Frank Barnes (Denzel Washington) has lost his job. He is serving out is notice period with NWVR, a railroad company and is in his last 3 weeks now. All this after 28 years of committed work for the organization. He is an engine motorman. Several older personnel in the organization are being replaced with younger blood. Many of his close friends particularly Judd Stewart (David Warshofsky) have also been victim of this sudden move by the organization. Whats worse, they get only half the benefits that they are eligible for (Sometimes I feel it is so much better to work in India than anywhere else ). Frank has lost his wife about 4 years back to cancer. He has 2 daughters aged 18 and 19 - Maya (Meagan Tandy) and Nicole (Elizabeth Mathis). They are working their way through college by waiting tables @ Hooters – not the most respectable job one can have but not one that they keep their father in the dark about. All in all they seem to be one small happy family with the regular father daughter fights etc.
With the jobs being lost around, it is no surprise that when Will Colson (Chris Pine) joins the company as a conductor, he is given an ice cold welcome on the first day itself. But Chris has problems of his own and does his best to ignore the cold vibes. His wife, Darcy (Jessy Schram) has served a restraining order against him thanks to a very close cop friend. Story goes that Will suspected something fishy between Mrs. Colson and her cop friend and gets a little harsh with her – no beating up or physical abuse but just some pushing and shoving. To make matters worse, he leaves home that very instant and goes to the cop’s place to give him a piece of his mind and surprise surprise – pulls a gun on him – I mean what kind of a nit wit would pull a gun on a cop???? Not Mr. Colson’s proudest moment especially when he realizes that Darcy was only messaging her sister – the message was the core reason for the fight to start and then finish with a restraining order. What a waste!!!!
Nevertheless, fate provides both Frank and Will an opportunity to become heroes when Train 777 turns into what is termed in railroad parlance as a COASTER. A Coaster is a train that has an unmanned engine running on auto, usually at low speeds say under 10 miles per hour. Gileece (T J Lewis) and Dewey (Ethan Suplee) are 2 employees who are charged with the responsibility of pulling out a half a mile long goods train to make way for kids coming for a field trip. Since it’s a small job, they don’t put the air brakes on. Worse still, the not so slim Dewey gets off the train to manually switch tracks but slips in the bargain. The train picks up speed and Dewey is unable to get back onto it (must remember to start working out sooner than later or may land up like Dewey). And worse still, the throttle was @ the max level – so my friends we now have a super coaster. So fasten your seat belts and let the excitement begin.
Unstoppable is based on a true story it would seem. Not sure about the extent of the truth though. But one thing is for certain, it is far from famed director Tony Scott’s best to date. For a guy who has given us – hold on to your horses – Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop, Days of Thunder, Crimson Tide, Enemy of the State, SPY GAME (what a movie!!!), Man on Fire, Déjà vu and Taking of Pelham 123 he seems to have kind of lost his edge. Maybe he got so carried away by Taking of Pelham that he decided to extend his love for trains and move onto creating Unstoppable. Not pointing fingers at direction out here. But just the content didn’t seem sufficient for it to seem like a Tony Scott movie. It starts off slowly but picks up pace and before you know it, it is done. But in that limited period of time, he does show that there is a huge action director talent who has given us some of the best movies that we grew up with. Its compact for certain. Editing is very slick. But the really edge of the seat moments are few and far between.
Denzel Washington seems to be the director’s favourite and does full justice to the role but is quite wasted. Chris Pine seems more constipated than troubled. The rest of the cast has only bit parts with the exception of Rosario Dawson who plays the role of Connie who co-ordinates the entire effort of train 1206 to successfully stop 777. Overall nothing great. Also nothing you would miss if u see it on DVD. I give it 5 on 10.
Tuesday, 30 November 2010
Monday, 29 November 2010
Allah Ke Bandey
The trailers were mightly impressive. The cast – extremely strong to say the least. The story seemed to have been inspired from the 1996 movie by Barry Levinson – Sleepers. The reviews on twitter were very positive. And I was hoping to see the next 7 on 10 movie of the year. But it was not to be I guess. Never judge a book by its cover or a movie by its trailer.
Vijay Kamble (Sharman Joshi) & Yakub Ansari (Faruk Kabir) are a couple of 12 year olds living in Bhool Bhulaiyya, a Chor Bazaar. They live with their aging and dying mother (Suhasini Mulay). She is Vijay’s biological mother and has adopted Yakub since his parents died in a train accident. Bhool Bhulaiyya is controlled primarily by Mafkaan Yeda and his right hand man, Nana. The kids understand that if they have to get anywhere within the place, the best way out would be to join the gang. They start running drugs and doing small time “Bhaigiri”. But these petty crimes aren’t going to get them into the big league. When their mother is diagnosed with an extremely weak liver and has no other choice but to be operated upon, the kids decide it is time to take the next step. They approach Mafkaan with a plan to rob a local jewelry store. Nana doubts them but Mafkaan is impressed with their spunk and gives them the green. The boys commit their first serious crime. When they are done with the job, they are about to run off with all the spoils without giving Mafkaan his share of 50%. But Mafkaan lands up. A scuffle ensues and Yakub shoots Mafkaan.
It only takes the cops a couple of days to track them down thanks to the detailed description given by Nana. But most importantly, Nana has taken advantage of the situation and shot Mafkaan already. So when the kids get rounded up they get charged with multiple counts and eventually find themselves in juvenile prison. This is the beginning of their worst nightmare. The Jailor (Nasseeruddin Shah) and KT the in house gangster use most of the kids for their own pleasure. And also run a drug racket within the premises. Our enterprising duo soon find themselves in trouble in an attempt to take on the system. When they get violated for the first time, Vijay decides its time to play it cool and strike when the moment is right which they soon do and take control of the situation instead of succumbing to it.
AKB is not a complete take off on Sleepers. It seems to be inspired in bits and pieces though. There are streaks of almost every slum movie that has been made in the past few years from the likes of Slumdog Millionaire to City of God. Somewhere it doesn’t seem original. Faruk Kabir as an actor looked like a good prospect in the rushes but eventually turns out to be a damp squib. The support cast is average with Zakir Hussain playing the lead duo’s trusted lieutenant – Ramesh Bhai. One wonders why Anjana Sukhani and Rukhsar were ever involved in the entire movie. Even the sex scene that Anjana Sukhani is part of is fairly insipid to say the least. They were both furniture and not even the best looking furniture one can expect. The saddest part is that a fabulous talent like Atul Kulkarni is all but wasted with barely a few minutes of screen time. There is nothing that Nasseruddin Shah has to prove anymore. His execution of the nasty warden is almost flawless. Sharman Joshi proves once again that he is definitely one of the best that we have on the block currently. And lastly but not the least – the child artistes – who I believe were very good in parts but not completely awesome. I hate to say this about kids and don’t mean to be a dampner but seriously there have been better performances by children on screen even if it was required to be as raw as AKB. Having said that, there is tremendous potential in both. And if someone can help me out with their names it would be great.
Marginally above Average direction and decent editing + cinematography make AKB worth a watch. But it doesn’t do justice to the power packed cast. Yet, it’s one of the better movies released of late. I am only disappointed because it could have been so much better. Watch it for the supporting role from Nasser and a strong lead performance from Sharman. I give it 6 on 10.
Vijay Kamble (Sharman Joshi) & Yakub Ansari (Faruk Kabir) are a couple of 12 year olds living in Bhool Bhulaiyya, a Chor Bazaar. They live with their aging and dying mother (Suhasini Mulay). She is Vijay’s biological mother and has adopted Yakub since his parents died in a train accident. Bhool Bhulaiyya is controlled primarily by Mafkaan Yeda and his right hand man, Nana. The kids understand that if they have to get anywhere within the place, the best way out would be to join the gang. They start running drugs and doing small time “Bhaigiri”. But these petty crimes aren’t going to get them into the big league. When their mother is diagnosed with an extremely weak liver and has no other choice but to be operated upon, the kids decide it is time to take the next step. They approach Mafkaan with a plan to rob a local jewelry store. Nana doubts them but Mafkaan is impressed with their spunk and gives them the green. The boys commit their first serious crime. When they are done with the job, they are about to run off with all the spoils without giving Mafkaan his share of 50%. But Mafkaan lands up. A scuffle ensues and Yakub shoots Mafkaan.
It only takes the cops a couple of days to track them down thanks to the detailed description given by Nana. But most importantly, Nana has taken advantage of the situation and shot Mafkaan already. So when the kids get rounded up they get charged with multiple counts and eventually find themselves in juvenile prison. This is the beginning of their worst nightmare. The Jailor (Nasseeruddin Shah) and KT the in house gangster use most of the kids for their own pleasure. And also run a drug racket within the premises. Our enterprising duo soon find themselves in trouble in an attempt to take on the system. When they get violated for the first time, Vijay decides its time to play it cool and strike when the moment is right which they soon do and take control of the situation instead of succumbing to it.
AKB is not a complete take off on Sleepers. It seems to be inspired in bits and pieces though. There are streaks of almost every slum movie that has been made in the past few years from the likes of Slumdog Millionaire to City of God. Somewhere it doesn’t seem original. Faruk Kabir as an actor looked like a good prospect in the rushes but eventually turns out to be a damp squib. The support cast is average with Zakir Hussain playing the lead duo’s trusted lieutenant – Ramesh Bhai. One wonders why Anjana Sukhani and Rukhsar were ever involved in the entire movie. Even the sex scene that Anjana Sukhani is part of is fairly insipid to say the least. They were both furniture and not even the best looking furniture one can expect. The saddest part is that a fabulous talent like Atul Kulkarni is all but wasted with barely a few minutes of screen time. There is nothing that Nasseruddin Shah has to prove anymore. His execution of the nasty warden is almost flawless. Sharman Joshi proves once again that he is definitely one of the best that we have on the block currently. And lastly but not the least – the child artistes – who I believe were very good in parts but not completely awesome. I hate to say this about kids and don’t mean to be a dampner but seriously there have been better performances by children on screen even if it was required to be as raw as AKB. Having said that, there is tremendous potential in both. And if someone can help me out with their names it would be great.
Marginally above Average direction and decent editing + cinematography make AKB worth a watch. But it doesn’t do justice to the power packed cast. Yet, it’s one of the better movies released of late. I am only disappointed because it could have been so much better. Watch it for the supporting role from Nasser and a strong lead performance from Sharman. I give it 6 on 10.
Friday, 26 November 2010
Break Ke Baad
I had predicted 2 successful flops for Deepika in the current week with Break Ke Baad (BKB) and then next week with Khelein Hum Jee Jaan Se (KHJJS). The rushes didn’t enthuse any confidence in me. But I am pleasantly surprised and happy to have been proven wrong in the case of BKB. But in the same breath, I wasn’t too far off. Its not a very good movie but it isn’t too bad either. And this doesn’t come from the soft spot I have for RomComs.
Aaliya Khan (Deepika Padukone) is a rebel without a cause. Her core motive in life seems to be to do something that the world doesn’t want her to do. OR not to do what the world expects her to. As a child she doesn’t do her homework and actually convinces her teachers that she cannot because her actor mother, Ayesha (Sharmila Tagore – Coincidentally Ayesha is Mrs. Pataudi’s name after marriage), doesn’t have the time to pack her lunch box. She is more into movies than anything else and her only dream is to be an actor one day. Always on tenterhooks and living life on the edge, her pillar of support is Abhay Gulati a.k.a. Gulati a.k.a Gelato who is her exact opposite. Calm, composed, stable head on his shoulders, petrified of adventure sports and 100% dependable. Although he doesn’t quite know what he really really wants to do in life, he is currently biding his time helping in his father’s business as Vice President of Jeet Cinemas. No points for guessing that Abhay’s father is Jeet Gulati (Naveen Nischol)
All seems to be going well other than the fact that for a couple who has been seeing each other for nearly 10 years and has known each other for over 10 years before that, there seems to be little or no chemistry between them. I mean the only kiss they share is also very bland. But as expected, there has to be a break. I mean whats the point in calling the movie BKB if there is none right. Aaliya decides to pursue her acting ambition through a University in Australia. But has disguised it as a course in Mass Communication instead. However, mum is smarter and sees through the ploy. All hell seems to break lose. But with the Gelato’s support, she makes her way to Oz under the condition that she will focus only on mass com. Now how does a couple manage a long distance relationship. They go about it under the garb of just a break from each other and not a break up. Easier said than done as our leading couple finds out soon enough.
