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Upcoming films : November and December 2009

Posted on November 22, 2009 by amodini

A combined list of films for November and December this time. “3 Idiots”, “Rocket Singh” and “Raat gayi baat gayi” look interesting.

Release Date	Film Title	Genre	Director	Actors
Nov 20	Kurbaan	Drama	Renzil D’Silva	Saif ali Khan, Kareena Kapoor, Om Puri, Vivek Oberoi, Kiron Kher
Nov 27	De Dana Dan	Comedy	Priyadarshan	Akshay Kumar, Katrina Kaif, Sunil Shetty, Sameera Reddy, Paresh Rawal, Neha Dhupia, Rajpal Yadav, Johnny Lever, Aditi Govitrikar, Chunky Pandey, Archana Puran Singh, Tinu Anand, Vikram Gokhale
Dec 3	Radio	Drama	Isshaan Trivedi	Himesh Reshammiya, Sonal Sehgal, Shehnaz Treasurywala
Dec 4	Paa	Drama	R. Balkrishnan	Amitabh Bachchan, Abhishek Bachhan, Vidya Balan
Dec 11	Rocket Singh – Salesman of the year	Drama	Shimit Amin	Ranbir Kapoor, Shazahn Padamsee, Sharon Prabhakar, Gauhar Khan
Dec 18	Raat gayi baat gayi	Drama	Saurabh Shukla	Vinay Pathak, Neha Dhupia, Rajat Kapoor, Iravati Harshe, Ranvir Shorey, Navneet Nishan, Dalip Tahil
Dec 25	3 Idiots	Drama	Rajkumar Hirani	Aamir Khan, Sharman Joshi, Madhavan

Posted in bollywood, Previews | Tagged upcoming | Comments Off

Movie Preview : Ajab prem ki ghazab kahani

Posted on November 2, 2009 by amodini

Raj Kumar Santoshi has directed a bunch of films, “Andaz Apna Apna”, “Pukar” and “Damini” being the better known ones. His most recent film “Halla bol” didn’t do too well. This time he attempts a romantic comedy with the flavor of the month, Ranbir Kapoor, and the actress who’s had a flurry of films lately – the comely Katrina Kaif.

Of course if the Official Website is anything to go by, this film might be a dud. There’s Kapoor doing a Saawariya, with a towel. He’s also in one of the stills, in what looks to be woman’s dress. And in the promos, he’s hamming it up. Not good signs, any of them. This film is a romance, so hopefully there’ll be more to it than him being the President of Happy Club.

There’s Prem (Ranbir) and Jennifer or Jenny (Katrina). Prem is quite “ajab” and this is his “ghazab” ki kahani – you do see the clever punning by Santoshi & Co., don’t you ? OK then, so Prem falls in love with Jenny who’s already in love with someone else. He also inadvertently kidnaps her (not sure how that works) and she now loathes him, while he adores her, and thinks her vanilla ice-cream (hmm… this is starting to weird me out). Somewhere in there he also makes jalebis while wearing khaki shorts, so maybe he’s a halwai-in-training ?

The whole never-do-well, goofy guys cleaning up their act, after meeting the perfect woman thing is getting a tad clichéd. Didn’t Ranbir just play the same role in “Wake up Sid” ? Katrina’s the peppy, young thing – yet again. But on the bright side, two of the songs in the film have been sung by Atif Aslam, in his gorgeously soulful voice, and they turn out beautifully, especially “Tera hone laga hoon”

This film is aimed at the younger crowd, and I’m going by the look of the promos and the Website, and their ‘apparent” desire to be so cool and hip, and narrate in comic form. And everytime they get “comic-y” (remember Hum Tum ?), it ends up looking juvenile and losing appeal. So I do hope that there’s more meat in the film, and they are not so fixated on working the “masala” in that they forget that there’s more to a film than that. Santoshi generally isn’t all fluff so that gives me hope, although which schmuck is behind the silly Website (and OMG, this doesn’t bear thinking about, but will the movie be as silly as that?)

