Firaaq(2009, Hindi)

Director: Nandita Das
Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Paresh Rawal, Raghuvir Yadav, Deepti Naval, Shahana Goswami, Sanjay Suri, Tisca Chopra

Release Date: 20 Mar, 2009

Firaaq is set in after 2002 Hindu-Muslim riots period in Gujarat. The movie explores the discord and pain the riots have left in the lives of common men and the tensions that Hindus & Muslims suffer in each other's presence. Hanif and Muneera return to the modest home they had fled during the riots, and find it ransacked. With their lives upset and shattered not simply by vandalism but also by betrayal from their neighbours, the couple seeks revenge. Another middle class Hindu couple Sanjay and Arati are met with new moral challenges in the changed scenario. Even composed and mature musician Khan Saheb soon starts getting affected from the tension, staying in a Hindu neighbourhood. And in parallel is the story of Anu and Sameer, an intermarried Hindu-Muslim couple, who now face the tensions they have long ignored and suppressed

Little ZiZou

Director: Sooni Taraporevala
Cast: Boman Irani, Sohrab Ardeshir, Imaad Shah, Shernaz Patel, Zenobia Shroff, Mahabanoo Mody-Kotwal
Synopsis: A peek into the closed Parsi community and their quirky ways. The movie also explores issues such as inter community marriages.

Producer: Dina Stafford, Sooni Taraporevala

A perfect movie for respite from a heavy week of stressing work, Little Zizou relieves your senses with its Parsi based plot brimming with top notch humor, screen play and very believable costume designing.Little Zizou is a journey through a child’s narration into the realms of a small Parsi setting in urban Mumbai. The eleven year old Boy, Xerxes (Jahan Bativala) believes in his angelic mother watching over him and help him fulfill his life’s ultimate dream- to meet Zinedine Zidane (from where springs lil Zizou) and older brother Artaxerxes (Imaad Shah) are children of Cyrus II Khodaiji (Sohrab Ardeshir), a near fanatic parsi who dwells on fundamental parsi beliefs and erodes non-parsi ways to secure himself power among the Parsis. Boman papervalla (Boman Irani) on the other hand, a liberal Parsi and owner of a newspaper is forever at loggerheads with Cyrus, deriving humor in seething at his fundamentalist views. The plot is further unveiled with Boman’s wife Mrs. Pressvala (Zenobia Shroff) showering her affection on the motherless lil Zozou which evokes jealousy from her own offspring Liana (Iyanah Bativala) whereas the older daughter pulls the strings of Artaxerxis’s heart who yearns for reciprocation of his love. However her affection is attuned to the likes of someone else and Artexerxis is heartbroken to learn of it.The director, Sooni Taraporevala has done a wonderful job of stringing together the dazzling performances by the cast into a tidy little movie that is both soft in its narrative and fast in pace, keeping the audience pleasantly meandering into the movie with several knots which in the end comfortably gets untwined and sorted. John Abraham makes hearts flutter with his charming looks which is all his cameo role calls for. All in all a good movie to pass a memorable Sunday with family or friends.

Gulaal

Cast: Kay Kay Menon, Aditya Shrivastava, Piyush Mishra, Deepak Dobriyal, Ayesha Mohan

Director: Anurag Kashyap

Producer: Zee Limelight

Lyrics: Piyush Mishra

Cinematography: Rajeev Ravi

Editing: Aarti Bajaj

Art Direction: Wasiq Khan

Story Writer: Anurag Kashyap, Raja Chaudhary,Aparna Chaturvedi

hat Anurag Kashyap has a predilection for doing a reality check for us with every film he makes, is no secret. But every time, he doesn't hit the bull's eye and with Gulaal, he has surely ended up with confused issues, themes and sensibilities.

The film revolves around a deeply entrenched identity crisis of the Rajputana, the macabre face of politics and a fierce obsession with power. And what Kashyap could have seamlessly sewed together as the lost identity syndrome and superiority complex of the 'so called' blue blooded clan of the caste ridden Indian society and its unrelenting battle for consolidation, turns out to be a hotch potch disconnected strain of events.

Known for his ability, much like contemporaries such as Kukonoor, to extract marvellous performances from new comers, Kashyap's new kid on the block, Raj Singh Chaudhary, adds no substance to his wimper like character. The movie stays afloat owing to infallible performances by Kay Kay Menon and Piyush Mishra. The prose and poetry ofcourse lend great colour to the Kashyap's sardonic take on youth politics and politics at large where blood dilutes to become water and all that remains is an incessant avarice for the quintessential 'KURSI'.