BKB is Danish Aslam’s first directorial venture. There is definitely some talent there but there are also some obvious faux pas. Like Mr. India and Tezaab seemingly released in the same year. Or if it is around midnight in India, it cannot be broad daylight in Australia. And how in the blazes does one get to Australia overnight – has getting a visa become that easy or is Oz Visa on arrival (I hope so considering I am travelling next month). Obvious to the movie buff like me but may not be for the not so particular right? Although Danish keeps it fairly compact throughout it does drag towards the end quite a bit. Luckily the movie is under 2 hours and the drag lasts for only about 10-15 mins.
The support cast is fairly decent. Shahana Goswami (Nadia) continues where she left off from Rock On. Strong performance but again a very cynical role. Sharmila Tagore is as ethereal as ever. Pleasantly surprised to see Navin Nischol back on screen doing what he does best – play understanding daddy. DJ Yudi plays the role of the over excited, promiscuous Cyrus (Nadia’s brother) and should probably stick to only VJing. But even there he would be too old for it. The star of the support cast is however Lilette Dubey who plays Pammi Gulati and gives a 100% to her role as the supporting Aunt for our hero and has excellent crude and crass dialogues to back her up as well – chief among them includes referring to our heroine as a “Chudail” (Witch for those who are unfamiliar with the local lingo). The music is way below Vishal Shekhar’s best. Just about makes par. The timing of the songs also is fairly awry. Something that young Danish can look at. But overall BKB is an average movie. Average Songs, Average Story, Average Direction, Great Titling, Average acting from the lead cast, some strong performances from the support cast, Decent editing – AVERAGE – 5 on 10.
Aaliya Khan (Deepika Padukone) is a rebel without a cause. Her core motive in life seems to be to do something that the world doesn’t want her to do. OR not to do what the world expects her to. As a child she doesn’t do her homework and actually convinces her teachers that she cannot because her actor mother, Ayesha (Sharmila Tagore – Coincidentally Ayesha is Mrs. Pataudi’s name after marriage), doesn’t have the time to pack her lunch box. She is more into movies than anything else and her only dream is to be an actor one day. Always on tenterhooks and living life on the edge, her pillar of support is Abhay Gulati a.k.a. Gulati a.k.a Gelato who is her exact opposite. Calm, composed, stable head on his shoulders, petrified of adventure sports and 100% dependable. Although he doesn’t quite know what he really really wants to do in life, he is currently biding his time helping in his father’s business as Vice President of Jeet Cinemas. No points for guessing that Abhay’s father is Jeet Gulati (Naveen Nischol)
All seems to be going well other than the fact that for a couple who has been seeing each other for nearly 10 years and has known each other for over 10 years before that, there seems to be little or no chemistry between them. I mean the only kiss they share is also very bland. But as expected, there has to be a break. I mean whats the point in calling the movie BKB if there is none right. Aaliya decides to pursue her acting ambition through a University in Australia. But has disguised it as a course in Mass Communication instead. However, mum is smarter and sees through the ploy. All hell seems to break lose. But with the Gelato’s support, she makes her way to Oz under the condition that she will focus only on mass com. Now how does a couple manage a long distance relationship. They go about it under the garb of just a break from each other and not a break up. Easier said than done as our leading couple finds out soon enough.
BKB is Danish Aslam’s first directorial venture. There is definitely some talent there but there are also some obvious faux pas. Like Mr. India and Tezaab seemingly released in the same year. Or if it is around midnight in India, it cannot be broad daylight in Australia. And how in the blazes does one get to Australia overnight – has getting a visa become that easy or is Oz Visa on arrival (I hope so considering I am travelling next month). Obvious to the movie buff like me but may not be for the not so particular right? Although Danish keeps it fairly compact throughout it does drag towards the end quite a bit. Luckily the movie is under 2 hours and the drag lasts for only about 10-15 mins.
The support cast is fairly decent. Shahana Goswami (Nadia) continues where she left off from Rock On. Strong performance but again a very cynical role. Sharmila Tagore is as ethereal as ever. Pleasantly surprised to see Navin Nischol back on screen doing what he does best – play understanding daddy. DJ Yudi plays the role of the over excited, promiscuous Cyrus (Nadia’s brother) and should probably stick to only VJing. But even there he would be too old for it. The star of the support cast is however Lilette Dubey who plays Pammi Gulati and gives a 100% to her role as the supporting Aunt for our hero and has excellent crude and crass dialogues to back her up as well – chief among them includes referring to our heroine as a “Chudail” (Witch for those who are unfamiliar with the local lingo). The music is way below Vishal Shekhar’s best. Just about makes par. The timing of the songs also is fairly awry. Something that young Danish can look at. But overall BKB is an average movie. Average Songs, Average Story, Average Direction, Great Titling, Average acting from the lead cast, some strong performances from the support cast, Decent editing – AVERAGE – 5 on 10.
Monday, 22 November 2010
Meet Bill
How many movies can you name that have been single handedly taken to a whole new level thanks to the performance of just one person – typically the lead role. Take for e.g. 300 – thanks to Gerard Butler – no one else worth speaking about right? Erin Brockovich a.k.a. The Julia Roberts show Part 1. Gladiator – Totally Russel Crowe. Raging Bull – Robert De Niro all the way to the end. Get the drift right? If it weren’t for these performances, the movie in itself would not be anywhere close to what it landed up being. Also, these are the kind of actors who can hold a movie together no matter how weak the subject matter is. One such actor who is amongst my all time favourites and unfortunately one who I have been introduced to only in the past couple of years is Aaron Eckhart. When I think of Aaron Eckhart I can think of 2 words – Simply Superb!!! His performances in super satirical movies like “Thank You for Smoking” or as Harvey Dent in the Dark Knight or as Nick in No Reservations – S-I-M-P-L-Y S-U-P-E-R-B!!!! And Meet Bill is no different from the rest.
Bill (Eckhart) is the executive vice president @ Freedom First Bank which is primarily owned by Mr. Jacoby (Holmes Osborne) and is Bill’s father in law. Completing the troika is John Jr. (Todd Louiso) – Bill’s Brother in Law – an irritable guy to the core, whose only thrill in life is to make Bill feel like the scum of the earth. Bill pretty much believes that he has a position simply because he is married to Jessie (Elizabeth Banks) and is desperate to make something out of his life on his own terms. But all is not well @ home as Bill discovers accidentally about Jessica having an affair with the local micro celebrity, Chip Johnson (Timothy Olyphant). When the men go out on a hunting trip (which is not something Bill is very excited about), he sets up a handycam in their bedroom and finds out that his fears are indeed a reality. An obviously upset Bill beats up Chip and gets himself infamous across the town thanks to being on live TV for the wrong reasons. Worse still, the video finds its way to the Internet.
Now Bill is an Alumnus of Tate High which is the most prestigious institute in the area and also part of a mentorship programme which involves him spending 5 hours a week with a student. In the bargain he gets assigned to him a character who through the movie is referred to only as The Kid (Logan Lerman). The Kid is probably the most promiscuous and wild character you can ever meet. Barely 16, he is always smoking up or flirting with as many women as he can and he is quite good at it as well. Now the kid likes Bill a lot but one cant say the feeling is mutual. So in an effort to build confidence with Bill, The Kid decides to help him get his wife back. He takes the help of Lucy (Jessica Alba) a lingerie store assistant to pretend to be having an affair with Bill and use the jealousy card with Jessica (the wife not the actress). What follows is a serious attempt from Bill to win back the love of his life through various ways from putting in several laps in the pool to even shaving off his chest hair (Ouch!!!!).
Meet Bill is a fabulous way to spend 2 hours if you have that available in your itinerary. Bernie Goldman is primarily a producer but does a reasonable job in his only directorial venture to date. Assisted by another debutante Melissa Wallack, also the writer, and add the solid performances of the rest of the cast and you have a very entertaining comedy to say the least. Wonder why it never made the big screen in India. There seem to be so many of these movies that don’t seem to see the light of the day. Definitely a 7 on 10. Playing these days on Zee Studio. Watch it.
Bill (Eckhart) is the executive vice president @ Freedom First Bank which is primarily owned by Mr. Jacoby (Holmes Osborne) and is Bill’s father in law. Completing the troika is John Jr. (Todd Louiso) – Bill’s Brother in Law – an irritable guy to the core, whose only thrill in life is to make Bill feel like the scum of the earth. Bill pretty much believes that he has a position simply because he is married to Jessie (Elizabeth Banks) and is desperate to make something out of his life on his own terms. But all is not well @ home as Bill discovers accidentally about Jessica having an affair with the local micro celebrity, Chip Johnson (Timothy Olyphant). When the men go out on a hunting trip (which is not something Bill is very excited about), he sets up a handycam in their bedroom and finds out that his fears are indeed a reality. An obviously upset Bill beats up Chip and gets himself infamous across the town thanks to being on live TV for the wrong reasons. Worse still, the video finds its way to the Internet.
Now Bill is an Alumnus of Tate High which is the most prestigious institute in the area and also part of a mentorship programme which involves him spending 5 hours a week with a student. In the bargain he gets assigned to him a character who through the movie is referred to only as The Kid (Logan Lerman). The Kid is probably the most promiscuous and wild character you can ever meet. Barely 16, he is always smoking up or flirting with as many women as he can and he is quite good at it as well. Now the kid likes Bill a lot but one cant say the feeling is mutual. So in an effort to build confidence with Bill, The Kid decides to help him get his wife back. He takes the help of Lucy (Jessica Alba) a lingerie store assistant to pretend to be having an affair with Bill and use the jealousy card with Jessica (the wife not the actress). What follows is a serious attempt from Bill to win back the love of his life through various ways from putting in several laps in the pool to even shaving off his chest hair (Ouch!!!!).
Meet Bill is a fabulous way to spend 2 hours if you have that available in your itinerary. Bernie Goldman is primarily a producer but does a reasonable job in his only directorial venture to date. Assisted by another debutante Melissa Wallack, also the writer, and add the solid performances of the rest of the cast and you have a very entertaining comedy to say the least. Wonder why it never made the big screen in India. There seem to be so many of these movies that don’t seem to see the light of the day. Definitely a 7 on 10. Playing these days on Zee Studio. Watch it.
Guzarish
Sanjay Leela Bhansali has to be the most whimsical director in Indian cinema. But I tip my hat to him because he seriously seems to have the courage to follow what he believes is right. It would be fine to say that all his movies seem right out of picture postcards and that he may as well have signed up for a photo exhibition instead of making a movie worth a few crores. But at the end of all of it, one lands up seeing a treat that is probably a sight for sore eyes. Maybe not for the die hard movie fan who has come there to see some acting as well which in this case is almost missing. Not to mention that SLB has completed his quota of colours with Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam (Yellow/Orange), Devdas (Red), Black (Do I need to say anything), Saawariya (Blue) and now Guzarish (Green). And did I miss Khamoshi – haven’t seen it so can’t say which colour :P
Ethan Mascarenhas (Hritik Roshan) is a quadriplegic – for the benefit of those who do not understand – someone who cannot use any of his limbs and is paralysed neck down. He lives in an exotic (a la SLB) place in Goa which is also aptly titled Villa Mascarenhas. He is taken care of by his nearly full time nurse, Sophia D’Souza (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan) who would qualify to be the most made up nurse in the history of the world for sure. And also one whose lipstick never fades. Maybe Ethan always wanted her to dress up this way – a part of the deal that was not covered in the movie but left to the viewers imagination. Sophia is helped by 2 maids with the day to day work. Ethan maybe disabled but is a shining example to most others who are. He has since his disability written a best seller book and also has a radio show which is heard by most of Goa and is hugely popular. He is a shining example of the never say die spirit that most of us would kill for. He has been quadriplegic for over 14 years now out of which Sophia has helped him through 12.