Posted in bollywood, Previews | 1 Comment

Movie Review : Baabarr

Posted on October 25, 2009 by amodini

Rating : Average (3/5)
Genre : Drama/Action
Year : 2009
Running time : 2 hours 10 minutes
Director : Ashu Trikha
Cast : Sohum Shah, Om Puri, Sushant Singh, Govind Namdeo, Tinu Anand, Mithun Chakraborty, Urvashi Sharma, Shakti Kapoor
Kid rating : PG13

BAABARR : OLD WINE IN NEW BOTTLE !

Gangster movies first came to be noticed with Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s Parinda (1989). Satya which came in 1998 was the 90s version of the gangster saga. Urmila Matondkar made a beautiful foil for Chakravarty’s earnest gangster, and the tight story and screenplay held me engrossed for those couple of hours. Then came Vaastav, Company, Sehar and a whole host of films which gave this genre some respectability.

And in 2009 we have Baabarr a gangster film which left me unmoved, and I must admit a little bored. Baabar depicts grass-roots growth of crime – how a boy surrounded by violence grows up to be a gangster. You’d think this would be an interesting story to tell and see, but the director, the script-writer and the weak screenplay manage to project the protagonist as an unsympathetic psycho with anger issues.

Baabarr is a little boy who is privy to his family’s fights with other local thugs. His brothers, the eldest of whom is played by Shakti Kapoor, retaliate by producing home-made guns and fighting bloodshed with bloodshed. Baabarr, then a 12 year old decides to assist his brothers by picking up a gun and killing a man. From then on, it’s a downward spiral, with Baabarr growing up to become a thuggish lout, known for his anger, and his obstinate and trigger-happy ways.

The government decides to reign in criminal activities in the area, by bringing in encounter specialist Dwivedi (Mithun Chakraborty). Dwivedi is assisted by his second-in-command Inspector (Om Puri), who has his own fish to fry, in the midst of all this. The rest of the film delineates altercations between the cop and the gangster, with an offbeat ending.

The leading man is newcomer Sohum Shah, although why he is in the lead is quite the question. Sohum cannot act and does not have the screen presence to carry off a persona such as Baabar’s. Besides those failings, the screenplay and story do not help much. The way Baabar’s introduction to crime has been depicted make you think the director’s taken the easy way out. Baabarr as a boy, is cold and emotionless, someone who might have been better of a in a shrink’s office, than fighting it out on the streets. And the “sympathy” factor which normally kicks in, in gangster movies comes from the fact that the hero can redeem himself in our eyes, by possessing at least some admirable qualities, such as integrity, a sense of fair-play, or even kindness to those weaker than him. Baabarr, unfortunately possess none of those.

This film has a number of very good character actors like Govind Namdeo, Sushant Singh and Tinnu Anand, but they are used poorly, and can do little in the face of weak scripting and character development. Mithun, as Dwivedi, is still Mithun, with his characteristic swagger and style of dialogue delivery, and it is a pity to see a talent who started off in the most excellent Mrigaya come to this.

Besides the generally poor quality of the film, there’s also the fact that everything we see here has been done before and done better. There is no new element to capture our imagination, as the film offers the same old “wanna-be-gritty-crime-thriller”, albeit in more tawdry garb. For it’s casual, trigger-happy violence, and the glorification of a bhai type this film earns itself a PG-13 rating.

Baabarr is quite a disappointment; this one can be lived without.

Posted in 2009, bollywood, rating-PG13 | Comments Off

Movie Preview : Blue

Posted on October 14, 2009 by amodini

My intuition is wishy-washy on this one. Promises to be another blown-up, bloated, can-you-do-this stunt-filled film with more hype and very little matter (hopefully will be more complimentary in the Blue movie review) i.e.; another wanna-be Indian action/thriller. For starters there is Aarav, Akshay Kumar , owner of “Blue Shipping & Fisheries” (that’s probably where they got the name, no ?) , eminently eligible bachelor, risk-taker extraordinaire, and very-very sun-glassed. In his honor, an ode to similarly sun-glassed men :

Ah, so cool,
So very, very cool,
I drool
Drool : nothing but saliva

Then there is Sanjay Dutt, the man who must never, ever appear in a wetsuit in public, or else we will all be blinded. Which I am. I can’t type.

