me a couple of days after I watched the movie – when you watch the movie, you can tell me if I was wrong or right. I thought Aaliya’s character and idiosyncrasies were heavily based on Jab We Met’s Geet . None of the Bhatinda Punjabi madness, but a calculated effort by the makers to use that quirkiness and happy-go-lucky nature. But then again, Geet was a million times better than Aaliya would ever be.

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Movies to look out for this week

Red [IMDB]

When his idyllic life is threatened by a high-tech assassin, former black-ops agent Frank Moses reassembles his old team in a last ditch effort to survive

Cast: Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich

Direction: Robert Schwentke



Break Ke Baad [IMDB]

Abhay and Aaliya love each other, but they want to follow their individual dreams. So they take a break from each other, but will they find each other again

Cast: Imran Khan, Deepika Padukone

Direction: Danish Aslam


Unstoppable [IMDB]

With an unmanned, half-mile-long freight train barreling toward a city, a veteran engineer and a young conductor race against the clock to prevent a catastrophe

Cast: Denzel Washington, Chris Pine

Direction: Tony Scott



Allah Ke Banday [IMDB]

Allah Ke Banday tracks the journey of two boys who commit their first murder at the age of 12. Sent to Juvenile Prison, they return to take over the vast slums where they grew up

Cast: Sharman Joshi, Faruk Kabir, Naseeruddin Shah

Direction: Faruk Kabir



Secretariat [IMDB]

Penny Chenery Tweedy and colleagues guide her long-shot but precocious stallion to set, in 1973, the unbeaten record for winning the Triple Crown

Cast: Diane Lane, Scott Glenn

Direction: Randall Wallace



Spanish Beauty

A Hindi-Spanish coproduction about a married woman, who looks outside her marriage to bring some excitement back to her life. But things are not what they seem when her husband discovers the adultery

Cast: Barbara Mori, Christian Meier

Direction: Ricardo De Montreuil
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Movies to look out for this week

Guzaarish [IMDB]

Ethan, a magician rendered paralyzed in an accident, sets off a furor when he makes a petition to the court to end his own life.

Cast: Hrithik Roshan, Aishwarya Rai Bachhan, Aditya Roy Kapoor

Direction: Sanjay Leela Bhansali



Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part I [IMDB]

Voldemort's power is growing stronger. He now has control over the Ministry of Magic and Hogwarts. Harry, Ron, and Hermione decide to finish Dumbledore's work and find the rest of the Horcruxes to defeat the Dark Lord.

Cast: Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint

Direction: David Yates


Shahrukh Bola 'Khoobsurat Hai Tu' [IMDB]

A flower-seller Laali's chance encounter with her idol SRK at a traffic signal and the how it makes her life go topsy turvy

Cast: Pritika Chawla, Afzal Khan, Kay Kay Menon

Direction: Makrand Deshpande

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The Social Network

Right from the word go, The Social Network makes it clear it is not going to be a lazy watch. A rapidfire exchange between a young Mark Zuckerberg and his date in the opening scene sets a fast-paced tone for this movie. It makes it clear that you, the viewer, has to pay a lot of attention to what the actors are saying. Because as you’d realize later, a lot of the movie is a boardroom drama, where lawyers grill a disinterested Mark Zuckerberg over the events leading up to the founding and growth of facebook.com

Interspersed between the boardroom scenes are events from Harvard in 2003, where a geeky, socially awkward Mark Zuckerberg launches the predecessor of facebook.com in a drunken night of coding after being dumped by a girl. In the whirlwind days that follow, we see how one of the most ubiquitous of websites – www.facebook.com - came into being.

What makes this movie special is that it is purported to be based on real events not 50 or 100 years back, but a mere 7 years back in time. And we also get to see how facebook might not be one sole man’s idea or work. In parts, the movie resembles some of the documentaries on History & Discovery channel when people are recounting the events of the day. But what makes this movie stand out is the character of Mark Zuckerberg. His mind is shown to be capable of genius – yet his actions seem inscrutable and leave more questions than answers. And fittingly, the movie never answers some of the questions – leaving you to judge whose story you want to believe,

Acting-wise, it is a lesser known cast, but they make a big impression. More than Jesse Eisenberg, who plays Zuckerberg, it is Andrew Garfield - who plays facebook’s first CFO Eduardo Saverin - who wins the acting honors. He makes Eduardo an endearing friend – and also an uncontested winner of the proxy PR battle that this movie is. Justin Timberlake delivers an admirable performance as Napster-founder Sean Parker. That part of the movie is eye-opening. Also adorable are the Winklevoss twins, who apparently are played by two different actors, but with the face of one superimposed later on the others.