But all is not well in Ethan’s world. He has slowly but surely lost his will to live. He finally calls his closest friend & lawyer, Devyani Dutta (Shernaz Patel) to formally file a mercy killing petition. Devyani leaves in a fit of rage but I wonder why she waits till the wee hours of the morning to call Dr. Nayak (Suhel Seth) and inform him about this. Dr.Nayak has a similar reaction to this and even threatens to certify Ethan as mentally ill and therefore incapable of taking his own decision. But somewhere, they have also seen enough of suffering and eventually do file the petition which is promptly rejected by the courts. But Ethan is not one to give up. He starts a campaign for “Ethanasia” – a play on Euthanasia to gain support for the cause. But surprise surprise – people don’t want Ethan to die. They want him to stay in his suffering.
And adding to the suffering for the audience are 2 specimens of humanity – the erstwhile Miss World and a new Veejay (Aditya Roy Kapoor) who must seriously consider giving up the profession because – how do I put it – aah to hell with the language – YOU CANNOT ACT TO SAVE YOUR LIVES!!!!!! Please spare us the pain. The support cast of Shernaz Patel, Suhel Seth and Nafisa Ali are miles ahead of these 2 but still not really upto the best that they have come up with I guess. I haven’t seen quadriplegics but for in movies and I guess somewhere Hritik has done his research and has come up with a reasonably impressive performance. Definitely not his best. Somewhere I believe that Hritik would be best as a villain. A damn good looking villain like he was in D2. Probably waiting for the right impactful role that would catapult him from a wannabe to an actual acting talent which I believe he is capable of.
Guzarish is an incredibly esoteric movie. Not for the faint hearted and definitely not for those who do not believe in the concept of mercy killing. And it is meant primarily for the die-hard SLB fan. 6 on 10 I say. Worth a dekko for the grandeur that SLB gets to the frame and the decent performance than Hritik gets to the table.
Ethan Mascarenhas (Hritik Roshan) is a quadriplegic – for the benefit of those who do not understand – someone who cannot use any of his limbs and is paralysed neck down. He lives in an exotic (a la SLB) place in Goa which is also aptly titled Villa Mascarenhas. He is taken care of by his nearly full time nurse, Sophia D’Souza (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan) who would qualify to be the most made up nurse in the history of the world for sure. And also one whose lipstick never fades. Maybe Ethan always wanted her to dress up this way – a part of the deal that was not covered in the movie but left to the viewers imagination. Sophia is helped by 2 maids with the day to day work. Ethan maybe disabled but is a shining example to most others who are. He has since his disability written a best seller book and also has a radio show which is heard by most of Goa and is hugely popular. He is a shining example of the never say die spirit that most of us would kill for. He has been quadriplegic for over 14 years now out of which Sophia has helped him through 12.
But all is not well in Ethan’s world. He has slowly but surely lost his will to live. He finally calls his closest friend & lawyer, Devyani Dutta (Shernaz Patel) to formally file a mercy killing petition. Devyani leaves in a fit of rage but I wonder why she waits till the wee hours of the morning to call Dr. Nayak (Suhel Seth) and inform him about this. Dr.Nayak has a similar reaction to this and even threatens to certify Ethan as mentally ill and therefore incapable of taking his own decision. But somewhere, they have also seen enough of suffering and eventually do file the petition which is promptly rejected by the courts. But Ethan is not one to give up. He starts a campaign for “Ethanasia” – a play on Euthanasia to gain support for the cause. But surprise surprise – people don’t want Ethan to die. They want him to stay in his suffering.
And adding to the suffering for the audience are 2 specimens of humanity – the erstwhile Miss World and a new Veejay (Aditya Roy Kapoor) who must seriously consider giving up the profession because – how do I put it – aah to hell with the language – YOU CANNOT ACT TO SAVE YOUR LIVES!!!!!! Please spare us the pain. The support cast of Shernaz Patel, Suhel Seth and Nafisa Ali are miles ahead of these 2 but still not really upto the best that they have come up with I guess. I haven’t seen quadriplegics but for in movies and I guess somewhere Hritik has done his research and has come up with a reasonably impressive performance. Definitely not his best. Somewhere I believe that Hritik would be best as a villain. A damn good looking villain like he was in D2. Probably waiting for the right impactful role that would catapult him from a wannabe to an actual acting talent which I believe he is capable of.
Guzarish is an incredibly esoteric movie. Not for the faint hearted and definitely not for those who do not believe in the concept of mercy killing. And it is meant primarily for the die-hard SLB fan. 6 on 10 I say. Worth a dekko for the grandeur that SLB gets to the frame and the decent performance than Hritik gets to the table.
Sunday, 21 November 2010
State of Play
Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck) is a successful politician & congressman. His current assignment is part of the committee that is hearing the case of Point Corp, an organization involved in dealings with the US Miliatry. However, this morning is not going to be too great. Just before he walks in for the hearing, he is informed about the death of Sonia Baker (Maria Thayer) one of his assistants on the case and also someone he has been having an affair with all this time. Shocked at this news and unable to handle the situation, he excuses himself from the hearing citing the untimely death. Obviously, a senior congressman like him should be setting an example and not creating doubts and the press is quick to start asking questions. It is just a matter of time before the tongues start wagging all over the place and questions are asked about the romantic involvement between Congressman Collins and his aide. However, Senator Fergus (Jeff Daniels), a senior congressman and Collins’ senior tries to get the situation under control and reiterates his support to Collins.
Cal McAffrey (Russel Crowe) is an investigative / crime journalist with the Washington Globe, a newspaper that is struggling to stay afloat and has a new bunch of owners. It really needs a story to spice things up and get circulation numbers high. Something that really doesn’t go too well with too many journalists including his boss Cameron Lynne (Helen Mirren) but she doesn’t have much of a choice in the matter. Knowing that Cal and Collins were room mates in college, she urges him to look into the issue, first through a novice internet reporter of the Globe itself, Della Frye (Rachel MacAdams) and then herself. Cal doesn’t take the bait at first but changes his mind when Collins lands up at his doorstep late @ night and explains to him that he smells a fish. He starts moving the investigation in the right direction by taking help from Della.
State of Play is an absorbing drama from the maker of Last King of Scotland, Kevin MacDonald. The direction is extremely slick and actually straightforward. There is not too much action or effects and therefore much higher emphasis on the acting part. He is helped immensely by Russel Crowe and Helen Mirren. And much to my surprise, Ben Affleck also manages to put in a good performance. Nothing too great from the rest of the cast as such. But a good movie nevertheless. It released last year it would seem but somehow don’t remember having heard about it in this part of the world. A pity I say. Would have received a strong response on the big screen for sure. 6.5 on 10 for this one. Playing on HBO these days
Cal McAffrey (Russel Crowe) is an investigative / crime journalist with the Washington Globe, a newspaper that is struggling to stay afloat and has a new bunch of owners. It really needs a story to spice things up and get circulation numbers high. Something that really doesn’t go too well with too many journalists including his boss Cameron Lynne (Helen Mirren) but she doesn’t have much of a choice in the matter. Knowing that Cal and Collins were room mates in college, she urges him to look into the issue, first through a novice internet reporter of the Globe itself, Della Frye (Rachel MacAdams) and then herself. Cal doesn’t take the bait at first but changes his mind when Collins lands up at his doorstep late @ night and explains to him that he smells a fish. He starts moving the investigation in the right direction by taking help from Della.
State of Play is an absorbing drama from the maker of Last King of Scotland, Kevin MacDonald. The direction is extremely slick and actually straightforward. There is not too much action or effects and therefore much higher emphasis on the acting part. He is helped immensely by Russel Crowe and Helen Mirren. And much to my surprise, Ben Affleck also manages to put in a good performance. Nothing too great from the rest of the cast as such. But a good movie nevertheless. It released last year it would seem but somehow don’t remember having heard about it in this part of the world. A pity I say. Would have received a strong response on the big screen for sure. 6.5 on 10 for this one. Playing on HBO these days
Shahrukh Bola "Khoobsurat Hai Tu" .... and she believed it
Laali (Pritika Chawla) sells flowers at a signal. Its just another day in her lowly life. She is trying make her money for the day when an old man in an auto asks her to stop picking flowers from the graveyards. She is utterly humiliated when the car next to her stops @ the signal. The window rolls down. She is least bit interested. But the voice says, “Khoobsurat Hai Tu”. She turns around and is face to face with her favouritest hero of all time – Shah Rukh Khan (himself). Obviously she cannot believe her eyes and is shell shocked to say the least. John (Sanjay Dadheech) who sells books and is smitten by her to say the least approaches her to find out why she is standing at the signal like a zombie and she faints in his arms.
Now John is, as mentioned before very much infatuated by Laali. But Laali doesn’t as much as remotely reciprocate the feelings. She is a happy go lucky girl post the incidence is of course even more smitten by SRK. John doesn’t take this too well and chases her around half of Dharavi (I can only assume that since the signboards say Sion in most places) and stabs her in the stomach. Coincidentally, a reporter – Ravinder (Nagesh Bhonsale) and his Hindi speaking German girl friend Stephanie (Suzanne Bernert) are around the same area and take her to hospital. Ravi and Stephanie decide to write a story about this entire episode about how a young girl, obsessed with her love for the King Khan almost loses her life in the bargain.
Laali survives and returns from hospital when John apologises to her for having stabbed her in a fit of rage. In the meantime, we have Champa (Choiti Ghosh a.k.a the only person in this movie who seems to have acted) the local dance bar girl and prostitute who professes her utmost love for John but is rejected since John says he is a 10th pass guy and wants to be able to choose who he gets married to. Then there is Wanted, the local goon who beats up John over some squabble. Taking this as an opportunity, Champa gets Wanted beaten up by Salim (Makarand Deshpande) the local don of sorts. She gets John an auto who without choice in the matter resigns to the situation.
SRBKHT seemed to be an interesting movie. Something alternative and esoteric. A welcome change from the usual song and dance that we get in theatres. Add to that the fact that most of the cast are theatre personnel and that the director was Makarand Deshpande. These things prompted me to take the pick over Guzaarish on Friday evening when I had some time to kill. Was proven woefully wrong to say the least. Deshpande’s direction is completely wayward. I haven’t seen his previous 2 attempts @ direction – Danav and Hanan neither of which created any waves @ the BO but wouldn’t expect too much from either post this. The sound editing and even basic editing all reek of a movie which was probably made on a complete shoe string budget and even worse, by people who would rather have finished the movie in a hurry than pay any attention to detail whatsoever. Mr. Deshpande I am disappointed to say the least.
The only acting talent on display was from Choiti Ghosh who was very good in essaying her role of Champa. Good enough for you to start actually feeling sorry for her after a bit. Pritika Chawla tries her best but really doesn’t have it in her. Sanjay Dadeech was being done a favour by someone for sure. On second thoughts he probably played the role of the loser John quite easily – by just being himself – sorry to be mean Sanjay but just didn’t cut any ice with me. Nothing else really worth mentioning in the movie but for the fact that it had a solid storyline which could have capitalized on much much better. I give this 3 on 10 for just the story.