** 2 hours later ** Apparently the blindness is temporary. So back to business. Saagar (Dutt) is Aarav’s closest friend, and, the website says, “a straight-forward, simple man with a troubled past and a modest future”. OK. Sam (Zayed Khan) is Sagar’s estranged brother. He’s also arrogant, passionate about bikes (I didn’t see that coming), and seeking refuge from an accidental brush with the mafia. Lara Dutta’s character is creatively named Mona, and she is a marine enthusiast, and Sagar’s lady love. She’s also pretty, “effervescent” (according to the website) and compassionate. How nice, really ! The part about her being compassionate, and . . . er, effervescent. Must help with the floating in the H20.

There is also Katrina Kaif, sporting a chin stud, dishevelled hair, and presumably the surprise package, because the official website doesn’t mention her in the cast. Accidental ommission ? I think not. Anyway, the story is that the 3 males go treasure hunting in the Pacific Ocean, amid shark-infested waters. Ms. Dutta is presumably a hanger-on of sorts, because the story doesn’t explicitly mention her role.Very few come back from the deep, we are told. So will these pretty people ?

The music looks good. “Aaj dil gustakh” is very nice, although I do have reservations about the “Chiggy wiggy” song – wish it didn’t have the Bhangra beats forced in there. Kylie Minogue is in the movie as herself. Lara Dutta joins the bevy of bikin-clad Bollywoodian beauties, and looks fit and svelte doing it.

Blue floats up Oct 16th – here’s the official website.

Tags : Blue film preview, Blue movie preview

Posted in bollywood, Previews, rating-PG15, thriller | 2 Comments

Upcoming films : October 2009

Posted on October 9, 2009 by amodini

October has more than the usual number of releases, and there’s something for everyone : romance, comedy, thriller, kiddie stuff. And Sanjay Dutt (I’m not a fan) Govinda and Fardeen Khan star in a lot of them :

Release Date	Film Title	Genre	Director	Actors
Oct 2	Wake up Sid !	Romance	Ayan Mukerji	Ranbir Kapoor, Konkona Sen Sharma, Anumpam Kher, Supriya Pathak Shah
Oct 2	Do Knot Disturb	Comedy	David Dhawan	Govinda, Sushmita Sen, Lara Dutta, Ritesh Deshmukh, Ranvir Shorey, Rajpal Yadav
Oct 10	Acid Factory	Thriller/Action	Suparn Verma	Fardeen Khan, Dino Morea, Diya Mirza, Aftab Shivdasani, Danny Denzongpa, Manoj Bajpai, Irrfan Khan
Oct 16	Blue	Thriller/Action	Anthony D’Souza	Sanjay Dutt, Akshay Kumar, Lara Dutta, Katrina Kaif, Sunil Shetty, Zayed Khan, Kabir Bedi, Kylie Minogue
Oct 16	Main aur Mrs. Khanna	Romance/Comedy	Prem Soni	Salman Khan, Kareena Kapoor, Sohail Khan, Govinda
Oct 16	All the Best	Comedy	Rohit Shetty	Ajay Devgun, Bipasha Basu, Fardeen Khan, Sanjay Dutt, Mugdha Godse, Asrani
Oct 23	Bal Ganesh 2	Kid Cartoon	Pankaj Sharma
Oct 30	Aladdin	Adventure/Fantasy	Sujoy Ghosh	Amitabh Bachchan, Ritesh Deshmukh, Jacqueline Fernandes, Sanjay Dutt
Oct 30	London Dreams	Musical	Vipul Amrutlal Shah	Salman Khan, Ajay Devgan, Asin Thottumkal, Rannvijay Singh, Om Puri

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Movie Review : Wake up Sid !

