I go to watch this movie yesterday with no pre-fed reviews on my mind and any remote association with the background of this movie .  Lucky me , didn’t know that I will catch one of the best movies like this which is still growing on me.

This is one of the best things which has happened to Indian Cinema . Amol Gupte (The Director)  who was the scriptwriter and creative director of “Taare Zameen Par”  has shown to Indian Cinema how theater and main stream cinema can be mixed to offer one of the most heart warming movie of 2011.

It has a simple story which will take you to wonder days  of your school and remind you of your school buddies who will always stand by you and treat you like a hero, your Rosy Miss who loves her students like her own kids and makes your day every day with her “rise and Shine” smile , the  khadoos teachers who teach for the sake of feeding their stomach and ego (may be losers is a better word for them) .  Amol has used very routine things in school life as a skeleton of the story to showcase much broader things like the Bonding among friends  in school, the limitless imagination and sea of creativity they have   ,  the current pedagogy  and the teachers who can kill the child in the children.

As i am not reviewing the movie here , very shortly, the characterization in the movie is brilliant with both Stanley (Partho, Amol’s son in debut ) and Verma Sir (Amol himself) giving a life to their character . The best part is the story paving the way for its ending , catching you totally unaware , hitting you hard and leaving you poignant with a lump in your throat.

So far one of the strong contenders to go for Oscars from India.

PS : It took Amol nearly two years to finish this movie as making movie was never the intent out of the workshops which Amol used to conduct to teach theater to the school children from his Alma Mater.

be your own Masand Chopra

First let me clear the air that Guzaarish is not a bad movie at all , will throw light on the parts which were good and the pieces which could have been  better in next post.

This post is to vent out my anger at the reviews from the established movie critics who have labeled this movie as a piece of work from an aesthete and a melodrama based on  three masterpieces –  “The Prestige”, The Sea Inside” and “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” . I don’t remember a single review where critics missed mentioning these three names and going overboard on these flicks than reviewing Guzaarish. It was  as awkward as a bikini clad women would be in a Gutkha Ad.

The only  similarity Guzaarish has with “The Prestige” is the lead actor being a magician and having a rivalry which proved to be fatal.  The other similarity Guzaarish derives from other two movies is lead actor being in “locked-in Syndrome” or “being a quadriplegic”  and fighting to end his life. Are these justifying enough to call this piece of work as the derived one.  Off course  not ,  else why would we fall for war movies with same war most of the time , movies with same  plot of Nazis killing the Jews and movies capturing it from defferent angles (or perspectives).

If  audience writes off the movie which pre-exists in same or other form, then these three movies would also not have had the followings they demand today .  “The Prestige” is completely based on Christopher Priest’s novel of same name, “The sea inside” is based on real life story of a ship mechanic who fought for  euthanasia for 28 years and “The diving bell and the butterfly” is based on the memoir of the same name.

In my view, most of the reviews are done on the barometer of fun , masala and entertainment factor which  can help folks to quickly decide the combo  – movie A + Popcorn  + killing next 2.5 hours or movie B + popcorn + killing next 2.5 hours. To make the research look more authentic, the critics would drop 2-3 hollywood names to claim he knows what is he talking about ….

I would  have loved if a single review has captured the attempt of the director  to tread a new path which  most of the new age directors fear to walk on. The beauty was in the attempt .

You gotta read my second post on Guzaarish to know about my personal views .

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Ryan with the Doll

I was checking Ryan Gosling’s history on IMDB  being impressed with his performance in “Half Nelson”  when the site showed up other movies  he is known for. As I was not in a mood  of heavy drama , I put my hands on “Lars and the Real Girl” , frankly it’s the name which got me excited and when i can risk putting my money on IPO on gut feeling, this habit is risk free.

That was the reason to pick the movie but certainly not for dedicating this piece of writing for writer Nancy, director Craig and actor Ryan.  The beauty of the movie is the story which can be just considered as thought for being so simple and so minimalist. Its about a delusional young person who develops an unconventional affinity for a doll and how everyone close to him get along with this false believe to help him come out of this believe.

As story is so subtle and pure, its very critical to maintain the same feeling among audience throughout the movie and this is where director Craig has done a brilliant job.  The movie has its bits of humor and pensiveness in between but handled carefully  to ensure they don’t adulterate the feeling which is instilled right from the beginning.

Ryan is awesome , again very unconventional role played beautifully and i guess our own Abhay Dheol is treading the same path.

Its difficult for me to give a Genre for this one, both Drama and Comedy don’t define it.  You might end up being confused reading this post, but I recommend this movie to those who want to see a movie which is so gentle and pure that you don’t like the movie but you love it. Probably “the painted veil”  comes close to it if it needs to be compared with one.