Now John is, as mentioned before very much infatuated by Laali. But Laali doesn’t as much as remotely reciprocate the feelings. She is a happy go lucky girl post the incidence is of course even more smitten by SRK. John doesn’t take this too well and chases her around half of Dharavi (I can only assume that since the signboards say Sion in most places) and stabs her in the stomach. Coincidentally, a reporter – Ravinder (Nagesh Bhonsale) and his Hindi speaking German girl friend Stephanie (Suzanne Bernert) are around the same area and take her to hospital. Ravi and Stephanie decide to write a story about this entire episode about how a young girl, obsessed with her love for the King Khan almost loses her life in the bargain.
Laali survives and returns from hospital when John apologises to her for having stabbed her in a fit of rage. In the meantime, we have Champa (Choiti Ghosh a.k.a the only person in this movie who seems to have acted) the local dance bar girl and prostitute who professes her utmost love for John but is rejected since John says he is a 10th pass guy and wants to be able to choose who he gets married to. Then there is Wanted, the local goon who beats up John over some squabble. Taking this as an opportunity, Champa gets Wanted beaten up by Salim (Makarand Deshpande) the local don of sorts. She gets John an auto who without choice in the matter resigns to the situation.
SRBKHT seemed to be an interesting movie. Something alternative and esoteric. A welcome change from the usual song and dance that we get in theatres. Add to that the fact that most of the cast are theatre personnel and that the director was Makarand Deshpande. These things prompted me to take the pick over Guzaarish on Friday evening when I had some time to kill. Was proven woefully wrong to say the least. Deshpande’s direction is completely wayward. I haven’t seen his previous 2 attempts @ direction – Danav and Hanan neither of which created any waves @ the BO but wouldn’t expect too much from either post this. The sound editing and even basic editing all reek of a movie which was probably made on a complete shoe string budget and even worse, by people who would rather have finished the movie in a hurry than pay any attention to detail whatsoever. Mr. Deshpande I am disappointed to say the least.
The only acting talent on display was from Choiti Ghosh who was very good in essaying her role of Champa. Good enough for you to start actually feeling sorry for her after a bit. Pritika Chawla tries her best but really doesn’t have it in her. Sanjay Dadeech was being done a favour by someone for sure. On second thoughts he probably played the role of the loser John quite easily – by just being himself – sorry to be mean Sanjay but just didn’t cut any ice with me. Nothing else really worth mentioning in the movie but for the fact that it had a solid storyline which could have capitalized on much much better. I give this 3 on 10 for just the story.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1
If it’s a Harry Potter movie one has to see it whether I write a review or not right? So I was wondering for all of yesterday about what I should be writing in this review. Tough one to decide. But after all of that, I thought, maybe I should tell you about a story within a story. They story of the deathly hallows.
Once upon a time, there were 3 brothers, The Peverell brothers, who were on a journey somewhere (didn’t pay attention :P) and they get to a river that is in spate. The river would have normally swallowed anyone who dared to pass but not the Peverells. They used their magical skills and built a bridge across the river. As they were crossing the river, they encountered someone who was extremely upset. Someone who is not very pleased about being cheated – DEATH. But contrary to what you expect, Death doesn’t kill them. The scheming person that he is, he offers them 3 wishes instead – one each only. None of them realize however, that it is a trap that Death is setting for them, to claim their lives at a later stage in their lives.
The eldest brother, Antioch Peverell asks Death to craft him a wand from Elder wood. He wants it to be the most powerful wand ever made. Wish granted. However, as he goes about defeating all his enemies, he is killed in his sleep by an envious adversary – Death Wins. The 2nd brother, Cadmus Peverell, asks Death to give him a stone that would help raise anyone from the dead. Armed with the stone, he goes back and tries to get the love of his life back. He does get her back but is unable to truly be with her. Distraught he commits suicide – Death Wins. The youngest of the 3, Ignotus Peverell, the most humble of them all asks death for a method which would shield him from everyone’s sight. He goes on to live a long fulfilling life and death is really not able to locate him thanks to a wish that was granted by death himself – ironic right. Nevertheless, years later, Ignotus finally welcomes death into his life after handing over the cloak to his son. Hence the sign of the Deathly Hallows as seen with Xenophilius Lovegood (Rhys Ifans) who tells our heroes the story.
Peppered with the search for the Horcruxes that would finally lead to the death of Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes), the Legend of the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 makes a heady combination for not just Harry Potter lovers but for the population in general. David Yates is known only for directing the previous 2 editions of Harry Potter i.e. Half Blood Prince & Order of the Phoenix. But I guess he did go to film school and learn a thing or 2 about creating excitement in movies. The last but one edition of Harry Potter (thanks to the smart work of making it into a 2 part movie) is not your complete edge of the seat drama but it has its own thrilling moments. Some of them are quite scary. This one is definitely for the family all the way through. 7 on 10 like probably all Harry Potter movies to date.
Once upon a time, there were 3 brothers, The Peverell brothers, who were on a journey somewhere (didn’t pay attention :P) and they get to a river that is in spate. The river would have normally swallowed anyone who dared to pass but not the Peverells. They used their magical skills and built a bridge across the river. As they were crossing the river, they encountered someone who was extremely upset. Someone who is not very pleased about being cheated – DEATH. But contrary to what you expect, Death doesn’t kill them. The scheming person that he is, he offers them 3 wishes instead – one each only. None of them realize however, that it is a trap that Death is setting for them, to claim their lives at a later stage in their lives.
The eldest brother, Antioch Peverell asks Death to craft him a wand from Elder wood. He wants it to be the most powerful wand ever made. Wish granted. However, as he goes about defeating all his enemies, he is killed in his sleep by an envious adversary – Death Wins. The 2nd brother, Cadmus Peverell, asks Death to give him a stone that would help raise anyone from the dead. Armed with the stone, he goes back and tries to get the love of his life back. He does get her back but is unable to truly be with her. Distraught he commits suicide – Death Wins. The youngest of the 3, Ignotus Peverell, the most humble of them all asks death for a method which would shield him from everyone’s sight. He goes on to live a long fulfilling life and death is really not able to locate him thanks to a wish that was granted by death himself – ironic right. Nevertheless, years later, Ignotus finally welcomes death into his life after handing over the cloak to his son. Hence the sign of the Deathly Hallows as seen with Xenophilius Lovegood (Rhys Ifans) who tells our heroes the story.
Peppered with the search for the Horcruxes that would finally lead to the death of Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes), the Legend of the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 makes a heady combination for not just Harry Potter lovers but for the population in general. David Yates is known only for directing the previous 2 editions of Harry Potter i.e. Half Blood Prince & Order of the Phoenix. But I guess he did go to film school and learn a thing or 2 about creating excitement in movies. The last but one edition of Harry Potter (thanks to the smart work of making it into a 2 part movie) is not your complete edge of the seat drama but it has its own thrilling moments. Some of them are quite scary. This one is definitely for the family all the way through. 7 on 10 like probably all Harry Potter movies to date.
Saturday, 13 November 2010
The Social Network
My First Look @ Social Network was in July. It was by far one of the best trailers I have seen in modern cinema. I had in fact written about it as well. Superb utilization of audio and visual cues to create an impact that leaves you asking, “I WANT to see this one”. When I walked into the theatre late last night, I was only hoping that I would not be let down. Add to that the rave reviews given by people who saw it the previous evening @ a paid preview and the pressure for “The Social Network” to deliver was immense to say the least. Thankfully I was not let down at all.
One would think that everyone knows or has at least heard of Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg). But not too many would know about the grime behind the entire success story and how things really built up between Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield), Dustin Moskovitz (Joseph Mazzello) & Chris Hughes (Patrick Mapel) on one side and the team of Cameron Winklevoss (Arnie Hammer), Tyler Winklevoss (Josh Pence) & Divya Narendra (Max Minghella) on the other. And where the hell is Mark in all this? Mark is stuck in the middle and getting chewed for borrowing and idea that was supposedly the Winklevoss’. But who was responsible for actually making it the biggest mega trend in recent times? No points for guessing that.
The Social Network takes a really close look at the build up of the facebook story from the really early days on the Harvard Campus. Starting with the night that Mark manages to really piss off one Erica Albright (Rooney Mara) over dinner and then goes onto blog about her. He then in a fit a rage starts putting together “Face Mash” which gets 20K hits in 2 hours and crashes the Harvard server by 4 am. Following this, he is put on 6 months academic suspension when the Winklevoss’ get in touch with him for a social network called harvardconnection.com (later called ConnectU.com). Mark agrees to work on it but knows that he is onto something really big out here and spends the next 7 weeks building the first version of www.thefacebook.com which he goes onto announce. Obviously the trio of the Winklevoss’ and Divya Narendra are not at all pleased but do not want to behave like gentlemen of Harvard and so don’t take him to court. But once the juggernaut starts rolling, there is no stopping it and we are know that FB now has more than 500 million active users.
The Social Network is in line for a nomination for the best movie @ the Oscars next year. It will not win the Oscar thanks to one Christopher Nolan but will definitely earn itself a nomination. In what is probably the 2nd best movie made this year, David Fincher gives us yet another fabulous 2 hours. Fincher is best known for starting his movie career in 1995 with Seven. 15 years and 5 more huge movies later, he has given us yet another reason to cheer about. Superb direction and awesome editing are the stand out features of the movie. It takes a while to get used to the cuts in between nearly 6 parallel story lines. And be forewarned that it is a severely dialogue intensive movie with loads of internet jargon thrown in. But also watch out for the slick humour thrown in as garnish.
I could not have thought of anyone else to play the part of Mark Zuckerberg than Jesse Eisenberg. Not that he has any movies where his acting talent has been on display but then again, he never had the likes of David Fincher to work with. Jesse does a wonderful job with the portrayal of Mark and so does the rest of the cast. Stand out performances from Andrew Garfield as Eduardo Saverin & surprise surprise Justin Timberlake as Sean Parker (Napster fame). Performances all through are very intense.
Must watch movie folks – 8 on 10 clearly.
One would think that everyone knows or has at least heard of Mark Zuckerberg (Jesse Eisenberg). But not too many would know about the grime behind the entire success story and how things really built up between Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield), Dustin Moskovitz (Joseph Mazzello) & Chris Hughes (Patrick Mapel) on one side and the team of Cameron Winklevoss (Arnie Hammer), Tyler Winklevoss (Josh Pence) & Divya Narendra (Max Minghella) on the other. And where the hell is Mark in all this? Mark is stuck in the middle and getting chewed for borrowing and idea that was supposedly the Winklevoss’. But who was responsible for actually making it the biggest mega trend in recent times? No points for guessing that.
The Social Network takes a really close look at the build up of the facebook story from the really early days on the Harvard Campus. Starting with the night that Mark manages to really piss off one Erica Albright (Rooney Mara) over dinner and then goes onto blog about her. He then in a fit a rage starts putting together “Face Mash” which gets 20K hits in 2 hours and crashes the Harvard server by 4 am. Following this, he is put on 6 months academic suspension when the Winklevoss’ get in touch with him for a social network called harvardconnection.com (later called ConnectU.com). Mark agrees to work on it but knows that he is onto something really big out here and spends the next 7 weeks building the first version of www.thefacebook.com which he goes onto announce. Obviously the trio of the Winklevoss’ and Divya Narendra are not at all pleased but do not want to behave like gentlemen of Harvard and so don’t take him to court. But once the juggernaut starts rolling, there is no stopping it and we are know that FB now has more than 500 million active users.