Posted on October 3, 2009 by amodini

Rating : Above average (3.75/5)
Genre : Romance/Drama
Year : 2009
Running time : 2 hours 30 minutes
Director : Ayan Mukerji
Cast : Anupam Kher, Supriya Pathak, Ranbir Kapoor, Konkona Sen Sharma, Rahul Khanna, Shikha Talsania, Namit Das, Kashmira Shah
Kid rating : PG

WAKE-UP SID : DREAMY DEBUT

Richie-rich Sid, as you know, is your perennially lovable loser. Aisha Bannerji is a motivated wanna-be writer who desires her independence, and she tells Sid, when he asks, a MAN not a BOY (such as he) for a soul-mate. So never the twain shall meet, you think ?

Director Ayan Mukherji’s debut vehicle “Wake up Sid” is actually a film about Siddharth waking up, metaphorically that is, to his life, and his place in it. Aisha, the new girl in town, befriended by Sid, is instrumental in making that happen, but her disdain for his childishness – she calls him a “bachha”, ensures that younger Sid and older Aisha remain “just friends”. So when slacker Sid fails his graduate (or under-grad for the US) exams, misbehaves with his mother (Supriya Pathak Shah), and is booted out by his father (Anupam Kher) he lands up where else, but at his friend Aisha’s doorstep.

Aisha is inching along with her own goals in life – she has a job, but she wants “the” job – as a writer. Romance is in the air once we spy the very artsy looking Rahul Khanna as her boss. Sid must learn to live sans his Dad’s wealth and the various associated comforts, but there is hope in terms of possible work and love might be right around the corner once he meets an old (and very pretty) acquaintance. Life happens, but will it, for Sid and Aisha ?

“Wake up Sid” is sensitively crafted, and humorously told. Much of the humor stems from the interaction between Sid and his friends, and his very guileless remarks like the one where he tells Aisha, whom he’s only just met, that she probably is not the college crowd type, since she looks older. The college camaraderie is reminiscent of parts of “Dil Chahta Hai” which also was a story of very rich kids. And cynically speaking, maybe the atmosphere feels right, and the humor funny, when the vodka is flowing and the wealth inherited ?

Not to say that Mukherjee doesn’t put his best foot forward – he does. He takes this basic coming-of-age story and infuses it with humor, charm, and some very moving familial touches. The film’s screenplay which was good on the whole, was at times so graceful that emotions jumped at you from the screen, and at times, fumbled for logical reasons. It’s not that the film portrayed fantasy, but it did portray a very pretty reality – newbie Aisha not only gets the job, but she obtains a flat in Bombay (which sounds prohibitively expensive on no salary) before she lands the job !

Konkona Sen Sharma might not be the prettiest actress we have, but she wins hands down when it comes to emoting. Her character Aisha Banerjee, was realistically written and portrayed. Ranbir too gave a pretty good performance as Siddharth, although his acting skills could be honed; the cracks showed in the scene where he goes to talk to his Dad about the cheque. His character, that of clear-hearted, fun-loving, guileless Sid was well sketched. Also very believable and adding to the general merriment were Sid’s loyal friends Laxmi (Shikha Talsania) and Rishi (Namit Das).

As far as characters go, Supriya Pathak’s was the one fragile spot. An actress of Pathak’s caliber is stuck in a weak, wishy-washy role as Sid’s mother, where she clings on pathetically to her son’s affections via broken English. She seemed more weak-willed than the average mother, and quite unalike mine, who would have soundly told off (and thrashed) a son like Sid. Anupam Kher depicting Sid’s father Ram Mehra, is outstanding, and I didn’t need to say that, did I ?