Overall, the movie delivers a vague message and ends in bewilderment and aimless death and destruction.

Karma aur Holi

Cast :	Sushmita Sen, Naomi Campbell, Randeep Hooda, Vikram Chatwal, Rati Agnihotri, Deepal Shaw, Suchitra Krishnamurthy
Director :	Manish Gupta, Alumni of NY Film Academy
Producer :	David Roma, Drena De Niro, Prashant Shah
Genre :	Family
Release Date :	6-3-2009

SOMETIMES, you ruin products with customising things for the local audience. KARMA Aur Holi is one such product. The dubbing – to Hindi – is so lacklustre and inane that sitting through the length of the movie is a pure test of your patience.

The film unfurls when a group of characters meet at Sushmita Sen and Randeep Hooda’s home for Holi. There’s of course Sushmita and Randeep, the married couple. Sushmita is unhappy about their not having children, while Randeep is secretly trying to a handle a financial crisis in his company with his business partner (Debbie Mazor).

Sushmita’s suspicious sister (Rati Agnihotri), who is married to Suresh Oberoi, is over-protective of her teenaged son. He finds himself ostracised by his classmates, thanks to his voyeuristic tendencies. Rati also does not favour anyone except Hindus and Indians.

There are Suchitra Krishnamoorti and her chauvinistic husband. And Suchitra’s outgoing sister Deepal Shaw, who wants to be an actress.

Then come the ‘star attractions’: Supermodel Naomi Campbell, as a struggling actress who discovers she is pregnant with her director-cum-boyfriend’s child.

And Drena De Niro (Hollywood actor Robert De Niro’s daughter), as a tarot card reader and Sushmita’s friend.

The Holi party they congregate at becomes the catalyst to revealing their secret desires and unfulfilled dreams.

Sushmita Sen dominates practically every frame in the movie and holds the movie together. A sight for sore eyes, her onscreen chemistry with Randeep is obvious.

As for the other actors, it is hard to critique a film that is completely dubbed, therefore missing any possible nuance that the actor might have evinced.

Speaking of which, not only is the dubbing jarring, the dialogues are also simply amateurish. You are caught between wanting to laugh at the sheer ridiculousness of it and letting your irritation get the better of you. Sample this. An African-American yells at his bodyguard, “Main item ke saath bathtub mein mazze le raha tha aur woh meri video utaar raha tha (I was having fun with the hot number in the bathtub and he was filming it all!).”

Then there’s the crudeness. Suresh Oberoi calling Rati a ‘monster’ and hatyaaran (murderess) for aborting her child.

Sushmita asks a businessman to get out of her house because his girl is a vaishya (prostitute).

Deepal Shaw seems to be attached to a camera throughout, and the only person she films is 17-year old voyeur Vikram.

Indifferent, sloppy editing, with no real rhythm, scenes just jumping from one scene to another and no plotline to speak of – no wonder Sushmita Sen backed out of promoting this film.

To give the film its due, the English version might perhaps not be so bad. You might want to check it out – if you like conversation-driven films and love Sushmita Sen.

Meanwhile, the Hindi version should have stayed safely in the can.

Chal Chala Chal

Movie Review : Chal Chala Chal

Rating : 1/5

Banner : A Fuel Picture Company

Cast : Govinda, Murli Sharma, Reema Sen, Rajpal Yadav, Om Puri, Asrani, Manoj Joshi, Upasna Singh, Amita Nangia, Razzak Khan, Asif Basra and Others

Music : Anu Malik

Cinematography : C K Muraleedharan

Producer: K Sera Sera

Director: Rajiv Kumar

Released Date: February 06, 2009

Story:
An outdated tale, the story begins with Deepak (Govinda) who is an honest man to the core and due to his ethics, he has to change his jobs at all times and he is struggling to make a good career. Added to this, he has been helping his father (Om Puri) in a legal case as his father is due to receive his arrears from the school he worked. Finally, they manage to win the case but since the school does not have enough funds, the father -son duo gets something else, a bus. Deepak decides to run his own bus and with the help of his longtime friend Sundar (Rajpal) whose only aim is to go to the US, both of them name the bus 'Chal Chala Chal' transport. However, Deepak's two sisters (Amrita and Upasana) have their husbands (Asrani and Manoj Joshi) who are keen on selling the home than anything else. In between all this, there is also a romance angle with the arrival of Payal (Reema) and a baddie element in the form of the union leader Singh (Murali Sharma). How does Deepak manage to come out of all this forms the rest of the story.