The Social Network is in line for a nomination for the best movie @ the Oscars next year. It will not win the Oscar thanks to one Christopher Nolan but will definitely earn itself a nomination. In what is probably the 2nd best movie made this year, David Fincher gives us yet another fabulous 2 hours. Fincher is best known for starting his movie career in 1995 with Seven. 15 years and 5 more huge movies later, he has given us yet another reason to cheer about. Superb direction and awesome editing are the stand out features of the movie. It takes a while to get used to the cuts in between nearly 6 parallel story lines. And be forewarned that it is a severely dialogue intensive movie with loads of internet jargon thrown in. But also watch out for the slick humour thrown in as garnish.
I could not have thought of anyone else to play the part of Mark Zuckerberg than Jesse Eisenberg. Not that he has any movies where his acting talent has been on display but then again, he never had the likes of David Fincher to work with. Jesse does a wonderful job with the portrayal of Mark and so does the rest of the cast. Stand out performances from Andrew Garfield as Eduardo Saverin & surprise surprise Justin Timberlake as Sean Parker (Napster fame). Performances all through are very intense.
Must watch movie folks – 8 on 10 clearly.
Monday, 8 November 2010
Due Date
Peter Highman (Robert Downey Jr.) is a successful executive expecting his first child. He is in Atlanta and needs to get home i.e. Los Angeles by Friday because his wife, Sarah (Michelle Monaghan) is having a C Section. He wakes up to take his flight on Tuesday morning after a slightly disturbing dream. He is about to get out of the car when a random car cuts in from the right and crashes into the car door. Thankfully no one is hurt. But out walks a visibly stoned / drunk Ethan Tremblay (Zach Galifianakis) who as nonchalantly as possible asks Peter if he is fine and then moves on to board his flight.
Peter is visibly shaken but is more preoccupied with the thought of his first born and proceeds to board the flight. As he is moving through security, he realizes that one of the packages has been exchanged with Ethan. The worse news is that he is now carrying a marijuana pipe. Nevertheless, he manages to wriggle himself out of the sticky situation. But his troubles have just about begun. As luck would have it, Ethan is on the same flight and has been bumped upto first class and is now seated behind Peter much to Peter’s chagrin.
Some random conversation about terrorists ensues and it prompts a US Marshall to pull out a firearm on Peter and shoot him. Thankfully with a rubber bullet. Both Peter and Ethan are off loaded. Things seem to be going only downhill. As luck would have it, all of this wasn’t enough. Both of them are put onto a “No Fly” list. So they have no choice but to drive down to LA. In the melee, Peter couldn’t pick up his bags and wallet from the aircraft and finds himself without any money or id. Out of a lack of choice, he accepts Ethan’s offer to take him along.
Todd Philips’ 6th full length feature film to date. Considering that he made the likes of a Starsky and Hutch, the not so slick (but not so slapstick either) humour should have been expected I guess. But then, the same guy also gave us one of the best comedies made to date – The Hangover. But then Todd – one is only as good as his last movie. So the Hangover from The Hangover seems to have sailed you through Due Date as well. There were enough and more in the audience who were extremely thrilled with the movie and went out feeling satisfied – if that makes you feel better. But from my side, this was way below par. Especially after you have set the bar so high with The Hangover.
Robert Downey Jr. is as usual ice cold with his performance. Very smartly executed role from his end. And Zach “Tounge Twister” Galifianakis is superb with his performance as the aspirational Hollywood actor with a fondness for Two and a Half Men & is carrying his Dad’s ashes in a coffee tin because he thinks it is still vacuum sealed. No one else actually has a role in the movie. Jamie Foxx is wasted in his 3.5 mins of screen time. So is Juliette Lewis. Due Date is definitely entertaining but nowhere close to The Hangover. So don’t go expecting the quality of humour or execution that you saw there. Overall a 6 on 10. Definitely the best movie over the weekend.
Peter is visibly shaken but is more preoccupied with the thought of his first born and proceeds to board the flight. As he is moving through security, he realizes that one of the packages has been exchanged with Ethan. The worse news is that he is now carrying a marijuana pipe. Nevertheless, he manages to wriggle himself out of the sticky situation. But his troubles have just about begun. As luck would have it, Ethan is on the same flight and has been bumped upto first class and is now seated behind Peter much to Peter’s chagrin.
Some random conversation about terrorists ensues and it prompts a US Marshall to pull out a firearm on Peter and shoot him. Thankfully with a rubber bullet. Both Peter and Ethan are off loaded. Things seem to be going only downhill. As luck would have it, all of this wasn’t enough. Both of them are put onto a “No Fly” list. So they have no choice but to drive down to LA. In the melee, Peter couldn’t pick up his bags and wallet from the aircraft and finds himself without any money or id. Out of a lack of choice, he accepts Ethan’s offer to take him along.
Todd Philips’ 6th full length feature film to date. Considering that he made the likes of a Starsky and Hutch, the not so slick (but not so slapstick either) humour should have been expected I guess. But then, the same guy also gave us one of the best comedies made to date – The Hangover. But then Todd – one is only as good as his last movie. So the Hangover from The Hangover seems to have sailed you through Due Date as well. There were enough and more in the audience who were extremely thrilled with the movie and went out feeling satisfied – if that makes you feel better. But from my side, this was way below par. Especially after you have set the bar so high with The Hangover.
Robert Downey Jr. is as usual ice cold with his performance. Very smartly executed role from his end. And Zach “Tounge Twister” Galifianakis is superb with his performance as the aspirational Hollywood actor with a fondness for Two and a Half Men & is carrying his Dad’s ashes in a coffee tin because he thinks it is still vacuum sealed. No one else actually has a role in the movie. Jamie Foxx is wasted in his 3.5 mins of screen time. So is Juliette Lewis. Due Date is definitely entertaining but nowhere close to The Hangover. So don’t go expecting the quality of humour or execution that you saw there. Overall a 6 on 10. Definitely the best movie over the weekend.
Saturday, 6 November 2010
Golmaal 3
My expectations from G3 were not too high. Especially after the debacle called Action Replayy which I was subjected to last evening. I guess news of Action Replayy had spread like the wildest of fires. And when I was making my bookings for the 9:30 am show of Golmaal 3 this morning, I had a fabulous choice of 3 seats in the entire theatre. Yes my friends, the morning show of Golmaal 3 was sold out. Rohit Shetty will be definitely receiving a huge thank you note from the officials and staff of PVR Mulund. They have finally received a full house to manage!!!
The gang is back. But like the previous time, this is a different story altogether. The cast remains identical with some minor changes in roles and a couple of new introductions. Pritam (Mithun Chakroborthy) stays in Goa with his 3 fully grown brats Madhav (Arshad Warsi), Lucky (Tusshar Kapoor) and Laxman (Kunal Khemu). Pritam used to run an orphanage and these 3 were the left overs (for lack of any other word) in a manner of speaking. They have since then grown up to being hard core nincompoops. They keep borrowing money for their adventurous projects and now owe half the world a lot of money. They are of late backed by Puppy Bhai (Johnny Lever) who is the local goon suffering from short term memory loss. His 2 cronies Daga (Sanjay Mishra) and Teja (Vrajesh Hirjee) are right out of a Bollywood movie from the 60s / 70s (wonder why that trend seems to be in this Diwali).
On the other side are Gopal (Ajay Devgn), Daboo (Kareena Kapoor) and another Laxman (Shreyas Talpade) who stay with their mother Geeta (Ratna Pathak Shah) in another suburb of Goa. They are mirror images of our earlier trio with the exception that their backing is from Vasooli Bhai (Mukesh Tiwari). Both these troikas are at logger heads with each other coz they come up with the same business plan every single time. Be it water scooters or fireworks. Adding to the complication is Puppy Bhai who is also an ace thief and has stolen the Maharani’s necklace and hidden it in a suitcase which belongs to Pritam. And thanks to his short term memory loss, he cannot remember where he has kept it. And if u thought the complication was too much – we also have a love story – not between Gopal and Daboo. That would be too predictable. It is between our lead pair – Pritam & Geeta – a very old love story that is dying to achieve completion. Thanks to the assistance of Daboo it starts seeing some hope.
Golmaal 3 continues with the slapstick humour that G1 and G2 left us with. I personally thought G1 was good and G2 took slapstick to a whole new low. But G3 seems to have taken it back. The first half is very entertaining to say the least. With quite good humour. Keeps u entertained all the way. But the 2nd half is much slower and starts deteriorating in quality of humour but somehow manages to see it through to the end with the least of hiccups. Don’t watch G3 with an expectation of super quality of movie making or quality humour. Watch it if you are a Golmaal fan or a fan of the erstwhile superstar of our time – Govinda. Despite the lack of direction (as always) and acting skils (again as always – with the exception of Arshad Warsi), G3 is a good mishmash of slapstick and decent humour. Some of the one liners include “Jahaan Harsha hai wahaan Bhogle hai, jahan Asha hai wahaan Bhonsale hai” and “Wife Dil hai toh Husband Dhadkan hai, Wife diya hai toh husband Diwali hai, wife zabaan hai to husband gaali hai” and the worst of the lot, “Tu insaan nahin farishta hai – café barista hai”!!!! – Harish Bubna & Amit Tandon you will totally love this movie I guarantee it. For the rest of the lot I cannot give any guarantees but I loved it. 5 on 10 for this one.
The gang is back. But like the previous time, this is a different story altogether. The cast remains identical with some minor changes in roles and a couple of new introductions. Pritam (Mithun Chakroborthy) stays in Goa with his 3 fully grown brats Madhav (Arshad Warsi), Lucky (Tusshar Kapoor) and Laxman (Kunal Khemu). Pritam used to run an orphanage and these 3 were the left overs (for lack of any other word) in a manner of speaking. They have since then grown up to being hard core nincompoops. They keep borrowing money for their adventurous projects and now owe half the world a lot of money. They are of late backed by Puppy Bhai (Johnny Lever) who is the local goon suffering from short term memory loss. His 2 cronies Daga (Sanjay Mishra) and Teja (Vrajesh Hirjee) are right out of a Bollywood movie from the 60s / 70s (wonder why that trend seems to be in this Diwali).
On the other side are Gopal (Ajay Devgn), Daboo (Kareena Kapoor) and another Laxman (Shreyas Talpade) who stay with their mother Geeta (Ratna Pathak Shah) in another suburb of Goa. They are mirror images of our earlier trio with the exception that their backing is from Vasooli Bhai (Mukesh Tiwari). Both these troikas are at logger heads with each other coz they come up with the same business plan every single time. Be it water scooters or fireworks. Adding to the complication is Puppy Bhai who is also an ace thief and has stolen the Maharani’s necklace and hidden it in a suitcase which belongs to Pritam. And thanks to his short term memory loss, he cannot remember where he has kept it. And if u thought the complication was too much – we also have a love story – not between Gopal and Daboo. That would be too predictable. It is between our lead pair – Pritam & Geeta – a very old love story that is dying to achieve completion. Thanks to the assistance of Daboo it starts seeing some hope.
Golmaal 3 continues with the slapstick humour that G1 and G2 left us with. I personally thought G1 was good and G2 took slapstick to a whole new low. But G3 seems to have taken it back. The first half is very entertaining to say the least. With quite good humour. Keeps u entertained all the way. But the 2nd half is much slower and starts deteriorating in quality of humour but somehow manages to see it through to the end with the least of hiccups. Don’t watch G3 with an expectation of super quality of movie making or quality humour. Watch it if you are a Golmaal fan or a fan of the erstwhile superstar of our time – Govinda. Despite the lack of direction (as always) and acting skils (again as always – with the exception of Arshad Warsi), G3 is a good mishmash of slapstick and decent humour. Some of the one liners include “Jahaan Harsha hai wahaan Bhogle hai, jahan Asha hai wahaan Bhonsale hai” and “Wife Dil hai toh Husband Dhadkan hai, Wife diya hai toh husband Diwali hai, wife zabaan hai to husband gaali hai” and the worst of the lot, “Tu insaan nahin farishta hai – café barista hai”!!!! – Harish Bubna & Amit Tandon you will totally love this movie I guarantee it. For the rest of the lot I cannot give any guarantees but I loved it. 5 on 10 for this one.