Another feather in the cap for the film-makers is the music. The title song, and “Kya karoon” are both youthful and energetic. I also like the very melodious “Aaj kal zindagi” – very vintage Shakar-Ehsaan-Loy and reminded me strongly of “Kaisi hai yeh rut” from “Dil Chahta Hai”. Also very nicely done was the Uday Benegal (remember Indus Creed ?) sung number “Life is crazy”. I wasn’t floored by “Iktara” but what really drove me nuts was how, whenever a romantic scene came on, the music immediately changed to this English ballad style shit – what ? Hindi not expressive enough for romance ?

So now we come to the part where I tell you that this life drama-cum-romance gave me my money’s worth. Well, yeah – upto a point. I loved the lazy banter, the unselfconscious horsing around, the great leap that Hindi cinema has supposedly taken in actually showing a platonic relationship between a good looking young man and woman, and not having them jump in bed together, even though they sleep only a few feet from each other – yup, wrap your mind around that one ! Bollywood might actually be coming of age !

What didn’t work for me was that I just didn’t fancy the way it ended, happily which was good, but not very believably. Chalk and cheese, the two of them, you know ? Therefore no warm-and-mushy feelings mellowed my drive home, and the bells of true romance on-screen didn’t jangle at all (as they did post Love aaj kal, or post Cheeni kum) – which is kind of a bummer, because that was the point, wasn’t it ?

Still, a very worth-it film from Ayan Mukerji, this one is pretty clean and classy, but gets a PG (and not G) rating for some girly, “how’s your sex-life” kind of talk

Tags : Wake up Sid movie review, Wake up Sid film review, Wake up Sid review

Posted in 2009, All Netflix, bollywood, drama, family-friendly, Hindi movies on Netflix, rating-PG, recommended | 10 Comments

Movie Review : What’s your rashee ?

Posted on September 25, 2009 by amodini

Rating : Above average (3.3/5)
Genre : Comedy / Romance
Year : 2009
Running time : 3 hours 12 minutes
Director : Ashutosh Gowariker
Cast : Priyanka Chopra, Harman Baweja, Anjan Srivastav, Darshan Jariwala, Manju Singh, Dilip Joshi
Kid rating : PG

WHAT’s YOUR RASHEE (MOVIE REVIEW) : THE LONG AND BORING WAY TO FIND A BRIDE !

Ashutosh Gowariker – film maker extraordinaire, or a director too cheap to hire an editor ? “What’s your rashee ?” was a whopping 192 minutes long. Yes, that’s 3 hours and 12 minutes. And it’s not like Gowarikar made an exception here – Lagaan was about 3 hours and 40 minutes long, Swades 3 hours and 14 minutes, and Jodha-Akbar 3 hours and 35 minutes. So you could call WYR his “shortest” film, although me thinks it could have been much shorter – like by at least 1.5 hours !

This film also had 12 songs (one of which Gowariker has sung himself), on average it seemed, one per Rashee ! Reading the reviews, and finding out that I was about to watch an almost 3.5 hour film with wishy-washy Harman Baweja in the lead made me quake in my boots (or sandals really – it’s still summer-like weather here). However I persevered (that’s my middle name), because the way I see it, the worst from Gowariker still has to be loads better than the best from directors like David Dhawan, Sajid Khan, Anil Sharma and their ilk.

The story, as per my preview, is of Yogesh (Baweja) trying to find a bride in 10 days, to save his family from catastrophe. Having gotten his pointers from a book, and deciding that there are only 12 types of girls in the world, one of each Rashi (or Zodiac Sign) Yogesh decides to meet one of each Rashee and then pick his soul-mate. Priyanka Chopra plays all 12 girls – small-town Anjali , rich heiress Vishakha , fun-loving Kajal , sedate Hansa , fiery Mallika , selfless Pooja , toe-my-line Rajni , wanna-be model Nandini , come-hither Bhavna , gauche Jhankhana , foreign-born Sanjana and superstitious Chandrika.