Presentation:
The director has come up with a pre-historic story and true to the line, the narration was pathetic and the presentation was poor. The dialogues were rotten, the script was written meekly and the screenplay was nowhere near perfect. The music was jarring and caused a lot of annoyance while the camera could not capture the right moments. Editing was nowhere to be seen with the haphazard sequences while the art department was poor. Overall, the total show was a mess. Govinda added more to the woes with his role as he looked like a misfit, Reema was beautiful but did not have much to do, Rajpal Yadav managed few smiles, Asrani was regular, Manoj Joshi was alriight, Upasana and Amrita are their own self. The others did not have much to contribute.

Conclusion:
The basic blunder of the movie happens to be the storyline and there is literally no plot to begin with. While the first half of the movie goes about with the struggles and travails of the protagonist, the second half gets a bit confusing with some random scenes and a haphazard sequences. The film fails to engage the audience in anyway and given the delay that happened during its making, the old thinking surely surfaces on and off. The film will be a dud at the box office, better luck next time folks.

Luck by Chance Review

Star Cast: Farhan Akhtar, Konkona Sen Sharma, Rishi Kapoor, Isha Sharvani, Dimple Kapadia, Hrithik Roshan and others;

Director: Zoya Akhtar;

Rating: ****; Is quality cinema.

Vikram Jaisingh (Farhan) comes down to Bollywood town Mumbai from Delhi to become a star. At his fellow struggle friend’s house he meets Sona (Konkona) for the first time. Sona too has dreams in her eyes of becoming a lead actress in an A grade film. For the past three years till then she has been living with this hope in her eyes. Taking advantage of her is Chaudhary (Aly Khan) a small time producer who has been assuring her of that one big break and in return of which he is sexually exploiting her and assigning her B grade projects. Both Sona and Vikram start getting closer as they are doing their struggling. At the same time, a big producer Romy Rolly (Rishi) is making a film starring one of industry’s hottest stars cum his protégé Zafar Khan (Hrithik) and launching Nikki (Isha) opposite him. Nisha is the daughter of famous yesteryears actress Nina Walia (Dimple). When Zafar gets the opportunity to work in Karan Johar film along with Shah Rukh Khan he dumps Rolly’s film despite the shooting for it having begun. Destiny plays a crucial role then and the smooth talking struggle Vikram manages to bag the lead hero’s part whereas on the same day Sona’s dream of becoming a lead actress get shattered when Chaudhary ditches her. What happens next as Vikram manages to grab that one lucky chance and how it takes the toll on his love life forms the rest of the film.
Luck By Chance just like Rangeela or to some extent Om Shanti Om takes you right into the true to life functioning of the Hindi film world. Zoya for her directorial debut deserves a huge applause for making a brilliant film which manages to strike the fine balance between art house cinema and a commercial entertainer. Her characterizations and selection of right actors deserve special mention. While it may appear as Vikram’s story you realize as the film comes to an end that the main protagonist is not him but Sona. The ending may not be everyone’s cup of tea but the way it has being treated you do get the feeling that this is the perfect and most logical way how the story could have ended. Zoya has handled the emotional moments very sensitively. Giving Zoya perfect aid is her father Javed Akhtar in the dialogues department. Right from philosophy laden ones to extremely witty liners, the dialogues manage to touch your heart.
The production values of the film are of high standards with Carlos Catalan’s camerawork giving the film a very international look. Shankar Ehsaan Loy’s music is already climbing the charts and is well mixed in the film’s proceedings. Don’t miss the opening song sequence.
Konkona delivers an award winning performance which lingers in your mind for a long time even after the film is over. Farhan is extremely natural in his act and has brilliantly underplayed his part. Rishi Kapoor and Juhi give able support. Dimple is extremely charming and is brilliant in the pre-climax scene where she brings out her frustration on her daughter very well played by Isha. Sanjay Kapoor is very funny as the film director. Hrithik Roshan in an extended special appearance is simply superb. His dance sequence is awe inspiring. The film has quite a few guest appearances right from Aamir Khan, Rani Mukherjee, Akshaye Khanna, Kareena Kapoor to Shah Rukh Khan and are very well treated. But it is writer-director Anurag Kashyap making his acting debut who is simply outstanding in his 2 scene appearance as a frustrated writer.
Luck By Chance is quality cinema that takes you straight into the heart of the Hindi film industry’s functioning, showing you both the good, the bad and the ugly side of it and yet keeps your love intact for the film industry.