Action Replayy
Dear Robert Zemeckis – I hope and pray to God that you never get around to watching this broad day light carnage. At this rate they will get to Forrest Gump in a bit. So it may well be worth it to put some stay orders on Vipul Amrutlal Shah lest he considers making Action Replayy 2 and then 3 and then eventually gets to being “inspired” by your best movie to date. Please consider this as a humble request to send your people to set up a representative office here in India – or at least ask Universal Pictures to do the same. It is a humble request / plea.
Bunty (Aditya Roy Kapur) and Tanya (Sudeepa Singh) are in a relationship for quite a while now. Funnily, Tanya is the person who has been asking Bunty to marry him for quite some time now. If I had someone like Tanya I would grab her with every single bone in my body – I mean seriously the chick is HOT guys!!!! She was to date known for only the small screen. 2 serials under her belt – Risshton Ki Dor & Kabhie To Nazar Milao – and thanks to Vipul Amrutlal Shah she is no longer seen only on a 29”screen . Nevertheless, for someone to reject several marriage proposals from Tanya would mean some kind of terminal illness or child abuse which has left a permanent scar on his brain and prevents him from understanding the difference between True Love and Hotness (trust me – Hotness prevails ). It would seem that Bunty has been a victim of the latter – CHILD ABUSE – those long drawn nights where his parents – Kishen (AK) and Mala (ARB) – who were never meant to be together spent hours on end fighting over the most trivial issues. These instances have gotten our poor little Bunty to a situation where he has given up on the institution of marriage completely.
But Tanya will have nothing of it. She has had it finally and wants Bunty to make his decision right away – Atta girl I say, I am first in line after Bunty. But my excitement is to be short lived as Tanya drags Bunty to meet her Grandfather (who she refers to as Grandpa in the same manner as a 6 year old would – and the bubble of Tanya has finally burst – Bunty you can have her). Now Grandpa (Randhir Kapoor) has an equally corny name – Gonsalves – Anthony Gonsalves (By now u are reaching for your own throat). He gives Bunty 24 hours to decide whether he wants to marry Tanya or not. But Bunty is more fascinated with the old scientist’s (Oops I forgot to mention that Anthony Gonsalves was a scientist) contraption or Time Machine as he refers to it. Bunty dodges the marriage question by claiming that it is his parents 35th Anniversary the next day and he is too busy to think about marriage. As luck would have it, Kishen and Mala cannot help but fight once again and things come to breaking point – DIVORCE!!!! I mean it took them 35 years to get there!!!! Some patience. Bunty swears that he will not let the D word enter the family and runs off to meet to scientist, takes his time machine and sets off to 1975 to change what he calls the one mistake in his life that he would change if he could – his parent’s marriage.
My sentiments of Action Replayy are best captured by one of my co-movie watchers who probably ruined his Diwali evening too. At the interval there was a loud, “THANK GOD”!!! that erupted from a dark recess in the movie hall. Just a word of advise though. If you have survived till the interval – believe me the toughest part is over. The 2nd half is much better but don’t get your hopes too high. Much better than the first half is what I meant. The 4 good things for me in Action Replayy were the introduction of Sudeepa Singh (purely from the perspective of hotness), the voice in the interval which said “Thank God”, The music which is really foot tapping and worth listening to and lastly the way Kishen says “Aawaaz Neeche”!!!! once he changes his avatar to a super confident one. The rest of the movie is vastly forgettable.
Direction is pretty much absent most of the time. Consistency has nothing to be written home about. Posters of Bobby (released 1973) still dot the lamp posts outside Capitol cinema in 1975. AK has lost his comic timing more than 2 years back. Ash has anyways been only furniture. The only time she has tried to act was when SLB directed her. The costume designing is a total khichdi between everything from the 60s to the first decade of the 21st century. The sets look good till you figure out quite clearly that a lot of it is Computer Graphics work very badly executed. The support cast with the exception of Kirron Kher and Om Puri is extremely insipid. This music as mentioned earlier is a saving grace but even that may have been “inspired” considering it comes from the house of Pritam. I know Nakhre is inspired from a 60s number. But the rest will eventually come to light (hopefully not). 2 on 10 is the verdict from my end. Not the worst movie of the year as predicted from my side earlier.
Bunty (Aditya Roy Kapur) and Tanya (Sudeepa Singh) are in a relationship for quite a while now. Funnily, Tanya is the person who has been asking Bunty to marry him for quite some time now. If I had someone like Tanya I would grab her with every single bone in my body – I mean seriously the chick is HOT guys!!!! She was to date known for only the small screen. 2 serials under her belt – Risshton Ki Dor & Kabhie To Nazar Milao – and thanks to Vipul Amrutlal Shah she is no longer seen only on a 29”screen . Nevertheless, for someone to reject several marriage proposals from Tanya would mean some kind of terminal illness or child abuse which has left a permanent scar on his brain and prevents him from understanding the difference between True Love and Hotness (trust me – Hotness prevails ). It would seem that Bunty has been a victim of the latter – CHILD ABUSE – those long drawn nights where his parents – Kishen (AK) and Mala (ARB) – who were never meant to be together spent hours on end fighting over the most trivial issues. These instances have gotten our poor little Bunty to a situation where he has given up on the institution of marriage completely.
But Tanya will have nothing of it. She has had it finally and wants Bunty to make his decision right away – Atta girl I say, I am first in line after Bunty. But my excitement is to be short lived as Tanya drags Bunty to meet her Grandfather (who she refers to as Grandpa in the same manner as a 6 year old would – and the bubble of Tanya has finally burst – Bunty you can have her). Now Grandpa (Randhir Kapoor) has an equally corny name – Gonsalves – Anthony Gonsalves (By now u are reaching for your own throat). He gives Bunty 24 hours to decide whether he wants to marry Tanya or not. But Bunty is more fascinated with the old scientist’s (Oops I forgot to mention that Anthony Gonsalves was a scientist) contraption or Time Machine as he refers to it. Bunty dodges the marriage question by claiming that it is his parents 35th Anniversary the next day and he is too busy to think about marriage. As luck would have it, Kishen and Mala cannot help but fight once again and things come to breaking point – DIVORCE!!!! I mean it took them 35 years to get there!!!! Some patience. Bunty swears that he will not let the D word enter the family and runs off to meet to scientist, takes his time machine and sets off to 1975 to change what he calls the one mistake in his life that he would change if he could – his parent’s marriage.
My sentiments of Action Replayy are best captured by one of my co-movie watchers who probably ruined his Diwali evening too. At the interval there was a loud, “THANK GOD”!!! that erupted from a dark recess in the movie hall. Just a word of advise though. If you have survived till the interval – believe me the toughest part is over. The 2nd half is much better but don’t get your hopes too high. Much better than the first half is what I meant. The 4 good things for me in Action Replayy were the introduction of Sudeepa Singh (purely from the perspective of hotness), the voice in the interval which said “Thank God”, The music which is really foot tapping and worth listening to and lastly the way Kishen says “Aawaaz Neeche”!!!! once he changes his avatar to a super confident one. The rest of the movie is vastly forgettable.
Direction is pretty much absent most of the time. Consistency has nothing to be written home about. Posters of Bobby (released 1973) still dot the lamp posts outside Capitol cinema in 1975. AK has lost his comic timing more than 2 years back. Ash has anyways been only furniture. The only time she has tried to act was when SLB directed her. The costume designing is a total khichdi between everything from the 60s to the first decade of the 21st century. The sets look good till you figure out quite clearly that a lot of it is Computer Graphics work very badly executed. The support cast with the exception of Kirron Kher and Om Puri is extremely insipid. This music as mentioned earlier is a saving grace but even that may have been “inspired” considering it comes from the house of Pritam. I know Nakhre is inspired from a 60s number. But the rest will eventually come to light (hopefully not). 2 on 10 is the verdict from my end. Not the worst movie of the year as predicted from my side earlier.
Thursday, 4 November 2010
ROMANCING THE STONE
OK I am not trying to brag out here but when you have a reasonably large collection of DVDs, it is only obvious that you have a choice to re-live the moments that you grew up with. The year was 1984 and Robert Zemeckis gave us his 2nd movie. I would probably call it his first coz Used Cars (1980) wasn’t really big at the BO. Nevertheless, 30 years down the road and old Bob has given us nearly 15 movies that can be watched almost anytime of the day. This is the one that started the very misconceived notion of a trilogy – Romancing the Stone (1984), Jewel of the Nile (1985) & War of the Roses (1989). War of the Roses did star the magical trio of Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner and Danny DeVito but was in no way related to the Jack T Colton and Joan Wilder adventures that were released before.
Joan Wilder (Kathleen Turner – did they make women more beautiful then or is it just a figment of my imagination and my singledom talking) is a successful romance novelist. She writes Western Romance novels with a principle characters called Angelina and Jessie who she believes is the manifestation of the ideal man. She believes that her Jessie is somewhere out there and is waiting to be found. He publisher, Gloria (Holland Taylor) is also continuously on the look-out for a potential man for Joan. As she is about to leave home in a massive hurry to give Gloria her next book, she gets a nondescript envelope which she doesn’t bother opening. She returns to find her house ransacked and turned completely inside out. To make matters worse, she gets a call at the same time from Elaine (Mary Ellen Trainor), her sister who has been kidnapped.
Elaine asks Joan to come to Cartagena (pronounced Cartahena), Columbia with the package. Her kidnappers are Ira (Zack Norman) and his cousin Ralph (Danny DeVito). Joan lands into Columbia and boards the wrong bus thanks to being incorrectly led by Zolo (Manuel Ojeda) – the guy responsible for ransacking her home. Ralph is also present @ the airport but misses her and realizes it only when the bus has already left. A few hours later Joan finds herself up in the hills of Columbia. As she asks the bus driver as to how much longer it would take to Cartagena, the bus crashes into a stationary jeep and obviously breaks down. Using this opportunity, Zolo tries to extract the map out of Joan at gun point. However, our hero, Jack T Colton (Michael Douglas), the owner of the now trashed jeep and the birds worth nearly $20K appears. A gun fight ensues and Zolo runs away unsuccessfully.
Romancing the Stone, as mentioned earlier, released in 1984. The challenge in rating the movie right now would be to get to a comparable level that existed in the early 80s. In its time, RTS was a very well made movie. But if you look at it today, you can easily make out the use of blank cartridges in the guns and you would probably laugh at the ease with which our protagonists dodge bullets. It does have a charm of its own – heroes dodging bullets that is – but very honestly thoda far fetched. Unlike a James Bond where anything is considered possible, Jack Colton is not really associated with doing the impossible.
Lesser known fact I am sure would be that Michael Douglas also produced RTS. I guess it helped being born to a family where acting was in the genes and loads of money in the bank. What makes it admirable is that he actually produced his first movie 10 years before RTS @ the age of 30. Surprise Surprise – One flew over the cuckoo’s nest. He doesn’t look a day over 30 even in RTS. Strong performances by the 3 lead characters make RTS an evergreen classic. Zemeckis’ direction seems to be just about moving in the right direction at this stage. One which would peak with Forrest Gump a few years later. Fast Paced & never short of action but a little stretched at the beginning. Takes a while for the action to start. Lets hope the remake which is due to release next year addresses some of these issues. Not too tough an act to emulate. 6 on 10. Next up is Jewel of the Nile followed by a weekend of releases. So it would be back to current movies. Watch out this space for more. HAPPY DIWALI FOLKS!!!!!
