Heroine

Dear Mr. Madhur Bhandarkar – a few pointers that I picked up from Heroine

1. What is the necessity of getting in so many characters into the movie to support your main cast? After a while, I actually lost count of the number of characters. Aryan (Rampal) is boyfriend 1. Angad (Randeep Hooda) is boyfriend 2. Rashidbhai (Govind Namdeo) is secretary. Pramita (Shahana) is lesbian fling. Mummy (Lilette Dubey) is having affair with politician. Rhea Mehra (Mugdha Ghodse), Shaheen (Pooja Chopra)and Gayatri Reddy (Meenakshi – I think) are competitors. Tapan Da (Ranveer Shorey) is an eccentric Bengali director. Abbas (Sanjay Suri) is the hot shot lead actor. Zara (Shilpi Sharma) is Abbas’ wife!!! Like WTF??? The average movie watcher would go half psycho by the time s/he finishes the first 45 mins.

2. And why is everyone after ruining Randeep Hooda’s image as an actor by forcing him to over act like his life depended on it?

3. Arjun Rampal is one of the – if not THE MOST – constipated in this performance of his. He was always challenged but this time the struggle was super obvious.

4. Why in the blazes would you make up Kareena to look even more heinous than she looks normally? Seriously – some of the shots with mascara running down her face made me believe that Heroine was a horror flick ala Vikram Bhatt.

5. And as if that weren’t sufficient, your actual run time is 2 hrs 29 mins!!!! What???? Seriously???? SERIOUSLY???? Why do you have to stretch all your stories to an extent that it starts competing with Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayan – in my time it was called the Height of Elasticity.

6. And what makes you believe that everyone and their uncle and their mother in the movie industry is a chain smoker? The “Cigarette Smoking is injurious to health” disclaimer at the beginning was apt for Heroine. There was barely a shot in which there was no cigarette. Now don’t get me wrong – I am a smoker myself but with so much smoke around, I would have contracted cancer even by watching. And if the idea is true then at least try and get your actors and actresses to smoke naturally and not like they have been forced into it.

7. For future reference – Please do not use terms such as Bi-Polar disorder loosely. It is a serious psychiatric issue. Mahie Arora (Kareena Kapoor) showed any indication of a “frenzied state (as described by Wikipedia)” probably only once in the entire movie. Eccentric – yes. Bipolar disorder – you fell way short of that. – not the first time you are doing it.

8. But fear not. The movie is not fraught with only bad points. There are some high points in acting for certain. I thought the support cast – no matter how unnecessary they were – actually put in a solid effort. Govind Namdeo, Shahana Goswami, Divya Dutta, Helen and even Ranveer Shorey as the eccentric Bengali director were all superb.

9. So much that they kind of overshadowed a performance from Kareena that was much better than her usual performances to date. Maybe she really took a leaf from the role of Tarannum that she played in the movie. All this despite the sad make up. Overall, a decent watch, despite all the negatives.

10. Yet again, you have delivered an average flick that will be received reasonably at the Box Office, make some money and maybe get a national award (much as I would hate Kareena pipping Vidya Balan’s performance in Kahaani).

11. Will the audience get bored? No. But is it essential to watch on big screen – No again. 5 on 10.

Thanks & Regards

An avid movie watcher and a hopeful that someday you will deliver a superb movie

Watch the trailer on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWB_h91HqP0