Jugaad Review

Movie Review: Jugaad;

Star Cast: Manoj Bajpai, Hrishita Bhatt, Vijay Raaz, Govind Namdeo and Sanjay Mishra; Director: Anand Kumar;

Rating: ***

The film revolves around the infamous sealing issue that had been a hot issue in India’s capital city, Delhi in 2007-08. It tells the story of Sandip Kapur (Manoj Bajpai) who heads an advertising agency. He is already facing a demanding life when to add more trouble to his life his agency is sealed by the Muncipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). Sandip fails to reinstate his company, despite his attempts and efforts. Eventually, he finds himself alone on the road, along with his team. Now desperately wanting to re-establish his agency, Sandip opts for ‘Jugaadbaazi’, a technique that people nowadays believe in more than anything else. What it all leads to and how he succeeds in getting together the property dealers, power brokers, politicians and senior officers involved into it forms the rest of this satirical comedy.
Anand Kumar who made a flop debut with Delhi Heights (2007) makes a solid comeback with an interesting comedy which makes you laugh out loud and yet make you think. Once again basing his film Delhi just like his debut film, Anand makes a sincere attempt to unfold the real situation that prevailed in Delhi when MCD’s sealing drive was underway. Shot mostly in Delhi and Gurgaon, the film has tried to give a realistic scenario of the sealing drive. Anand also succeeds in showing the true never-say-die attitude of the Delhiites. The dialogues are extremely funny at places and the narration technique of the maker is good too. What also make the film more fun is the characterizations. The only weak department of the film is the music.
Manoj Bajpai doing a comic role is a revelation. He shows he is as good doing funny roles as he is in intense ones. Hrishita Bhatt playing the female lead doesn’t have much to do but she looks pretty nonetheless. Vijay Raaz brings the hall down with his antics and brings a smile on your face whenever he comes onscreen. Sanjay Mishra is another actor who is simply hilarious in the film.
Jugaad is a harmless entertainer and though it may not be another Khosla Ka Ghosla it is one of those rare good satirical comedies made in Bollywood. Definately a better option than watching those mindless comedies that have been regularly hitting the screens off late.

Delhi 6 Review

Movie Review: Delhi 6;

Star Cast: Abhishek Bachchan, Sonam Kapoor, Rishi Kapoor, Om Puri and Waheeda Rehman; Director: Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra;

Rating: *** - Is worth a watch

Delhi 6 is a delightful musical run through the Hindu and Muslim cultures of Old Delhi as seen through the eyes of protagonist Roshan (Abhishek Bachchan) who comes to India to fulfill the desire of his terminally ill Daadi (Waheeda Rehman) to spend the last days of her life in her hometown. As Roshan after a brief culture shock, tries to understand the complexities of relations that kept his people apart from each other as well as close to each other, he slowly gets attached to Bittu (Sonam Kapoor) and the chemistry grows, which is very convincingly directed using rich background music and believable day-to-day situations.
The first half, though appearing a little lengthy focuses on reverse-culture-shock jokes, lavishly reproduced Ram Leela, a visit to the Taj Mahal, and a cow giving birth in the street. It is in the second half that things take a more serious turn. Unwelcome traditions and smoldering religious hatred comes bubbling to the surface and erupt into a Do the Right Thing climax that takes everyone by surprise. Several characters and subplots weaved together to relate to the central plot of analyzing beliefs against rational thinking, with a touch of humor is quite entertaining but one has to endure the laborious and forced accent of Abhishek Bachchan throughout the movie. Although at several places, the movie seems predictable, Mehra succeeds in putting surprises well in time and balance. The climax gets dragged due to cameos and voiceovers. Although Roshan’s attempts to put belief and trust in people ahead of belief in customs and religion deserve a pat, what disappoints is Mehra getting preachy at many places. Rahman’s soulful music takes the film to a completely different level altogether.
Mehra and his cameraman Binod Pradhan have succeeded in capturing the buzz of Delhi city very well in every frame. Those living outside of India will find that connect with that feeling of wanting to be in both places. The song in the second half which juxtaposes Abhishek’s life in the US with the people and life in India is beautifully done as well. Hat’s off to the director and technical team there.
Abhishek has delivered one of his better performances but his American accent doesn’t really work. Sonam Kapoor doesn’t have much to do but except for the climax but she carries herself immensely well. Waheeda Rehman, Om Puri and Rishi Kapoor are simply outstanding. The huge ensemble cast comprising of acclaimed actors such as Raghubir Yadav, Pavan Malhotra, Supriya Pathak Shah, Deepak Dobriyal, Divya Dutta, Vijay Raaz, Tanvi Azmi and Atul Kulkarni do a wonderful job.
Just look at the diversity of topics addressed convincingly through brilliant performances and slick editing, you will realize why I say it’s worth a watch! -Sampurn

Dhoondte Reh Jaoge Review

Movie Review: Dhoondte Reh Jaoge;

Star Cast: Paresh Rawal, Johnny Lever, Kunal Khemu, Soha Ali Khan, Sonu Sood, Asrani; Director: Umesh Shukla; Rating: ** - Truly ‘Dhoonte Reh Jaoge’.