Joan Wilder (Kathleen Turner – did they make women more beautiful then or is it just a figment of my imagination and my singledom talking) is a successful romance novelist. She writes Western Romance novels with a principle characters called Angelina and Jessie who she believes is the manifestation of the ideal man. She believes that her Jessie is somewhere out there and is waiting to be found. He publisher, Gloria (Holland Taylor) is also continuously on the look-out for a potential man for Joan. As she is about to leave home in a massive hurry to give Gloria her next book, she gets a nondescript envelope which she doesn’t bother opening. She returns to find her house ransacked and turned completely inside out. To make matters worse, she gets a call at the same time from Elaine (Mary Ellen Trainor), her sister who has been kidnapped.
Elaine asks Joan to come to Cartagena (pronounced Cartahena), Columbia with the package. Her kidnappers are Ira (Zack Norman) and his cousin Ralph (Danny DeVito). Joan lands into Columbia and boards the wrong bus thanks to being incorrectly led by Zolo (Manuel Ojeda) – the guy responsible for ransacking her home. Ralph is also present @ the airport but misses her and realizes it only when the bus has already left. A few hours later Joan finds herself up in the hills of Columbia. As she asks the bus driver as to how much longer it would take to Cartagena, the bus crashes into a stationary jeep and obviously breaks down. Using this opportunity, Zolo tries to extract the map out of Joan at gun point. However, our hero, Jack T Colton (Michael Douglas), the owner of the now trashed jeep and the birds worth nearly $20K appears. A gun fight ensues and Zolo runs away unsuccessfully.
Romancing the Stone, as mentioned earlier, released in 1984. The challenge in rating the movie right now would be to get to a comparable level that existed in the early 80s. In its time, RTS was a very well made movie. But if you look at it today, you can easily make out the use of blank cartridges in the guns and you would probably laugh at the ease with which our protagonists dodge bullets. It does have a charm of its own – heroes dodging bullets that is – but very honestly thoda far fetched. Unlike a James Bond where anything is considered possible, Jack Colton is not really associated with doing the impossible.
Lesser known fact I am sure would be that Michael Douglas also produced RTS. I guess it helped being born to a family where acting was in the genes and loads of money in the bank. What makes it admirable is that he actually produced his first movie 10 years before RTS @ the age of 30. Surprise Surprise – One flew over the cuckoo’s nest. He doesn’t look a day over 30 even in RTS. Strong performances by the 3 lead characters make RTS an evergreen classic. Zemeckis’ direction seems to be just about moving in the right direction at this stage. One which would peak with Forrest Gump a few years later. Fast Paced & never short of action but a little stretched at the beginning. Takes a while for the action to start. Lets hope the remake which is due to release next year addresses some of these issues. Not too tough an act to emulate. 6 on 10. Next up is Jewel of the Nile followed by a weekend of releases. So it would be back to current movies. Watch out this space for more. HAPPY DIWALI FOLKS!!!!!
Wednesday, 3 November 2010
Legend of the Gaurdians - The Owls of Ga'Hoole
Kathryn Lansky is a very happy woman. Earlier this year, she released her fourth book under the title – The Gaurdians of Ga’Hoole and that too after 10 years. I am not so sure how the book turned out but I can tell you this much – Zack Snyder has turned the book into a front runner for the Oscars this year in the Animation Category. Toy Story 3 would be a really tough one to crack and How to Train your Dragon was almost as good as Toy Story 3. I would hazard a guess this time that The Legend of the Gaurdians would definitely find its way into the nominations..
Noctus (Hugo Weaving) and Nyra (Helen Mirren) are a happily married barn owl couple. The stay up in the tree tops with their 3 children – Soren (Jim Sturgess), Kludd (Ryan Kwanten) and Eglantine (Adrienne De Faria). Taking care of their children when they are away is their nanny – Mrs. Plithiver (Miriam Margoyles) a pink barn snake I am guessing. Kludd and Soren are almost ready to branch out but are not the most confident. They are learning to fly but are not completely ready. Soren is a dreamer. He has grown up on the stories of the Gaurdians of Ga’hoole – a kind of myth in owl world. He listens to his heart more than his head. He is fun loving and confident and gets people to like him very easily. Kludd on the other hand tries too hard to prove a point and get the world to like him more. He kind of lives in the shadown of Soren – and he is obviously not too thrilled about it
One evening when Noctus and Nyra go off on their evening hunt, the boys decide to try their hand at flying – a little too soon it must be said. They quickly find themselves on the ground, a place which is considered most dangerous for owls in general. As expected, they have to fight for the next minute or two with a wolf but are saved in the nick of time by a couple of owls who they haven’t met ever. But they are quick to realize that they have not been saved but kidnapped and taken to St. Aggies where the legendary wicked Metal Beak (Joel Edgerton) is gathering owl orphans to form an army of Titos or what he calls, The Pure Ones. These guys kidnap young owlets in need and use them in a variety of ways including building them into soldiers who would fight the war against the Legendary Gaurdians. He has also managed to pull together a legion of bats to work with him in this wicked endevour. But Soren and Gylfie (Emily Barclay) one of the other kidnapped owlets, manage to escape and make their way all the way to the Island of the Ga’hoole.
Zack Snyder is a confident director. With the likes of Watch Men & 300 under his belt, he is brimming with the confidence of a director who knows what he is upto. I haven’t seen Watch Men yet but 300 speaks volumes of the capability of this director. The narration is very strong and the movie is extremely compact with little or no wastage of time and unnecessary additions. The editing is par excellence and voice overs extremely apt. The Legend of the Gaurdians is the typical story of good prevailing over evil but portrayed through a the eyes of owls. The attention to detail is phenomenal. Watching it in 3D @ the IMAX is as good as living the experience. One can, if upto it, actually count the feathers on the owls. Simply superb I say. Easily a 7.5 on 10.
Noctus (Hugo Weaving) and Nyra (Helen Mirren) are a happily married barn owl couple. The stay up in the tree tops with their 3 children – Soren (Jim Sturgess), Kludd (Ryan Kwanten) and Eglantine (Adrienne De Faria). Taking care of their children when they are away is their nanny – Mrs. Plithiver (Miriam Margoyles) a pink barn snake I am guessing. Kludd and Soren are almost ready to branch out but are not the most confident. They are learning to fly but are not completely ready. Soren is a dreamer. He has grown up on the stories of the Gaurdians of Ga’hoole – a kind of myth in owl world. He listens to his heart more than his head. He is fun loving and confident and gets people to like him very easily. Kludd on the other hand tries too hard to prove a point and get the world to like him more. He kind of lives in the shadown of Soren – and he is obviously not too thrilled about it
One evening when Noctus and Nyra go off on their evening hunt, the boys decide to try their hand at flying – a little too soon it must be said. They quickly find themselves on the ground, a place which is considered most dangerous for owls in general. As expected, they have to fight for the next minute or two with a wolf but are saved in the nick of time by a couple of owls who they haven’t met ever. But they are quick to realize that they have not been saved but kidnapped and taken to St. Aggies where the legendary wicked Metal Beak (Joel Edgerton) is gathering owl orphans to form an army of Titos or what he calls, The Pure Ones. These guys kidnap young owlets in need and use them in a variety of ways including building them into soldiers who would fight the war against the Legendary Gaurdians. He has also managed to pull together a legion of bats to work with him in this wicked endevour. But Soren and Gylfie (Emily Barclay) one of the other kidnapped owlets, manage to escape and make their way all the way to the Island of the Ga’hoole.
Zack Snyder is a confident director. With the likes of Watch Men & 300 under his belt, he is brimming with the confidence of a director who knows what he is upto. I haven’t seen Watch Men yet but 300 speaks volumes of the capability of this director. The narration is very strong and the movie is extremely compact with little or no wastage of time and unnecessary additions. The editing is par excellence and voice overs extremely apt. The Legend of the Gaurdians is the typical story of good prevailing over evil but portrayed through a the eyes of owls. The attention to detail is phenomenal. Watching it in 3D @ the IMAX is as good as living the experience. One can, if upto it, actually count the feathers on the owls. Simply superb I say. Easily a 7.5 on 10.
Tuesday, 2 November 2010
Mamma Mia!
I wonder how Mamma Mia! did when it was launched a couple of years back in India. I thought I was one of the few people who was unable to watch it then. But I am guessing it should have. I mean it is as good as a Bollywood love story – only much bolder, much more slickly made, much much much much better acting talent on display and much more ABBA thrown in for good measure.
Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) is all of 20 (and I challenge someone to believe that!!!! With her face she doesn’t look a day over 15 – but in the real world she will be 25 in a month). She has been bought up on a Greek island by her single mother, Donna (Meryl Streep). She is about to get married in a few days to Sky (Dominic Cooper – who is also her boyfriend in the real world). But she is a confused soul. She feels a void in her life. She is troubled with a question – Who will walk her down the aisle? Who will give her away? The worry is not that she doesn’t have a father. The worry is she doesn’t know who her father is. Its Donna’s well kept secret all these years.
But the wily Sophie digs around and finds her mother’s old diary – coincidentally of course. She traces the diary back to 20 years ago and is now even more confused. She could have been fathered by one of 3 possible men that her mother was seeing at that time. Now Donna was not promiscuous in any manner. She just moved out of failed relationships much quicker than anyone else. So now, Sophie has zeroed down to one of 3 possibilities – Bill (Stellan Skarsgard) – an adventurous writer, Sam (Pierce Brosnan) – an architect & Harry (Colin Firth) – a extremely successful financial advisor of sorts. Obviously her mother will not hear any of it an so without a choice, Sophie – to the background of “I have a dream” – sends across invitations on her mother’s behalf to all of them – What’s to lose anyways?
The movie unfolds at a really solid pace after this. Mind you, I have only written about the first 10-15 mins till now. Mamma Mia! is a beautifully made movie, with a generous dressing of ABBA. Almost every ABBA number worth its salt and even not worth its salt finds a place either through normal dialogues or full fledged songs. And mind you – all songs are not the studio versions but covered by the actors themselves. Simply amazing I say!!! I picked up the soundtrack much before the movie (a quizzer’s habit) and was floored with the voices of Streep, Walters, Seyfried and Brosnan. Thanks to DVD – I have seen the movie as well now.
No point in waxing eloquent about the seasoned Meryl Streep, Julie Walters, Stellan Skarsgard, Pierce Brosnan or Colin Firth, all of who have very rarely or never disappointed on screen. Who stands out is Amanda Seyfried. She seems to have come a really long way from her days of portraying the bimbo Karen Smith in Mean Girls. Mental note made to watch Letters to Juliet which is her latest flick. She seems to be very comfortable on screen and most importantly not over awed by the really huge stars. Direction was pretty much spot on with very little loose ends towards the second half. Phyllida Lloyd comes on tops in her first serious attempt to date. Overall a 7 on 10. Must must watch.
Sophie (Amanda Seyfried) is all of 20 (and I challenge someone to believe that!!!! With her face she doesn’t look a day over 15 – but in the real world she will be 25 in a month). She has been bought up on a Greek island by her single mother, Donna (Meryl Streep). She is about to get married in a few days to Sky (Dominic Cooper – who is also her boyfriend in the real world). But she is a confused soul. She feels a void in her life. She is troubled with a question – Who will walk her down the aisle? Who will give her away? The worry is not that she doesn’t have a father. The worry is she doesn’t know who her father is. Its Donna’s well kept secret all these years.
But the wily Sophie digs around and finds her mother’s old diary – coincidentally of course. She traces the diary back to 20 years ago and is now even more confused. She could have been fathered by one of 3 possible men that her mother was seeing at that time. Now Donna was not promiscuous in any manner. She just moved out of failed relationships much quicker than anyone else. So now, Sophie has zeroed down to one of 3 possibilities – Bill (Stellan Skarsgard) – an adventurous writer, Sam (Pierce Brosnan) – an architect & Harry (Colin Firth) – a extremely successful financial advisor of sorts. Obviously her mother will not hear any of it an so without a choice, Sophie – to the background of “I have a dream” – sends across invitations on her mother’s behalf to all of them – What’s to lose anyways?