Gowariker adds some reflections on society in this story – there’s the problem of dowry, and under-age marriage, and the issue of an unwed woman who is not quite the coveted virgin. But while the story is relatively strong, the film suffers from a rather loose screenplay. For a romantic comedy, WYR can never gather up enough pace to render it either romantic or a comedy. The songs are quite interruptive, and meeting one girl after another got quite dreary after about the first 3-4 (and we were counting !).

I’m happy to report however that it’s not all bad news folks. This film is L-O-N-G, as in you-need-3-intermissions-lots-of-refreshments long. But I can’t quite call it a bad film. It reminded me of an older genre of movies, of a thoughtful, sedate style of film, albeit extremely stretched. It’s fairly clean, with some very well shot scenes and songs. Take for example the credits in the beginning of the film – they were done in a play of light and shadow with Priyanka in what looked to be a leotard, and reminded me of the credits in a Bond film.

Priyanka over-shadows Harma effortlessly – she’s come a long way in acting terms. I was especially impressed with her “Anjali” avatar – slouchy posture, diffident gestures, and to top it all the snort – quite marvelous ! Baweja, unfortunately, lacks screen presence. Although he can act quite the ingénue (that’s what saves his performance) and seems quite earnest, he also appears unsure of himself, and it shows. The supporting cast was fantastic – there was Anjan Srivastav as Yogesh’s “Pappa”, Manju Singh as his emotional mother (remember her from the Doordarshan days ?), Darshan Jariwalla as the match-maker uncle and Dilip Joshi as Yogesh’s brother Jitu bhai.

Gowariker who lends his sensibilties to thoughtful dramas quite well, fails here to peddle romantic fluff. Keeping extra footage which you might absolutely love as director might work in ponderous drama, but in a film genre where short, sweet and pithy works best, it’s a pity that the editor’s scissors didn’t go snip-snip a bit more. Thus while this film would be a good DVD watch, it’s hardly the warm-n-fuzzy romantic comedy promised.

Kidwise : This gets a PG rating – some suggestive clothes/postures, some adult-oriented talk (virginity/affairs).

Tags : What’s your rashee film review, Film What’s your rashee, What’s your rashee movie review

Posted in 2009, bollywood, drama, rating-PG, watchable | 3 Comments

Movie Preview : Wake up Sid !

Posted on September 22, 2009 by amodini

Update : Here’s the review.

“Wake up Sid” is produced by Karan Johar and Ronnie Screwvala, and written and directed by Ayan Mukerji (Rani Mukherjee’s cousin). From the promos WUS appears to be a “coming of age” film, much like “Lakshya”. Here you have charmer Ranbir Kapoor – and he seems quite perfect for the role, because he “looks” (and this might be just my point of view) like a rich, young wastrel, which he is in the film. Great casting, yes 🙂 ?

Anyway Kapoor is Siddharth Mehra aka Sid, going along his merry, wealth-paved way with a nary a care in the world. He doesn’t worry about the future as long as he’s having fun today. What he needs he’s got – the love of his parents (Anupam Kher and the fabulous Supriya Pathak, who I wish did more films) and their money – hence a comfy, cushy life, which he takes for granted. He’s also got 2 dependable friends Rishi (Namit Das) and Laxmi (Shikha Talsania). Soon enough he makes one more – Aisha Banerjee (Konkona Sen Sharma) a talented writer from Calcutta, looking to find her space in Mumbai.

With her advent into his life, things begin to change for Sid, and at the end of a momentous summer, he must decide what he wants from life.

Now, the promos project the film to be a love-story between immature, young slacker Sid (played by 27 year old Ranbir Kapoor) and relatively saner (and smarter ?) Aisha (played by 30 year old Sen-Sharma). Konkona, a very able actress, appears to play the part of the more “grounded” character, much like the one she played in “Luck by chance”, while Ranbir gets to fool around a bit more as happy-go-lucky, but oh-so-sweet and nice Sid Mehta. Kapoor looks to be a star in the making, having inherited his father’s (Rishi Kapoor) buoyant charm, and his mother’s (Neetu Singh) sparkly verve. And there’s no one like him to carry off the part of an empty-headed young wastrel, AND make you like him !