The Social Network is one of those movies which have an intricate storyline connected by crisp dialogues and not much action. But it is also the story of one of the biggest phenomenon of our times – facebook ! For that reason alone, it is a must watch. Admittedly, you’d enjoy the movie a tad more if you are a little technically inclined – I know I did. But you do not need a computer science degree to understand human feelings – and isn’t facebook all about the need to be connected with everyone ?


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Movies to look out for this week

The Social Network [IMDB]

A story about the founders of the social-networking website, Facebook (based on the book The Accidental Billionaires)

Cast: Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield, Justin Timberlake

Direction: David Fincher



Skyline [IMDB]

Strange lights descend on the city of Los Angeles, drawing people outside like moths to a flame where an extraterrestrial force threatens to swallow the entire human population

Cast: Eric Balfour, Donald Faison, Scottie Thompson

Direction: Colin Strause, Greg Strause


A Flat [IMDB]

Rahul finds himself trapped in a flat with a ghost who wouldnt let him go

Cast: Jimmy Shergill, Sanjay Suri

Direction: Hemant Madhukar

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Action Replayy

Atrocious. Boring. A mindfuck
That is the most concise way I can describe Action Replayy. Horrendous writing, fucked-up characterizations, bad music, terrible art design and without a shred of evidence of even a single functional brain anywhere in the crew of this movie ! I am hard pressed to find one charitable thing to say about this movie – except for Aishwarya Rai’s looks. She has been looking better than ever nowadays and this movie is no exception. Can anybody guess by looking at her that she is 38 years old ?

Back to the movie, Bunty (newcomer Aditya Roy Kapoor), uses a convenient mad scientist angle to travel back in time to see if he could make his perennially-squabbling parents like each other a little more. When he lands in 1975, he realizes that he would have to man up his wimp of a father Kishan before he can take on his intimidating mother Mala and all can be well in his current world.

This story by itself could have been an interesting movie. But in the hands of Vipul Shah, it results in a horrible, pathetic piece of moviemaking which I think is unparalleled in my limited movie history. The only movie that I would consider worse than this would be Drona. From inane story elements to Aishwarya’s clothes (which look anything but the 70s) to terrible locations (what is with showing CST exterior as a location for every alternate shot) to bad music/picturization (Zor Ka Jhatka is a good song though) to the desperate lack of humour, it is a mindfuck

I have no beef against nonsensical – look this week’s other release Golmaal 3 – it is an enjoyable movie. But this is not even funny. The way Bunty goes about coaching his dad a-la Hitch, the director would have you believe it is serious. But then concepts like son singing in 4 different voices while dad lip syncs and gyrates to the songs make your clasp your head in despair. The dialogues are equally wince inducing. And you will finish watching the movie without coming across a single exciting turn in the script which will perk up your interest.

I think I have vented my feelings enough. If you still feel like you want to watch this movie, do it at your own peril. You have been warned!


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Golmaal 3

The look and feel of the Golmaal franchise has become so familiar now, that it almost feels like you are watching episodes of a sitcom. The wacky dudes – Ajay Devgan, Arshad Warsi, Tusshar Kapoor, Shreyas Talpade and Kareena act exactly the same. The new addition to the group is Kunal Khemu – who acts just as good or bad as the rest of the gang. Mithun & Ratna Pathak are the guest stars in this episode (sequel) – though I didn’t like their performance that much. The other minor characters – Vasooli etc are retained too, maintaining the Golmaal “feel”

Golmaal 3’s plot takes a feather out of the Hrishikesh Mukherjee classic Khatta Meetha where two old widowers marry and move into a single house with their grown up children. While the interactions of the original movie was fun, the Golmaal interpretation of events is a little more risqué. One of the best scenes in the movie is a wordless competition among the ‘children’ of thrusting stuff up each other’s ass – figuratively, ofcourse. It is awesome fun to watch the contortions on their faces as they imagine things being thrust into their backsides – and it summarizes the entire Golmaal franchise. Extremely low-brow comedy, but they will succeed in eliciting a few laughs out of you

The movie overall, however is a little disappointing in the second half when the director starts focusing too much on action and comedy takes a back seat. There are one too many slow motion car crashes and super slo-mo Ajay Devgan entries. Even the most ardent Golmaal fans will start yawning at all the action sequences.