The movie unfolds at a really solid pace after this. Mind you, I have only written about the first 10-15 mins till now. Mamma Mia! is a beautifully made movie, with a generous dressing of ABBA. Almost every ABBA number worth its salt and even not worth its salt finds a place either through normal dialogues or full fledged songs. And mind you – all songs are not the studio versions but covered by the actors themselves. Simply amazing I say!!! I picked up the soundtrack much before the movie (a quizzer’s habit) and was floored with the voices of Streep, Walters, Seyfried and Brosnan. Thanks to DVD – I have seen the movie as well now.
No point in waxing eloquent about the seasoned Meryl Streep, Julie Walters, Stellan Skarsgard, Pierce Brosnan or Colin Firth, all of who have very rarely or never disappointed on screen. Who stands out is Amanda Seyfried. She seems to have come a really long way from her days of portraying the bimbo Karen Smith in Mean Girls. Mental note made to watch Letters to Juliet which is her latest flick. She seems to be very comfortable on screen and most importantly not over awed by the really huge stars. Direction was pretty much spot on with very little loose ends towards the second half. Phyllida Lloyd comes on tops in her first serious attempt to date. Overall a 7 on 10. Must must watch.
Monday, 1 November 2010
Jhootha Hi Sahi
Siddharth (Sid) runs a book store called Kagaz Ke Phool in London along with his partners – Omar (Raghu Ram) and Amit (Omar Khan). He is in a relationship with Krutika (Manasi Scott) – an air hostess. Omar lives next door to Sid with his extremely pregnant sister Aliya (Alishka Varde). Aliya is in a relationship with Nick (George Young) who is, I can only assume, a 2nd generation Japanese dude because he doesn’t show any signs of being Jap. Looks fairly European to me. But yes, he definitely has a Jap surname. Nick is apparently madly in love with Aliya and doesn’t stop short of proposing to her almost every single day – he would do it every hour if he could.
Now Sid is not really in love with Kruttika. And the rest of the gang is not really hot about her either. Omar keeps asking Sid when he is going to break up with her but Sid is in denial. Sid stammers when he is in front of beautiful women and he believes he is in love with her because he doesn’t stammer with her – and just in case your devious mind thinks that she is not beautiful – Mansi Scott is gorgeous to say the least (drool drool). Nevertheless, all of this takes a twist of fate when “Dost Help Line”- a suicide helpline for Indians in London, prints Sid’s residence number instead of their number. Sid is inundated with calls through the night. When the helpline realizes their mistake, the representative (Nandana Sen) requests Sid to keep help by taking calls and giving the actual number – a person who is about to kill oneself is definitely prepared with a pen and paper to take down a new number.
Sid is not pleased but offers to help since it is a matter of life and death. As luck would have it, that very night he receives a call from someone who is not willing to speak at all. So Sid is left holding the line through the nite – which he does painstakingly through a few coffees and large doses of National Geographic. The next morning, the caller – who has by then slept off, introduces herself as Mishka (Pakhi) and goes on to give her entire sob story of how her mother committed suicide and how her boyfriend Kabir has left her etc. etc. Now Sid, to keep her pepped up gives a whole lot of bull shit about how he has climbed Mt. Everest and worked for NASA and that life has loads to look forward to and it is not worth ending. Slowly a friendship develops between Fidatoh (that’s what Mishka calls Sid over the phone coz she doesn’t know he is Sid). Inadvertently, Fidatoh tells her about a book that is available only in one book store in London i.e. Kagaz Ke Phool. Now Sid meets Mishka and the complicated balancing of life between Sid and Fidatoh begins.
Most of the male cast tends to go overboard on the acting front. The entire female cast is quite balanced. Pleasantly surprised with Pakhi who has also written the movie it would seem. I wonder what the confusion with Friends is all about. Cant remember any episode of friends that goes this way – but then I am not a huge Friends fan anyways. Abbas Tyrewala had only one directorial venture before this which was a huge success – Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na. This one will not be as huge but is quite decent. Humour is a bit forced in part but good overall. Entertaining movie I say – 6 on 10.
Now Sid is not really in love with Kruttika. And the rest of the gang is not really hot about her either. Omar keeps asking Sid when he is going to break up with her but Sid is in denial. Sid stammers when he is in front of beautiful women and he believes he is in love with her because he doesn’t stammer with her – and just in case your devious mind thinks that she is not beautiful – Mansi Scott is gorgeous to say the least (drool drool). Nevertheless, all of this takes a twist of fate when “Dost Help Line”- a suicide helpline for Indians in London, prints Sid’s residence number instead of their number. Sid is inundated with calls through the night. When the helpline realizes their mistake, the representative (Nandana Sen) requests Sid to keep help by taking calls and giving the actual number – a person who is about to kill oneself is definitely prepared with a pen and paper to take down a new number.
Sid is not pleased but offers to help since it is a matter of life and death. As luck would have it, that very night he receives a call from someone who is not willing to speak at all. So Sid is left holding the line through the nite – which he does painstakingly through a few coffees and large doses of National Geographic. The next morning, the caller – who has by then slept off, introduces herself as Mishka (Pakhi) and goes on to give her entire sob story of how her mother committed suicide and how her boyfriend Kabir has left her etc. etc. Now Sid, to keep her pepped up gives a whole lot of bull shit about how he has climbed Mt. Everest and worked for NASA and that life has loads to look forward to and it is not worth ending. Slowly a friendship develops between Fidatoh (that’s what Mishka calls Sid over the phone coz she doesn’t know he is Sid). Inadvertently, Fidatoh tells her about a book that is available only in one book store in London i.e. Kagaz Ke Phool. Now Sid meets Mishka and the complicated balancing of life between Sid and Fidatoh begins.
Most of the male cast tends to go overboard on the acting front. The entire female cast is quite balanced. Pleasantly surprised with Pakhi who has also written the movie it would seem. I wonder what the confusion with Friends is all about. Cant remember any episode of friends that goes this way – but then I am not a huge Friends fan anyways. Abbas Tyrewala had only one directorial venture before this which was a huge success – Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na. This one will not be as huge but is quite decent. Humour is a bit forced in part but good overall. Entertaining movie I say – 6 on 10.
Rakht Charitra
This one is based on a true story – But ironically claims that all characters are fictional and that any resemblance to a person living or dead is purely coincidence – Now that’s what u call playing to the laws of the land. The funny part is that both these claims follow each other at the beginning of the movie itself. Now hows that for absolute irony. Based on the story of Paritala Ravindra, this one is everything that you can expect out of an RGV biography. Home Territory as one would call it. This is RGVs backyard. This is what RGV does best. And he comes reasonably close to his previous best.
Ananthapur is a district in Andhra Pradesh where Jungle Law prevails. It is led by and completely controlled by Narasimha Reddy, the local politician. His right hand man from the lower caste (wonder why this was beeped out in the movie) is Veerbhadra (Rajendra Gupta). He painstakingly helps Narasimha build his empire over 2 decades. And on Narasimha’s insistence goes ahead with the listings for the upcoming elections. Obviously he favours people who are closer to the so called downtrodden and thereby gives the people hope of a brighter future.
Unbeknownst to him, Nagamani Reddy (Kota Srinivasa Rao), yet another close associate of Narasimha Reddy is extremely upset with the turn of events which is taking away a lot of power from the upper classes (which coincidentally is not beeped out). He starts sowing seeds of doubt in Narasimha’s mind of how VB is misusing the power and tarnishing his image with the lower classes. Wonder why Narasimha never looks at checking up on these claims but directly takes away all power from VB. VB is obviously incensed about this entire episode and decides that he doesn’t need the lead party’s support. Goes ahead and launches his own challenge to fight the elections. Not a good idea Mr. VB. Remember – Jungle Law prevails. Obviously the result is his death – brutally murdered by his own kin – Manda (Ashish Vidyarthi) – who is threatened by Nagamani.
All hell breaks lose after this. Shankar (Sushant Singh) who is VBs elder son leaves the town for the jungle and starts plotting the revenge plan on his father’s killers. Simultaneously news reaches Pratap (Viveik Oberoi) who, at that time has just returned after discussing his plans to marry Nandini (Radhika Apte). He returns back to see an ocean of blood all over and his brother leading the revenge. Only a matter of time before he has to jump into the slug fest coz Shankar is also killed by the local cops who are hand in glove with Nagamani.
RGV’s home turf as I had mentioned earlier. Music is atypical Sanskrit Shlokas in the background. Some unnecessary stuff songs thrown in for bad measure. Could have done without it. And then there is the kicker in the shitter – There is RC2 releasing on November 19th 2010. Now how is that for squeezing the market dry. Smart Marketing RGV Saar!!!! Glad to say that VO is back although his entry could have been much better than riding on a scooter in slow motion!!!! Come on guys lets give the guy his due. But the absolute stand out performances are by Abhimanyu Shekhar Singh who plays the role of the disgusting despicable Bukka Rao – Nagamani’s son and by Kota Srinivasa Rao who plays Nagamani. Super performances by both. Overall RC1 is a 6 on 10. Not too close to Sarkar which was much better executed. Don’t think RC2 is going to be too great. But will be worth a dekko I guess.
Ananthapur is a district in Andhra Pradesh where Jungle Law prevails. It is led by and completely controlled by Narasimha Reddy, the local politician. His right hand man from the lower caste (wonder why this was beeped out in the movie) is Veerbhadra (Rajendra Gupta). He painstakingly helps Narasimha build his empire over 2 decades. And on Narasimha’s insistence goes ahead with the listings for the upcoming elections. Obviously he favours people who are closer to the so called downtrodden and thereby gives the people hope of a brighter future.
Unbeknownst to him, Nagamani Reddy (Kota Srinivasa Rao), yet another close associate of Narasimha Reddy is extremely upset with the turn of events which is taking away a lot of power from the upper classes (which coincidentally is not beeped out). He starts sowing seeds of doubt in Narasimha’s mind of how VB is misusing the power and tarnishing his image with the lower classes. Wonder why Narasimha never looks at checking up on these claims but directly takes away all power from VB. VB is obviously incensed about this entire episode and decides that he doesn’t need the lead party’s support. Goes ahead and launches his own challenge to fight the elections. Not a good idea Mr. VB. Remember – Jungle Law prevails. Obviously the result is his death – brutally murdered by his own kin – Manda (Ashish Vidyarthi) – who is threatened by Nagamani.
All hell breaks lose after this. Shankar (Sushant Singh) who is VBs elder son leaves the town for the jungle and starts plotting the revenge plan on his father’s killers. Simultaneously news reaches Pratap (Viveik Oberoi) who, at that time has just returned after discussing his plans to marry Nandini (Radhika Apte). He returns back to see an ocean of blood all over and his brother leading the revenge. Only a matter of time before he has to jump into the slug fest coz Shankar is also killed by the local cops who are hand in glove with Nagamani.
RGV’s home turf as I had mentioned earlier. Music is atypical Sanskrit Shlokas in the background. Some unnecessary stuff songs thrown in for bad measure. Could have done without it. And then there is the kicker in the shitter – There is RC2 releasing on November 19th 2010. Now how is that for squeezing the market dry. Smart Marketing RGV Saar!!!! Glad to say that VO is back although his entry could have been much better than riding on a scooter in slow motion!!!! Come on guys lets give the guy his due. But the absolute stand out performances are by Abhimanyu Shekhar Singh who plays the role of the disgusting despicable Bukka Rao – Nagamani’s son and by Kota Srinivasa Rao who plays Nagamani. Super performances by both. Overall RC1 is a 6 on 10. Not too close to Sarkar which was much better executed. Don’t think RC2 is going to be too great. But will be worth a dekko I guess.
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