Although I’ve always felt that Karan Johar’s films are generally eye-candy and not much more, this one with a different director at the helm might turn out to have more meat. The promos hold out the promise of a more sensitive handling than Johar films generally get, but of course only upon viewing the real thing can one actually tell. The music, composed by Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy has so far (and I’ve listened a few times) appeared “different” and not necessarily catchy – maybe it needs time to grow on one ? “Kya karoon” seems to be the best of the lot.

The official website is here. “Wake Up Sid” releases Oct 2nd. I’m looking forward to this one !

Posted in bollywood, drama, Previews | 3 Comments

Review : Dil bole hadippa

Posted on September 18, 2009 by amodini

Rating : Above average (3.5/5)
Genre : All-in-one
Year : 2009
Running time : 2 hours 30 minutes
Director : Anurag Singh
Cast : Anupam Kher, Shahid Kapoor, Rani Mukherjee, Rakhi Sawant, Vrajesh Hirjee, Dalip Tahil, Poonam Dhillon, Sherlyn Chopra
Kid rating : PG

DIL BOLE HADIPPA (MOVIE REVIEW) : AVERAGE ENTERTAINER !

“Dil bole hadippa” is predictable fare, but we already knew that, didn’t we ? Seating myself in an almost packed theatre this Friday evening, I was pretty sure what I was in for. Even so, this film did better than expected, and actually surprised me with a breezy first half. The second half didn’t do as well, but still left me decently entertained, which is more than I can say for all the other crap out there.

The film’s story, as I’ve said before is of a rebellious girl, Veera Kaur (Rani), in love with cricket. To make it to her local town’s team she dresses up as boy, and becomes the star player of a team captained by England-returned Rohan (Shahid). Their objective ? To beat the Pakistani team and win the “Aman” cup. The Pakistanis have won it 9 years in a row, so understandably the pressure is high.

Admittedly with such a clichéd script (notwithstanding the cricket angle) Shahid and Rani have their hands tied. But inspite of that, they both do very well. Rani as a feisty Veera Kaur, and then as scrawny Sardar Veer Pratap Singh gives a great unselfconscious performance. She gets into the spirit of things, not only as exuberant Veera spouting pidgin English at Rohan, but scrambling around quite boyishly on the field as Veer. Shahid exudes affable charm, and it doesn’t hurt that he dances well and can do intense scenes as well as he can comedy. While a slimmer Rani makes her almost-comeback with this film, Shahid proves he’s on his way to a well-earned super-stardom.

A great amount of time, to my surprise was spent on the cricketing field, either on Rohan’s team’s practice, or on the India-Pakistan matches. The first half of the film established the characters; there’s Veera running around in Punjab ke khet, with her sidekicks Shanno (Rakhi Sawant), Hirjee, and the rest of the nautanki company. And there’s Rohan brought to India by his motherland-loving father, and persuaded to train and lead the local town cricket team. Thus, while pre-intermission the film was well-paced and we are treated to some colorful, in-your-face songs, and some very tried-and-tested boy-meets-girl scenarios, the second half tried to do it all. It combined a sorta half-baked love story, with a cricket match, some very archaic Indian platitudes, and an appeal for equality for women, and came up rather thin in all quarters.

While the biggest downer was the predictability, the whole pseudo-patriotic theme got pretty annoying too. It is understandable that the film plays up the India-Pakistan rivalry (this is cricket after all), but when it came down to touting the merits of Indian culture over “Western” values, the dialogues sounded heavy and hollow. The film toed the Punjabi patriarchal line; the good desi woman wore salwar-kameezes (and thought dresses witch-wear) while the clingy siren wore shorts and halter tops, and for good measure seductively slathered on a sunscreen lotion in full view of the entire cricket team. And then all the whining and moaning about a woman’s right to do this and that – and all the woman is ever shown doing is being at the man’s mercy (even if he is the Captain of the team) – to play or sit , as his emotional state of mind sees fit.