The following views are strictly of my own and people should not ask me for money if they go for movie and don’t like it. So here we go…

If i have not told u earlier, i am a big sucker of western and world cinema , specially Spanish, German and French as each of these movies creates a new genre for audiences who have developed taste buds for “something new”.  The “experimentative mindset” has stepped in bollywood also and is still  in its infancy as we as an Indian audience would still like to see a superstar, a superman and a utopian world in those 2-3 hours which we can never be or achieve in real life. We pose a lot of challenges for people who dare to produce, direct and execute the concepts never done before. LSD is one of those experimentation Dibakar Bannerjee has done who should now be referred as the curator of this trend in bollywood.  It was the real middle class story in Khosla ka Ghosla, the uncanny dialogue delivery and screenplay in Oye Lucky Lucky Oye and the sheer cinematography and the very concept  in LSD which establishes DB as a man who knows cinema as a cinema more and business less.

I think LSD will go down in the history of  bollywood as a classic, cult or contemporary cult. Why do I think so .. well first is its cinematography , the  movie has been shot to appear like recorded digital tapes of handheld , CCTV and Spy cameras.  Though it goes  well with horror as theme like we saw in “blair witch project”, “cloverfield” and very recent “paranormal activities”, but with voyeurism as theme , cinematography is the soul of this movie.

Moving to the story part, the way the three words in the title sums up the three stories running  parallel in the movie and are interlinked towards the end, reminds me of the trend set by Alejandro González Iñárritu with movies like Amores Perros, 21 Gramas and Babel. Again , if not at par with Amores Perros, but a brilliant start with LSD. Then there are actors who are not acting in front of the cameras, the characters with uncanny dialogues which makes LSD more and more watchable.

If you love real cinema , here is one masterpiece of modern times.

It was like Sas Bahu serials’s concsecutive three times “KYA” moment for me when my  dear friend for last three years ditched me . I am talking about mininova, who  has been serving the people like me who prefer torrenting the  movies than watching them on DVD or at theatre , specialy if its English, German, Italian,French and Spanish.     When i was away from mininova for the last 45 days, little did i know there are other friends like thepiratebay which i never knew existed.  

So on saturday i got this movie downloaded (thanks to thepiratesbay which is far better than e-bay as you dont pay ) and watched it as first thing on Sunday morning.  I have penchant for world cinema and being german i was expecting this also to be more of drama which i am big sucker of, but poor me  i was wrong as the next 80 mins proved to be maggy sauce  - its different . 

This movie is a bolt from the blue !!!  Trust me , i have watched all kinds of wired movies (which are nicely called cult movies) and any new genre, concept doesn’t  surprise me easily, but  this movie totally swept me off my feet and german cinema has become more dearer to me.  The last i luved was – Das Leben der Anderen (the lives of others).

I won’t go reviewing it , just an honest confession  that  i have never come across such wierd concept or i would rather say experimentation with human minds earlier and which i have liked each and every bit of.  The concept is , there runs a story about a girl and a boy where girl needs to accomplish “Something” in 20 mins to save her boyfriend’s life and the run-length also is near to 20 mins.  After 20 mins ,  the story ends with some “ending” to it and you throughly enjoy what she does in those 20 mins and what all happens to her.  So what after 20 mins… wait, wait ….here it comes… the  damn thing starts all over again, yes it starts all over again …  with same girl, same boyfriend, same situation… with only change in the situations in those 20 mins and those different situations culminating into a differnt ending.  The second ending is totally different like again maggie sauce with diffetent flavour. If you are intelligent like me and remember that i told you its  80 mins  flick so there got  to be some more to it …. right .  Yes there is, there is the same situation again  - ” The Third Time”   where everything remains same but the diffferent situations and ending.   So it came across to me like a video game where i am given more than one chance to play the game.  I thanked  that minute when i chucked the idea of  doing  abit of research on the movie before watching it , like genre, star cast and  two line summary. Had i done that, i woulnn’t have mustered enough courage to dedicate 80 mins of my sweet sunday morning to such crazy concepts. 

Trust me all those who like something “different” in cinema will luv it.  It has got three endings for same story , you can pick whatever you like and feel good about that but someone like me would like it more for the reason of  thinking  - how on earth can someone even think about these concepts which are more astonishing than the concept casrs shown in Auto Expo (sorry.. bad one).

Its Different!!!

I sat through the whole  two and half hours of movie , totally captivated and to my surprise , when I was speaking to my friend on the story part,  I took not more than a minute to finish it.

This is what we call a minimalist plot which is the beauty of this flick.

I heard people comparing WUS with Lakshya, but for me it has very less resemblance with Lakshya. The only resemblance is  the aimless life of both the characters. If the essence of the movie is to be compared, then both the movies are pole apart and the only commonality is the  fresh direction.

If I were asked to draw parallels, then frankly it reminds me of Richard Linklater’s  1995 drama film “Before Sunrise” (and  “Before Sunset” –  sequel). It’s  a minimalist plot where two strangers meet , they travel in train, disembark in Vienna , , discuss on love , life, history , architecture, try to  know each other and then they depart at the end of the movie to meet again (in the sequel ).  It has no twist, no climax and no out of the blue ending. It takes the us  on a journey called “your life” wherein we get  immersed in the movie , identify with the character, live through the whole movie where each dialogue resonates with the conversation we have everyday and it ends just like any other day in our life.