And I never quite understood, why does Ajay Devgan get so much ‘bhaav’ in the Golmaal franchise ? He is not all that good in comedy – Arshad Warsi, Tusshar and Shreyas are much better at it than him. Neither does Golmaal work because of him – again the above three provide most of the fun. But he gets more screentime than any of his co-stars (not to mention, he gets the only female co-star in version 3)

Nevertheless, it is one of the those mindless movies which are proud of be nonsensical, and can be genuinely funny once in a while. And it is SO much better than this week’s big release


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Movies to look out for this week

Action Replayy [IMDB]

A young man tries to revive his parents' wilting marriage in a unique manner - travel to the 1970s when their romance was budding and make it bloom. This is more complex than he expects.

Cast: Akshay Kumar, Aishwarya Rai

Direction: Vipul Shah


Golmaal 3 [IMDB]

Did the first two have any story ? Seriously ?
Then why look for one now ?

Cast: Ajay Devgan, Kareena Kapoor, Tusshar Kapoor, Arshad Warsi, Shreyas Talpade, Kunal Khemu, Mithun Chakraborty

Direction: Rohit Shetty


Due Date [IMDB]

High-strung father-to-be Peter Highman is forced to hitch a ride with aspiring actor Ethan Tremblay on a road trip in order to make it to his child's birth on time

Cast: Robert Downey Jr, Zach Galifianakis

Direction: Todd Philips


Devil [IMDB]

A group of people trapped in an elevator realize that the devil is among them.
(this is M Night Shyamalan written movie)

Cast: Chris Messina, Logan Marshall-Green, Jenny O'Hara,

Direction: John Erick Dowdle
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Piranha 3D

It is the year of 3D. So why not a monster movie in 3D ? Lots of people dying – lots of blood and gore. And lets make it Spring Break (an opportunity for US college students to go crazy in bikinis – think the MTV Grind) – so there is lot of boobs to see too. Awesome combo right ?

Piranha 3D is a proper b-movie, filled with clichéd sequences and lots of dumb college kids – but is a very entertaining 2 hours. If you have seen one monster movie, you know how all the scripts go. A monster is unleashed, who kills couple of people on the outlying areas before unleashing an attack on the bigger population. And there will always be a hero & his family who would get trapped – but they always get saved in the end.

So the story is inconsequential. What is new is the monster. In this case, a group of prehistoric piranhas who had been trapped in a subterranean cave for a couple of million years before an earthquake sets them free in an inland lake. Too bad college kids are holidaying on the lake at that very time.

There is copious amounts of blood and gore – as the ugly-teethed piranhas strip all flesh from the body within seconds. There is a particular “wow” moment, when the screaming movie producer is pulled out of the water, with his upper body completely intact but only bones left from his hip down. The producer in question is a porn movie producer who recruits our leading man for scouting locations on the lake. The bad part is that all the full nude scenes have been cut out by the censors – and going by the internet, there were a lot of them

So it might not be a bad idea to get the international version from the internet to enjoy the full cocktail of gore and nudity. But the large screen fun of vicious piranhas attacking make up for the few snipped scenes, so if you enjoy the monster movie genre or want some mindless fun in 3D, Piranha is a good bet.


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Movies to look out for this week

From Paris With Love [IMDB]

In Paris, a young employee in the office of the US Ambassador hooks up with an American spy looking to stop a terrorist attack in the city

Cast: John Travolta, Jonathan Rhys Meyers

Direction: Pierre Morel


Piranha 3D [IMDB]

After a sudden underwater tremor sets free scores of the prehistoric man-eating fish, an unlikely group of strangers must band together to stop themselves from becoming fish food for the area's new razor-toothed residents

Cast: Richard Dreyfuss, Eli Roth

Direction: Paul W.S. Anderson


Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole [IMDB]

When a young owl is abducted by an evil Owl army, he must escape with newfound friends to seek out the legendary Guardians to stop the menace

Cast: Abbie Cornish (voice), Emily Barclay (voice)

Direction: Zack Snyder
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Hisss

At the risk of attracting several arched eyebrows and incredulous looks, I have to say I was looking forward to watching Hisss. And even more alarmingly, I rather enjoyed the movie. Maybe my ability to derive joy out of nonsensical movies is more evolved than others, but then to my defense, I absolutely detested Singh is Kinng (and all subsequent Akshay – and Priyadarshan - movies). This movie goes much beyond Akshay’s efforts, and delivers a really cinematic classic

Infact I happened to read in the papers today that the director Jennifer Lynch has disowned the movie saying she left the movie once the shooting was wrapped up. She never entered the editing room and we actually owe the present form of this masterpiece to co-producer Govind Menon. Infact according to Jennifer, she was intending to make it a love story rather than a horror one.