The title genuinely lives up to its expectation. The audience at some point of time does start thinking – Dhoondte Reh Jaoge.
The film kick starts with our short but loyal Anand Powar (Kunal Khemu), the chartered accountant who always chooses to follow the long-cut where on the other hand the world opts for the short-cut ways. He does feel proud about it, although cursing that because of his decision he is always looked down by others. His house is so small that if he tries to stretch himself, the vessels start crumbling down. His Bengali girlfriend, Neha (Soha Ali Khan) is unhappy about this and his mama, Dilip Joshi, a theatre director is frustrated with him.
On the other hand is Aryan (Sonu Sood), an overconfident superstar who intents to do films only with big directors. These are two ‘chapters’ but the biggest ‘chapter’ is Raj Chopra (Paresh Rawal), who is drowned in the sea of debts. He is a flop director who gave 10 consecutive flops in a row. Raj is smart; smart when it comes to fooling others. He drops the rickshaw and catches the other one, hence cutting down the cost. He goes to a posh restaurant and leaves the bill for others to pay. He wears his old shabby coat and secretly exchanges it with a new one from the showroom. Now his only way of escaping his debts is to do a movie with the star Aryan.
Aryan on the other hand ignores his offer thinking that who will contribute in making another flop at the box-office. At this point of time Raj meets Anand, who had some personal rivalry of fooling each other more than once. They together plan out a deadly concept which would fetch them a profit of 100 crores. Their only motive is to make the biggest flop of the century which will fetch them the profit and the sufferers will be the 10 financiers who will be unaware of each others contribution in the movie.
They start their own company called ‘Raj Anand’ and money starts flowing in. Finally, Aryan agrees to star in the movie along with Neha (Soha) as the lead. The extra friendship and bonding between them makes Anand jealous. If one wants to make a big flop who else will they contact than Pervez Asaraff’ (Johnny Lever), who is a big time devotee of Pakistan. Hearing the script Raj finalizes Pervez for a sum of rupees one thousand only. They start working on the movie.
The script prepared by Pervez is all copies of big hit films like DDLJ, Sholay, Lagaan and more. So by default the title of the film goes as ‘Solay se Lagaan Tak’. Raj and Anand decide that in the end there will be a cricket match in which team Pakistan will win and this will automatically make the film a big flop with tomatoes and potatoes flying over the screen.
Unfortunately that does not happen due to Aryan’s involvement, which again unfortunately Raj and Anand are unaware of. Dubai’s don’s involvement as a financier put them in deeper trouble when every financier comes to know that they are not the sole financier the film.
Dhoondte Reh Jaoge (DRJ) is a comedy film with amazing performance by each and every artist. But no doubt the show stealers are none other than Paresh Rawal and Johnny Lever. Their stupendous acting with a spoon of masala comic timing make the audience laugh their hearts out. The movie is entertaining all throughout the first half. The second half of the film takes a rapid pace making things confusing and irritating. The sequence where the actors enact the scenes from Sholay, DDLJ, and Lagaan are a big turn off. Some of the dialogues are good enough, especially the ones delivered by Paresh and Johnny, but most of them doesn’t even get a smile on your face.
The music in the film is very satisfactory. Some of the songs are annoying, especially the ‘tapori song’. Sajid-Wajid has certainly not lived upto the expectation. A romantic song featuring Soha and Kunal has been removed which was much praised by the team.
Director, Umesh Shukla has done a decent job and has plotted everything very carefully. The major twists and turns in the movie are something to make a note of. Unfortunately the very spark in the film is missing which makes the movie a complete showdown. Anyways it was a good try by the director but he needs to keep his flaws in mind.
All in all the film is for the people who are wanderers and just want to spend their 3 hours in an air conditioner theatre or for people who watch a movie just for the heck of it. Yes, if one is a die hard fan of Paresh Rawal or Johnny Lever, they can certainly go for it.