WUS does significantly well in treading the same path. So I am clear its not  another Lakshya , hope you are too …

Also , I read somewhere that it’s a story of a spoiled brat who finally wakes up and realizes what he wants to do in his life and shoulders the responsibilities.  Frankly, this part of the story was over much before the intermission and this is something which won’t appeal much –not to me at least.

The beauty of WUS is in Sid’s and Ayesha’s realization of their love for each other which is a culmination of staying together as friends , confronting on many occasions but not accepting , fighting on trivial issues and many  occasions of compromising for each other.  This part of the story has a fresh as well as mature look.  Fresh is because it was never tried before as most of our bollywood  movies  show us something which we call un-natural just to entertain us and mature because  every part of the movie tells an untold story  - even  if it was a just a scene of hugging.

This is the movie to get immersed in, to feel and live through and yes not to write about as words can’t describe everything.

I salute these new age directors – Ayaan and Farhaan who are trying to give a new meaning to cinema in our country.   I have woken up, have you ?

But… every cloud has a silver lining , so good movies are hitting back  so would my posts now. I saw Love Aajkal a week back.. seriously I just want to keep it as an update from my end to you and nip it in the bud. There is something special to be discussed here which I saw last night … what a fweet KAMINEY.

Again , I won’t be reviewing it  but revisiting the subtleties of the direction, choreography, performance and music.  Thinking of performance first , I must  salute Vishal Bhardwaj on his choice. I can’t think of  anyone else but Shahid to justify the role . He is as innocent as Guddu as he is macho as Charlie.  Aamir  is too old to do Guddu, Imran is too young to do Charlie ( hope u didn’t forget KIDNAP) , Ranbir doesn’t fit in either of the roles and BLANK, there is no one .. the role makes Shahid as the first and last choice for the movie. After watching movie, I second Vishal  on his comment that the role was never offered to Saif which he claims.  Not sure about you guys , but certainly i would roll over the floor watching Saif Lipsying and stammering with his unique voice J.

Priyanka was as super as always , it’s a no brainer …  if you really want to  see how deeply she was involved in  her acts .. go and watch her jaw dropping marathi dance in “raat ke dhai baje”  with multiple pauses and observe her facial expressions when she is about to do the V-Shape dance .  The intellectuals would get what I meant by V-Shape dance  J . Not for a nano second , she appears like acting..what more could someone could have asked for. I did the same thing for “Jalwa Song” from “Fashion” which has historical ramp walk of Kangana Ranaut which must have given Priyanka , the lead actress many sleepless nights. She was just fantastic and passed my test with flying colors J

Now coming to music, I think after Panchamda , its only Vishal Bhardwaj who can compose that kind of music  which complements to the movie and acts not as a filler but a story teller.  Each song tells its part of the story with music indicating the mood.  If you want to judge a fine music, you should have a script of the movie in your mind after listening to the songs in a chronicle order. I guess only a director can compose such music or only a music director can do such a fine direction.

It is purely an entertainment movie packed with good action and drama. UTV has done it again and I could see a time very soon when UTV brand will become a crowd puller.. so wake up Sid….

lets not talk about 13 B   but i think Gulaal would have been well accepted and appreciated by critics as well as masses, if  it was released atleast an year or two  back . The freshness  in direction, screenplay and script was conspicuous by its absence.  Its just those seven years which Anurag took to finish it are to be blamed. Guess, if it was finished within normal time and released around 2k3, it wd’ve been another Dev  – D, well ahead of its time.

As promised, i’m finishing it… planing to watch Firaaq, it may end up as one worth -2- watch movie of march…

Let me start this one with something I do for my living – my job. As part of my job, I have to train our sales force and the channel partners about the services under my vertical. Initially I would flood them with info on all the services in one go and pity I couldn’t read their helpless, restless faces. Sooner I realized it’s better to pick one service and eat , drink and sleep with that one only for that session.

Now you would appreciate why I started off with something “Official”. I have learned from my mistakes, but Mr. ROM is one step ahead, he started off flawlessly with RDB and I really don’t understand what exactly was in his mind for the2^nd inning. In one recent interview, I remember telling him to the interviewer that with RDB he cleared his high school and with Delhi – 6, he has completed his graduation. Well, I have never seen a high school guy with so much maturity. I just hope it to be a curious case of Mr. ROM.

Let’s come to the movie, we all know we still have issues related to backwardness, superstition, non-secularism in our country with mother of all – Terrorism also acquiring a face. Bollywood has been taking up these issues with stories moving around the issues and issues just part of the story. Delhi – 6, is also one attempt in that direction. The screenplay, the subtlety of the music and the ensemble cast is just incredible and any art lover will fall for these. The only thing missing in the whole movie was – CLARITY.

Clarity doesn’t mean ROM was not aware what he was up to, but clarity in dealing with one issue and not multiple issues in 150 mins. I felt as if it was the last movie of ROM and as a patriot he wanted us to know all the issues ruining our country.

The movie has been made with right intentions and ROM might have experimented with the theme of taking up multiple issues, but it really has not clicked. I just hope ROM realizes it as all of us expect lot more from him.