(I have to say, after watching the movie, I cannot for the life of me imagine this as a love story. But then neither can something so funny be a horror movie !!)

Nevertheless I think the greatness of this movie can be judged only by comparing it to that another epic - Jaani Dushman. And I have to say, this movie trumps Jaani Dushman by some margin. Granted it doesn’t have Sonu Nigam’s terrible hamming in it, but it has Mallika Sherawat in almost every frame of the movie, almost naked or as a giant snake. Plus she doesnt speak (only screams a little at the end). And Mallika’s snake (or butt) would anyday kick Armaan Kohli’s butt

By now you must have realized that Hisss is not a movie to be taken seriously (I can just imagine how much fun this movie is going to be drunk). You definitely should not expect a cogent, logical story and slick editing – it has neither. In fact it has problems keeping the timeline linear. However, to its credit, the snake scenes are done rather well. Coupled with jerky camera movements, it will definitely make you jump more than once. And the family scenes of Irfan Khan and Divya Dutta are also handled very sensitively

Now let me touch on why you should bother with this movie. Mallika is mostly minimally clad – just a dupatta draping her, for example. Or she is naked climbing trees, lamp posts - or swimming in rivers. Some of those scenes are quite explicit – it is surprising how they cleared the censors. But the most epic of scenes comes when Mallika is chasing one of the baddies in a burqa and nothing else. She is jumping from roof to roof and one such jump is caught in surprising detail from the street below – bums and all. Nearly everyone in the hall almost choked on their laughter

There are similar ridiculous moves which make the movie worth it. But only if you can overlook the cheesiness. I don’t see any point in rating this movie, since it will score very poorly. But if you want to watch a movie after having a round of booze - or you enjoy nonsensical movies like I do - you cant pick a better movie.
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Do Dooni Char

For it's first attempt at making hindi movies, Disney played it safe and went with the safest name that they could find - Yash Raj Productions. Most of us don't even remember the product - Roadside Romeo. (Yes, it was Disney's first attempt at hindi movies). But then to give credit to Disney, they didn't give up on the Indian market. They waited around for a better script - even if it came from a unknown name like Habib Faisal - and released their second movie with much less fanfare last weekend. And they managed to pull off a casting coup of sorts, by getting Neetu Kapoor to break her hiatus and star with her husband in this movie.
(Though apparently the credit for this coup goes to IIPM's promoter Arindam Chaudhari - the executive producer of this movie)

The result of all their hard work is worthwhile - Do Dooni Char is one of those exceptionally heartwarming movies that anyone will find hard to fault with. It is a picture postcard of a happy Delhi middle class family, without the glamorous sheen our Bollywood usually puts. The house, their clothes, their fights - everything is delightfully genuine. Most of the movie is shot in actual Delhi, and all the actors do a tremendous job in portraying that quintessential Dilliwala. Lest you be concerned, Delhi doesnt overpower the story - it is just a backdrop for the events. And allows for some amusing Dilliwala jokes, maybe.

But there are things that everyone would be able to identify with - the excited planning that went into purchasing anything big for the house, the disagreements, the constant bickering between siblings for no rhyme or reason - and in the end the father having the final say. The Duggals are a delightful take on the Indian middle class. The story is essentially about the Duggal family’s dream of upgrading their scooter into a car – and the struggles they undergo to make that dream come true. And to the writer’s credit, the story does not focus much on the negatives of the situations – they always takes the happy route out. But the actors – Rishi & Neetu Kapoor as well as the kids – are such natural performers, that you are never distracted enough to ponder about alternatives.

Rishi & Neetu Kapoor’s chemistry is still sparkling and it shows. The two kids are very believable too. The supporting characters – the ‘Fufu’ and the neighbours – every one does really great. If I had to summarize the movie, it is like Khosla ka Ghosla, but without the wacky humour and with more sweetness in it. The good thing is that it is still playing this week, although not too many shows. I just wish they had done a little more publicity for it - for it is definitely a must-watch!