The film was bright, slick and nicely packaged. The songs were energetic, although I can’t exactly recall the melodies now. The film made innumerable references to previous Yashraj hits, a practice I’m getting quite sick of. I mean I’m all for touting your success, but I do not need to be reminded of them in every YRF movie ! The dialogues sucked – lots of clichés thrown in. And I didn’t think that there was much chemistry between Shahid and Rani, although it looked like they tried to get the “Jab we met” feel.

Inspite of all this, why does “Dil bole hadippa” get an above average rating ? Well, firstly because it was relatively clean. I say relatively, because there is Rakhi Sawant displaying and heaving copious amounts of cleavage. There is also Sherlyn Chopra, the resident vamp who’m no-one likes, and she is heralded on screen by the in-thing these days : background music which sounds like breathy pseudo-sexy cat-calls – in her case it was a refrain of “Soniya” (that’s her name in the film). And like every other desi masala film I’ve seen, there was the subtle objectification; little snatches of on-screen time, where all you could see was a woman’s bust or hip or waist. No face, and no body to go with it – just those pieces of anatomy.

And secondly, for a Friday night entertainer, with a few shards of intelligence, this was a film which shone remarkably with the screen presence of two of Bollywood’s brightest and most likable stars. You really don’t get that too often.

Tags : Dil bole hadippa film review, Dil bole hadippa movie review

Posted in 2009, bollywood, dance, drama, family-friendly, rating-PG, watchable | 4 Comments

Movie Preview : What’s your Rashee ?

Posted on September 15, 2009 by amodini

Update : Movie review here.

Ashutosh Gowariker does romantic comedy. With trusted producer Ronnie Screwvala backing him up. Note that Screwwalla started his producing career with TV, producing popular Hindi serials but has now progressed to some of the best Hindi films. Swades, Jodha-Akbar, Rang de basanti are some of his productions. So naturally I am enthused (aren’t you ?) – a great director, a good producer, some very good music, AND Priyanka Chopra in 12 different roles – all the (Rashee ?) signs tell me that this film’s going to be fun.

Based on a Gujarati novel “Kimball Ravenswood” (not available on Amazon) by playwright Madhu Rye, “What’s Your Rashee” is the story of Yogesh Patel, a romantic lad, who must forego the love marriage route, when he is told to find a bride in 10 days to save his family from “utter ruin”. Lest you worry for him, note that he’s got it all planned : he’ll meet 12 girls of each Rashi (Zodiac sign), 2 every day – that’s 6 days. Then he’ll give himself 3 days to think it over, and the 10th day will be D-day.

My instincts want to give Yogesh a swift kick in the back-side, and natural cynicism raises it’s head here – what if the girl doesn’t want to marry him ? I’m betting that Yogesh bhai didn’t think of that, hmm ? And 2 girls every day – all assembly-line-ish, what ? This being Bollywood – they’ll probably all line up neatly for him, waiting to be viewed by their future Lord and Master. And for the same reason, the girl (a former Miss Universe) will probably be falling all over the guy; candidly I’d describe him as the poor man’s Hrithik Roshan.

Anyway, rant out of the way, here’s a teaser :

Priyanka Chopra plays all the 12 girls – bet she’s smirking at all the double roles now, huhn ? There’s Anjali , Vishakha , Kajal , Hansa , Mallika , Pooja , Rajni , Nandini , Bhavna , Jhankhana , Sanjna , Chandrika, and what with her new found potential (Kaminey, Fashion etc.) I’m looking forward to see her play them all. I’m also looking forward to see Hurman Baweja come into his own this time, instead of trying to ape Hrithik Roshan. Gowariker also directs a pretty talented cast – there’s Manju Singh, Anjan Srivastav (also spelled Anjjan Shrivastav), Darshan Jariwala, Visswa Badola, Rajesh Vivek and Dayashankar Pandey.

For your perusing pleasure here’s the Official Website.

Posted in bollywood, Previews | 2 Comments