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The American

The American is the one movie which might make even a hardcore George Clooney fan doubt his mania for a while – because George Clooney not only stars as lead, but also produces this maddeningly dull movie. So you cant blame anyone else for making Clooney look bad – he did this to himself.

The movie is about an American hitman who is on the run from some enemies (identified only as “the Swedes”) and is also looking to retire. When his remote Swedish countryside hideout is busted, he flees to Italy and looks up an old friend/boss, who arranges for him to lay low in a small hilly town of Castel del Monte. In exchange for that, he has to make a custom-made rifle for another assassin to use. However he meets some interesting people in that small Italian town and gets involved with them without wanting to.

The plot is quite common – In Bruges is a movie with a pretty similar subject. But while In Bruges was enormously entertaining, The American is like a version of it with all the quirkiness and humour stripped out. This movie has no comic relief and the only scene where the heroine drops her clothes has been chopped off by the censors !!

The reason why most of you would loathe this movie is its dryness. It is extremely slow paced and agonizingly dull without any color or vivacity. The dialogues in the movie are minimal and quite a bit of the footage is just of Clooney going about town – walking, drinking coffee etc. We are forced to watch the same footage of Clooney driving from Castel del Monte to a nearby town to make phonecalls multiple times – without any sound of the car engine or brakes or anything else – just silence. There are similar other shots of many such activities – where the natural sound has been completely filtered out for unnatural silence

It seems like a desperate attempt to be stylish. But it falls flat on its face

The other big failing of the movie is the complete lack of explanations – like who was after Clooney and why? Or what was his relation with the guy on the phone? Or what made him choose the Italian girl while rejecting the Swedish one ? It is quite ok for a movie to leave some questions unanswered. But to not answer any question at all was highly unsatisfying. You can conjecture, but you would never know for sure.

All in all, a complete avoid for everyone, movie enthusiasts included. Don’t quite understand what got it the 6.8 rating on IMDB


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Dabangg

We are already looking at Dabangg getting the biggest opening ever, bigger than 3 Idiots. And most of us have had our curiousity piqued after the ultra rustic trailers featuring Chulbul Pandey and Munni Badnaam – we are wondering, is it the real thing ? However, even after trying very hard to like it, I can’t describe Dabangg as the jhakaas movie it is made out to be. Sure it has got some kickass sequences and Salman clearly is the only one who can carry this role off, such is his persona, but Dabangg comes across wanting where it matters most – its dialogues

We have all seen the trailers with the “itne chhed” and the “haramzada” dialogue – and they got us chuckling the first time we saw them. Unfortunately, you have already seen the best dialogues of the movie – there is nothing else in the movie that is as much fun. The dialogues in the movie are all one liners (thankfully no rambling dialogues) – but there are no more ‘awesome’ dialogues.

The story is very similar to Telugu blockbusters – a story set in some rustic location, where the kickass no-nonsense hero will decimate villain goons army single-handedly, but not before sorting out some family complications. There is of course, a village belle whom the hero romances. In Dabangg, the hero is a police inspector who calls himself Robinhood Pandey – who apprehends bank robbers, but doesn’t turn in the loot to the government. And he is not averse to dealing with politicians etc to counter political pressures. But he is essentially good at heart, even if he is a little quirky about it.

Acting wise Salman seems to be having a ball – just look at him dance in the middle of the fight to a caller tune. Arbaaz Khan plays a very subdued role thankfully and Sonu Sood plays the ‘bhaiyya’ politician very well. Newcomer Sonakshi Sinha seems to have quite a spark in her – her performance is quite spirited and she looks pretty good. So no complaints acting-wise. The song Tere Mast Mast Do Nain stands out as a really melodius number while Munni Badnaam is just pure awesomeness.

Finally, it all comes down to the fun factor. For a movie that sells itself for full paisa vasool masti, it was not enough fun. The opening sequence is nicely done – with visceral action and fun ‘Chulbul Pandey moments’. But the tempo doesn’t last and there aren’t enough ‘Chulbul Pandey moments’ in the rest of the movie. I am not bothering with the story etc because in a movie like this, no one should care for it. But it falls short on the ‘wolf whistle’ moments and were it not for Munni Badnam, it would get only 2.5 stars.


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